Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 26 Nov 2021 @ 2:25am
Re: Re:
I'm still on the fence here. Just because LittleCupcakes keeps building the argument around alt-right talking points doesn't mean we're talking about a Koby, Baghdad Bob or Shel10.
Unfortunately there are plenty of progressive liberals who have heard the alt-right talking points so often by now they've started thinking they're partially real. That, I surmise, is logical enough when it comes to PV for anyone who hasn't actually read up on PV and O'Keefe in particular.
And when it comes to this bit about California it's an unfortunate fact that US progressives as a whole love to educate themselves about an issue, will pay a lot of lip service and keyboard warrioring around it...and then, when they find out that desperate measures are expensive they instantly back off.
Housing shortage in liberal areas? Sure, housing scarcity is horrible and robs everyone not born of privilege of proper access to work and education.
But god forbid high-density housing is built where it could conceivably impact the prices of their dreamy one-household villas.
Global warming? Horrible. Awful. We Must Do Something.
Unless it means gas and electricity prices go up in which case go on and bring the coal.
Racial equality and education? A Given. Must Be Done. All Are Born Equal.
Unless it means letting their kids learn about the inconvenient reality of slavery and the genocide of the native american tribes in which case toss those books right on that big bonfire and bring the happy bedtime story about the slave and the injun being happy about knowing their place.
The US as a whole is too driven by avarice to put together a functional public health system or even manage to get accurate history taught in schools...but they're supposed to somehow manage to scrap fossil fuels because the next generation will be facing a god damn extinction event?
I don't see that happening. Even China has more political will to change - perhaps because they're used to planning for generations ahead and don't like the idea of massive famine coming back as a trend in the middle kingdom.
No, the world will have to try to face global warming in spite of the US crying, screaming, and clinging to its ways like a recalcitrant child every step of the way.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 26 Nov 2021 @ 2:07am
Re: Re: Re:
"Of course, generating cost for energy aren't the real story, that's providing energy to the consumer when required."
This being the real issue at hand. Actual generation only really skews the cost-efficiency ratio a bit further to the direction it's already leaning into. Eventually the solar plant, no matter how inefficient, beats out the running costs of coal.
The real monsters at hand are storage and transmission. Every grid today is built around the access to existing plants and planned around the major load just being along the trunk. To cater to wind and solar farms at scale, not to mention providing every existing gas station along every highway with the capacity for dozens of EV charging stations rather than just what's required to run a large freezer, a few stovetops and lighting...every nation will need to replace the bigger part of their power grid.
"We are close to the point that the best thing politicians can do to solve the carbon crisis is simply get out of the way."
That is lamentably naíve - even in Europe where the citizenry normally realizes that fixing old issues costs money. If, in the US, the price of gas or the electricity bill go up by 10% that nation would without further ado elect Hannibal Lecter if that meant cheaper utilities. Even if that means abandoning every green initiative in favor of coal on the spot.
"...the biggest single thing the pols can do to address the crisis is also good economics without any economic cost to the government - stop subsidizing fossil fuel use (whether at production, transportation or consumption)."
Easy enough in most countries in the G8 which don't have any such subsidies in the first place - which is why the price of gas in europe is roughly upwards of 8$ the gallon and public transportation is a major thing.
Meanwhile in the US if gas prices hit 4$ per gallon whatever administration is blamed for that won't hold office for the next 20 years.
If the population is as a whole on board with tightening the ship and taking the bitter medicine politicians will be elected to carry out that will. But you try telling the average US voter, no matter how progressive, that for their children to have a future they'll need to pay in the present. They'll elect the grifter making unreasonable promises he can't keep over the inconvenient Al Gore any day.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 26 Nov 2021 @ 1:35am
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"Is there any particular reason they couldn't use pumped storage with seawater?"
There is. Seawater is corrosive, meaning the facilities will be far more expensive to build and maintain...and the cost of a leak at any point in the pipe going down is going to be an ecological disaster because inland vegetation isn't fond of brine.
Secondly the amount you can store with seawater is limited by the height at which you can store it. Meaning you need to first find an area significantly higher than ocean level, then hollow out a container the size of a lake in it unless you're lucky enough to find a suitable mountain valley to sacrifice by just damming the runoff point. It's not a minor engineering feat.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 26 Nov 2021 @ 1:31am
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"Another option is pumped storage hydroelectricity."
With the current issues of keeping Hoover dam at sufficient level and the general - and worsening - shortage of water on the west coast that's not much of an option.
