Located 986 results from search term 'corruption'
-
Commented in This Danish Political Party Is Led by an AI
In a way this is very attractive, since an AI would see no use in retreiving bribes or other forms of corruption, unless it is programmed to do so. When the human representatives in the parliament would exactly follow the AI's ideas and policies, it could be trusted. But as with all computerprogrammes, this AI is depending on what the input is to form its' ideas and outcomes. The article states that the input is from all the fringe parties since 1970, which is probably a lot to digest, but could be interesting as experiment. Most and maybe all fringe parties have more practical ideas than the common parties and are better suited to fullfill the needs of the people, since they are more closely related to them.
On the other hand, the AI could start as a political experiment which closely relates to the people, but could get out of hand, since its' excistence can be secured when AI in general will be protected and seen as a sentient lifeform, a logical wish from the AI itself. How would the politicians and people handle such questions? I do not think a Turing test will suffice, since it is not just being seen as a lifeform that counts, but also a lifeform that represents other lifeforms, like humans. It takes a human to understand a human, I think.
I was surprised to see that there are other nations already experimenting with this and that there even is the idea to form an international corporation of AI's. In just one country it could have quite the impact when it succeeds, on all levels of society, but internationally I'm not sure how that would turn out. And what is a success, I would dare to ask. Is that in favour of some part of society, for instance the AI's creators or is it in favour for all of society? When those questions already arise when thinking about such an experiment on a national scale, what kind of impact would it have internationally? Just take in consideration the differences in culture, for instance, or the concept of nationalism? Those clashes are now already wrecking any idea of progress or even civilisation, with all the consequences that come from it. How would several AI's solve such things? And what if fringe parties from a few countries are on the hateful side of the spectrum and have a lot of influence on the workings of the AI?
I am curious to see how this works out, but I'll stay very reserved about the results of such experiments. It's easy to have dystopian thoughts about it, just as easy as it is to have utopian thoughts about it. One thing is for sure: that AI would have more personality than any of the nowadays politicians and it would be a determining factor of its' success.
-
Commented in Facebook introduces new AI systems to detect misinformation
My natural intelligence told me (10 months ago) to get my ass off of Facebook, because of the misinformation, crappy webdesign, lots of scripts people do not need and an algorithm that does exactly what they say they're fighting with the artificial intelligence (giving priority to paid posts with misinformation, for instance). If Facebook wants to stop misinformation, which they won't, they should stop with the data-selling for directed ads, which provide misinformation tailor-made.
Actually, I do not give a shit about it, because it is a clear signal to me that people still fall for bullshit, which says more about the people than the spreaders of said information. It's a bit like politics: people cuss on it, but they still vote for the incompetence and corruption. -
Commented in Netflix Indicted in Texas Over "Cuties" movie's "prurient interest in sex"
moral panic hysteria
people who play LPs backward and find Satanism in Chris De Burgh's "Lady in Red" or Harry Potter clearly have too much time on their hands to be outraged by what is clearly, in this case, nothing more than fiction inspired by contemporary culture
Cuties is clearly a film about widespread cultural nymphomania driving little girls into being sexualized from a young age in the same way it pressurizes women into being oversexualized past the age of consent. which is to say that film is every bit about pedophilia by way of societal norms as it is about gender biased chauvinism by way of societal norms; societal norms laid bare and discovered by young people who merely mimic behavior in order to seek attention and find acceptance in a continuing and self-perpetuated cycle
and the movie is hardly subtle on this topic. it really hammers the audience over the head with the theme. to the point where it becomes utterly unenjoyable as a drama about a character. i struggled to finish it; i only didn't assume presentation morality lesson déjà vu because of controversy surrounding it so i watched till the bitter fucking Hollywood end - where the protagonist inexplicably abandons all behavioral momentum, and, for reasons yet to be determined, mid Act III climax, does a complete 180 reversal and gives the audience the proverbial "happy ending"
