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34 ISPs Subpoenaed By U.S. Government
seanonymous writes "The Justice Department, in their continued effort to revive questionable legislation, has subpoenaed dozens of ISPs for files. Considering that ISPs generally host their users' mail, this seems like it could be a larger issue than their fight with Google over search queries. Some, like Verizon, even resisted the call for information." From the article: "Representatives for McAfee and Symantec confirmed that the companies had received and complied with the subpoenas. A spokeswoman at LookSmart did not immediately return a phone call. Many of the subpoenas asked for information related to products that can be used to filter out adult content for underage Internet users. Symantec's subpoena, dated June 29, asked for a wide range of information about the price and popularity of the Internet filtering products it sells and how the products are used by customers. " Information Week has a number of the documents involved, including the letter of objection from Verizon.
Orwell was only off by two decades. Makes you wonder if the government uses his book as a guide?
My, that was a yummy potato!
Can somebody please explain why it is that the DoJ is being allowed to write all these subpoenas anyway? I didn't think they had any legal right to do so.
Is this just a simple matter of the DoJ assuming that at least some of the corporations will decide it's faster to comply, than to argue for their privacy?
I was under the impression that for any seiziure of private property for investigation, there had to be a reasonable suspicion that there was a crime commited.
So now "not helping the government" is a crime in and of itself?
Hmm.. I do think that this is getting a bit out of hand now. I'm glad that some of "them" do resist the calls for information, but for how long ? After all, most resources are controlled by the government and they're capable of putting an enormous amount of pressure on said corporations.
I don't quite understand the US governments crusade against online porn and for child protection. Is it just a ploy to gain votes ? It's however scary to see such a breach of privacy, even if on a small scale. IMO, this could grow into things much bigger.
I work with online advertising (read that I have a couple of websites..), and I want to share something with my fellow slashdotters. Many of you must have heard of/seen Google Adsense. Well, MS's response to that, MSN Adcenter launched in Beta a few months ago and I've been working with that. One look inside that interface and it is shocking to see the kind of targetting they're capable of. If they can target so well, they obviously have an ENORMOUS amount of information on folks on the internet. Just an example of their penetration, you can choose to target to "Unmarried Men in the age group of 30-35 in the state of New York with incomes in the rage of $100,000". (We all know what those ads are ;)) I saw this and was like "WHAT ?! How the hell are they supposed to have so much information on a person who's just opened a website to see some stuff.."
Well, my point is that all this information that lies with MSN, Google, etc. CAN be accessed by the government, and as an individual worried about my privacy, this is alarming.
I think it's time we all scroogled. (and no, this is not a promotional post :))
I am all for stamping out child porn, it is sick and damaging. But like many others I do wonder if the action taken here and elsewhere is using this as a pretext for a wider intrusion on people's rights.
Even if the Government does not currently read everyone's mail the fact that ISPs store the email for a long time (forever?) means that eventually once all ISPs comply they will.
So don't send anything that you wouldn't be happy for the Government to read unless you use a web based account from a cybercafe terminal (where you can't be tied to an IP), and wear a disguise so you can't be ID'd from CCTV. Oh the paranoia.
Private information can be subpeonaed. The Internet didn't change that.
Generally the objections to adult materials come from religious groups. So why aren't they funding authoring of good content filters? Tithing adds up to a lot of money. A few million from the Mormons, Catholics, Baptists, Methodists, etc. would be enough to fund a quality programming group, which could then distribute filtering software for free. Add a few folks to monitor domains, and make judgements on the "adultness" of the content (something like an extended version of the TV ratings), and you would have a service lots of parents would love to have, church-going or not.
But perhaps the desire to control others runs too deep.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
Why is the government so concerned about controlling children's access to porn latley? Have the children found a way to extract oil from internet porn?
Does anyone else find that the current trend by the government to collect any and all information they can to be a little spooky, the recent fuss about the NSA phone taps on US citizens sanctioned by the president, all these attempts to get information on peoples internet habits from search engines and ISP's. It is easy to say but think about the children, or think about the terrorists and any other sugar coating they decide to place on it, but the end result is the government is building a very large database of information on US citizens.