Seawater has been suggested as the medium of choice but the issue there is that salt water is corrosive and poses a lot more expense - and risk, when the storage solution involves pumping a lake's worth of water to a mountaintop with surplus power and tap it for hydro in times of need.
It's a sign of the desperation that thought up ways to store surplus power for days and months of scarcity by now include innovatively sculpting vast areas of landscape. Like turning big parts of coastline into iron-seawater batteries or building vast jenga towers of house-sized concrete blocks using cranes to store kinetic energy. So far there just isn't anything which scales well for the amounts of energy storage required.
And thus plants - fossil fuel-driven or nuclear - need to pick up the slack, putting a hard limit on the proportion of clean energy we can use at scale.
And that limit is enforced by every person, no matter how eco-aware, who realizes the cost of switching to clean energy quickly will spike their energy and gas bill.
The US can't even tolerate the price of gas going up a few cents, so we shouldn't expect any headway in switching to green energy to come from that place. Not until after everyone else has paid the price of developing functional infrastructure around it, and probably not then either.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 6:59am
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Well, given the correlation of copyright cultists and fascists, i'll take that correction. Information control fanatics bereft of human empathy or respect for principles of law, hell-bent on reversing burden of proof by any other name and all that...
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 5:50am
Re: Re: Re: Stealing a Diary
"No, it's actually not. It doesn't work that way outside of Hollywood movies."
It certainly does if they can invoke the official secrets act, some scummy clause out of the seamy crotch of patriot act 1 or 2, or any other paragraph regarding antiterrorism and espionage belted out under GWB or Obama. I'm not sure about Hollywood's claims unless you refer to documentaries made around the Church Commission.
"If the president's grandkid is writing things in her diary that are classified natsec material..."
They don't know that she has. But they don't know she hasn't, either.
You are aware that "natsec", when it involves a US president - or any other head of state - would be absolutely everything not deliberately released to the press? If she writes about how daddy has trouble peeing, is addicted to pistachio ice cream, or has a soft spot for maine coon cats? That's natsec unless specifically stated otherwise, for the simple reason that it involves information about the president of the US.
It's certainly good enough for a law enforcement agency tasked with domestic security to start marching. She is in a position to observe sensitive information simply by virtue of seeing daddy in his office or when he's doing his job at home. And the FBI has a very long record of using far flimsier excuses for overreaching.
"Regarding the theft itself, that's clearly a matter of state or local jurisdiction and the FBI can liase with them and monitor the investigation for intel, but it simply has no primary jurisdiction in the matter."
Multiple jurisdictions disputes seem to be a fairly common thing where the FBI is concerned. In this case I'd argue the strongest claim would be that of the Treasury since their agents are explicitly tasked to safeguard POTUS and his surroundings, including relatives.
I will guarantee you that should the relative of POTUS have something stolen the only agency I'm damn sure won't end up running the investigation will be the local PD.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 5:35am
Re: Re: For your own sake, that's why
"You really do love quoting that scene as if it means something in this day and age."
It does. The same principle applies today.
Here, I'll make it easy for you; If you want to see the laws changed to shut the trumpist fuckwits up then you simultaneously need to somehow make damn sure those fuckwits never come to power again. Or once they're back in power, those laws will be used against you and you'll be worse off by far.
This, incidentally, is the recipe for civil war. I could argue that the US is already at a point of polarization so irreconcilable that's what its going to come down to. But where would you draw the battle lines, given that even in the reddest of states there's still at least 45% voting democrat? It's not going to be the old maison-dixie job, that's for damn sure.
Pulling up the option of a purge opens the door on the terrible fact that from that point on, that's going to be a valid tool for government to treat dissenters. And that's not a tool anyone wants the "least objectionable" side of this conflict to have.
Because although today most liberals and progressives are democrat, not all democrats by far are liberal and progressive.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 5:27am
Re: Re:
“William Roper: “So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!”
Sir Thomas More: “Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?”
William Roper: “Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!”
Sir Thomas More: “Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!”
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 5:23am
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"...if Project Veritas could actually dig up actual evidence for Project Veritas narratives, they wouldn't have to keep faking/doctoring evidence to make their case..."
Or it's a variant on the Tucker defense. Under US law fact and implausible implication is protected speech.
If O'Keefe obtains dirt on someone but not definitive proof he'd do better to sit on it because publishing a plausible accusation or implication opens him to a libel suit. Safer by far to only publish what he can establish as fact or that which is spun out of free fantasy.
