Schadenfreude alert

If I'm reading the signs right, the new talking point in the guns-for-penises crowd is that we need to have gun safety and live fire proficiency training in public schools, as the gun equivalent to driver's ed.

These people are insane.

No, you're governed by a party you did not vote for. You consent to that possibility by being part of a democracy.

Consent to that possibility as opposed to what? Actively revolting? I don't see "accepting an unpleasant situation because resistance is impractical" as consent.

I'm not saying democracy is precisely the same as a dictatorship, but I didn't consent to a number of government policies. I tolerate them, and that's not really very different than having to tolerate unpleasant policies in a relatively benevolent dictatorship. The main difference, as I see it, is that if I can convince enough people of something in a democracy, I have a reasonable chance of changing policy (although, to be fair, if I could do the same in a dictatorship, the movement might represent a credible enough threat of overthrow to change policy too).

I definitely agree with the idea that a democracy is less prone to abuse of power than a dictatorship because the power isn't as individualized, but I don't think it is a system of consent. If 50.1% of the population were to believe that the correct policy for the country would be the systematic rounding up and execution of <insert hated minority group here>, it would most certainly not be something I consented to.

It's like Dred Scott for the 21st Century - I want the right to keep guns in my house AND bring them over to yours.

If I'm reading the signs right, the new talking point in the guns-for-penises crowd is that we need to have gun safety and live fire proficiency training in public schools, as the gun equivalent to driver's ed.

Actually, if you're going to have guns in the public sphere, I think this is a pretty good idea. It's a dangerous technology if you're not knowledgeable about the dangers. I'd also support teaching basic fire safety and basic swimming techniques as part of public education.

It's really a shame some of those here couldn't have been around in 1776 to tell Washington and Jefferson what a mistake they were making.

Actually, if you're going to have guns in the public sphere, I think this is a pretty good idea. It's a dangerous technology if you're not knowledgeable about the dangers. I'd also support teaching basic fire safety and basic swimming techniques as part of public education.

I think those kinds of classes fit a lot better as part of obtaining a gun license. That's how they do it in other countries and it works well.

Schadenfreude alert: 5 people shot at 3 gun shows on Gun Appreciation Day.

Glad they weren't killed, but as long as they weren't I have to admit I love stories like this. "Gun Appreciation Day" has got to be one of the creepiest concepts of all time, even if it does lend itself to some delicious lampooning.

No takers on #1715?

Glad they weren't killed, but as long as they weren't I have to admit I love stories like this. "Gun Appreciation Day" has got to be one of the creepiest concepts of all time, even if it does lend itself to some delicious lampooning.

Eh, its not anything weirder than some of other big convention shows out there for various interests. Although, its pretty damn clear that a Darwin award should be given to the organizers of this event if only because they apparently need to specify that any and all guns SHOULD BE UNLOADED.

The guy taking the shotgun (loaded) out of its case and pelleting three bystanders is just made of win.

No takers on #1715?

LOL

Glad they weren't killed, but as long as they weren't I have to admit I love stories like this. "Gun Appreciation Day" has got to be one of the creepiest concepts of all time, even if it does lend itself to some delicious lampooning.

Eh, its not anything weirder than some of other big convention shows out there for various interests. Although, its pretty damn clear that a Darwin award should be given to the organizers of this event if only because they apparently need to specify that any and all guns SHOULD BE UNLOADED.

Hmmmm, in some states those gun show organizers might have a lawsuit on their hands. I guess it's okay to carry a loaded gun into a church or a school or a restaurant, but at a gun show, heaven forbid.

The guy taking the shotgun (loaded) out of its case and pelleting three bystanders is just made of win.

And I suppose with "Gun Appreciation Day" under their belts, it was inevitable that the gun nuts would think up a series of rallies called "Guns Across America". They should get Mel Gibson to sing "We Are The World" or something.

Although, its pretty damn clear that a Darwin award should be given

Not sure you can do that with creationists.

DALLAS — On one side of Young Street, volunteers from First Presbyterian Church of Dallas attempted to persuade gun owners to turn in their firearms. They would receive $50 to $200 — from donors — and know that their guns would be destroyed.

Across the downtown street, members of the Right Group — formed to compete with the church event — set up in a rented vacant lot to urge visitors to resell their firearms rather than destroy them. They had signs reading "We pay more" and "Gun rescue."

