BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
No free press means no democratic society.

So , is Fox-news NOT manipulating information to advocate (widely thought-of-as-undeserved) support for the republican party? Alternatively Is Saturday night live not fostering blatant & shameless support for liberals(and twisting information to make republicans look like donkeys, why are republicans usually the proverbial butt of all their jokes? you might argue about that, giving as an example: one skit on Obama's fawning media fan base; but even there they attacked/mocked/ridiculed the 'media' not Obama), granted it's a comedy show and comedic exaggerations are not to be taken seriously, but (the) fact is, (that) they are and CNN by promoting/airing/running 'S.N.L', Tina fey's show and The daily show; helps media-generated public bias towards liberals. So, The large news media base, powered/funded/run by liberals promoting liberals in America and Obama singling/blotting FOX NEWS(the 'only' news media network/channel for pro-republican propaganda/bias) out (by not giving them an interview) is not an example of government controlled, leadership biased media?? Of course it is "Does it necessarily follow that any degree of press freedom, no matter how great, is worthless because of inevitable bias?" Yes, because the very concept of a 'free unbiased' press is a lie and those who sell it are conscious hypocrites. It's like saying "Sir, I cannot tell a lie" I was not 'defining' communism and capitalism, but making a stark contrast of how media-control/bias differs in the two systems of government, in practice(in keeping with the motion) A definition of the two terms would be something else entirely. It is very possible to have free press under dictatorship, Former president/authoritarian/dictator/general Pervez Musharraf did wonders for 'free press/media' in his term/time-in-office, lauding the spawn of a multitude of private T.V channels; all opposing him and his regime(funnily & ironically). Point being, a free press does not equate naturally to democracy and it is not 'vital' to a democracy either, continuing the Pakistani case in point, above: Government owned P.T.V(and later its scions S.T.N and N.T.M) was the only T.V channel being run during both democratically elected reigns of P.P.P's Benazir Bhutto and P.M.L-N's Nawaz Sharif.
Receiving gifts from others can be nice but it is much more satisfying to see the pleasure that the ...

Everybody says that giving presents is better, but everyone secretly prefers to receive them. We all love the excitement of opening a parcel, the thrill of surprise and acquisition, and the glow of knowing the giver cares for you. Really, the only reason we bother to traipse round stores sorting out presents for other people is because if we didn’t provide presents for others, we wouldn’t get so many ourselves. The trick, of course, is to make sure that overall you gain from the overall gift exchange. In this way, we are all “homo economicus”, the rational economic actor who always seeks to maximise the value of what they own. And for young people, receiving presents is especially important – it is the greatest single way in which economic resources are transferred down through the generations. The young simply can’t afford financially to give presents that are worth as much as those they receive, and frankly, they wouldn’t want to anyway.
Giving more gifts than you receive is good for your social status. Traditionally gift exchange has ...

Society today is much more egalitarian than the feudal structures of the past. No one who calculates the net gain or loss in status from gift exchange will ever really be happy with their place in society. It is much better to accept each gift gratefully, seeing it as a symbol of how much others love and value you. We can never truly know the mind of another person, so we can’t know exactly how much joy our presents have given them. But we can know our own minds and take pleasure in the loving gifts of others. In this way, it is indeed better to receive than to give.
How many of the gifts we receive are truly welcome anyway? Most presents we get given simply reveal...

It is just as true that the presents we give are often not wanted by the recipients, so this argument cuts both ways. In fact, studies have found that the value people put on the gifts they receive is usually considerably lower than the amount they cost the giver to purchase. But there is a solution; just as it might be a good idea to ask those you are buying for what they actually want (yes, really), so you can help them in turn. Simply leave a few relevant catalogues lying around the house, perhaps with helpful asterisks against desirable items, or, for your more web-savvy relatives, try emailing them the URLs of appropriate online retailers’ choicer items. After undertaking such helpful preparation work, you will truly deserve to enjoy receiving the resulting presents!
In the developed west, we all have too much stuff anyway – more books, music, clothes, hardware and ...

Who says you can ever have too much stuff? Whatever you have in life, it is always nice to have more – in evolutionary terms, it allows us to hoard resources against an uncertain tomorrow. Often others know us better than ourselves and give us presents we would not have thought of for ourselves, surprising us with their thoughtfulness and challenging us through their gift to try new things. And friends and relatives can also give us things that we have really wanted, but which we could not justify buying for ourselves.
It may briefly be fun to get presents, but for well-brought up people everywhere the pleasure of rec...