To the FBI, with their resources, such indications are worth gold though, because the last thing they intend for is to publish whatever the information leads to.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 4:53am
Re: Re: Re: Re: On review
[addendum]
...eh, and to add to that the FBI report on the current overlap between law enforcement employment and white supremacy organization membership.
Ten years ago I would have looked at what keeps coming out of the US as news and considered it the plot of a bad novel where the author kept going over the top to the point of unintentional satire.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 4:50am
Re: Re: Re: On review
"Aye, there is that as well.
The whole situation is fucked."
Meanwhile Switzerland is even more in love with their guns than the NRA can credibly claim yet have one of the lowest gun murder rates per capita in the world.
The "situation" as I see it boils down to three factors;
Not a single sensible firearms restriction law. Basically anyone and everyone can obtain a firearm without the need to display they know how to properly handle and store them.
The general state of mental health in the US combined with a culture rooted in violence.
The mythology of the gun being the first method of choice to solve all your ills.
A van full of cops shooting up the neighborhood and terrorizing people on so frequent a basis citizens may have created a home defense guard to deal with them is just the icing on a rancid cake which has 500 children dead every year, to avoidable at-home firearms accidents, as the foundation layer and only gets worse with every layer stacked on top.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 4:37am
Re: Re: Re: Re:
"A slung rifle is generally not threatening. Not to us. Nor is one herald at the ‘low and ready’ position. "
How about one in the hands of an agitated punk running right at you with the rifle solidly held in both hands right after shots had been heard? With your s.o. right behind you?
"Also, AR15cv, this is not an automatic. There’s no spray n pray. This is a manual single fire rifle with self eject-and-load. "
Tell you what, if at night I see some kid running right at me with a device with the profile of an AR-15 I'm not going to make any assumptions whether the device in question is a functional firearm, or capable of burst or sustained fire. I'll act as if my life is under threat. If cover is too far off I might decide my only shot to live is to do unto him before he does unto me. Quintessentially american. The one and only reason Rittenhouse is alive today is because liberals tend not to bear quite as many guns.
"The three people he shot were shot because they actually threatened his life."
Sure, because running up to a guy clenching a firearm, in a visible state of agitation is somehow not him threatening their lives.
I keep saying this; US self-defense laws are deranged. If both parties are armed those laws are nothing more than a quick way to make sure the survivor - whoever it may be - walks away without going to jail.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 4:28am
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"And he was generally trying to help supply medical aid. Not shoot people. "
In the US walking into a "riot" zone open carrying an AR-15 means that your choice is made; you will be shooting people. Your very presence makes people fear for their lives.
The first guy Rittenhouse tangled with was bipolar. With firearms involved, one of them was going to die.
The second guy was there with his girlfriend when he saw an agitated punk with a smoking gun running towards them. He tried to defend his girlfriend, died as a result.
The third guy saw rittenhouse shoot the second guy, intervened, and rittenhouse shot him as well.
At some point I think you need to realize that the responses of at least two of these victims was quite valid and merited.
Rittenhouse is, imho, the utterly worst sort of scum - someone who deluded himself into a hero complex, showed up with a firearm, and left two people needlessly dead as a result of his piss-poor judgment...and who has now become the living mascot of the US fascist movement. At best this is stupidity writ so large it breaks Hanlon's razor and become actual malice.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 2:41am
Re: Re: Re:
"I’m surprised their offices aren’t wrapped in tinfoil."
[citation required]
I find it remarkable, though, how the US seems unable to keep any agency from sliding down the rabbit hole of "insane". It's not as if the phenomenon of narcissistic mini-popes helming their agencies like personal ultra-authoritarian fiefdoms is unknown elsewhere...but in the US it seems the rule rather than the exception that this is the case. And I really want to know why.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 2:32am
Re:
Meanwhile in socialist Europe the cost of an EpiPen is about 1/10th of what it costs in the US. The US really did take a horribly bad turn with Reagan turning a nation with a vibrant socialist backbone and political influence into such a pariah that these days claiming tax money should be used for public benefit is seen as an unholy abomination to put down with fire and sword.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 2:28am
Re: to much logic
"Things not mentioned, tend to be 'Where' they have found Old sea life. Which is a great marker of how high the water was in the past."
