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Yes, many will not concur with Richard, but the truth is that the foundation IS Bill Gates PR arm. I give you the example of Mexico's enciclomedia project (which was an absolute failure): with the simplest menace of the country's strategy of including linux as a base platform for millions of computers for elementary schools, the B&MG foundation (after a lightning trip of ballmer and gates to personally talk to President Fox) donated 40 million dollars worth of boxes with a simple, little string attached: it HAS to run Microsoft Windows.

also :
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

Also, as an earlier poster mentioned :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_and_Melinda_Gates_Foundation#Criticismsplease explain this oil connection and the windows pushing in terms of investment and charity.

Yes, many will not concur with Richard, but the truth is that the foundation IS Bill Gates PR arm. I give you the example of Mexico's enciclomedia project (which was an absolute failure): with the simplest menace of the country's strategy of including linux as a base platform for millions of computers for elementary schools, the B&MG foundation (after a lightning trip of ballmer and gates to personally talk to President Fox) donated 40 million dollars worth of boxes with a simple, little string attached: it HAS to run Microsoft Windows.

also :
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

Also, as an earlier poster mentioned :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_and_Melinda_Gates_Foundation#Criticisms

Yes, many will not concur with Richard, but the truth is that the foundation IS Bill Gates PR arm. I give you the example of Mexico's enciclomedia project (which was an absolute failure): with the simplest menace of the country's strategy of including linux as a base platform for millions of computers for elementary schools, the B&MG foundation (after a lightning trip of ballmer and gates to personally talk to President Fox) donated 40 million dollars worth of boxes with a simple, little string attached: it HAS to run Microsoft Windows.

also :

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

Yes, many will not concur with Richard, but the truth is that the foundation IS Bill Gates PR arm. I give you the example of Mexico's enciclomedia project (which was an absolute failure): with the simplest menace of the country's strategy of including linux as a base platform for millions of computers for elementary schools, the B&MG foundation (after a lightning trip of ballmer and gates to personally talk to President Fox) donated 40 million dollars worth of boxes with a simple, little string attached: it HAS to run Microsoft Windows.

also :

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

Yes, many will not concur with Richard, but the truth is that the foundation IS Bill Gates PR arm. I give you the example of Mexico's enciclomedia project (which was an absolute failure): with the simplest menace of the country's strategy of including linux as a base platform for millions of computers for elementary schools, the B&MG foundation (after a lightning trip of ballmer and gates to personally talk to President Fox) donated 40 million dollars worth of boxes with a simple, little string attached: it HAS to run Microsoft Windows.

i would really like to see what kind of 'charitable' act this one is. ah, also below too :

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

The reason they 'only spend 10%' is because they have a endowment to maintain.

I'm not sure anyone is criticising the foundation's financial model, but the LA Times has questioned the nature of the investments that the foundation makes to sustain itself.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,6827615.story?coll=la-home-headlines

I believe the assertion being made is that the foundation's charitable efforts are being sabotaged by its unethical investments.

To be fair to RMS, he doesn't really personally attack the Foundation, but simply cites an LA Times story criticizing it. The LA Times story makes a convincing argument that the Foundation's investing in pollution-causing industries negates a lot of its good work, and uses as an example an African man who has been immunized by the Foundation against polio and measles, while his lungs are destroyed by a nearby oil plant whose owner the Foundation invests in.

The Gates Foundation has poured $218 million into polio and measles immunization and research worldwide, including in the Niger Delta. At the same time that the foundation is funding inoculations to protect health, The Times found, it has invested $423 million in Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and Total of France â" the companies responsible for most of the flares blanketing the delta with pollution, beyond anything permitted in the United States or Europe.

The pollution it talks about is contributing to the poor health of the locals that the foundation is supposed to be helping.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

First of all, the money Gates is so charitably donating, is money he acquired from an illegal monopoly, so it is reasonable to follow where it is going.

This is not RMS' argument. His argument is that the charity invests some of their money into companies like oil plants which pollute the air, see this article.

If you're going to defend RMS, at least get it right.

