New Texas Law Limits Computer Repair To Licensed Private Investigators

IJ client Mike Rife cannot compete with a government-created cartel that demands he close his businesses and complete a three-year apprenticeship under a licensed private investigator to get a state-required license to fix computers.

Texas now demands that every computer repair technician in the entire state acquire a private investigator’s license to repair a computer. To get that license, you are required to have a degree in criminal justice or perform a three-year apprenticeship under a licensed private investigator. If you perform certain repairs without a private investigator’s license, or if you have your computer repaired by someone without a license, you can be punished by a $4,000 fine and one year in jail as well as a $10,000 civil penalty.

I support the IfJ in this effort!

Institute for Justice: First Amendment Cases: Texas Computer Repair

ubernoir wrote:
You have a higher per capita murder rate which arguably could be connected to gun ownership and we have a government which sometimes treats its citizens like children.

Let me say this. There is a connection, but I'm not sure its direct.

We have a high murder rate and a high rate of gun ownership because we are a more violent society. Banning guns, or allowing them, may, or may not, actually relate to our murder rate. The same might be offered about banning violent movies. I've offered that we shouldn't execute people, because we communicate a message through doing so that killing people is a reasonable way to solve problems in peacetime. But regulations of individuals... well, you can't force people to be something they're not.

Our violence is related to our independence but not directly. We're more violent because of our history. The UK has quite a fine history of violence but most of it was committed overseas. In the US, it happened here. The French-Indian War, the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Spanish American War, and the Civil War.... We had a period of about 100 years in which each generation fought on U.S. soil.

After, our western frontier experience was distinct from Canada's in that they deployed a strong federal police force to secure the frontier, whereas the US left security up to local governments, who were often too poor to keep order... Ultimately, Civil War vets took their guns west after the war and fended for themselves. And particularly in the south, the mutual distrust during a subsequent 100 year apartheid society that followed the 100 years of war provided a culture that was by then used to needing guns for war with a reason to keep them at peace.

I don't think Europe's most recent century of war (from the Franco-Prussian war to WWII) had the same impact because people didn't take the guns home after the battles were over.

Clearly, by the 1970's, these rationales for keeping firearms were gone, and at the same time you saw a rising tide of inner city violence caused by the peak of the suburban abandonment of the city, and thus you saw the sort of gun control laws beginning in the 1980's that this whole debate refers to. The pendellum is, today, swinging the other direction in many respects. Our cities are becoming safer, and the rates of violence are going down, but, like racism, it will take several generations to work some of this history out.

RE: Guns for Safety? Dream On, Scalia. - washingtonpost.com

ubernoir wrote:
I am so shocked by this discussion. It is so unbelievably alien to anything, to any mind set or experience I have ever had as a European....

It seems a very strange idea of freedom. Like living in a bunker, "no one can get me now!", I'd rather walk in the fresh air, walk by the river, have a little faith, enjoy life rather than live in fear, not seeing enemies in every shadow, where every stranger might be a killer or a rapist, but seeing ordinary people with lives and hopes not threats. Where is the peace of mind when you need an AK47 as a comfort blanket?

If its any consolation I don't think the views on this thread accurately represent a cross section of Americans. Barely 20 percent of us own handguns. A lot of the people on MemeStreams are southerners, and southerners are more likely than people who live in other regions to own a gun, but gun owners are not in the majority even here. Certainly only a very small percentage keep their guns as close at hand as many on this thread seem to.

Crime, in some American cities, is oppressive. I certainly think its oppressive in Atlanta. Its a sad think that I feel less safe in my adopted home town that I do in almost any other city that I travel to, but that is the case. I'm always looking over my shoulder when I ride Marta, while I've recently ridden subways in Barcelona, Munich, New York, and Paris and not been the least bit concerned.

However, I don't own a firearm. I don't think carrying a handgun would make me feel safer. I generally prefer to be aware of by surroundings and avoid situations where one is likely to become a statistic. On the other hand, to the degree that ownership of handguns is a deterrent, the fact that other people carry enables me to benefit from their presence.