Seriously even if this online child protection act fails they still have all the information they are requesting, what is to stop this information being cross indexed with the phone tap information, and credit information and anything else they may be gathering end result a rather worrying profile of a large cross section of the US population.
I am usually not a paranoid person I don't subscribe to most conspiracy theories but this is a rather worrying invasion of personal privacy, at this rate bring in a few psychiatrists to review the files they are building on you and build a profile next thing you know you get a knock on the door from the feds arresting you because your physiological profile indicates a possible threat to the internal security of the US in the future, because of your worrying desire to take a vacation in Eygpt and since Eygpt is a mostly islamic nation you must be a terrorist.
GeekServ Unix Consulting Services (http://www.geekserv.com)
Republicans stand for small, limited, noninvasive government. Personal freedom, corporate independence.
--
make install -not war
The fight for the Internet has just gone global. Looking to help China is great, fabulous, noble and all, but the time to focus on America is now. ISP's are clamoring for tiered networks, the government is looking to legislate censorship (it only starts with protecting the kids, soon it will be to protect EVERYONE,) and the entertainment industry is suing people left and right for sharing, which I'm sure will lead to regulation of P2P traffic.
The question is this, do we continue with this network as it is now, let the man direct the traffic and install his regulations, or do we the geeks of the world build a new Internet in the hopes of even one more day of geekish freedom?
-Buddy of DoQ
You know, I look at that and wonder.. reminds me of MS, they can't solve a problem themselves so beat it out of someone else who might have the solution. Except this is the government, I'm afraid to see how far they'll go to do what they want... I'm not just being paranoid am I?
What they're doing is trying to set up a case to argue that Congress needs to legislate more censorship and regulations to protect Americans from our own freedoms. What they should do is get their goddamn hand out of the pot and let the market decide what it needs. Do people want web filtering to protect their children? Let them pay for filters, or even better, take a hands-on approach with their children online. Either way, this is between consumers and producers. I don't see how the government belongs in this picture.
One of the most irritating things I find about television is the censorship. Even on shows that are above average as far as the brainpower of their target audience (e.g. Mythbusters), I find that I have to listen to goddamn beeps and blips all the time. I say let them swear, and don't censor it. If people don't like it, they won't watch, and will hopefully tell the producers why. Even better, implement some sort of on-demand filtering so my cable box censors it if I choose. Conservative Christian? Turn it on. Everyone else? Turn it off, enjoy the language. The same it true of the Internet. I don't want the FCC or Congress telling me what I can and cannot see or do online. Fuck them and the horse they rode in on. If I choose not to expose myself or my children to certain content, I will either not go to those sites, or I will allow the free market to provide content filtering software to me.
By the way, I don't usually watch much TV. Partly because of the mind-numbing dullness and idiocy, partly because I cannot stand censorship. I want my swear words!
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
I'm not just being paranoid am I?
No, you're not, especially with a DoJ run by someone who has openly endorsed torture (in terrorism cases, not obscenity, granted -- but just wait to see how long it is before we start hearing "Al-Qaeda is funded by porn sites!") Microsoft is big and bad and scary, but the government is a great deal scarier.
Think selective enforcement. Realistically, everyone knows they're never going to get rid of internet porn, and they're never going to keep kids from seeing the stuff. That's not really the point. What is the point is that this law, if upheld, will give them a club to hold over the head of every single person in the US who posts anything on the web, ever, as well as the service providers which provide the hosting space, if even one of those postings contains a dirty word or risque picture. It doesn't mean they'll break down your door in the middle of the night -- but it means they can, if you piss them off enough. And you'll never know what constitutes "enough" until you're in handcuffs.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
So now "not helping the government" is a crime in and of itself?
Easy, "if you're not for us, you're against us"
This just in: Having solved all other problems, the US gov't has decided to waste our tax money and invade our privacy because apparently parents don't know how to be parents. Porn is out there. Parents must realize this and if they feel their children shouldn't see it, then don't let them! Put the PC in the living room or some other common area. Install a filter. I've never used one, but I'm sure they're not all bad. Why does the government have to get involved?
nothing
FTFA:
"The subpoenas are part of the government's defense of the 1998 Child Online Protection Act. The law makes it illegal to provide children with online content deemed harmful to them."
