Slashdot Mirror
Siemens, Nokia Helped Provide Iran's Censoring Tech
An anonymous reader writes "The Wall Street Journal has an article about Nokia and Siemens selling the censoring technology to Iran's government. Do you believe that the public relations damage to these companies can persuade them from selling this kind of technology to other dictatorial regimes?" I don't believe there will *be* any PR Damage, and that makes me a little sad.
I'm sure first and second world dictatorships all over the world will be looking at buying that technology.
"If you want to know what happens to you when you die, go look at some dead stuff."
There won't be any PR damage, unless people make a huge stink out of it.
It's not like the world will wake up and think of them as "evil" unless they're told to think of them that way.
This is a good time for another couple companies to step in and blast away.
I'm sure that here in the UK the government is already enquiring on how they can do the same.
These are capitalist corporations. Their goal is to make money. People are willing to buy censorship technology (just look at any government office). Why do you act shocked that this is happening?
... Cisco... ... after finding out they collude with the Chinese government for censorship and spying.
Look how much that's slowing them down!
Needless to say, Motorola manufactured chips used in land mines. IBM manufactured some nasty stuff for WWII. There will be no PR fallout from this. Nobody wants to know.
People, in general, don't know or care enough about the situation in Iran to warrant any kind of significant response to this.
"It couldn't be determined whether the equipment from Nokia Siemens Networks is used specifically for deep packet inspection."
So in other words a European venture sold a bunch of equipment to Iran for network usage and (also FTFA)
If you sell networks, you also, intrinsically, sell the capability to intercept any communication that runs over them."
It sounds like a beat up to me. What would the story be if a US company had sold the equipment to Iran? (yeah I know .. trade embargo etc) This story smells of sour grapes.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
first we should stop selling them weapons.
I hate signatures
All they're doing is selling the Iranian government some mobile telecommunications infrastructure. What the government decide to do with said infrastructure is entirely their responsibility.
Sophistry, I hear you say? Only about to the same degree as that moron who was arguing with me here, that the author of the World of Warcraft Glider bot should not be sued by Blizzard; because he wasn't doing anything against the rules himself. All he was doing was creating a macro generation program; what other people did with it was entirely their own responsibility.
Not for long.
Sadly, we've come to accept most modern corporations as pretty much ammoral when it comes to stuff like this, and they're rarely ever held accountable in any meaningful way. The bulk of the population will no more hold this against Nokia/Seimens than they will hold Volkswagon responsible for its early Nazi roots (does it invoke Godwin's Law to mention that?), Yahoo/Google responsible for selling out dissidents in China, etc., etc.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Anyone who professes to that an imaginary being is responsible for everything is insane and doesn't deserve any benefit of science. Jonas Salk, Louis Pasteur, Thomas Edison, Galileo Galilei, and the other great minds have saved more souls and advanced humanity further than any Mullah, Pastor, or Priest of any faith. The Mad Mullahs of Iran don't deserve cell phones or any other bit of technology.
Yeah, it's a rant, but I'm just tired of religious nut jobs of any type forcing their superstitions on anyone else.
It just occured to me that I Godwin'd this story already, but this is just like when IBM sold adding machines to the Nazis to help them tabulate Holocaust victims.
Way I see it, who cares? The corner store selling smokes isn't to blame for the lung cancer - ultimately the smoker is. Except it's even more generic than that.
- Siemens sold network technology to Iran - the same you'd use for all sorts of network admin - and they used it to censor. That's Iran's bad.
- IBM sold adding machines - they'll count anything - and the Nazis used them to count Jews (and others). That's the Nazi's bad.
In short, don't blame the maker for the use of the tool.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
I'm willing to bet if you poll the Iranian population, you will find that the majority of them would support censorship. The same thing would happen in China. Censorship has been with us for as long as there as been communications. I'm not saying it's alright or that censorship is a good thing. Freedom of speech is actually a pretty radical ideal and one that isn't universal outside of the western societies. Even in the US that right is constantly under threat from different sources. At the end of the day it is our believe in the value of freedom of speech that keeps it alive. Look at how often this issue comes up on Slashdot and how people are all up in arms about it. The EFF is constantly busy fighting for it. Didn't some very wise man once said, "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance."? If Iran or China is to have freedom of speech, their people must be convinced of its value and necessity. Until that happens, denying them the technology would lead to them either developing their own or just not connecting to the Internet. I am not sure the latter is actually better.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
free will my ass
Why single out Iran? Are you saying Nokia shouldn't operate in Iran; they should break the law there; what?
I'm guessing a lot of people reading this have the former in mind: information technology companies in the industrialized world shouldn't operate in countries that place restrictions on political speech to the extent seen in the countries on which the United States already has sanctions. In the 1980s, near the end of South Africa's counterpart to the U.S. "Jim Crow" era, there was an effort to boycott companies that did business in South Africa: disinvestment was a result.
I'm sure they sell the same technology to all the governments in the world so it's just question of time when German, US, Chinese, Iran
will enable filters for democracy, sex, scandals, personal freedom and security....... of course for our own good.
I'm getting a little fatigued of calling these companies out because their products are used for censorship purposes. Where do you draw the line between when it is acceptable to sell to them and when it isn't? Canada engages in certain levels of Internet censorship (child pornography and so forth), should Siemens stop selling to the Canadian government? And more importantly, who decides where to draw that line? The corporations themselves? No thank you, sir.
Dislike the Electoral College? Lobby your state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
"...so, what do you do?"
"I sell net censoring software."
"Really? Who buys that stuff?"
"Oh, lots of people. We have ISP customers from around the world."
"What do they use it for?"
"You know, censoring kiddie porn sites, blocking mail spammers, and so on." ...
I think that's a pretty good description of what this is about. People are selling tools. The problem is how those tools are used. There are evil shit-heads all over the world. That does not mean the tools themselves are evil.
Nearly fifty percent of all graduates come from the bottom half of the class!
Of course democracies, like the U.S., would never consider buying deep packet inspection to spy on their own citizens.
The question has to be asked: why does this matter? Iran would still do its own thing.
In this case, they had the product, so why not buy it? That's not such a hard thing to understand. This is like saying "omg Raytheon makes missiles!" which is no surprise to anyone. What about their clients? What about their unofficial clients? Even those aren't a surprise.
Sure, we may not agree with Iran's internet policy, and yes, the vendor may take a portion of the blame in an incident, but I hardly see Iran's isolationism as the fault of any one company.
