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FBI Prioritizes Copyright Over Missing Persons
An anonymous reader writes "The FBI has limited resources, so it needs to prioritize what it works on. However, it's difficult to see why dealing with copyright infringement seems to get more attention than identity theft or missing persons. In the past year, the FBI has announced a special new task force to fight intellectual property infringement, but recent reports have shown that both identity theft and missing persons have been downgraded as priorities by the FBI, to the point that there are a backlog of such cases."
The FBI exists to protect profits. In fact the government exists to protect commerce, the very basis of our society
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
There should be a free market of investigative agencies, with limited oversight by a US government agency that has limited oversight by the people.
Next time I'm kidnapped; I'll be sure to start pirating music and movies. Maybe they'll find me!
Identity theft and missing persons aren't costing $500 billion a year, are they?
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
Does the FBI know how many missing persons may have disappeared carring ipods with hundreds, even thousands, of tracks being illicitly enjoyed by their captors, even as we speak, in various isolated cabins, underground dungeons, and seedy motels all around america?
How could they be so blind?
Missing persons haven't spent millions in lobbying, while the copyright industries have. It's distressing how easy governments are to buy these days, and the US seems to be doing its absolute worst lately -- they are almost dropping all pretence and simply doing what the corporate masters tell them to do.
so that is bigger then going after rapist in the DNA lab?
Follow the money.
Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
If there were a missing persons industry, then we could assign an imaginary and excessive value to "loss of profits" due to missing persons. Then they could be considered as valuable as a CD, and the FBI could put more effort into investigating.
. . . maybe it's the copyright infringers that go missing!
Hello Hollywood money in Obama's pocket...
Kill all birds with one stone.
1) Every person should be copyrighted
2) Any missing person should be considered abducted and cross filed under copyright theft
3) Any person that has gone missing should be cross filed under identity theft as it could be an abduction, copyright abduction / theft, and a missing person at the same time.
I could find sarcastic ways to connect ident theft & copyrights to possibility of missing persons but I'm lazy.
Their DNA lab is so backed up, they can't effectively pursue any violent criminals, so evil copyright violators are the low-hanging fruit.
This is the "change" we voted for?
I wouldn't have put it so bluntly, but I agree with you. Power + Money = Corruption. This has been true since the beginning of time. *yawn*
I know some people will say that copyright shouldn't exist at all. But ignoring that argument for a moment, I'm curious why copyright isn't part of state law and not federal. What is the reasoning?
I hope you get kidnapped then. Maybe they won't even find your skeleton after you long rot away.
Political power, then, I take to be a right of making laws with penalties of death, and consequently all less penalties, for the regulating and preserving of property, and of employing the force of the community, in the execution of such laws, and in the defence of the common-wealth from foreign injury; and all this only for the public good.
--- John Locke, 2nd Treatise of Gov't vis-a-vis US Const, 5th and 14th Amendments.
The argument then becomes whether ideas can be property. The US Constitution, by implication, says no - "Writings and Discoveries" are an "exclusive right" only for a "limited time," a clear statement that "intellectual property" is not property at all, but a limited and artificially constructed grant of rights.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
INCORRECT:
The FBI is NOT prioritizing copyright over missing persons.
CORRECT:
The FBI has a backlog of missing person DNA to run in the DNA labs.
The FBI is increasing the amount of manpower assigned to copyright.
I don't know how much the FBI should spend at all on copyright, but it is a bit of a stretch to take the current facts and say that copyright is prioritized over missing persons.
kidnapping and identity theft as "business practices". Then the FBI would hunt down these copyright infringing criminals.
Nullius in verba
Some of these missing persons will be downloading movies or music, so they'll turn up. :)
Instead of reporting someone missing, just claim he's made a fortune selling DVDs at the street corner and is now looking to settle on a nice beach.
... Charles Manson decrying the prioritization of murder-kidnap over, say espionage.
How does finding rapists and prosecuting them help corporate profits and the economy at large? Women who are raped should just go home and take a shower and get over it, and get back to work so their employer doesn't suffer any loss of profit.
(in case it wasn't obvious)
Dammit, I enclosed my (/sarcasm) tag in brackets and it disappeared.
And now, stupid Slashdot is telling me I'm posting comments too quickly.
At the FBI, we take customer service seriously.