In most cases those who scream "How bad could it be?" have the answer staring them in the face every time they look at the cross-section of a rock from where they live and see the fossils of some antediluvian crustacean. Or pass sinkholes and beachfront which weren't in that place when they were young.
"Anyone think of a way to create something that could filter out the carbon in the ocean? Which has turned to an acid. Will make TONS of money."
You're thinking of Phytoplankton. The population of which, since the 50's, have drastically declined due to said acidification and the warming of the oceans.
No, science has looked at that option the same way it has looked at every other carbon sink technology, and come to the conclusion that it can be done...just not at scale. The best and most effective carbon sinks, bar none, is massive amounts of vegetation. But with drought fires increasingly burning off the forests, phytoplankton currently undergoing an extinction event and the amazon forest predicted to collapse into a shrubby plain by 2064...
The current scientific concensus already says it's too late to prevent an actual extinction event. In all likelihood human civilization is done for within the century. The fight right now is one to determine whether humanity will be left alive as a species at the end of this. And that's a battle too many people aren't even aware they're in, or refuse to see.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 2:07am
Re: Incompetent and proud of it!
"Yeah, the incompetence is rampant, obvious, and intentional."
At every level. Bear in mind the Texas legislature looks the way it does because the texas population haven't been too good on where to draw the line in sand regarding the priorities they consider relevant and necessary in their elected representatives. Same as in any other democracy, if your leader is a moron you need to look at the apathy of those who allowed that person into power.
That lesson is a few millennia old and we, as a species, haven't really managed to go beyond Plato's saying about those who consider themselves too wise to engage in politics.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 2:03am
Re:
"We ratepayers pay (a lot) for that decision, even though it wasn’t even an emergency."
Environmental care in energy generation actually became an emergency some twenty years ago. Worldwide, however, no government or state agency has ever placed switching the energy generation paradigm on the front burner and so these last few years started a frantic game of playing catch-up. Which, needless to say, is way more expensive than a gradual effort would have been.
"...energy companies are forced to generate expensive renewable energy."
Worse, really. For the most part currently they are forced to generate the illusion of renewable energy. Again a worldwide problem - because the infrastructure (storage capacity, grid expansion, coverage) doesn't exist. Your rate increases, same as most in the world, will be covering a rush job of scattered efforts not meeting the stated goals.
I'd say if we had actually started working hard, accepting minor constraints and expenses, twenty years ago or so, we would today already have a proportion of renewable energy significant enough to stave off the worst effects of global warming within this century.
Since we haven't, there are few options left. In most cases the most plausible options left will either be a lot of new nuclear plants, drop the focus on sustainability altogether, or push massive amounts of government money into emergency infrastructure expansion.
Either option has costs and consequences. We're paying for ten pounds of cure instead of for an ounce of prevention...
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 1:49am
Re: Re:
"There is no easy way to install a New power generation facility in california."
The real trick isn't power generation. It's transmission and most of all, storage which pose the major challenges.
Wind and sun can provide the power no problem - but unpredictably. With no way to store the surplus they can't match the utility of a plant where all you need to do is turn a dial to increase or reduce energy generation. Solar in California will provide best utility on local levels, where individual households can save the grid some strain by installing a roof full of collectors and a big enough battery to cover most of the household needs.
But then you hit the logistics of batteries with the required capacity requiring lithium and the extraction of that element is...not environmentally friendly.
With the timelines we currently face it'll boil down to nuclear in the end, for every country save Iceland and similar places sitting on nigh-infinite geothermal power.
Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 25 Nov 2021 @ 12:30am
Re: More and more...
" I wonder what they would have done if I was a minority or if I had not thought of asking what they would do with the 15 year old."
Pot odds given your description of the events? You'd have been dead when you reached for that car door and that 15 year old would have grown up utterly traumatized after whatever passes for a system in Virginia put her through the wringer.
I'd confess to shock and outrage over that story but given the source - the US - all I can say that not ending that trip in the morgue or hospital already makes it a happy ending. Even if your gf's daughter ends up fearful of the police uniform forever after.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: Re:
I'm still on the fence here. Just because LittleCupcakes keeps building the argument around alt-right talking points doesn't mean we're talking about a Koby, Baghdad Bob or Shel10.
Unfortunately there are plenty of progressive liberals who have heard the alt-right talking points so often by now they've started thinking they're partially real. That, I surmise, is logical enough when it comes to PV for anyone who hasn't actually read up on PV and O'Keefe in particular.
