I was about to ask you what the first thing was.

Then my stomach rumbled.

If you're at a table with 11 people and a Nazi, you're at a table with twelve Nazis.

Most people aren't the extremes, sure. But if they refuse to denounce the extremists, they create space for the extremists viewpoints to survive and gain traction and acceptance on a broader scale.

So, no, even though I know most of my family would be against outright killing me, I also know they support and vote for people who are in favor of killing me. So no, I do not feel safe around them. How do I know if any of them hold extremist viewpoints before it's too late? If they don't denounce it, they're every bit as culpable.

They probably didn't have you as a prosecutor there, unfortunately.

I'm a public defender. Was about to talk about how even though I'm as leftist as they come and find this guy reprehensible, that I'd have had no problems arguing what he argued in court.... But I missed that it was charged as "attempted." That's an excellent point. I agree that he almost certainly attempted to commit voter fraud.

That said, I can still see how the jury could find a not guilty though, even if, were I on it, I would have said guilty. Attempted crimes still have a mens rea (usually, and I'll note here that I'm not barred in PA so this is all a best guess, consult a local attorney to know anything for sure). So the state would still have to prove his intent beyond a reasonable doubt.

I'm guessing the jury said they couldn't prove the intent beyond a reasonable doubt. Your argument convinced me, but, I can see how a jury might go the other way, for sure. Especially since juries are always unpredictable. I've won cases I should've lost and lost cases I should've won, you just never know what's gonna happen in the jury room.

Defense lawyer here, though not in New York so take this all with a grain of salt, I just felt I should put my 2 cents in based on the vibes in this comment thread.

It is weird for a judge to go against a joint recommendation, which seems to have happened here. It takes something extraordinary. The article indicates that the judge felt she didn't truly feel remorse for her actions, which could do it, but doesn't always do it. But, to me, just the fact that the judge went against a joint recommendation will always raise an eyebrow. Usually, if the sentence isn't harsh enough, the prosecutor won't agree to it, and if it's too harsh, the defense won't agree to it. So joint recommendations are almost always followed.

Yes, it's "only" 6 more months, but that's really not insignificant.

Now, to all the people screaming about how it's not enough (and especially to the one person saying she should have her citizenship revoked (????)), I wonder, how many of you are also against the prison industrial complex we have here in America? I challenge you to think beyond your initial emotions. Is this death tragic? Yes, absolutely it is. It was senseless violence for no good reason. So I agree, it deserves a harsh punishment.

But everyone keeps calling it murder. Not every killing is a murder. I also want to challenge people to watch their language. Murder carries with it an intent to kill. A shove does not intend death, regardless of who is being shoved. No, it shouldn't have happened, yes, it's tragic, but it was not a murder.

Now, all of you calling for 20+ years, really think about what you're saying. Do you think this person has no chance of rehabilitation? Those are the people we put away for life. I don't think that's the case here. She fucked up. Obviously. She deserves to be punished harshly, and make no mistake, she is. 8.5 years is a LONG time. Think back to where you were 8.5 years ago. Were you the same person? I doubt it. Now, do you think she might better herself in those 8.5 years? I think it's very likely, though again, the prison industrial complex makes that less guaranteed.

Sentences have many goals. Some of the primary goals are punishment, protection of the public, and rehabilitation of the defendant. Does this sentence punish her? Yes, a lot. Does this sentence give her a chance for rehabilitation? I'm not sure on that one, but that's because it may, if anything, be too long, and cause her to get too used to life in prison, and increase her likelihood of recidivism. But that's not her fault, that's the fault of the prison industry. Does this sentence protect the public? I say yes. She lost her temper once and it's now going to cost her 9 years of her life (if you include the duration of the case). That's a hell of an incentive not to repeat.

Alright, I think that's all I really want to say. But please, everyone, in the future, try to think about how our prison system really works, and how much you support it, when you're discussing individual crimes, not just when you're talking about the system as a whole. I think most people on this site lean left, and therefore should support reducing the prison populations, but this comment section has me worried with everyone here frothing at the mouth to give MORE prison time, when the sentenced amount should be enough to satisfy our sentencing goals.

This is good advice, I appreciate it. But I should clarify, I definitely won't be launching my practice before I'm comfortable with the OS. I'm probably going to take some other user's suggestions and do some test runs on my home machine to figure things out. I'm not launching tomorrow, there's no real rush. My current contract runs until May 2024. So I've got 6 months ahead of me to figure things out.

Criminal defense attorney here, confirming this is correct in at least every jurisdiction I'm aware of.

But as always, it's best to contact a lawyer in the same jurisdiction of the court to know for sure.

It is now, but you used to get a free one each day, iirc. So while this is definitely cringe, there's a chance, depending on when it happened (if it happened), that it's slightly less than max cringe.

