I recommend Sin City Outdoors on YouTube[1]. Father and son outdoorsmen have been doing some excellent first hand documentation of the water level decline. They do a dedicated update every two weeks.
I will cast an uninformed "yes" to this as an American. Long ago, I studied philosophy and discovered Vedic influences, along with pop-culture American visions of spiritual India. I was impressed by the thinking and erudition of Vedic (and Buddhist) scholars, and immediately found links to English and German scholarship. All together, I had an early-adult vision of India as a place with high literacy and a long religious and scholarly history. Meanwhile, my urban life in America confirmed daily that there are illiterate people who thrive on being loud, pushy and often fat -- of every national origin. As the years go by, my views have changed.
I always knew India was a populated place, but I did not understand that it means there are low-education and low-culture people in such numbers. I have met far more people from India now than I had in the past, and their human stories show me how I had been fortunate to see great writing, thinking and devout practice from India, but that is not the whole story.
This is a long intro to basically seeing both India and America as a place with strikingly different people, next to each other, filling the cities. Very high skill, very high education, visiting a store right next to very low skill, very low education people, in great numbers.
I respect my colleagues from India and I trust that they can also respect Americans. There is no single story here, and low quality outsourcing did cost me personally as a coder in the USA for decades.
I'm about to re-enter the job market. Pay is the biggest motivator due to COL increases (non-relational to human nature) which affects my ability to provide for my family (more relational). So, you're not wrong... but also far off track from the question asked.
Are the same number of people seeking fully remote jobs now as were seeking them 8 years ago? Human nature may not change that much, but a job market certainly can.
All -- it’s a good idea for your card(s) to be “stolen”, maybe once every year or two. And yes, it is definitely “stolen”, and not lost. Reps will definitely ask this. If it is lost (which it isn’t), the “thieves” may be able to continue to charge your card number.
That's like, to me, why can't my bank/credit card block charges from a merchant? (Or make you jump through repeated hoops to do so).
I've heard banks tell me "well, you signed a contract with them, so we need to let the charges go through", or the "for your convenience"...
No, my bank has a fiduciary duty to me. If blocking a charge causes me to get into conflict with the merchant, that's between the merchant and I - my bank shouldn't be taking any "side" (and if they do, it should be mine).
Those days don’t exist anymore. You shouldn’t feel pity for those kids, you should feel shame in being part of the generation that robbed all of those good experiences away. It’s no joke that a lot of these kids are depressed and have no skills or resources to find entertainment.
Before smart phones many of their parents watched TV for 4+ hours a day. What did you expect the kids to do?
Thanks for reminding me of the pleasure I feel having a setup that ignores all of the work you and other like you have done in this field. Personally, this whole comment is ludicrous… but I can’t explain why. Maybe it’s just a smell
The article claims that this was the second trial, not his third. He was convicted on some counts in his first trial, but the jury was hung on the Espionage Act charges:
> This was the second trial against Schulte. In March 2020, his first trial ended in a mistrial on several Espionage Act charges, but he was found guilty of contempt of court and lying to the FBI.
You are correct, there were two trials. In the first, the jury convicted him of 1) contempt of court and 2) making false statements to the FBI.
> In March 9, 2020, after hearing four weeks of testimony and deliberating for six days, the jury convicted Schulte on two counts: contempt of court and making false statements to the FBI. However, jurors were deadlocked on eight other counts, including the most serious of illegal gathering and transmission of national defense information. Although the judge declared a mistrial, the government chose to retry the case.
No, they can't. If the defendant is acquitted, that's the end of the line (barring a few dual sovereignty loopholes, as you mentioned, but those also aren't limitless).
I think hung should be just as good as acquittal, or at least ONE other try or something different than potentially infinite retries until the prosecutor gets a tap on the shoulder to move on
Plenty of other countries allow conviction by simple or supermajorities.
I'm far from a punitive-justice kind of person, but arguing that a single dissenting juror should be sufficient to acquit strikes me as not at all obvious.
As long as I can convince one in twelve that I'm innocent, I should be considered innocent?
Having been on a jury in the US one time (attempted murder), the purpose of this system is probably not at all obvious. The idea is to put 12 people in a room and force them to agree to the same thing. You can deliberate almost any amount of time you want. If you try to tell the judge after a single day of delibrations that you are a hung jury, the judge will force you to stay longer. Only in extreme cases where the jury has been hung for a very long time does the judge allow a mistrial.
So the idea is to force 12 people to convince each other of one idea or the other.
In the final play of the Orestia trilogy by Aeschylus, the goddess Athena convenes a jury of twelve citizens to decide the guilt of Orestes in the murder of his mother, Clytemnestra.
The jury is evenly split, and Athena adds a final vote for innocence, calling it her precedent.
It is unfortunate that the United States did not follow this ancient judicial custom EDIT: to acquit if half the jury refuses to convict.
> It is unfortunate that the United States did not follow this ancient judicial custom.
Requiring a simple majority of the jury for a serious criminal conviction, but splitting ties for the defense, rather than the US practice of requiring a unanimous verdict for conviction?
>So the idea is to force 12 people to convince each other of one idea or the other.
You said nothing to contradict the GP. If someone is on trial, all they need is one of the twelve to not be convinced of guilt. Your phrasing of "force" that one person to change their mind is absolutely insane to me.
Well, I think the clarification is important. It's not like you just go for a vote, and if there's no consensus outcome, boom, mistrial.
Judges aim for consensus, and juries are intended to debate/discuss until they can reach it. So the complaint about "well, prosecutors can just keep trying" rings a little more hollow in that case.
(Again, there are a ton of other reasonable complaints--bullshit forensic "science", the fact that expert witnesses cost money that defendants don't have, mandatory minimum sentences, federal prosecutors' aversion to risking losses at trial, the awful penal system, etc. But this is a weird one to be hung up on, I think.)
Having been stuck on several courts-martial panels in the military as well as a civilian jury later for an assault trial, I found the military court system seemed, in many ways, more fair to the accused.
On the flip side, the verdict does not have to be unanimous.
Just to clarify, in the US at least, juries don't determine innocence, but rather "not guilty", aka, inefficient evidence of guilt.
From cornell law website:
> A not guilty verdict does not mean that the defendant truly is innocent but rather that for legal purposes they will be found not guilty because the prosecution did not meet the burden.
As an interesting quirk, Scottish law has three verdicts: "guilty", "not guilty" and "not proven" where the latter is basically "we think you're guilty but the prosecution sucked so we have to let you go"
This turned out to be a big deal because of the trial of the Lockerbie bombers who blew up a Pan-Am flight over Scotland and were ultimately tried under Scots law. There was a real possibility that the bombers could have gone free with a "not proven" verdict.
While its true Megrahi and co were tried under Scottish law, it wasn't in a court room in Scotland. There are a number of features of how the Megrahi case was tried by Scottish judges in an area of the Netherlands on a US airforce base that was legally declared part of Scotland that are unusual, it was a very unique process that has never been repeated:
There are aspects of how that trial unfolded that have long been subject of concern even from victims families (Dr Jim Swire famously); politically a "not proven" verdict would have been so unpalatable I'm honestly not sure how much chance there ever was of that occurring - politics is how we ended up in the bizarre Scottish courtroom in the Netherlands situation in the first place. Even the way in which the judges deliberated is not standard for a typical High Court of Justiciary case in its normal home in Scotland.
This almost never happens. The jury basically has to not make up its mind for at least a week. (and the judge can keep it going as long as they want) Its almost never just 1 person either. But if one person is willing to hold their ground for a week it means there is something going on. Either that person is a committed ideological actor, saw something, or had some major bias. It takes an immense will to deal with 11 other people for a week straight who all want to go home and get back to their lives, usually if its just one person they give in after a few days to the social pressure. So if a jury hangs it usually points to more than 1 disagreeing. This is where we get into "compromise" verdicts, where maybe 1 person is being stubborn but will go along with the group if they are allowed to win on one point, which is why prosecution throws the kitchen sink at criminal defendants.
>Either that person is a committed ideological actor, saw something, or had some major bias.
...Or they haven't been convinced beyond a reasonable doubt.
You realize as a juror, your job isn't to kowtow to the state. You're literally the last bulwark between said state and your fellow man. If anything, ypu need to be picking hard at any case you get presented, especially if it smells like a political/railroad case.
I'm more "Convince me that this man is the only person who could possibly have done what you allege."
If they presented no compelling evidence that he did it, and as someone with technical understanding, I'd have questions to raise if things did not sufficiently add up.
Sorry, deliberations will continue until either the prosecution or these other jurors get with the program I'm not putting someone away while I entertain a reasonable doubt.
Who cares about statistics I saw it happen and finally the next presidential administration appointee hit up the prosecutor to stop on or after the third trial
1. That outcomes should be binary, i.e. "guilty" or "innocent" with no mistrials.
2. That outcomes should be decided by unanimous, supermajority, majority, or some other arrangements.
I don't think either of those arguments are especially fundamental. My point was only that it's a bit hyperbolic to view the whole hung jury rule as some sort of Bill of Rights violation.
A hung jury is just one of the causes of a mistrial; and the net effect of a mistrial is that no verdict is reached. The common law has no prohibition on retrying a defendant after a mistrial.
well the argument is that if the state is so inconpetent that it keeps mistrying an individual, then that's potentially harrasment of an innosent person and can't be allowed
Given the role of a jury as ground truth to the legal system, it's rather dangerous to hold that a jury can "misbehave".
Jury nullification, as controversial as it is, is an important escape valve and check on the system. Prosecutors and judges just don't like it because it threatens stare decisis.
I think the point is, while there are limits, most of those will last longer than the resources anyone would have to defend themselves. It doesn't have to be limitless, only a bit longer than anyone can "survive".