As easy as it is to change some words in the article, you should also be able to change the filter. Let's try it:
"The subpoenas are part of the government's defense of the 1998 Child Online Protection Act. The law makes it illegal to provide people with online content deemed harmful to the government."
Mod me a troll if you want, but I still think this issue is scary. I am all for protecting children, but not at the cost of my own freedom to access all the (legal) information I want to.
Oh modern American parents are so busy that they cannot keep track of little johnny or susie. They can't watch the media they buy, they can't notice needle tracks, slutty/pimp cloths, etc. But wait, others claim that they can't regulate what their kids do and see when they go outside. Huh? When has that ever been the case? Heroin used to be sold at general stores alongside whiskey and military-grade firearms. Softcore porn has been around in America in small, but noticable numbers for over a hundred years. It's always been there, and then some, but never before have parents had so many self-enforcing controls like content filtering, V-Chips, etc.
Parents have **never** had control of what their kids are exposed to when they go to a neighbor's house. It's a basic fact of life. If parents did their jobs, instead of pursuing wealth for its own sake, their kids would have a very hard time getting porn. But how are they going to do that when both parents work because neither of them wants to give up their job for selfish reasons like self-fullfillment. Can't give up your uber-fullfilling job? Don't have kids. You can't "have it all," despite what the fucktard feminists and their male counterparts have claimed for decades. Being a parent is a fulltime job, not a babysitting job.
We don't need this damn law because kids only get access to porn when parents refuse to be parents. I can perfectly well understand a woman not giving up a job as an artist or scientist, but most of the girls I saw at college were headed for jobs like human resources. Anyone, regardless of gender, who won't give up a shitty ass job like that for their kids to keep them raised right is a selfish bastard who deserves to be sterilized.
My girlfriend's mom gave up a job as a realtime assembly and Ada programmer to homeschool her. My mom gave up her job as a GSA IG agent in the early 80s to be a stay at home mom, despite the fact that she'd be probably a GS14 or GS15 today knowing how good she was at her job. What's every other "fullfilled" office monkey's excuse for valuing their job more than their kids' mental, physical and spiritual health? I don't care how you have to do it, but the person who makes less and has less prospects for making money should give up their job and be a full time, stay at home parent. Either that or those who refuse to do it should just hand their kids over to the government to raise fulltime instead of the part time parenting known as public schooling.
First, this proves that the government's infamous "Carnivore" either does not exist or does not work. Which is nice.
Second, this proves that something is wrong with the government.
Porn is legal and good. The quality and quantity that you can get now is astounding, and most of it is served straight from the US in very high speed, and the companies comply with all laws, or at least as many if not more than other companies.
Porn is legal. Subpoenaing ISPs and snooping into our business is not legal.
I'm guessing that this is yet another attempt by the feds to get more control of its people they work for, and they are just disguising it as one of those "think of the children" things so that women and the like will say, "Well its for the greater good, right?"
If they really wanted to look for porn, subpoena CCBill, subpoena a porn website, subpoena credit card companies, or bank records. Oh, that might not slip under the "save the children radar" of the courts and the people. So, lets just look at ISP records for now, later....
This is where we are headed.
Once this point is reached, does that mean all content providers lose their 'common carrier' status and are now liable?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Why on Earth is a humble ISP supposed to provide the DOJ with this information, and how are they supposed to do it? And why doesn't the DOJ just research this themselves if this is such a big deal for them?
I hear there's rumors on the Slashdots
Sirs:
Due to the complex nature of the requested data and the security requried to gaurd such data, we must clear this information throught the board of directors and shareholders of this company. Also, due to the volume of data, we will take at least three years to collect such information. Please be advised that we intend to comply with the subpeona but your data will not be available until March 6, 2010.
We will keep you informed of the progress.
Sincerly,
Corpoerate Red Tape Caused By Government Beauracracy
Athiesm is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
To stop this from happening, you have to lock the records up. Having this data open to the public, allowing scrutiny is important. As an example, look at the massive debates after the last census between the Dems and Repubs. The risk of an open records is that someone will use the data in a way you don't like.
What they should do is get their goddamn hand out of the pot and let the market decide what it needs. Do people want web filtering to protect their children? Let them pay for filters, or even better, take a hands-on approach with their children online. Either way, this is between consumers and producers. I don't see how the government belongs in this picture.