Seeing as how most of the footage we get out of Iran is from mobile phones and such, is it any surprise that they'd ask a mobile phone maker for help? Business is business, and in this case, it's easy to pin the responsibility on the buying party.
There are no perfect answers, only the right questions. More questions at http://foresightandhindsight.blogspot.com/
Why is this modded "Funny" rather than "Insightful"?
When is Ayatollah Ali Khamenei up for reelection? Who ran against him in the last election?
There is nothing special about what they did... It was a class of service change for non government services, pure and simple... any PBX and a good administrator can block, downgrade or restrict outgoing calls per user or by class of service (you know, the restriction class for In-house, local and long distance service...) They just restricted everyone to local calls...
In this economic environment and with my student loans, I'd being do that. I wouldn't be turning away business!
This isn't death camps or anything like this. This is just censoring and eventually it'll just worsen the Iranian Government even more.
Yeah, yeah, yeah! When you make my student loan payments, mortgage, and other bills, THEN you can judge me!
what is bad about allowing a government to hide the killing of it's own citizens; isn't that what we all want as a civilized society, the ability for the government to hide the atrocities it's doing on it's own citizens without the rest of the world looking on and judging.
the blocking and inspection list is not to be viewed by public nor by the courts!
1984 = 2000 - 16
maybe Eric Arthur Blair ( not Tony ) meant 2000 + 16 ?
Eric Arthur Blair a.k.a. George Orwell
because it assumes that the UK government does not have the technology already, and as such it is both funny and naive :)
-- All this knowledge is giving me a raging brainer.
Do you believe that the public relation damage to these companies can persuade them from selling this kind of technology to other dictatorial regimes?
Of course not.
And once again it is time for people to make up their minds - isn't it a basic tenet of Capitalism that the only thing that should concern the employees of a company is to maximize profit? That, in a word, if selling drugs to teenagers, weapons to mercenaries or technology to dictators gives the best profit, then it is your moral duty to do so?
Ok, ok, so maybe I exaggerate a bit, but I do get tired of hearing these so called "freedom advocates" on one hand tell us how they hate government, any and all government, while on the other hand they feel compelled to tell others off for not being "moral".
Don't be so surprised! IBM was able to sell their number crunching machines to the Germans during the Holocaust period. Read the book ...
IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance Between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation
by Edwin Black
Certainly not. Why would they buy it when they can just pass laws forcing ISPs to do it for them?
I see a parallel here between the supply of Hollerith card machines (punch card sorters, etc) to Nazi Germany by IBM, and the supply of 'great firewalls' to Iran. In neither case was it critical to the country in question to source their IT equipment from a particular supplier - they just wanted something that worked. The refusal to sell to the government in question wouldn't have materially affected the outcome in that nation. So what's the big deal anyway, since their refusal to sell wouldn't have mattered a bit in the real world?
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Or, did you stop refueling your car?
If they did, they would have to look elsewhere than Nokia/Siemens:
They dumped that division before the shitstorm got started, no doubt hoping to sidestep it in the process.
It's not as if they probably only got the contract because American companies such as Cisco are forbidden from selling such equipment to Iran.
My point is that I do not believe there is a company in the world that would pass up this kind of contract. Do I disagree with it's use? Of course I do.
But I fail to see why Nokia and Siemens should be demonised anymore than any other company in the world - at the end of the day the only difference here between Nokia/Siemens and any other networking company is that those guys got the contract - it didn't mean others didn't bid and it doesn't mean others like Cisco wouldn't also bid if they had the opportunity to.
Rather than focus on chastising company x for the fact company x sold something to country y which was used in a bad way we should be chastising big corporations in general for this sort of behaviour. It's a problem that extends far far beyond just Nokia and Siemens and we can't expect Nokia and Siemens to change their ways if no one else will else it puts them at a major disadvantage and is like committing corporate suicide.
oh yeah, you can't chant "death to america" for 30 years and do business with american companies ;-P
siemens is german, nokia is finnish
so dear germans and finns, and euros in general: pillory those fucking companies, in the name of your affinity and fraternity with those simply fighting for their rights in the streets of tehran
perhaps siemens.com and nokia.com deserve some DDOSing, get their stock to fall with some false rumors, some googlebombing about the truth of their involvement with iranian the regime, some facebook groups called "siemensandnokiasupportthebasij", some wikipedia edits... anything to punish the suits in the glass towers who are otherwise disconnected from what their technology is being used to do
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
well technically Iran is a democracy
with democratic elections
and president elected by people.
obviously there are problems
and problems with ballot counting,
however Florida also had ballots accounting problem...
I do not say Iran is a happy place to live
but it is more open than many think.
do you think manifestations would happen in North Corea ?
do you think people would be able to play WoW or use Twitter in many Burma ?
The world belongs to those who get up early. - I'm far from being the king of Earth then
The trend here seems to be that Nokia and Cisco are the ones to blame. If you ask me this sounds like more bad news from a dying news source trying to get one last whiff of the limelight. They are all scared of social networking sites because they have millions of eyes and ears... most of which are not tethered to some political agenda.
...or is this just the media cynically cheering-on a 'peoples revolution' so that they can fill out their news cycles. So far I haven't heard of any widespread election tamporing, some anecdotal stories, unlike in some other elections. I could have missed it though.
Honestly so far I just see this as a knee-jerk reaction in the west sympathising with the disgruntled minority voters because clearly 'Iranians would never vote for that evil, west-hating dictator, so it must have been rigged'.
One thing I DID hear through some media analyses is that up until a few months ago, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the favourite to get elected, then he made some fumbles, made some comments, and his standing in THE ELECTION POLLS significantly reduced, and the opposition got giddy. Well that can either be a realistic reflection of the voters intentions, or it could just be a backlash that gets put to the side when it comes to making the final and long-term decision in the voting box.
So, is there any evidence of election rigging yet?
PS, I'm not apologising for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, just that suggesting that, maybe, he is popularly supported. I know that when I watched a recent doco about Iran I was surprised that their society was much more modern and free than I felt that I had been led to believe.
PPS I'm not saying it wasn't rigged either, just that in the large amount of media I have seen on it, it is all about rallys and protest, not of massive vote rigging, feel free to point out something concrete on the contrary.
Did the US government ever loose any sleep over training/arming/supporting the very same Taliban they are fighting now? Well, there's your answer. The world changes rapidly and as a result of that, nobody cares anymore for anything else than making more money whatever way they can. Also, where (big) money or (big) politics is involved, such things as "freedom", "free speech" and "justice" are just third class issues.