Is there any point of trolling a church's voluntary buyback program?

very random but I am pissed at those who equate swartz death as to something noble, he is a kid who got way in over his head considering his actions and the punishment he was facing was legit, just because he took the ##### way out does not make him some magical person. It just makes him some scared kid who did not understand what the #### he was doing. It is not the fault of MIT or anyone else, it is own damn problem. And one he failed to deal with

also the person i am arguing with seems to think its ok to steal the works from mit with out repercussions. needless to say he does not agree with me when I say Bradley Manning deserves every bit of hell he has gone through

If Swartz stole from JSTOR, then so did I and every other college kid who used the archive and then shared an article with somebody else. Hint, downloading something when you have access is not 'hacking'.

But downloading and publishing when you do not have access is a big issue. I dont care who you are or what school it is but to hack and publish the work done by others with out their consent is illegal ( and I may be one of the most liberal people here) This type of activity cannot stand. It is not society's fault he didnt have the balls to face what he did. The fact he didn't is not an indictment on society but an indictment on the student himself.

But downloading and publishing when you do not have access is a big issue. I dont care who you are or what school it is but to hack and publish the work done by others with out their consent is illegal ( and I may be one of the most liberal people here) This type of activity cannot stand. It is not society's fault he didnt have the balls to face what he did. The fact he didn't is not an indictment on society but an indictment on the student himself.

He didn't actually publish the work done by others. Also, JSTOR didn't want criminal charges brought, they just wanted the content secured, which it was.

All that leaves is Swartz being very clever about using an internet network he wasn't authorized to use. He wasn't using it to send military secrets to Al-Qaeda or arranging to have sex with 12-year-olds. Charge him with a misdemeanor and let him do a couple hundred hours of community service. There was no justification for the federal government treating the Swartz case as if he was Aldrich Ames.

very random but I am pissed at those who equate swartz death as to something noble, he is a kid who got way in over his head considering his actions and the punishment he was facing was legit, just because he took the ##### way out does not make him some magical person. It just makes him some scared kid who did not understand what the #### he was doing. It is not the fault of MIT or anyone else, it is own damn problem. And one he failed to deal with


I'm not going to justify suicide. I'm also not going to say that Aaron Swartz did nothing wrong, because that isn't true. He was an activist, and his intentions were based on a belief in free exchange of information (a cause that I believe is very noble), but he did break the law.

That said, the punishment he was facing was not legitimate (at least in a moral sense). His crimes carried a potential sentence of up to 35 years, and up to $1M in fines. But don't take my word for it; here's a quote from Rep. Zoe Lofgren:

The government was able to bring such disproportionate charges against Aaron because of the broad scope of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) and the wire fraud statute. It looks like the government used the vague wording of those laws to claim that violating an online service’s user agreement or terms of service is a violation of the CFAA and the wire fraud statute.

Using the law in this way could criminalize many everyday activities and allow for outlandishly severe penalties.

When our laws need to be modified, Congress has a responsibility to act. A simple way to correct this dangerous legal interpretation is to change the CFAA and the wire fraud statutes to exclude terms of service violations. I will introduce a bill that does exactly that.

It's not reasonable to say that the government killed Aaron Swartz, a young man that suffered from depression and chose to end his own life. It is reasonable to say that the government acted poorly, and that the threat of an outrageous punishment contributed to the emotional state that led to Swartz's decision.

Actually, if you're going to have guns in the public sphere, I think this is a pretty good idea. It's a dangerous technology if you're not knowledgeable about the dangers. I'd also support teaching basic fire safety and basic swimming techniques as part of public education.

Let me know when we have a rational dialogue about guns in this country. The country has gone over the bend on the objective plusses and minuses of guns.

Legal or not, I think a gun that's kept in the house for personal protection makes the household less safe. Guns in households tend to be used in ill-thought-out suicides and family arguments far more often than defending the household from intruders. Same goes for concealed carry. Legal or not, if I'm in the same place as Joe Schmo who's carrying, I'm probably less safe.

But we can't talk about such issues, can we? Could we have talked about DWI if a significant portion of the population either felt that alcohol was some sort of magic potion that cured all ills, or sided with those that did believe it?

But we can't talk about such issues, can we? Could we have talked about DWI if a significant portion of the population either felt that alcohol was some sort of magic potion that cured all ills, or sided with those that did believe it?

There is an astonishing amount of people, who think they drive better after a few drinks.

Do we know everything here? How far along were they in proceeding to trial? Many defendants are overcharged, then there's negotiation down from there. This guy wasn't a person without resources. Was he really going to go to jail at all? In the fume and froth to always blame the government, from popular media representations, we maybe should assume a more becoming modesty. The prosecutor says they would have probably recommended six months. Also, wikileaks has confirmed Swartz was a source. A lot of this we'll never know definitively from a legal standpoint, since the dead aren't prosecuted.

Do we know everything here?