I of course agree, but this is NOT about "the children".
Its disguised that way, its completely, as well put by the parent to:
to set up a case to argue that Congress needs to legislate more censorship and regulations to protect Americans from our own freedoms.
and I'll expand, by adding to limit our freedoms.
In talking with a friend last night, he believes that we are heading towards being a 3rd world country. And this guy is juiced into the government, bigtime. Former DOE and NSF guy, and still sucks grant money all the time. He said that the discrepancy between the "haves" and the "have nots" is going to keep expanding. Housing prices are through the roof. The banking, oil, and insurance companies pretty much rule this country, etc.
It won't affect me in my lifetime, nor probably my children, but after that, I have no predictions that are positive with the direction things are going.
I'm a parent of a 6-year old girl. She's been using the Web since she was old enough to use a computer (3 years old? perhaps, 2+). Her mom has often asked me to install a content filter.
I have long since learned that to come up with a solution, you have to understand the problem first. So, I just watched my kid's online behavior trying to see what she can get to that I don't want her to see. The result? I still don't have any content filters installed to this day. Why? Porn is of no interest to her whatsoever. She goes to various kids' sites. If she wants to search for something, I taught her to use google instead of typing random words into the URL bar. As a result, it is very rarely (as in, once a year) that she gets to see an image of a nude person on the Web. Her reaction so far was to navigate away from such a web site. And if she shows any interest, I feel I would be able to explain to her what was going on. I mean, she doesn't believe in tooth fairies, and she figured that Mickey Mouse was a costume when she was 3, so why wouldn't she be able to figure out the rest of the real world?
Of course, I might be missing something, but then I'm wondering what that is?
My only problem with Microsoft is the severity of bugs in their software.
Even better, implement some sort of on-demand filtering so my cable box censors it if I choose.
The ClearPlay DVD player will take a file from ClearPlay to use to skip objectionable portions. Both the MPAA and the Directors Guild of America sued ClearPlay. The MPAA claimed it created a derivative work, the DGA claimed it harmed the brand name of its member directors.
The truth about Scientology, Xenu, and you: Operation Clambake
In an effort to reduce children's exposure to pornography, the U.S. Government today subpeonaed all existing forests and wooded areas. "It's commonly known that the second greatest, and before the internet the greatest risk for children's exposure to obscene materials stems from finding porn in the woods," said State Department representative Ms. Fascista McRedstate. "The fight against standing timber is the fight to save our children."
This space available.
" "And" and "or" shall be construed either disjunctively or conjunctively as necessary to bring within the scope of the request all responses that might otherwise be construed to be outside of its scope. "
So and can mean and or or, and or can mean or or and? (Or possibly and can mean and and or... no, let's not get crazy.)
Talk about a broad subpoena. If I were Comcast, my response would be, "It depends what your definition of is is, jerk. You owe me two hundred thousand dollars."
Ideology: A tool used primarily to avoid the bother of thinking.
I'd suggest that it's safest for him if he move out of the country, but, realistically, the Freemasons are scattered throughout the world, and they are likely to catch him wherever he goes. Their tie to the Illuminati is obvious, and it is also obvious that the Illuminati is behind all of this.
I think that he needs to run to the mountains of Montana, move into a cave, and then build a faraday cage IN that cave to block the signals from the RFID chip implanted in his brain. Just to be safe, he should wear a tinfoil hat on the drive.
If he chooses to go through Canada, instead of into Montana (better Maple syrup, honestly), then he should refuse to remove the hat at the border, and scream "They're going to get me! Save me! They've caught up with me!!"
The way I see it there are a few possible outcomes to this. The government is trying to prove that there isn't sufficient software capable of helping parents keep their children away from porn. That is what they're looking for information to prove/disprove.
Beyond the repercussions of them wanting information from ISP's there is a greater question here and that is what will be the outcome? I work in the security and content control industry. I know what's out there, and I have seen how much a parent can lock down a PC , I have helped my friends do it so that they wouldn't have to worry as much about their 5 year old surfing. There are great tools, but it's like direct TV with an almost infinite number of channels, you can only control what you know to look out for.