Not after seeing what a piss poor job it did at actually preventing information leakage.
The reason we have this tech is that the same stuff is sold in Europe and the US amongst others. Most of Europe is right now implementing deep packet inspection and are about to become just like Iran. If the west starts complaining about it not only does it look bad but first of all it draws attention to widespread surveillance. I do not expect much complaints about Irans KGB/Stasi methods from the EU or the US.
HTTP/1.1 400
Of course the US is planning for deep packet inspection.
"Free Market, YAY!!!"
If one of you "free market" ideologues can explain to me what market force would possibly address high-tech sales to tyrants, I'd love to hear it.
Whenever I hear someone from the Right talking about how "free markets" support individual and political liberty, I am just amazed. In fact, the result of any "free market" will always be a corporatocracy or at least a close working relationship between widespread tyrannical governments and the most powerful corporations. They are made for each other. Further (and this is a slightly different issue) Capitalism will always result in some form of slavery.
You won't hear that on the Sunday morning news/talk shows, though.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I work at Siemens and I can tell you that they already have the same technology
...and someone uses one of those hammers to beat someone else to death, does that make the manufacturer evil?
Stop blaming the tools, you morons, and put the blame where it belongs: on those who decide to abuse those tools for their own, evil ends.
Regards;
Well, until they get out of the censorship software business I will boycott both Nokia and Siemens. I have been a Nokia phone user for years, and I really like their Nokian tires, but they have just lost me as a future customer, unless and until they get out of this aspect of their business. Shame on them!
IBM sold the Nazis the tabulating machines as well as customizing the field inputs and tabulation outputs of the punch cards used for recording Jews/Gypsies/homosexuals/dissidents expelled as well as those sent and processed through the concentration camps. The president of the entire company demanded that verbal instructions to his German managers be the rule, to avoid a paper trail. IBM was the sole servicer of machines at all the concentration camp, for FSM's sake. Of course they knew exactly what they were selling. And they sold yet more equipment, customized punch cards and services to Nazi Germany after we were at war with them via their Geneva office which is, at the very least, treason. Do blame the maker for the use of the tool if the tool was customized for mass killings. Don't listen to people with no comprehension of moral responsibility or professional (not to mention general human) ethics. Don't open your digital pie hole if you don't actually know what you're talking about.
Planning? They've been doing it for years, its pretty well known that they have the capability, it's just a matter of trying to prove that to other people is damn-near impossible.
We know via the Bush domestic spying program and the revelations to EFF about "secret NSA rooms" in the telco switching centers, that the US has this capability on a massive scale. Link for the uninformed My comment at the time was, "Think what you could do with that equipment."
To assume the Brits or any other mostly solvent government on the planet can't do the same 7 years later is not just naive and funny, it is downright ignorant.
"I'm just here to regulate funkyness." - James Gandolfini, as Winston in The Mexican
Same time Queen Elizabeth II is. At least the office of head of state in Iran is up for election, however rigged and preposterous that could be. Also, the "Assembly of Experts", which has elected him, can dismiss him.
Khamenei ran against Mohammad Reza Golpaygani, winning by two-thirds of the votes.
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y
So is there any evidence of election rigging yet?
"In 50 Iranian cities the number of votes cast in this month presidential election exceeded the number of eligible voters, the state's election watchdog admitted today. "
Take that as you will.
Does anyone else find it interesting that Nokia is the owner of Qt?
They're also the ones who decided to LGPL it.
Go figure.
Correct, according to this article from the BBC:
"Western governments, including the UK, don't allow you to build networks without having this functionality."
here comes the obligatory AC CCP troll with the "things are the same in the US" BS....
Just ask Yahoo how they feel about "PR damage" from shipping reporters off to prison in China.
(a strongly worded letter from congress just doesn't hurt that much)
overthrowing an autocratic state that believes it has the authority of god behind it
which seemed impossible two weeks ago, but which seems possible right now (before the basij reach for their submachine guns and pull a tiananmen square on the iranian populace: please no)
point being, anything is possible in this world
especially ddosing network infrastructure manufacturers who sold censoring hardware and software that aren't exactly providing the airtight experience the regime in tehran expected
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Funny how we react differently to other technology. We say that P2P is not only for copyright infringement, but also for other uses. We say that hacker tools are also used by security researchers and consultants. Whenever the politicians or the mainstream press try to demonize a technology, we are the first to show that it's not that simple.
But with technology that hits one of our sweet spots - censorship - we turn around 180 degrees? And wish the companies PR backlash? Why? Are we doing anyone a favour? Should not the anger about censorship be focussed on those who engage and support censorship, and not the technology?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
...but technology is a double edged sword. It can be used for bad purposes as well as good purposes. It doesn't mean that I or any of should condone such activity, but it should be a reminder that we need use caution. Much like people saying in movies and books that we need to have a healthy respect for the things can bite back.
Your television will not tell you when to start the revolution.
Nothing new, excerpt from their wikipedia entry
"Preceding World War II Siemens was involved in funding the rise of the Nazi Party and the secret rearmament of Germany. During the Second World War, Siemens supported the Hitler regime, contributed to the war effort and participated in the "Nazification" of the economy. Siemens had many factories in and around notorious extermination camps such as Auschwitz and used slave labor from concentration camps to build electric switches for military uses. In one example, almost 100,000 men and women from Auschwitz worked in a Siemens factory inside the camp, supplying the electricity to the camp.[8]."
I try my best to never buy their shit, so far im pretty sure ive been sucessful.
If it weren't Nokia-Siemens it would have been another big corporation... Iran would be still under surveillance.
"Sum Ergo Cogito"
(1) Judgement day. (2) Jesus.
Lots of companies provide technologies to other countries like Pakistan and they use it against India to kill innocent people (see recent mumbai incident). What about good old USA? Your own government use technology to spy on you. Terrorist use cell phones and the Internet for communication. Google, Yahoo and others help China to do the same. Do you blame all the companies out there for misuses?
Isn't it to be expected that the world's largest provider of cellular phones is better at providing connectivity devices than censorship devices?? At some point, some executives decided that a communications device with degraded service is better than no communications device at all. When you consider the utility of a cellular device, then subtract the censorship laws, you still are better off than when you started. We should be praising Nokia in particular for working around the laws of Iran and providing the Iranian people with the best tools available.
