Critics Call For Probe Into Google Government Ties

bonch writes "The National Legal and Policy Center has written to the House Oversight Committee to investigate alleged ties between Google and the Obama administration, specifically with regards to the closure of an FTC probe into Google's Wi-Fi privacy breach, when the company admitted to having collected users' unencrypted information over the course of three years. The NLPC compares Google's relationship with the administration to that of Halliburton and cites the timing of a $30,000-a-head Democratic fundraiser at Google CEO Marissa Meyer's home less than a week before the FTC ended its inquiry, where Obama made a personal appearance, as well as the fact that US deputy chief technology officer Andrew McLaughlin is a former Google employee. The NLPC further alleges that the FTC is tougher on other companies, issuing fines to Twitter and Sears for their privacy violations while letting Google off the hook after the company promised to improve its privacy practices."

Comments

Same Obama administration

[Enderandrew]

Is this the same Obama administration that threatened Google with an anti-trust trial and breaking Google up if they landed a search deal with Yahoo, but said they'd allow Microsoft to buy-out Yahoo?

I wouldn't say the administration has been particularly pro-Google.

Re:Same Obama administration

[drinkypoo]

Good points. I'd also counter with a request for a probe into the former administration's ties to Microsoft. Why exactly did the DoJ find that Microsoft had illegally exploited their monopoly position and then let them go with nothing more than an admonition?

Re:Same Obama administration

[gad_zuki!]

The real issue, and whats missing from the summary, is that the NLPC is a conservative organization (look at its list of targets) and as such is biased against Democrats. Now that the GOP has power in the House to start investigations, you'll start seeing a lot of frivolous attacks on Obama that they hope will lead into a Whitewater-like investigation which leads to more investigations until something sticks. More than a couple GOP politicians has stated that taking Obama down is a priority. The next two years will be full of these accusations, but we wont see much about connections between the GOP leader and big oil or big tobacco (Boehner famously handed out Tobacco lobbyist checks on the House floor), etc.

Corruption is not partisan, but I have a feeling the "energized" conservative base is going to dominate the discussion with an avalanche of complaints - frivolous or not. Anything to get a foot in the door for investigations and to try to paint the other guys as the shameless corporatists.

Re:Same Obama administration

[mcgrew]

An article I found says

"Like Halliburton in the previous administration, Google has an exceptionally close relationship with the [Obama White House]," NLPC Chariman Kenneth Boehm wrote in a letter to the House obtained by The Hill.

Google's relationship with the Obama administration is nothing like Cheney and Halliburton. I mean, has Biden or Obama held large amounts of Google stock like Cheney and Bush held stock in Halliburton?

I don't remember anybody calling for an investigantion into Cheney and Halliburton during the Bush administration.

This is more like the Bush ties to Microsoft; the Bush Justice Department pretty much let MS off the hook after Clinton had them by the balls. I didn't see any investigantions into that, either.

This smells to me like nothing more than dirty politics; kind of like Clinton's forty million dollar blow job.

Re:Same Obama administration

[spun]

Wait, wait, wait. Blowjobs are going for $40 million a pop? Looks like I picked the wrong line of work!

Re:Same Obama administration

[vvaduva]

Wow, so you actually really believe these threats made before the general public were for real? Did they do anything, or did they just leak some press statements to manipulate people like you into thinking they care?

Re:Same Obama administration

[hey!]

Look for a lot, lot more calls for the House to investigate the Obama administration. The new majority in the House will not be able to pass any of its program, but it will have the subpoena power to make political theater. With enough smoke, some voters will believe there's fire.

Re:Same Obama administration

[Enderandrew]

http://www.factcheck.org/kerry_ad_falsely_accuses_cheney_on_halliburton.html

Actually, that is a common misconception. Cheney never got donations from Halliburton when in office, and they pledged to take any profits from their stock options and donate them to charity.

However, it certainly could be that Cheney took care of his old buddies that he knew in a company he used to work for. But he didn't necessarily directly profit from it.

Re:Same Obama administration

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, they have a former Google employee! I'd say hang them all, and bring back the VP who got a long visit from the MS CEO just before the gov't decided to let MS off the hook. Now that was a government that had no insiders.

Re:Same Obama administration

[mcgrew]

You and I paid the forty million; that was the cost of the investigation into his blow job.

Re:Same Obama administration

[spun]

Fuck, now you are telling me I did all these mouth stretches for nothing? Damn it.

Re:Same Obama administration

[Anonymous Coward]

Another way of looking at it - Google was never really interested in the deal so they used their contacts to do this?

Re:Same Obama administration

[sumdumass]

Google's relationship with the Obama administration is nothing like Cheney and Halliburton. I mean, has Biden or Obama held large amounts of Google stock like Cheney and Bush held stock in Halliburton?

Neither Cheney nor Bush held large amounts of stocks in halliburton that would benefit them. Your claim otherwise here is either made out of ignorance or complete malice.

I don't remember anybody calling for an investigantion into Cheney and Halliburton during the Bush administration.

You must have a selective memory or are making statements out of malice again.

This is more like the Bush ties to Microsoft; the Bush Justice Department pretty much let MS off the hook after Clinton had them by the balls. I didn't see any investigations into that, either.

And as far as I know of, there weren't any fundraisers hosted by Microsoft or it's CEOs in the weeks leading up to the Bush administrations relaxation of antitrust prosecution on Microsoft. Something else you are leaving out of this is that the court ultimately approves of and made the ruling in the MS antitrust case. A court is a separate body from the administration entirely. This is notable here because it wasn't a court, it was a department under the administration that directly regulates the perceived actions. This is before another branch of the government (the courts) even begins to take it up. So no, it's not like the Bush ties to Microsoft that don't exist outside of your head.

This smells to me like nothing more than dirty politics; kind of like Clinton's forty million dollar blow job.

Ah.. So here is the truth. Your just a complete and total tool, a useful idiot who can't tell the difference between lying under oath and what the lie was about. This makes much more sense now. First you make shit up, take it out of context, then attempt to bury it in someone else that's completely out of context. Well, good for you, you are probably one of the most useful idiots out there.

Re:Same Obama administration

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, that worked so well for them against Clinton, didn't it?

Re:Same Obama administration

[hey!]

Well it did work for them. It cost them *electoral* victory, but shifting the focus of political discourse toward the personal got them the policies they wanted.

Re:Same Obama administration

[Chicken04GTO]

I don't remember anybody calling for an investigantion into Cheney and Halliburton during the Bush administration.

Where you on another planet?

Agree ... but

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I am concerned, most big companies are in bed with US govt. Look at what Microsoft has gotten away with.
Haliburton anyone?

Why single out Google here?

AC

Re:Agree ... but

[Pojut]

Pretty much. The United States of Corporations is alive and well!

Re:Agree ... but

[bonch]

Why single out Google here?

What do you mean, singling them out? This is a technology site, so technology companies like Google are often the topic of discussion.

Re:Agree ... but

[spun]

Why single out Google here?

What do you mean, singling them out? This is a technology site, so technology companies like Google are often the topic of discussion.

Read your own sig, then you tell us what you think he means.

what

[Anonymous Coward]

The NLPC compares Google's relationship with the administration to that of Halliburton

Exactly how many unnecessary and costly (both in terms of money and lives) wars has Google profited off thus far?

Re:what

[Anonymous Coward]

Think about it. Every single war that has existed they've profited off of. Even ones before Halliburton was created.

Political Parties = "Which Industry"

[TaoPhoenix]

So it's big news if Google has ties with the administration but it's just fine for an army of ex-RIAA critters to be nominated to high posts?

Re:Political Parties = "Which Industry"

[PietjeJantje]

Yes it is big news if Google has ties with the administration, which is a good thing as we should not want that, and because some corrupted Google employers and fans think that any such criticism can be simply disposed of by pointing to an entity everyone hates, and mod such redirections as "Insightful". I'll probably be the "Troll". I guess you excuse murder, because O.J. got away with it, or, less dramatic, speeding, because not everyone gets a ticket. I find it despicable you failed to say anything about the actual corporate ties, and are only interested in battling the criticism, with stuff which is irrelevant like mentioning O.J. in a murder trial. In the meantime, I wonder if you voted Biden, and thus the RIAA into government? That would make you the ultimate hypocrite. In any case, it gets confusing. Google says vote Democrats, which means vote RIAA, but we can't criticize, because the RIAA is in government? Uhhhhmm.. make up your mind.

Re:Political Parties = "Which Industry"

[bonch]

Yes, it's big news if Google has ties with the administration, and no, it's not fine for an army of ex-RIAA critters to be nominated to high posts. Next question?

Re:Political Parties = "Which Industry"

[TaoPhoenix]

Hmm, your reply is rather aggressive.

My original post was a remark about differing media coverage. I took this article's tone to sound "shocked" that an information-based corporation might have ties with the government. Wasn't the success of the X-Files all about the government's secret ties to information sources?

For your second line, I don't excuse murder, I am upset at the flaws in the system that allows events like that to happen. Re: "Speeding", every driver's ed course says "compare to the flow of traffic". If the road is a long-haul one, you can actually cause trouble by cruise-controlling exactly at the speed limit.

Yes, it would be fun to elect the President and the VP *independently* and let them figure each other out during their term. For now, we're stuck with Two-Pairs-Of-Two so voting Anti-Republican was the best I could do.

Re:Political Parties = "Which Industry"

[PietjeJantje]

Yes, excellent, but what about google's ties with government? Look at the title of this topic. Me, when I'm about to get a speeding ticket, I always try to talk about anything but the speeding. I just talk about the RIAA and the aggressive attitude of the officer.

Re:Political Parties = "Which Industry"

[PietjeJantje]

I bet you're not going to cover those ties, which proves you a morally corrupted twat.

I'm glad...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad they included Halliburton (and oil companies?) and it's ties with previous administrations in the complaint. My only question is, where were the probes on those relationships? One more: is it possible for this kind of junk to ever actually end?

The Underground Twinkie Syndicate at Work Again

[eldavojohn]

As clear as the rigged elections keeping the Mennonites out of representation in Congress, this Google/Government link is one very deep rabbit hole. In the 80s and 90s, a series of books and movies gave the Twinkie empire a bad wrap. Hostess, Lil' Debbie and a number of other producers put together a syndicate that now only has meetings behind closed doors once a year in a hotel in Germany. The top people all attend.

Sure, some less powerful people like Barack Obama and various world leaders attend but they're really just an audience for what is decided. Back when "Google" was getting its start, Larry and Sergey were actually installed by the Twinkie Syndicate to archive and modify all movies and books online to reflect Twinkies as a healthy, natural alternative to apples and other competing products. In doing so they restored order and the Twinkies once again began to flow.

This action, of course, was backed by the Corn Growers Association and the European based "Society for a Stupider, Fatter America" -- the same people responsible for the advent of Christianity in the Americas as well as cream.

Sure there were some unexpected side effects like GMail and Android ... but these were just a means to an end. Nothing bad can be said of Twinkies in e-mail nor could you text something bad about Twinkies.

Don't be surprised if you hear news reports of my body found floating in the Potomac ... with a Twinkie obstructing my throat.

Re:The Underground Twinkie Syndicate at Work Again

[zarthrag]

Pssst, I found some evidence to support what you're saying. It's a conspiracy and we shouldn't trust ANYONE! Check out this story they planted.... http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/index.html?hpt=T2

What's up with all these black suburbans? One sec while I answer the door...

