nkw's comments

nkw | 2 years ago

Do any of the financial gurus have opinions on what happens if/when the Tether fraud collapses? My naive guess would be the price of bitcoin increases short term since that is probably the only quick way out of Tether in the event it loses its peg or there is a stampede for the exits.

nkw | 3 years ago | on: FCC Closes Robocall Loophole

This will do absolutely nothing. Since the Supreme Court gutted the TCPA there is zero downside for companies to violate it.

nkw | 6 years ago | on: PACER Fetch APIs

There are much better ways for the judiciary to maintain their finances than relying on arbitrary non-cost based fees for public access to public information. Judiciary funding is around $7 billion/year. Pacer makes maybe $150 million/year. Agree that Congress should fix Pacer fees, but the judiciary is not free from blame here.

nkw | 6 years ago | on: Refunds for 300M phone users sought in lawsuits over location-data sales

This is pretty much doomed to fail because of the pre-dispute mandatory arbitration clauses coupled with class action waivers contained in the carriers' contracts. Under the current law surrounding arbitration it is a practical impossibility for consumers to sue cell phone companies.

nkw | 7 years ago | on: Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services?

Contact a member of this organization: https://www.nacdl.org/ who practices in the area (geographic and subject) of your pending charges. Almost all have websites that will accept messages and most will communicate by email and take credit cards. Find one you are comfortable with.

However there is one wrinkle - be aware that lawyers are inundated with emails from overseas/out-of-the-country potential "clients" looking to hire them that are, in fact, fake check/wire transfer scams, so any mention of being outside the country and wanting to hire the lawyer will most likely lead to your emails being ignored/spam canned. You will need to be ready to provide some specific information that can be verified such as the case number/pending court, and possibly be willing to start off with a telephone call.

nkw | 7 years ago | on: Bail reform could give justice to poor, minorities

> Because my life is fucked worse than it already is if I don't show up.

This is already the case, but surprisingly people (including those accused of crimes) do not always make choices which are in their long-term self interest.

> If that's not the case, then that's almost the working definition of "flight risk", and you don't release them for any amount of money.

So how do you determine who is a "flight risk"? Past FTA? Past convictions? Don't own property? No family ties to community? From the wrong part of town? Wrong skin color? These are the types of things that will end up going into detention decisions when you take the posting of security off the table and start trying to decide who is a "flight risk". The reason we have our bail system, including in many places a constitutional right to bail for non-capital offenses, is before that Courts would simply deny bail willy-nilly for certain crimes or people they didn't like.

nkw | 7 years ago | on: Bail reform could give justice to poor, minorities

> you have to be tried within 56 days

If this was attempted in the United States, and we wanted to maintain the due process protections afforded by our Constitution, we would have to fund our indigent defense programs at levels far, far beyond what anyone has been willing to do.

nkw | 7 years ago | on: Why Americans Spend So Much on Health Care–In 12 Charts

I'm actually surprised there has not been more pressure by the business community to decouple health care/health insurance from employment. Health insurance costs, and the administrative effort to provide it, are an enormous burden on businesses/employers. From small business to giant corporations, it is an extraordinary burden that is only going to increase and at some point is going to start seriously impacting the competitiveness of US business. It should be an issue the Republicans have front and center.

nkw | 7 years ago | on: Bail reform could give justice to poor, minorities

> Yeah, I'm sorry, but as a citizen of the UK, the US system of bail and bail bounty hunters is just nuts.

Which is somewhat ironic since the foundation of our bail system originates from UK common law and the limitations on it (e.g. the 8th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution) originate from limitations put into place after abuses of bail in the UK legal system. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excessive_Bail_Clause#Origins

nkw | 7 years ago | on: Bail reform could give justice to poor, minorities

I think most people with more than a passing acquittance with the bail systems in most states could agree with the title, but what I have not seen are any proposed solutions that address the underlying problems certain characteristics of our bail systems are meant to address.

For example, without the threat of forfeiture how do you ensure people actually show up to court?

Without bail bondsmen how do you fund the extra police/marshals/sheriffs to find and arrest those who do not show up for court?

Without the ability to set bond amounts based upon offense characteristics and individual financial circumstances and criminal history, how do you prevent especially violent offenders with a likelihood of committing more violent acts while on pretrial release from committing new violent offenses? Keep in mind there are some jurisdictions where you are constitutionally entitled to bail of some amount.

There is much (justified) lamenting on the evils of the use of the bail bond industry, but after bail reform in the Federal system which effective ended the use of the industry for the Federal criminal system -- do people really think the Federal system is better? If so why?

If you want to go the other direction and eliminate money bail, do you really want to police/prosecution to able to indefinitely incarcerate people until trial?

Do you want to seriously jack up the criminal penalties for failure to appear in lieu of money forfeiture? That is going to screw over a lot of people.

Again, there are serious problems, but I haven't heard significantly better solutions.

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