Let's just say that they do find that there isn't good enough software out there and they decide to legislate the problem. I think this would be a bad idea, but what are they going to do?
a) Implement a national firewall/control system? As much of the traffic comes from inside the nation this would be virtually impossible to put into place.
b) Outlaw pornography on the internet? Hold on while I say HA! Watch how fast some less then identifiable lobbying groups representing certain multi BILLION dollar industries make sure that doesn't happen. Not to mention it would only be able to apply to US companies meaning just like many gambling sites they would move to overseas servers.
c) Some kind of government subsidy to software manufacturers to come up with a technology that can really work. Such as a free content filtering software with a government funded list of porn sites that it would block. (Imagine the job of being paid by the government to FIND PORN so that you could list it.. the mind boggles, but I bet it would pay well)
d) Pass some big wordy and much touted law which would say , much as many laws already do, that distributing porn to a minor is illegal and if we can prove you're doing it.. you're in BIG trouble mister!
I think D is the most likely outcome and what we have here are bureaucrats posturing on the need to look moral in order to win over soccer moms.
I'm a fiscal conservative, it's a pity we don't have a political party anymore
The Justice Department doesn't seem to have anything to do. All the real crime in the U.S. has been eliminated, so they're moving on to thought crimes. God knows what teenagers would do if they found out sex existed.
I, for one, welcome our aimless overlords.
While I don't wholly disagree with your opinion, do you think your mother, who gave up her career for you, would be proud to hear you throwing vulgar stereotyping names towards vague groupings of people in an internet rant?
"fucktard feminists"?
You've either lived a very sheltered life, are very closed minded, or both. In upper-middle-class suburbia, I wholeheartedly agree with you. The kids are going to have shoes on their feet, food in their belly, and they'll get to college no matter what.
In lower income areas, however, many parents do give up their lives for their children, just not in the way you're looking for. Imagine: Both you and your spouse both work two "shitty ass jobs" and get 4 hours of sleep each night, and still get their kid to daycare, school, the doctor, etc. Many parents give up everything in an attempt to get their kids into college, and a good chance at a better life than they had. Isn't that the goal of all parents? Some don't start out with the financial stability that you enjoyed.
Calling for the sterilization of these people? Adolf, is that you?
Open your mind a little.
I'm an admin at an ISP... who's newsgroup servers were confiscated in 1998 (before I worked here) by a certain Attorney General, and set sort of a legal precident for ISPs. (The guy did it as a PR stunt, he was up for re-election. If you search google, you can find the story).
... ready, something conservative types should know about: BEING A PARENT. Wow, we *don't* need filters, and magic subpeonas and laws.
I've never understood the need for filters. Sure, there's "bad stuff" out there on the internet. And I have a teenager in the house. I *know* he goes to porn sites, and I don't care. I care when he gets viruses on his machine from those sites, that's about it. (Of course, he is a bit older).
Parents (and political types), here's the formula. Send your kid's machines' through a proxy. You can control where they go from there. You can see whatever site they go to, etc. Don't want them online when you're not around? Setup special policies. (Aka, on a router). Internet time is 6-10pm, etc. You can enforce this in the router. I'm not saying every parent has to be an admin, but I am saying every parent should know more about the Internet than their kids. Don't allow the federal government to enable you to be lazy.
This works! It works wonders! It's called
Why are we wasting our time finding difficult solutions to easy problems? Is our government really that dumb, beuracratic and full of red tape? Since when did the government become the parents of every kid in America? Is that what you're trying to accomplish here?
FLR
Here we go again. Wasn't it posted here in the last few days about the .XXX bieng shot down again?
.XXX and all porn related material had to be there, then you would not need consumers using products or apps to block this stuff.
Seems to me this is a redherring, if there were a
But let's let the government waste money and time to get whatever information they are seeking under the guise of "it's for the children".
I'm a parent myself, I have an 8 year old. My child has their own computer in their room, and it has net access. I also have a proxy server which limits the places that pc can do on the net and where it can go. It is currently setup to goto child related websites that I have browsed myself and verified the content. Why did I do this?
Because it is [b]MY[/b] responsability to raise my child and know what content they are seeing.
