Now, I know you profess to love our country and the founding fathers (unless you are reminded that they believed in the separation of church and state), but I need to remind you that America is NOT what Fox News says it is. America is a melting pot, it always has been. We are a multi-cultural amalgamation of all kinds of people, and yet you still demonize everyone who is not a rich, white, heterosexual christian male or his submissive and obedient wife.
You hate liberals, moderates, hell, anyone who disagrees with Conservative dogma as espoused by Fox News and Rush Limbaugh. You hate em. Well, here are the facts, Jack. If you hate the Government then you are unqualified to manage it. If you hate gay people more than you love America than you should take your own advice and get the hell out. There are several countries that are openly hostile to gay people, but they are full of brown people and you don’t like them much either from what I understand. It looks like you are screwed, but that’s not what I am here to tell you.
Under George H.W Bush and Bill Clinton it gets raised a bit more to 39.6 percent. But then George W. Bush comes in and cuts it to 35 percent and lowers the rate on qualified dividends to 15 percent. And by now I’ve retired. I’m living off investments. All my income is coming from qualified dividends. And so I’m sitting there in the 15 percent tax bracket. And I use the maximum charitable deduction every year. So my actual tax rate has been 7 percent every year since 2007!
- David Levine, Former Chief Economist for the investment-management firm Sanford C. Bernstein
(via A rich guy’s case for (much) higher taxes - The Washington Post)
The principles of openness and universal access that underpinned the creation of the internet hree decades ago are under greater threat than ever, according to Google co-founder Sergey Brin.
In an interview with the Guardian to launch our new Battle for the internet series, Brin warned that there were “very powerful forces that have lined up against the open internet on all sides and around the world. I am more worried than I have been in the past … it’s scary.”
- Read the full interview on guardian.co.uk and find out more about our newBattle for the internet series
again, this could be a glimpse into the future if things like acta are put into play…this is a machine that is hard to stop..started as US legislature..moved to global…if these all fail, we could see it on a state to state basis maybe? they are trying everything they can to stop the flow and freedom of information… social networking brought forth a process of change…a social engineered future where everyone shared every little detail about themselves, everyone giving up their info willingly where everyone could see it, the flow of information was too great for them to handle..now its out of control and they will stop at nothing to try and regain control, because without control they tremble in fear. become uncontrollable..untrollable ..substance. keep the internet free…or kill it in the process..
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Internet giants Google and Facebook have removed some content an Indian court found offensive to local political and religious leaders. The court warned the companies that their services could be shut down over the case.
A New Delhi court Monday gave Facebook, Google, YouTube, Blogspot and the other sites two weeks to present further plans for policing their networks.
The officials say it is not a question of censorship, but of the necessity to operate within the laws of the country.
Google India did not say which sites were removed, but said it would go after anything that violated local law or its own standards.
“(Our) review team has looked at the content, and disabled this content from the local domains of (Google) search, YouTube and Blogger,” Google spokeswoman Paroma Roy Chowdhury said.
In January, the Indian government approved the prosecution of 21 web companies, including Google and Facebook, for publishing offensive content, and demanded the companies moderate what is published on their sites.
Back then, the companies said it was not possible to control everything their users upload to the Web.
A conversation between FBI special agents and authorities at the UK’s Scotland Yard was leaked online Friday morning, the latest in a series of data dumps conducted by Anonymous hackers to protest against law enforcement.
But the conference calls may have inadvertently released more information than the hacking collective would be comfortable with.
Read more: Details in leaked FBI call could prove uncomfortable for Anonymous
All About ACTA
It’s not over yet. #SOPA and #PIPA are one thing. The international version is #ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. The agreement has been signed, while existing mostly in secret, by most of the world, with notable exceptions including the EU.
The act is an attempt to create international standards for intellectual property rights enforcement.