That aside, did anyone notice that the article chose to point fingers at two European companies? This would be a fine piece for brewing American distrust of Europe. I'm not so sure that was unintentional, given the messenger? Who owns the WSJ again ?? =)
Full disclosure: I work for NSN.
The system in question is explicitly designed to provide access to Lawful Interception functions of various communication technologies (fixed-line, mobile, internet). The emphasis here is firmly placed on the 'Lawful Interception' part - the state of Iran has a lawful right of interception in the same way as the other states have the right. We're talking violent drunken abusive husband threatening battered wife by telephone and being monitored by the police to assist in the legal due process. That's a positive case. Suppression of free speech following dodgy elections in Iran is the negative case. The technology should not be seen as the villain here.
Anyway, NSN won the business under a competitive tender. Had it not made the sale the state of Iran would have purchased the equivalent from somebody else...
such a hypocrisy as usual from slashdotters, we are living in countries where everything is monitored and censored (esp UK & USA and considering I am Muslim and i m sure these words i m typing too ) and still we all moaning about Iran's censorship. Lets play in equal field, every government has their policies either wrong or right and we cant criticize on standing wrong footed. P.S. it does not mean whatever Iranian Govt is doing is right as well !!!!
Corporations doing something evil AGAINST humanity?!?!?! THAT NEVER HAPPENS!!!!
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
"Recent media reports have speculated about Nokia Siemens Networks' role in providing monitoring capability to Iran. Nokia Siemens Networks has provided Lawful Intercept capability solely for the monitoring of local voice calls in Iran. Nokia Siemens Networks has not provided any deep packet inspection, web censorship or Internet filtering capability to Iran." http://www.nokiasiemensnetworks.com/global/Press/Press+releases/news-archive/Provision+of+Lawful+Intercept+capability+in+Iran.htm
Of course, the U.S. government is using AT& T for this. Which is another sign of our falling behind as innovators. I mean AT&T can't get MMS on my Iphone yet. Anybody think Iranian telecom allows tethering?
There are scores of articles on the news, in just the past 6 months, about FREE DEMOCRATIC NATIONS implementing censorship. The fact that Iran censors something that those same nations think should be freely broadcast changes nothing. The UK, the US, Australia, and Germany lead the list, with thousands upon thousands of sites that they want censored.
World attention is focused on Iran's censorship at the moment, but give it a few weeks, and 99% of the world's population will have their heads in the sand again, oblivious to the fact that their own government is quietly encroaching on their own rights.
Ignorance, hypocrisy, and stupidity all rolled up into one.
But, think of the children.
Good God, this whole mess makes me sick.
Don't get me wrong, people, I abhor child pornography. It would make me very happy to never see one single image of CP on the darkwebs again. But, in the process of getting those people off the web, almost all of us are willing to abdicate our own rights. Ten, fifteen, twenty years from now, what we see happening in Iran may well happen again in the United States, or Canada, or perhaps even in an EU-wide election. Simply because we are quietly surrendering our rights to the meatheads who want to control us.
Sorry, people, but I can't get on the bandwagon condemning Iran's government, when almost every idiot around me, almost every idiot on the internet, is happy to see our own governments moving in the same direction.
At the same time, I have the utmost respect for those activists who have quashed legislation in Australia and other places in recent months. Even though I suspect that those laws will return next month, or next year, to be adopted by a lackadaisical population.
Oppression. It's not just an Iranian or a Korean problem. Wake up, everyone. If you don't like what you see in Iran, WRITE YOUR CONGRESSMAN (or minister, or whatever name you use for the same thing) AND TELL THEM ABOUT IT!!! Check pending legislation in your own home state and country. Send a dozen letters, to anyone and everyone who has any voice, or any influence with the voices. Tell them that you don't want to be the next Iran.
Censorship is censorship - even in those rare instances when I think I might approve of it being used against some select group, the censorship is still a tool of government used to oppress a group it disapproves of.
Get off your asses, and make your voices heard where it counts. In your own government!!
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
I'll bite.
"Free market" forces don't deal with Tyrants, and they shouldn't. That is the responsibility of the oppressed. Lasting change won't come about externaly, it must happen internally. Note Afghanistan and Iraq, which we attacked for our own interests. If those had both been civil wars, triggered internally, the countries would probably be well on their way to their own freedom instead of being "iffy" like they are now.
Oppressed countries don't have free markets, they have tyrants stealing the majority of what they produce to further oppress the people. If a tyrant allowed the markets in his country to be open and free, guess what would happen. That's right, they'd have vastly greater liberty! You probably wouldn't be able to call the leader a "tyrant" or a "despot" either. It would be more like "benevolent ruler", because freedom to trade requires a few things, like freedom of speech (in a practical sense, not a bill of rights sense), freedom to travel, etc. These breed other freedoms that these rely on, and pretty soon the government, regardless of what kind of government it is, becomes a smaller and smaller part of life.
Free markets on a global scale don't take into account the internal market of a country, other than in the sense that there are avenues of trade that simply will not exist into or out of an oppressed country. That doesn't mean there will be NO avenues of trade, just fewer and they will be controlled by the government.
To flip the whole thing around, you can't have complete liberty if you don't have the freedom to trade. If you aren't free to trade to whoever you want, whenever you want, then you aren't completely free.
That said, complete freedom produces incivility and is counter productive. If it were possible to give everyone in the world 100% liberty, you'd have a perfect world for all of about 10 seconds, probably less. It would immediately degenerate into anarchy, which only provides freedom for those who can take it by force. In a sense, even they aren't free.
Ideally the governments role should be to maximise the individual liberties of its citizens. This requires restrictions on interactions between people, but only for the purposes preventing the imposition of another's will on the individual.
In fact, the result of any "free market" will always be a corporatocracy or at least a close working relationship between widespread tyrannical governments and the most powerful corporations.
It's not a free market if the government prevents individuals from competing. Assuming the "tyrannical government" is not preventing individuals from getting together and competing with the large corporation, in a free market system the corporation topples when becomes less efficient than what a smaller group of individuals can produce. This can take some time, but it always happens.
Look at the banking and insurance industry, that big crash? That was the market self adjusting, attempting to eliminate the "most powerful corporations" when they pushed the market too far. And what did socialism do? It went in and rescued them, taking billions of dollars from the citizens to shore up the corporations. The market can't eliminate a corporation if the government props them up!
Further (and this is a slightly different issue) Capitalism will always result in some form of slavery.