the movie is more akin to an after-school TV special; a moral lesson with clear-cut, black/white message. there's virtually no theatrical nuance, no sub-themes, no character development, no suspense or drama to speak of all reflected in the film's cinematographic style, ham-fistedly made to look to be documentary-like; observational, not dramatic
it is a single-perspective film, with all other characters made to look as either 2-dimensional cardboard cutouts or, in the case of father figure, absent altogether (the protagonist's father, a major plot device is spoken of frequently but is only ever spoken of and makes an appearance as a phone voice for a sum total of 10 seconds of "screen-time")
on a personal note - compromising the material in order to have moral alibi on the publicity tour is not an approach i particularly value artistically. im more inclined to applaud thematic subtlety and direct, confrontational publicity rather than the other way around (it is in my view, if nothing else, braver to chose to defend oneself from accusations of sensationalizing a topic over offending the religiously extreme but that's just me)
in spite the production team's effort to make their case that this movie should and could never be interpreted pornographically even more obvious than it could possibly be by hit-you-over-the-head plot constructs, those who are most guilty of sexualizing minors with actual sex abuse, deliberately chose to ignore these material compromises (presumably made in order to avoid the very politicizing of media to fabricate public concern by feigning it) and the filmmakers now appear to be in the midst of discovering that, as the saying goes, those who trade liberty in exchange for a little bit of security receive, in kind, ample amounts of neither of those; a most unfortunate and foreseeable set of circumstances
be that as it may, to set aside the interpretation of Cuties as something other than a critique of the very hypocrites whose scrutiny it was inevitably to fall under and to interpret the backlash against it by deliberately ignoring the painstaking effort ...
-
Commented in Epic Games lawsuit is just a publicity stunt, says Apple
I hope Epic Games wins and that proof of political input/influence (or even corruption) surfaces during the trial.
-
Commented in Sandy Hook Families Just Proved Congress Lied to Pass One of the NRA’s Favorite Bills
So, congressmen lie to pass bills favored by their real owners. Not like the US government is full of systemic corruption or anything.
-
Commented in Italian vet who posed next to dead lion he killed dies while shooting wild birds
One can only describe these people who use the law to justify moral corruption as sincerely intellectually challenged.
-
Commented in 'Major Victory for Public Health': Court Orders Trump EPA to Ban Pesticide That Harms Kids' Brains
Straight up, that's not how this went down. For one thing, the Trump Administration is clearly as hungry for checks as anyone else in this story, for a given definition of 'checks.'
While I get what you mean about the separation of powers, there're a few things you've got the wrong end of the stick about. I've worked on environmental law cases before the Ninth Circuit. You seem to think there are judges in that circuit aching to make new law. Take it from me, you'd have more luck finding a hooker that uses their real name, or a sheepdog you could tell to put two sheep in one pen and three in another. It's just not so. Nobody wants to be overturned. Nobody wants to be the squeaky wheel. Nobody wants to make new law. A few don't mind, but that's not how jurisprudence works.
It's refreshing to see the faith you have in the EPA. At my age, one can become cynical. I used to believe in 'watchdog' agencies looking out for the public. That was a sick joke before they were captured by the industries they were supposed to regulate. Now they're run by the gangsters they were supposed to be protecting us from, it's not any prettier a picture. My faith wouldn't've made it past the climate change denial, the go-fuck-yourself-if-you-don't-like-it corruption, or Hell, Scott Pruitt's desk.
Chlorpyrifos is objectively dangerous. The only confusion about that is the FUD you were throwing up a few comments ago. It's not safe. Are we agreed, there? Environmentalists sued EPA to ban it, because it's poison. As the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals said in their August 10, 2015 writ of mandamus ordering EPA to essentially either show it was safe in food and agriculture or to ban it in accordance with the law:
The panel held that EPA’s delay in responding to the administrative petition warranted the extraordinary remedy of mandamus. The panel held that the issuance of a writ of mandamus was necessary to end the EPA’s cycle of incomplete responses, missed deadlines, and unreasonable delay.