I don't think banning or allowing handguns is the solution to the problem. I think its one of those political footballs that gets passed around, like life prison sentences for failure to register as a convicted statutory rapist, that plays off of media sensationalism and makes people think that something is being done when nothing is being done. The problem is more complicated than that. Its a product of official corruption (which these political debates are a part, as are those thin blue line stickers on people's cars), a history of segregation, racism, and slavery that created a caste system which still persists, and suburbia's desertion of urban cores (which is fortunately a dying trend but more slowly here than elsewhere). These problems cannot be repaired with quicky legislation, and few of our leaders have the strength to form a long term vision to change the state of our communities. Most effective solutions are expensive. More police on the street (assuming they aren't corrupt) would have a greater deterrent effect than handgun ownership or any change in sentencing policy, but it costs real money, so it is almost never discussed.

RE: Guns for Safety? Dream On, Scalia. - washingtonpost.com

flynn23 wrote:
I think that it's perfectly acceptable to own weapons in your home for sport, protection, or collection. Although I do have serious reservations about the TYPES of weapons owned. You can collect WW2 rifles or even historic machine guns, but there's no reason why someone should have an operational M2 or an AK47, both of which I know of several people who possess.

I've been meaning to get back to this thread. Its been interesting. I want to interject some thoughts.

1. I think the second amendment consists of a purpose and a means to achieve that purpose.

2. I think the means is a near total ban on federal firearms laws. The 14th amendment extends this ban to the states. Certain exceptions such as the case of felons or in certain locations are probably allowable given an over-riding government interest, but I don't think a ban on certain types of weapons is possible and I'm not sure I buy U.S. v. Miller. You can obviously use a sawed off shotgun in a war. Actual wars in the world today involving actual militias are actually fought with all kinds of fucked up weapons. Actual militias have things like RPGs. I think the second amendment cannot achieve its stated purpose if it allows for the federal regulations on the ownership of RPGs.

3. Self defense in the home is not the purpose, nor is hunting, nor is collecting. But the ownership of weapons for those purposes is a given considering the means employed by this amendment. Similarly, the purpose of the first amendment was not to protect porn videos from federal bans, but it does so anyway, due to the means employed (nearly total prohibition on regulation of speech.)

4. The purpose was to protect the right of the people to form armed militia groups capable of challenging the power of any other contemporary armed force. The original federalist structure of the U.S. Government may have put states in the position of regulating such militia, but the 14th amendment set that power aside.

5. Militia of the sort envisioned by the Constitution are not obsolete from a technical standpoint. Generally, we refer to them as terrorist organizations. The closest modern equivalents are Sunni and Shia insurgent groups in Iraq, and Hezbollah. I think thats really what the founders were thinking. In fact, I recall Nanochick making a very insightful analogy between the founding of this Republic and the present bloodshed in Iraq. Looking at the situation there is the closest thing you can get to understanding the context that the Constitution was written in. I doubt very seriously that you'll see any party to any settlement in Iraq agreeing to lay down their arms. The 2nd amendment is an agreement that the federal government of the US would not disarm the militia. Its the same kind of thing.

6. Almost no one in the US today is comfortable with the idea that armed terrorist organizations can rightfully exist here. The actual purpos... [ Read More (0.4k in body) ]

RE: Guns for Safety? Dream On, Scalia. - washingtonpost.com

I found this to be a particularly pleasing metafilter post. I recently moved across the street from some train tracks in Atlanta. I'm sure there is an argument that it sets an upper bound for the value of the place, but I love watching the trains go by. They are a connection to the history of this city and of technology. Far more interesting than many views that I could have had. I'm quoting a post from the thread:

When I was 20 I bought an old house in Atlanta that backed up to the railroad yard. My Dad laughed at me when he saw the excitement in my eyes looking at those tracks. He said that made the property worth so much less. I thought of the tracks as a bonus. Sitting on my hill, watching a train pull through was fun, but what really got me was the sound.

It was a symphony of cacophony. Some of the sounds repeated, as each car hit the same bump between track sections, ca-chunk-ca-chunk, ca-chunk-ca-chunk, while the soaring solos of squeaky wheels panned in stereo as they screeched by. The grind and clang of loose metal parts slowly complained out an odd measure.

I wanted to record that, to share the experience, to let other people know about the secret symphony. But I realized that you literally had to be there; that the tall golden grass and the painted cars and the heaving rails were all part of the experience.

