DISQUS

Dad seems to have a clue about what is going on.

"suchi-mu, suchi-mu" = "steam, steam"

One of the reasons that official Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints involvement is so notable is that the LDS church has millions of adherents, many of whom may feel a religious duty to, or at least, an undue influence upon them to, follow the lead of their church.

In contrast, while Focus on the Family has many loyal supporters who do take their lead from the organization, their leaders do not claim the kind of pre-eminent relationship with God that the Supreme Pontiff in the Roman Catholic Church, or the leading prophet of the LDS church hold as a matter of doctrine in their respective faiths. Falling out of good standing with the Roman Catholic Church or the LDS church is also a far more serious matter than falling into the momentary disfavor of Focus on the Family (witness Focus on the Family's recent rehabilitation of John McCain during the 2008 Presidental election).

Also, part of the concern about LDS involvement is the possibility that the church has not been fully forthcoming about reporting its involvement. Electoral activity is a secondary activity, for which it is not as institutionally accustomed to accounting for to meet campaign finance requiements, for the LDS church; Focus, in contrast, is to a much greater extent a political actor and set up to operate like one from an accounting perspective.

FWIW, it also isn't necessary hypocritical or problematic for Focus to both contribute to the Prop 8 campaign and lay off workers. The depth of the impact of the finacial crisis was not yet obvious several months before the November 2008 general election when funding commitments had to be made, and Focus, like most ideologically oriented groups, exists to "change the world" not to serve as an employment program for the people of Greater Colorado Springs. Opposing Prop 8 is certainly consistent with the larger mission of Focus on the Family. I disagree vehemently with them, but it is their right to state their case to the people.

There is nothing mysterious about the action by Congress to kill the program. It was over budget to an extent never seen before in Navy history, behind schedule and didn't do what it was supposed to do. Few project kills have been easier.

Also, the DDG-1000 fills a role, of sea based fire support, that only makes sense if it is more affordable than cruise misiles. That was originally the plan, but didn't work out.

Finally, the LCS while troubled, is not as troubled and can fill many coastal warship roles.

Now, one could call the incompetence of the contractor mysterious, but that would be contrary to known facts, history and all good sense.

While the attention is on violence in high security lockups, the typical federal prisoner is in for immigration or white collar or a non-violent drug crime. And, a typical federal prisoner has less of a criminal history than a typical state prisoner.

Bottom line: Alternatives to sentencing for federal prisoners charged with non-violent crimes could potentially have more more impact in freeing up capacity in the system, than in any state system in the country, where there is a much higher proportion of violent criminals and criminals with very long rap sheets.

Mandatory minimums and harsh sentencing guidelines have devoted lots of federal prison resources to marginal criminals who aren't a great threat to the public.

While home ownership is often beneficial, it isn't a first step out of poverty.

Home ownership is not a good choice for people who have unstable incomes or the bad credit that often results from unstable incomes or inability to stay on budget.

Home ownership is not a good choice for people who are living pay check to pay check. Unless one can afford a significant down payment, say 5%, and have a comparable emergency fund, it doesn't make sense.

There are multiple rungs on the ladder that leads to homeownership. First, is to bring yourself current with your paycheck -- get debts like old credit card balances paid off and get out of rent to own contracts and payday loans. Second, get a pay check (really, three to six months of paychecks) ahead by building up an emergency fund. Once you have debts paid, an emergency fund in place, stable employment and a history of good credit at least recently, then it is time to think about home ownership.

From the homeowner's perspective there are multiple reason for taking this approach: (1) the economic harm associated with defaulting on your lease if you are unable to pay is smaller than the econmic harm associated with being foreclosed upon, (2) renting is usually cheaper than owning when you have a small down payment, a mortgage insurance requirement and a subprime loan interest rate -- renters benefit from the generally good credit of landlords, (3) if you employment is insecure, being tied down by a house can cause you to forego good income opportunities, (4) lower income people often don't get nearly as much tax benefit from a mortgage as higher income people do, because their itemized deductions don't exceed the standard deduction by much, if anything.

One of the simpler things that mortgage underwriters can do to help those who should have mortgages get them is to affirmatively collect data on payment histories like rent payments and utility payments that may not show up in a conventional major credit reporting agency's credit report.

Also, keep in mind that the housing bubble collapse hasn't hurt everyone. While it has destroyed subprime credit, it has also brought down housing prices dramatically in some markets, without an increase in interest rates. Housing is more affordable right now than it has been in a decade, at least.

