Discussion thread [Serious]

[atomtengeralattjaro]

I also wanna post this:
https://flydontspy.com/

If I could afford to go on a holiday to the US, I'd probably go to Canada instead, I mean, equally beautiful nature, nice people, less of a nightmare to get through the border...
(but no rocket launches. That would have to be weighed in.)

[Ml08180]

For U.S. individuals:
As required by your laws, the EPA is calling for public comment on the planned rollback of environmental regulations.
https://www.epa.gov/laws-regulations/regulatory-reform
I've heard the gov't is required to read and respond to public comments.

I care because even though I've got no say in this as it isn't my government, it's a large country with a lot more global environmental impact than mine.

They're required to, but they pay a bunch of interns half the minimum wage to manage them. The only way to actually get anywhere with things like this is to put together a phone bank and call the various offices so much that the phone system can't handle the load; even the Whitehouse.gov page where people are supposed to be able to get a response out of the White House by getting enough people to fill out a 30-second form isn't actually looked at by anyone outside of a small group unless it gets serious traction. Our government is very much run like the helpdesk at a phone company

There are three ways to comment:

1. Email
2. Mail
3. "Docket" (essentially a blog entry with comments)

I've looked at the Docket, and there are a couple hundred comments. All of the ones I glanced at are saying that they shouldn't repeal any regulations, and that in fact more should probably be put into place, and that they should be enforcing regulations better.

That last part is really true where I live, about two years ago we had a coal ash spill into a major waterway and now we're finding out that some chemical called Gen-X has been pouring out into a major lake AND into the air around the plant that was just dumping it into the river. For a state that tries to sell itself on its natural beauty, we sure do like to dump poison into the rivers

I also wanna post this:
https://flydontspy.com/

I'm actually fairly certain (very certain actually, we had a similar issue when I worked as an RA where one of the mid-level Community Directors was trying to get his RA's to hand over their social media logins) that if they did require that information it would be a clear violation of the amendment to our constitution where you have to get a warrant to gain access to a private social media account. There's been several court rulings on this. They could start doing it, but it would quickly be litigated and stopped. It'd be nice if we didn't have to worry about this in the first place, but that would mean electing people who have actually, y'know, read the constitution

If I could afford to go on a holiday to the US, I'd probably go to Canada instead, I mean, equally beautiful nature, nice people, less of a nightmare to get through the border...
(but no rocket launches. That would have to be weighed in.)

If people in the US could afford to go on a holiday in the US, the tourism industry might be more affordable!

[Uly]

I have a question, as it came up in class today.
What are the long term health of effects of smoking marijuana as opposed to cigarettes?

[Shai'tan]

I believe the long term health effects of smoking marijuana is not very well researched, but it depends on when you start and how much you smoke. The effect of smoking cigarettes are well documented though, it's really bad for you. Smoking things in general is bad for your lungs though, whatever the substance.

[Uly]

A lot of information I have heard about marijuana seems questionable or shaky. I feel as though people are trying to push the legalization of marijuana because they know they can make plenty of money of it. As well, the government could make bank off of taxes on it such as the one on alcohol and tobacco.

[Pocket]

Pot can make you lazy.