If you want to see slavery (which occurs based on the morals head of society, and has nothing to do with the market) on a mass scale, go take a look at the USSR and their Communism. You were told where to work, when to work, what you got, and any attempt to change this made you a criminal. You'd sure as hell better stay in line, or the KGB will come take you away. China was the same way when they attempted to go pure Communist, but had to re-introduce captitalism or face collapse. If Communism, the only alternative socio-economic ideology, is so great, why does the Chinese government have to block access to information about the outside world?
Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
Cisco, and ALL quality routing and switching equipment, have features built in that allow for traffic inspection and redirection. These are NECESSARY for any kind of decent network maintenance and control. ALL networks in the world have this capability. Even a shitty network built on dumb linksys devices can be made to do this by running everything through a computer with packet inspection and redirection software on it (there are a hell of a lot of Open Source options for you too ;) ).
I'm not sure why you would be upset that Cisco would set this up for China and show them how to use it.
Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
Want a free market solution to keep tyrants from getting high tech weapons? How about we stop using half our entire government budget to subsidize the military industrial complex. If there is anything that is decidedly not free market, its using Tax dollars to purchase products from select companies, decided almost entirely by lobbying efforts. http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/
With that kind of argument, you can "justify" selling anything to anybody. I don't buy it.
There is a balance. Obviously some controls must be in place, such as antitrust laws.
On the other hand, I do not agree with your main argument. Many economists, in fact, do believe that a free market prevents the formation of monopolies, and that monopolies do not form naturally without some form of government collusion. There is some evidence to support that idea.
For example, in recent years the FTC has been allowing corporate mergers that in the past would never have gotten through, on grounds of being anti-competitive. That is certainly a form of government collusion. On the other hand, some free-market purists might argue that the FTC is unnecessary regulation (which is foolish).
In any case, certainly some regulation is necessary. But the questions remain: how much and what kind?
Only candidates that are approved by the real power in Iran (the Ayatollahs) are allowed to be voted for. That's why it's so foolish for Western pols (most notibly the GOP) to be touting Mousavi as a Persian Lech Walenza. You really think he and the rest of those demonstrators are Pro US? Really?
I just read a conspiracy theory. Nokia was the main reason why Finnish legislators ran through a law which enables companies, universities, housing cooperative etc. etc. to spy users activity on net. Law broadly talks about "header information" but doesn't describe which header (IP, TCP, HTTP etc.). And what's the most evil about it, companies doesn't even have to have court order for this. Law is aptly named LexNokia in Finnish local news.
Now NSN is selling spieng equipment/software/whatever to Iran. Some sources says that this is beta test to polish out small bugs and such. After Iran the technology is supposed to be sold all over the world and most certainly to Finnish companies willing to spy on their employees.
This is continum to the rumours why digi TV was brought so hastily to Finland. Nokia had manufactured a heck load of digi TV boxes in store and it needed buyer for those. Nokia wrestled this current digi format to Finland using it's relationships to the government, sold it's stores empty and quit digibox business.
"I feel like God wants me to run for President. I can't explain it, but I sense my country is going to need me. Something is going to happen... I know it won't be easy on me or my family, but God wants me to do it."
"God told me to strike at al Qaeda and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam [Hussein], which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East. If you help me I will act, and if not, the elections will come and I will have to focus on them."
"I'm the Commander, see ... I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being the President ... [I] don't feel like I owe anybody an explanation."
"I do not think witchcraft is a religion, and I do not think it is in any way appropriate for the U.S. military to promote it."
"I urge all Texans to answer the call to serve those in need. By volunteering their time, energy or resources to helping others, adults and youngsters follow Christ's message of love and service in thought and deed."
Therefore, I,[...], Governor of Texas, do hereby proclaim June 10, 2000, Jesus Day in Texas
"I believe that God wants me to be president."
and, last but not least:
"We need common-sense judges who understand our rights were derived from God,"
Yes, These are all from former president G. W. Bush. The last two sourced from http://www.beliefnet.com/News/Politics/2004/07/George-W-Bush-On-Faith.aspx and the rest from http://www.gainesvillehumanists.org/dubya.htm
Either way, as a US citizen and former god-person, Bush scared me so much I decided to go secular and humanist.
I cannot believe he got elected twice.
Two wars and how many dead because "god told him to?" Not that bin Laden isn't just as bad, just a different god, and that's why myths should not be the guiding principle in any form of government.
I'll try to stick with your most egregiously wrong statements to keep this fairly brief.
"Free market" forces don't deal with Tyrants, and they shouldn't.
They don't? Since when? Even when there are sanctions against a government, trade still occurs. And let's not forget who loaned Bush / America the money for the foreign policy debacle that was Iraq, as well as the bank bailout after all those 'free market' idiots enabled the bankers to play roulette with our money... China (or are you arguing that China is not a tyranny?)
You probably wouldn't be able to call the leader a "tyrant" or a "despot" either. It would be more like "benevolent ruler"
We have reasonably free market, yet Bush was clearly a tyrant. What else can you call someone who starts a war of choice and tries to legalize torture?
To flip the whole thing around, you can't have complete liberty if you don't have the freedom to trade. If you aren't free to trade to whoever you want, whenever you want, then you aren't completely free.
So far as I know, there is no place on earth that does not place SOME kind of rules and regulations on trade. Please show me these 'free' people. And demonstrate reasonably that they have absolutely no restrictions. For what it's worth, I'll agree that tyrannies commonly controlled trade ALONG WITH EVERYTHING ELSE.
It's not a free market if the government prevents individuals from competing.
This is the huge straw man argument of closet republicans (Libertarians), neocons, and every other corporate apologist. So far as I know, Rearden Steel never existed, and I have never heard of an instance where the American government tried to force a company to give technology to their competitor, although I could conceive of it happening in a limited number of special cases in WW2, since there were 2 military juggernauts threatening to take over the world. Since I'm not speaking German or Japanese, I'd say that it was a good move if it happened then.
If you want to see slavery (which occurs based on the morals head of society, and has nothing to do with the market) on a mass scale, go take a look at the USSR and their Communism...
This is the second biggest straw man argument of the corporate apologists and economic anarchists. First and foremost, It is not Socialism that made the USSR bad, it was CORRUPTION (not to mention having a paranoid sociopath like Stalin in charge for so long). No matter WHAT system you have in place, corruption will topple empires period. Did socialism open the door to corruption? Possibly, but in the long run corruption plus corporate domination (I wouldn't even call it a free market, since the corporations own 90% or the Republicants and 40% of the Democraps) has the potential to do as much if not more damage, and ultimately fall as hard if not harder.