Big brother will be moving in soon enough, I want him to enjoy some sense of personal freedom before they are all stripped away.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
I don't want the FCC or Congress telling me what I can and cannot see or do online.
you mention this and it got me thinking, Isn't China doing this EXACT same thing? they are telling their people what they can see and what they can do online...Didn't the government wag it's finger at Google, Yahoo & MSN for giving into China's demands for censorship?
Did the US government suddenly have a change of heart and decided that censorship is the way to go? That they to should get in on some of that action all in the name of "protecting the children"?
how long before they take care of that pesky first amendment bullshit law the forefathers put in (they didn't know what they were thinking when they wrote that), leave us with the right to bare arms so we can continue to protect ourselves from the threat of british invasion (It's coming, their poised to strike!) and to hunt for our own food (those supermarket things are on their way out you know) it just sucks this administration can't run again, if they just had one or two more chances they could take away so many more freedoms from us, To bad they haven't slipped an amendment under the radar to let them stay in power for a few more years.
The FTC is going to be in a world of hurt if they manage to pass any form of censorship law on the internet in the US, they can say "it's all in the name of children" all they want but when you piss off that many people from looking up anything they want (you'd be suprised how many people would snap if they couldn't get to their porn, not to mention how many "Amature" porn stars would suddenly have to get REAL JOBS!).
in the motives for this; but simply, this is a major step the government is taking to control the internet; what you see, what you hear, what you think, it's all about who controls the information (Marty!) ;)
To clarify the confusion; this step is being pushed through to give the government key information that will help them undertand the psychology of the average internet user in effort to make moves towards influencing & controlling the information (like is done in every other popular media form). Unfortuantely, Google alone cannot stop this.
Where we fail is that we think it will be obvious like:
Gov. body: "American people, can we take control of the internet to further our own greed?"
Of course the American people would reply:
American people: "Hell no!"
But don't think for a minute, for a nano-second, that these manuevers will be overtly public & obvious and without spin. No, it will likely take the standard "scare you with something to fear, then offer a vague solution that favors Gov." form that we fall for again and again.
What makes me say this? How do i know?
Because it works and is exactly what i (and any clear thinking person) would do if they had such desire and the resources (our tax dollars at work); which i don't in either case... i tend to more lean towards those crazy "sharing is better than hoarding" & "truth reigns supreme" ideas... But we all know what bullshit those ideas are, right? right?
Ha! You fell into their foul trap! Don't you know that Canadian maple syrup has a biogenic compound that causes a person wearing a tin-foil deflector beanie to start bleeding EM radiation out their pores. This is especially insidious since, during the type of self-manipulation that people often participate in during on-line perusals of mature content, a huge burst of EM radiation will occur along with usual burst that is the natural end result of such self-manipulation.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
The government has just cause to investigate what people consider harmful.
NO. the government has just cause to investigate a crime. Do you think its harmful to not wash your hands after you take a crap? Better get the government on that. We better legislate that.
In this case, the government is attempting to get broad sweeping, but detailed information about what EVERYONE is doing on the internet in an attempt to uphold its own unconstitutional law. What will they do with this information? throw it away when they're done with it? nope.
Would you want them to pass legislation without investigating the issue?
But that's exactly what they did! They passed legislation and then waited for the courts to settle it out. So now they're trying to cover their asses by getting as much info as possible in hopes of finding something to support their actions. its all rubbish. they're reaching and YOU will pay for it one day when they come arrest you because you accidently surfed to a porn site. or worse, you didn't delete your spam and they found porn sites advertised in it. Or how about when they click track everything you do and they discover that you clicked on one of those pron-emails and went to the site cause you weren't thinking? Gee too bad. go to jail. [/rant]
man, I feel like mold.
Speak all you want. But when I ask you to shut up and stop bothering me, because I do not share your sense of what is sin and what isn't, have the decency to shut up. In the US, I used to think that the 1st Amendment to the Constitution gave me the right to not believe I had an everlasting soul I was endangering by looking at pictures of naked women.
It really doesn't. This is all about the november 2006 elections. (you did hear about them, right?)
Look at Bush's approval rating. What if the voters decide to take it out on congress? Leave the president stranded in Iraq?? We haven't even invaded Iran yet for fucks sake!
