Free kibbles

FREEDOM OF SPEECH:

Hypocrisy by feds on free speech.

"[AG Holder and company exist] in an alternate reality, where Wikileaks is “arrogant, misguided and ultimately not helpful in any way.” Funny, that’s what I thought Wikileaks had gently revealed about Washington, D.C. Nearly simultaneously, Hillary (thanks, Butler) shares her bureau’s concern “about the determination of some governments to censor and silence individuals, and to restrict the free flow of information.” Huh? Dear Hill and Eric — the 13th Amendment applies to you too! Throw off your chains and be free!"

This would be funny if it wasn't so dangerous.

The technical aspects of the WikiLeaks maelstrom tell us about arguably the greatest value of the internet:

"If suppressed content automatically goes viral, the Internet’s construction basically guarantees that that content will have a home for the rest of time. If you attack DNS support, people will tweet raw IP addresses. If you take down the BGP routes to web content, people will put up more mirrors, or switch to overlay networks to distribute the data. You can’t burn down the Library of Alexandria any more— it will respawn in someone’s basement in Stockholm, or Denver, or Beijing."

Government hates that and will attempt to destroy it.

TAX AND SPEND:

Democrats angry with Obama's compromise on the Bush tax cuts. Here's a neat point about how political realities forced Democrats into caving to Republicans on the Bush tax cuts.

"To pass a measure by reconciliation, the Senate must pass a budget that contains what are called reconciliation instructions. But this year, as they faced an angry electorate and grim prospects in the midterm elections, the Democratic leadership made the specific decision not to pass a budget. Revealing their spending priorities to voters already unhappy with out-of-control federal expenditures was just too risky, so Sen. Harry Reid and party leaders punted, even though passing a budget is one of Congress' core constitutional responsibilities.

With no budget, there could be no reconciliation. And no possibility of using reconciliation to extend the Bush tax cuts -- which were originally passed with bipartisan support -- on the Democrats' terms. Shirking your constitutional responsibilities can have consequences."

Better for us.

From Boortz:

"Greece, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, California, Illinois, Los Angeles and Chicago are simply the poster children for what happens when elected officials engage in reckless and irresponsible management of their economies."

Don't leave out our central government.

REGULATION:

Here's how government shakes down a company and forces it into the corrupt political economy, creating the fascist economic system we have today:

"The Federal Trade Commission declares war on Facebook, and the company responds accordingly:

Facebook is expanding its Washington, D.C., office and consulting with privacy advocates as lawmakers question how well the world’s largest social-networking site protects the personal information of users.

The company is looking for a public-policy expert and a deputy press spokesman after the June hiring of Marne Levine to head its D.C. office. Levine is a former top aide to Larry Summers, director of President Obama’s National Economic Council. The new hires would bring Facebook’s Washington team to eight, up from zero three years ago.

As smart as the people who run companies like Facebook are, they lack the intelligence to put their resources into discrediting and undermining the regulators — who seek only welfare and destruction — instead of wasting scarce capital in futile lobbying efforts."

The government threatens the company, and the company responds by expanding its lobbying efforts in Washington to protect itself from the predator government. The corruption process continues, with the company paying more and more tribute - or call it protection money - to the aristocrats. The company eventually discovers it can make far more profit for less cost off its lobbying operations than by improving its product, and the corruption becomes complete and it becomes an agent of the government, one of the Sheriff of Nottingham's tax collectors. If there's a market for a facebook like service with better privacy concerns, an entrepreneur would provide it (unless government uses IP laws to prevent him). But once facebook starts playing ball with the government, the government will protect it from competition, stifling the development of better services that would have otherwise surpassed it.

FEDERAL RESERVE:

The Fed and the government have rigged the banking system so that the big four "too big to fail" banks own 55 percent of all banking assets. The remaining ~8,000 banks are competing for the other 45 percent.

Analysis of Bernanke on 60 Minutes.

"If he is out for two years, his technical skill sets are likely to erode. Here is the threat. No one imagined in 2008 that this could happen to him. Now it has."

Tell me about it. I didn't imagine it in 2001 either.

EDUCATION:

This is a dog bites man story: government schools continue to fail students.

"Fifteen-year-olds in the U.S. ranked 25th among peers from 34 countries on a math test and scored in the middle in science and reading, while China’s Shanghai topped the charts, raising concern that the U.S. isn’t prepared to succeed in the global economy."

What else would you expect from government? As for people who say China's schools are run by the government too, China doesn't have a two party system, Chinese aristocrats don't have to buy votes, and China's government isn't centuries old.