From the article:

Monica Harrington, a senior policy officer at the foundation, said the investment managers had one goal: returns "that will allow for the continued funding of foundation programs and grant making." Bill and Melinda Gates require the managers to keep a highly diversified portfolio, but make no specific directives.

I don't think they're specifically looking for investment in oil and gas companies, this just happened to be one of their investments (I'm not saying that it's OK, but RMS can blow things way out of proportion).

There's also this story: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,4205044,full.story

Have a read of this article from the LA times:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,6827615.story?coll=la-home-headlines

I think that's what Stallman is referring to.

Don't know how much is true, but it makes depressing reading.

There are whole medical labs dedicated to fighting TB and AIDS in southern Africa that wouldn't exist without the Bill&Melinda foundation. How is that hurting anything?

Well this is what he said according to TFA:

Gates' philanthropy for health care for poor countries has won some people's good opinion. The LA Times reported that his foundation spends five to 10% of its money annually and invests the rest, sometimes in companies it suggests cause environmental degradation and illness in the same poor countries.

So basically, he being outed as a Charity basher because he is citing the LA times article that the foundation only spends 10% of its money on actual helping the poor. He doesn't say the organization shouldn't exist... He's pointing out that they aren't doing their best job of giving to the poor because they are investing for a return.

Read the LA Times article and decide for yourself though.

Read the LA times article the parent talks about please, this is indeed both very interesting and a cause for despair.

Essentially the B&MG foundation is doing more harm than good, it seems.

Charity is a pretty good spot to recoup karma, IMHO. Certainly better than hookers, blackjack, and coke.

The "Charity" is a front. It makes for-profit investments and has pledged not to review its investments for their ethical acceptability. Everything you need to know about the Gates foundation can be summed up by their response to Dark cloud over good works of Gates Foundation, an LA Times investigative article (I know, I was as shocked as you must be) which tells the story of the Gates Foundation's investment in big oil that is killing people in the places in which they claim to try to be saving them. This is my favorite paragraph:

The Gates Foundation has poured $218 million into polio and measles immunization and research worldwide, including in the Niger Delta. At the same time that the foundation is funding inoculations to protect health, The Times found, it has invested $423 million in Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and Total of France â" the companies responsible for most of the flares blanketing the delta with pollution, beyond anything permitted in the United States or Europe.

Now, keep in mind that the Gates Foundation is not restricted to making holding investments, they are allowed to make them for profit. The profit ostensibly goes right back into charity, right? But here's the issue. As of January 2007 (when the article was published) they'd spent nearly twice as much on sucking oil out of the region (killing people in the process) than on actually helping anyone! And let's not get into what percentage of that money spent is actually applied effectively...

Bill Gates is not interested in helping anyone. Remember how the idea of a presidential bid for Gates was floated in the media? That was not a mistake. It was a test. It did not go over well; millions of the best-connected people on the planet certainly spoke their mind on the issue on every public forum they could find. Now, he is sitting on top of one of the largest fortunes on the planet, in charge of doling out money both to the greedy companies raping the land, and to help people who are being harmed by them. If you follow the money, though, you can see where priorities lie.

Gates has placed himself in a position of power which makes his former position at the top of Microsoft look like the elementary school yard bully on top of the pitcher's mound winning a game of king of the hill, and this is not a cause for celebration. He is not there to do good deeds.

How about a link to a real newspaper?

here
here
here
here (oops, my bad ;)
here
here
here
or how about one from a city that is directly impacted by the decision, like here?

Mayor Daley calls Supreme Court's gun-ban reversal 'a very frightening decision'
High court strikes down Washington D.C. law in ruling that could have Chicago implications
An angry Mayor Richard Daley on Thursday called the Supreme Court's overturning of the Washington D.C. gun ban "a very frightening decision" and vowed to fight vigorously any challenges to Chicago's ban.

The mayor, speaking at a Navy Pier event, said he was sure mayors nationwide, who carry the burden of keeping cities safe, will be outraged by the decision.