No.

How far along were they in proceeding to trial?

Swartz had been indicted and released on $100,000 bail.

Many defendants are overcharged, then there's negotiation down from there. This guy wasn't a person without resources. Was he really going to go to jail at all?

I think you've already identified a major problem with our criminal justice system. Defendants shouldn't be overcharged as a negotiation tactic; they should be charged properly. Our system encourages plea bargains through excessive charges and maximum sentencing. Because of the threat of an outrageous penalty, overbroad laws are often not tested and remain on the books. The system doesn't really work.

As for Swartz's jail time, it depends how much of an example the government wanted to make of him, and of course, on the judge's discretion in sentencing. Shortly before his death, if wikipedia and one of Swartz's attorneys is to be believed, the only way to avoid trial was to plead guilty to all 13 charges and to spend six months in jail. If that was the government's best offer, odds are pretty low than a guilty verdict would have resulted in less jail time.

In the fume and froth to always blame the government, from popular media representations, we maybe should assume a more becoming modesty. The prosecutor says they would have probably recommended six months.

That's what the prosecutor is saying now that Aaron Swartz is dead, and there's a bipartisan concern about prosecutorial overreach that includes a potential investigation by Congress, and a petition to remove her from office. Six months ago, she was saying things like "stealing is stealing, whether you use a computer command or a crowbar" and "if convicted of these charges, Swartz faces up to 35 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, restitution, forfeiture and a fine of up to $1 million." After Swartz killed himself, the tone of her public statements changed a bit: "this office sought an appropriate sentence that matched the alleged conduct – a sentence that we would recommend to the judge of six months in a low security setting."

I don't really blame Ortiz too much, though. (It does appear that a six-month plea bargain was on the table, so it's not like she was making monstrous demands.) While discretion in charging certainly is part of her job, it's not really her place to re-write the law. The CFAA is really the culprit here.

Also, wikileaks has confirmed Swartz was a source. A lot of this we'll never know definitively from a legal standpoint, since the dead aren't prosecuted.

Why does it matter if Swartz was a source for wikileaks? He was very heavily involved in the open information movement; I'd imagine that practically every major contributor to internet freedom was a potential wikileaks source.

It would have been good for the people to see this issue tried, to bring public attention to the issue, rather than disposed of via plea bargain silently. Certainly, it's getting a lot of attention now, but at what cost?

But downloading and publishing when you do not have access is a big issue. I dont care who you are or what school it is but to hack and publish the work done by others with out their consent is illegal ( and I may be one of the most liberal people here) This type of activity cannot stand. It is not society's fault he didnt have the balls to face what he did. The fact he didn't is not an indictment on society but an indictment on the student himself.

He was working on a fellowship at Harvard. So he had access to the archive. Have you ever been on JSTOR? When I was using it, they never put limits on what or how many articles I could download, or how many times I could it. Its pretty clear that JSTOR never considered that somebody would just try to download the entire archive. But somebody did, and they didn't need to 'hack' it. Really, its JSTOR's own shoddy infrastructure that made it possible in the first place.

The Dems in 2006 had secret future knowledge that it wouldn't? They simply lucked out that one of their bullets didn't kill a hostage. Why do you defend hostage takers?

You call it luck, I call it a reasonable assessment of risk that everyone else understood and made at the time.

But yeah, the S&P was all the Republicans fault. Just look at the S&P's *actual justification*.

Dan, since I've actually read that S&P report, I know you left out the S&P's quotes about the "political brinksmanship" that made them conclude that U.S. policymaking was less stable than in the past.

Dan, since I've actually read that S&P report, I know you left out the S&P's quotes about the "political brinksmanship" that made them conclude that U.S. policymaking was less stable than in the past.

Yes, because Democrats didn't engage in political brinksmanship as well at all. Nope, not our young handsome heroes!

Do we know everything here? How far along were they in proceeding to trial? Many defendants are overcharged, then there's negotiation down from there. This guy wasn't a person without resources. Was he really going to go to jail at all? In the fume and froth to always blame the government, from popular media representations, we maybe should assume a more becoming modesty. The prosecutor says they would have probably recommended six months. Also, wikileaks has confirmed Swartz was a source. A lot of this we'll never know definitively from a legal standpoint, since the dead aren't prosecuted.

Preach on, Roland F.

Preach on, Roland F.

?

That wasn't very productive on my part.