And when it comes to this bit about California it's an unfortunate fact that US progressives as a whole love to educate themselves about an issue, will pay a lot of lip service and keyboard warrioring around it...and then, when they find out that desperate measures are expensive they instantly back off.
Housing shortage in liberal areas? Sure, housing scarcity is horrible and robs everyone not born of privilege of proper access to work and education.
But god forbid high-density housing is built where it could conceivably impact the prices of their dreamy one-household villas.
Global warming? Horrible. Awful. We Must Do Something.
Unless it means gas and electricity prices go up in which case go on and bring the coal.
Racial equality and education? A Given. Must Be Done. All Are Born Equal.
Unless it means letting their kids learn about the inconvenient reality of slavery and the genocide of the native american tribes in which case toss those books right on that big bonfire and bring the happy bedtime story about the slave and the injun being happy about knowing their place.
The US as a whole is too driven by avarice to put together a functional public health system or even manage to get accurate history taught in schools...but they're supposed to somehow manage to scrap fossil fuels because the next generation will be facing a god damn extinction event?
I don't see that happening. Even China has more political will to change - perhaps because they're used to planning for generations ahead and don't like the idea of massive famine coming back as a trend in the middle kingdom.
No, the world will have to try to face global warming in spite of the US crying, screaming, and clinging to its ways like a recalcitrant child every step of the way.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: Re: Re:
"Of course, generating cost for energy aren't the real story, that's providing energy to the consumer when required."
This being the real issue at hand. Actual generation only really skews the cost-efficiency ratio a bit further to the direction it's already leaning into. Eventually the solar plant, no matter how inefficient, beats out the running costs of coal.
The real monsters at hand are storage and transmission. Every grid today is built around the access to existing plants and planned around the major load just being along the trunk. To cater to wind and solar farms at scale, not to mention providing every existing gas station along every highway with the capacity for dozens of EV charging stations rather than just what's required to run a large freezer, a few stovetops and lighting...every nation will need to replace the bigger part of their power grid.
"We are close to the point that the best thing politicians can do to solve the carbon crisis is simply get out of the way."
That is lamentably naíve - even in Europe where the citizenry normally realizes that fixing old issues costs money. If, in the US, the price of gas or the electricity bill go up by 10% that nation would without further ado elect Hannibal Lecter if that meant cheaper utilities. Even if that means abandoning every green initiative in favor of coal on the spot.
"...the biggest single thing the pols can do to address the crisis is also good economics without any economic cost to the government - stop subsidizing fossil fuel use (whether at production, transportation or consumption)."
Easy enough in most countries in the G8 which don't have any such subsidies in the first place - which is why the price of gas in europe is roughly upwards of 8$ the gallon and public transportation is a major thing.
Meanwhile in the US if gas prices hit 4$ per gallon whatever administration is blamed for that won't hold office for the next 20 years.
If the population is as a whole on board with tightening the ship and taking the bitter medicine politicians will be elected to carry out that will. But you try telling the average US voter, no matter how progressive, that for their children to have a future they'll need to pay in the present. They'll elect the grifter making unreasonable promises he can't keep over the inconvenient Al Gore any day.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"Is there any particular reason they couldn't use pumped storage with seawater?"
There is. Seawater is corrosive, meaning the facilities will be far more expensive to build and maintain...and the cost of a leak at any point in the pipe going down is going to be an ecological disaster because inland vegetation isn't fond of brine.
Secondly the amount you can store with seawater is limited by the height at which you can store it. Meaning you need to first find an area significantly higher than ocean level, then hollow out a container the size of a lake in it unless you're lucky enough to find a suitable mountain valley to sacrifice by just damming the runoff point. It's not a minor engineering feat.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"Another option is pumped storage hydroelectricity."
With the current issues of keeping Hoover dam at sufficient level and the general - and worsening - shortage of water on the west coast that's not much of an option.
Seawater has been suggested as the medium of choice but the issue there is that salt water is corrosive and poses a lot more expense - and risk, when the storage solution involves pumping a lake's worth of water to a mountaintop with surplus power and tap it for hydro in times of need.
It's a sign of the desperation that thought up ways to store surplus power for days and months of scarcity by now include innovatively sculpting vast areas of landscape. Like turning big parts of coastline into iron-seawater batteries or building vast jenga towers of house-sized concrete blocks using cranes to store kinetic energy. So far there just isn't anything which scales well for the amounts of energy storage required.
And thus plants - fossil fuel-driven or nuclear - need to pick up the slack, putting a hard limit on the proportion of clean energy we can use at scale.