Chicago's handgun ban, which has lasted for more than a quarter-century, came under threat earlier in the day when the Supreme Court decided that Washington D.C.'s law against handgun ownership is unconstitutional.

In a 5-4 decision, the high court determined that Americans have the right to own guns for self-defense as well as hunting. The decision, which had been expected, is a win for gun-rights advocates and provides a better definition of the rights of Americans to own firearms.

Illinois gun-rights activists have said they expect to mount a quick legal challenge to the Chicago Weapons Ordinance.

Other city officials said they felt confidant that challenge would fail.

I'm disappointed in you, timothy. I'm sure there were a lot more submissions than this one. Since this is Thursday, I hereby nominate you as "Aurthur Dent" (Monday is my Dent Day).

Why do I have to <p> on my paragraphs when I've selected "plain old text"??

I know martinw89 linked a page containing all of the links, but in case that was too confusing, I better link them again:

Article 1
Article 2
Article 3
Article 4
Article 5
Article 6
Article 7
Article 8
Article 9

Hope that helps

A government tool provided for their friends to squash anyone that might dissent. Canadians? Listen up... this kind of thing is on it's way to you.

That's OK, our government has already got its own such tools. Pray they don't end up coming down to YOU.

Quoted in The Register yesterday,

Senator Herb Kohl, head of the Antitrust Subcommittee. "We will closely examine the joint venture between Google and Yahoo announced today," his statement read. "This collaboration between two technology giants and direct competitors for Internet advertising and search services raises important competition concerns. "The consequences for advertisers and consumers could be far-reaching and warrant careful review, and we plan to investigate the competitive and privacy implications of this deal further in the Antitrust Subcommittee."

The US Justice Department is also looking at the deal. This is the same administration that gave M$ a slap on the wrist for it's proven anti-trust behavior, so this kind of corruption is not entirely surprising. That does not make it any less outrageous or obvious.

This is the influence Enderle is talking about but it should be waning. The current administration's time is up.

Who says a non exclusive deal is a merger? Even Enderle thinks the deal is legitimate but that M$ might be able to pull the wool over regulator's. We should all cry foul about things like this.

A related story talked about the odd assortment of fake groups opposed to these deals.

discussions have already provoked objections from an unusually diverse set of Washington players. In fact, it is safe to say that the American Corn Growers Assn. has never before joined forces with the Dominican American Business Network. Those and 14 other nonprofit organizations sent a joint letter to the Justice Department on Friday asking for an antitrust investigation of the possible Google-Yahoo alliance

That's from the same paper that covered the spamming of Senators by a M$ PR firm against the anti-trust trail. You might also remember them claiming to represent blind people opposing ODF. That spamming fooled no one at the time, so you wonder why they keep trying to pull the same stupid trick.

One more thing: I think it's especially interesting that this sentiment isn't just from supporters of Candidates like Paul (who is in fact starkly different from most candidates on several fronts). This portrayal of the general presidential election as one of small differences is actually apparently a mainstream media meme:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-obamacain8-2008jun08,0,543931.story
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601070&sid=aH8EMkkeMCtw&refer=politics

Not unanticipated, or without precedent:

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/06/04/how-will-the-campaign-be-covered/

I think the question is: Why? Why, when there are easily locatable differences are there people who seem to like level them? I can understand why Paul looks different compared to Obama and McCain, but that's not even who we're talking about -- we're talking about a media that played up the heat of the contest between Obama and Clinton, but now appears to be playing down the much greater gulf.

Maybe it's because McCain appears to be a moderate if you average his positions:

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/14577.html
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/15649.html

Or maybe it's some inner working of mainstream "journalism" that's just too mysterious for me.

Or maybe it's true what my acquaintances who've worked in the Senate have said: McCain's great in front of the cameras, assiduously cultivates one media image, but in private, he's at best a tyrant and quite possibly mentally instable (note: before you try to pass that off on partisan rancor, note that these acquaintances (plural) that I've received these opinions from were *Republican* Senate staff).

