Grillick

Yes, everyone who lives here should be able to vote. In addition, I don't think that whether people pay taxes or not should be a factor in whether they can vote: the Constitution agrees with me. And we wouldn't have problems with "illegals," as you call them, if we just let everyone who wanted to move here come. Immigrants are a boon to our economy, and they enhance our culture and make us more tolerant. We shouldn't have any restrictions on immigration, or on voting.

Duplicate voters are the only illegal voters anyone has any business being concerned about, if you ask me. It's a travesty that we keep anyone who lives here from participating in our government. And the inherent racism/classism of voter ID Laws was already discussed at length on the previous thread.

Not really. Duplicate voter registrations are not a concern at all. It's bad enough that voters have to actively go out and register. Requiring them also to actively remove their registrations when they move goes too far. And 164 duplicate voters out of 2.2 million is also not a cause for concern.

This is absurd. The federal government has no authority to pass a law banning incest, so the lack of such a law is irrelevant.

Seriously, WISD0MTREE, I know you're young, but I thought you had more sense than that. You site testimony delivered to Congress by a partisan research group that only investigated the federal justice system to demonstrate that the death penalty is not racist? There are only 37 prisoners on death row in the federal system. There are over 3000 people on death row nationwide. Also, you can't just look at the race of the convicted murderer. You also need to look at the race of the victims.

This statement appears to be a non-sequitur. I haven't seen anything from those of you who support the death penalty that reflects a nuanced interpretation of morality. While it may be true that I have an absolutist stance when it comes to killing people, my opposition to the death penalty does not require that. Even if I thought it was justifiable to kill in self-defense, or in defense of others, or during war, it would not be inconsistent with that belief to say that killing a defenseless person who has already been subdued and incarcerated is unacceptable. There's plenty of room for grey-area morality while still opposing the death penalty.

What does California have to do with any of this? You don't think I hail from that dump, do you?

Of course, there's also the middle road option of not executing anyone, but punishing the guilty people (and maybe, for a time, a few innocents). Execution is irreversible, and therefore unjustifiable in an imperfect system of proving guilt. As I said earlier, I don't believe there is anyone who is irredeemable. Unless we can be absolutely certain beyond the shadow of a doubt that the person being executed is guilty (and, as described elsewhere in this thread, that is impossible given a non-omniscient justice system), then simply saving money is not a sufficient excuse to end a life.

Actually it was missing an i. Also, I'm not Outburst.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that the link in your post is broken, Sheepy.

In fairness, simply trading with one another and being a member of the same alliance doesn't fall directly within the prohibition in that rule. Use of multiple nations on a single network for the mutual benefit of those multiple nations is not exactly the same thing as using them for the benefit of one. If there were a "primary" nation with several multis set up as sort of vassal states, that would be a clear-cut case. This sounds more like two brothers who want to play the same game and want to play it together. If it weren't for the fact that there's no way to prove they are different people, I'd say there was nothing wrong with that. If my brother (who lives 2000 miles away from me) were to want to play the game, and join my alliance, that wouldn't be a violation. This is simply because they live together? Sure, the distinction is probably reasonable, because not making it would open you up to abuse, but it also would be reasonable to be a little less harsh in the punishment. Rather than deleting one nation immediately, issue warnings, and see if the collusion continues. That's my suggestion, anyway, as a non-moderator.

I wouldn't grab it in any event. It's not mine.

Sociological studies show that the death penalty does not function as a deterrent. Its punitive value is the only value that could justify it. Since punishment is not, in my opinion, a legitimate goal if the justice system, the death penalty is wholly inappropriate. Also, fear is not the only way to ensure compliance with the law. Nor is it, in my opinion, the most effective way.

I don't believe that anyone is irredeemable. And an undue focus on punishment over rehabilitation is a more upsetting flaw in the system than long sentences (though I will admit that in many cases, the latter is driven by the former).

No, the "problem" you are describing is the fact that we want to make absolutely sure we're right before we impose an irreversible punishment. How horrible of us! There is never a legitimate reason to kill another person. As such, there is never a legitimate reason for a society to do so. The death penalty taints every citizen in that criminal's death.

Assuming that I think war is an acceptable form of societal behavior. Cute.

I think life imprisonment is a good alternative to the death penalty, because human systems are flawed, but death is a permanent solution. Life imprisonment allows for the possibility that society could change its mind about a particular convict, either because of new evidence or changing moral judgments. Without a flawless justice system, an irrevocable punishment is unjustifiable.

No criminal justice system is effective enough to accurately distinguish between the cases you describe and cases that merely appear to be as you describe them.

No, you've never made a cake from scratch. You've always used ingredients that were created for you before you got to them.

I'd rather have a thousand guilty people go free than have one innocent person executed.

If you wish to make a cake from scratch, you must first create the universe.

Isn't that amazing? I love it. We really should be having heated arguments.

The only assumption I'm making is that your description of Texas law is accurate. Regardless whether that is true, the policy remains constitutional. This does not mean that it is unobjectionable, however. It merely means that the means for combating it lie outside the courthouse.

Sorry, but that's not how federalism works. When Congress has expressed a clear intent (as it has with border crossings) to occupy the entire field of regulation, state laws that conflict with, supplement, or interfere with the federal law are void. To the extent that Texas law imposes requirements other than those imposed by federal law or the federal regulations on federal officers (and I am merely assuming, rather than admitting, that it is true that they do so), those laws are void.

What makes you say there's no federal law in place, WISD0MTREE? There is. Federal statutes give the CBP and ICE authority to regulate the borders of the U.S. Regulations promulgated by those agencies create guidelines for agents to conduct searches of the contents of electronic devices even without reasonable suspicion (i.e. randomly). Those regulations describe the length of time the agent can retain the device, and when and under what circumstances the device can be confiscated and sent to a lab for forensic examination. There is hardly a void that needs to be filled by state law, and it's not like a satisfactory explanation of the details of this program would only take 30 seconds, anyway. It took the District Court in New York (in the case you referenced) five pages to describe the CBP and ICE programs.