Let me rephrase. Morty's post is an example of why I'm having more trouble finding common ground to vote for Democrats in the last 5 years or so, a sad command government leanings among a percentage of leftists, as seen in such things as articles characterizing the First Amendment as free speech fetishism, suddenly finding drone strikes a-ok, and stuff like this. The idea that it's OK for the government to overcharge a defendant because he has resources and that we should be concerned about being more modest about government prosecutions really leaves a bad taste in my mouth. No, the government didn't hang Swartz with piano wire, but the way the entire case was run and the arguments of the people defending the government have a disturbing tinge of Volksgerichtshof running through it.

Retardo and I have a great deal of mutual dislike, but at least his (I believe erroneous) concept of rights is concerned about individuals.

He was working on a fellowship at Harvard. So he had access to the archive. Have you ever been on JSTOR? When I was using it, they never put limits on what or how many articles I could download, or how many times I could it. Its pretty clear that JSTOR never considered that somebody would just try to download the entire archive. But somebody did, and they didn't need to 'hack' it. Really, its JSTOR's own shoddy infrastructure that made it possible in the first place.

From what I've read, Swarz actually snuck around to different libraries specifically because he had had limitations put on his downloading activities, after he began. There's a ton of prosecutorial overreach and there's a lot of criticisms to be levied against prosecutors and DA offices run amok in our criminal "justice" system, but let's not pretend that Swarz didn't realize what he was doing was frowned upon and illegal, to the extent that he took extensive action in the world (going to libraries at other campuses than Harvard) to avoid systemic rules.

The other thing that I find really weird here is that Swarz identified himself as an internet activist and he behaved as such. He quite clearly put himself in the upper tier of a group of activists who intentionally commit acts of civil disobedience to call attention to what they believe to be unjust laws. The assumed result of civil disobedience is arrest, detention and jail time. MLK didn't protest in Birmingham and then expect to avoid time in a Birmingham jail. That's what I find really disconnecting here. It's like the guy was out playing the role of anarchist internet activist going against the man, but then completely freaked his #### when it turned out that the man was actually powerful and intent on maintaining the status quo of his power and authority in the world. It seems Swarz was approaching his "activism" as a bit of trust fund dillitente role playing rather than real action in the world, and the world came up to brutally burst his bubble.

It's part of the unavoidable essence of adversarial proceedings that neither party will tend to negotiate with itself. Both sides will take extreme positions at the outset. Indeed, it's done here in argument with practically every post.

I would like to refrain from making too many assumptions about guilt and reciprocal responsibility since matters in the Swartz case were some distance from a conclusion. We simply don't know, and now will never know, what would have eventuated. But, we do know how things are with legal proceedings. We know prosecutors overcharge--because they can and because it is effective. And we know they negotiate down. There's not much reason to believe Swartz was going to get anything like 30 years. You might as well believe everyone who is caught smoking a joint for the first time is given ten years hard time.

People's ideology infects almost everything they say on this thread. They need to step back and get a grip; give the life and death Armageddon mindset a rest sometimes. I know we all think we have the answers to all the problems, and don't need to consider untoward possibilities, but, really, it can get awfully tiresome.

. The assumed result of civil disobedience is arrest, detention and jail time. MLK didn't protest in Birmingham and then expect to avoid time in a Birmingham jail. That's what I find really disconnecting here.

It's not the fact that he was charged that I find disturbing -- he appears to have been guilty of something -- it's the zealousness and overcharging of the prosecution in this case that's the problem. Even racist Alabama, upon finding King guilty, limited the punishment to $500 or a year in jail, not up to a million dollars or decades in the slammer if convicted. If Jim Crow justice actually looks merciful by comparison, something's gone horribly wrong.

It's not the fact that he was charged that I find disturbing -- he appears to have been guilty of something -- it's the zealousness and overcharging of the prosecution in this case that's the problem. Even racist Alabama, upon finding King guilty, limited the punishment to $500 or a year in jail, not up to a million dollars or decades in the slammer if convicted. If Jim Crow justice actually looks merciful by comparison, something's gone horribly wrong.

Swartz's attorney actually said that right before Swartz's suicide, he'd negotiated a plea bargain that would have resulted in no jail time at all, but that MIT had vetoed it.

Hey, don't harsh their buzz.

(CNN) -- The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was called a communist, an outside agitator and a drum major for righteousness.
But now a growing number of people are calling King something else: A conservative icon.
As the nation celebrates King's national holiday Monday, a new battle has erupted over his legacy. Some conservatives are saying it's time for them to reclaim the legacy of King, whose message of self-help, patriotism and a colorblind America, they say, was "fundamentally conservative."
But those who marched with King and studied his work say that notion is absurd. The political class that once opposed King, they argue, is now trying to distort his message.

Sometimes they are so free and unthinking wrt that it is rather insulthing and deserves insult in kind.