So all of a sudden our precious innocent children are ingesting copious amounts of that terrible porn. And who better than Washington to take care of that problem for us? It's really a pity they have to trample over privacy to do it, but in a post 9-11 world, you just have to make some sacrifices.
Expect to hear more about this in the months to come.
poor thing - $1200 for a 1 bedroom appt. look into manhattan, brooklyn, queens. parking costs $1200 per month.
... need i continue? in addition, i find your remark extremely sexist. blame it on the women. after all, they're supposed to be b&p. asshole.
1) i agree: fewer workers = more demand for labor. it also means a smaller workforce, which leads to lower production. lower production means higher costs. you make more, but pay more (inflation anyone?). that, of course, leads to higher interest rates. which leads to
2) problem: americans have high credit card debt. solution: lower their income so that one spouse can stay at home watching tv all day. please explain?
3) nice point. you should continue to pay property tax for your local public schools, but should educate the kids yourself. teachers have a higher degree in teaching. you? are you qualified to teach? what would you teach? are you going to teach your b&p beliefs as 'social studies'? hey, if you feel you're qualified to teach and that you can do it better than licensed teachers, perhaps you should approach your local school board and give them a few pointers. good luck with that.
4) uh-oh. i guess you aren't qualified to teach. you can't even read! where did i mention single-parent situations? perhaps it was this one: "do you have a suggestion as to how one parent can stay-at-home when 2 full-time incomes are needed..."? 1 stay at home + 1 working = 2. had i said "do you have a suggestion as to how an only parent can stay-at-home when 2 full-time incomes are needed", then your point would be valid.
Wave upon wave of demented avengers March cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream
And this is why all personal hosting should be on your own personal machine. Your email, your website, etc. Sure, hire someone else to maintain it for you if you want, but you need to own the hardware, the software, and the data. Which brings me to an interesting thought. Who owns email on someone else's server? Can the government subpoena my email from someone else or do they need to subpoena it from me?
Regardless, I host my own email, webpages, etc. I control my personal data. No-one else.
I do security
So, we are "free-ing" a couple OTHER countries from their dictatorships but heading ourselves down the path to dictatorship... NICE!
At least there is "balance" in the world.
Wow. Um.
You certainly are holier-than-thou and more than a little uptight. I think you are making a fairly gross assumption - that it is better for kids (how, exactly?) to have one parent at home than two parents working. I'm not sure I buy that. I'm sure we can throw togeter all kinds of anecdotal evidence about bad things that have happened in working-parent households, but I'm sure I can come up with an equal number of anecdotes about how two parents working meant better schools, affording college, better food,...
So, put up or shut up. You cast dispersions on families where both parents work. Why is it better for one parent to be at home? Seriously. Concrete reasons. Then back it up with some science, not some Focus on the Family pap.
Personally, I think that circumstances vary widely. I know, for example, that my kid can't handle some things that other kids his age can, but in other things he is light years ahead. I tailor my parenting to my child, because I know him best, and what he can handle. I would never presume to tell someone else that they are parenting poorly, because I *don't* know their kids, and what they can handle. I believe that the vast majority of parents love their children, and try to do what is best for them. Therefore, I have to trust that they know what they are doing, and give them the benefit of the doubt. This is because I realize that there are more special situations out there than stars in the sky, and if I try to paint everyone with the same brush, I end up looking like - well, a fucktard.
Your misogynistic tendencies aside, I believe that you are speaking from the heart, and you are concerned about other people's kids. You just don't have any problem marginalizing anyone who disagrees with you. This is really the heart of the difference between liberal and conservative - conservatives are always right, and liberals believe there is more than one way to look at it.
My only consolation is that in the end, conservatives always lose. If they didn't, we'd still be living in caves.
Back in 1997/98 I wrote dozens of letters to the government and to the controlling entities of the TLDs... .XXX or .SEX TLD.
My idea was to create a TLD called ".XXX" or ".SEX".
At the time I worked at Microsoft, testing the Operating Systems. One of my tasks was to verify the IE Filtering worked. It was one of the only times a person could surf porn at work, and not get fired.
In my testing, I found that the filtering worked less than 10% of the time. So my reasoning in writing the letters was that these TLDs would allow porn manufacturers and distributors to freely "do their thing", while allowing simple filtering programs to block any
Now, my idea is stuck. The keep brining it up for consideration, and they keep smacking it down.