One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces. - PF
If the market, when left to itself, didn't tend to form monopolies, there'd be no need for an organisation to prevent that happening.
You seem to be confusing failure to prevent with collusion.
In a truly free market, there'd be no FCC to block competition. Something that doesn't exist can't collude with anyone.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Queen Elizabeth II, although a queen, is powerless. In Iran's society the role she represents is equivalent to the role of President of Iran.
Moreover, claiming that the "assembly of experts" is elected is, at best, throwing sand at the world's eyes. The candidates to that spot must be a part of a pre-approved list of people chosen by the supreme leader of Iran himself who, after a vote, are nominated through parliament, another group of people personally nominated by the supreme leader.
So Iran's figure of the supreme leader is someone who controls every aspect of Iran's society, including military, clergy, executive branch and judicial branch, which isn't subjected to any vote and is supposedly monitored by people he chose and appointed directly and indirectly.
That isn't a democracy.
Economic freedon and political freedom are different dimensions. They often go together, but not always.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The BBC article is very good:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8112550.stm
The BBC's article points out that a monitored system is better than no system, and that the Islamic Republic would certainly not have allowed mobile phones & internet to exist without such a system.
Listen:
Most large mobile phone networks (and internet networks) in western countries have a feature known as lawful intercept designed to allow law enforcement officials to monitor subscriber conversations. No vendor in their right mind would design gear without this feature as many nations' laws mandate its presence in public telecom networks.
In western nations, it's use requires a search warrant by law. Obviously, the hardware has no clue whether the operator has a warrant or not.
The only difference is that Khamenei doesn't give two shits about the warrant. But then, George Bush ordered the use of this exact same feature on AT&T and PacBell's networks without warrants as well, so what's the difference?
Not after seeing what a piss poor job it did at actually preventing information leakage.
Thas a lot more to do with the technology's implementation than the technology itsself.
Network security training isn't exactly something the West has been exporting to the Islamic Republic's government in copius quantities. It's like the fighter pilots that defected after the revolution: most Iranian security professionals are intellectuals and want little to do with their government.
Please, out of America Nokia and Siemens are the biggest technology providers (talking about communications). I'm shure IBM, Microsoft, ... are providing technology for other evil projects. And who cares ? this is the capitalism, this is America (even Europe), don't blame SIEMENS or NOKIA to play the game.
/// This message censored by Nokia and Siemens. ///
When you give a gun to an idiot, you are responsible when he shoots himself.
SNL needs to do a spoof ad about this. "Nokia. Because despots deserve control." or whatever.
How about we stop using half our entire government budget to subsidize the military industrial complex.
Where do you get half from?
Social Security: $749.1B
Medicare/Medicaid: $1058.4B
Interest on Public Debt: $454.5B
Military Budget: $743.2B
Other: $585.9B
I get under 21%. How did you get half?
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
And let's not forget who loaned Bush / America the money for the foreign policy debacle that was Iraq, as well as the bank bailout after all those 'free market' idiots enabled the bankers to play roulette with our money... China (or are you arguing that China is not a tyranny?)
China holds $739.6B of US debt, which they have acquired over 30 years. The total outstanding debt is over $11,342.7B. Roughly 6.5%. China didn't finance shit.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Yes, China financed only 6.5% of the US debt. But it was mostly the most recent 6.5%.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Did you know that almost 100% of the Iraq War was financed "off-budget" using "emergency financing measures".
That's why Republicans have been claiming that Bush only had a $300billion-plus deficit in 2008. The real figure, if you include the Iraq War and the September TARP bailout, is about $1.6 trillion.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Yes, they do, but they never, ever explain the mechanism by which this prevention supposedly occurs.
Pick any book by one of the big free-market believers. Go to the section on how free markets make people "free" and you'll read the equivalent of a poorly-executed fairy tale.
You are welcome on my lawn.
We don't know that because a "free market" has never existed. So every assertion that's made about them is simply conjecture and wishfulness.
You are welcome on my lawn.
You mean the amount loaned in the last year? So, China didn't finance anything before 2008?
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
That's Obama's budget, actually. Now, to go with your numbers and add them into the above, as you seem to incist,
Lets see, TARP was $700B, which means that the total military spending in that $1.6T would be $900B, which if we add to what is in the above, means that the military budget would be $900B out of $3747.9B, would be a hair over 24%. Still a far cry from the half being claimed. Care to try again?
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
and that's why myths should not be the guiding principle in any form of government.
That may be so, but it has nothing to do with what I wrote! I am not denying that specific part of the OP's rant.
"If the market, when left to itself, didn't tend to form monopolies, there'd be no need for an organisation to prevent that happening."
As mentioned previously, there are a great many economists who disagree with you.
"You seem to be confusing failure to prevent with collusion"
It is certainly failure to prevent, but on what basis do you claim that it is not also collusion?
"In a truly free market, there'd be no FCC to block competition. Something that doesn't exist can't collude with anyone."
That is a nonsensical statement if I ever heard one. There can be no real free market when it comes to the radio spectrum, because it is not a commodity! It is a scarce public resource. There is a difference. Some sort of method is necessary to dole out spectra to interested parties. I am not saying the FCC is the best answer, but SOME KIND of regulation is absolutely necessary.
Using that argument, you could as easily say that in a free market, we could all use as much water as we want, and sell it commercially for any purpose. That is completely ridiculous, because drinking and irrigation water, again, are not normally "owned" by anyone and are a limited public resource. What to do with it is a public matter.
While they are relatively rare, there are obviously some areas in which a truly free market is not appropriate and would never work. Let's not get silly.
Restrict the sale of technology to that which has legitimate legal uses.
If you make an anti-AIDs medication, that works, but kills the user 15 days after use, it's not useful to sell. Nuclear weapons? Is there a legal use for nuclear weapons? Nope.
Courts commonly uses this test to determine the legality of technology. Bittorrent? Lots of illegal downloaders, but Blizzard uses it as do a lot of Linux distros. Pass.
Further, if the developer of a product discovers some risk *cough* death *cough* that can arise from use of their product *cough* cigarettes *cough*, and fail to properly disclose it, they can be sued as well. *cough*
Seriously, I ought to quit smoking;)
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
"... but they never, ever explain the mechanism by which this prevention supposedly occurs."