Re:The Underground Twinkie Syndicate at Work Again

[Attila Dimedici]

But what about the Milk Marketing Board?

Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[aGuyNamedJoe]

Let me guess, "The National Legal and Policy Center" is a non-profit organization able to accept donations without needing to reveal the donors, isn't it? Probably with absolutely no political agenda.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[just_another_sean]

Let me guess, "The National Legal and Policy Center" is a non-profit organization able to accept donations without needing to reveal the donors, isn't it? Probably with absolutely no political agenda.

I bet they get most of their funding from Mark Zuckerburg.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[Sonny Yatsen]

From Wikipedia:

The National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) is a right-leaning 501(c)(3) non-profit group that monitors and reports on the ethics of public officials, supporters of liberal causes, and labor unions in the United States.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Legal_and_Policy_Center

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[icebike]

FAIL!

Quoting Wiki on anything even remotely political earns you 30 days in the corner wearing your Dunce hat.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[Bigjeff5]

I can get behind that. Wikipedia really is shit for anything political or otherwise controversial. It's really only useful for shit no one cares about.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[m509272]

So if they reported the facts accurately should it be discounted because they have a "right" orientation? I guess if Wikileaks reported on it, it would be more ok? Why are you trying to discredit the source if these are known, undisputed facts which are easily discountable if false?

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[rev_sanchez]

This is just one of the first few calls for investigations by the likes of Darrell Issa who recently asked that the House have "7 hearings a week times 40 weeks" investigating the executive branch. It's just like Clinton/Whitewater thing but with even less merit.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[Anonymous Coward]

Mark me troll all you want guys, meta-moderation's got my back!

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[RightSaidFred99]

"Some Obama fan"? This place is crawling with them. I'm surprised nobody's whipped out that ridiculous "wtf has obama done" website. That site makes me laugh. I mean printing a laundry list of shitty legislation in no context or with no mention of the actual impact it's had? Seriously?

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[oh_my_080980980]

This is good too

The Corporate Integrity Project as stated on the NLPC website "seeks to promote integrity in corporate governance, including honesty and fair play in relationships with shareholders, employees, business partners and customers." It does so by:

*Combating practices that undermine the free enterprise system, including philanthropic giving to groups hostile to a free economy.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[euroq]

This is one of those cases which happen often in Slashdot conversations where one should read the article instead of speculating (the original post on the nlpc.org website). You are absolutely correct that, by merit of being right leaning, does not make an article discountable. However, the guy who wrote the article talks about how Google collected URLs, e-mails, and passwords, and its credibility is "shredded". This is a clear misrepresentation of what Google Street View actually did. It claims the "scandal" is one of the most serious issues of privacy, wiretapping, and campaign financing. The author is actually claiming that Google has been capturing and storing your personal information illegally, which is absolutely not true. I don't have the references on me now, but basically the Street View program just used hotspot points to triangulate location data. So, the source does not have known, undisputed facts, in fact it is wrong.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[bonch]

So, their political affiliation somehow refutes the accusations? Are you saying someone of a particular political viewpoint can't investigate someone else with a different political viewpoint? Checks and balances are a good thing.

I get that Slashdotters are utterly in love with Google, but let's not get silly here. The company has been very cozy with the administration, and when the president himself is showing up at people's houses days before FTC inquiries are dismissed, it's something that should be checked into, if only out of principal.

I have to say, I really find it interesting how eager people here were for Microsoft to get investigated all the time, but when Google faces the threat of inquiry, it's suddenly a bad thing. Google is no better than Microsoft, seriously. They're both just technology companies out to make money.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[anyGould]

I suppose we should give them some credit for not even bothering to pretend to monitor conservative causes?

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[bonch]

Well, that settles it, guys. Wikipedia says they're "right-leaning," so we can dismiss all the accusations outright. No investigation needed. Whew! For a second there, I was worried Google might be viewed in a critical light.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[icebraining]

Each piece has a link to an article about it. What more do you want?

For example, "Created more private sector jobs in 2010 than during entire Bush years" links to http://newsjunkiepost.com/2010/10/08/its-official-more-private-sector-jobs-created-in-2010-than-during-entire-bush-years/, which has plenty of data and an analysis about the subject (correct or incorrect, I have no idea).

"Signed New START Treaty - nuclear arms reduction pact with Russia" links to http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/world/europe/09prexy.html?_r=2, which not only reports about the specific meeting, but gives a insight about the US pass history with Russia in terms of armament.

Regardless of Obama's record - I don't know if he's a good president, and I don't really care anyway - the site seems decent.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[poity]

Looks like a moderate like me, who happened to like Obama more than any other 2008 candidate, deserves a -1 troll for pointing out the laughable and fallacious thinking that underlies shooting-the-messenger type of ad hominem attacks that are so predictable in any article critical of Democrats. Because saying so makes it obvious I'm a conservative wacko. I used to come here because Slashdot was a place of critical thought, it was a rung far up from the likes dkos and freep, and far less susceptible to the group think in alternet and digg. Guess that time has gone.

Re:Just another non-profit, I'm sure

[darien.train]

I've never followed a posters comments on his own story until today because you're so obviously the biggest troll ever. Your statements contradict each other and no matter what a sensible commenter does to refute your points you keep up your inane refrain of bias and Democrat love and the claim nobody's refuting your points.

but when Google faces the threat of inquiry

Google was not only threatened with an inquiry, an inquiry was actually made! Imagine that! Said inquiry said there isn't evidence of theft or wrongdoing so no charges are made. It's easy to imagine that charges were dropped as the information they collected was publicly broadcast over unsecured networks. It's a much more plausible explanation than conspiracy but I assume you will continue to project your bias issues on everyone else.

And ?

[unity100]

where the fuck these people were during bush era, and why didnt they call any inquiry to bush administrations BLATANT dealings with haliburton ?

Re:And ?

[kwerle]

where the fuck these people were during bush era, and why didnt they call any inquiry to bush administrations BLATANT dealings with haliburton ?

In office?

Re:And ?

[erroneus]

They were participating in those deals. They had no interesting in bringing their own dirty dealings out into the light.

Re:And ?

[clarkkent09]

Are you saying that if the US president gets a company off the hook because, if the allegation is correct, they contributed money to him, it is ok as long as the previous president did the same thing? Plenty of people did call attention to Bush admin. dealings with Halliburton. These guys happen to be calling out Obama's dealings with Google.

Re:And ?

[Anonymous Coward]

The same place you are during the Obama era....

Re:And ?

[oh_my_080980980]

Because that was good business!

Re:And ?

[DerekLyons]

Congratulations on waking up from your coma (and to the people who modded you up too).

When you've had a chance to actually catch up on the events of the Bush years, you'll find many people in fact *did* call for such inquiries.

Re:And ?

[unity100]

im asking about notable organizations, corporations, think thanks, 'science' groups. not ordinary citizens.

Re:And ?

[Silver Surfer 1]

Haliburton Smalaburton...

This myth has gone on for so long that one wonders why no one can see the obvious.

During Papa Bush 4 years Haliburton was presented as a right wing bogyman by the political left.

During the 8 years of Clinton/Cigar dudes rule who do you think held all those no bid contracts, yes Haliburton.

Than the ebil Bush/Cheney empire we had for 8 years and more Haliburton! Oh noes!!?

Now 2 years into teh 0nes! rule and who holds all those no bid contracts? Yeah, Haliburton.

What is the political left doing to replace teh ebil Haliburton corp?

Nothing...

Re:And ?

[unity100]

During the 8 years of Clinton/Cigar dudes rule who do you think held all those no bid contracts, yes Haliburton.

during the 8 yeras of clinton/cigar dudes, congress and senate was at the hands of republicans. the right.

Re:And ?

[DerekLyons]

In other words, you've made up your mind and facts need not apply.

Get the fuck over yourself. Grow the fuck up.

Re:And ?

[unity100]

or, in other words, you cannot realize that there is heaps of difference in between random people saying something around the net, or notable organizations doing it.

get a fucking clue.

Re:And ?

[sumdumass]

Not really. The senate bounced back and forth. However, this is pretty much pointless because the executive branch is what controls the executive, not congress.

Re:And ?

[unity100]

yeah all those senate committees, congress groups do not affect anything. its just administration. like, army awarding the haliburton contracts. obama appoints all staff.

Re:And ?

[sumdumass]

dude, read your fucking constitution and learn how the government operate. Halliburton is not part of the administration's staff and does not need congressional approval. Congress cannot mandate that the president uses a particular company for any particular task. The closest they can come is to prescribe an open bidding process and refuse to allow any government funds to be used for a specific purpose. That hasn't happened with Halliburton.

Re:And ?

[unity100]

im not an american, i dont need to read the fucking constitution. however, ironically, i seem to know more than you that appointments need to be approved, and all the important places in bureaucracy therefore pass from approval by either house, even if appointment is done by administration. and, how each coming administration tries to stuff the bureaucracy with their own men, and how they staff the lower ranks with more of their men. and then how easy it is when you have congress and senate at your hand. you either get the candidate you like, or, they have to bring you a candidate you can minimally accept. under the guise of requiring 'bipartisanship'. and how, after a certain period of time, through that, the bureaucracy shapes policies according to the appointed lot, and even when administration changes, they shape it to their own policy. even to extreme extents like cia or military ignoring obama's orders to stop firing missiles at the first 2 months of his administration. it is a goner that any staffed bureaucrat does their best to cater to the bidding of their leash holders.

this is the way english and american bureaucracies have worked since centuries. in britain it is so solid that for centuries most of their policies remained same.

get a fucking clue.

Re:And ?

[sumdumass]

im not an american, i dont need to read the fucking constitution. however, ironically, i seem to know more than you that appointments need to be approved, and all the important places in bureaucracy therefore pass from approval by either house, even if appointment is done by administration. and, how each coming administration tries to stuff the bureaucracy with their own men, and how they staff the lower ranks with more of their men. and then how easy it is when you have congress and senate at your hand.

Evidently you don't even know what you speaking of yourself. First, it's the administration's right to stack the appointments under him. It's true that they need approval from congress but that's it. The president selects them, submits them, and directs their actions. IF at any time, they didn't want to use Halliburton, they could have stopped. If at any time, they wanted to make it legally required to have a separation between government employees and businesses like Halliburton, they could have by executive policy order as well as asked congress to pass a law. They didn't.

and back to the senate confirmation hearings. It takes a lot more then political bias to disqualify a candidate from approval except for appointments to the courts. For any position in the executive cabinet, a political bias is expected as that's how it was intentionally designed.

his is the way english and american bureaucracies have worked since centuries. in britain it is so solid that for centuries most of their policies remained same.

Outside of your confusion over political bias, you have shown nothing that could have prevented any democrat from stopping the government from using Halliburton. In fact, in Clinton's term, he had all his confirmation hearings for cabinet positions with a democrat congress. The same is true for Obama's. Again, you have showed nothing other then what's in your mind that would have prevented them from doing it.

Re:And ?