There is a good argument that the law should permit a local clown operation to avoid trademark liability in this kind of setting simply by clearly disavowing a connection to the trademark owner (with the parents). As long as it is clear that the local guy isn't affiliated with Nickelodeon and is not selling an authorized product, the justifications for trademark liability are greatly diminished. The gravemen of the offense in a case like this is appropriation of an artistic creation with value, not consumer confusion.

The harder Gordian knot to cut, it seems to me, is liability for breach of copyright through performance of a derivative work.

When actual creators interact directly with the public, without the intervention of a publisher or studio, the cultural norm in the United States is to permit others to create derivative works not for profit so long as any affiliation with the creator is disavowed. But, creators expect more if there is a profit.

But how much of a right a copyright holder should have to prohibit people from creating derivative works that the holder has no intention of creating? There are precedents for creating an "efficient breach" alternative to the exclusive right to create derivative works. One is the right to create a cover of a song and perform it, subject to payment of a statutory royalty. Another is the common provision of copyright laws in non-English speaking countries to permit translations to be written without voluntary licenses where the copyright holder refuses to use that right or grant a license to someone who will.

There isn't much evidence that these efficient breach regimes have hurt copyright holders much. The copyright holder still makes a profit that wouldn't otherwise have been realized, and many of the resulting works have significant public value.

Why not create an "efficient breach" statute for neighborhood clowns? In exchange for a royalty established much like the right to cover a song, one could make no holds barred imitations of Dora or any other licensed character, for private performance, so long as a disclaimer of affiliation was made to the consumer.

Better yet, why don't the owners of this IP make such a license available, much like the automatic licenses available to people who want to reproduce AP stories.

If it was never sold in the first place, does the first sale doctrine apply?

Allowing potential publishers to review a manuscript, for example, does not allow them to resell even their copy, under the first sale doctrine, even if there is no demand that the copy be returned.

From the pro link above:

"a 1989 German study by Wille and Beier, for instance, compared 99 surgically castrated sex offenders and 35 non-castrated sex offenders about a decade after their release from prison, and found that the recidivism rate of castrated offenders was 3%, while the rate for non-castrated offenders was 46%. . . . studies by James Dabbs et al. (See Crime Times, Vol. 1, No. 3, Page 2 ) . . . strongly suggest a link between elevated testosterone levels and violence, delinquency, substance abuse, and prison rule violations."

If we could get from 46% recidivism to 3% recidivism, that would meet the effective standard in my book.

people always (mistakenly) assume ’sexual’ assault and ’sexual’ crimes are indeed sexual.

they are NOT. they are crimes of violence and power. chemical (or real) castration is not the answer. i fear they will just assault again…………..

Chemical castration reduces testosterone. Testosterone is a major factor in the fact that more than 95% of violent felonies are committed by men. Assuming you are correct that sexual assault is a crime of violence and power, and not about sex, it doesn't follow that chemical castration will not dramatically reduce it.

Indeed, the hard question is really not, why not chemically castrate high risk sex offenders, but why not chemically castrate all high risk violent offenders whose offenses were not committed in cold blood.

The difference between this and Bell (or the no death penalty for adult rape case) is that it isn't permanent and involves someone who was convicted of a crime for which lifetime imprisonment, or at least, lifetime parole supervision, is often a punishment.

Convicted sex offenders are clearly higher risk for committing a sex offense in the future than people never convicted of a crime. And, the fact that chemical castration isn't permanent means that the permanency risk associated with physical castration or execution doesn't apply. If the sentence is later vacated, the chemical castration can discontinue.

The assumption is not: "That we know that “high-risk” offenders will re-offend; that all “high-risk” offenders will re-offend." The assumption is that (1) we know that "some" high risk offenders will re-offend (something about which we have abundant proof), (2) indeed that high risk offenders will re-offend at a rate significantly greater than the general population of people never convicted of an offese (something about which we also have abundant proof), and (3) that chemical castration reduces the risk of a high risk offender reoffending (something that research studies are supposed to discern).

At significant reduction in sex offense recidivism would make parole officials and the public more comfortable with allowing someone's release, which gives that individual greater freedom than incarceration (which employs the abstinence only approach rather differently), and would reduce the number of victims of released sex offenders. Its existence also might discourage juries in death penalty for child rape states from imposing the death penalty, if that punishment is upheld as constitutional (as it has been at the state supreme court level).