Sure they do, and it's not complicated at all. In fact, someone mentioned it elsewhere in this thread:
"Assuming the "tyrannical government" is not preventing individuals from getting together and competing with the large corporation, in a free market system the corporation topples when becomes less efficient than what a smaller group of individuals can produce. This can take some time, but it always happens." - Bigjeff5
"Pick any book by one of the big free-market believers. Go to the section on how free markets make people "free" and you'll read the equivalent of a poorly-executed fairy tale."
I don't know where you got your information, but the fact is that the free market (not perfectly free, no, but free in the important respects) did in fact produce the strongest economy and freest people in the world... the United States. It has been subsequent interference in those free markets that has led to the sad situation we are in now, not "too much" freedom.
Mobile phone systems need to to be able to geographically locate the individual mobile in order to route calls to that mobile. The basic function of a phone network requires you to be able to accurately locate the closest cell to the mobile phone. That means anyone familiar with the technology and with access to the network can use it to trace individual mobiles regardless of whether the manufacturer helps or not. ALL police forces, worldwide. use this technology to monitor and locate criminals and espionage, hence the concept of the "one-use phone" for any secure operations. That the Iranian police consider people fighting for freedom as criminals is no different than anywhere else in the world, including the USA and the UK. Why should Nokia Siemens, or any other other network manufacturer be attacked for providing to Iranian police something they provide to _any_ police force, especially something which the police force could easily make themselves anyway given the nature of the technology requires it to be able to geographically locate mobiles?
I actually have the same poster on my wall so I got 'about half' by a cursory glance. If you want a more accurate up to date estimate, just go to the link I sent you and look at the center. The poster is continually updated with budget data and he has already calculated the percentages you are looking for. Military/National Security: 799 billion or 68% Non Military/National Security: 383 billion or 33% Your numbers are likely off because you weren't figuring in National Security expenses which are also part of our Military Industrial Complex. All "The War on X"'s are heavily influenced by lobbyists who get their bread and butter from military contracts.
Not surprisingly, the Wall Street Journal has this completely wrong.
The DPI software/hardware does *not* do the broadband filtration that the WSJ says it does. At SALabs, our R&D arm of the SiliconANGLE blog, we've done some pretty extensive research, and it's plain to us (and likely most of the IT audience here at Slashdot) that the type of censorship taking place in Iran is unsophisticated and isn't the result of DPI techniques.
We have several articles going into this matter on the site.
(http://www.siliconangle.com/ver2/?p=5972) (http://www.siliconangle.com/ver2/?p=5925) and (http://www.siliconangle.com/ver2/?p=5919).
The bottom line is that this stuff is good old fashioned gateway blocking of addresses. The DPI software that Nokia sells is for mobile network packet shaping only, and not useful for censoring an entire country's information infrastructure.
goto http://rizzn.com
[parade] [rain] http://www.thoughtcrime.org/software/sslstrip/ [/parade] [/rain]
The GP is a little off. Economics teaches that harmful monopolies do not exist in free trade. Harmful means taking excessive profit (actually, excess rent. I forget some of the technical terms). The mechanism for abusive monopoly prevention is described. If there is excess rent, then there is the possibility for another entity to provide the good or service for less. Someone will see this and compete with the abusive monopolizer. The abusive monopolizer must lower prices in order to be a viable competitor, thus no longer being abusive.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
No message or link received. Post it here. And your numbers are far off. Look at my numbers again.
Me:From Here
Social Security: $749.1B
Medicare/Medicaid: $1058.4B
Interest on Public Debt: $454.5B
Military Budget: $743.2B
Other: $585.9B
You:
Military: $799B
Everything Else: $383B
Military budget difference of $55.8B. Yet the budget this year is $3,591B. Your numbers total to $1182B, a difference of $2,409B. Your numbers do not include interest on the public debt, medicare/medicaid, Social Security or a variety of other things. Even using $799B as the total military spending on the entire budget, it comes out to 22.3%.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
You must be including non-discretionary spending, which is very odd. When most people talk about the budget they just talk about discretionary spending. Since it doesn't include present obligations, its really the only thing the white house has much control over. For a better explanation of discretionary spending use google. Also I have no idea how your not seeing the original link I posted. Just google 'death and taxes poster'. It's not an uncommon item, I got mine through think geek.
That link I posted requires Java. It sometimes takes a minute to load. Also, I see the link you mean now. I didn't realize you meant back in the original post and thought you meant you messaged me after that.
Why is it odd? I'm including everything in the budget. Even the link you posted says discretionary spending "is one third of total government spending". Whenever I've talked about the budget with someone, it has been the whole budget, discretionary and non-discretionary. Social Security is in the budget and voted on, so is Medicare/Medicaid and a variety of other things. Regardless of it being discretionary or not, it is money being spent by the federal government and is part of the presidents budget. All that non-discretionary means is that the government has some equation made years ago for making payments and it can change it when it wants to. i.e. It can change social security payments or medicare/medicaid payments by passing a bill as it has before for both of them. Non-discretionary spending has to be voted on in appropriations bills, just like discretionary spending, which means the president still signs the spending bill into law.
Also, It's also not like the non-discretionary spending doesn't increase the national debt. Medicare/Medicaid spending alone this year totals $1058B, while medicaid/medicare taxes total about $375B, leaving a difference of about $675B that has to be made up in taxes or borrowing.
(PDF) Here's the presidents budget for FY10. You want page 3, receipts and outlays, specifically outlays. FY10 Outlays: $3591B
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
there is a facebook group to boyocott nokia and seimens
Meh. So I took a very small amount of poetic license to prove my point. Compared to right wing rhetoric it was a solid fact.
One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces. - PF
Well now you know what half I was referring too so to get back on track; If you are making the point that we have far too much domestic spending I completely agree. I just didn't mention it because it didn't really relate to what I was responding to. So do you agree or not that we spend too much on military? Not in relation to domestic spending, I just mean period. If so, do you think it would help keep weapons out of the wrong hands if we were producing so much less of them? That's the crux of my original point.
"Economics teaches that..."
I would say THAT is a little off. Which school of economics? There are a great many to choose from.
I have never seen it specifically tied to rent, but yes the mechanism that that other person was describing, relates to the fact that monopolies become inefficient or expensive and others will start to fill the gaps that they inevitably leave open.