Missing persons who wish to file a customer service complaint can contact us via telephone, email or postal address:
http://www.fbi.gov/contactus.htm
We value your feedback. Have a nice day.
to the RIAA and MPAA
Why is Snark Required?
So the best thing to do if kidnapped is to try and convince your captors to download some movies via torrent, burn them to disc, then get the blanket out and sell them on the front law. You would just would have to convince them of the potential money and reassure them that no one gets caught doing so.
Kind of like a reverse Stockholm syndrome power play?
Well, at least the FBI knows how much. And also knows that *AA ask for copyright violations enough money to do several banks bailouts, pay external debt, and even finance a trip to Pandora. Is not their fault that math work that way.
Isn't it amazing what a signature line can get a moderator to do?
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
Sure, in a society hijacked by greedy corporations.
Palm trees and 8
The FBI does not exist to investigate one thing OR another. It investigates what crimes are capable of being solved by lab work and field agents who may or may not have any leads. Missing Persons and Identity Theft are two types of cases where the amount of time and money expended is often beyond the department's means to rectify the relative damages caused.
In the case of missing persons, because some of them don't want to be found, or another department has already exhausted their leads.
In the case of Identity Theft, because the perpetrators are often in other countries, where it doesn't make practical sense to send field agents to sift through hearsay or rumor in order to find someone who might be their criminal, and who, if he's smart at all, has since erased the evidence of his theft anyways.
"1) Every person should be copyrighted"
OK. But I'll be copyleft. Feel free to replicate me and if you make any improvements in me please pass those along.
I've looked at the Wired article and the Techdirt articles, and I'm pretty sure I can track down original sources in what might be called the "major media" that discuss the downgrading if emphasis on missing persons. Similarly, I can track down sources discussing the creation of a new task force on IP. What I'm looking for is a major media source that talks about the relative prioritization of these two. Did I miss that in the articles? Does somebody know of one?
they'll be all over it. And you won't hear anything else on the news for a month.
But the farther you are from "little blonde girl", the less you matter.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Seriously, I think it's easier to find and hire (and cheaper to pay) people to investigate computer crimes. They probably just don't have enough field agents to go looking for missing persons, and who knows if they even CAN find people to recruit for that?
This is because of political power that effects budgets , laws and decisions made about the running of government in the future. A missing person doesn't have a lobbyist, well paid representatives or lawyers.
Serve and protect**.
Big personal crimes that get an outcry such as rape and murder are still investigated. However if your house is burgled, broken into,or your car is stolen you are asked to come down to the station and fill out a form. This is for insurance reasons , there is never a real investigation. 15-20 years ago it was different the police would , at the very least, actually show up.
Contrast this with the law enforcement reaction to a break in at a corporate office.
** those who hold the purse strings and power.
Let's not be hypocritical. I think most people here voted for Obama/Biden. If know what you were voting for with Joe Biden, you know he is an RIAA man. They can and have bought him, but it was you who elected him to power. And then the industry uses the power they bought into the government. So this is all very logical and the consequence of voting the RIAA into your government. There will be much more of this. All of this was brushed away because defeating McCain was all that mattered.
what an asshole
I realized, that when it come to money, there is too much stupidity in this world to possibly fix.
The monetary value of a person is known.
I live in New Zealand. Emergency services here run helicoptors. Not just for the old cliche of plucking people of a cliff face, but also for car accidents and medical emergencies in non-urban areas. To provide perspective, a seriously injured person, just 20 minutes from a city may recieve helicoptor service for severe cases.
What defines severe? Is it worth it to the taxpayer?
About 12 years ago, a study was done to put a monetary cost to a citizen loosing their life. Presumably this factored loss of taxable income, consequences of earning potential of spouses, impact and costs to assist a dependant child.
It was in the news even, and it ignited a moral debate. That cost to society was NZ$1,100,000.
The point being, the cost of the helicoptor recovery was less than this, at about $5000 per hour.
We can perhaps conclue the FBI has done some similar sums, but the poor individual has not fared so well in the cost/benefit analysis. Or someone high up has an interest in a copyright litigation practice.
In post Patriot Act America, the library books scan you.
I would say that the RIAA and the FBI make a good pair...neither one lets the facts get in the way of what they want!