[unity100]

Evidently you don't even know what you speaking of yourself. First, it's the administration's right to stack the appointments under him. It's true that they need approval from congress but that's it. The president selects them, submits them, and directs their actions. IF at any time, they didn't want to use Halliburton, they could have stopped. If at any time, they wanted to make it legally required to have a separation between government employees and businesses like Halliburton, they could have by executive policy order as well as asked congress to pass a law. They didn't.

thats it ?


if you bring someone that the other party is totally against, you cannot have it passed. hence, everyone has to pick a candidate that is acceptable by the other party under the guise of 'bipartisanship'. otherwise your candidate gets rejected, and you get into a standoff. that was the way the candidates were selected even by obama, supposedly a very leftist president. candidates are vetted even before they are selected as a lot, through unofficial channels in between the sides. this is the way things work in every country. not only such a situation is detrimental for the administration, but also bad for the image of the country internationally. it never happens, because the ones who appoint never chooses someone who wouldnt get accepted. so its either the approver's candidate, or closest to what they can get.

huh ? democrats won senate at 9 Nov 2006, and biggest halliburton contract was canceled in 31 jul 2006 http://www.alternet.org/story/39567/

in addition stopping a military contract is not a trifle. because of the immense lock-in that occurs due to the military equipment, armies use the same vendor for decades until they can slowly replace their vendor with newly acquired equipment. however as you can see, democrats at least canceled the biggest contract they can cancel.

also, by saying 'you showed nothing', you wont end up invalidating the opposing argument. its self-reinforcement at best.

Re:And ?

[sumdumass]

if you bring someone that the other party is totally against, you cannot have it passed. hence, everyone has to pick a candidate that is acceptable by the other party under the guise of 'bipartisanship'. otherwise your candidate gets rejected, and you get into a standoff. that was the way the candidates were selected even by obama, supposedly a very leftist president. candidates are vetted even before they are selected as a lot, through unofficial channels in between the sides. this is the way things work in every country. not only such a situation is detrimental for the administration, but also bad for the image of the country internationally. it never happens, because the ones who appoint never chooses someone who wouldnt get accepted. so its either the approver's candidate, or closest to what they can get.

When one party holds more then 51% of the senate, any candidate can be approved. There only needs to be a 51% majority to confirm nominations. If you are the president and your party controls more then 50% of the senate, then you can get anyone confirmed as long as the party supports your nomination. No watering down needed.

huh ? democrats won senate at 9 Nov 2006, and biggest halliburton contract was canceled in 31 jul 2006 http://www.alternet.org/story/39567/ [alternet.org]

So what your saying is that the republicans did what the democrats wouldn't. Actually, no that's not what your saying. What you are saying is that you are confused. Halliburton is still in contract with the US government and had been long before Bush was a president. If there was something wrong, Clinton could have changed that and Obama certainly could have too.

in addition stopping a military contract is not a trifle. because of the immense lock-in that occurs due to the military equipment, armies use the same vendor for decades until they can slowly replace their vendor with newly acquired equipment. however as you can see, democrats at least canceled the biggest contract they can cancel.

Actually, Halliburton picked up one of the three logistics contracts that the old contract was broken into. This wasn't as intricate as you are suggesting as Halliburton was providing services that wasn't directly ties into military operations. these services was transportation (not lock in), food and shelter (again, no locking outside caloric requirements).

also, by saying 'you showed nothing', you wont end up invalidating the opposing argument. its self-reinforcement at best.

Actually, a claim was made. Support for that claims needs to be made when it's questioned. He showed nothing means he has not supported the claim at all. So for all we know, it's a wild claim made up on the spot. Just like the claim that a political party having control of the executive and senate couldn't get a confirmation passed without support from an apposing party. If shows ignorant and wrong someone is.

Re:And ?

[unity100]

When one party holds more then 51% of the senate, any candidate can be approved. There only needs to be a 51% majority to confirm nominations. If you are the president and your party controls more then 50% of the senate, then you can get anyone confirmed as long as the party supports your nomination. No watering down needed.

no. with the numbers and conditions for balance u.s. senate has, just flipping 1-2 senators to the other side will change things. as frequently happens. given even the side switches of some senators in the recent years, it is evident that any party can sway a senator to their side even if he doesnt totally switch sides.

So what your saying is that the republicans did what the democrats wouldn't. Actually, no that's not what your saying. What you are saying is that you are confused.

is it ? or, did republicans try to weer off the blame in the last moment before the elections so the mud wouldnt stick, after years of doing business with them.

Halliburton is still in contract with the US government and had been long before Bush was a president. If there was something wrong, Clinton could have changed that and Obama certainly could have too.

yes they are, and they will be contracting a long time too. when an army is locked into equipment, software it is locked into it for a long time. decades.

Actually, Halliburton picked up one of the three logistics contracts that the old contract was broken into. This wasn't as intricate as you are suggesting as Halliburton was providing services that wasn't directly ties into military operations. these services was transportation (not lock in), food and shelter (again, no locking outside caloric requirements).

you apparently havent grasped the concept yet. let me put it in a context; when ussr went poof, turkey wanted to buy soviet equipment to supplement the army, because there were very good purpose specific equipment there. but, after research, it was found that the equipment would be too incompatible with the existing nato standards that, there would be an entire separate chain of supplies, spare parts, qualified personnel would have to be created in order to maintain them. so, the project was canceled.

such is the way with military. you can contract out any kind of lame task like logistics, catering to any given party. but, the more locked in contracts require the same standards. that goes for similar technology bloc too - if you buy eurofighter, you are locked into it for at least two decades.

haliburton didnt sell any aircraft to u.s. but heaven knows what kind of equipment was sold and deals made in secret. due to terms of these, and to get favorable conditions for renewal, it is possible that the administrations to come may have to give them bones here and now, like the smaller bit of logistic contract youre talking about.

youre way too naive and shallow in your thinking of social/political matters. things are not as simple as you make them up to be.

Re:And ?

[sumdumass]

no. with the numbers and conditions for balance u.s. senate has, just flipping 1-2 senators to the other side will change things. as frequently happens. given even the side switches of some senators in the recent years, it is evident that any party can sway a senator to their side even if he doesnt totally switch sides.

And your point is what? I mean it doesn't disprove or remove anything that I said. Maybe your statement may be in the lines more like, "the president can't put just any cuckoo into a position under him as he has to convince his own party to accept them". but if his party controls the senate, he has to do nothing to appease the other party.

is it ? or, did republicans try to weer off the blame in the last moment before the elections so the mud wouldnt stick, after years of doing business with them.

I guess in your rush to pin everything on one side, you are missing the entire point. Halliburton did business with the government long before the republicans were in power and long after they were out. The only blame to assign here is what you have made up in your mind in order to fault the republicans. None of the democrats had attempted to stop Halliburton from doing business with the government outside of spewing crap to incite useful idiots like you. And yes, they have had more then enough opportunity to do something by now.

yes they are, and they will be contracting a long time too. when an army is locked into equipment, software it is locked into it for a long time. decades.

Wrong, there is nothing technically locking the military into using Halliburton outside of it's size and capabilities and Halliburton winning the bids on competitive advantage, not vendor lock ins. You are completely making this crap up as Halliburton never supplied the military with anything that dependent. Halliburton is a mobile services company specializing in oil field services- not a weapons system developer or munitions supplier or anything of the sorts.

you apparently havent grasped the concept yet. let me put it in a context; when ussr went poof, turkey wanted to buy soviet equipment to supplement the army, because there were very good purpose specific equipment there. but, after research, it was found that the equipment would be too incompatible with the existing nato standards that, there would be an entire separate chain of supplies, spare parts, qualified personnel would have to be created in order to maintain them. so, the project was canceled.

And perhaps you don't grasp it yet. Hallitburton did nothing that required NATO standards and/or supply chains to be in place. Plus, even if they did, Halliburton would have already been NATO standards compliant seeing how they were a US company working for the US government. Worse yet, Standards are in place simply to avoid the shit you mentioned with Turkey and Russian parts. In other words, even if they were involved in something that caused Standards to kick in, the entire reason for standards in the first place is so the stuff can be changed out and inter-operate from a number of different countries or companies.

such is the way with military. you can contract out any kind of lame task like logistics, catering to any given party. but, the more locked in contracts require the same standards. that goes for similar technology bloc too - if you buy eurofighter, you are locked into it for at least two decades.

haliburton didnt sell any aircraft to u.s. but heaven knows what kind of equipment was sold and deals made in secret. due to terms of these, and to get favorable conditions for renewal, it is possible that the administrations to come may have to give them bones here and now, like the smaller bit of logistic contract youre talking about.

Lol... your making so much of this up it isn'

Re:And ?

[unity100]

this discussion has deteriorated. no point in continuing it. in addition, you know little about military, military technology.

Re:And ?

[sumdumass]

I know enough to know that your wrong on this. Halliburton does not supply the military with technology. They provide services with their own technology and/or the military's existing technology. Replacing Halliburton is as simple as getting someone else to do the same. There is nothing that Halliburton did that isn't able to be replicated by any other company except maybe for the scale in which it was done. This one fact BTW, was the only reason why Halliburton was on the no bid contract in the first place.

What a surprise!!!!

[ArtFart]

Doing a Google lookup on the "National Legal and Policy Center" makes it pretty evident why this organization isn't fond of Google! After the first couple of references to the organization's own Web site, one finds a host of references, beginning with Wikipedia, describing them as a well-funded right-wing "think tank" that puts a great deal of its resources into harassing Democrats. I have to admit I didn't have the patience to see how far down the list I'd have to go to find an entry in "Conservapedia" or some other non-derogatory reference.

not the CEO

[Anonymous Coward]

Marissa Meyer isn't the 'Google CEO', that's Eric Schmidt. Marissa is the 'Vice President, Search Products & User Experience'

Re:not the CEO

[ffreeloader]

Ummm..... I think you need to at least understand what you read before you criticize it. The article states that Marissa Meyer is an "executive". All upper level business administrators, such as a vice president, are executives. executive != chief exective

Re:not the CEO

[VertigoAce]

The summary is where the incorrect title appears: "fundraiser at Google CEO Marissa Meyer's home."

Re:not the CEO

[ffreeloader]

OK. Then it's whoever wrote the summary that doesn't understand the difference between CEO and executive. I didn't read the entire summary. I got to the link to the article and then read the article. Guess that's what I get for not reading the summary.

Marissa M*a*yer is not the CEO

[Anonymous Coward]

... Democratic fundraiser at Google CEO Marissa Meyer's home less than a week before the FTC ended its inquiry.

Nice journalism. There's no Marissa Meyer at Google, and Marissa Mayer is not even Google's CEO. She's the vice president of geographic and local services.

This is the real result of the election

[funkylovemonkey]

Gaining the House doesn't really help Republicans much at all without having the Senate. And of course anything that they can get through the Senate can still be vetoed by the President. But having the House does allow subpoenaing power, and it's not surprising that already the right leaning NLPC has started preparing for what will certainly be a very long two years of investigations and hearings.

Re:This is the real result of the election

[sarhjinian]

You know what bothers me about the Democratic party?

They could have spent the last two years dragging everyone and anyone who was involved with the Bush administration's more questionable policies (wiretapping, suspending habeus corpus, extraordinary rendition, Halliburton, bogus intelligence and so forth) and probably had a PR field day tearing the ethics of their predecessors apart. Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld alone would have been pure gold, and we'd all have been better for having the spotlights turned on the dark, dusty corners of that era.

But oh no. Either they were idiots and thought that, after eight years of dirty pool, the Republican party's powerbrokers would respond well to bipartisanship (you'd think they'd notice how that was going after six months?), or they were hoping to pull some of the same stuff, in which case they pissed away the moral high ground which would have served them pretty well a few days ago.

I swear, the Democrats have, certainly since Clinton and possibly since Kennedy, been completely spineless and cripplingly un-unified in the face of a much more disciplined Republican machine. How they managed to piss away the single biggest political advantage of all time in two years is astounding. How they've silenced their conscience (and anyone else on the Left who has one) is even more shameful

They really are past their sell-by date, and the few who have principles (Kucinich comes to mind) need to put some respectful distance between the rest of the chumps, endorse Nader (or someone like him) and start work on a progressive, thinking version of the Tea Party.