However, some economics theories neglect to account for barriers to entry that can be put in place by monopolies or near-monopolies. In the last couple of decades in the United States, some barriers to entry have included lobbying for restrictive laws (like DMCA and its ilk), that prevent a level playing field and keep small players from entering a market. But those represent corruption in the system, not economics per se.
As a side note : at times there are even voices claiming that human rights are not universal - that is of course true - obviously there are people with interests that are in direct conflict with such ideas like democracy etc.The question is - can for instance people in Iran achieve better Islamic Republic with Revolutionary guards and big Mullahs on top of political structure and at the same time enjoy what they deem worth enjoying, do what they perceive worth doing etc - I suppose there is a balance somewhere but I do not think people's wish to do what they please as long as they do not physically disturb others are compatible with current system in Iran and small reforms would not help here either.
Still waiting for a point. China has loaned less than 10% of the money borrowed in the past 10 years. They haven't done the financing for Iraq. More money has come from Americans by several multiples than china.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Further,
If so, do you think it would help keep weapons out of the wrong hands if we were producing so much less of them?
Lets see, the US produces 1 F-18 for $30 million or China or Russia produce 100,000 AK-47s with ammunition. Further, when was the last time 'the wrong hands' got a weapon that was owned by the US DoD? So no, I don't think the US DoD having a decent budget, of which the majority is used for spare parts (non-ammunition), personnel pay, building construction and RDT&E. A small percentage of that, under $200B is for weapons.
That's the crux of my original point.
Then why were you trying to include the NSA, DHS and other budget in with the DoD? If your argument is that the DoD buys too many weapons, you don't include non-weapons budgets in your totals.
its using Tax dollars to purchase products from select companies, decided almost entirely by lobbying efforts
By the way, this too is not true. If you knew anything about the actual DoD acquisitions process, you would know that just about everything is put out for bid and the winner must be justified as being better than the rest in concrete numbers.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
"Censoring technology doesn't censor people, people censor people!"
I find this whole excitement is bit overblown as whoever wins nothing will change: Iran will still pursue its nuclear dream,it will still support Hezbollah and mullahs will continue to have a say in almost anything.
A small percentage of that, under $200B is for weapons.
200B or 26% of your own numbers. Umm.. yeah.. sure thats a small percent, not even outside of the margin of error really.
If your argument is that the DoD buys too many weapons, you don't include non-weapons budgets in your totals.
Nope, there is a lot more to it then just the DoD buying weapons. Including but not limited to how heavily we are deployed all of the world for our War on Terror, War on Drugs and interventionism by our Intelligence agencies.
By the way, this too is not true. If you knew anything about the actual DoD acquisitions process, you would know that just about everything is put out for bid and the winner must be justified as being better than the rest in concrete numbers.
Read up on what most lobbying actual entails, it's budget appropriation as well as the securing of no-bid contracts and either way, who gets the contract has nothing to do with whether or not we are spending too much.
Sounds good, but that isn't actually true. The US occupied, rebuilt, and remade in their own image a number of nations at the end of World War II. If they were really willing to spend the blood and treasure over another decade or so, the same could be done to Iraq.
This sig all sigs devours
200B or 26% of your own numbers. Umm.. yeah.. sure thats a small percent, not even outside of the margin of error really.
$200B out of $3591B? Yeah, that is a small percentage. Under 5.5% is for weapons. Well under. Most of that is for replacement aircraft, ships and vehicles with very little being for bombs, bullets and missiles. $200B out of just the DoD budget? There you go trying to say only discretionary spending matters when it is a small portion of the total bill.
Nope, there is a lot more to it then just the DoD buying weapons. Including but not limited to how heavily we are deployed all of the world for our War on Terror, War on Drugs and interventionism by our Intelligence agencies.
If so, do you think it would help keep weapons out of the wrong hands if we were producing so much less of them? That's the crux of my original point.
Will you make up your mind on what your argument is? You first said the problem was that the DoD was over half the budget, which I proved false. Then you said that decreasing the DoD budget would prevent weapons from falling into the 'wrong hands', yet I asked for evidence of DoD weapons falling into the wrong hands and you try to dodge it by now claiming that "it's more than just the DoD buying weapons". What is your point? You try to claim one, then change it every time I show that you have no point or ask for evidence.
Read up on what most lobbying actual entails, it's budget appropriation as well as the securing of no-bid contracts and either way, who gets the contract has nothing to do with whether or not we are spending too much.
If there is anything that is decidedly not free market, its using Tax dollars to purchase products from select companies, decided almost entirely by lobbying efforts
"almost entirely" Gee, sure seems like you're saying that no-bid contracts are the reason we're "spending too much" (your words, not mine). As I said, let me know when you get your argument straight.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
GP said there were no explanations. I don't have to identify a school. And whether or not a given interpretation comes from a particular school doesn't change whether or not economics as a discipline teaches it.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Why do you keep mis-summarizing my point as to having solely to do with the DoD? Your were the first one to even specifically mention it. For some reason, all US military spending == DoD to you. Which is entirely false. It's a big area of our military budget, not the entirety of it. Your obviously not introducing any new ideas but 'proving wrong' complete mis-interpretations of seemingly simple points. Was it because I cited something and expected you to read it? I don't know but this is waste of time. Consider this my last response.
I strongly disagree.
"Economics teaches that..." is a ridiculously broad statement. One school of economics will teach you one thing, another will teach you something contradictory. They do not all play well together under the umbrella term "economics".
Having said that, though, I do agree with your assertion that monopolies should not exist in a free market. I was just giving you crap about your broad statement. No offense meant.
"Free market" forces don't deal with Tyrants, and they shouldn't.
As if the 'free market' has morals and doesn't deal with tyrants. I was and am calling that complete horse manure. Interesting how you never bothered to read that much of my post or the post I was responding to, yet I was the one whose post was modded as 'troll'. But that's right wing ideologues for you, they just support their own, never regarding things such as 'logic' or 'facts'. The bottom line is that the free market not only does not have morals, but commonly deals with tyrants of all stripes. Any claim to the contrary is ludicrous, especially in light of the fact that G.W. Bush's tyranny was arguably financed by China's tyranny. It doesn't matter what percentage of American debt that China holds. We were borrowing and spending significant amounts of China's money while actively engaging in our own tyranny. The one argument you seem to have found with my post is moot, and totally missing the point. Have I spelled it out in enough detail for you?
One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces. - PF
AK-47 sales to citizens.
I know tobacco is bad for you, so I smoke weed with crack.
It's an approximation.
I know tobacco is bad for you, so I smoke weed with crack.