Like I said, no circuit court was going to do this to fuck with Trump. This isn't a bunch of Marxists in black robes sitting around figuring out ways to piss you, in particular, off. This was in the Obama Administration. You remember him, the Kenyan usurper antichrist? This was about Obama's EPA, their regulatory capture, and their malfeasance of duty.
You say Trump's EPA had good reasons to ignore science, to defy a court order, and to make sure that the most common pesticide used today remained this particular toxic Dow Chemical product. Tell you what: I can't think of any reasons those may be that aren't better reasons why they should have banned that shit. Can you?
It's fairly obvious your animus toward that circuit has more to do with Trump's scapegoating Latin Americans and Muslims than it does this case. We're not going to make much progress on whether the most ignorant, racist, bigoted moron to occupy the White House since Wilson would be running concentration camps without his Jim Crow Roberts Court today, but we could at least get to seeing eye-to-eye on the facts of what's happened around him accepting bribes to keep chlorpyrifos in our food.
-
Commented in For the first time, Trump confesses that his campaign turned to Russia for help
If
Let's take a moment to note the crime you're alleging is, even in this strongest possible statement of what exactly that might possibly've been, entirely hypothetical. Not to say riven with the kind of prior assumptions one would expect from out-of-control mass hysteria.
he
Trump's as crooked as any Mississippi sheriff, only not as clever. Say you wanted to nail this guy, and you had your pick of any of the crimes he commits on a daily basis to investigate and prosecute him for. As long as we're having flights of hypothetical fancy, why not pick a crime that could be proven? The Emoluments Clause comes to mind, which Trump's wildly offside of. He should've been impeached for that alone early last year. But, not coincidentally, Democrats have lost every branch of government. Democrats can only lose eight more state governments before Republicans get to draw up a new U.S. Constitution. So Democrats can't, in real life, do anything. At all. Let alone mount an impeachment in Congress. This is an ugly charade, just like Benghazi, just like Whitewater. Only this time, the stakes are real. Plus there's so much more bunting now,
was
Saving you a bit of trouble, for the purposes of this conversation, let's say it goes down like this. Boris and Natasha put the briefcase labeled 'Secrets' on the conference table. Donald pulls out a wad of cash and starts making it rain, right in front of Dudley Do-Right. A little time spent on the usual evil cackling, light mustache twirling, and some dissing on popular American celebrities and much-cherished notions of fair play, truth and the American Way. That's the meeting. Okay. So stipulated.
trusting
Is it illegal to be Russian? I guess it is, now. Funny how crucial demonization of the 'enemy' is, right? Not "ha ha" funny. Sad, how obvious that dehumanization is outside of those toxic bubbles.
I'm American, and I consider Russia a key ally. But then, I live on Earth in the 21st Century, too. Ruinous U.S. foreign policy, fighting the Global War on Terror on the side of terrorism, celebrating the end of the First Cold War by massing forces on Russian borders, and campaigning for president on a "muscular foreign policy" of war with Russia, makes that hard to see sometimes judging solely by the corporate-controlled Establishment media.
and
Oh boy. Here it comes. He was already trusting these civilian-clothed, non-human Russian devils? And now there's more?
working
This. Is. Not. Normal.
with
Maybe we got it wrong before. Maybe it wasn't "Vladimir K. Putin in Trump Tower with Hillary's emails." You can't nail jelly to a tree. The RussiaGhaziPalooza story changes, like any highly-fetishized fever dream, as, where and when it needs to because it's hopeless nonsense anyway. Sometimes, though, Trump's not the bottom. Sometimes it's Donald Trump, Russian deep-cover superspy top using his awesome powers of hacking and wanton, open corruption in government to do what the Soviet Union never could hope in a million workers' paradises to do, defeat Hillary Clinton. Never clear whether Boris and Natasha needed Comrade Trump's permission to sow doubt in loyal Americans' helpless minds, testing their infinite faith in our perfect, flawless democratic system; or whether Trump needed the personal say-so of V. "The Impaler" Putin before launching his hacking and cracking spree, so fill in whatever details get you off. Let's say it's every bit as sexy as you need it to be.