Re:This is the real result of the election

[Anonymous Coward]

Gaining the House doesn't really help Republicans much at all without having the Senate. And of course anything that they can get through the Senate can still be vetoed by the President.

Wrong. First, it means that Obama can't get any new legislation passed since that always requires consent of both the House and Senate; so all the parts of Obama's agenda that he can't enact through Executive Orders just came to a screeching halt. Second, control of the House gives the Republicans total control over the federal money spigot--the Constitution mandates that all spending bills must originate in the House of Representatives. So the Republicans can defund all of the programs/laws/initiatives that Obama did get passed unless they have an automatic funding provisions in place (ie Social Security, Medicare, etc). For example, fat chunks of ObamaCare are now officially in limbo because the GOP won't give money to IRS or anyone else to hire the additional personnel needed to implement them.

It's true that the Republicans don't have the power to enact their own ideas into law, but they have more than enough power to stop Obama from enacting any of his; and right now, the GOP is much more interested in stopping Obama in his tracks than getting any of their ideas turned into law, so the current situation hurts Obama far worse than it hurts the GOP.

Re:This is the real result of the election

[Wyatt Earp]

To their credit, they did go after CIA/FBI in the 1970s, but after Carter they really did fold. There was Iran/Contra through the end of the Bush Administration, but nothing happened from '93-95 when they had both houses and the Presidency, and nothing happened from '07-now when they've controlled both houses and two years of the Executive branch.

Re:This is the real result of the election

[ImprovOmega]

The reason they didn't go after the Republicans is the same reason we didn't nuke Russia during the Cold War: mutually assured destruction. Start shining a flashlight into the dark corners of Washington politics and everyone is guilty. 2/3's of the administration would have ended up in jail, impeached, or at least publicly ridiculed over such an attempt. The Dems don't talk about or investigate Halliburton (except to regurgitate the talking heads' arguments ad nauseum) and the Republicans do not go after Democrats ties to labor unions (except as vague campaign promises that never lead to action).

There's similar quid pro quo deals all through Washington, unspoken but very real. The only thing that they can seem to agree on is the putting down of any upstart who won't play the game. Hence any real, honest politician is either corrupted into the system, or they cooperate to find/manufacture dirt about him and get him booted out of office. It's sickening.

Re:This is the real result of the election

[StopKoolaidPoliticsT]

They could have spent the last two years dragging everyone and anyone who was involved with the Bush administration's more questionable policies (wiretapping, suspending habeus corpus, extraordinary rendition, Halliburton, bogus intelligence and so forth) and probably had a PR field day tearing the ethics of their predecessors apart.

First, a correction, the Democrats gained both houses in 2006, not 2008, so they could have started then... and as a member of the right, I WISH THEY WOULD HAVE. Not because the open partisanship would have cost them votes, because I don't think it would have given how reviled the right had become by 2006, but because we need an open an honest government. However, neither party wants that, they both want a closed, powerful government even if it means they take turns owning the keys.

Obama continued the Bush wiretaps, even "accidentally" extending them to domestic only calls and wants to extend it to the internet. Obama hasn't closed Gitmo, he's still practicing extraordinary rendition (which didn't started under GWB), Halliburton is still getting contracts (because they're one of only a handful of companies that does what they do), we still have problems with bad intelligence, etc.

I don't say that out of partisanship, I say it because Obama and Bush are relatively interchangeable in their practice of foreign policy (oh, sure, there are minor differences, but all the major policies are identical).

But oh no. Either they were idiots and thought that, after eight years of dirty pool, the Republican party's powerbrokers would respond well to bipartisanship (you'd think they'd notice how that was going after six months?), or they were hoping to pull some of the same stuff, in which case they pissed away the moral high ground which would have served them pretty well a few days ago.

Again, noting the above, there is one additional reason why they didn't... They were acting like Mark McGwire. Career batting average of .263, but you knew every time he got up to the plate, he was swinging for the fences, looking for that home run, or even better, grand slam. What do I mean?

Democrats have long been in love with socialized medicine... for the political leadership, it's the one thing they're missing in their dependency pie. Again, what do I mean? Every time a Democrat runs for office and is seriously challenged, what do they run on? "My opponent wants to starve your kids, kick your parents out of the nursing home, take away your childcare, etc." A HUGE portion of the Democrat bases votes Democrat on the fear that their precious entitlements would be taken away. By finally getting socialized medicine in place, it would have forced the working stiffs in the middle that traditionally vote Republican to vote for the party that would keep the handouts going.

So, they spent most of the first two years swinging for that grand slam. The bases were loaded - people already hated the Republicans, the Democrats occupied the White House and, most importantly, had large majorities in both houses of Congress. They came up to the plate, pointed to left field, swung and missed. The liberal Republicans weren't going to go along. They came up to the plate again and missed. This time the conservative Democrats weren't going to go along either. Then Ball 1, the Senate passed a bill in the middle of the night before Christmas break. Ball 2, the House would work on passing the Senate bill if they could get some fixes. Ball 3, they promise some meaningless stuff on abortion and to fix the bill's most glaring problems down the road, all while giving the crowd the finger. Democrats are standing at a full count. Finally, a homer down the left line! But wait! Now th

Re:This is the real result of the election

[QuoteMstr]

They really are past their sell-by date, and the few who have principles (Kucinich comes to mind) need to put some respectful distance between the rest of the chumps, endorse Nader (or someone like him) and start work on a progressive, thinking version of the Tea Party.

And split the liberal ticket so that conservatives win? No, thanks. A third party is not the right approach in any country in which Duverger's Law applies.

The proper venue to drag the Democratic party, kicking and screaming, in a more progressive direction is the primary. We don't need a party filled with Kucinich clones. Instead, we need to fill the Democratic Party with Kucinich clones. Only the latter has a chance in hell of working.

Re:This is the real result of the election

[QuoteMstr]

So they could have started then... and as a member of the right, I WISH THEY WOULD HAVE. Not because the open partisanship would have cost them votes, because I don't think it would have given how reviled the right had become by 2006, but because we need an open an honest government. However, neither party wants that, they both want a closed, powerful government even if it means they take turns owning the keys.

Neither ideology's policies have really been tried! 41 of the 100 senators can kill any bill. The result is a debilitating inability to pass legislation in order to respond to circumstances. Any legislation that does manage to pass does so only after its supporters remove any half-objectionable policy provisions and load the bill up with bribes for each of the 10 opposition-party senators who have to vote for it. Neither party can reform anything this way. With nobody at the controls of the ship of state, it's little wonder our civil society has decayed. What little governance remaining comes in the form of increasingly brazen executive action, and that's deeply unhealthy for any democracy.

Eliminate the filibuster. Let whichever party is in control actually govern, and give that party a fair shot at improving our lot.

Now, as a liberal, I feel that conservative and libertarian policies would be disastrous, but I'd rather endure them for a few years so that voters would see how awful they are. Having seen what conservatism really means, voters would put progressives into office and keep them there, where they could do some good.

Frankly, I wish the Republicans had invoked the "nuclear option" a few years ago. In that world, without the filibuster, the Democrats would have been able to pass another New Deal and actually start the work of healing the country.

Collecting data

[wiredlogic]

Google only logged publicly accessible information. How is that a privacy violation? They didn't attempt to crack any encrypted sessions. It seems rather unfair to hold them accountable because of someone else's lax security. Consider the amount of information that other, older data mining companies have on us, what Google did was nothing to be bothered by.

Re:Collecting data

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly.

The lack of understanding of technology by our public figures is going to doom the internet. It worked fine back when the decisions were made by engineers for primarily technical reasons. But more and more they're made for political reasons, and that is going to kill it.

And it's not just "lax security", it's a REAL dangerous game to say that you can't listen to something that another party is broadcasting in the clear out into public space. We don't want to go down that road. If you want it private, there are very, very clear and well known ways to say that. Hell, even if they had ROT13'ed the damn stuff and google had decrypted it, I'd be on their side against google! But if you spew it out in the clear to everybody within 100 meters, don't be surprised if someone hears it. If we change this trivial fact, that will be used against our interests eventually, and it STILL doesn't stop a less honest party from listening and not self-reporting. Trying to dumb down reality for the incompetent does no one any favours.

Re:Collecting data

[Big Boss]

That was my thought on the whole thing as well. If you are stupid enough to broadcast your private data over public airwaves without encryption, you deserve what you get.

It sounds like they really wanted just the MACs for the APs anyway, so they probably ignored everything else, but you need a packet to get the MAC.

It didn't seem unreasonable to me to log a bunch of data, then just go through it later to grab the MAC and line it up with GPS data.

Re:Collecting data

[Hyppy]

I couldn't agree more. This is no different than standing on the street with a tape recorder. They were driving down public roadways, listening to public radio signals that hit their vehicle. Where's the violation?

Re:Collecting data

[_Sprocket_]

Google is scary. They keep showing us how powerful collected data can be. It's the public's view in to that world and it's frightening. Some members of that public start thinking about all the projects Google is involved with and all the additional data that goes through their systems and their even more frightened. Then they go to post about that fear on Facebook.

Re:Collecting data

[RightSaidFred99]

I'll tell you what. You go find a woman you find attractive, and stand outside her house at night and peep through her windows. You can even make sure her window is very close to the sidewalk so you're not on her property.

When they arrest you, you tell them if she wanted privacy she should have shut that last 1" of her curtains. Let me know how it works out for you.

Re:Collecting data

[bonch]

It's not legal to trespass into someone's home just because the door was unlocked. The constant defense of Google's blatant disregard for privacy is pretty shocking considering how vehemently pro-privacy this website used to be a few years ago. It seems privacy today only matters to people if it protects them from RIAA lawsuits.

Re:Collecting data

[LanMan04]

It's not legal to trespass into someone's home just because the door was unlocked.

Which is not at all what Google did. Your wireless router transmits data into public space (the street). Anyone is free to collect that data. Don't like it? Paint your house in RF-blocking paint or don't use wireless!

Re:Collecting data

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not legal to trespass into someone's home just because the door was unlocked.

But if their front door is wide open, it probably *is* legal to look through it at whatever you can see while standing on the public sidewalk, especially in the process of visually searching for a house number likely to be located on or near it.

Ethically, Google probably shouldn't have done what they did, and they haven't contested that conclusion. But they didn't actually do anything illegal, they just failed to think about how technically reasonable actions would be perceived.

Re:Collecting data

[Anonymous Coward]

> It's not legal to trespass into someone's home just because the door was unlocked.

False analogy. Google was not trespassing nor were they decrypting private data.

I'm completely pro-privacy. But I'm also pro-reality. The reality is that data broadcast in the clear to public spaces is not private. What the law says doesn't even matter: it's not private for the same reason that my shouting isn't private if people out in the street can easily hear it. Pass all the laws you want, those people in the street will still hear me shout no matter what the law says about it.

I don't like google. I don't use their search engine or their web services. I disagree with their mass data collection. But not liking them doesn't mean I have to turn off my brain. They did nothing wrong here. If we don't want them to have all our private data, let's stop giving them all our private data.

Re:Collecting data

[GiMP]

In some states, walking down the street with a tape recorder would be illegal. I know that Pennsylvania is one such state. We have very strict wiretapping laws, arguably the most strict in the union. Google operates in our state and may have to answer to a number of felony charges.