Just hope your kidnappers use a copyrighted font in the ransom note that they didn't properly license. That should get the FBI on your case.
Eggs
Milk
Bread
Cat Litter
Soda
Damn Bush and his stomping on rights and corporate pandering.
oh, wait...
(and BTW, BAWAHAHAHAHAHA! Suckers! You BELIEVED that Change bullshit?? Seriously? And you made fun of Bush's intelligence? Wow. Just.. wow)
The link points to a blog post that points to another blog post, which points to another blog post.
Where is the news? Where is the stuff that matters?
Does it seem to anybody else like Techdirt is actually just self-citing itself for its proof? I don't really see where it's shown that the FBI has copyright enforcement actually prioritized higher than missing persons here. I see references to people saying it's a major priority, but that doesn't actually mean it really is. I think we need some more evidence laid out a little more clearly than what Techdirt has done, at least.
I tried to start a non-profit to find missing people. I got C&D letters from 4 states for my website as I sought start-up, even with clearly stating I did not have 503x status. Missing people is not good business. I was surprised I did not get a note from the FBI.
6.8SPC TR of 550, l xwind at 6, drift rt at 26" drops 77". AT has 503 ft-lbs at 1403 fps. FT 0.86
FBI doesn't pursue rapists unless it happens on Federal land or Indian Reservation.
The kidnappers would never let you do that. Even terrorists would never torrent! I mean they're bad, but they're not that bad!
Think of the children... of the music and movie executives and shareholders! Without police enforcement of their right to inherit royalties, they might have to get jobs when they grow up!
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Pretty sure this wasn't the result of Obama. Unless you can cite some evidence to suggest that it was Obama that reduced funding for this kind of thing then you should shut the fuck up.
Just because he's a black democrat doesn't mean that every bad thing that happens is his fault. I know it's hard for you to understand.
This is the "change" we voted for?
Ha! I voted for the "more war" candidate with the Alaskan Barbie Doll.
My understanding is that they become involved in various crimes requiring DNA analysis when local/state agencies need their services. FBI agents don't do the footwork, but their lab is used.
37 CFR 202.1:
Material not subject to copyright.
The following are examples of works not subject to copyright and applications for registration of such works cannot be entertained:
...
(e) Typeface as typeface.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
>>The economy is shit precisely because of intellectual property. China will never buy IP - why would they? They can pirate all they want as US police have no jurisdiction. So anyone who produces IP, instead of things that can be exported, represents a net loss of wealth to the country - they take money *only* from other Americans, while spending that money all over the world.
They do spend a considerable amount keeping the US economy afloat with cash that we gave them. Exactly who is at fault? They for taking it or U.S. for giving it away?
I'm just not intellectual enough to be able to understand why we are starting to place less value on humans just like our "trading partners".
Personally, I'll put even less value on human ideas than on the people themselves. Just my 2 cents (or whatever in yuan).......
You may not want to be found. Once "rescued", you'll be throw into jail to be ass raped by the convicts.
The works themselves are not property. What is property is the copyright.
A distinction without a difference since you can't have a copyright on a non-existent work. The copyright is what grants ownership of the work. You sell the copyright and you have effectively sold the ownership of the work.
So no, the argument is not whether ideas can be property. Even those who support copyright, if knowledgeable about the Constitution and the law, do not claim that ideas are property.
Ideas certainly can be and are property in a practical sense. If I have an implementation of an idea and you are restricted from copying my implementation of that idea, voila - the idea is de-facto property for at least some circumstances. Same thing with a patent. The Lord of the Rings or Winnie the Pooh are ideas and you'd be hard pressed to convince me that they are not property under our current laws.
Whether that is a good thing or not is a separate issue. While it's admirably idealistic to want to abolish copyright and patents I have yet to see anyone argue against copyright or patents who has a solution for the free rider problem. Solve the free rider problem and we can do away with intellectual property. Plus you can collect your Nobel prize in economics. Until then, copyright and patents are sort of the least worst situation albeit in drastic need of reform.
Abduct people, and force them to download your MP3's and warez for you. You know they won't be looking for them...
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
Corporate citizens more important than actual citizens.
Impounded bootleg film at 11.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
So, "Without a Trace" would now be "Without a License". A thrilling hunt through thousands of wiretaps to prove that Little Johnny did indeed torrent "2012"!
