Subj : Re: How much should I charge for fixed-price software contract? To : comp.programming From : Richard Heathfield Date : Mon Aug 22 2005 02:30 pm Randy Howard wrote: > Richard Heathfield wrote > (in article > ): > >> ([Freedom of speech is] on its way out, though, so get some while >> stocks last.) > > Same here. Along with every other right brave 'patriots' once > fought and died for against your folks a couple centuries ago. (sigh) I dealt with this years ago. A bunch of people went to the New World partly to escape oppression. Those who remained were just as oppressed as those who left. I suppose it's true that a people gets the government it deserves, though, so perhaps you have a point. But if your country declared war on my country later today, I would assume that your government, rather than the people of the USA, were to be blamed. >>> I tend to agree. However, I have more worrying things to be >>> concerned about, such as the so-called "PATRIOT Act", which is >>> basically a government coup over the US Constitution. Copyright >>> violations are oh so lesser in importance compared to the loss >>> of all freedom in the country. >> >> Indeed (although in fact even Adobe would have to acknowledge that >> Sklyarov and Elcomsoft did not breach copyright!). > > I doubt Adobe would acknowledge anything like that, but you're > welcome to contact their press office and try to obtain one. :-) Heh. Okay, I was making the foolish assumption that they'd have to acknowledge the truth. Duh @ me. >> I am under the impression that a US law which contradicts the US >> Constitution cannot be enforced. Is that impression incorrect? > > In theory it is correct. In practice, it's completely false. Nice. > The Supreme Court has decided in the last half century or so, > perhaps a bit longer, that it will do "interpret" what is good > for the people, instead of abiding strictly by the Constitution. > It is called "legislating from the bench" instead of its proper > name, "treason". I have discovered that our own government abolished the death penalty for treason in 1998. Hardly surprising, given that the ceding of national sovereignty (which they have been doing hand over fist for some years) is treason. > Of course, one way to make the passage by congress of > unconstitutional laws far less likely, is to require the death > by hanging of any congressman or senator which votes for a law > which is later found to be unconstitutional, along with the > president that signed it into law. That would obviously make > them far, far more careful about such stretches on reason, Cool idea. We could do with the same rule over here. > but will never happen, since they have to vote for it now. :-( Always a downside... >>>> Here's a little reply from your nephew Richard. If the police arrested >>>> everyone they suspected of breaking any law, the jails would be full - >>>> and many of the inmates would be policemen! >>> >>> That's true, but doesn't really answer the issue of compensation >>> at all. When there is a so-called 'flight risk' with a foreign >>> national, arrest is apparently fairly common. >> >> And should be compensated if it turns out to be wrongful arrest. That's >> common courtesy - especially with foreign nationals. > > I don't see why foreign nationals should be treated better than > citizens in their own country. It's quite often true here (note > the billions in free health care for non-US citizens here > illegally), but shouldn't be the case. I certainly don't expect > to be treated better than a citizen in any foreign country that > I visit. That is certainly an argument for treating one's own citizens better. Good; we agree. :-) > > They basically have the entire space > covered, and you are, simply be existing, guilty of something. > I wish I was joking, but I suspect it is far more true than I > like to contemplate. I, too, wish you were joking and know that you are not. Whatever happened to "government for the people by the people"? >> So maybe you didn't know there was an area in which to stay >> clear of suspicion. Just maybe you thought you could say what you like in >> a land of free speech. > > I doubt he was arrested for what he said while speaking at a > conference. If you can point to a copy of the arrest paperwork, > let me know. If that is so (and you do seem to be correct), then I don't see how the US could point to any single act he performed whilst under US jurisdiction that could reasonably construed as criminal (modulo the crime of breathing, of course - the "everyone's guilty of something" ethos). >>> but think it's okay to put people in the slammer for using the latter. >> >> I can't help thinking there must be a better solution to that problem >> than shutting people up in prison. > > Lot's of people have tried. Perhaps we could try a bit harder. > >>> That's bull, and so is >>> dicing and slicing other laws to meet individual opinion. If the >>> law itself is suspect (which the DMCA almost assuredly is) then >>> work to have it reversed. >> >> Nobody in the US Government is going to pay the slightest attention to my >> opinion on DMCA. You know it, I know it. > > Even more depressingly, nobody in the US Government is going to > pay the slightest attention to my opinion either. Unless I can > come up with about 40 million registered voters that all loudly > and violently share my opinion after waking up from their > television and high-fructose corn syrup induced coma, the feds > couldn't care less. It's all part of their plan to help us, > because they are convinced that they know better than we do how > we should live our own lives. In fact, it sounds remarkably like life in Britain under George III. >> But I think your civil liberties >> groups might be able to do something to mitigate its effects. I mean, >> chucking a guy into the clink for writing program code in another >> country? Weird. > > Civil liberties groups don't care about much beside minority > rights today. The bulk of the Bill of Rights, is completely > ignored by them, and even worse, by the education system. Then get some new civil liberties groups? > Primary level education in the US pretends like the Constitution > consists of Freedom of Speech, and nothing else. A couple more > generations through the system, and the bulk of the US > population will have been completely indoctrinated into the > notion that the government itself is their new religion. Praise Dubya. Hallelujah. > > Of course, when the government itself controls the educational > system, what would you expect? Education. I know; it's very naive of me. >> Seven shots in the back of the head, and one in the shoulder, while the >> victim was being restrained, face down, on the floor by other officers. I >> am not sure this can count as accidental or negligent discharge. You >> don't shoot a guy in the head multiple times unless you really mean to >> kill him. > > Unless the first one was an accident, and the rest were put > there to make the first one stand out less. Try as I might, I just don't see that happening. > But you are > probably correct. Unless someone decides to come clean, the > truth will never be known, and almost assuredly not by the > general population. It might be written down in some little > notebook somewhere in a file in the British secret service. > Next time you stop in to file a report on eddie, be sure and > look it up. :-) By a curious coincidence, that was just this morning - and I did pop in to take a look, but the page had blood all over it, and was completely illegible. -- Richard Heathfield "Usenet is a strange place" - dmr 29/7/1999 http://www.cpax.org.uk mail: rjh at above domain .