Re:Collecting data

[ElectricTurtle]

Actually, in order to prosecute somebody on the grounds of 'intrusion of solitude and seclusion' one has to first demonstrate a reasonable 'expectation of privacy'. If I dance naked in the front window of my house in clear view of the street, I will be charged with indecent exposure, and I will not be able to charge those viewing me with any kind of voyeuristic violation, because I would have no expectation of privacy in such an event.

In order to have a real violation of an expectation of privacy, some special effort must be made by the alleged voyeur outside of casual behavior. Whether that's trespassing, or using equipment like cameras/binoculars, etc. If somebody is just walking down the street and looks in a house to (incidentally) see a person undressing that does NOT pass the threshold to make a good case. It IS the responsibility of the undresser to take reasonable care of their own privacy in order to have an expectation such that casual observers from the street don't get a show.

Where this applies to Google is quite clear. They were casual observers in transit. They acknowledged that signals were there and incidentally picked up some random traffic from those signals, but there was no effort or intent to intercept a specific activity, and no loitering was done to attempt a wide scope of capture of any given signal. Further, an open network is implicitly public. It is the responsibility of the owner of the equipment to know how to operate it to suit their interests and intents before they operate it and beam it into public places, ignorance is not an excuse. I run an open wireless network myself. I expect people to connect to it. A person looking at networks has no way of gauging a difference of intent between my deliberately open network and some dumbshit's accidentally/ignorantly open network. To the potential network user an open network *is* permission.

(I am not a lawyer and the previous should not be taken as legal advice.)

Re:Collecting data

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you for another horrible analogy. A better one would be idiots broadcasting their private information over a CB radio and Google happened to be listening...

Re:Collecting data

[icebraining]

You're not free to take pictures at a woman's underwear just because she's wearing a skirt on the street.

Yes, the people using unencrypted wifi are stupid and/or ignorant, but that doesn't excuse Google.

Re:Collecting data

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it legal for me to stare from the sidewalk at a hot naked blond who has left her blinds up?

Seriously I need to know, I think she's calling someone.

Re:Collecting data

[IICV]

Yeah, exactly - I'm not allowed to go on to your property to peer in your windows, but if you have a giant blazing electronic marquee on top of your house that displays exactly what's being shown on your monitor at all times, I am allowed to photograph it from the street.

This is exactly what an unencrypted wireless network is, with two exceptions: it's your network traffic, not your monitor, and it's not in the visible spectrum so people don't pay attention to it (out of sight, out of mind after all).

Google did nothing wrong in this case, though what they did may have been ill-considered (for instance, it's trivial to determine if a wireless network is encrypted or not; if it's not encrypted, don't store anything besides the positional stuff and wireless MAC).

Re:Collecting data

[LanMan04]

Sure you are. So long as it's displayed in plain view (no mirrors on my shoes), I can take a picture of anything I want.

Re:Collecting data

[scot4875]

Nice false equivalence. You seem to be good at it.

What Google did would be more similar to, say, driving around and looking in all directions, and in one of those directions they happened to see an attractive woman. Then they noted that "hey, there's a pretty woman here. Anyone else that sees this pretty woman must be close to this location." Then they drive off and that's the end of it.

--Jeremy

Re:Collecting data

[vux984]

and it's not in the visible spectrum so people don't pay attention to it

I see that as a key distinction actually. That you need to use special equipment to pluck it out the aether is a pretty significant difference if you ask me.

I can use specialized equipment to record the electromagnetic signals passing from your keyboard to your PC. Is that fair game to record too?

I can use a laser listening device to capture sound waves vibrating a window and use that to reproduce what you are saying behind it. Is that fair game to record too?

The fact that non-visible signals leak out of our homes is hardly an open invitation to record them.

"out of sight" vs "in plain sight" are different.

Re:Collecting data

[IICV]

I would say - well, you need specialized equipment to pick up things in the visible electromagnetic spectrum. It's just that most people have them, they're called "eyes".

However, you might argue, most people don't have the specalized equipment required to pick up 2.4 GHz signals, so it's different.

Aha, I would say - nowadays, I wouldn't be surprised if a significant fraction of the population has the equipment necessary to pick up 2.4 GHz signals sitting in their pockets, or in their backpacks.

The problem with saying "you can't look at it without specialized equipment, therefore it should be private" is that in this case, the "specialized equipment" is getting less and less specialized.

Re:Collecting data

[chris mazuc]

Man Charged After Making Coffee Naked.

Re:Collecting data

[vux984]

Aha, I would say - nowadays, I wouldn't be surprised if a significant fraction of the population has the equipment necessary to pick up 2.4 GHz signals sitting in their pockets, or in their backpacks.

The problem with saying "you can't look at it without specialized equipment, therefore it should be private" is that in this case, the "specialized equipment" is getting less and less specialized.

That wasn't my argument. That was yours. I said "out of sight" is different than "in plain view".

Its a simple convention of society that we respect other peoples space. Some amount of privacy leakage is unavoidable, and we as a society politely ignore it.

Suppose I leave the curtains open. I can't really then complain if you happen to see into my home as you go about your business because its in plain sight; you can't reasonably be expected not to see anything in that situation. However, even in plain sight its *still* not an invitation to setup a camera and start recording.

When it comes to wifi and anything else that requires specialized equipment... common or not its still out of sight, and you aren't inadvertently stumbling onto the data.

If you are accessing a wifi transmission its because you made an active effort to. Basic common courtesy dictates you don't do that. Purposefully recording it, yeah, that's wrong. Maybe its not actually illegal, but perhaps it should be.

Re:Collecting data

[Anonymous Coward]

It's probably perfectly legal for you to stand on the sidewalk and watch a six year old child who didn't draw their blinds change clothes. And you'd probably do it given your questionable grasp of the notion of privacy and decency. What possible beneficial public use is there to intercepting and publishing everyone's traffic? Google's Hubris makes Microsoft's look minor league.

This is just propaganda

[spun]

Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians. Not that left wingers aren't sucking up to corporate interests, you can't be in politics in this country without giving the corporate masters at least a quickie handjob, but conservatives will do ANYTHING for their overlords.

So, they need to make a false equivalency, to show that everyone is just the same. "We do it, they do it, what are you going to do? That's life, that's politics, now shut up and vote for me. Unless you want a communist to win." Yeah, a communist corporatist who wants to take money from the rich and give it to the, uh, rich. They can't even keep the message straight. It depends on what suits them at the moment, look, they are socialists, oh wait, no they are in bed with Wall Street.

Oddly enough, this supposedly unbiased non profit,The National Legal and Policy Center, seems to have gone after about five times as many democrats as republicans. They were instrumental in sinking the Clintons' health care proposal in the nineties. George Soros, who is not a politician, is one of their favorite targets. I'm not sure who they serve, they are not completely right wing obviously, but I am pretty sure they serve someone with money and an agenda. Their list of targets does not look random at all, it stinks of political and financial motivation.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

George Soros, who is not a politician, is one of their favorite targets.

Maybe because he is a puppet master, trying to pull the political strings from the background through massive amounts of money? He is a master manipulator and narcissist.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Attila Dimedici]

Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians.

Wow, I never realized that Senator Chris Dodd or Congressman Barney Frank were right wing conservative politicians. But they must be, since it is impossible to be any more in bed with corporate interests than either of those two.

Re:This is just propaganda

[CAIMLAS]

Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians.

Oh, really? Would you care to look at corporate candidate funding before spouting off like that? Which companies are you talking about, exactly? Ford? Dominoes Pizza? Outback Steakhouse? Office Depot? Maybe that's why pizza delivery is so goddamn expensive, or why it's 2010 and we're unable to get 'paperless' still, seeing more fucking printers being bought than ever before.

Hint: It's complete bullshit, almost a polar opposite of how things actually are.

http://www.goodguide.com/contributions

The reality is that more money tends to move towards corporations when Democrats are in power. Corporations, particularly technology corps, are much more heavily Democrat in their contributions, by far.

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

Your sig is laughable given your childish left wing posts. The NLPC describes itself as promoting small government, which by definition makes them right leaning, so your expert investigation was not necessary.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

How so?

Re:This is just propaganda

[Pojut]

"Here's politics in America: 'I think the puppet on the right shares my belief.' 'I think the puppet on the left is more to my liking.' 'Wait a minute...there's one guy holding both puppets!'" -Bill Hicks

Republican, Democrat, Third Party...they all serve the same corporate masters. The only difference exists in we the people's minds.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

They are not for small government. They are for big government handouts to their corporate masters, and ethics investigations of their master's competition and political opponents.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians. Not that left wingers aren't sucking up to corporate interests, you can't be in politics in this country without giving the corporate masters at least a quickie handjob, but conservatives will do ANYTHING for their overlords.

You're just as single-sided in your analysis, biased and lacking any evidence to back anything up. Conservatives rarely go after left-candidates for being in bed with corporations, its a loser on both sides of the aisle when you see just how much money goes to both sides. It's mostly the union ties they have a problem with (so as to not be hypocritical, one example, see number of union-specific immunities given in the health care overhaul bill, Washington Longshoremen union for instance).

Re:This is just propaganda

[Attila Dimedici]

Google Chris Dodd and Countrywide Mortgage and then do the same for Barney Frank. There are several other widely reported connections as well.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

You cite a breitbart website as proof? You might as well just make shit up. .. Oh, wait, you did!

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

Wow, when you get tired of foaming at the mouth about evil Republican "corporate masters" that you read so much about on huffington post and daily kos, maybe you'll realize that Democrats get more money in political contributions from corporations than Republicans do. To take one example, Obama was the biggest recipient of donations from BP.

Re:This is just propaganda

[RightSaidFred99]

No no no. It's _secret_ money these "fat cat" Republicans get from their "corporate masters". You obviously aren't up on modern smug left wing kookery.

Right wing kooks thing the government is out to get them, left wing kooks thing the evil corporations are out to get them. Same idiocy, different set of assholes.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Proof?

Re:This is just propaganda

[MickyTheIdiot]

The difference between the "left" and the "right" (in quotes because these "sides" mean a hell of a lot less than what the media would lead you believe) is that the right is totally on the side of the corporations and honest about it while the left is totally on the side of the corporations while being embarrassed and somewhat secretive about it. When it comes the corptcracy there really only one side in Washington. Obama is greatly on the side of the corporations too even if he's not as blatant about it as Bush was which is why his presidency is a disappointment.

Middle America's support of either side is crazy.

Re:This is just propaganda

[euroq]

The organization is DEFINATELY biased. A quick look at nlpc.org will give a clear indication of this. It talks about rejection of Big Government and Obamacare.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

For the sake of argument lets suppose you are correct. Does that excuse the fact that right wing politicians are in bed with corporations, too?

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

More money moves towards everyone when Democrats are in power, because Democratic policies are better for the economy and everyone makes more money.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Yes, Breitbart IS very jealous of Soros.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

That's not really what I meant, the NLPC are more specifically an attack dog for the two founders, going after whichever politicians piss them off and whichever corporations compete with them. Yes, that happens to mean left wing politicians bear the brunt of their attacks, but obviously they go after corporations and right wing politicians they don't like, too.

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0510/36783.html
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_timothy__071011_corporate_donations_.htm
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/democrats-rake-record-donations-corporations/story?id=9777742

Btw, since we are on the subject of Soros: http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/viewSubCategory.asp?id=589

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

He didn't suggest that it does. You're trying to put words in his mouth, which makes you a liar.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Moryath]

Democrats have been in power since 2006.