I think I know what is happening...our Government is so HOT to have an enemy that they will do anything to find one. Not terrorists, not Iraqis, not even Big Business can provide as many enemies as the American People.
This is why they keep casting their nets...they want to find email, web sites, search results, anything to have an enemy to go after.
This "problem" could have been resolved 10 years ago, yet it is still "stuck" in debate. It isn't about solving the problem, it is about fighting an enemy.
--E--
I cant wipe my ass with it, it already has shit all over it.
:) I look at it that way now.
The country is failing. The ride is over. All great nations fall, and when they do, they fall fast, and hard.
Its over.
Our people do not think like the Americans of old. There is no tolerance or American idealism. It's now about control and the people are too complacent and out matched.
They've been brainwashed by corperate media for the past 10 years. Conservative radio has bread intolerance and arrogance in the name of "good" But had nothing to do with "American ideals"
People have gotten so twisted, that the American idealology of old, is lost. We're widdling away at our country because we can. Our people like to tinker and blaim, so they keep chopping away at the country, for it is to blaim for all our problems.
Freedom is our problem. We can not handle it. We are not tolerant of it anymore. We want it our way, or no way at all.
You're christian or you are not. You're straight, or you are going to hell. You're on Rush Limbaughs side or you're the enemy. The republicans are always right, truth be damned. We're going to go down with the ship because despite the obvious sinking motion of the boat, we're told that its all ok because its someone else's fault.
Its over.
We're at a real turning point in our existance.
We actually LIKE slave labor now. We actually want to legalize slave labor. We have no problem with exploiting illegal aliens as long as they clean up our shit. We'll pay them less, we dont even give a shit if they're American citizens... Just as long as they show up and weed wack our lawns.
This is not America. This is our country as it is now. We welcomed immigrants, and wanted them to be apart of our country... but now we dont care if they're legal, or if we know who they even are... because WE LOVE SLAVE LABOR.
We are in a decline. We no longer beleive that people are equal, or working men and women deserve a quality life experience.
We beleive in the ultra rich, and we say the economy is doing great... while the country is in decline. The numbers say everything is great! But the truth is... the rich are simply making more money because they're not employing people. They're spreading around the world, thats why their value goes up, thats why our country looks to be economically fine... But corperations are not beholden to any country anymore. Our country is not doing fine, the corperations are.
Our people are consistantly getting the short end of the stick in our booming economy.
The law is out of countrol. Our president is a criminal. Our entire government is currupt. They spend more time fund raising than setting foot in a commitee hearing. They get handed a peice of paper on how to vote by think tanks and outside people who are not elected officials.
Policy is created by companies, buisness interests. The same people bribing our government elected officials. The same people they're getting funds from when they go and fund raise, when they should instead be representing the people in the house/senate.
The party holds the line... BOTH OF THEM.
It's over. They have this thing wrapped up in a nice little messy game of "gotcha"
And it wont end. Think about it. If you're lucky, you will be alive for 100 years at most. You only have hopefully 100 years on the planet. Truthfully, probably 65 years...
Do you think the rich power hungry people give a shit about what happens after they're dead?
Do you think senators and congressmen do? They raise funds to stay in office, so they can be elected and raise more funds to stay in office... It keeps them living a nice life, and then they die. Their children are set for life.
Do you really care about your neighbor? Do you value your family more than other people?
I'm betting on "yes". So why in the hell would you think the government gives a dam about you?
They're taking care of themselves, and th
Get your facts straight. This is not a "case" in front of a "court". This is a fishing expedition whose data will be spun six ways from Sunday in some study to "prove" that a new law to "protect the children" is in fact needed.
In Google's case, they want to prove that an innocuous search can pull up a significant percentage of links to porn sites which, if accidentally clicked on, will suddenly and irreversably warp the precious child's mind forever.
In actuallity, their agenda is in fact to eliminate all porn and, failing that, to prevent any adult from having any access whatsoever, all under the guise of "saving the children".
After all, "Father" knows what's best for the poor citizens of our country, who're obviously unable to choose such a wise course of action for themselves.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.