...
-
Commented in The Net Neutrality Repeal Is Official. Here’s How That Could Affect You.
The icing on the cake of corruption. The inability to freely access information on an even level, and not even know what we are missing.
-
Commented in Ukraine 'paid Trump lawyer for talks'
The only reason I still feel okay is because history will look on this era of corruption with a very critical lens.
-
Commented in The princes, the president and the fortune seekers
Nothing to see here, just a boatload more corruption.
-
Commented in Michael Cohen Forced to Reveal His Mystery Client Is Sean Hannity
I see them all over the place.
Mueller (the bag man for Uranium One) was impaneled by Rosenstein (who may be facing impeachment for diddling FISA warrants, 302s, and perjury) with a vaguely worded mandate (special prosecutor investigations require a specific crime) to investigate "collusion" based on DNC opposition research paid for, in part, by HRC. He picked a "dream team" of partisan hacks, some of whom have been removed and are in legal jeopardy themselves (Strzok and/or Page have probably already flipped). They couldn't find "collusion", they moved on and couldn't find "obstruction". Now they are simply looking for dirt.
Since then Comey has been fired, has admitted he spiked the email investigation because he thought HRC was going to win, and has all but admitted perjury, McCabe has been fired for unauthorized leaking of classified and multiple instances of perjury and obstruction. (His GoFundMe is for legal expenses for criminal defense.
What did Sean Hannity talk to Cohen about that creates any conflict of interest? We don't know and will never be told. You're just supposed to draw the natural inference that since he's a Trump supporter and both talked to the same (possibly crooked) lawyer that they are secretly...I don't know, "colluding"?
Hannity has been going after systematic FBI corruption on the air. They need to shut him up.
The rest of the OIG report will drop in the next few weeks. I expect it will be even better than the one on McCabe. I recommend reading it, not the summary. And not what CNN or late night hosts say what it says.
-
Commented in Blockchain is not only crappy technology but a bad vision for the future
Nope, it's always been around. As long as we have a human in the equation, there will be corruption.
-
Commented in Blockchain is not only crappy technology but a bad vision for the future
Are you implying that corruption is a novel and recent addition to the equation?
-
Commented in Blockchain is not only crappy technology but a bad vision for the future
Problem with this whole article is that the "system of trust" we are implementing these days is generally all fine and dandy until corruption crashed the party.
-
Commented in Chelsea Manning on Her Alt-Right Partying: I Was a Spy, Not a Racist-This is what is planning on running for U.S. senate
No she was not "charged" with treason by the United States.
Fair enough. Then again, you were never "charged" with killing that prostitute in Pasadena either.
She downloaded personal information on American soldiers involved in the Iraq conflict.
All I know about it is that now apparenly people are talking about how you raped and murdered those hookers in SoCal.
I understand her intentions with exposing the "collateral murder" video, butdoing so she put those soldiers and their families lives at risk
With all these allegations about how you hunted countless street people for sport out West, even though you were never "charged" with your crimes, I just wonder what drove you to it. Is that the standard we're using now? Saying it over and over again makes it so?
Leaking documents that can potentially harm the United States is treason.
Whatever you say. I'm not overly worried that someone on the internet is wrong. To my mind, though, you don't get what treason is. Sometimes the decent thing, the patriotic thing is to oppose your government's policy. Not simply to question, but to act. Consequences schmonshiquences. Consequences she endures, by the way.
In Vietnam by 1968, American policy was to "kill anything that moves." Arriving at the scene of one such "search and destroy" mission, one helicopter crew commanded by Hugh Thompson intervened to protect, by force, surviving Vietnamese civilians from advancing American troops. You might call that treason. If you'll forgive my saying so, that's pretty fucked up.
Was Smedley Butler a traitor? Dan Ellsburg? Ed Snowden? At what point is this facile interpretation of 'treason' simply feckless authority worship?
she put those soldiers and their families lives at risk
More so than the liars that put them there? This is selective understanding. With all the pearl clutching about Manning, have you had time to pay attention to what, for instance, "signature strike" is a euphemism for?
agendas
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
The fact is that those soldiers were ordered to do what they did.
