Right, this is an indictment of policing in America, not Flock.

But since you clearly cannot trust the police, you double cannot trust them with access to Flock.

You cannot keep the police from getting access to Flock, therefore the only reasonable thing to do to Flock is destroy it.

Yes, this is only* because the police are corrupt, but since they are...

* Yeah, and some other people too, this hyperbole is for the purpose of the discussion in scope

Although it would be wonderful if we could retrieve them, realisically we can't. And if we could get something to them to fit new nuclear batteries and replacements for components that cannot be revived, we could get newer probes out there with better sensors and a more powerful nuclear battery that could last a lot longer.

Having said that, I honestly wouldn't trust any of today's manufacturers to be capable of building anything with a comparable level of robustness, so a recharge mission isn't quite as stupid as it sounds. Almost, but not quite.

Still, fresh probes sent into the Kuipier Belt and the Heliopause would be extremely interesting.

So a murder suspect can appear in court and explain that someone gave him the wrong photograph, so it's not his fault?

The US, and many other countries, need to put forward a new law -- if an excuse applies to officials, then it applies to the citizenry. This is not because officials don't sometimes need extra freedoms, but because the vast majority of manmade disasters are "perfect storms" and because this case is a perfect illustration of the banality of evil.

Legitimate causes are just that and they won't cause problems. If, indeed, they are truly legitimate. Excuses mean that they knew they were doing wrong but felt that finger-pointing would confuse the issue for long enough for the storm to die down. Innocent people do not make excuses. Innocent people don't need them.

But this isn't something officialdom will ever accept. Nor will they tolerate a loss of power. So you don't take away their power, you merely insist that powers they claim are the same everywhere for everyone, and that the powers they deny are likewise denied to all. The sensible ones will see in seconds precisely where that's going to go and will get rid of the stupid ones very quickly. Not because they're morally better, but because such a rule is highly volatile and self-interest takes on a very different meaning when the consequences are unpredictable.

I think we both know that ship has sailed

Ideology vetos reality, news at 11.

ACAB includes shapeshifting constables.

This is really no different from many other areas in which you can have conflicts of interest. For example, sports! And the answer isn't to ban betting, it's to ban betting by people who have a conflict of interest. This is well-trod ground.

I'm not particularly a fan of Kalshi or Polymarket and don't really care if they exist or not. My point is just that this isn't really any different from anything else.

The biggest clue that he hasn't read the books -- or maybe just doesn't remember them well -- is that all of the books and stories were built around demonstrating ways in which the rules failed. The 0th rule is only one example, and far from the clearest.

A lot of people behave pretty ghastly when it comes to money.

Good thing we hardly are made out of any bacteria.

Wait...

In which subfield is development not happening rapidly?

Won't you want those things to be software upgradable?

Given how much of modern manufacturing is fully automated, why couldn't US companies compete on a level playing field with Chinese ones?

Tariffs simply allow domestic manufacturers to reap higher profits and/or continue to use inefficient processes to create an equivalent product.

Perhaps the motto of the USA will eventually become: "Tariffed into mediocrity"

indeed. this is more akin to the more abusive ideas proposed for the PATRIOT act but not implemented. In what we got, they could ask the phone companies and 'cloud' (we didn't call it that at the time) companies for all the info on a specific person without a specific warrant on the person themself. And yeah that was bad enough to be sure, especially because the company that turned over the data didn't have to tell you they did it (all part of trying to catch them without them knowing they're being caught, of course).

This 'dump' is more a case of "we can ask for EVERYTHING on your servers"...without telling anybody that their data was included.

Solar + Wind + Battery doesn't require water, and that is what Google is planning to use. I did some searching and found that they've funded additional buildout of a large renewable generation plant (solar + wind + battery) in Gujarat, plus transmission lines to bring the power the 1100 miles from Gujarat. The Gujarat plant is already in progress, the government is investing $70B in it, and it's a particularly good area for renewable generation because the seasonal wind cycle is exactly opposite the seasonal solar cycle, so as the days get shorter and solar generation declines, the wind ramps up, and vice versa.