JasonN.com - public law

A different take on freedom: Turkey's constitutional ban on head scarfs

Fri, 06 Jun 2008 08:23:33 -0500

Turkey is a free country. The people are free to worship as they wish, travel, vote, conduct business, and all the other things that western liberal democracies allow their citizens. Recently, Turkey's government has become more Islamic in nature due to its free elections. However, the courts made an impressive move to stand firm on constitutional law banning religious elements in public spaces. It's a very interesting take on separation of church and state.

The Constitutional Court said in a brief statement that the change, proposed by Mr. Erdogan’s party and passed by Parliament in February, violated principles of secularism set in Turkey’s Constitution.
-- NY Times

Soak the Rich

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 10:33:39 -0500

Historically, federal taxes have averaged about 18.5 percent of the gross domestic product.

That percentage sank to 16.3 percent of the G.D.P. in 2004, largely because of Mr. Bush’s tax cuts, but it edged up to 18.8 percent last year as a result of booming corporate profits and investment income.
- NY Times

That means the rich paid more tax and nobody raised taxes. Is that possible?

Sun on the Litigation War Path Again

Sat, 27 Oct 2007 19:18:28 -0500

"In addition to seeking the removal of their products from the marketplace, we will be going after sizable monetary damages. And I am committing that Sun will donate half of those proceeds to the leading institutions promoting free software and patent reform (in specific, The Software Freedom Law Center and the Peer to Patent initiative), and to the legal defense of free software innovators. We will continue to fund the aggressive reexamination of spurious patents used against the community (which we've been doing behind the scenes on behalf of several open source innovators). Whatever's left over will fuel a venture fund fostering innovation in the free software community."

Wow, Sun is on a litigation and public relations warpath again. Last time they focussed on Microsoft, won the suit, lost big time in their market cap because they were perceived by investors as they perceived the game themselves, to be playing in the small (personal style) server space instead of the big iron business, where they were once the heavy weights.

Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Act and Development

Mon, 14 May 2007 07:02:34 -0500

SOX has an interesting set of impact features for tech. This article has some good intel.

SaaS and GPL Infections

Fri, 09 Mar 2007 16:09:25 -0600

Companies like Google and Barracuda Networks use open source software to run their companies, often modifying the code to provide a service, bundling commercial (privately owned) software together with open source software and providing services that run on open source software, but not distributing their modifications. The issue at hand is whether or not a company can modify open source software and use it in their services without distributing their modifications to competing service providers.

Thou Shalt Not Deny Global Warming, So Sayeth the Senators!

Mon, 04 Dec 2006 13:59:52 -0600

A letter from Senators Rockefeller and Snowe warn Exxon Mobile that they should get on board with the universal doctrine of global warming.

Americans Voted for More Tax, More Spending

Wed, 08 Nov 2006 18:54:10 -0600

[WARNING: THIS IS SARCASM] In a sweeping win, Democrats took both houses, proving that Americans want more spending, more social welfare programs, and big big taxes!

AP Reports

The new masters of the House, the Democrats, are promoting an economic agenda that would put more money in the pockets of ordinary citizens and government, while leading to greater oversight of big business.

Is that really what Americans voted for? Do most voters want more taxes and obstructive government regulations on business. No. People were mad at the Republicans for failing to curtail spending and executing the war in Iraq with the vigor and overwhelming force we demand.

The average American thinks Democrats will control government growth and kill more terrorists than Republicans. Why do they believe this? That's what Democrats campaigned on. Democrats who won did not campaign on withdrawal from Iraq or increased taxes

My ID Theft Experience

Thu, 12 Oct 2006 10:48:44 -0500

I was cleaning out my credit cobwebs, and clearing up some tax bills when I found out my state issued a Driver's License to someone with my social security number. That someone didn't use my name, address, or any other ID. He just hijacked my social security number.

At this point, I don't know if it was a simple clarical error (though schocking nobody picked up on it) or intentional fraud. Unfortunately, it is more likely it was fraud.

