Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 457 posts

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#131

Post by jajko »

yieldcrv wrote: post #123
jajko wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are separate issues. Healthcare aint cheap anywhere for the state, but its perfectly fundable for any but the most poor and broken countries in the world, to a very decent level. But US is broken in another way - everything is for-profit, no real oversight, and unrestricted capitalism full throttle. Then you get what you got. There are 2 absolutely basic pillars of modern free society worth living in - 1) how i…

correct, but Americans as a whole aren't envious of what other countries are doing. There is very little consensus to suggest envy - as the supposition above had suggested was the root of European bashing. There is more consensus on accessing these things - healthcare and higher education - via wealth, or programs within the state of residence. Some individual states/cities do offer free higher education, and free he…

Sure we can solve problems. In fact, the only problem - underfunded military. We already started across most Europe, to the tune of half a trillion of additional spending just now. Most of that money will come back to our economies, so expect EURO value to rise. Since russia has 0 motivation to stop its war and its goals are pretty clear, this will also increase in near future. It won't be immediate since we foolishly planned long term for peace, but give it a decade and ie Wehrmacht will be in completely different shape than now.

Also, its not just US throwing money into black pit of Europe - the money came back with interest in form of global power projection with additional half a billion people standing by you even in your most fucked up invasions like Iraq, thats over for good. We mistakenly bought tons of military hardware from US to the tune of hundreds of billions USD - thats over now too, and it doesn't matter who will be the next guy, the trust is broken for good (for what - some additional negotiation pressure on Ukraine to force them into some minerals deal? Bravo, this is how things are when you give too much power to a bipolar narcissistic person).

I am not holding my breath that US will fix half of the issues I've mentioned, although they are pressing issues now.

Also, every time I mention healthcare costs in US somebody comes and tells how its almost a fixed issue already. then I read how people give 20k or 40k for a birth, how open heart surgery costed them 60k on top of insurance, how some long term medicine is crushingly expensive. Compare it to here - 0, our 2 childbirths, wife was twice off work for 6 months, full salary kept coming. Even in most capitalistic country in Europe - Switzerland. Also I've had paragliding accident last year with both legs broken, been off work, on wheelchair, tons of MRIs, physiotherapies and so on. Cost - 0, also salary fully compensated by mandatory employer's insurance.

Where jdv comes from and his background is irrelevant, he is ass licking amoral pos and showed it to whole world live numerous times. If he represents half of US population, well then the division is just naturally following discord between our continents, cultures and philosophies.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#133

Post by Hikikomori »

yieldcrv wrote: post #123
jajko wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are separate issues. Healthcare aint cheap anywhere for the state, but its perfectly fundable for any but the most poor and broken countries in the world, to a very decent level. But US is broken in another way - everything is for-profit, no real oversight, and unrestricted capitalism full throttle. Then you get what you got. There are 2 absolutely basic pillars of modern free society worth living in - 1) how i…

correct, but Americans as a whole aren't envious of what other countries are doing. There is very little consensus to suggest envy - as the supposition above had suggested was the root of European bashing. There is more consensus on accessing these things - healthcare and higher education - via wealth, or programs within the state of residence. Some individual states/cities do offer free higher education, and free he…

[flagged]

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#134

Post by mixologist »

yieldcrv wrote: post #123
jajko wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are separate issues. Healthcare aint cheap anywhere for the state, but its perfectly fundable for any but the most poor and broken countries in the world, to a very decent level. But US is broken in another way - everything is for-profit, no real oversight, and unrestricted capitalism full throttle. Then you get what you got. There are 2 absolutely basic pillars of modern free society worth living in - 1) how i…

correct, but Americans as a whole aren't envious of what other countries are doing. There is very little consensus to suggest envy - as the supposition above had suggested was the root of European bashing. There is more consensus on accessing these things - healthcare and higher education - via wealth, or programs within the state of residence. Some individual states/cities do offer free higher education, and free he…

That perspective, as anything US based, is very US centric and wrong.

EU supported US war on terror, or whatever you call last 25 years of US invasions, with our own troops and what did we get out of that? Immigration crisis. We basically had to spend huge amounts of money on handling immigrants because of all the wars US (our so called ally) started.

Also, EU banks invested a lot of money in US scam financial institutions and our saving got wiped out in 2008. All of that money dissapeared in US economy.

US doesn't charge you for services by issuing an itemized bill, but instead they suck it out through different venues. Like a leach. I guess you can easily ignore things like that if it doesn't fit your narrative.

You are at the same time complaining that the EU is too dependent on US and that it doesn't pay its' share. The main problem with dependence is that you don't develop your own industry and instead you rely on imports and send money to other countries for services. So how can EU at the same time be both dependent on US and not sending money to US? That doesn't make any sense.

