jeffdavis

5 ms·

1.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
How are mail-in ballots protected from fraud? I keep hearing that fraud is not a problem, but I'm wondering (a) how do we know there is little fraud; and (b) what mechanisms make it safe from fraud?
2.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
The revenue of bootleggers is sharply down since the 21st Amendment, because many people still choose to buy legal alcohol rather than moonshine.
3.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Article I, section 3: "The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof...".
4.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
"Democracy" and "the will of the people" are abstractions, and pretty crude ones, at that. I'm not saying that we shouldn't have democracy, but we should acknowledge that it is far from perfect. As Churchill sa
5.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Think about it this way: collecting taxes from states was a two-party relationship. The states were compelled to pay in this transaction, but it's still two parties on opposite sides of the table, and their are other topics to negotiat
6.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I am confused about what you mean. First, the federal government clearly has authority over international commerce. Second, the price of drugs in legal markets would be much lower, which would likely reduce revenue for criminal gangs in for
7.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
The biggest flaw when reasoning about government is overestimating how well democracy works as a method of solving problems. If everyone agrees about the major stuff, and you just need to finally make a decision on what color to paint the b
8.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
This is why direct taxation (16th Amendment) was a mistake. It allows the federal government to take away the citizens' money first, and then give it back to the states, with conditions. If the federal government had to collect from th
9.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Federal drug laws were upheld on the grounds that they are regulating interstate commerce ("regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;"). The idea that growing plants on your
10.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
What are the consequences to people in Tulsa who aren't tribe members? Landowners who aren't tribe members? Can the tribe expel them and confiscate the land?
11.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Which justices do you believe follows originalism, which follow textualism, and which follow neither?
12.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
It's unlikely that we will effectively review the totality of Gorsuch's opinions in a HN thread. Let's just say he's an interesting justice. Whether justices should be interesting is itself an interesting question.
13.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Let's start by eliminating federal drug laws, and leave it up to the states whether they want to pass laws against it. Then, have a hard conversation about what freedom means, and whether restrictions on it really lead to better outcom
14.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Good idea. How about: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." That would keep the pesky federal government
15.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
What is the financing and implementation plan? Will it be donor-funded, publicly-funded, or are they looking into some revenue options? If I donate now, what will the money be used for? Will it put green sand on beaches, or be used for bure
16.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I've been wondering for a while whether the concept of "open source" and its connection to freedom are becoming meaningless. Source code has been a dynamic thing for a while, and I think that's part of the reason the GPL
17.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
It's weird how modernized things can end up so bad at their original purpose. Like a computer being a bad calculator. The same thing with phones. Smart phones are good at a lot of things, but they are mediocre as a telephone.
18.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I read about project vesta on HN a while back, and it seemed promising. Why do these approaches not get more attention? Project vesta has the additional benefit that it works directly on the oceans, which may be the more pressing problem.
19.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
It's completely moving away from the client/server model to something else. Perhaps that's a great thing to do, but it's not something to do quietly.
20.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
What is the magnitude of this problem? What are the possible solutions? Can it be addressed with, say, liability insurance premiums (and is it already)? Do we need a stigma associated with unnecessary trucks? More laws?
21.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Isn't that what I said: that it's a gas milage problem and not a truck problem? Also, I advocated sharing a truck rather than owning one truck per household. So if we disagree about something, I don't understand what.
22.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Having one truck for an extended family to share is really convenient. (EDIT: E.g. one truck per 4-6 households.) And let's face it -- cars in general are completely unused at least 95% of the time (EDIT: probably an exaggeration). And
23.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I want to apologize for this thread. I can't reply to my own comment or edit it now, so I'm replying to your comment which was a reasonable reply. I realize probably nobody will read this old thread, but I wanted to write this as
24.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
CS is a specialty. It is in high demand, but it's also centralizing. If you are in the periphery, it's easy to miss out on a lot of that demand. It makes sense to reach out to build diverse CS talent, but I'm not sure that it
25.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Not quite. Right now there's a lot of confusion. Is gluten a problem for me, or dairy, or fat, or sugar, or alcohol, or caffiene? It's easy to get overwhelmed. If you eliminate everything that might be bad for you, there's
26.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
Can you explain? Is it a metabolic thing, or is it related to the carb content of beer/wine?
27.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I think it comes from the idea that you'll have more knowledge about what you are eating. There's some truth to that, but cooking for yourself still hides a lot. And it might end up just being a false sense of health. It's al
28.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I guess the holy grail is to get to the point where you can take some lab tests (genetic?) and a doctor can tell you: "eat this kind of diet, avoid these kinds of foods, and you'll be healthy". Obviously it would take a lot t
29.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
I agree that it couldn't be a rigorous double-blind. But the point is to make some kind of prediction about the results a policy will have, so that you can later reflect on what actually does happen.
30.
by jeffdavis 6y ago
"Judge systems for their results, not their motives." There's a third important concept: the process. In this case, the process is pretty horrible -- the article's author has no idea what was wrong, and therefore can&#x2

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