And that limit is enforced by every person, no matter how eco-aware, who realizes the cost of switching to clean energy quickly will spike their energy and gas bill.
The US can't even tolerate the price of gas going up a few cents, so we shouldn't expect any headway in switching to green energy to come from that place. Not until after everyone else has paid the price of developing functional infrastructure around it, and probably not then either.
On the post: Wherein The Copia Institute Tells The Eleventh Circuit That Florida's SB 7072 Law Violates Our Rights
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Well, given the correlation of copyright cultists and fascists, i'll take that correction. Information control fanatics bereft of human empathy or respect for principles of law, hell-bent on reversing burden of proof by any other name and all that...
On the post: Yes, Even If You Think Project Veritas Are A Bunch Of Malicious Grifters, FBI Raid Is Concerning
Re: Re: Re: Stealing a Diary
"No, it's actually not. It doesn't work that way outside of Hollywood movies."
It certainly does if they can invoke the official secrets act, some scummy clause out of the seamy crotch of patriot act 1 or 2, or any other paragraph regarding antiterrorism and espionage belted out under GWB or Obama. I'm not sure about Hollywood's claims unless you refer to documentaries made around the Church Commission.
"If the president's grandkid is writing things in her diary that are classified natsec material..."
They don't know that she has. But they don't know she hasn't, either.
You are aware that "natsec", when it involves a US president - or any other head of state - would be absolutely everything not deliberately released to the press? If she writes about how daddy has trouble peeing, is addicted to pistachio ice cream, or has a soft spot for maine coon cats? That's natsec unless specifically stated otherwise, for the simple reason that it involves information about the president of the US.
It's certainly good enough for a law enforcement agency tasked with domestic security to start marching. She is in a position to observe sensitive information simply by virtue of seeing daddy in his office or when he's doing his job at home. And the FBI has a very long record of using far flimsier excuses for overreaching.
"Regarding the theft itself, that's clearly a matter of state or local jurisdiction and the FBI can liase with them and monitor the investigation for intel, but it simply has no primary jurisdiction in the matter."
Multiple jurisdictions disputes seem to be a fairly common thing where the FBI is concerned. In this case I'd argue the strongest claim would be that of the Treasury since their agents are explicitly tasked to safeguard POTUS and his surroundings, including relatives.
I will guarantee you that should the relative of POTUS have something stolen the only agency I'm damn sure won't end up running the investigation will be the local PD.
On the post: Yes, Even If You Think Project Veritas Are A Bunch Of Malicious Grifters, FBI Raid Is Concerning
Re: Re: For your own sake, that's why
"You really do love quoting that scene as if it means something in this day and age."
It does. The same principle applies today.
Here, I'll make it easy for you; If you want to see the laws changed to shut the trumpist fuckwits up then you simultaneously need to somehow make damn sure those fuckwits never come to power again. Or once they're back in power, those laws will be used against you and you'll be worse off by far.
This, incidentally, is the recipe for civil war. I could argue that the US is already at a point of polarization so irreconcilable that's what its going to come down to. But where would you draw the battle lines, given that even in the reddest of states there's still at least 45% voting democrat? It's not going to be the old maison-dixie job, that's for damn sure.
Pulling up the option of a purge opens the door on the terrible fact that from that point on, that's going to be a valid tool for government to treat dissenters. And that's not a tool anyone wants the "least objectionable" side of this conflict to have.
Because although today most liberals and progressives are democrat, not all democrats by far are liberal and progressive.
On the post: Yes, Even If You Think Project Veritas Are A Bunch Of Malicious Grifters, FBI Raid Is Concerning
Re: Re:
On the post: Yes, Even If You Think Project Veritas Are A Bunch Of Malicious Grifters, FBI Raid Is Concerning
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"...if Project Veritas could actually dig up actual evidence for Project Veritas narratives, they wouldn't have to keep faking/doctoring evidence to make their case..."
Or it's a variant on the Tucker defense. Under US law fact and implausible implication is protected speech.
If O'Keefe obtains dirt on someone but not definitive proof he'd do better to sit on it because publishing a plausible accusation or implication opens him to a libel suit. Safer by far to only publish what he can establish as fact or that which is spun out of free fantasy.
To the FBI, with their resources, such indications are worth gold though, because the last thing they intend for is to publish whatever the information leads to.