But that's a rumor, one you can't verify unless you also have the acquaintance of Senate staff, and I don't expect you to believe a random poster on the internet about this. Just whatever you do, don't fall for the line that McCain and Obama are somehow twins, that voting for either won't make a difference.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080528/pl_nm/usa_politics_issues_dc

Who you cast your vote for absolutely matters this fall. If you absolutely HAVE to -- vote for Ron Paul or your favorite third party candidate to send a message, sure. Everybody has that right and it's a legitimate use of a vote. But make sure you really understand who the candidates are before you cast your vote. If you genuinely think Obama and McCain are the same, you quite simply haven't done that yet, and your vote will be cast irresponsibly.

The ninth circuit is about to lose a defender of free speech because he had the savvy to run a web site but not enough to know how it really works. His collection of "porn" are things that other people sent him, the kind of crap that clogs email systems everywhere. It is impossible to have an email address and not have it sent to you. Someone you know will send it along. His mistake was putting it where it could be seen by the same kinds of fanatics that are pushing the "war on porn" in the first place. Ignore the fact that they routinely get busted like Jimmy Swaggart did. Kozinski thought people would not find it because there was no link to the directory ... ugh! He's exactly the kind of level headed person the courts need to rule fairly on these kinds of cases.

Like the fine article quotes him saying:

You don't realize how bad it is in a country like that until you live in a free society like ours. People there live in fear of the secret police -- fear that something they say may get them taken away in the middle of the night. I have seen people hauled off in their pajamas. I've seen what a system of government can do when it is not restrained by law.

Those were fine sentiments when he was appointed by Ronald Reagan, but it's bad news under a regime that wants to be above the law. There you will find your animals, those who want to live by tooth and claw.

People want to feel safe. That's not the same as being safe, but hey, that's an unachievable goal anyway. So you strut and fret with your sniffer dogs and your M-16s, and everybody feels better!

Hey, did you know that California state employees are still required to sign loyalty oaths? These were invented 50 years ago to keep subversive elements out of government employ. I don't suppose they accomplished that purpose ("Sorry, my KGB control says I can't sign this!") but they do weed out the odd Quaker.

Except the radio stations don't pay for it, they sometimes even get paid to put certain tracks on because the music execs quite rightly figured out nobody wants to pay for music that they have never heard of before.
Or at least that's how it is right now, lately the RIAA has been pushing to make them pay up. (source)

Bill deserves absolutely NO 'credit' for 'giving back'

Take a look here for how his 'giving back' is actually working...(he's just 'donating' money to invest in pharm companies for profits, etc.) He couldn't care less about people. Shows in his software, shows in his 'giving back', etc.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx7jan07-sg,0,261331.storygallery

Bill didn't mention getting his picture taken in Albuquerque? http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2007-12/34454506.jpg

That said a recent court decision has just made the act of "looking" for it illegal and in the process has made drawings or renderings of it illegal too. That would arguably be a victimless crime. There's a slippery slope here and I think we're already starting to go down it.

Please see Dark Cloud Over Good Works of Gates Foundation (story link)

Bill Gates is not a good guy. Even if you could measure such things mathematically, in the balance, he's still not a good guy.

Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but it seems pretty racist to me. They stuff just enough fact in for a nice bite of rhetoric.

Just an FYI, you don't need to be Islamic to demand a larger slice of the national ear, you just need powerful lobbies, like:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5258240.stm
or lack thereof:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-malanga18oct18,0,2480105.story?coll=la-opinion-rightrail

Boy, this thread is going off on a bit of a tangent.

You bring up an interesting point regarding the 6 guys sending money home.

I've seen estimates from about 30 billion to 300 billion dollars that are being being wired to other nations anually from legal and illegal workers in the US. While I can't fault the legal ones, especially since I occasionally send funds to help my Brazilian in-laws, the illegals are an unpleasant and growing addition to this problem. Why is it a problem? Because the money is not spent on the US economy. It is hemorraging from our economic system. Sure, it's cheap labor, but when this cheap labor is exlpoited on a large scale, the effect from disenfranchising an increasingly significant demographic of your customers (the U.S. workers that cost a bit more but will actually spend their money in the U.S.) by off-shore outsourcing and hiring illegal immigrants who wire their money back to the homeland, the system (U.S. econonmy) will eventually fail due to the money not re-entering it. Some say it is a nice way to get economic aid directly to the poorest residents of other nations -- not a completely unreasonable point, but at the same time we shouldn't be using that point to justify being a welfare system for other countries at the expense of our own country's economic well-being. I just hope that we find some sort of balance before it's too late. We don't want to be too protective or too open.

