What was the mechanism for rationing of toilet-paper sheets?
I find it hard to understand how there could not be a record of his transaction with Maison Blanche. Or if there is one, how he could not produce it to show that the money is not his. The usage of "scorched earth" made me flash on a billionaire embroiled in a nasty divorce, going to Atlantic City and laying his fortune on the roulette table, repeating if necessary until it was gone.
Civil contempt can go on forever -- it's not supposed to be punishment, it's supposed to be compulsion: we'll keep you in jail until you obey. Where obedience is impossible, as the guy here claims it is, that's a problem.
The whole thing is explained in two things in the story: First, the husband blew off a court date where he was found in contempt. Second, this quote: ‘It hinges on a charge of civil contempt designed to force Chadwick to turn over $2.5 million the courts say he hid overseas all those years ago. Except he won't. Or can't, depending on whom you believe.’
Apparently (this is ambiguous because apparently a judge who got the case on a referral concluded otherwise) the courts thing the guy is lying about what happened to the money.
In most states, if the court believed he’d made a showing that he could not pay the money, he’d be out of jail. I would assume from the story that the court’s are still convinced he’s lying.
And, no, this doesn’t violate the 8th amendment (the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishments). I’d think his lawyers have checked out the notion that there would be a due process problem if he was being held until he purged himself of a contempt that he couldn’t possibly purge himself of.
This story seems to get pretty regular publicity.
Yeah. I find it hard to believe that the guy would stay in jail for 11 years out of pure stubbornness. Very surreal story--I remember reading about it seven or eight years ago, but I never dreamed that the guy was still in jail. Definitely not fair, whatever happened to the money.
It's like one of those ethical thought-experiment thingies come to life: If you can hold out long enough, you can go free and grab your 2 million dollars & all the time you've spent will have been worth it. But if you crack at some point, then all the time you've spent up until that point will have been useless. So maybe you wouldn't go to jail for 11 years over a couple million dollars, but now that you have, what's the cost of another year if it might possibly get you off the hook?
Yeah, this looks like one of those stupid hypotheticals come to life. "Given this payoff matrix, how many years in jail would be worth $2.5 million?"
I hope the other goddamn hypotheticals stay hypothetical, and not just because I'd be thrown off the lifeboat pretty early in the game.
A building is on fire. In one room is a small child. In a second room there are a dozen viable frozen fetuses. In a third room there are a thousand mice having continuous orgasms as part of a psychology experiment. You control the sprinkler system from the distance, and it can only save one room. There's not time for you or anyone else to do anything else. What do you do?
Just as long as there aren't any fat men stuck in mineshafts.
That's the best moral dilemma ever. I'm going to give up writing moral dilemmas. No one can top that one.
Okay, could we hear from someone who would save the mice?
After discounting for waiting and for the uncertainty of the embryo and baby futures, a million mouse orgasms right now has got to provide pleasure than one baby or 12 possible babies could feel in their lifetimes. To say otherwise would be to put almost zero value on mouses. Thus, a good utilitarian pleasure-maximizer would save the mice.
9 -- take a look at "White Teeth" by Zadie Smith. A wonderful book on many levels plus it features a character who would save the mice.
You say "put almost zero value on mouses" like it's a bad thing.
(Actually come to think of it, the "White Teeth" character would also want to save the mice from the orgasm experiment.)
12: Talk to Bitch on this one. She's very mouse-friendly. Mouses and orgasms are both big in the Bitch world.
Have you seen this, John? (esp. "utilitarian" and "Benthamite")
Matt, I think I did, possibly indirectly.
I think I hurt myself laughing at that.
It may be the most awesomest thing I have ever read on the internets.
Does anybody know what happened to the Fafblog? Why the hiatus?
Noooooooooooooo.
Say it ain't so...
Something to do with birds talking to our S. Jones.