It's a Series of Tubes

Tue, 25 Jul 2006 08:10:11 -0500

If you've not heard clips of Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska ranting about how the internet is a series of tubes, you're officially not in the internet lifestyle at all. Net neutrality is the latest land grab the [US] federal government is trying to sell the American consumer. And, to his credit, Senator Stevens complained that he didn't think the senate knew enough about the internet and the bill to adequately determine its potential impact. And, for all the laughing, he's correct on that point: senators don't know enough about the internet to regulate it properly.

Spyware or Antivirus: Both Cripple Your PC

Mon, 10 Jul 2006 17:53:50 -0500

An MSNBC article discusses a recent law suit filed by the New York State Attorney General against Direct Revenue, a very lucrative spyware company.

Most users don't care about law suits, and wraggling, etc. They just want these resource thieves to go away. If they died, that wouldn't upset most PC users. But, the big thing is, we're tired of fighting for the right to use the hardware and software we paid to use!

Kenya Suspends California Styled Public Smoking Ban

Thu, 01 Jun 2006 03:07:17 -0500

You wouldn't think Kenya's biggest health problem, or primary health concern would be discouraging tobacco use. BBC reports the legal battle ensues over the government's legal right to ban smoking in public.

There has also been confusion about where people can smoke as the law is vague in defining a "public place".

...

Under the ban, those caught smoking in offices, bus stations, airports and sports venue would face a fine of 50,000 Kenya shillings ($700; £375) or six months in prison.

Communist Revolutionaries, Illegal Immigrants, the Protests, and Anger

Mon, 01 May 2006 23:49:48 -0500

Glenn Reynolds is DEAD ON RIGHT!

People are talking about backlash, and how these rallies are counterproductive. That's probably right, but I think that's what the A.N.S.W.E.R. folks are hoping for. Right now you have lots of immigrants who want to be part of America. The A.N.S.W.E.R. people have been stoking these demonstrations not because they want to help illegal immigrants, but because they hope to provoke a backlash that will make them angry at America instead. They don't have short-term ameliorative political goals -- they want shock troops for the revolution.

It was no accident that the organizers scheduled the rally for May Day, though most of the protestors likely weren't socialists.

My position is that we should control our borders. That's not anti-immigration. It's rational. Mexico isn't in charge of our borders, and neither is anybody else. America is. If Americans are too cowardly to stop drugs, criminals, and other unwanted traffic, that's the beginning of our nation's downfall. You can be pro-immigrant and anti-open border. The two are not exclusive. Hard working immigrants of all kinds make America strong. That's a completely unrelated topic to the real problem of our unprotected borders.

Next, as a nation we should embrace everyone in our country. We should work to ingratiate ourselves to them, whether they intend to stay or not. Getting angry at people that are here to provide for themselves and their families doesn't solve any problem, it just fuels potential friction we don't need.

Does China Sell Organs Taken from Executions?

Tue, 18 Apr 2006 21:33:34 -0500

China's medical tourism business has made all sorts of treatments, illegal or unacceptable in western countries, very lucrative in this growing industry.

Top British transplant surgeons have accused China of harvesting the organs of thousands of executed prisoners a year to sell for transplants. - BBC

Why shouldn't the government take good body parts from criminals and give them to willing and paying patients? Isn't that another one of our cheesy western hangups, best left to the internal debates, or lack thereof. For that matter, it's all global capitalism, right? Is it anybody's business to tell China they can't sell organs from whomever they want to take? Most of us pesky moralists would say yes.

Who Will Take Care of Your Golf Courses?

Sun, 02 Apr 2006 15:02:49 -0500

"You and I are beneficiaries of these jobs," Bloomberg told his WABC-AM radio co-host, John Gambling. "You and I both play golf; who takes care of the greens and the fairways in your golf course?" - UPI

You just can't make this stuff up.

City Employee Threatens CentOS for "Hacking"

Mon, 27 Mar 2006 09:24:07 -0600

This story would be funny if it weren't an example of dangerous ingorance, where a city employee accuses a Linux distributor of criminal action because their web server doesn't work. He calls a default Apache Web Server message a "hack." OK, it's funny anyway. The exchange and fact that he expected a distributor of Linux software to repair his web server is hillarious. Especially funny is how one of the city's websites still isn't corrected.