Chief Justice John Roberts Upholds the Affordable Care Act : The New Yorker
Chief Justice John Roberts Upholds the Affordable Care Act : The New Yorker.
I’ve been impressed by the sheer quantity of adulation poured on Roberts’ head for his ACA decision by self-proclaimed liberals: people who should know better. I was amazed because Roberts’ seemingly reluctant decision did on the face of it quite a lot of damage. Yes, it upheld the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) but it did so by gutting the accepted and fairly unquestioned power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce. Put another way, as I see it, the power of the Federal government has just been put into question, at least as it pertains to an enormous volume of interstate commerce.
So it was with pleasure I read Toobin’s analysis: it reflected my own judgment and again made me wonder: Why are liberals so very eager to hail Roberts and anoint him so quickly–without thinking through the problem now presenting itself? People: It’s not as if the far-right wing of the court has at all been weakened. It hasn’t. In fact, the opposite arguably obtains. So….? Why the celebration? Yes, the woefully inadequate and deeply problematic ACA has been preserved, but isn’t that a reason then for moving aggressively to protect other rights we have seen put into jeopardy? Isn’t it time, in fact, to attack the retrogressive agenda of the right, when it seems–seems, not is–in some disarray and split?
ircmaxells blog: The True Problem With PHP
ircmaxells blog: The True Problem With PHP.
An interesting summary, though not sure I’m persuaded. But the problem described–one of community and its identity–is probably true for many Foss communities. Actually, I’d be interested to learn of those that do not suffer from fracture. (And isn’t it the privilege of open source to have forking rights? A fork is not necessarily a death; the opposite is often true. The further virtue is that the risks–economic, technological, social–are simply lower with a lot of open source endeavours, though not for all.)
FRED WILSON: Mobile Is Where The Growth Is – Business Insider
FRED WILSON: Mobile Is Where The Growth Is – Business Insider.
Is it just me or is this not obvious? And has been so for years. Or do these coming in from older generations still see computer technology (even the term stinks of fustian age) as something “new,” the way that, say, the NYTimes continues to place “Technology” in a separate section.
It’s not just that “technology,” that “computers” that ICT in general are now ubiquitous and even definitive of the New Modernity. It’s that all this fascination with what the aged would call gizmos and so on obfuscates the reality of work, use, distribution characterizing modern ICT economies. Actually, outside of ProPublica’s periodic articles on the issue, it’s probably only the NYT’s iEconomy articles that take the needed steps to comprehend the economic logistics of this present world. And that’s just a start. For instance: The role of ICT in, say, Africa or Brazil or India is not about cool gizmos but about necessary communications and the shift from traditional economic practice (read: farming built during an epoch of climate benevolence–the not now world of Global Climate Change or Hell on Earth, HoE) to economic modalities that are slowly being established to accommodate the displaced, displacing workforce. Not about gizmos and not really about survival but all about sustainability: Living today so that we can live tomorrow.
In New Jersey Halfway Houses, Escapees Stream Out as a Penal Business Thrives – NYTimes.com
In New Jersey Halfway Houses, Escapees Stream Out as a Penal Business Thrives – NYTimes.com.
Some more on prisons for profit, and not for much of anything else.
Private prison companies look to Canada as industry faces lawsuits in US World news guardian.co.uk
Private prison companies look to Canada as industry faces lawsuits in US World news guardian.co.uk.
Oh, no. I’ve been tracking ProPublica’s (and others’) account of the emergence of the privatized prison system in the US, and it’s frightening. And even more so to think of it finding a place in Canada. Privatizing social works and services is a generally bad idea and in prisons, as with medical care and education, all the more fraught. Private prisons exist by housing prisoners, meaning that the more the local juridical system produces them, the better the locality where the private prison is located (employment, taxes). It goes further. Prison labour is cheap and not unionized. These, alas, are not idle connections.