Some links:
http://www.immigrationwatchdog.com/?p=4509
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-transfer2apr02,1,3240079.story
http://www.rense.com/general62/frain.htm
http://www.politicalprisonerblog.com/politicalprisonerblog/2008/04/money-launderin.html
(I don't agree with all of the ideas in these, but they're somewhat though provoking)

I bet they'd try it. They are attempting to convict the fryer oil to Diesel guy for not paying his road tax on fuel he made out of waste oil. That's the way to support green initiatives!

The Bush presidency dearly wants to invade Iran. They are also utterly incompetent and their intentions are self-serving. The U.S. has been lied to and bankrupted and there are still people who don't get it. In a democracy, I think you should not be allowed to vote if you can't tell the difference between an 'M' and a 'W'.

-FL

Sigh...you really need to get out more...

B&MGF is little more than investment in oil, pharmaceuticals (i.e. big pharm corps.), etc.
They care little about helping people, only their legacy, idolatry, power, etc.

This latest selling out by Negroponte is just another sad example of N. being corrupted.
Goodbye OLPC and Negroponte. You've now demonstrated beyond all doubt that you don't care about kids either, since you are now actively advocating enslaving them to send more money to the world's richest when they become addicted and spend money on software instead of food, health, etc. Appalling.

For some eyeopeners on B&MGF, I'd (highly) recommend the following articles for starters:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gatesx7jan07-sg,0,261331.storygallery

You asked what "activist judges" were. They are judges who overlook the letter of the law and make rulings that contradict the law or constitution. Statutory and constitutional law always must be given higher priority than common law. To do otherwise ignores the will of the people, the legislature, and upsets the balance of power. A good example is the D.C. handgun ban that was overturned by the supreme court recently. This law was an obvious abuse of the citizens 2nd amendment rights but activist judges in D.C. overlooked the letter of the law and made "common law" what was overturned by the higher court because it was in conflict with the constitution which fortionatly for us plebeians trumps common law and statutory law. I hope this answers your "what's an activist judge" question, it was never about case law.

I'm not sure where the "problem" is in that analysis. If Bill Gates's foundation cures malaria, then he'll certainly have a legacy as the guy who cured malaria. But just because he gets something out of it (a good legacy) doesn't mean that every single person who won't have malaria in the next 500 years is somehow harmed. In a way, it's a win-win transaction -- Bill Gates gets to feel good about himself and people in sub-Saharan Africa get to not have malaria. There's nothing mutually incompatible about those goals.

The contradiction in what the Bill and Melinda Gate Foundation is doing come from how it doing it. While the foundation is working to help people it has also invested in a corporation that pollutes in the Third World. The foundation is invested in Eni, an Italian petroleum giant, which has harmed people with the pollution it creates.

> What is needed to make your case is a statistical analysis that says C.S. majors earn less and are unable to find work.

Actually no, becuase that was not my case. A BSCS may be employable, but he or she would have been better off to have chosen a different major.

BSCSs may earn more than IT workers who have no degrees, in some cases. But, often there is little, in any, difference. Employers want experience, not degrees, look at the job ads.

Unlike doctors, lawyers, engineers, CPAs, nurses, or many other professions; a BSCS is not a hard requirement for most IT jobs. The degree has very little value relative to it's cost and difficulty. Add that to the aggressive offshoring of IT professionals, and it seems to me that a students time, effort, and money, would be better spent elsewhere.

