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Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

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Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#501

Post by tinyhouse »

bluelu wrote: post #96

According to https://techcrunch.com/2021/01/19/former-google-engineer-ant... "Instead, Alsup sentenced Lewandowski to 18 months, but delayed his prison time until the pandemic was under control. Levandowski also agreed to pay $756,499.22 in restitution to Waymo and a fine of $95,000." So he didn't even spend a single minute in prison. Wow

To be honest I don't know the fine details about the allegations against him and what he already paid. His reputation would definitely never be the same. The fact he didn't spend time in prison might be a good thing. I recall seeing a horrifying doco about a guy in prison who stabbed another inmate like 100 times and killed him. The stabber was already doing life in jail for murder. But his partner who helped him by holding that inmate down is a guy who ended up in prison for a minor fraud of a check or something along those lines. The fact they mix those people in prison is crazy (that was a pretty old case, maybe today things are different).

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#502

Post by ocdtrekkie »

n4r9 wrote: post #131
WalterBright wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The man believes manslaughter is the cost of doing business for innovation > There's a difference between accepting the costs of progress I'm not seeing the essential difference here. P.S. I know nothing about Levandowski, his beliefs, or his statements. Just commenting on what the parent wrote.

I'm also only commenting on what the parent wrote to be fair. My point is that being disappointed not to be involved in a death - as that comment suggests - is a level of callousness that goes well beyond accepting the cost of progress.

Here's the context in question: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25847994

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#503

Post by thekyle »

shadowgovt wrote: post #475
dgellow wrote: post #363

No Assange, no Snowden. What a fool I am, I seriously envisaged that could happen... Instead it’s just more and more corruption.

I'm sorry to say it was never in the cards. The enemy of Assange's enemy was never his friend. Nothing about Trump's conduct has ever suggested he wants more whistleblowers walking free, especially ones who may not feel a "professional courtesy" to refrain from leaking some things. The next thing Wikileaks reports on could have been shady back-dealing on Trump real estate projects, for all we know. Trump never saw pa…

I believe you mean Wikileaks.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#504

Post by Larrikin »

rendall wrote: post #348
Larrikin wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you insist and insult the people who are agaisnt the racist people who call out the symbol. If the symbol is so important to you then your fight should be with the actual white supremacists who have co-opted the symbol and not the people who don't let racists get away with recruitment/trolling/owning the libs by flashing their co-opted gang sign. It's like you being furious at black people because your great g…

> Why do you insist and insult the people who are agaisnt the racist people who call out the symbol. Because they aren't against racist people. They are pro-idiocy. They're only pro a good thing (being non-racist) by an accident of history and circumstance, certainly not because of sober reflection and empathy. These are the same idiots who would be all in on bullying the Satanic Panic preschool teachers in the 80s,…

I think it's a little telling that you're calling out historically conservative movements and trying to conflate them with a very progressive movement of not letting white supremacists use their favorite recruitment tool of "it's just a joke bro... unless you actually believe it"

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#505

Post by masklinn »

me_me_me wrote: post #174

The fact that even fox news was onboard with pardoning Julian Assange and then he pardons Levandowski is... well ironic is an understatement. I am failing to find a word that encapsulates my feelings.

> I am failing to find a word that encapsulates my feelings.

I don't know if there's a specific word for it in any language, but it's completely in character for trump to always pick the worst of two choices.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#506

Post by ISL »

emn13 wrote: post #433
DevX101 wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Constitution has some excellent checks and balances but the blanket pardon isn't one of them. The pardon doesn't do anything to address systemic problems in the justice system and has become a channel for doling out political favors.

This myth that the US constitution is in any way "good" is weird. It's one of the earliest; and fortunately others leared from its mistakes. Including the US itself, when it had considerable influence in drafting the WW2 losers constitutions, which uncoincidentally are quite different from the US. Checks and balances essentially don't work in the US. The best bit is simply a decent judiciary, but that was mostly copi…

I strongly disagree.

A check and balance has been on great display in recent weeks. A President has stated, "the election was a fraud, I should get another term". Congress has stated, "the election was correct. Moreover, we may choose to prevent you from holding office ever again." The judiciary agrees.

That Congress is likely to deadlock is arguably a feature, not a bug. (That voters don't demand better from their congresspeople is, perhaps, a correctable bug.).

There is only one exception to the amendability of the Constitution -- states cannot be deprived of equal suffrage in the Senate. See Article V.

The disproportionate representation is by design. Without it, the country literally would not have formed. I am pleased to see states hacking around it without an amendment, thus, should the prior function be required, the states themselves can revert.

Is adding states too easy? There are three million US citizens in Puerto Rico without representation in Congress.

I am hopeful that we will find ways forward on gerrymandering. The only true beneficiaries of the existing system are the political parties.

Impeachment is not just hypothetical. Though it was not fully realized against Nixon, it would have been had he not resigned.

Regarding the endless accretion of laws: we get the government for which we vote. Speaking up, as you have done here, is the first step toward making it better.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#507

Post by mamon »

hawkice wrote: post #459
emn13 wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This myth that the US constitution is in any way "good" is weird. It's one of the earliest; and fortunately others leared from its mistakes. Including the US itself, when it had considerable influence in drafting the WW2 losers constitutions, which uncoincidentally are quite different from the US. Checks and balances essentially don't work in the US. The best bit is simply a decent judiciary, but that was mostly copi…

>Seriously, name 1 check/balance that's actually particularly good! The person in charge with executing the law is different from the people in charge of crafting the laws to be executed.

Exactly! And the best thing is that, unlike most European countries, executive and legislative branches are actually elected in separate elections. European system with Prime Minister being elected by Parliament is pathological, because it does not provide full separation.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#508

Post by shadowgovt »

thekyle wrote: post #503
shadowgovt wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry to say it was never in the cards. The enemy of Assange's enemy was never his friend. Nothing about Trump's conduct has ever suggested he wants more whistleblowers walking free, especially ones who may not feel a "professional courtesy" to refrain from leaking some things. The next thing Wikileaks reports on could have been shady back-dealing on Trump real estate projects, for all we know. Trump never saw pa…

I believe you mean Wikileaks.

(Thank you; corrected)

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#509

Post by rtkwe »

vmception wrote: post #437
dgellow wrote: post #363

No Assange, no Snowden. What a fool I am, I seriously envisaged that could happen... Instead it’s just more and more corruption.

Pay attention to that list, each pardon has a list of people who supported each pardon. Nobody from the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the ACLU is on that list. We are wasting our time and energy caring about either of those organizations. Let them stick to filing Amicus Briefs in courts, but they clearly have no pull or influence or backchannel despite our tech scene thinking they do.

What part of the EFF and ACLU should have gotten involved? He plead guilty to a trade secret theft charge which doesn't really seem like the ACLU's bag and only tangentially related to the EFF's.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#510

Post by raldi »

marcusverus wrote: post #455
raldi wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American, I agree with everything you said. (Well, except that Supreme Court justices are appointed, not elected.) The other gaping flaw is the systemic, undemocratic bias that determines the makeup of our Upper House.

The issue you're referring to with the Senate is, of course, the fact that each state gets two senators, regardless of population. This means that the sparsely populated North Dakota has the same number of senators as California. This a feature, not a bug, and in fact the United States would not exist without it. The senate prevents small states from being dominated by large states, and is the only reason that smalle…

Same reason Bootjack doesn't secede from California just because it doesn't get the same representation as Los Angeles
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