s0crates

So I have to admit I haven't watched much basketball in years, but I don't remember it being a full contact sport with fouls every other possession. Is that just how the game is now or is this an aberration?

Her superior should tell her to use discretion. I wouldn't call it ignoring the law any more than I would say a cop who doesn't stop people for doing 67 in a 65 zone is ignoring the law. You don't think a cop's job involves using good judgement? Talk about not making sense. I've already addressed this slippery slope argument above. It's really a very silly point if you think about it.

Meh. You're nit-picking. All he was charged with was the headlight. The cop perhaps thought, wrongly, that there was more. It sounds like the prosecutor knew better. And, for the record, you cannot be held long without formal charges. I didn't say that. I said she should have used common sense and left the kids alone. I would hope one of her superiors tells her as much.

There is a video of this a page or two back. She was polite enough, although there was no "wink, wink" deal as kosher ham suggests. It would have been better if she had left the kids alone.

I think the climate change debate is a bit of a red herring. Even assuming the majority of scientists (who admittedly fudge data all the time) are wrong about climate change, burning fossil fuels still has an obvious environmental impact. Consider for example the smog in China or the high childhood asthma rates in LA. Anybody who thinks all the combustion of fossil fuels is harmless should try sitting in his garage with the car running or living next door to a coal fired power plant.

I wonder what compassion has to do with it.

Nothing in there about possession or DWI charges . . .

Sounds like that's all the cop had on him, and all he charged him with. Since he did go to jail on that charge, the answer to your question is yes. Here's everything the article says about his case: Now it does sound like the cop suspected him of something else (dealing weed), but he didn't have any evidence to support that charge.

I don't think that would work. Let me provide a counter-example. Suppose I take a traffic ticket to court. Say I was speeding. Imagine my lawyer gives the following argument: "Your honor, my client was not the only person speeding that day. Several other speeders were allowed to travel unmolested. If the highway patrol cannot be bothered to stop those drivers, then I cannot see legally why my client should be forced to travel the speed limit." Do you think that argument would work? I don't. I'm sorry, but I'm just not buying the idea that ignoring little kids selling lemonade would prevent prosecution of shady businesses. I'm not saying to take the laws off the books, I'm saying that an officer should use some common sense. You can let a guy go for doing 66 in a 65 and still stop a guy for doing 80.

I'm all for shutting down dirty restaurants and shady businesses. No argument there. It's the connection between that and little kids selling lemonade I'm having a hard time seeing. How exactly would not bothering those kids enable the shady businesses? Are you saying that a cop ignoring the kids would set some kind of legal precedent? If so, I'm not buying it. Failure to prosecute one person doesn't exempt another from prosecution, does it? If one guy gets away with a crime, it doesn't prevent somebody else from being charged with one, as far as I know. When I get stopped for speeding, the law won't buy the excuse that the guy ahead of me was speeding too.

So kids' lemonade stands are a slippery slope to what exactly? Unregulated restaurants? I don't see it. Yes. There are two guys named Brown in the story, try not to get them confused. The guy named Tommy Brown went to jail for a headlight, it was the guy named Albert Brown who had the drugs. Tommy's case is notable because the officer completely overreacted. Albert's case is notable because the officer failed to follow the law, resulting in the drug charges being dropped. Both are clear cases of the officer bullying black people, which is what I find unsurprising. The writer could have made the distinction between the two clearer, but you could have read more carefully too.

Sure there is a lot of alarmism in the news, but there are also real problems. NY is doing a lot of engineering to protect its shorelines; consider Sandy for example. http://www.nyc.gov/html/sirr/downloads/pdf/final_report/Ch3_Coastal_FINAL_singles.pdf

Surprise, surprise.

Really? Well put.

This post is outrageous. By the same logic, you could say that the easiest thing to do in communist Russia was to submit to Stalin's authority. That way you wouldn't have to go to the gulag camps. Otherwise you'd have to try to reform the system, which would just be too hard. But who cares about our rights anyway? Ridiculous. The way people are submissively going along with the police state in this country is deeply troubling to me. We have the largest per capita prison population, a growing surveillance state, everyday incidents of police brutality, militarized police, and hordes of people actually think that is a good thing. Whatever happened to liberty and justice for all?

When you give a guy a badge . . . http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment

Sounds unconstitutional. Not that they believe in the US Constitution there . . .

That was aimed at you in particular, just all the excuse making in general, hence the phrase "no excuse."

Some people . . . There is no justification for what that cop did to that girl.

Salvage yards are good for stuff like this (fender, random plastic piece).I had my Integra painted about 8 years ago at Maaco. I got the cheapest option, it was like 300 bucks IIRC, but it looked good, and the paint has held up well, even with 5 years in the Phoenix sun. Speaking of my Integra, I'm looking to sell it. It's a '95 w/ 180k miles, new tires, new distributer, runs good (just drove it 2300 miles, no problems). It has no stereo or speakers, and slightly bent rotors on the drivers side (because it was stolen and stripped last year). Also the ABS computer is on the fritz, goes on and off. Any idea what I should ask for it? I'm thinking like $2k maybe, but I would probably take $1.5k. It pains me to get rid of it honestly. It has sentimental value: It's been reliable (I've put 100k miles on it with only basic maintenance), it's made several cross country trips, and it's lasted longer and been more faithful than my last three GFs. But the insurance is too high for a car I barely drive now, $70 a month for liability (red sports car, stupid insurance companies think that matters, despite no accidents or violations in over a decade, the ****ers, my comprehensive coverage on my new Civic costs about the same). IDK, I have half a mind to keep the thing for five years so I can stick antique tags on it, but I'd be interested in a ballpark figure on what the thing is worth.

Sometimes I think twa is doing satire . . .

If you want to make a case for sports fixing, then this is exhibit A: