OK. So by that logic, let’s say you are touring Europe and have a heart attack. The paramedics are in the area and available, but refuse to take you to the hospital. You are left to die on the street.
You think you deserve such foul treatment?
When a government is informed that people are dying within its waters, and the gov has the capability to respond but deliberately chooses not to because the victims are “african”, you think that the government bears no responsibity for their deaths?
Is it really so different though? The outcome of both situations is the same. Migrants are dying, through direct action and deliberate inaction.
Mediterranean nations have the opportunity to protect lives, but instead they choose kill / let migrants die.
You are defending willful negligence that leads to the deaths of migrants.
Up to 1 in 13 migrants die in the Mediterranean. Italy as well as Greece have been allowing migrants to die as a part of deterrence-based migration policy. Rescuing the passengers of capsized migrant vessels has been criminalized. There are plenty of articles that confirm these facts. Here is one example.
Why are there foreign judges serving in Hong Kong?
It is a holdover from Hong Kong’s past as a British colony. After the UK handed Hong Kong back to China in 1997, the agreement between the countries stipulated that the special territory would continue to operate with its freedoms and systems for 50 years- including its common law legal system which operates in several other jurisdictions worldwide. Currently there seven foreign judges remaining on the court– three British and four from Australia.
So, foreign judges who are meddling in HK affairs are upset that China (the inheritor of HK) is meddling in HK affairs?
If the West actually cared about HK independence, why do they wish to maintain colonial judges in HK courts? If they cared, shouldn’t HK judges be in HK courts?
While China has been heavy handed in its effort to speed up the timeline of the power transfer, in the end, the West has concluded that HK is to be Chinese territory. By the West’s own policy, these are foreign judges getting kicked out by the “rightful” new rulers, just a bit early.
This is great! Now you can compare prices for the 10 services you require and calculate the extent of your of financial ruin, all from the back of the ambulance!
I jest. Also, good luck opening a SQL database or parsing a massive minified JSON file. Many facilities do not provide the data in an easily accessible or standardized form, making it inaccessible for most people.
That’s fair.
Is it not tax evasion/fraud? In the US, either can bring criminal charges. For a smaller municipality, is there no assistance available from higher government?
It’s both.
An example of bad urban planning is low density urban sprawl, which requires lots of resources for few housing units.
Less housing, price go up. High build cost, price go up.
Blaming AirBnB for high housing prices is like setting up a chain of dominos, and criticizing a guy who comes by and knocks it over.
Yeah, and that’s exactly what they chose to do. They contributed to the reasons John Public can’t afford housing, and were rewarded massively for it.
If it wasn’t him, it would have been someone else, or the wind.
Yeah, anyone can rob a bank with poor security, but we should still punish the guy who actually robs the bank.
Cops would rather beat up college students and the unhoused than go after landlords.
that’s an expense that’s hard to justify to taxpayers
Ah, yes. We don’t have money because collecting taxes would be too expensive. Classic.
EDIT:
https://www.businessinsider.com/irs-tax-audits-recover-12-dollars-for-every-dollar-spent-2023-6?op=1
It depends whether you think killing 200,000+ civilians is a defensible act.
300,000+ if you include the bombing of Tokyo.
Nobody knows how a conventional war would have played out. To assert civilian deaths would have been higher is pure speculation and a gross attempt to justify the slaughter of noncombatants.
Though it is likely that even without nukes, the US would have still razed these cities with conventional munitions, given the events in Tokyo.
Yes, but that is irrelevant. France involving themselves opens them up to retaliation from Russia. If Russia retaliated against France, and even if not strictly required to by Article 5, it is likely other NATO countries would join the conflict.
France putting “boots on the ground” would mean a direct conflict between nuclear powers and would likely drag in the entirety of NATO.
Unless you want to live Fallout, such an escalation would be absolutely insane.
Of course this could all be addressed by designing robust systems that implement strong redundancy, safety checks, and sufficient regulation, but that increases complexity and costs money.
I think we still need more time/data to get the whole picture. EVs are still in their early stages.
It would be interesting to look at fire rates for vehicles at rest. These types of fires have the potential to become quite serious, as they are often not immediately noticed, especially if the vehicle is parked in a garage or remote area. This additional time allows the fire to spread and intensify.
Since EV fires are typically more intense than ICE vehicles, we should expect EV fires to cause more damage to the surroundings and to spread faster. Though, this danger could be offset if EVs have a lower probability of self ignition.
We should also look at fires while refueling/charging. Lithium cells are most dangerous when charging and discharging. While an overfilled gas tank is easy to spot and may catch fire, a continually overcharged battery is invisible and will catch fire. Also, because of the long charge time of batteries, many EV owners leave the vehicle unattended while charging and would not immediately notice a fire if one were to occur. In addition, EVs are often charged at home, in close proximity to residences and other vehicles, and often within garages. These residential locations do not have the same fire safety requirements and suppression systems as gas stations, so a vehicle fire at home is already much more dangerous and has the potential to severely damage your home.
We have had a century to figure out ICE, but it’s still very early days for EVs, so only time will tell.
LiPo batteries of the same capacity actually have the potential to be much more dangerous than the sodium cell shown here.
LiPo packs typically use flat, soft walled cells which are far more susceptible to being punctured. In the event of a puncture or overcharge event, high temperature enduring flames are produced, with the severity and duration largely depending on the amount of energy within the cell. LiPo batteries also degrade at a much faster rate (both over time and with charge cycles) and have been known to spontaneously combust in storage while at rest.
With the sodium battery, the thrust produced by the puncture could have been easily been overcome by properly securing the cell.
Yep, less/no fire is very important when creating battery banks with many cells. The probability of single cell failure spreading to adjacent cells is reduced, making a catastrophic failure of the entire bank less likely.
Yep, cylindrical Li-ion cells like the 18650 already do this.
I’m sorry, but there is no situation where it is permissible to stand idle as someone suffers an untimely and preventable death.
Even soldiers at war, captured in foreign territory without visas, are entitled to lifesaving care.