Future forecast looks fearsome | Local | News | St. Thomas Times-Journal
Future forecast looks fearsome | Local | News | St. Thomas Times-Journal.
I tend to see the report cited here conservative, given the gross uncertainties regarding specific effects produced by the huge introduction of moisture into the atmosphere and the increased population densities….. And yet, no surprise, Canada joins the other wilfully blind polities in neglecting work on policy that would mitigate the inevitable damages.
John Dickie on the Italian Mafia | FiveBooks | The Browser
John Dickie on the Italian Mafia | FiveBooks | The Browser.
A good account. The ‘Ndrangheta of Calabria are strong in Toronto, it seems. See, for instance, this article.
Secret ‘Kill List’ Tests Obama’s Principles – NYTimes.com
Secret ‘Kill List’ Tests Obama’s Principles – NYTimes.com.
It’s an interesting article and is one of the few in the definitively mainstream US press that actually presses the claims of the administration to execute whomever they deem worthy of such extreme prejudice. But what I found interesting, too, was the rhetoric used in the account, in particular, the use of “lawyer” and “lawyerly,” and cognates, to describe Obama, his reasoning, and dodges. I suppose I found it interesting because the rhetoric was so obvious in its condemnation that I wondered, Why not simply say, I accuse! I think that would have carried greater not less moral weight. As it was, the article’s rhetorical ploys grated, and made me wonder if there was some other agenda at play demanding the sliming and indirection. Wouldn’t it have been more morally and ethically direct and honest simply to state the evidence (if not the facts), the reasoning, as surmised by witnesses and by the reporters and editors, and–at really any point–a clarion accusation and reasons for the accusation? For what it seems now is that Obama is worse for being a lawyer (and doing those slimy lawyer things we all know about, and they are always dodgy) than morally traducing not just the expectations his credulous voters held but the morals and ethics most people seem to hold. The state of war may legitimate the institutionalization of killing–not that that is good but it’s legally defensible–but killing by state institutions doesn’t make for defensible war; it doesn’t (necessarily) make it legitimate at all. (Foreign Policy has a fairly good critique and justified condemnation of the policy and acts coming out of it.)
Big Data Troves Stay Forbidden to Social Scientists – NYTimes.com
Big Data Troves Stay Forbidden to Social Scientists – NYTimes.com.
Another interesting article on the perennially fascinating complexity that is privacy. Sometimes, I think that the idea of privacy, especially the American one, resembles the 19th century notion of nature, a notion that today can be thought of as cartoon simplicity that confuses more than it helps, and that perpetuates a belief in bounded objects when in fact there is little that is not always in flux. Even death, life, is better understood as an ecological process, not a state leading to being or nothingness. To articulate privacy, we need to start with the recognition that it’s a process, and not really a contract, though that can happen. But the step into this process is for most people happening with blinding speed, and only retrospectively, and with some horror, do so many realize that the private words and acts and pictures they posted to share with friend if anyone are now part of a very public–globally and perpetually public–narrative that haunts the once-private individual. Today, the confession spoken in privacy and otherworldly listening under the assurance of absolute boundedness more accurately resembles the shameful secret whispered far and wide by the reeds growing from the muddy hole Midas shouted into, falsely believing that his isolation actually meant invisibility and anonymity.
Exporting copyright: Inside the secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership | Ars Technica
Exporting copyright: Inside the secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership | Ars Technica.
*Read* the article. It’s excellent, and very informative.
I’ve been involved but mostly as a follower IP discussions over the last couple of years. They’ve grown quite interesting. Ever since ACTA ground our faces into the notion that some copyright legislation “must” be worked out and agreed upon in *secret*, the politics of IP–global as well as national–have become inescapable, at least to me, and I think many others.
The issues are hardly as abstract as “intellectual property” would suggest. They have to do with the way many of us not only make our living but simply do our living, and they put under legal scrutiny local and regional community formations, as well as international ones.
newspeak 