Citizens of EU have been complaining about reliance on US to our governments for years, but our bureaucrats ignored it and kept sending money over seas because it was the easiest thing to do. Current US administration has finally shown that this dependence is dangerous, and now hopefully instead of sending money to US they will divert it into EU economy.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#135

Post by yieldcrv »

jajko wrote: post #131
yieldcrv wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

correct, but Americans as a whole aren't envious of what other countries are doing. There is very little consensus to suggest envy - as the supposition above had suggested was the root of European bashing. There is more consensus on accessing these things - healthcare and higher education - via wealth, or programs within the state of residence. Some individual states/cities do offer free higher education, and free he…

Sure we can solve problems. In fact, the only problem - underfunded military. We already started across most Europe, to the tune of half a trillion of additional spending just now. Most of that money will come back to our economies, so expect EURO value to rise. Since russia has 0 motivation to stop its war and its goals are pretty clear, this will also increase in near future. It won't be immediate since we foolishl…

> We already started across most Europe, to the tune of half a trillion of additional spending just now.

I’m aware, this is the best inception I’ve ever seen because Europeans are acting like its their own idea because they're scared of the US / Russia now

and not that the people in the current US administration have been demanding Europe to do this for 8 years straight.

less talking, and just scare people into action. Same result, at the expense of some relationships that wore out its welcome. and everyone investing into their local economies.

sidenote: I like Switzerland. Way to go guys.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#136

Post by walrus01 »

sersi wrote: post #113
nadermx wrote: post #4

"Two men were released after The Times asked about them, half a year after their sentences had been completed." Horrific. This egregious human rights violation is something you'd think you read about in a developing nation, not a developed nation.

I think at this point the general consensus of most Europeans is that the US has more in common with a developing nation than with a developed nation when it comes to equality in the eye of justice, equal access to health care, support for the downtrodden and freedoms...

I've heard the US described as a third world country wearing a Gucci belt.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#137

Post by bryanrasmussen »

AngryData wrote: post #38

Anyone who has ever dealt with the US justice system as just some regular bloke knows it is broken. 90% of it is about extorting the population for funding for the courts and cops. If you can't afford a lawyer, they will provide you with a joke. And if you can afford a lawyer, now its just a question if you are willing to spend more on your lawyer than the state is hoping to extort from you. If you are, you will get…

there are decent public defenders, but they have to sort of pick and choose how hard they will work for you, because of the unbearable case load.

I knew a guy who if you were not a death penalty case you got the joke, and if you were a death penalty case you got the all out work his ass off to save you. He took a lot of death penalty cases.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#138

Post by A_D_E_P_T »

AngryData wrote: post #38

Anyone who has ever dealt with the US justice system as just some regular bloke knows it is broken. 90% of it is about extorting the population for funding for the courts and cops. If you can't afford a lawyer, they will provide you with a joke. And if you can afford a lawyer, now its just a question if you are willing to spend more on your lawyer than the state is hoping to extort from you. If you are, you will get…

I agree 100%.

I've written about this here before, but I've been involved in two civil lawsuits in my life. One was in the USA, the other was in mainland China.

I should stress that I am an American, and I wasn't even in China when the lawsuit over there was moving along.

The Chinese process was very fast -- it went before a judge who reached a verdict in something like ten months -- and it was extremely inexpensive. Total fees were less than $10k. What's more, the court attained the right outcome, and I won the case. Still better, the court itself enforced the verdict, and I was able to attain the monetary damages it decided were owed me.

The US process was interminably slow. A year on, we were barely past the starting line. Two years on, and we were just at the beginning of "discovery" -- an amazingly invasive process that appears to be unique to the US legal system. At that point bills far exceeded $150,000. I realized that I was looking at spending >$1M and taking five or ten years to fight the case, and, though I was sure I would have won in the end, decided that I had to settle and get the hell out.

The US civil legal system is basically a game of financial attrition. This is why the big corporations seem to get away with whatever they want, whereas being dragged to court can be life-ruining for smaller entities and persons.

I don't know how things are in Europe, and hope I never have to find out, but the Chinese civil system is truly something like 20x better than the US system. (>10x cheaper, >2-5x faster.)

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#139

Post by thaumasiotes »

AngryData wrote: post #38

Anyone who has ever dealt with the US justice system as just some regular bloke knows it is broken. 90% of it is about extorting the population for funding for the courts and cops. If you can't afford a lawyer, they will provide you with a joke. And if you can afford a lawyer, now its just a question if you are willing to spend more on your lawyer than the state is hoping to extort from you. If you are, you will get…

I have a bigger conceptual problem with the workflow of:

1. The police are looking for someone. They arrest you, a second, different person.

2. They determine you are not the person they were looking for.

3. They bill you for their time.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#140

Post by FirmwareBurner »

t-writescode wrote: post #103
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Trans people can't get passports[0] Literally everything with the word "gay" is being removed from federal ledgers[1, 2] Initiatives to **penalize** companies that still choose to have DEI hires greatly impacts anyone that's not a white male. [3] Anti-Abortion legislation directly attacks women's health, including when there's a harm to the mother. [4] Elderly may very well be missing out on their social security pay…

[flagged]
Post reply on HN