How's that working out for you?

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Quoting the article you reference:

“President Obama didn’t accept a dime from corporate PACs or federal lobbyists during his presidential campaign,” spokesman Ben LaBolt said. “He raised $750 million from nearly four million Americans. And since he became president, he rolled back tax breaks and giveaways for the oil and gas industry, spearheaded a G20 agreement to phase out fossil fuel subsidies, and made the largest investment in American history in clean energy incentives.”

You may want to read what you cite before you cite it, to make sure it says what you think it says.

Re:This is just propaganda

[bonch]

On Slashdot, only right-wingers are evil puppetmasters. Left-wingers are enlightened, oppressed victims just trying to get the word out.

Just look at all the people who immediately rushed to Google's defense by attacking the NLPC while completely ignoring the points they raised in their letter about the timing of the FTC inquiry's dismissal, the inconsistent punishments handed out to companies other than Google, or the Google employees serving in the administration. To them, none of the accusations have any merit because of the NLPC's political leanings, even though they're refuting none of the accusations.

You cannot criticize Google on Slashdot. The posters have become fanatical about this company no matter how many privacy breaches there are or how many boneheaded statements Eric Schmidt makes. If it was any other company, people would be all over their asses. If Steve Jobs said only people who have something to hide care about privacy, it would be a months-long controversy.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

How am I putting words in anyone's mouth by asking a simple question? I want to hear it from him, he can simply say "Yes, it is just as bad when Republicans do it."

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

Ha, ha, you are quoting the article's quote of Obama spokesman. Please read from the begining:
 
  "While the BP oil geyser pumps millions of gallons of petroleum into the Gulf of Mexico, President Barack Obama and members of Congress may have to answer for the millions in campaign contributions they've taken from the oil and gas giant over the years.

BP and its employees have given more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Donations come from a mix of employees and the company's political action committees -- $2.89 million flowed to campaigns from BP-related PACs and about $638,000 came from individuals. "

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Better than the alternative, Grandpa Crazy and Caribou Barbie.

Re:This is just propaganda

[bonch]

Okay, so you believe the NLPC is biased. What does any of it have to do with the NLPC's accusations? You didn't actually refute any of them.

You don't think an investigation is warranted if the president shows up at a top Google employee's home mere days before a major FTC probe is dismissed? Other countries continue to investigate Google, and Britain recently re-opened its probe. Why does Twitter get fined by the FTC but Google just promises to do better next time and avoids any punishment?

You're seriously not a wee bit suspicious about that? If George W. Bush visited Steve Ballmer's home days before a favorable antitrust verdict, wouldn't you want that looked into?

Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians. Not that left wingers aren't sucking up to corporate interests, you can't be in politics in this country without giving the corporate masters at least a quickie handjob, but conservatives will do ANYTHING for their overlords.

This is just silly. Left-wing liberals are just as in bed with corporations and other special interests as right-wingers. Democrats clink wine glasses with some of the wealthiest, most corrupt organizations in the world down in Hollywood, and billionaires like George Soros funnel money into America to influence politics from abroad. Remember that Obama also recently paid a visit to Steve Jobs to discuss the economy, so it's not like Democrats are morally or ethically superior in any way when it comes to network with their "overlords."

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Hey Bonch, are you pissed that I derailed your little propaganda piece in the first few comments? Here's a bone, then: fuck google. Fuck them right in the ear. They are corporate scumbags just like all the others, out to make a buck at everyone else's expense.

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

I never said political donations from corporations are a bad thing, I am just pointing out the hypocrisy of the left. Corporations are made out of people, employees and shareholders, that's it. If the shareholders, who own a corporation, wish to donate their money to a political candidate why on Earth shouldn't they be allowed to do so? If the executives who are hired by the shareholders to run the corporation give the money without shareholders approval, they are free to fire them.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

It is no secret that corporations give more money to the candidate most likely to win. It's just good business. Whoever is in power gets the most money.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Of course an investigation is warranted. Lots of investigations are warranted. The things that actually get investigated tend to be the things that benefit someone wealthy. Why has the NLPC not called for an investigation of Halliburton?

The real question is, what have you got against Google and liberalism? It's in your sig. You have a specific beef with them. You pick and choose stories that make google and/or liberals look bad. You've never submitted a story railing against Microsoft, or Republicans. What's up with that?

Just so you know, it makes your motivations seem questionable.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Ah, so you believe corporate control of our political process is a good thing, gotcha. You are actually happy that big corporations are giving money to liberal causes. I was confused about that. Because earlier, you made it seem like a bad thing.

Re:This is just propaganda

[CAIMLAS]

That's interesting. I wonder why we've got increasing levels of record unemployment right now, at a time when we've got a record level of Democrats in power (House, Senate, Executive). Any ideas?

Similarly, Carter's Presidency had the same issue.

Clinton did not - but he also didn't get much done, either. Republican-locked House+Senate kinda made that not happen, so government was more-or-less inoperable for a while and minimal damage was done.

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

Anybody donating to politicians is a potential problem, including individuals, lobby groups, unions etc. Why single out corporate shareholders as the only group not allowed to donate? The reality is that politicians need money to finance their campaigns and get their message out, otherwise democracy wouldn't work as you wouldn't have a clue who to vote for. The question is where the money should come from and the sad truth is that wherever it comes from there is potential for abuse. Financing campaigns with public money would be even worse. Btw, are you in favor of banning political contributions from unions? Good luck getting one Democrat to support that and yet it is not substantially different from contributions by corporate shareholders.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

It takes time for event he best and the brightest to fix the epic mistakes of Bush Jr.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Wow. You are saying that people should educate themselves based on the messages put out by politicians, and paid for by corporations?

How about, since we the people own the airwaves and just lease them out to corporations, we require those corporations to give every politician who raises X number of signatures free airtime?

Corporations are not people. They are not citizens, they are immortal and immoral sociopathic machines which diffuse responsibility to such an extent that nobody involved feels that they, personally, are contributing to evil. But they are. The corporate structure itself is an IMMENSE moral hazard, it creates evil despite the best intentions of the people involved.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

Instead of power checks and balances of office, we only check one party or another and to hell with any real power.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Moryath]

Really?

"Ambition must be made to counteract ambition" - James Madison

Our system fails whenever one party amasses too much power. Since 2006, it's basically been all in the hands of Democrats, since Bush was a wishy-washy RINO who wouldn't stand up to Pelosi and Reid anyways.

But go along with what you want to think. Personally, I subscribe to the "keep government divided" school. If the Democrats have the congress, vote Republican for Prez. If the Democrats have the prez, vote Republican for congress.

If you let one group have it all, they fuck the system up. Happened under Carter, happened for the first two years of Clinton, happened under Shrub for basically 8 years since he was a wishy-washy rubberstamp, and happened now for the past two under Oh Bummer.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

What this country seriously needs is a comprehensive left-wing Final Solution.

Seriously, what do you fucks contribute, anyway? People who create no wealth that have big ideas about how other people's wealth should be spent, people who can't run a business that want to tell people who do run businesses how they should run them, people who think they know it all when they don't know shit.

Just filthy parasites, and they ought to be treated that way.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

So which is it that you are so vehemently protection? Is it Google, the Obama administration or what? I mean you openly admitted that you derailed a legitimate conversation into corporatism and political favors. It seems that you know a connection exists and want to dissolve it. Well, that or you are trolling which isn't out of the question.

Hell, I bet you secretly love Google for all it's might and worth and only threw the corporate scumbags line in there to prop your street cred as an ignorant anti capitalist so you can protect both Obama and Google. It's the old, look at me, I support X even though I hate X, Y, and Z, so my opinion must be correct and I'll call you the liar if it isn't. That seems to be the mode of operation for you doesn't it?

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

What mistakes were made under Bush that need fixing now? I bet you can't think of one that didn't have a bunch of democrats behind or involved with, and there aren't many made that is directly related to the economy and jobs. SO please enlighten us on your mysterious insights that aren't just blind followings of a certain party.

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

How about, since we the people own the airwaves and just lease them out to corporations, we require those corporations to give every politician who raises X number of signatures free airtime?
 
"people own the airwaves" part is a special kind of bullshit but that's a whole other discussion. As for your "idea" of, presumably, banning private campaign funding and instead giving access to airwaves based on number of signatures. Where does it say in the constitution that the freedom of speech is limited to those who gather X number of signature? How can they gather X number of signatures if they don't have access to airwaves and therefore cannot promote their cause until they get them. How many signatures will be required? Too many and the government effectively prohibits the rise of new political parties (no potential for abuse there at all). Too few and you give a national platform to neo-nazis, communists, religious fundamentalists etc.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

Your use of the word immoral should be amoral and calling them sociopaths is sort of completely conflicts with your dead entity machine speech.

Do you find yourself fighting to get your message out? It's probably because you can't even get a sentence out that makes sense, analytically or when viewed in reality. You see, corporations are conglomerations of people. More appropriately, they are conglomerations of people who step back from running the business and hire third parties to direct the corporation in their best interests. If someone is separated from the company, then it makes sense to have their advisers operate on their behalf. When a corporation donates to a political group, works to enable or defeat a law, it's little more then those third parties working on someone's behalf with respect to the business they were hired to run. A corporation makes not decisions, does no actions, neither hire or fires anyone. People within that corporation do all that. Any morality of social mentality you want to assign to it must be accurately assigned to the people running it else you appear as nothing more then a confused little boy full of hate. And since not all corporations are run by the same people, assigning the acts of a few to the whole is completely futile. It's like saying all blacks are drug users who want to rob and mug you because you saw one of them like that in a movie.

Reality simply isn't the way you think it is.

Re:This is just propaganda

[James_Duncan8181]

"Bush was a wishy-washy RINO"

Wow. He cut taxes for the rich, lowered food/water standards, gutted constitutional protections from unreasonable search, invaded two states and threatened more. And now he's called left wing by trolls? Life is harsh sometimes.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Your problems with reading comprehension aren't my problem. Normal users of the English language have no trouble following my prose. I'll give you the 'amoral' though. As for sociopaths, do you know what the term means? Psychological theory tells us one of the primary characteristics of sociopathy is the inability to see anyone, including oneself, as a person. Lacking empathy, sociopaths see everything as objects.

I'll stand by my characterization.

Now, as for airwaves, they are a public good. No one can buy them, they can only lease them, because we, the people, own and control them. They aren't like regular property, you transmit and it will enter my property whether I give you permission or not.

It amazes me that you can defend corporations as simply made up of individuals, yet the evil Government is not. Corporations, as I mentioned, diffuse responsibility by their very nature. They affect the people involved in them, allowing those people to do evil without thinking of it as evil. The stockholders of BP can rest easy at night, knowing they weren't the ones who ordered corners cut. The CEO can rest easy, knowing he just did what any CEO would do for their stockholders. Each gets to blame the other while they profit, don't you see that this combination of easy profit and no remorse can lead normal people to make very evil decisions?

Sadly, reality is more like I think it is than it is like you think it is. I mean, I would love to live in a world where republicans cared about fiscal responsibility and corporations were not evil.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Which is it I'm so vehemently protection? What?

Isn't it obvious? It's the Obama administration. Google can go take a flying fuck for all I care. No, I am trying to combat what will soon be a constant media storm of calls for Obama's impeachment. The Republicans could give a fuck about governing the country, they want his blood. So we will be seeing all kinds of stories about this and that supposed scandal. All of them will be lies, or blown way out of proportion like this one. I don't recall you getting up in arms about Bush pardoning Microsoft. In fact, weren't you one of his stalwart defenders on the issue? I'll need to look it up, but I seem to recall you were.

