It's true that electronic voting machines can be rigged. It's also true that paper ballot elections can be run dishonestly. Literally "stuffing the ballot box" can an does happen, as can the opposite, omitting ballots or entire boxes from the count. Voting machines (the mechanical kind) were originally introduced largely to deal with the weaknesses of a paper ballot system. I think that mechanical "lever" voting machines, and not paper ballots, are the "gold standard" in tamper-resistant voting technology. With today's advances in metallurgy and composite materials, they can be made to be more reliable than the models that were used until recently, which unfortunately are no longer being made.
Absolutely spot on. Glad to hear someone say it.
According to the judge's opinion, he would have issued a default judgement against Obama, meaning that Obama would have been off the Georgia ballot, except for the fact that the plaintiffs specifically ASKED FOR A DECISION ON THE MERITS instead. The judge did not believe the case against Obama had been proven, so he ruled "on the merits" that Obama's name could stay on the ballot. If Taitz and her clients had taken the default judgement, Obama would be OFF the ballot. Maybe an appeal could have got him back on, maybe not, but it would have been a significant victory, one the Obama camp could not ignore. You have to wonder what is really going on.
"Abnormalities" is a loaded word that really shouldn't be used in this context. Yes, people who become addicts are usually people who had certain predispositions that led them to become addicts. That shouldn't be a surprise. Nor should the fact that it may be possible to identify those predispositions with certain differences in brain structure. But they are still just differences, not abnormalities, as evidenced by the fact that their siblings with those same brain differences did not become addicts. Scientists need to abandon the notion that any trait that's not what they would consider ideal is "abnormal".
Yeah, just speaking and asking her to move should be OK. I guess it's a question of how insistent, and how disturbing to the rest of the bus, he became.
Enforced segregation on a public bus line can't be tolerated. But maybe these buses should be redesignated as "private" buses for members of Haredi congregations. One synagogue could be the official operator of the bus for its members. A sign in the bus window would explain that, and also explain that, as a courtesy, they will allow non-members to ride their private bus, provided they make a small contribution towards the operating expense (i.e. pay a fare) and respect the customs of the people running it (i.e. modest dress and separation of men and women). This solution might work in Brooklyn too, where a privately-owned "public" bus line, known as the B110, has had the same issue come up.
This is insane. If the growers or sellers of Christmas trees want to advertise, they can. They don't need a Federal board to "promote" the industry. In fact, I don't think it is the Federal government's job to promote any particular industry, so the Commodity Promotion etc. Act ought to be repealed. I guess some may be glad that the board is called the "Christmas Tree" promotion board, and not "Holiday Tree" whatever. But that is hardly a valid reason for implementing this.
Why does this New Black Panther leader use the name Malik Shabazz? That, of course, was the name adopted by the former Malcolm X when he realized that his previous Nation of Islam-inspired idea that all white men were "devils" was just plain wrong, and that people of ALL colors deserved respect and equality. But the ideas of this Malik Zulu Shabazz seem closer to those of the NOI's Malcolm than to those of the post-Hajj Malik Shabazz, so I repeat, why does he use the name?
This is the government we fought "Desert Storm" to reinstall back in the 1990s. Is the U.S. uttering even one word of protest against it perpetrating this kind of despotism?
John Quincy Adams once said of the United States, "She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own." Today's U.S. government honors neither half of that formula.
The United States should tell Morsi and his cronies that we will have no tolerance for his "no tolerance for insults" policies. If he wants continued support from the West (without which I don't think he would have achieved his current position), he must release Mahfuz immediately. (Of course, if we don't admit giving him support in the first place, it is hard to publicly threaten to withdraw that support. But a clear message sent privately might do some good.)
It's not the history of the maid that the defense team should be looking at, but that of her supervisor(s). Specifically, who told her that the suite Strauss-Kahn was in was empty, and that she should go in and clean it? How and why did she come to be told that? She has said that she WAS told that. I think Strauss-Kahn was likely expecting someone else - a prostitute, to be blunt about it - but someone arranged to have the call girl cancelled, and to have the real hotel maid sent in instead. The result, as intended, was this "assault" and the end of Strauss-Kahn's career. From the maid's perspective, it WAS an assault, but from Strauss-Kahn's, it wasn't (because he thought the maid was a hooker). So they should focus on who sent the maid, not on the maid herself.
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Ruckus