Edit: I looked closer, this is apparently from 2016, you still got free super likes back then.

That's been Catholicism's playbook since day one. There's a reason they're so against any kind of sex that doesn't lead to procreation.

Course, it also used to be rooted in the fact that medicine was trash for a long time, and a lot of kids died, so you'd want to have as many as you could to give some a shot at living a full life. But that's not the case anymore, so yeah, the only reasons to have as many kids as possible is as you say, to outnumber the sane people, and to keep the working class populated, so we inch closer and closer to Idiocracy becoming reality every day.

But hey, look at those shareholder's profits!

This seems like a good thread to ask this.. I'm sure I could find the answers I need myself but frankly I trust the userbase here more than most online articles.

As my username hints at, I'm a lawyer. I'm considering starting my own firm as a solo practitioner. I need a computer and/or laptop for it, and as a new business my budget would be pretty tight. I've mostly only ever used windows, but I'm getting fed up with the bullshit, so I'm considering going with Linux.

I assume Linux is capable of doing everything I need, which is primarily handling word documents, viewing PDFs, watching evidence videos, and online research. But my concern is that some of the more commonly used video types might have trouble on Linux, or that some of the word document templates I use in Windows might have compatibility issues.

I'm also nervous about using an OS I'm not familiar with for business purposes right away.

So I guess I'm asking a few questions. What is a reliable yet affordable option to get started? Are my concerns based in reality or is Linux going to be able to handle everything windows does without issues? What else might I need to know to use Linux comfortably from the get go? Is it going to take a lot of time and effort to get Linux running how I need it to?

For reference, I do consider myself to be somewhat tech-savvy. I don't code or anything, but I've built my last two home computers myself and I'm not scared of general software management, I just don't make it myself.

So, yeah, sell me on Linux, please.

I'm a big gamer, and was a massive HP fan. I did not buy the game, or even consider it, specifically because of JKR's bullshit.

I may be in the minority, but I guarantee I'm not the only one in this boat. So now you've talked to someone who cares, if you count this as talking.

And just to say a little more, no I didn't crusade against the game, nor do I villainize people who bought it and enjoyed it. I do think it's possible to enjoy art without liking the artist. Hell, my favorite book series of all time is the Ender's Game series, and Orson Scott Card is probably just as bad as JKR, though maybe not quite as famous/public about it.

But I can't bring myself to buy it. I'm trans, and her rhetoric, and how public it is, has been specifically harmful to me, directly. But that's just me. I won't tell other people how to live their lives or enjoy their free time, so long as they're not actively hurting others. And no, I don't consider buying a game where one person who is profiting from it might spend a sliver of that profit on anti-trans BS to be actively harming others, especially when she already has enough money to do whatever the hell she wants anyways.

This doesn't make a dent, and ethical consumption under capitalism is impossible anyways. I just hope that some portion of people who bought the game heard about the protests and maybe donated a fraction of what they paid for the game to some pro-LGBTQ groups. I have to believe there's at least a handful of people like that. I do believe that people are mostly good, and want to do good.

Yeesh, I wrote a lot more than I planned to here. I'll stop now lol.

I believe the correct lawyer term is HA HA HA HAHAH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH HA HA HA HA HA HA HAHA!!

Lawyer here. Can confirm.

You're not wrong, but you do still have to swear an oath to uphold the constitution. Also, the bar exam doesn't test your ethics, or even your ability to practice law. It tests your ability to memorize a ton of shit you'll never use in your actual practice. Maybe it was useful once upon a time before every lawyer practiced in a specialized subset of law, but mostly it was made to stop people of color practicing law. (https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/commentary/story/2020-12-07/abolishing-the-bar-exam-bias)

It really needs to be reformed, though I would actually be in favor of abolishing it and having the third year of law school be reformed into an apprenticeship model where you learn directly from an experienced attorney. Or a specialized bar exam that tests for the area of law you want to practice. Something needs to change about it.

I'm getting off topic. Yes this guy is a fraudster and so is everyone who advised him to sign, but it has nothing to do with whether anyone took the bar exam.

Source: am lawyer in Wisconsin (who actually took the bar exam)

Meanwhile in Wisconsin I have to pay an extra $100/yr for registration because I drive a hybrid.

Why?

Because, I shit you not, driving a hybrid apparently costs the state too much money, because we have to fuel up less, and so they get less tax.

What the fuck.

I don't necessarily disagree with you. I don't think there's really a number of years to put on it to make it appropriate. But I'm sure the lawyers discussed all the points you raised in negotiating this sentence. These numbers aren't pulled out of our asses, there are guidelines (almost certainly, again, not barred in NY) which help ensure similarly situated defendants are sentenced similarly.

What I'd like to hear more about, is whether the judge also ordered some kind of anger management counseling. I think that's what she needs more than a longer sentence.