What a miserable, bourgeois and thoroughly uptight outlook on life. First, lighten up and enjoy the moment. Second, please don’t inflict your own hang-ups on your kids. After all, it’s a present! You didn’t have to earn it. Someone gave it to you because they like you. Isn’t that great? Doesn’t it make you want to thank the person who gave it to you? Maybe instead of writing you should call them to express your gratitude. There, that wasn’t so hard, was it?
Choosing presents for other people is an excellent excuse for going shopping. Visiting shopping mal...

Shopping is an exhausting and depressing experience, even if some of it is done online these days. It is slow, expensive and frustrating, with so much choice between so many types of essentially pointless objects, sold to you by inept, uncaring salespeople amid heaving and unhygienic crowds. What is the purpose of all this conspicuous consumption anyway? Certainly it would be better to forget about shopping for gifts one Christmas, and be happy that the people who give you things slogged round stores instead of you. Even if you got given fewer presents next year it would still be worth it.
Receiving gifts from others can be nice but it is much more satisfying to see the pleasure that the ...

Receiving gifts from others can be nice but it is much more satisfying to see the pleasure that the gifts you have chosen give to others. Covetousness (desiring material possessions) can only be temporarily satisfied even by opening a whole stack of presents, but the warm glow of a truly altruistic (unselfish) act lasts much longer. Even young children learn that it is fun to see the pleasure mummy gets when they give her something they have made at kindergarten. And now scientists have proved the connection, using brain scans to show that giving someone else a gift results in more activity in the parts of the brain associated with happiness than receiving a gift from someone else. This is further supported by a Harvard Business School study which found that, for a given level of income, those who gave away more of their money were on average happier.
Giving more gifts than you receive is good for your social status. Traditionally gift exchange has ...

Giving more gifts than you receive is good for your social status. Traditionally gift exchange has been an important part of social relationships in many societies, with those who give the most presents to others signalling their higher position in society. A patron who gives gifts to others who cannot reciprocate in kind establishes their economic superiority, and places the recipients in a socially-indebted, client relationship to the giver. In this way, it is definitely more advantageous to give than to receive, and even in a modern society the generous gift-giver can establish a beneficial network of relationships that may help them achieve business or social success throughout the rest of the year.
How many of the gifts we receive are truly welcome anyway? Most presents we get given simply reveal...

How many of the gifts we receive are truly welcome anyway? Most presents we get given simply reveal how little our friends or relations really know about our tastes. From sweaters we will never wear, to books we will never read and music we will never listen to, what we receive is often not what we want. At least when we give gifts we have some control over the process and can hope that they will be welcome. By contrast, the process of opening others gifts to us is inevitably tinged with disappointment.
In the developed west, we all have too much stuff anyway – more books, music, clothes, hardware and ...

In the developed west, we all have too much stuff anyway – more books, music, clothes, hardware and electronics than our grandparents could even have imagined when they were our age. So most gifts we receive make very little difference to our comfortable lives, other than providing yet another thing to be found room for. Some people even pay experts to help them “de-clutter” their houses and lives by getting rid of the vast mass of unnecessary stuff that surrounds them – much of it, no doubt, given to them by well-meaning friends and relatives as gifts. For such people, giving without having to receive in return is definitely preferable.
It may briefly be fun to get presents, but for well-brought up people everywhere the pleasure of rec...

It may briefly be fun to get presents, but for well-brought up people everywhere the pleasure of receiving is tainted by the demands of good manners. When you receive presents you have to go through the dreaded ritual of writing thank-you notes (or worse, forcing your children to write them!). Few indeed are the gifts that make this burden worthwhile, which is why most middle-class people enjoy giving other people presents much more than they like receiving them.
Choosing presents for other people is an excellent excuse for going shopping. Visiting shopping mal...

Choosing presents for other people is an excellent excuse for going shopping. Visiting shopping malls and department stores has become the most popular leisure activity in the developed world, but there is still an unfortunate stigma attached to consumption for its own sake. But no one can criticise you for heading for the warmth, colour, bright lights and food courts of the nearest retail centre if you are doing it for others.
NAFTA is a giant free trade block which importantly includes the USA. NAFTA will ensure maximum tra...

The key feature of NAFTA is asymmetric power. Wage disparity between the US and Mexico is 8:1 as opposed to 4:1 within the European Union. The US does only 7% of its trade with Mexico and 20% with Canada, whilst they do over 75% of their trade with the USA. Asymmetry is further shown by the USA’s ability to exploit non-tariff barriers as a continuing protection for domestic industries. NAFTA is not therefore a meaningful trade bloc.
All three countries benefit from the arrangement. The US ensures access to its largest single marke...

