The 1-2-3 Killam
Mid-Card Championship Winner
[LINK]
For anybody that likes to look at these kinds of things - and I imagine there aren't many of you - a full list of the acts passed by the 112th Congress, from 2011 to 2012.
I was pleasantly surprised to see how many pushes for public transportation went into effect. Lots of funding for high speed rails (there's one going in now between Chicago and St. Louis), better inter-city public transportation, and renewing some key interstates that badly need to be redone. As a person who lives in a city and relies on PT to get around, this kind of things appeals to me, a US voter.
The only thing I was kind of shocked to see was 112-3. It's a bill that extends the Patriot Act, as it relates to formerly confidential business files, and roving wire taps. A giant fuss was made over this by many conservatives I know, and so I did a little research. You see the phrase "wire taps" in a bill passed by congress, and I can see how people would get a little unnerved. But all "roving wiretaps" really means is that they can more effectively track a single TARGET (not every US citizen ever), if he/she is trying to avoid being tracked. A Wiki example on the subject suggest that if a target were being tracked via cellphone, and threw that cellphone away to avoid being tracked, congress would have to be called, and they'd have to wait on a new order to be able to continue tracking the potential threat. With this extension, it basically means they can - with extreme use of judgement - initiate a roving tap, that follows the target rather than the device that's been jacked.
And before anybody mentions how Obama is an evil communist that doesn't believe in privacy or individual liberty...this law was passed by George W. Bush four months PRIOR to the events of 9/11.
For anybody that likes to look at these kinds of things - and I imagine there aren't many of you - a full list of the acts passed by the 112th Congress, from 2011 to 2012.
I was pleasantly surprised to see how many pushes for public transportation went into effect. Lots of funding for high speed rails (there's one going in now between Chicago and St. Louis), better inter-city public transportation, and renewing some key interstates that badly need to be redone. As a person who lives in a city and relies on PT to get around, this kind of things appeals to me, a US voter.
The only thing I was kind of shocked to see was 112-3. It's a bill that extends the Patriot Act, as it relates to formerly confidential business files, and roving wire taps. A giant fuss was made over this by many conservatives I know, and so I did a little research. You see the phrase "wire taps" in a bill passed by congress, and I can see how people would get a little unnerved. But all "roving wiretaps" really means is that they can more effectively track a single TARGET (not every US citizen ever), if he/she is trying to avoid being tracked. A Wiki example on the subject suggest that if a target were being tracked via cellphone, and threw that cellphone away to avoid being tracked, congress would have to be called, and they'd have to wait on a new order to be able to continue tracking the potential threat. With this extension, it basically means they can - with extreme use of judgement - initiate a roving tap, that follows the target rather than the device that's been jacked.
And before anybody mentions how Obama is an evil communist that doesn't believe in privacy or individual liberty...this law was passed by George W. Bush four months PRIOR to the events of 9/11.