And here is some data to back that up:

> "According to the AeA Cyberstates yearly reports, "High Tech" employment experienced job losses of 945,000 in the 2001 recession. Since this drop in employment, the "High Tech" sector has recovered about *300,000* jobs, but during the period in question, a probable *669,681* H-1B and L-1 computer-related workers were added to the workforce."

http://tinyurl.com/3pj2c3

> "Job security for IT professionals plummeted more than 10% from January to February of this year, far surpassing the average job security declines seen nationwide in a rigorous analysis of U.S. employment patterns."

http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/edu/2008/033108ed1.html

> "Gates claims that Microsoft needs more H-1b to hire new foreign graduates. But there are many U.S. graduates with several years of experience trying to find work at Microsoft and other employers - but Gates does not open these "entry level" positions to these Americans. Why? Experienced Americans are only considered for the positions that require an arbitrary 3 to 7 years of experience in several specific skills - then the Americans are summarily rejected for not meeting all of those arbitrary qualifications."

http://tinyurl.com/358alw

> "Dell Job Cuts to Top 8,800 as U.S. Spending Slows"
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aEO1GX_CC.8U&refer=us

> "Motorola to lay off 2,600 workers"
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-fri-motorola-8k-jobcuts-motapr04,0,4870738.story

> "Chrysler Slashing Tech Jobs - The latest cutbacks affect 400 technology workers"
http://www.thecarconnection.com/blog/?p=1095

> "AMD axes 10% of its staff"
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/36823/167/

> "Yahoo Profits Slip; To Cut 1,000 Jobs"
http://blog.wired.com/business/2008/01/yahoo-profits-s.html

> "Google lays off about 300 at DoubleClick"
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/03/BUA2VUNAO.DTL&tsp=1

> "EBay Cuts 125 Jobs in Europe, North America"
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080320/ebay_jobs.html?.v=4

> "CNET to Lay Off 120"
http://www.redherring.com/Home/24032

> "At least 160 employees at CBS Corp. . . were let go"
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-stations9apr09,1,7495348.story

> Applied

While I see what your getting at it can't be the case, the Hummer received the worst crash rating of all SUVs http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-crash26feb26,1,7353733.story , and yet some very small and light cars receive excellent crash ratings. Being light is not mutually exclusive with being safe, crumple zones, airbags, and proper design matter much more than mass and size in a crash. I think with the proper design any of the x price cars can be made into a safe vehicle without adding weight or reducing performance.

It's true that people still consume media the old-fashioned way -- but fewer and fewer do so every day. Most of the content industries are seeing flat or declining revenues and audiences.

1. Movie ticket sales at record high.
2. Cable company reports record sales.
3. Digital sales boost music industry.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation only donates a small fraction of its holdings. In many ways it seems less like a charity and more like a tax dodge. Plus, many of its practices are questionable, such as investing in ethically irresponsible companies that actively cause harm to the people they're trying to help.

The other story was about ways to DoS the Great Firewall of China from outside. You can, in theory, overload the content filter parts. If they're too busy to forge RST packets (or they don't forge them in time), that part of the Great Firewall won't work. You can also create false positives. So you can send packets containing banned content into China to create false positives (and tell that it's working by watching for forged RSTs). And you can reflect it by using OS bugs that sometimes reply with parts of the original packet (e.g. pings), which could allow you to create millions of false positives for them to investigate. Unlike most things, those allow outsiders to interfere, who have no worry about being arrested by the Chinese government. Of course, they would adapt things to filter them out, but hopefully that would accidentally create more openings in it by filtering out too much, creating new opportunities.

Those might even work, so I hope someone follows up on them :) Note that I wrote them all as I Believe in Irrational Property instead of I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property. Here they are:

RIAA Yacht Copied in Daring Act of Piracy

In a what the Coast Guard is calling a 'daring act of nautical infringement,' pirates have copied RIAA CEO Mitch Bainwol's personal yacht. After attacking with high speed inner tubes, they quickly made off with the data necessary to exactly duplicate the ship and vanished, but not before leaving behind an NFO with a pirate flag and a threat to 'rip' former RIAA chief Hillary Rosen's ship next. The RIAA is now demanding that the US Government issue Letters of Marquee and Reprisal so that they can prosecute these pirates under a little-known provision of copyright law governing ship designs as well as Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the US Constitution.