...ever heard of HTML entities? Forget it, just type < when you want <, okay?
$ make available
Score: 0, Troll
Given that I'm vexingly ambivalent whether your username is icing on the irony, this level meta-irony at least is going way over my head ;)
There's several different options for posting HTML on Slashdot. Learn them and save yourself much heartache:
Plain Old Text: This is for when you want to add tags occasionally to emphasize something. Your get checked, passed through as text, and have your linebreaks turned into proper HTML <p> tags.
HTML: requires you to write your own <p> and <br/> tags (handles lists better than Plain Old Text mode).
Extrans: escapes all < signs and > and & signs for you, uses <br> tags to create line breaks. Use this when you want your <sarcasm> tags to show without having to think about how it does it.
And remember to hit preview.
How about just typing < when I want <??
The FBI exists to protect profits. In fact the government exists to protect commerce, the very basis of our society
In the American federal system, tracking down missing persons is traditionally a local and state responsibility, prosecuting economic and property crimes that have a national and constitutiobal dimension a federal responsibility.
The FBI has 60 active Kidnapping and Missing Persons Investigations
This may give a clearer idea of how small the FBI role in such cases really is.
I think most people here voted for Obama/Biden
That implies you think most people on slashdot are liberals. That's incorrect. Every political poll we've had shows that there's roughly an equal amount of liberals and conservatives on slashdot, both of them heavily outnumbered by the libertarians.
Most people on slashdot voted for Ron Paul on the primaries, and probably didn't vote at all when he didn't get nominated. That's what I did, after all the choice of Obama vs. McCain is like the choice of who would you most want to rape you in the ass. The answer is, "no, thanks." That said, there aren't enough nerds in the country to make a difference in the election (as proven by the fact that Ron Paul came nowhere near to winning). We're not to blame for the current government, we definitely did not get who we voted for.
FBI | prioritizes | copyright over missing persons
Quick, where is RMS? Can we arrange to have a copyleft GPL over missing persons? How do you copyright something that by definition is not there? Do they have a symbol for missing persons that they copyrighted? :)
Organization: alphabetical, sometimes numerical or messy
How does finding rapists and prosecuting them help corporate profits and the economy at large?
Rape is almost never prosecuted in the federal courts.
It is extraordinarilly rare for any crime of violence to be prosecuted in the federal courts.
What you are really asking for is a national forensic lab and a massive DNA database managed by the FBI.
I have just an inkling that he was being sarcastic and being a narrator for big corporations' actual motives.
Missing people don't contribute to re-election campaigns.
Have gnu, will travel.
Welcome to The United Corporations of America
Actually, it's a reference to electronic signal integrity. Prior to getting fed up with /. moderators' habit of flagging "Troll" on anything remotely sarcastic and changing my sig line appropriately, it was "FR-4 is the root of all evil."
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
Obviously commercial forces join together And continually let the FBI know who contributes big bucks to officials. Justice is for sale in more ways than one.
Of course. Most of these missing persons were just a drain on the economy anyway. The victims of copyright infringement, on the other hand, are the only people producing anything in this country anymore.
The Wired article doesn't even suggest that the backlog in missing persons cases is due to prioritizing copyright over people. Indeed, it suggests that the backlog is due to information management and civil rights issues. What it does state is that the FBI is giving priority to "case completion" which (the last I heard) is notoriously low for missing persons. So the question is, would you rather the FBI prioritize cases that can never be solved over those that can be solved?
Don't get me wrong: I don't like the notion of prioritizing non-violent crime over violent crime. On the other hand, it is absurd to allow several criminals escape the justice system because the FBI is neutered by prioritizing crimes with low case completion rates.
Although I enjoy the comments and the expected rhetoric from this thread, there is an important trend that should be emphasized: This is, and should be called 'State Sponsored Espionage' - The FBI and other government organizations have been directed to do something about a new threat. Land, Sea, Air, and now Net, are areas of major concern. Secondly, if you talk to your local FBI agent that is associated with cyber crime, a huge percentage of their time is spent on.. Hunting down pedophiles. Since the chess game is in motion, I would prefer my tax dollars being spent on Knight, Queen, and Rook moves, rather than they day-to-day pawn moves. Strategically we need to be adjusting to this new defense model. (ref. Black Hat 2010 Keynote from retired general) (Notice I left out Bishop as a key move to avoid all the potential comment references to Catholic priests....)