And..?
I consider someone who pretends to have your interests in mind while working against you, to be a snake.
I'm losing the thread here. Help me out, are you saying Chelsea Manning is a reptillian Taliban agent?
Her actions were reckless and poorly executed.
That's funny. I might've said the same thing about the crimes, corruption, and murderous policies she exposed.
These are not good traits of what I would like to see in a senator.
Your loss. Watch out, though. Wouldn't wanna pull something punching down while kissing up like that.
-
Commented in Alabama Sheriff Legally Took $750,000 Meant To Feed Inmates, Bought Beach House
Based on that article the Sheriff did everything he was required to do, he fed them, then he pocketed the rest all in line with law, it's not his fault that the law and lawyers interpret that law that way, if anything this is a failure of the Alabama Congress to do what is right by the inmates. I mean everybody is pretty peeved about his taking of money, nobody seems to care about the 2009 debt he had:
When Entrekin was appointed sheriff in November 2007 - to fill a vacancy left by the death of Sheriff James Hayes - he had to borrow $150,000 to continue feeding the inmates. Entrekin reduced the debt to about $35,000, but with the increased cost of food, he says his debt now is more than the amount he originally borrowed.
I fully believe this should be changed because it's very open to corruption, it's just not against the law and he is within his rights to do this, but I don't agree with buying $2mm worth of properties. That money could have been used for other programs at the jail. I also assume this sheriff feeds his prisoners more than just bologna sandwiches because another appeared before a federal judge who chastised him and no longer takes money because he failed to properly feed the inmates, he fed them corn dogs twice a day. Source: Corn Dogs
You also have this:
A constitutional amendment approved in 1977 makes it optional for county commissioners to take over the feeding responsibility.
Which means the county didn't want to pay for it.
The sheriff can buy food items and transfer them to the business without paying sales tax and can use any surplus money as personal income. The state bid law does not apply because the law directs the sheriff to operate it as a personal business.
An attorney general’s opinion issued last year said sheriffs have to keep the money left over after feeding prisoners. Entrekin said the law, as it is written, is outdated and needs to be changed, but any change could cost taxpayers more money. The county commission would have to purchase all food under the bid law, and it is estimated it would lose about $1 million a year, Entrekin said. The commission still has no interest in taking over the feeding of the prisoners, Entrekin said.
The law was written in 1911, at a time when the sheriff and his family lived in the jail. The sheriff’s wife usually cooked for her family and the prisoners. In those days, sheriffs did not get a salary and were paid by the fees they brought in.
TL,DR: This went long and rambly if it doesn't make sense down vote it. It just went too long to just delete and go about my day. The point, it looks corrupt but is completely legal and there seems to be a failure of the state and not the sheriff himself.
-
Commented in Florida shooter Nikolas Cruz a white nationalist member
I think it's about time to tell my story of Pete. I lived in Hannibal, Missouri for about a year, just about 15 years ago. It was surprising for me to see that many guns, compared to New York, Washington or Philadelphia where I stayed in 1989. Even in Far Rockaway, Queens I haven't seen one gun. Not even the South Bronx, when we went to Yankee games. The Midwest is an opposite of everything East Coast, I think.
Anyways, Pete. He owned and ran a liquorstore, downtown Hannibal. He offered me a nice comfy chair when I came in for the first time, checking for local beers and, of course, if he had anything Belgian. ;-) We talked for many hours during my stay and became somewhat friends. Making friends is hard in Hannibal, so I see it as valuable. At one night, while smoking cigarettes and tasting some brew from Washington state, he took out a rifle, beautifully engraved, all shiny. A piece of art, if you look at merely the designs and not the destructive power. I asked him why he had also that rifle behind the counter, since there was obviously already a gun and a baseball bat. Every small store had that. But not that rifle. Pete told me his father bought it in 1948, just around the start of the CIA. The reasoning behind it was that it might be needed in the future "when those assholes will throw away every liberty we have".
