Heller v. District of Columbia, and what it means for you

Yesterday, the Supreme Court of the United States heard oral arguments in the case of Heller v. District of Columbia, in which a security guard named Dick Anthony Heller is suing DC’s government over its ban on handguns, which has stood since 1976, on the grounds that the law violates his Second Amendment rights. A full text of the oral arguments is available here for those of you who enjoy reading such things. This is the first time the Supreme Court has heard a meaningful case on the Second Amendment since 1939. The main issue is whether the Second Amendment (“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”) applies only to government-run militias like the National Guard, or whether it is meant to bestow upon individuals the right and responsibility to defend the nation in case of invasion or tyranny. Right now, it’s looking as though at least five members of the Court (Roberts, Thomas, Scalia, Alito, and Kennedy) agree with the latter interpretation. My thoughts after the jump. Click to continue reading…

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Promiscuity Required for NY Governors

David Paterson, the newly appointed governor of New York, has confirmed in an interview that he has previously had extramarital affairs. You may be thinking, “Gee this is old news. We’ve been hearing about this all last week.” Well, that was the other governor. The one who quit his job because he had sex with a super expensive prostitute ($2000 for sex every night? No thanks!). Amazingly, Michelle Paterson, the current governor’s wife, also admitted to having extramarital affairs during the same interview. The couple say that they have solved their marital problems and that neither has had an affair for five years. Way to go guys!

[Source: NY Daily News]

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Why the RIAA Fails at Life, The Universe, and (especially) the Internet

As Chris just reported, the Nine Inch Nails album released independently via download has garnered $750,000 so far. A similarly released Radiohead album made about $10 million recently. The recording industry is unsure what to do, but thus far has mostly seemed to ignore these successes and continued to focus on music piracy, which they blame for loss of profit. To combat piracy, they’ve taken measures such as encrypting CDs with Digital Rights Management (DRM) software, which in Sony’s case included a rootkit, which presented serious computer security issues to users. However, as of last year, all major record labels had dropped DRM due to its cost and ineffectiveness at preventing piracy. Why the record labels are on their way down, after the jump. Click to continue reading…

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Guns on Campus

Given the unfortunate propensity in this country for psychos to walk into public places and start killing people, most recently at Northern Illinois University, the debate over whether or not guns should be allowed on college campuses has become a major issue. Only a couple of universities, including the University of Utah, where I attend, allow concealed carry permit holders to carry their guns on campus. Anti-gun groups claim that allowing concealed carry on campus would result in even more shootings; pro-gun groups say that the only way that students will be able to defend themselves from a psychotic gunman is to be on equal ground with the shooter. My thoughts after the jump. Click to continue reading…

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HD-DVD is Toast!

Engadget, the popular gadget website, just put HD-DVD on their “deathwatch.”

HD-DVD looked promising with it’s slightly lower price range, but with Sony’s continual push of Blu-ray technology, HD-DVD looks pretty beat. It might be due to lack of studio support for HD-DVD, with Blu-ray now holding about 70% of newly released titles. Warner gave Blu-ray an little extra bump when they went Blu-ray only. Maybe, it was the two largest movie rental companies, Netflix and Blockbuster, following suit and also going Blu-ray only. It also could have been the higher quality of Blu-ray movies, with a single disk being able to hold two to four times more infomation than an HD-DVD disk. Perhaps, it was even the Playstation 3 that helped Blu-ray. Just kidding.

HD DVD

[Source: Engadget]

[Image credit: Travis Church]

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