soda

soda 9 months ago

eses61387: my comment refers to the lack of a meaningful proposal in the main posting. Bad things may have happened to Mmehling, but what is posted here is nothing more than a "woe is me" complaint.

Posting an useful, informative proposal with implementation details is interesting. Complaining about how your life sucks because you have an autistic kid isn't.

soda 9 months ago

Clicking on a tag can get you a list of all other ideas that also have that tag. I've actually found a number of useful things in obscure or unlikely categories based on tags.

The problem is that some posters put a large number of unrelated common tags on ideas in an effort to get more people to view them. Doing this makes the tag system less effective, in that it becomes less likely that I will find what I'm looking for based on the tag fields.

One other possibility might be to only allow viewers to specify tags, with only the most common tags being displayed. This would prevent the author from gaming the idea.

soda 9 months ago

Merlin: fission, and nuclear power in general, is a rabid-dog topic when it comes to the general public - anyone who touches it gets bitten and infected.

The general public is still deathly afraid of nuclear radiation. It doesn't have to make sense; that's just the way it is. This fear in the general public is easily whipped up into legal and other witch hunts, and these witch hunts have kept new nuclear power plants off the books for decades. Fear of ending their career prevents politicians from carrying the flag against popular opinion.

Things have only recently become sufficiently dire that more rational discourse can occur.

soda 9 months ago

No, the site isn't rigged. Your posts are being eliminated because they are spam, and a lot of people like me are tired of seeing them. Speaking of which, time to mark this idea as spam as well...

soda 9 months ago

Is this yet another veiled attempt to get someone to investigate Obama's birth certificate? Just curious.

soda 9 months ago

This is a good idea. I often see posts that contain too many ideas to be digestible; or alternately, a single screed of incomprehensible material that seems to go on forever. There are also ideas that I agree in large part with, but cannot vote for due to some isolated yet critical failing that could be easily separated.

(If the president should get line item veto, why can't I have it here?)

Having a two page word limit would require that only the most important parts of the idea be posted. Single ideas that only change one aspect of things are also much more likely to be implementable than sweeping reforms.

soda 9 months ago

Unfortunately, this type of requirement is completely pointless in a real political environment. Like so many other things, all existing laws that are eligible for expiry will simply be renewed en-banc without review.

In short, congress will simply vote once a year to "renew all laws that are currently up for expiry, except this handful here", and it will pass with all yes votes, and that will be that. It will take them 15 minutes.

Voting down as infeasible.

soda 9 months ago

Money: yes, I read it, and no, it's not solid scientific research. I know how to tell the difference; unlike most people, I actually do scientific research.

As for who pushed it through the FDA, assuming for the moment that I even believe this claim, this is completely irrelevant to the compound's efficacy.

Even Snopes knows better than this.

http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/aspartame.asp

soda 9 months ago

Merlin:

1) Global warming is unambiguous and the science behind the warming trend is pretty much beyond reproach at this time. That global warming is happening is a certainty; the real question is whether or not it's important. I maintain that it's not.

2) Why do lefties push wind and solar as alternatives? There are many reasons. Both are truly renewable so long as the sun shines, whereas coal, oil, fission, and fusion have limited lifetimes and will only last as long as the natural resources do. Wind and solar will be functioning right up until the sun dies, barring other major changes to the solar system.

That said, lefties are simply mistaken about how easy it is to use those energy sources. Both are very low energy density, both are inconsistent and highly variable. Most lefties just don't realize how much energy is required, and the reliability that must go along with it.

In the short term, we should go with fission. In the medium term, we should go with space based solar as soon as it becomes feasible. In the long term, only space based solar will remain viable.

There's no need to posit a conspiracy of money grubbing companies to explain the push for wind and solar. Ordinary ignorance is more than sufficient.

soda 9 months ago

- I disagree that the low turnout in the vote is relevant to his mandate. This is a republic, not a democracy.

Phase 1:

- I agree with holiday voting.

- I have no opinion on the honest open debate issue, as I know nothing about the League of Women Voters and the way in which current debates are structured.

- I agree with expanded debates, though it seems to me that the debate process itself is fundamentally flawed: we are not naturally rational creatures. We will be swayed by presentation, appearance and the like, no matter how hard we try to fight it. Some will be swayed substantially more than others.

- My mind is not yet made up on what the best voting system would be. Instant runoff would be an improvement in some ways, but may also fragment the parties too much (see below.)

Phase 2:

- I don't necessarily agree with full and balanced representation. We need look no further than the gridlocked government of Israel to understand how too many representative blocks rapidly becomes a hinderance instead of a bonus. I believe part of our strength as a nation lies in the ability of the current majority party to actually get something done. ("do something, even if it's wrong, but don't just sit there")

I do believe there should be cutoff levels below which parties are no longer considered eligible. The posted specification does not appear to have any such cutoffs, or I am reading it wrong.

