Day: May 30, 2009

POLITICAL: Teen Age Driver’s decals are age-ism!

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.mycentraljersey.com/article/20090531/OPINION02/905310313/-1/STOCK01

Decals for teen drivers bit silly, don’t you think?
May 31, 2009

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There has been a great deal of debate about the efficacy of placing decals on the vehicles of drivers under the age of 21. Apparently the reason is that other drivers will know that vehicle is being driven by a young driver and, as a response, alter their own behavior. Otherwise, what is the point? A plausible argument can be made that this legislation does not go far enough. It should be implemented worldwide for American citizens.

Many of our Bradley fighting vehicles and Humvees patrolling the streets of Mosul and Abu Hishma in Iraq are being driven by young soldiers. How many Abrahms tanks are being driven in the mountains of Afghanistan by Marines under the age of 21? Here in New Jersey we know these men and women are not smart enough, as my mother always says, to come in out of the rain. After a combat tour or two, they can come home to New Jersey and buy a soda and talk with their friends down at the local teen social center about buddies who lost limbs or were killed in combat. On the other hand they are not mature enough to vote, purchase alcoholic beverages or buy a pack cigarettes.

As for driving a car, they are not to be trusted. Navigating the mean streets of Manville or Raritan is far more dangerous and complicated than driving through a combat zone in Iraq or Afghanistan with an insurgent sniper drawing a bead on your left eye.

As a country that prides itself on truth and fair play, don’t we owe it to the Taliban and al-Qaida to let them know when a Humvee they are about to blow up with a roadside bomb is being driven by a person under the age of 21? When the insurgents are planning an ambush, they need to know if the soldiers are under 21 so they can be careful.

Sometimes those kids drive a little too fast and that throws the timing of their IEDs off. Not fair play.

What we need is an ad hoc coalition of concerned citizen volunteers from New Jersey to go into combat zones and affix decals to vehicles being driven by American GIs under the age of 21. Any takers?

AMBROSE J. NELSON
South Amboy

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Yes! I think we should round up all the Trenton Politicians who voted for this non-sense and ship them to AfPak for “labeling” duty.

I’ll go one step further.

As a little L libertarian, I think we need to eliminate ALL drug, licensing, and most of the other “laws”.

If you’re not ready to go that far, see if you’ll take this FIRST step.

We “ask” children to go fight for us. Whatever age we “allow” someone to go get killed “for us”, then they have the RIGHT as a full citizen. Period! No restrictions.

If you agree with that first step, how about this SECOND step.

Our culture doesn’t teach youngsters to drink alcohol responsibly. So let’s take the age restriction off completely. Let’s encourage experimentation and education, long before they get to college. There they kill themselves drinking with their new found freedom.

If you agree with that second step, how about trying a THIRD step.

The pseudo “Drug War”is killing children is so many ways. Drug overdoses are a direct result of impure mislabeled and / or adulterated products. They are “products”. Just because they are “illegal” doesn’t take them off the market to children. Most will agree that MJ is MORE available than beer. Our prisons are filled with non-violent drug offenders. The addiction rate is far above the “natural addiction” rate. So, let’s get real here. The DEA is a total failure. They say insanity is “doing more of the same and expecting different results”. Lets admit defeat in the drug war. From Afgan to Columbia, a bunch of bad guys are profiting from our stupidity. And the children are the casualties in this war. It’s estimate that if “drugs” were not illegal, the cost of “drugs” would be comparable to aspirin. So let’s turn loose our “secret weapon” on the Drug Lords and Gangs … … WalMart! If drugs were a legal product, they’d take care of the problem. We’d turn prisoners into patients.

Laws aren’t the answer; common sense and liberty is the only workable answer.

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LIBERTY: “Too big to fail” is a gooferment failure

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http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=12177

Break Up These Banks
by: Mike Lux
Thu Mar 12, 2009 at 17:00

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I also fundamentally agree with David Sirota that if these corporations are too big to fail, then they are too big to exist: a proposition also agreed to by the populists and progressives of the late 1800s/early 1900s, by Abe Lincoln, by Teddy Roosevelt, by FDR, by Harry Truman. Progressives of all eras have understood that corporations that grow too enormous threaten our economy and our democracy, and should be woken up into smaller entities that can’t do so much damage when they are mismanaged. The era of bank consolidation has to come to an end, and these monsters need to be broken into smaller companies just like Standard Oil was in the early 1900s.

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Very good point.

“To big to fail, then they are too big”

It would seem that’s a great principle of regulation!

Wonder why none of the “brains” ever thought of it?

Could it be that the politicians need things big to get political contributions?

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TECHNOLOGY: Microsoft slips a “vulnerability” into Firefox

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2009/05/microsoft_update_quietly_insta.html

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When I first learned of this, three thoughts immediately flashed through my mind:

1) How the %#@! did I miss this?

2) The right way would have been to just publish the add-on at Mozilla’s Add Ons page.

3) This kind of makes you wonder what else MS is installing without your knowledge.

Then I found that I wasn’t the only one who had these ideas. Microsoft has heard these criticisms from others who long ago commented on this unfortunate development (see the comments underneath this post).

Anyway, I’m sure it’s not the end of the world, but it’s probably infuriating to many readers nonetheless. Firstly — to my readers — I apologize for overlooking this…”feature” of the .NET Framework security update. Secondly — to Microsoft — this is a great example of how not to convince people to trust your security updates.

By Brian Krebs | May 29, 2009; 7:40 AM ET

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One reason that I have left the Microsoft “flock” is their continued insistence on “secret hidden updates”. It similar to the problem of “cloud computing” in that your “production quality” software changes under your very nose!

The other huge reason is WGA aka as “You Pirate; You Screwed”. (I’ve had more legitimate copies of XP “nuked” by WGA after all sorts of trivial events!)

Linux everywhere anyone?

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RANT: The goofment punishes taxpayers?

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.lifenews.com/state4165.html

Louisiana Nurse Wins State Supreme Court Battle in Plan B Conscience Case
by Steven Ertelt LifeNews.com Editor
May 20, 2009

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Baton Rouge, LA (LifeNews.com) — A Louisiana nurse won her battle at the state Supreme Court last Friday when it refused to hear a hospital’s appeal of a lower court decision siding with her. The nurse, Toni Lemly, sued St. Tammany Parish Hospital in 2005 after it refused to grant a reasonable accommodation for her religious beliefs.

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See this is where it gets confusing to me.

The hospital is the gooferment for all intents and purposes.

The Constitution says we have religious freedom.

So now we taxpayers have to pay for when the gooferment doesn’t follow its own rules.

And, exactly how does this punish anyone but the taxpayer?

Can I get off this delusional merry go round? It’s making me sick.

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