HEALTH CARE:

Producer of drug can't produce enough to save all the lives that could be saved, but the patent on the drug prevents other companies from producing it and saving those lives.

GLOBAL WARMING:

The Al Gore effect strikes Cancun global warming fraud conference with Cancun setting low temperature records three days in a row. That's too funny.

In another case of scientists discovering the obvious, NASA scientists discover that plant growth prompted by increased CO2 levels provide negative feedback to global warming. In other words, NASA scientists discover CO2 is plant food, that increased CO2 prompts plant growth and those plants convert the CO2 into oxygen. I wonder how much that cost taxpayers. Still, it's always beneficial to have a new study that contradicts the frauds.

Illustrating just how brainless and knee-jerk the climate fraud movement is, the frauds in Cancun fall for the old dihydrogen monoxide gag.

Corrupt CRU head and central climategate figure Phil Jones forced to admit there has been no statistically significant warming of the planet since 1995.

The National Guard is now seizing land and blocking it from development in the name of going green.

1,000 scientists dissent from climate frauds.

"This new 2010 320-page Climate Depot Special Report — updated from 2007′s groundbreaking U.S. Senate Report of over 400 scientists who voiced skepticism about the so-called global warming “consensus” — features the skeptical voices of over 1000 international scientists, including many current and former UN IPCC scientists, who have now turned against the UN IPCC. This updated 2010 report includes a dramatic increase of over 300 additional (and growing) scientists and climate researchers since the last update in March 2009. This report’s release coincides with the 2010 UN global warming summit being held in Cancun."

The frauds stopped pushing the consensus lie a while back. Now they just call for burning skeptics at the stake.

POLICE STATE:

More on Assange's sexploits and arrest.

"The two Swedish women who accuse WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange of sexual misconduct were at first not seeking to bring charges against him. They just wanted to track him down and persuade him to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases, according to several people in contact with his entourage at the time."

But the condom broke, so hang him.

"After Assange left the country, Swedish authorities issued a European arrest warrant under which Assange could be detained and returned to Sweden. A spokeswoman for Swedish prosecutors affirmed, however, that at the moment Assange is not formally charged in Sweden with any criminal offense, but is only wanted for questioning."

So he isn't even charged with a crime, yet he's locked up and denied bail. Police state for sure.

In a good illustration of how much pressure government is putting on corporations to isolate WikiLeaks, VISA and Mastercard have cut off WikiLeaks, but they still work with the KKK. In a good reminder that government is god to corporations - it can destroy them or raise them from the dead with a stroke of a pen - the feds are pushing around every corporation associated with WikiLeaks.

US government already in talks with Swedish government to bring Assange to the US for trial. That might seem odd given he hasn't been charged with anything in the US, but if you think so it's because you don't understand the nature of government. The law does not apply to government. Government is all about power. They'll trump up some show charges eventually to make it appear this is about law, not power. Judge Napolitano interviews civil rights lawyer about possible violations of Assange's rights.

"Mr Assange went voluntarily to a London police station, accompanied by solicitors, after an international warrant was issued."

I bet Assange is already regretting that decision. No good deed goes unpunished. It's interesting how many people volunteered to pay his bail but were refused.

TSA singles out yet another hot woman for the nude-scanner, this time a Hollywood actress.

"After waiting in a long line of holiday travelers, D'Errico and her son finally made it to the moving carrier where all the carry-on bags are placed. That's when a TSA agent took her by the elbow and told her she needed to "come this way."

"I said I was traveling with my son, motioning to him, and the agent said he was to come along with me as well," D'Errico said. "I immediately asked why we were having to go through an extra search, and no one else was being made to do so, indicating the long line of other passengers in front of and behind where we had been in line. In a very sarcastic tone, and still holding me by the elbow, the agent responded, 'Because you caught my eye, and they' -- pointing to the other passengers -- 'didn't.'""

That's what passes for security in our airports. The people who think this makes us safer are fooling themselves.

""After the search, I noticed that the male TSA agent who had pulled me out of line was smiling and whispering with two other TSA agents and glancing at me. I was outraged."

So was her boyfriend, Roy J. Bank, the president of Merv Griffin Entertainment, who says he was in disbelief at what had just occurred.

"Anything that upsets Donna upsets me," he said. "I hated her being humiliated like that. I was genuinely shocked by both Donna and Rhyan being pulled aside for the extensive scanning."

What did they think was going to happen? Haven't they read a newspaper? Probably not. Putting a child through this is child abuse.

""This could, and I'm sure does, happen to other women," she said. "It isn't right to hide behind the veil of security and safety in order to take advantage of women, or even men for that matter, so that you can see them naked. It's a misuse of power and authority, and as much a personal violation as a Peeping Tom. The difference is that Peeping Toms can have charges pressed against them.""