Only an acquittal, meaning the jury agreed that guilt was not proven beyond a reasonable doubt. One mistrial makes sense. Perhaps there was someone with doubts, but those doubts were unreasonable. Or there was one person who believed the accused was guilty and that person was unreasonable. This could be fixed with a new jury.
After two mistrials (for failure to reach a consensus) it’d appear that reasonable minds may differ and the case must not have been proved beyond a reasonable doubt.
Often times, when a mistrial is declared and a retrial occurs, prosecutors will change strategy. Additionally, rulings from the previous trial are not automatically carried over, so suppressed evidence (for example) can be potentially displayed during a trial if the judge rules differently.
Another factor, which is more common in state courts, is the lesser charge consideration. Upon a retrial, the judge can instruct the jury to find a defendant guilty of a lesser crime in lieu of the originally charged crime. For example, manslaughter instead of murder.
Overall it’s obviously stacked against the defendant in federal court. Adding in unlimited retrials basically guarantees a defendant will be found guilty eventually.
The defense also gets to retool its strategy in light of the evidence. Defense also gets to make evidentiary motions. Retrials don't always favor the prosecution.
I think the most retrials I've seen (stemming from hung juries, not reversals) is the John Gotti Jr. case, where he got four mistrials. Prosecutors decided not to seek retrial after that.
Don't you just love how first you learn about the Bill of Rights, and then you learn that there's a bullshit loophole our judicial system uses to bypass every goddamn rule in the entire Bill of Rights?
The best part is magically none of these cases make it to the Supreme Court. We have had several decades of open and shut constitutional violations including mass warrantless wiretapping, indefinite detention without trial, civil asset forfeiture, executive order overreach. No ruling on any of it.
I mean, there are a ton of problems with the criminal justice system, but white, well-off defendants who can afford non-court-appointed lawyers getting convicted after a single mistrial isn't really top of the list, is it?
How on Earth is "other people have it worse" supposed to be some kind of counterargument?
No shit other people have it worse. I'd put Speedy and Public Trial and Due Process (Civil Asset Forfeiture) problems as the top of the list, with Double Jeopardy erosion a ways down. Mandatory minimums sound like they belong on the list too, but I'm not familiar enough to know exactly where to place them -- probably high on the list. In any case, one bad thing on a list certainly does not invalidate another bad thing on the list. That's an even more dogshit idea than the loopholes themselves.
> this guy's not exactly a poster child
Standing up for rights means standing up for bastards. Always has, always will, because that's when rights get tested.
Interestingly, the federalists tried to argue against the Bill of Rights by essentially saying if an individual right was not mentioned in the Bill of Rights than that omission could set a precedent that the individual did not have that right. Of course now we know that everything that isn’t explicitly protected has been taken from us so I guess it’s good they ultimately lost that debate.
On a somewhat positive note, there are things like the Speedy Trial Act that mandate charges be dismissed if a trial is not brought quickly enough. But it’s often not very effective because they are allowed to delay the trial basically indefinitely if the judge finds it is in the “ends of justice” to do so. There also have been major cases thrown out over Brady (evidence disclosure) violations recently which is a step in the right direction. I think defendants now probably have more rights than they ever did but the problem is that 1) there are way more laws to break today than ever before 2) federal prosecutors are less interested in the public good and more in their political ambitions and careers instead 3) good legal representation has become incredibly expensive.
Of course now we know that everything that isn’t explicitly protected has been taken from us so I guess it’s good they ultimately lost that debate.
And even the things that are explicitly protected are subject to the interpretation of the Constitution, via the ouija board that the Supreme Court uses to contact the "founders".
They can intentionally mess up the trial, or refuse to prosecute. There are people who get swept up in some old but reopened case investigation launched by a DA that wants to look tough. Trail might have died 10 years ago with essentially an acquittal, but it can be set up so it can be reopened at any point.
I think judges are allowed to dismiss cases "with prejudice" (i.e. not allow for a retrial), and I feel like this _should_ be done if the prosecution purposely punts to try again later, but I'm not sure how often this happens in practice
Convicted four times, but with conviction overturned on appeal (including one time to the Supreme Court), plus two mistrials. The new DA declined to seek a seventh trial.
Ah, that makes more sense. It isn't double-jeopardy when a conviction is remanded for re-trial (although why it's not is unclear to me in a common-sense sense).
You usually cannot appeal simply on the basis that you believe the jury made the wrong decision, i.e. on the basis of an error of fact.
There has to be an error of law (e.g. the judge have a wrong jury instruction, or evidence was inappropriately allowed/excluded, or the trial was allowed to continue when a mistrial should have been declared) or other constitutional basis, like ineffective counsel.
In some cases, appeal courts will decide that there could be no basis for conviction once the flaw is corrected (in which case a conviction can be reversed), but oftentimes the appropriate outcome is to remand the case back to the lower court for retrial.
Be kind. Don't be snarky. Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine. Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community.
Shilling for Israel is the past time of American corporate media, which older Americans consume a lot of, and, in much of the middle of America, your status is dependent on dutifully regurgitating those same opinions.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3Azy88IiVqU