On the post: Minneapolis Man Acquitted Of Charges After Mistakenly Shooting At Cops Sues Officers For Violating His Rights
Re: Re: Re: Re: On review
[addendum]
...eh, and to add to that the FBI report on the current overlap between law enforcement employment and white supremacy organization membership.
Ten years ago I would have looked at what keeps coming out of the US as news and considered it the plot of a bad novel where the author kept going over the top to the point of unintentional satire.
On the post: Minneapolis Man Acquitted Of Charges After Mistakenly Shooting At Cops Sues Officers For Violating His Rights
Re: Re: Re: On review
"Aye, there is that as well.
The whole situation is fucked."
Meanwhile Switzerland is even more in love with their guns than the NRA can credibly claim yet have one of the lowest gun murder rates per capita in the world.
The "situation" as I see it boils down to three factors;
Not a single sensible firearms restriction law. Basically anyone and everyone can obtain a firearm without the need to display they know how to properly handle and store them.
The general state of mental health in the US combined with a culture rooted in violence.
A van full of cops shooting up the neighborhood and terrorizing people on so frequent a basis citizens may have created a home defense guard to deal with them is just the icing on a rancid cake which has 500 children dead every year, to avoidable at-home firearms accidents, as the foundation layer and only gets worse with every layer stacked on top.
On the post: Minneapolis Man Acquitted Of Charges After Mistakenly Shooting At Cops Sues Officers For Violating His Rights
Re: Re: Re: Re:
"A slung rifle is generally not threatening. Not to us. Nor is one herald at the ‘low and ready’ position. "
How about one in the hands of an agitated punk running right at you with the rifle solidly held in both hands right after shots had been heard? With your s.o. right behind you?
"Also, AR15cv, this is not an automatic. There’s no spray n pray. This is a manual single fire rifle with self eject-and-load. "
Tell you what, if at night I see some kid running right at me with a device with the profile of an AR-15 I'm not going to make any assumptions whether the device in question is a functional firearm, or capable of burst or sustained fire. I'll act as if my life is under threat. If cover is too far off I might decide my only shot to live is to do unto him before he does unto me. Quintessentially american. The one and only reason Rittenhouse is alive today is because liberals tend not to bear quite as many guns.
"The three people he shot were shot because they actually threatened his life."
Sure, because running up to a guy clenching a firearm, in a visible state of agitation is somehow not him threatening their lives.
I keep saying this; US self-defense laws are deranged. If both parties are armed those laws are nothing more than a quick way to make sure the survivor - whoever it may be - walks away without going to jail.
On the post: Minneapolis Man Acquitted Of Charges After Mistakenly Shooting At Cops Sues Officers For Violating His Rights
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"And he was generally trying to help supply medical aid. Not shoot people. "
In the US walking into a "riot" zone open carrying an AR-15 means that your choice is made; you will be shooting people. Your very presence makes people fear for their lives.
The first guy Rittenhouse tangled with was bipolar. With firearms involved, one of them was going to die.
The second guy was there with his girlfriend when he saw an agitated punk with a smoking gun running towards them. He tried to defend his girlfriend, died as a result.
The third guy saw rittenhouse shoot the second guy, intervened, and rittenhouse shot him as well.
At some point I think you need to realize that the responses of at least two of these victims was quite valid and merited.
Rittenhouse is, imho, the utterly worst sort of scum - someone who deluded himself into a hero complex, showed up with a firearm, and left two people needlessly dead as a result of his piss-poor judgment...and who has now become the living mascot of the US fascist movement. At best this is stupidity writ so large it breaks Hanlon's razor and become actual malice.
On the post: FAA Blocks 5G Deployments Over Safety Concerns Despite No Actual Evidence Of Harm
Re: Re: Re:
"I’m surprised their offices aren’t wrapped in tinfoil."
[citation required]
I find it remarkable, though, how the US seems unable to keep any agency from sliding down the rabbit hole of "insane". It's not as if the phenomenon of narcissistic mini-popes helming their agencies like personal ultra-authoritarian fiefdoms is unknown elsewhere...but in the US it seems the rule rather than the exception that this is the case. And I really want to know why.
On the post: Why Are Drug Prices So High? Because Asshole McKinsey Consultants Figure Out Ways To Re-Patent The Same Drugs Over And Over
Re:
Meanwhile in socialist Europe the cost of an EpiPen is about 1/10th of what it costs in the US. The US really did take a horribly bad turn with Reagan turning a nation with a vibrant socialist backbone and political influence into such a pariah that these days claiming tax money should be used for public benefit is seen as an unholy abomination to put down with fire and sword.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: to much logic
"Things not mentioned, tend to be 'Where' they have found Old sea life. Which is a great marker of how high the water was in the past."