Gone, like a train... | MetaFilter

I typically plonk the Washington Times but this seems like pretty good reporting.

Federal prosecutors are asking U.S. District Judge Richard W. Roberts to send Ball to prison for 40 years, basing their request partly on charges that were never filed or conduct the jury either rejected outright or was never asked to consider.

Known as acquitted and uncharged conduct sentencing, the practice is raising a sharp question among legal scholars: Should federal judges dole out tougher sentences based on accusations that jurors rejected or never heard during trial?

I would support a Constitutional Amendment barring this practice.

Sentencing Law and Policy: Extended examination of ugliness of acquitted conduct enhancement

More evidence that sex offender hysteria motivates corrupt legislators to produce policy that is fucking stupid.

The facts are pretty darned sad. Barely more than a child himself at 19, Bradshaw was charged with statutory rape for having sex with a 15-year-old girl. Fine. That’s punishable. I’d prefer it had been kept out of the criminal justice system (see here for more) but its punishable. He gets 5 years.

After he gets out he gives an invalid address. For that, too, he pleads guilty and is sentenced to time served. When released he moves in with his sister but can’t live there because Georgia’s draconian sex offender law won’t let him live within 1,000 feet of a recreation center!

He moves in with an aunt but can’t stay there because the home is within 1,000 feet of the First Baptist Church! Growing desperate, he finds a family friend but this time inadvertently transposes the street address!

Now the cops move in. Bradshaw is arrested because he hadn’t moved into the friend’s single-wide trailer within the legally required 72 hours — and lied and said he did! His mandatory sentence for this infraction is life in prison.

A Georgia lawyer in this thread says that many of these people end up being homeless because they cannot find a place to live that complies with the law, and then they end up getting arrested for being homeless.

Fortunately we have elected representatives who are capable of forming logical thoughts:

Sen. President pro tem Eric Johnson (R-Savannah) said the law is clear.

"I wish it hadn't happened, but there are consequences for people's actions," said Johnson, a chief sponsor of the offender law. "What would have happened if he had given the wrong address and had lived in a place and was harming a child next door? The law is trying to protect children. Justice has to be blind to motive."

1. Eric Johnson recommended these particular consequences. He has to defend why they are appropriate, and not refer to them as if they are beyond his control!
2. This person is not a pedophile.
3. This is not an attempt to protect children. Strict statutory rape laws are designed to attack teenagers for having sex out of wedlock. In this case coupled with a hysteria driven over broad sex offender registration rule intended as marketing fodder for political campaigns.
4. No, justice does not have to be blind to motive! There is a difference between malice murder and involuntary manslaughter. If you don't understand that you shouldn't be writing laws.

Georgia Supreme Court considers proportionality in sex offender case

The legal ruling that the District's citizens can keep loaded handguns in their homes doesn't mean that they should.

Just nine of those shootings were legally justifiable homicides or acts of self-defense; guns kept in homes were also involved in 12 accidental deaths, 41 criminal homicides and a shocking 333 suicides.

In Atlanta, a city where approximately a third of households contain guns, a study of 197 home-invasion crimes revealed only three instances (1.5 percent) in which the inhabitants resisted with a gun. Intruders got to the homeowner's gun twice as often as the homeowner did.

I know a lot of people who explain their gun ownership based on the theory that they are going to defend themselves from some sort of home invasion. I think of this a bit like I think of Ralphie Parker's dreams of fending off Black Bart with his BB gun. In general, your home is not going to be invaded while you are there, and you are not going to defend yourself this way if it does happen. Shooting can be a fun hobby, but you're not John Wayne.

Guns for Safety? Dream On, Scalia. - washingtonpost.com

The eXile, the Moscow-based alternative paper founded by Mark Ames and Matt Taibbi — and which has been home these past few years to occasional TAC contributor Gary Brecher, the War Nerd — has been shut down by Russian authorities.

The American Conservative -- Save the War Nerd

I like this ad campagin, particularly shot 5. BTW I'm pretty sure this was posted here as blog spam, but I like it anyway, so I'm rerecommending it. If the responsible user gets out of control they'll be plonked.

Diesel Human after all - Ad campaign