So yeah, I am going to derail illegitimate bullshit like this every god damn time I see it, using the convenient and effective strategy of Telling the Truth. You might want to try it.

Re:This is just propaganda

[scot4875]

Yeah, that's irrefutable proof of your assertion. A Google search for some keywords.

Do you know which party outspent the other 7:1 in campaign ads last election? Do you seriously not think any of it came from "corporate interests"?

Enjoy your cognitive dissonance. Or rationalization. Or whatever the fuck it is that doesn't let you see reality.

--Jeremy

Re:This is just propaganda

[QuoteMstr]

Bullshit. This false equivalence between the parties is fueled by conservative media outlets, and it's designed to frustrate voters so they skip the polls entirely, allowing the vote be dominated by the right-wing base.

If you want to see the difference between the parties, just compare the Bush keys to the legislation that was passed by the House over the past two years. A lot of that didn't make it into law, but that's because of Republicans filibustering in the Senate, not Democratic malfeasance.

It really takes a special kind of stupidity to think "they're all the same" after 2000-2008. The Democrats aren't perfect, but by god, at least they don't yearn for a return to serfdom.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

Bush pardoning Microsoft. In fact, weren't you one of his stalwart defenders on the issue? I'll need to look it up, but I seem to recall you were.

Bush never pardoned Microsoft. What the hell are you talking about? Come on man, keep living in reality with the rest of us.

So yeah, I am going to derail illegitimate bullshit like this every god damn time I see it, using the convenient and effective strategy of Telling the Truth. You might want to try it.

Is it illigitimate or is your view completely confused? I mean you seem to think Bush pardoned MS or something and it would be the first I ever heard of it. Oh yea, just because it exists in your mind, it doesn't mean it's the truth. You should make a mental note of that.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Moryath]

He wasn't left wing.

He wasn't right wing.

He was a moron who'd basically just let anything by his desk, no questions asked.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Really? So how much was Microsoft fined? Sorry, I should have said the Bush DOJ, knowing what a pedant you are.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

Your problems with reading comprehension aren't my problem. Normal users of the English language have no trouble following my prose. I'll give you the 'amoral' though. As for sociopaths, do you know what the term means? Psychological theory tells us one of the primary characteristics of sociopathy is the inability to see anyone, including oneself, as a person. Lacking empathy, sociopaths see everything as objects.

And here is where you fail. The problem is not with my reading comprehension, it's with you attempting to claim an inanimate object is not a person then anthropomorphizing it when it suits you needs. And if we took your definition of sociopath at the face value you wish us to, then we would have sociopath cars and trees. Actually cars are a better consideration because it clearly is at the direction of the drive or some outside force.

Now, as for airwaves, they are a public good. No one can buy them, they can only lease them, because we, the people, own and control them. They aren't like regular property, you transmit and it will enter my property whether I give you permission or not.

And your point is what? I mean seriously, are you attempting to get around the first amendment by controlling the medium in which the speech is being made?

It amazes me that you can defend corporations as simply made up of individuals, yet the evil Government is not.

And here is the difference between them. A corporation has a legally bound fiduciary duty where the government is only theoretically bound. Further more, the government government over all within it's realm which can and does include plants, animals and corporations too. And without either, the people wouldn't last too long at all. So it is a necessity to encourage the growth and population of them in order to benefit the people being governed. Without that, you nothing but a bunch of citizens starving and/or freezing to death.

Corporations, as I mentioned, diffuse responsibility by their very nature. They affect the people involved in them, allowing those people to do evil without thinking of it as evil.

Well first of all, Evil is a subjective term. What you think is evil might not be evil to other and vice versa (think premarital sex, abortion, praying to other gods or refusing to accept a god are just a few). Second, corporations do not absolve someone's liability for their own actions. At best, they allow the actions to be confused and hidden making it difficult to hold them accountable but there are plenty of people who end up going to jail for their actions within a corporation.

The stockholders of BP can rest easy at night, knowing they weren't the ones who ordered corners cut. The CEO can rest easy, knowing he just did what any CEO would do for their stockholders. Each gets to blame the other while they profit, don't you see that this combination of easy profit and no remorse can lead normal people to make very evil decisions?

Actually, the CEO lost his job and was replaced. The share holders did nothing to cause the spill or complicate the cleanup so they shouldn't be penalized at all in the first place. The CEO isn't escaping any legal trouble if there is anyways. However, regulations generally are written to punish companies on the whole so unless a specific law was broken, you couldn't punish the CEO for his actions anyways. Do you know of a specific law that he broke? And remember there is often a difference between a regulation and a law. A law is made by congress and has the full force and constitutionality of the government behind it. A regulation is made by a governing comity and typically sidesteps the constitutional requirements for making a law. A regulation has a law backing it, but isn't directly enforceable as a law is.

Sadly, reality is more

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

We already require X number of signatures for all kinds of political things, why are you acting as though this is some kind of new, strange, and dangerous thing? As it stands, media companies decide how many signatures you need to get on the debates. How is that more fair?

As for the airwaves, please tell me how any one person can own a frequency. Now tell me how you are going to get permission from every single property owner to beam stuff onto his property. Or do you think that anyone should be allowed to beam radiation anywhere they like? Radio waves are not like normal property, they can't be. They are a shared resource by their very nature.

Where in the constitution does it say that freedom of speech is limited to those who can gather X numbers of dollars? Because that is what we have now. And why should it be up to the handful of corporations that own all media who gets on the air? I mean, it is pretty obvious that, left or right, no politician who pisses off the corporations will even get a fair hearing.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

Microsoft wasn't pardoned period. And the court punished Microsoft, not Bush or the DOJ under his direction. The courts are a separate branch of the government entirely.

And no, that's not being a pedant. What you suggest is completely a different issue then you are portraying it to be. Even if the DOJ asked the court to go soft on MS, it was still up to the independent branch of government known as the court to make that decision and Bush couldn't have done fuck all about it.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Attila Dimedici]

Because after all, the best way to tell who is in the pocket of corporate interests is to look at who gave money to politicians who have yet to take office, not look at who gave money to the politicians currently in office when they ran in previous elections. I mean, comparing the legislation they support to the money they received in campaign donations won't tell you anything at all.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

You can't really be this dense. I think you are pretending to have trouble in order to try to convince some imaginary reader that I am a loon. No one is reading this thread this far down but you and me, so give it a rest.

A corporation has a legally bound fiduciary duty to do what, exactly? Make money for its shareholders. The government is bound by the constitution.

Further more, the government government over all within it's realm which can and does include plants, animals and corporations too.

God, I love you, sumdumass. That sentence made this whole debate worthwhile. Ever watch Waiting for Godot? Yeah, that sentence reminded me of Lucky's monologue "Being given the existence such that it gushes forth from the public works of Poinçon and Wattman of a personal God quaquaquaqua ..."
Seriously, debating you is so much fun, I just have to wait for the frothing rage to reach your brain and render you incoherent, and you can be counted on to deliver gems like this. I think I might make it my sig.

And don't even try to tell me to take a deep breath and work on my emotions, I mean, who do you think you are fooling with that? Okaaaay, Mr. Spock. I shall work on my emotions, and become a creature of dispassionate logic, like you, ahahahahaha.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Right, I mean, Bill Gates has a personal meeting with Bush, a few days later the DOJ drops the case like a hot potato, how could anyone draw the conclusion that something untoward happened there? Obviously, that is completely different from the case at hand...

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

As for the airwaves, please tell me how any one person can own a frequency. Now tell me how you are going to get permission from every single property owner to beam stuff onto his property. Or do you think that anyone should be allowed to beam radiation anywhere they like? Radio waves are not like normal property, they can't be. They are a shared resource by their very nature.
 
Of course you cannot own radio waves but you could own (and buy and sell) an exclusive right to use a particular frequency. Why not? It's really not any different from the right to own land (a shared limited resource) and we have laws that manage that. To use the example I read somewhere (Friedman I think) Opera houses are a limited resource as not everybody who wants to sing in an Opera house can do so. Therefore should government take over Opera houses and ration them with conditions attached? After all Opera houses are build on a limited resource we all share (in this case land, it could be radio frequencies). But it is not land or radio frequencies that give value to the Opera House/radio station. It is the work the owners put into it by building and running the opera house or the infrastructure to make programing and broadcast possible that give it value. Otherwise its just a bunch of dirt/unused frequency bands.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

You can't really be this dense. I think you are pretending to have trouble in order to try to convince some imaginary reader that I am a loon. No one is reading this thread this far down but you and me, so give it a rest.

Is everyone out to get you? And now you somehow feel safe? Give it up.

A corporation has a legally bound fiduciary duty to do what, exactly? Make money for its shareholders. The government is bound by the constitution.

A corporation is bound to it's owners, business model/charter, and the public it serves. Nothing in the constitution makes the government to be bound to the people. In fact, there is quite a bit about what the government can do independently of the people and what the government is expressly forbidden to do to the people. Again, one is bound by law, the other is implied. That makes a big difference.

God, I love you, sumdumass. That sentence made this whole debate worthwhile. Ever watch Waiting for Godot? Yeah, that sentence reminded me of Lucky's monologue "Being given the existence such that it gushes forth from the public works of Poinçon and Wattman of a personal God quaquaquaqua ..."
Seriously, debating you is so much fun, I just have to wait for the frothing rage to reach your brain and render you incoherent, and you can be counted on to deliver gems like this. I think I might make it my sig.

And don't even try to tell me to take a deep breath and work on my emotions, I mean, who do you think you are fooling with that? Okaaaay, Mr. Spock. I shall work on my emotions, and become a creature of dispassionate logic, like you, ahahahahaha.

Nice debating tactic there. I mean attempting to show you addressed the subject without ever doing so and then comparing it with something else as an attempt to retort it without ever addressing it is slick- if we were in third grade. In any real debate, it's a sign of a losing argument. Perhaps you should take a deeper breath this time.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

You do realize that pardon has a specific meaning right? You do realize that the court is a separate branch of government right? This is why we use words to communicate with, they provide specific information and allows people to understand what is being communicated.

And yes, that is completely different from the case at hand. No matter how much you want to close your eyes and make believe it happened, Bush did not pardon Microsoft and he holds no power over the courts. So what if MS had a meeting with Bush, So what if Bush instructed the DOJ to back down. It's the court's final decision and you have absolutely no clue what happened in the meeting. It could have been Gate offering to give the US government a back door or kill switch into foreign deployments of operating systems. It could be that the famous UK Aircracft carrier that blue screened and needed a tow back to port was a demonstration. We simply do not know. But what we do know is that there was no fund raiser like with Google, no trackable money changed hands like with google, and unlike with Google, the ultimate decision was in the courts hands, not the administrations hands. And yes, that is completely different from the case at hand.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

I love how you can claim a business is bound to the public it serves, but not a government. A business is bound by law to screw the customers out of every penny they can, or the stockholders can sue. But a corporation is not really bound to the stockholders, it is bound to the old boys club that runs the board and appoints the CEOs. Stockholders get screwed all the time, as we see in every economic crisis we go through, and yet, somehow, that old boys club gets bigger and bigger bonuses all the time.