Yeah, no shit. Is it really that hard to write some code that looks to see if it's a valid HTML tag (like <i>), and if it isn't (like </sarcasm>), go ahead and print it as-is?
INCORRECT:
The FBI is NOT prioritizing copyright over missing persons.
CORRECT:
The FBI has a backlog of missing person DNA to run in the DNA labs.
The FBI is increasing the amount of manpower assigned to copyright.
I don't know how much the FBI should spend at all on copyright, but it is a bit of a stretch to take the current facts and say that copyright is prioritized over missing persons.
The FBI, by virtue of their administrative actions, is defacto prioritizing copyright over missing persons, while offering little to no actual OFFICIAL statements to either confirm or deny the apparent facts as they stand.
There, fixed that for you.
Oh, and by the way, your Bureau supervisor may STRONGLY suggest you should get back to work with your already oversized caseload. Those copyright cases won't solve themselves, y'know.
People love blaming inherited problems on the person currently in power. Just watch Fox News. No, not for news, but to see how someone can spin anything to blame the wrong party, and then have die hard followers repeating the same garbage.
I only include Fox News because they are one of many sources that do the same thing. The list of counterproductive spin doctors is far too long to list.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
It is inevitable for government and government agencies in capitalist systems to eventually give priority to 'preferred' citizens ; corporations. Profits over people. The irony is that, in capitalist systems, those preferred citizens always pay less and less taxes increasingly.
Read radical news here
Pretty sure this wasn't the result of Obama.
He did pick Joe Biden as his VP, though.
May be HTML 6 will have a sarcasm tag ....
I'm much more funny, interesting and insightful than the moderators think
Just because the money is not being given to the FBI for this, does not mean the federal government has spent any less. I work for a non profit that provides forensic services training, lab auditing, etc and also runs the national missing and unidentified persons database (http://namus.gov) and we have nearly doubled in size in the last two years. By providing these services to the local and state police offices, they become more effective at the prosecution of rape and missing persons cases and allow the FEDERAL police to focus on crimes that cross state lines.
I don't particularly support the *AAs, but this kinda makes sense. IP cases are more likely to cross state lines than rape/missing persons. Local and state agencies have the tools to co-operatively prosecute cases now that didn't exist three years ago. I'm not outraged by this news.
Didn't south park do this one?
http://www.southparkstudios.co.uk/clips/sp_vid_255332/
The notion of tangible property existed long before organized coercion (what we now call "government"). It is a product of human nature, not government, and is honored by the vast majority of human beings in the absence of threat or coercion. Even animals understand the notion of personal property, although they don't respect other animals' property on the same level as we do.
The notion of intellectual property, on the other hand, certainly did not arise from human nature and certainly did not exist before organized coercion. This is the fundamental difference which completely sinks your theory.
When someone you care about is missing, rather than going to the FBI who would tell you they have no time to spend on that, go to the RIAA and tell them that person was last seen ripping music CDs and uploading the MP3s to bittorrent. Within half an hour, the FBI will be on a massive manhunt to find them.
And remember to hit preview.
How can I forgot to hit preview? It's required before you can post the comment.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
to follow the money?
Si vis pacem, para bellum! For evil to succeed good men need only do nothing!
"see how someone can spin anything to blame the wrong party"
See how Fox News can spin anything to blame the Democratic Party, only getting it half right.
(there, fixed that for you)
Well I have no problem paying for my music or movies. Mostly I buy indie stuff now days and used CDs as I suspect many people do. Could be that's why their sales are down. If they were more interested in producing a quality product at a reasonable price perhaps their profits would increase. Welcome to capitalism. You don't provide me with the product I want at the price I want to pay, and I don't buy your product. I do take issue with my tax dollars being used to protect corporations over our citizens. You do see the distinction do you not? Piracy sucks, but is stamping out piracy more important than finding kids that have been abducted? Think about it. Not only that, the idea that we're ever going to be rid of piracy is a fantasy. In high schools all over the US you've got teenaged kids that buy an album and burn a copy for 100 of their closest friends. Those friends can subsequently make copies for their friends, and so on. No IP address. No public evidence. How are you going to stop that? You might as well go piss in the wind. Sure the Internet makes it easy, but people have been making illegal copies of music since the 60s, and probably even longer than that. The feds have better things to do than protecting the media industry.