I just poked into the JSTOR/Swartz thing. We do that all the time, although we have subscriptions to all the journals. We don't let people download them, but we point text indexers at them.

It's relatively easy to accidentally DOS (Denial of Service) journal sites (or even PubMed) downloading PDFs or other webservices. Usually you just get an email and your IP address blocked.

But if he's publishing the material, ya, they will get after him.

Yes, because Democrats didn't engage in political brinksmanship as well at all. Nope, not our young handsome heroes!

You seem to have me confused with someone else, Dan. Rather than rise to the bait (although come on, how could you not find this guy handsome), I'll just say I think you're misleading yourself if you think that (a) the 2006 vote on the debt ceiling bore any resemblance to the 2011-and-after votes on the debt ceiling, or that (b) the Democrats engaged in similar brinksmanship to the Republicans in either case.

Threatening not to permit the increase the debt ceiling and thus run the risk of default and tanking the economy if you don't get your way, even when your own party leader's debt reduction plan (Paul Ryan's Path to Prosperity) didn't balance the budget for ~20 years, and that was with (IMO) optimistic revenue assumptions...that is not a good faith negotiation.

"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. . . . It is a sign that the U.S. government can't pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our government's reckless fiscal policies. … Leadership means that 'the buck stops here.' Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better. I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America's debt limit."

— some United States senator, 2006

Attacking a politician for changing his mind about an issue politicians invented is about the weakest of weak sauce one could possibly come up with.

— some United States senator, 2006

interestingly, also back in 2006, john boehner, eric cantor, paul ryan, bobby jindal, darryl issa, pete sessions, tom delay, and pete hoekstra voted on a debt ceiling bill. i wonder whether their position has changed?

It's like the guy was out playing the role of anarchist internet activist going against the man, but then completely freaked his #### when it turned out that the man was actually powerful and intent on maintaining the status quo of his power and authority in the world. It seems Swarz was approaching his "activism" as a bit of trust fund dillitente role playing rather than real action in the world, and the world came up to brutally burst his bubble.

That's an unfair characterization, based on what I've read. I don't think that just by being a non-violent activist you should be automatically held to the MLK gold standard. His suicide should not cast a shadow over all the real good he did as an activist, and should not call into question the sincerity or seriousness of his prior actions.

#1792: "Hey guys, I posted this once already, and no one cared, so I posted again asking why no one cared and still no one responded, so now I'm reposting it, in hopes that someone will care this time."

Bad form.

The Dems in 2006 had secret future knowledge that it wouldn't? They simply lucked out that one of their bullets didn't kill a hostage. Why do you defend hostage takers?

You call it luck, I call it a reasonable assessment of risk that everyone else understood and made at the time.

First of all, Dan's completely forgetting the 'Hastert Rule' -- previous debt ceiling hikes had, indeed, always passed under split Congress/Pres scenarios, but with the minority (President's) party supplying almost all the votes.

The Hastert Rule mucked that up -- because it meant Boehner wouldn't bring a bill to floor that could pass with majority Dem support.

The Dems don't have a 'Hastert rule' -- Pelosi brought a number of bills to the floor during her speakership that got less than majority Dem support...

In fact - if you want a difference between this GOP caucus and similar Dem caucuses in reverse circumstances, look at the 2008 bailout...

You had a GOP President more reviled than any President on his way out the door since probably Hoover... You had a Democrat running against "him" as a proxy, even as John McCain was actually on the ballot.

Suddenly, Lehman collapses, Bush's treasury secretary is asking for blank checks or the world dies, etc... Did the Democrats extract anything from the GOP President? Universal health care? An immediate end to Iraq? Expansion of Medicare?

Nope - Pelosi got Bush the votes... Dems didn't like it, they got beat up for it, but this monstrosity that everyone seemed to be saying was absolutely necessary got passed with Democratic votes for a proposal from a Republican President everyone hated.

#1782 Nothing unusual about activists not wanting to pay the price of civil disobedience. King is not the norm.

Saw an interview with Alan Dershowitz on this subject and I found it fascinating. (And yes, YMMV on Dershowitz)

It's part of the unavoidable essence of adversarial proceedings that neither party will tend to negotiate with itself. Both sides will take extreme positions at the outset. Indeed, it's done here in argument with practically every post.

That's a filthy lie, but no more than I'd expect from a Communist and a sodomite.

Saw an interview with Alan Dershowitz on this subject and I found it fascinating. (And yes, YMMV on Dershowitz)

He sometimes has interesting things to say, my problem with Dershowitz is that he's such a loathsome scumbag it pretty overrides anything worthwhile he may have to say.