If we truly want to balance the goals of protecting the public, adequately punishing the defendant, and also rehabilitating her, I don't think a few more years either way is what makes the biggest difference. I think it more depends on what she does with that time. I'm not sure what the situation is like within New York prisons as far as counseling goes, but if they have good programs, it's hard for me to imagine, if she takes it seriously, that 8.5 years of good counseling wouldn't be helpful to her, and to society at large.

I also think she could make all those gains in counseling, again, if she truly takes it seriously, within a couple of years. But then, I could probably be convinced that 2-3 years isn't long enough for causing someone's death. I've seen people get that for having the wrong amount of weed on them.

But then we get into the larger discussion about the entire prison industrial complex. We need some kind of change with how our prisons operate. Exactly how that looks isn't the point here. I'm just trying to point out that there's a bigger picture in play, and hope that people will consider that in the future.

In the end, nothing we say here has any impact on her life or the issued sentence. But it might have a difference in how people perceive and talk about the system as a whole in the future, so I think it's important to not lose sight of that.

Not sure how uncommon you're looking for, but I think I already did this.

I chose Sage.

According to some quick googling (read: not sure how accurate this is), Sage wasn't in the top 500 names for my birth year, but my given name was top 100.

Though both names I've used have been trending towards more common for most of my life. Looks like my original name is now a top 35 most common, but Sage is still outside the top 100 for females and outside top 300 for males.(Really wish there was more data for the popularity of nonbinary names. I think Sage is probably one of the more popular enby names, so maybe it's not all that uncommon, depending on how you define it.)

That's a quote from his letter from Birmingham jail, right?

While there are, of course, major differences in trans and black liberation, I read the full letter again recently and was shocked at how much of it was applicable to the current trans rights movement. I actually get the feeling that the two movements are more alike than they are different.

History repeats itself. I highly encourage everyone to take a half hour and read the full letter. Maybe if everyone took his words to heart, we could avoid some of the bullshit this time around. The conservative playbook of oppression hasn't changed much. It's just focused on a different target this time.

Sports at the top level already are dominated by rich kids. Wealth is actually more likely to lead to athletic advantages than being a trans woman.

https://www.cces.ca/sites/default/files/content/docs/pdf/transgenderwomenathletesandelitesport-ascientificreview-e-final.pdf

Hmm, this link might be dead. Search for "Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport - Transgender Women Athletes and Elite Sport" and it should pop up.

More:

https://news.osu.edu/want-to-play-college-sports-a-wealthy-family-helps/

The Income Gap Is Becoming a Physical-Activity Divide https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/24/health/sports-physical-education-children.html?smid=nytcore-android-share

This is a great tip, I'll definitely do some test runs, thanks!

See, e.g., the war on "drugs"

The GOP has been working towards making the US a dictatorship since the 60s. We passed the civil rights act and the right was so appalled that they had to treat people of color like, well, people, that they've been coming up with new ways to ensure progress never happens again ever since.

It was once a crime for black people to sit at the front of a bus in America. Guess that means Rosa Parks is responsible for the Holocaust.

Thank the gods we had you to point it out.

"instead of using the singular nongendered pronoun already present in English."

Lmao. That shoulda given away the /s right there.

But uh, I think the pronoun you're talking about there is "they." 😜

And is the issue of whether Republicans should invoke the Comstock Act to ban abortion going to be directly voted on? Because if not, it's not in a literal sense.

I certainly agree that it's a very important issue to understand, but we will not be voting, directly, literally, on whether or not to ban abortion nationwide. We will be voting on candidates who might try to do that though.

Completely fair, and I totally agree! I'm also not a person of color, so I hope my comment didn't come across as trying to co-opt the movement. Just wanted to, as you said, point out there are a lot of similarities and lessons that could be learned.

I, as a trans person, fully recognize that black people had it worse than trans people do now. While both communities face violence, black people faced violence that was heavily state-sponsored and far more widespread, even with the recent increased rates of violence against trans people. The entire U.S. legal system was rigged against them from the start. It was their blood that earned us the Civil Rights Act, which is the foundation our movement needed. And that's a debt we will owe forever. And I also recognize that people of color continue to face discrimination. The fight isn't over, for any of us.

I'm getting wordy. I think we're both on the same page here. I guess civil rights discussions get me going (but tbh, I'm okay with that). Hope you have a great day!

What if they're also a lawyer? If that's no problem...

Hey ;)

Yes, mostly paperwork and email for sure. Some basic spreadsheet stuff for tracking clients and payments and whatnot, but there's also programs for that.

One less common, yet essential, thing I haven't gotten a specific response on yet, is converting word docs to PDFs with searchable text. Not sure if you know things about that, but it popped into my head while responding here so hopefully someone who sees this knows something.