She got that part exactly right.

WAR:

In today's reminder that central planners are no better at nation-building overseas than they are at nation-building at home, US troops are angry at the release of Taliban fighter because the Taliban is trying to kill them.

"More than 500 suspected Taliban fighters detained by U.S. forces have been released from custody at the urging of Afghan government officials, angering both American troops and some Afghans who oppose the policy on the grounds that many of those released return to the battlefield to kill NATO soldiers and Afghan civilians.

And those numbers understate the problem, military officials say. They do not include suspected Taliban fighters held in small combat outposts or other forward operating bases throughout the region who are released before they ever become part of the official detainee population."

I'd be angry too. Bring our troops home so they won't have people trying to kill them.

Since Obama declared the end of US combat in Iraq, eleven Americans have been killed, three by hostile action.

POLITICS:

China launches Confusius Peace Prize to compete with Nobel.

MEDIA:

Will Gregg rips Charles Krauthammer a new one.

"Perhaps we are to believe that the 21 Yemeni children slaughtered via remote control belonged to an al-Qaeda youth auxiliary. Then again, for a militarist like Krauthammer the operative principle in dealing with Muslim children appears to be "nits make lice."

The point here, I suppose, is that those children are simply invisible to Krauthammer. Their deaths should play no role in the calculations of imperial power, and the real scandal is not that they were annihilated but rather that the crime and attempted cover-up were publicly disclosed.

The course of boldness and valor for the Regime in Washington, Krauthammer apparently believes, is to cower behind a tiny, embattled Arab puppet government that is expected to take the blame when the CIA slaughters innocents."

Wow.

MISC:

Scientists criticize NASA claim of discovering an arsenic-based microbe, calling it bad science.

"Some scientists are left wondering why NASA made such a big deal over a paper with so many flaws. "I suspect that NASA may be so desperate for a positive story that they didn't look for any serious advice from DNA or even microbiology people," says John Rothof UC-Davis. The experience reminded some of another press conference NASA held in 1996. Scientists unveiled a meteorite from Mars in which they said there were microscopic fossils. A number of critics condemned the report (also published in Science) for making claims it couldn't back up. And today many scientists think that all of the alleged signs of life in the rocks could have just as easily been made on a lifeless planet."

Bad, self-serving science from government? Imagine that.

George Lucas buying the rights to old movies so he can use computers to put old actors and actresses in new movies. We knew this was going to happen soon, and looks like Lucas is positioning himself to profit the most.

MTV encouraging teenage girls to get pregnant so they can audition for its Teen Mom show. This is absurdly irresponsible.

Naturism. Ohio nudist camps. More. More. More. More. Western Ohio nudist info. Nudist parks in Ohio. http://www.sunshower.com/ Interesting comment:

"I am from southwest Ohio have visited Paradise gardens ,first time last fall they do have a web site very nice and enjoyed my stay . they did let me visit with out my wife but told me I couldn't come back with out her .

Cedar trails is near peebles ohio but they want let married men in with out there wifes .

I wish you lucky ,Ceasar Creek dosen't allow nudity . almost got caught by a ranger there . let me know if you find a place that will allow married men without there wifes ,Mine is totally against any kind of nudity."

Nudism article.

The costs of government and IP.

"This concerns a new study by economic historian Eckhard Hoffner that shows that Germany’s lack of copyright in the 19th century led to an unprecedented explosion of publishing, knowledge, etc., unlike in neighboring countries England and France where copyright law enriched publishers but stultified the spread of knowledge and limited publishing to a mass audience. According to Robert Groezinger, “This article in Der Spiegel is all about how the absence of copyright in Germany led to an “explosion of knowledge” in the 19th century. The reason there was no copyright law was that there was no central government until 1871. This contrasts with the UK, where there had been copyright since 1710, and the number of publications was lower by a factor of 10 compared to Germany. Also, the number of copies printed was much, much lower in the UK (hundreds as compared to ten thousand or so). The article claims that this is the main reason that Germany’s production and industry had caught up with everyone else by 1900.”"

So the explosive advance of German during the 19th century was because it had no central government and no copyright laws. Freedom always leads to increased prosperity. Government control always leads to decreased prosperity. There are no exceptions. That's the only way it can be.

Thomas Sowell praises Walter Williams's autobiography.

Evidence that cancer is a recent disease caused by man. Fight it by making sure you get plenty of vitamin D and cut back on the carbs.

Solar powered hornets? I'm skeptical. How would the energy get to cells?