In most cases those who scream "How bad could it be?" have the answer staring them in the face every time they look at the cross-section of a rock from where they live and see the fossils of some antediluvian crustacean. Or pass sinkholes and beachfront which weren't in that place when they were young.
"Anyone think of a way to create something that could filter out the carbon in the ocean? Which has turned to an acid. Will make TONS of money."
You're thinking of Phytoplankton. The population of which, since the 50's, have drastically declined due to said acidification and the warming of the oceans.
No, science has looked at that option the same way it has looked at every other carbon sink technology, and come to the conclusion that it can be done...just not at scale. The best and most effective carbon sinks, bar none, is massive amounts of vegetation. But with drought fires increasingly burning off the forests, phytoplankton currently undergoing an extinction event and the amazon forest predicted to collapse into a shrubby plain by 2064...
The current scientific concensus already says it's too late to prevent an actual extinction event. In all likelihood human civilization is done for within the century. The fight right now is one to determine whether humanity will be left alive as a species at the end of this. And that's a battle too many people aren't even aware they're in, or refuse to see.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: Incompetent and proud of it!
"Yeah, the incompetence is rampant, obvious, and intentional."
At every level. Bear in mind the Texas legislature looks the way it does because the texas population haven't been too good on where to draw the line in sand regarding the priorities they consider relevant and necessary in their elected representatives. Same as in any other democracy, if your leader is a moron you need to look at the apathy of those who allowed that person into power.
That lesson is a few millennia old and we, as a species, haven't really managed to go beyond Plato's saying about those who consider themselves too wise to engage in politics.
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re:
"We ratepayers pay (a lot) for that decision, even though it wasn’t even an emergency."
Environmental care in energy generation actually became an emergency some twenty years ago. Worldwide, however, no government or state agency has ever placed switching the energy generation paradigm on the front burner and so these last few years started a frantic game of playing catch-up. Which, needless to say, is way more expensive than a gradual effort would have been.
"...energy companies are forced to generate expensive renewable energy."
Worse, really. For the most part currently they are forced to generate the illusion of renewable energy. Again a worldwide problem - because the infrastructure (storage capacity, grid expansion, coverage) doesn't exist. Your rate increases, same as most in the world, will be covering a rush job of scattered efforts not meeting the stated goals.
I'd say if we had actually started working hard, accepting minor constraints and expenses, twenty years ago or so, we would today already have a proportion of renewable energy significant enough to stave off the worst effects of global warming within this century.
Since we haven't, there are few options left. In most cases the most plausible options left will either be a lot of new nuclear plants, drop the focus on sustainability altogether, or push massive amounts of government money into emergency infrastructure expansion.
Either option has costs and consequences. We're paying for ten pounds of cure instead of for an ounce of prevention...
On the post: Texas Gas Companies Hit Texas Consumers With 'Whoops You Froze To Death' Surcharge
Re: Re:
"There is no easy way to install a New power generation facility in california."
The real trick isn't power generation. It's transmission and most of all, storage which pose the major challenges.
Wind and sun can provide the power no problem - but unpredictably. With no way to store the surplus they can't match the utility of a plant where all you need to do is turn a dial to increase or reduce energy generation. Solar in California will provide best utility on local levels, where individual households can save the grid some strain by installing a roof full of collectors and a big enough battery to cover most of the household needs.
But then you hit the logistics of batteries with the required capacity requiring lithium and the extraction of that element is...not environmentally friendly.
With the timelines we currently face it'll boil down to nuclear in the end, for every country save Iceland and similar places sitting on nigh-infinite geothermal power.
On the post: No Immunity For Cops Who Used A Field Drug Test To Turn Stress Ball Sand Into Cocaine
Re: More and more...
" I wonder what they would have done if I was a minority or if I had not thought of asking what they would do with the 15 year old."
Pot odds given your description of the events? You'd have been dead when you reached for that car door and that 15 year old would have grown up utterly traumatized after whatever passes for a system in Virginia put her through the wringer.
I'd confess to shock and outrage over that story but given the source - the US - all I can say that not ending that trip in the morgue or hospital already makes it a happy ending. Even if your gf's daughter ends up fearful of the police uniform forever after.
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