I don't believe in karma, I just call it like I see it.
So, the FBI doesn't care about missing PEOPLE. They only care about large corporations. And it's a good bet that large corporations don't really care if their own people go missing either, they just find someone else to fill those shoes.
So here's a great opportunity for all of us. Let's start putting bullets in CEOs, RIAA officials, etc., and make them go "missing". The FBI won't do anything about it, large corporations won't do anything about it, but, it will send a clear signal to the PEOPLE in those large corporations.
And just think about the huge cottage industry that could be built in providing security to all those scared CEOs and RIAA officials. Imagine if every high-priced lawyer needed an armored Mercedes and three guys that look like Vin Diesel just to get to work every day. Imagine if gated communities became armored, metal-plated, machine gun emplacemented, armed camps.
American could get to work again, and there'd be a lot more economic equality by providing a huge security industry that works to protect the rich from all the people that want to kill them.
All thanks to the FBI enforcing copyrights. How ironic watching people gunned down in the streets while the FBI officer handcuffs the Chinese girl selling DVDs for $5... Wait, this sounds like a pretty good script for a movie...
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
*He* would have nabbed all those civil rights leaders who've been kidnapping our citizens!
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Clearly, the solution is for the parents of missing children to copyright their children's DNA. The FBI will be all over it then...
--- Generation X: The first generation to have SIG lines inferior to their parents... ---
What if they use letters cut out of a newspaper? Does that count as fair use?
Funny, I seem to recall all sorts of democrats actively demonizing the administration just a few years ago. Every single bad thing that happened was automatically attributed to Bush, regardless of wether or not it was true. Oh, but now that the democrats are in power, that's suddenly unacceptable. How dare you criticize Obama for anything! Don't you know that any good that has happened is solely his doing, and anything bad is due to outside influences he cannot hope to control?
Wake up. The "current administration" will ALWAYS be held accountable for what's happening in the country. It might not be fair, but it IS part of the job. And just because the president didn't cause a problem doesn't mean he has no responsibility to SOLVE the problem. As Truman said, "The buck stops here."
After all, Obama did ride into office promising "change."
People love blaming inherited problems on the person currently in power.
The President (any President, any party) is head of the Executive Branch of Government. The head of the FBI answers to the President, making him ultimately responsible for what the FBI does or does not do.
Now, if Congress was responsible for the changes and he didn't veto it, he's still responsible. I didn't vote for the FBI head, I voted for who would be his boss. The buck stops with him. This is indeed squarely on Obama's shoulders.
Free Martian Whores!
When you file a missing persons report just tell them the missing person is a pirate, that should solve this problem.
That's all it is. Mike going fap fap fap, and taking offense when you call him on it. He's an ass and I don't know why anyone still links to his articles here on /.
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
What do people expect when Vice President Joe Biden is pro-MP-RIAA?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
So were the Germans. In 1943 Hitler himself ordered the execution of Italians on the Greek Island of Cephalonia who surrendered to the allied forces. In what became known as the Cephalonia Massacre the German military commenced the "Weeklong Massacre of the Acqui Division" of Italians. Soldiers didn't even have to surrender, Germans went around rounding them up.
The US itself has done more than enough backstabbing. The US has broken a number of treaties it has signed. It has supported right wing dictators and coups against democratic governments when it felt like it. And it has supported mass murderers and genocide. Both Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr supported Saddam Hussein, even as he was ordering the use of WMDs against not just Iranians but Iraqis too.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
People love blaming inherited problems on the person currently in power.
It is easy, and true, to blame this administration for this. VP Joe Biden is pro-MAFIA, er MP-RI/AA.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I used to think that.
Few of us will be so fortunate as to live even a hundred years in relatively good health.
I haven't reached 50 years of life yet, and I don't care if I don't live another year. At least not how my life is now.
A person who lives in Bohemian semi-poverty but is rich in friends, ideas, and experiences is wiser than a friendless man who accumulates wealth so vast it can't be experienced except as an abstraction.
But who is richer, the Bohemian or the wealthy person who uses the money to encourage and grow ideas and experiences making friends along the way?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
People love blaming inherited problems on the person currently in power.