- I agree with districting reform in general. A computer drawn map is one option, but I think a better structural reform for this would be a constitutional amendment stating that districting powers must be held by the judicial branch.

- I have no opinion on the full public funding of diverse candidates beyond a statements that 'this is harder than it looks' and 'this looks likely to have the same level of abuse as the current system'. Politicians, and political entities, are EXCEPTIONALLY good at finding ways to use things.

- Legislation without consultation: this contains far too many ideas for a single paragraph. Eliminating special interest groups has other problems. Public reading and posting of legislation is detailed in multiple other ideas. Earmarks and pork are only earmarks and pork when someone finds them and labels them as such; there is no magic button you can push to define something as pork in isolation of the legislation it is attached to.

- I would think it very rare that local voters affected by a local earmark would ever vote to change it other than to increase its size. This seems to me a fairly meaningless addition that is not required.

soda 9 months ago

Perhaps I we are discussing differing time scales; there is a finite amount of fissionables, and a finite amount of fusionables on the surface of this planet. Using these requires extracting them from natural resources, and as energy production climbs those extraction processes will have to become larger and larger.

How many years of fission power are easily available at current rates? How many years of fusion power are available assuming standard growth curves in power consumption? Both will be gone all too quickly, or the required consumption rates will simply be deemed too environmentally damaging to be usable.

Solar power is the only other usable energy option that has a longer time period. We certainly can't do it with ground based solar, but space based solar is entirely different.

Regarding radioactivity of fusion versus fission, fusion is only slightly (around an order of magnitude) better in terms of byproducts, when both are used in a best-practices environment.

Breeder reactor fission produces neutrons, a huge amount of low level waste due to those neutrons, and a small amount of very high level waste which decays rather quickly; fusion produces a similar quantity of neutrons, a huge amount of low level waste due to those neutrons, and no meaningful amount of high level waste. The storage of the high level waste from a fission reactor is trivial relative to all the other low level material which must be handled, at least in the current regulatory regime.

Again, I agree with you that fusion is better in this regard; but I do not regard it so much better that should be chased this vigorously.

Given its only moderate advantages and my belief that it will become feasible around the same time as orbital solar, I cannot justify more than the research-level spending already taking place.

soda 9 months ago

Voting down due to complete ignorance of how the oil market actually operates.

soda 9 months ago

This is not yet economically feasible, and probably will never be except in select areas.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

This is the job of the free press and you as a voter/citizen.

Lie detectors are easily fooled and inaccurate.

Voting down as "already implemented" and "not a valid fix".

soda 9 months ago

Not all federal lands are capable of supporting forests naturally.

Voting down as ill-thought-out.

soda 9 months ago

"If it looks too good to be true, it probably is..."

Free energy is a sham and always has been. No free energy machine that has been submitted to the patent office has been able to run under its own power.

Voting down as conspiracy theory/urban legend.

soda 9 months ago

The pay that government representatives get from their position is on average a pifling, trivial amount compared to their net holdings and other sources of income. This proposal would be meaningless and would provide very, very little incentive.

Further, it is exceedingly unlikely to pass.

Voting down as pointless.

soda 9 months ago

First answer: This has already been done. The French have been burning waste in fast breeder reactors for years. They have very, very little high-level radioactive waste, in that most of the waste contributes to the reactor power output and is destroyed.

Second answer: you'll get the same effect ive you simply wait 2-3 decades.

The answer is not to make nuclear radiation safe; the answer is to make it irrelevant. This will be done by being able to repair and rebuild the body even given massive radiation damage and exposure.

When radiation-caused health issues become trivially fixable, the irrational fear of nuclear radiation should decrease.

Voting down as redundant/already available.

soda 9 months ago

The line item veto has other issues associated with it, and it does not appear to be a good long-term idea.

There is another proposal on this site for line item veto on budget items, only if the previous years budget was not balanced. You may wish to investigate that one.

soda 9 months ago

I would go a step further to say that privacy rights for individuals should be enshrined in the constitution. This does not solve that fundamental lack, but is still probably a good idea.

Voting up.

soda 9 months ago

Climate change will not destroy the planet. Further, we have sufficiently advanced technology to do climate engineering should it become problematic. Also, huge numbers of trees are already replanted, due to requirements on the logging industry.

As a side note, the bulk of carbon emissions come from fossil fuels and coal. Planting trees will be at best zero the logging and farming losses. It will not compensate for the other carbon sources.