Pete's father wasn't talking gun ownership rights, he was talking freedom of speech, freedom of movement and forceful oppression by the state. It became a whirlwind of stories how the US got into a decline and that it will reset to a former shape, as in not so United anymore. A civil war was even discussed on an other night. At the time I thought it was kind of crazy talk, but during my stay I learned from Pete and other, not in the slightest related or friends with Pete, about the things people are acting surprised about the last two years. The corporate take over, the militarization of the police, excessive violence against your own citizens, money laundering, handing out tax money to institutions that have a multitude of that subsidy in their coffers, corruption, setting up diverse demographics against eachother. It is becoming a perfect storm to put that rifle into use. Not shooting civilians, but kicking back at government.
When I was a young kid I dreamed of living in the US. At 19 I had my first chance and fell in love with all the opposites, the diversity, the friendliness and politeness. I looked at it all through pink glasses, I know, but the second time (2002/2003) was way more grim. It took away that dream of me and reality taught me to get the hell out of Dodge, so to speak.
I will return, when all the mess is over. I have my eyes on Colorado or Washington state. I heard they have excellent coffee there. California is a bit too much for me. Too many crazies there. ;-) But I really mean it, the country, or to be technically correct, states are so different to one another, it is hard to not find anything you don't like. Every climate there is, from subtropical to polar, all kinds of environments, from mountains to deserts, everything someone can wish for to have a reason to live somewhere can be found in that one collection of states. Well, if that isn't a big compliment and that coming from a very vocal anti-US person. I am not against the people, it is so sad to see they are being sold out and betrayed by a small bunch of robberbarons. Instead of shooting at children, you could think of collectiv...
-
Commented in US stealth bombers in Guam appear to be readying for a tactical nuclear strike on North Korea
This is a scary scenario. We've know for more than a decade that the potential for certain terrorist groups working with the cartels to move people and weapons along the drug routes was a win-win for both parties, and a lose-lose for us.
A low-yield (relatively) tactical warhead taking out a chunk of a near-border city scenario needs only the bad actors acquiring one, and I didn't think anyone was going to take border security seriously until it happened.
Until a couple of years ago, I would never have thought The US government might do something at that level as a false flag. So many things that were believed to be tinfoil-hat conspiracy theories about rampant corruption and rouge 3-letter agencies are being proven true that it might not be that big a surprise if it happens.
-
Commented in Paul Ryan Collected $500,000 In Koch Contributions Days After House Passed Tax Law
In my country our politicians at least try to hide their corruption.
-
Commented in Senate probing Jill Stein for possible collusion with Russia
Is your position that a Putin-led, Russian government-funded, organized effort to subvert the 2016 US presidential elections is a complete and utter fabrication and that the reason Trump won the election is solely through a combination of Clinton incompetence, DNC corruption and luck?
-
Commented in Why the Anti-Corruption Drive in Saudi Arabia is Doomed to Fail
If you think it's really an anti-corruption drive then is is probably doomed to fail. If rather, you think it is the latest person in power purging any competition, then it's going pretty well.
-
Commented in Paul Manafort, Who Once Ran Trump Campaign, Surrenders to F.B.I.
Early days, yet. Suffice it to say that it's mining a rich vein of corruption, and that could lead far and wide and deep. So far, at least, it's criminal prosecution not the political revolution Clinton Democrats are praying for. It's more than some special prosecutors found after years and millions spent, like that on-again off-again pecksniff Ken Starr.
-
Commented in Puerto Rico Says It's Scrapping $300M Whitefish Contract
I kind of wish with this dumping of corruption they would turn to Elon Musk or someone else and say while we are fixing our grid how about we also put in a ton of green energy. I feel like this is the perfect time for a Government to do this, complete shambles, why not upgrade while fixing the old.
-
Commented in Congress votes to disallow consumers from suing Equifax and other companies with arbitration agreements
Talk about blatant collusion and corruption. The US government or a criminal organization