The President (any President, any party) is head of the Executive Branch of Government. The head of the FBI answers to the President, making him ultimately responsible for what the FBI does or does not do.
Now, if Congress was responsible for the changes and he didn't veto it, he's still responsible. I didn't vote for the FBI head, I voted for who would be his boss. The buck stops with him. This is indeed squarely on Obama's shoulders.
I agree that the current administration is responsible for what the FBI does on their watch, and they should be directing it to deal with more important issues and ensuring it has the resources to do so. That said, for many people, these kinds of things are left to fester until someone they don't like is in charge, either in the presidency or in Congress. If they're blaming Obama now, were they blaming Bush when this problem existed under his administration too, or vice versa? And will they blame the next administration that they support when it continues these policies?
What's worse is that once the people they don't support are out of office, they often no longer raise the issue with the administration that they do support. Wouldn't want to embarrass them or call for any sort of accountability I guess.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Even those who support copyright, if knowledgeable about the Constitution and the law, do not claim that ideas are property.
But some of those who support patents do think ideas are property, especially software patents.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
It also justifies writing off a hostage to capture a criminal.
Except some, though maybe not all, of the USA's Founding Fathers thought it was better to free 10 criminals than to falsely punish an innocent.
The are some seriously unpleasant court cases and laws out there.
And again the Founding Fathers thought jury nullification, in which a jury tells the government a law is bad or can not be enforced, was important. John Adams wrote in his diary on 12 February 1771:
"...As the constitution requires that the popular branch of the legislature should have an absolute check, so as to put a peremptory negative upon every act of the government, it requires that the common people, should have as complete a control, as decisive as the negative, in every judgment of a court of judicature...."
"...It was never yet disputed or doubted that a general verdict, given under the direction of the court in point of law, was a legal determination of the issue. Therefore, the jury have a power of deciding an issue, upon a general verdict. And, if they have, is it not an absurdity to suppose that the law would oblige them to find a verdict according to the direction of the court, against their own opinion, judgment, and conscience?"
"...Now, should the melancholy case arise that the judges should give their opinions to the jury against one of these fundamental principles, is a juror obliged to give his verdict generally, according to this direction, or even to find the fact specially, and submit the law to the court? Every man, of any feeling or conscience, will answer, no. It is not only his right, but his duty,...to find the verdict according to his own best understanding, judgment, and conscience, though in direct opposition to the direction of the court...."
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
As far back as the Franklin Roosevelt administration, in 1933, when it looked for a minute like the US government might actually start putting people ahead of corporate interests, a group of men, owners of some of our largest industries, including the grandfather of George W. Bush plotted to over throw and replace him with a pro-corporate Fascist regime.
Except FRD and Benito Mussolini copied each other. Some question whether FDR's New Deal was Based on Fascism. Il Duce wrote FDR with appreciation and congradulated him for winning his 1932 election.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
megacorps trying to corner the market (look at agribusiness and food stamps or defense contractors and defense spending) still have an amazingly strong, if not strict fascist, grip on government spending.
Sure farm subsidies and defense spending goes to corporations but food stamps have nothing to do with corporate fascism. Individual people get food stamps not corporations and they can use them wherever food stamps are accepted.
The rest of this anti-capitalist/free market rant doesn't show any more knowledge or reasoning either.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Ah, another person who fell for the fable that liberals are getting elected. Not one Liberal has been elected president since the 1800s. Then again said enough tymes people start believing lies, like liberals are for big government. They then spread those same lies. The fact is is that the closest the US has to liberals today are libertarians.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
As I'm not a partisan, I tend to be annoyed by all of them. Clinton was a good president IMO (I voted against him for his first term, voted for his reelection), but Waco and Ruby Ridge pretty much pissed me off. Nevertheless, the Republicans and their impeachment proceedings over a blow job was just plain obscene. A person's adultery is nobody's business outside their own families.
I was hopeful for Obama's promised change, but it doesn't appear to be happening. If the Pirate Party ever gets a foothold here I just might become a partisan.
Free Martian Whores!
"Hey Vinny, we caught this guy on the computer. He wasn't trying to call for help, he was downloading .mp3s. You want me to toss him back in the basement?"
How can I forgot to hit preview? It's required before you can post the comment.
N ot if you use the old posting mode.
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.