There is massive opposition to NAFTA in all three countries, which shows the potential danger. The US is worried about being swamped with Mexican goods through comparative advantage. The Trade Unions are against it and there are serious environmental concerns. Canadians fear they will lose cultural diversity. Canada’s influence in NAFTA has not stopped the US using protectionism over their largest single export, softwood lumber. Mexico may get swamped by US goods. Multinational companies may relocate and crush Mexican industry. There is the possibility of exploitation of land and labour which are cheaper in Mexico
If the US sneezes, then the rest of the world catches a cold. Similarly, if the US economy is buoyan...

The USA does not depend on trade from within NAFTA to survive. Only 27% of its visible exports and even fewer invisible exports come from the NAFTA area. Moreover, its buoyancy is determined by trade that can be established without any formal agreement, due to the sheer size of the US economy. NAFTA has therefore made little difference overall.
NAFTA’s success shows the US public, politicians and trade unions the advantages of freer trade. Th...

NAFTA’s economic benefits are still being debated, so no clear lessons can be drawn yet for wider application. The political battles fought to negotiate and pass the agreement were so bruising in all three countries that its politicians have come to fear any future battles over trade liberalisation, making this less likely. The more the world divides up into rival economic blocs (EU, NAFTA, Mercosur, ASEAN, etc.), the harder it will be to cut global deals which benefit everyone, but particularly the developing world.
NAFTA is a giant free trade block which importantly includes the USA. NAFTA will ensure maximum tra...

NAFTA is a giant free trade block which importantly includes the USA. NAFTA will ensure maximum trade advantages for a sizeable part of the economy of the world. Productivity will be high as growth and jobs are created in the region. Mexico as the least developed member of NAFTA has particularly benefited, but its increasingly prosperous consumers have become in turn a much larger market for US and Canadian companies.
All three countries benefit from the arrangement. The US ensures access to its largest single marke...

All three countries benefit from the arrangement. The US ensures access to its largest single market (Canada) and this also allows them to lock in the Mexican economic reforms. It has also secured a better political relationship with Mexico and more progress in dealing with cross-border issues such as drug trafficking and illegal immigration. Canada and Mexico can stop the US going protectionist and ensure access to the world’s largest economy.
If the US sneezes, then the rest of the world catches a cold. Similarly, if the US economy is buoyan...

If the US sneezes, then the rest of the world catches a cold. Similarly, if the US economy is buoyant, then the rest of the world benefits. Free Trade is the means whereby the US has secured a strong boom throughout the 1990s and NAFTA has helped to secure that. Consumers have gained from cheaper goods, and companies have benefited from being forced to exploit comparative advantage.
In criminal cases ‘justice’ fundamentally demands two things: that the guilty are convicted, and, ev...

In criminal cases ‘justice’ fundamentally demands two things: that the guilty are convicted, and, even more importantly, that the innocent are acquitted. The attorney-client privilege obstructs both. It blocks the courts’ access to attorney-client communication when such evidence could conclusively show that X has committed a criminal offence, even when X is some other person and not the client himself. Worse, the privilege stubbornly blocks access to evidence that may well prove somebody’s innocence – even when such evidence will in no way incriminate the client himself. Besides, there is no evidence that confidentiality is an important factor in encouraging people to seek legal advice. In fact, many accused persons seem willing to freely ‘confide’ in relatives and acquaintances, knowing that those third parties can be subpoenaed and compelled to testify against them. When defendants do not freely seek legal advice, the main reason by far is that they are too poor afford it. That is the true ‘access to justice’ problem in the legal system.
Clients frequently withold information from their lawyers because they worry that a lawyer will not ...

Clients frequently withold information from their lawyers because they worry that a lawyer will not ‘try his best’ if the lawyer thought they were guilty or that they were ‘bad people’. This has nothing to do with a fear about a lack of confidentiality. Indeed, this is why many clients frequently do withold vital information from their lawyers now, even though we do currently have the attorney-client privilege. A more fundamental point is that rules of law should not be designed to protect the guilty. And it is worth noting that the attorney-client privilege often protects, and is the most valuable to one particular group - the guilty.
There are many clear situations in which the privilege can (and should) be restricted – such as wher...

There are many clear situations in which the privilege can (and should) be restricted – such as where doing so cannot possibly affect the interests of the defendant adversely. One example of this has already been raised: when the confidential information just does not incriminate the client himself (although it might clear somebody else). A second situation is when the client is dead. Few people will be discouraged from being candid with their lawyers if there is merely the possibility that the communications may be disclosed after their death. Few people are concerned about criminal liability after they are dead, and few people care about their posthumous reputation. A third situation may be when the communications have already been somehow leaked to the public anyway. And a fourth situation is when the state is willing to grant ‘use immunity’ to the client – which means that any confidential communication disclosed cannot thereafter be used in any way against that particular client. ‘Use immunity’ has already been used to make feasible certain restrictions on other privileges, such as the privilege against self-incrimination. A fifth possible situation is when the matter at hand has simply nothing to do with criminal or civil liability. The matter might well just be about conveying a piece of land or drawing up a testamentary will. There would seem little reason to fear that, if privilege were not available in such circumstances, communications between lawyer and client would be inhibited.
In addition to situations where the client’s interest cannot possibly be hurt, there are situations ...

