Legalized Pickpocketing

In article <xtOdnYfLzf-RpOLanZ2dnUVZ_uninZ2d RemoveThis @speakeasy.net>, Erik Max
Francis wrote:
> > While NLarry was clearly writing from a US perspective,
>
> Suggesting that in his Known Space stories the idea of the UN he was
> positing as apparently serious and reasonable, and calling it "a US
> perspective," is pretty patently laughable.
>
You seem to be missing a phrase there, Erik. Care to try making
your point again?

NLarry is an American, and was at the time of starting Known
Space ; the Earth-end of almost all of his stories takes place in
America (exceptions : brief excursions to "Outback Field in Australia",
and Louis Wu's jaunt from Resht to Beirut to Buda (or was it Pesht?) to
Munchen to ... somewhere else at the start of Ringworld ; other
examples please?) and more specifically California with occasional
offshoots to the Rockies and Kansas. NLarry lives in California, I
think he grew up there and spent most of his university career there,
with a brief sojourn in ... Kansas. So I deduce that he has spent some
holidays in the Rockies, and perhaps in Australia.
He writes about an area and a society that he knows, and frames
his story as deviations from that "norm". Nothing wrong with that, but
his "comfort zone is very obvious in his writing. Indeed, the whole MKW
series is a consequence of NLarry being well aware of the perils of
leaving what you're familiar with.

As a minor ObNiven - can anyone think of a Known Space (or any
other NLarry) story set in, or making significant reference to,
anywhere in the Appalachian mountains or east of there?

--
Aidan Karley,
Written at Sat, 05 Jan 2008 13:00 GMT, but posted later.
"Please turn your monitors off when you leave the building. Not only
does it save power, but the flickering of the monitors annoys the
pterosaur."

On Sat, 29 Dec 2007 00:40:46 -0800, Erik Max Francis <max.TakeThisOut@alcyone.com>
wrote:
>Tim Bruening wrote:
>
>> Erik Max Francis wrote:
>>
>>> Tim Bruening wrote:
>>>
>>>> Voters on Earth had voted to make more and more crimes subject to the death
>>>> penalty, such as jaywalking and false advertising.
>>> And on that subject, nice to see that they don't have a judicial check
>>> and balance in their system.
>>
>> In "A Gift From Earth", Mount Lookathat leader Millard Parlette mentions that the
>> police on Earth have to obtain search warrents before they can conduct a search.
>
>I was referring to a supreme judicial check. Meaning, a Supreme Court
>that could strike down such absurd laws pursuant so some remotely
>reasonable constitution which outlawed things like cruel, unusual, or
>excessive punishment. The death penalty for jaywalking certainly qualifies.

But if they did that, then the Supremes wouldn't get their replacement
organs and might die.

Jasper