You can look at what is assumed to be the current final form of the agreement, which has been leaked, here. The text has otherwise not been made public; in the US, a Freedom of Information Act request has been denied on the basis of classification for national security. Of course this information was not too classified for those who had a hand in creating the act, a group representing US-based multinational corporations which include International Intellectual Property Alliance (coalition of seven trade associations), The Gorlin Group (Washington “consultancy”), Time Warner Inc. (media company), Eli Lilly and Company (pharmaceutical company), Cisco Systems, Inc. (consumer electronics), The U.S.-China Business Council (nonprofit org), Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc. (beer), Merck & Co., Inc. (healthcare), National Foreign Trade Council, Inc. (business organization), Sidley, Austin, Brown & Wood LLP (representing the biotechnology industry), Entertainment Software Association (computer and video games), CropLife America (crop protection and pest control products), Global Intellectual Property Strategy Center (consulting service representing gauge-manufacturers Thomas G. Faria Corporation), Recording Industry Association of America (recording industry trade org), IBM Corporation (technology), Intellectual Property Owners Association (trade association for owners of patents, trademarks, copyrights and trade secrets), Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. (movies), John Wiley and Sons, Inc. (publishers), General Motors Corporation (automobiles).
And that was just the Industry Trade Advisory Committee On Intellectual Property Rights that was involved. There are three other other committees, totaling 93 other members of the business elite who have access to the “classified” details of the act we as citizens are not allowed to see, for our own security.
This video is a chart.
Americans believe that the greatest source of tension in the U.S. is now the conflict between the rich and poor, taking the top spot from immigration issues, a new Pew survey is reporting.
Two-thirds of respondents surveyed last month think there are “very strong” or “strong” conflicts between the wealthy and the poor in the country. That’s an increase of 19 percentage points from those who answered the same question two years ago.
OWS Invests In Unmanned Surveillance Drone Dubbed The ‘Occucopter’
For years we’ve seen images of the military’s unmanned aerial vehicles aiding soldiers in combat zones, and their evolution from surveillance tools to the heavily weaponized Predator drones. Now, the Guardian reports, Occupy Wall Street livestreamer Tim Pool hopes to use that technology as an additional set of eyes on the police department.
Tim Pool, an Occupy Wall Street protester, has acquired a Parrot AR drone he amusingly calls the “occucopter”. It is a lightweight four-rotor helicopter that you can buy cheaply on Amazon and control with your iPhone. It has an onboard camera so that you can view everything on your phone that it points at. Pool has modified the software to stream live video to the internet so that we can watch the action as it unfolds.
The Occucopter comes in response to police departments, across the country, stepping up efforts to prevent their actions from being recorded. Some have started covering up their names and badge numbers. Others attempt to stand in the way of recording devices, or declare “frozen zones” that are off limits to even the most credentialed reporters. Tim hopes that the Occucopter will allow protesters to monitor the police, and record any cases of brutality that may have otherwise remained undocumented.
In addition to modifying the Parrot’s software for internet livestreaming, Pool is also currently working on modifying the software for multiple controllers. He even hopes to add 3G functionality, so that even protesters and supporters outside of New York could aid in the monitoring process. When asked about his plans by the Guardian, he explained:
We are trying to get a stable live feed so you can have 50 people controlling it in series. If the cops see you controlling it from a computer they can shut you down, but then control could automatically switch to someone else.
Now you, much like myself, might find yourself wondering, “Isn’t he concerned that some officer(s) will just shoot it down?”
No…They can’t just fire a weapon in the air because it could seriously hurt someone. They would have no excuse because the occucopter is strictly not illegal. Their only recourse would be to make it illegal, but it is only a toy
So it would appear that we finally have an answer to a twenty five year old question. Tim Pool is watching the watchmen.
And doing a damn good job of it.
(images courtesy of Time/iPhoneZA/GeekAlerts)
(via reuters)
The corporations that occupy Congress. - David Cay Johnston
I’d boycott everything Wall Street made, if they actually made anything.
There is a difference.
NEW YORK (AP) — A congressman is calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate allegations of police misconduct in connection with the treatment of Occupy Wall Street protesters and journalists covering the demonstrations in New York City.
WASHINGTON — The United Nations envoy for freedom of expression is drafting an official communication to the U.S. government demanding to know why federal officials are not protecting the rights of Occupy demonstrators whose protests are being disbanded — sometimes violently — by local authorities.
The Fed Grants $7.77 Trillion in Secret Bank Loan - Now Do You Understand Occupy Wall Street? (by DJKucinich)