Microsoft Seeks Partnership With IKEA

After being spurned by Yahoo, Microsoft is seeking to acquire the furniture maker IKEA. Microsoft's Ballmer was quoted as saying, 'They have many assets I can use for leverage in pursuit of future acquisitions.' The deal appeared to get off to a bit of a rough start when Ballmer's tour of one of their factories was cut short after what authorities are describing as a 'bizarre furniture-related mishap,' in which three VPs who opposed to the deal were hospitalized. Authorities are not releasing many details, but one officer made the cryptic comment that, 'I didn't think even Bob Goatse could do that with a chair.' Even so, inside reports indicate that the remaining company officers are now 'very eager' to finalize the deal.

SCO Lawsuit Was Really "Performance Art"

SCO's D

Rick Astley approves in this video clip:

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/webscout/2008/03/rick-astley-kin.html

with apologies:

http://www.ironicsans.com/2008/03/idea_the_wikroll.html

Microsoft Seeks Partnership With IKEA

After being spurned by Yahoo, Microsoft is seeking to acquire the furniture maker IKEA. Microsoft's Ballmer was quoted as saying, 'They have many assets I can use for leverage in pursuit of future acquisitions.' The deal appeared to get off to a bit of a rough start when Ballmer's tour of one of their factories was cut short after what authorities are describing as a 'bizarre furniture-related mishap,' in which three VPs who opposed to the deal were hospitalized. Authorities are not releasing many details, but one officer made the cryptic comment that, 'I didn't think even Bob Goatse could do that with a chair.' Even so, inside reports indicate that the remaining company officers are now 'very eager' to finalize the deal.

Look, yet another example of the kinds of stories that have been coming out for a few decades about the ever shrinking news room. Investigative journalism costs a lot of money, and it takes professionals doing a lot of work. If a corporation can get by on entertainment news, they will. See the prevalence of reality TV shows or game shows, these are dirt cheap to produce. And if you think citizen journalists are going to fill in the gap, I have news for you - you have a better chance of seeing citizen novelists, which isn't actually a bad analogy given the truckload of vanity crap they will produce.

hasn't moved in the same direction recently

The US has been fighting conventionally ever since the first Gulf War - even after that war ended, there was quite a bit of combat activity to enforce Iraq's no-fly zone. With the current wars, this has resulted in military personnel regarding conventional fighting as the way to get ahead in the military.

Let me find you a link...

• Air Force's Nuclear Focus Has Dimmed

After the Cold War, the once-vaunted Strategic Air Command, which controlled all Air Force nuclear weapons, was dismantled. The military's nuclear missiles were assigned to a division responsible for operations in space, and its nuclear bombers were moved to Air Combat Command, which also includes nonnuclear fighters and reconnaissance aircraft.

...

However, the Welch report is highly critical of the split commands. The report concludes that combining nuclear forces with nonnuclear organizations has led to "markedly reduced levels of leadership whose daily focus is the nuclear enterprise and a general devaluation of the nuclear mission and those who perform the mission."

I work in the network security field. Probably 70% of the IP space I block at the edge of my network is Chinese. The Pentagon and DoD have had repeated problems with hackers using Chinese IPs in the last two years or so. Make no mistake about it, this effort is tacitly (if not outrightly) being supported by the Chinese government.

Here's a sample- Google "china hacking" for plenty more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-uschina4mar04,1,3559963.story

i hope the meta mods catch this, 2 obama fans modding a rebuttal flamebait/overrated.

but don't take my word for it, take the words of the leader of the NY civil rights commission:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oew-meyers20mar20,0,3898931.story

According to the LA Times, the Republican party in Washington had two separate E-mail systems - one for party communications, and another for government communications. This setup was implemented to avoid charges of using government money for political campaigns, except now they are being accused of using the private network to avoid federal record and disclosure rules.

GOP-issued laptops now a White House headache