And, a generic thank you to everyone who has responded, this has all been very helpful. Even if I don't respond to you specifically, I appreciate it.

So I don't have one yet, but it's on my list and I'm curious: what is it about it that makes you actually finish games?

Palworld is mine. I've been loving it so far.

I'd say a couple things though:

1. Don't expect perfection. It's still early access and there are bugs. They put out a patch last night that fixed some of the most glaring issues, but there's still some wonky stuff. I'd recommend, when you build your base, to keep all the workstations that pals use on the ground level, and build your ceiling/second floor two units high. Some larger pals can't get through single tall doorways.

2. Feel free to play around with your server settings if you want things a little easier/harder (but I'd say definitely turn off structure decay right away, and maybe increase pal spawn rate slightly, mine is at 1.2x and feels good). The game is almost entirely customizable to what you want it to be, everything between super casual fun and hardcore survival is easy to set up.

3. Don't stress about min/maxing everything just yet. First of all, you probably simply don't need it while leveling up. Second, people don't know what the fuck they're talking about yet. There are conflicting sources for the best of pretty much everything. So just play how you like (but I'd say wait until you have a pal you know you'll use endgame before powering it up with essence/condensing, those can't be refunded to my knowledge).

Lol. Yes I am! How did you know?? 😜

Oh that's my bad. I missed what community this was in. I don't have any steam deck specific knowledge.

I've heard about some performance issues on multiplayer servers for console users, but iirc most people don't have issues for single player. Wish I could say more but I've only played on PC, sorry.

I get the feeling (I wouldn't really know, haven't been there in months) that Reddit is still significantly better. Sure, it's worse now, but it still has active communities on pretty much any topic imaginable. Lemmy is on its way, but won't be there for a few years I think.

My understanding is that it was created in response to a ton of Musk spam which was primarily positive, when he was first emerging as a popular figure. People got fed up with hearing about him, and started Enough Musk Spam to point out how absolutely terrible he actually is.

Nowadays, there's much less positive Musk news, so it feels more like a misnomer. But it was started as an attempt to highlight how bad he is. Seems to have worked a bit, tbh.

Hi, I'm a lawyer. While I work in a different area of law and therefore can't speak too in depth about this with certainty, if their terms are as enforceable as the linked articles seem to indicate, then yes, this is good advice.

As always with the law, things may vary by jurisdiction. If you have specific questions, contact a lawyer in your area.

Actually, here's my fun fact: Alaska is the farthest North, East, and West state in the U.S.

I guess I probably have more experience than the average player, about 25 hours so far. But I also learned my 3rd point the hard way, by doing ~10 hours of research outside of playing to try to optimize. It mostly just drove me crazy, but I did pick up a lot of little helpful tidbits. So if anyone has any general gameplay questions I'm happy to do my best to answer!

Just know I definitely don't consider myself an expert by any means. I'm not even at the level cap yet.

Yeah some counties use pointlessly complicated programs to distribute videos. I often have to try a few different players on windows to find one that works. If VLC has trouble with something, are there others you'd recommend as well?

Oh I'm aware the OS is free. The affordability I was asking for was for the actual computer to run it. I guess that part wasn't Linux-specific. Mostly just looking for a good option for a work computer that will last a while. Will probably just get some kind of refurb laptop, I've always had good success with those.

But if someone has a specific recommendation I'm all ears.

I mentioned this further down the thread, but Scrubs is full of micro aggressions.

I mean, pretty much the very first joke in the series is JD asking Turk if he's allowed to say the N word.

There's an episode where the theme is whether Turk is black.

As for trans-specific problems, Todd advertises his website with the T slur in it on his T-shirt one episode.

He's also a prime example of bi-erasure as when he "comes out," nobody says bi the whole episode, and it's like the whole cast can't conceive of someone liking both men and women. Not to mention the bi stereotype that we're all sexual deviants and overly promiscuous.

Frankly, I could go on for a while. Scrubs was fine for its time. It does not hold up well. Shame because it was my favorite show for a very long time. But I'm glad society has grown.

I got one off etsy, it's just 3d printed. Works fairly well, but the floss can get a little loose towards the end. But it's easy enough to fix.

Not quite as convenient as the individual picks, but FAR less waste. A trade off I'm happy to make.

If you're in the US, you can demand a company release the information they have on you, to you, for inspection. It's more data than you'd think. A LOT more.

You have the right to request access to inspect the personal information a company stores on you. At least, in the US. And I believe the UK and EU as well but I can't speak as much to those.

If you want to be truly terrified (or enlightened, however you prefer to think of it), pick any big company that you've used and request all the data they have stored on you. The amount of data they'll have is STAGGERING. Certainly hundreds of pages, possibly thousands. It's insane.