In addition to situations where the client’s interest cannot possibly be hurt, there are situations where the client’s interest may indeed be hurt but where this should be outweighed by some other very important public interest. In other words perhaps there should be ‘necessity’ or ‘public interest’ or ‘in the interests of justice’ balancing exceptions to the privilege. One such situation has already been highlighted: when the confidential communication is necessary to prove somebody else’s innocence. A second situation may be when public safety is at risk, for example if the client holds some very vital information but is not willing to disclose it to anyone other than his lawyer. A third situation may be where the crime involved is some kind of financial crime or fraud, where the people that stand to lose may be thousands or even millions of vulnerable shareholders or (worse) old-age pensioners [see further below]. In such cases there is a strong argument for courts weighing up and balancing the client’s interests against society’s and making a decision accordingly; instead of rigidly clinging on to the attorney-client privilege rule.
The corporate sphere is a special one in this debate. Given the complexity of large corporate struc...

The corporate sphere is a special one in this debate. Given the complexity of large corporate structures and their activities, often the best and only evidence about the conduct of a corporation can be obtained from that corporation’s own communications, including communications with its lawyers (hence the increasing importance of corporate ‘whistleblowers’). Furthermore powerful corporations may (often successfully) use their resources deliberately to conceal evidence of wrongdoing and to frustrate investigations. If corporations can further employ yet another advantage – the attorney-client privilege – the public interest in detecting and punishing corporate crime will inevitably almost always be defeated.
In criminal cases ‘justice’ fundamentally demands two things: that the guilty are convicted, and, ev...

In criminal cases, convictions can result from a lack of access to legal advice and knowledge as much as it can from actual wrongdoing. To ensure defendants are willing to seek legal counsel, it is necessary to guarantee that their communications with attorneys will not later be used against them. In other words it is necessary to guarantee that whatever is said or written will remain absolutely confidential. The attorney-client privilege has been regarded as one of the most fundamental rights in any legal system for this reason. It is the foundational right that ensures that every defendant has equal and effective access to legal help, and therefore access to justice.
Clients frequently withold information from their lawyers because they worry that a lawyer will not ...

Even if a defendant is willing to seek legal advice, in the absence of the privilege they will be reluctant to be completely honest with their lawyers, for fear that what they say may be used against them later. It is important to realise that even an innocent client may have ‘bad’ things that he may wish to remain confidential. It is not true that only guilty people will have something to hide. Yet, to advise a client properly, an attorney must have a complete knowledge of the facts, including any ‘bad’ or damaging facts. This gives the lawyer a better understanding of the client’s legal liabilities, and a better idea of what he will need to answer at trial. This in turn allows him give more accurate advice to his client, and to prepare his defence accordingly. By guaranteeing that privileged communications will remain strictly confidential and encouraging defendants to be more forthright, the law is giving real meaning to a defendant’s right to a fair trial and a proper defence.
There are many clear situations in which the privilege can (and should) be restricted – such as wher...

It is not true that in such situations the client’s interests cannot possibly be affected. The client's estate could become civilly or criminally liable because of the disclosure. The evidence may contain scandalous matter that could blacken the memory of the client or embarrass his family. Clients want confidentiality for a wide variety of reasons, not only for reasons connected to personal criminal liability. Even if these confidences are not any sort of admission of criminal wrongdoing, they may nonetheless be matters that the client, for one reason or another, would not wish divulged. Abolishing the privilege not only violates a person’s right to privacy, but a person who knows that his communications may be later revealed (even after his death, or even with ‘use immunity’) may well decide that it is better not to go to a lawyer in the first place – in other words, leading to the access to justice problem.
In addition to situations where the client’s interest cannot possibly be hurt, there are situations ...

The predictability in the application of the privilege protection is critical to its effectiveness and success. Openness and candour by the client can only be encouraged if the client knows that his communications with legal counsel are, and will remain, confidential and protected. The problem with recognising piecemeal ‘exceptions’ to the privilege is that uncertainty is created by such exceptions. People become unsure about the extent of such exceptions (which may be ever-enlarging) and therefore cannot be sure that their communications will remain confidential five or ten years down the road.