Voting down due to technical infeasibility.

soda 9 months ago

This is an urban legend designed to incite fear in the uneducated. It is similar to the saccharin-cancer scares of the 1970's.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

The safety of floride in drinking water is beyond debate. This is an urban myth, in the same vein as those who believe the moon landings were staged.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

Unimplementable. Gross misunderstanding of how the Judicial branch operates and the current state of law.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

Completely bogus assertions, and states are free to reject it if they want. Nobody I know has any problems with it. And, it would be expensive to undo.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

No proposal, no content. Abortion is a complex issue and not everyone agrees with your statements.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

Lack of content, lack of proposals for improvement. Anecdotal evidence is insufficient to warrant a material issue of fact.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

This is ridiculous. Most green/clean technologies are ignored not because their patents are bought out, but because they aren't cost effective. This posting is analogous to the urban myth that oil companies are hiding a secret 200 mpg carburator.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

Unimplementable, insufficiently specified.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

1) The cases are dismissed because they have no merit.

2) The document was released, and is in the public domain and readily accessible on many web sites.

3) She was born on American soil of at least one American parent. She is an American citizen. Full stop.

4) Travel bans, even federally mandated ones, often have or allow for exceptions. Often sweeping exceptions.

5) See item 4.

Voting down due to complete disregard for the widely accepted evidence.

soda 9 months ago

The records are in the public domain and easily accessible.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

The records are in the public domain and easily accessible. There is no issue to resolve.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

While I can understand your irritation, it seems very much to me like you want to have your cake and eat it, too.

There are military situations where failure is not an option. There are military situations where anything less than 100% commitment gets you killed, and situations where even 110% commitment does not guarantee success. As a result of this, the military must, and should be, very careful regarding anything that reduces that commitment level.

Life is full of compromise, often bad ones at that. Having a baby is a HUGE commitment; so is being in the military. You cannot reasonably expect to be able to do them both at the same level that you could do them in isolation.

I'm not voting this down, as I might be interpreting your post poorly; but I wouldn't vote it up either.

soda 9 months ago

Devoid of actual implementation details and specifics relevant to government change. Plugs own book, which is sold for profit. Contains many of the hallmarks of advertising and populist propaganda.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

The changes proposed here are too sweeping for a single initiative, and I disagree with, or would modify, at least half of them in some manner.

I would recommend a more incremental set of isolated changes. The probability of implementing a handful of isolated changes is substantially larger than the probability of getting this behemoth passed. Many of the points discussed above are already present as standalone ideas with high vote counts.

Voting down due to infeasibility and partial ideological conflict.

soda 9 months ago

I would propose instead that districting be preserved, but that it be the responsibility of the Judicial branch via some federal/constitutional requirement.

Not voting on this proposal, as I do not believe in removing districting, but discussion in this area is a good idea.

soda 9 months ago

No proposal specified. No content.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

No meaningful content or proposal.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

I think we have to be careful here; you've picked at least one bad example, and I suspect that the drug/generic suggestion also has problems.

Your bad example is the photographs from NASA: those images should be, and are, in the public domain. Public domain means no restrictions. I can publish them with a commercial publisher, you can post them on your web site, and a government employee can sell you a book of them for a hundred million dollars - but you can always go get them from the public domain for free.

Not sure how to vote on this one.

soda 9 months ago

I totally do not understand why this is being voted down. Copyright is already difficult enough to determine, given that it is implicitly granted to nearly all works. Requiring government documents to have copyright boilerplate seems to me like a huge positive.

Then again, I've had to deal with trying to determine whether a government document is usable, or if it has hidden IP restrictions due to external authorship. What did we determine? Not a damn thing. Noone knows the answer, and legal says the safe thing to do is not use it.

Voting up.

soda 9 months ago

Reliable global population estimates are already regularly being done, as well as future predictions. With great probability, the population will peak in approximately 40 years at approximately 9-10 billion people, then it will decline.

There is more than sufficient capacity to produce food for this number, as well as energy resources.

Voting down as unneeded.

soda 9 months ago

I am an atheist, and I want strong Jedeo-Christian law about as badly as I want Sharia law. To me, there is no difference.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

Fusion research is at a stage where it is so primitive that even with substantial resources allocated, it could not be expected to succeed inside of a multiple-decade timeframe. As such, it does not address the energy concerns you posited, which are short term.

Fusion is very hard and has radiations problems at least as severe as those associated with fission. Fission is a far better option, and more easily rolled out.

Fission power is more plentiful in the long term, and is available in the short term. In the very long term, only solar power is viable.

Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

This posting is too long, convoluted, and unreadable. Things proposed are very specific and do not affect structural issues. Other initiatives are more comprehensive and likely to succeed. Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

This is already being extensively done, to the extent that it's economically feasible. The problem is that there's not enough water in total, not that it isn't being piped. Voting down.

soda 9 months ago

Voting down. Devoid of meaningful content.

soda 9 months ago

This is a ridiculous idea due to the energy cost of desalinization. There are very few areas in the world where it is cost effective. The united states is not one of those areas.

soda 9 months ago

Another option is to simply delegate districting decisions in general to the judicial branch, ideally via constitutional amendment; this allows states to pick their own methods for determining districts, but still adds a solid layer of insulation between the politicians and their population.

This really should have been in the constitution by default, but the founders can hardly be faulted for not predicting the current scope of gerrymandering.

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