Ah, you know what, I should thank you. It was very kind of you to let me dictate the terms of debate, and ever so kind of you to take a vehemently pro corporate stance. In case you didn't know, corporations and Wall Street are a teensy bit unpopular right now, and deservedly so.

I also simply love how schizophrenic the right wing has become. They simultaneously defend and attack "big business." Wall street, good! No, Wall Street, bad! I guess the Wall Street that those ebil libruls pal around with is bad, but the Wall Street that gives Americans their jobs and Republicans their donations, THAT is the very HEART AND SOUL of capitalism. Haha, wow, you guys slay me.

You can't even see the utter hypocrisy, can you?

Perhaps you should get control of your emotions and take a deep breath. Perhaps in your own mind you are dispassionate, but you come across as highly emotionally invested. You use emotionally charged language and insults to try to make your case. And then turn around and in an obviously insulting and derogatory fashion and tell your opponent that they are being emotional.

Do you have no capacity for introspection whatsoever? Are you really that blind to your own nature?

Re:This is just propaganda

[sonicmerlin]

Stop being such a pedant. Jeez. Spun makes very valid points and you ignore them b/c you can't over yourself.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sonicmerlin]

Spun don't bother with these guys. They're just internet trolls.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

As for the airwaves, please tell me how any one person can own a frequency. Now tell me how you are going to get permission from every single property owner to beam stuff onto his property. Or do you think that anyone should be allowed to beam radiation anywhere they like? Radio waves are not like normal property, they can't be. They are a shared resource by their very nature.

Of course you cannot own radio waves but you could own (and buy and sell) an exclusive right to use a particular frequency. Why not? It's really not any different from the right to own land (a shared limited resource) and we have laws that manage that. To use the example I read somewhere (Friedman I think) Opera houses are a limited resource as not everybody who wants to sing in an Opera house can do so. Therefore should government take over Opera houses and ration them with conditions attached? After all Opera houses are build on a limited resource we all share (in this case land, it could be radio frequencies). But it is not land or radio frequencies that give value to the Opera House/radio station. It is the work the owners put into it by building and running the opera house or the infrastructure to make programing and broadcast possible that give it value. Otherwise its just a bunch of dirt/unused frequency bands.

You make this too easy. Try to think things through before you post.

Who would you buy such a thing from?

You really kind of walked right into that, didn't you? Because, in case you haven't figured it out, unlike physical property, you can't stake any kind of claim to the airwaves, because you can't physically occupy them in an exclusive fashion. Thus, you need a regulatory body to control and manage them, or everyone will claim them at the same time, meaning no one can use them.

It isn't about whether the resource is limited, it is whether it is exclusionary. Physical property can only be physically occupied by a certain number of owners, but every person on the planet could simultaneously occupy the same frequency. You can lock the door on an Opera house, how do you lock the door on a frequency? You really don't even understand the parameters of the problem. You have no idea why the government regulates airwaves in the first place. In your mind, airwaves are like physical property. But you obviously haven't even given thought one to how unregulated airwaves would work in the real world.

Re:This is just propaganda

[vux984]

Just filthy parasites, and they ought to be treated that way.

The filthy parasites are the ones leeching all the money out of the rest of the system.

Follow the money. Its flowing up to the rich, not the other way around, despite their (and your) complaints to the contrary. The rich are getting richer.

Piss an moan all you like about the parasitic left, but while you flail around whining about them, the real parasites are laughing all the way to the bank.

Re:This is just propaganda

[clarkkent09]

Who would you buy such a thing from?
 
Easy, the government should auction them, just like unoccupied land was auctioned off. If someone broadcast on a frequency in a certain area where you own the exclusive right you can sue them. No different than it is now, it is illegal for you to broadcast on a frequency "leased" by someone.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

I love how you can claim a business is bound to the public it serves, but not a government. A business is bound by law to screw the customers out of every penny they can, or the stockholders can sue.

Wrong. Where in the hell did you ever get that idea? Let me guess, it was made up in your mind one day when you couldn't understand something.

But a corporation is not really bound to the stockholders, it is bound to the old boys club that runs the board and appoints the CEOs. Stockholders get screwed all the time, as we see in every economic crisis we go through, and yet, somehow, that old boys club gets bigger and bigger bonuses all the time.

Again, something that only exists in the mind of a confused little boy. Perhaps you should inform everyone here which business school you went to so we can avoid hiring idiots who graduated from it. They are bound to the stock holders to a degree that doesn't violate their charter and that they can still live up to their fiduciary responsibility.

I also simply love how schizophrenic the right wing has become. They simultaneously defend and attack "big business." Wall street, good! No, Wall Street, bad! I guess the Wall Street that those ebil libruls pal around with is bad, but the Wall Street that gives Americans their jobs and Republicans their donations, THAT is the very HEART AND SOUL of capitalism. Haha, wow, you guys slay me.

This must be born out of ignorance and a willingness to ignore reality. The right wing has always supported open markets with the proper regulation but has always admonished markets with poor regulation, improper regulation, and the lack of enforcement of regulations. There is nothing in conflict unless you are not able to pay attention to detail and therefore are ignoring quite a but of relevant information. Of course this is probably your norm as you seem to blindly support the democrats while spewing lies.

Perhaps you should get control of your emotions and take a deep breath. Perhaps in your own mind you are dispassionate, but you come across as highly emotionally invested. You use emotionally charged language and insults to try to make your case. And then turn around and in an obviously insulting and derogatory fashion and tell your opponent that they are being emotional.

Having an investment in reality might very well be an emotional attachment. However, it's not one you should caution people about when your alternative is a fictional representation of what you want things to be like in order to justify your own political bias.

o you have no capacity for introspection whatsoever? Are you really that blind to your own nature?

If by introspect, you mean jumping to conclusions that aren't supported by fact and using that to justify my own ideology, you would be right, I have none. Instead, I like to take things for what they actually are in the real life and work from there.

Re:This is just propaganda

[sumdumass]

And what valid point was that? Was it that Microsoft was pardoned? Well, no because there was no fucking pardon. Was it that MS had a meeting with Bush? No because the court not Bush was in charge of it's punishment. So what fucking valid point is that? The only way he can make a point that is valid in anyone's mind is if you ignore the definition of pardon, ignore the separation of powers, ignore the president's inability to control the courts, ignore the fact that even if a meeting did take place, no money changed hands which is quite a bit different then Google's situation. I mean you have to fucking ignore reality in order to claim those are valid points at all. It's nothing more then specualtion and lines drawn that aren't visible without inventing something in connection with it. And that is not a valid point in any way.

You can choose to live in a fictional reality and allow lies to govern you conciseness, but it doesn't make me wrong.

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anthony Mouse]

Wow. He cut taxes for the rich, lowered food/water standards, gutted constitutional protections from unreasonable search, invaded two states and threatened more. And now he's called left wing by trolls? Life is harsh sometimes.

This is the problem: Those are not Republican ideals. Republicans are not supposed to be in favor of foreign occupations and violating the constitution. What happened during Bush was not Republicans, it was lunatics who called themselves Republicans. And many of them still do. But let's not forget what Republicans are supposed to be, because otherwise who is going to do that stuff? I ask in all seriousness, who is going repeal the Patriot Act if the people who call themselves "Republicans" are to the left of the Democrats (in the sense that "the left" wants expansion of government power)?

Re:This is just propaganda

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit. They just want to implement serfdom in a different way. It's called socialism. They want to take as much of your hard earned money as they can and dole it out back to themselves and whomever they find to have the "greatest need". Think I'm wrong? What do you think Social Security, Medicare, and the recent health care plan are all about. They're all just giant power grabs in the guise of being for "the greater good". It's about the Democrats thinking they are better equipped to spend your money than you are. They don't think that the product of your labor should belong to you, it should belong to them. And if you speak out against them they do a media hatchet job on you to make it look like you enjoy spending your evenings kicking puppies.

Re:This is just propaganda

[chrb]

Just look at all the people who immediately rushed to Google's defense by attacking the NLPC...

I remember the vast majority of the defensive posts being entirely technical and not political. The issue was that Google used some modified version of a tool like tcpdump, dumped raw packets, and didn't strip packets that might contain http headers or other potentially identifiable information. Nobody has alleged that Google used this raw data for anything nefarious, and nobody appears to be arguing that it's collection was anything more than a simple programming oversight. The defensive posts generally boil down to two points:

• The data was sent unencrypted over public airways
• Storing the raw unfiltered data was an accident and any potentially personal data was never used for anything.

Those are both technical arguments, not U.S. political arguments.

You cannot criticize Google on Slashdot....

Sure you can, people do all the time - if Google really were secretly collecting masses of personal information then they would be criticised. But this is a really odd argument, since Google of all corporations don't have to - since they already openly collect personal information and use it to target adverts, with the full cooperation of their users. Google doesn't need to sniff private data from your public wifi, and it makes little sense that they would deliberately do so, given the huge backlash it could cause.

Re:This is just propaganda

[drinkypoo]

The Democrats aren't perfect, but by god, at least they don't yearn for a return to serfdom.

What an astoundingly ignorant thing to say. Both parties are controlled by big business, which is behind the return to serfdom. It all went badly wrong when we have corporations personhood. The Republicans take your money and spend it on making war which kills people and which benefits the military-industrial complex. It's the last bastion of American manufacturing. The Democrats take your money and spend it on social services designed to keep people in the ghetto. Welfare and even food stamp programs are tied to your material wealth and if you start to save enough money to buy something, like say a car that won't break down on you every week and get you fired, then you no longer qualify for the programs. Whether they were designed for this purpose or evolved into it, "welfare reform" that keeps people on welfare endlessly is considered to be a feature!

All that is what it is, but what really got me to realize that it's all a big game was the last Republican ticket. During the election fraud that was used to put Bush into office I still believed that it was party vs. party. The second time it happened, though, I had a harder time getting on board. Finally we got a fossil and an idiot versus a black man and... who is that other person? I forget if they're even from this planet because of the media circus spectacle. The Republican ticket was obviously crafted to be unelectable. When you have a party willfully throwing the election, you know that the game is fixed. The Dems had the Reps red-handed on election fraud the last time we had Bush forced upon us and said "It's OK, we don't really care that much." Really? Seriously, you guys?

Then there's the fact that the Democrats are not liberal nor the Republicans conservative. The definition of liberal is someone who wants to regulate business and let you alone in your personal life, while the conservative is the opposite. Yet both parties want to heavily regulate business; Democrats speak in favor of tariffs while Republicans back subsidies. Or was it the other way around? Democrats want to put stickers on media and Republicans want them on textbooks. Democrats want to ban guns and Republicans want to ban books. These are not comparisons designed (all speech designed to educate or elucidate is propaganda, including my comment...) to hilight differences between the parties, although some people are doubtless nodding their head saying "yes, that's why they're the party for me!" The point is that they are both trying to control your lives for the good of corporations. One party hits you above the belt and one below the belt but at the end of the day they're both beating you. Does it really matter who hits you where?

So yes, they are all the same. They get together for expensive scotch and laughter at our poor, dumb expense after a day of yelling at each other across the aisles. Fox news on TV, Faux debate in Congress.

Re:This is just propaganda

[QuoteMstr]

If by "socialism", you mean having the kind of lifestyle that the citizens of France, Norway, Britain, Holland, Sweden, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy enjoy, then I am a socialist.

Re:This is just propaganda

[bonch]

I'm not pissed at anything. I don't know what propaganda piece you're referring to; if you mean this submission, I'm not the NLPC. You didn't derail any of the accusations the NLPC made, and since this story came out, the FCC has announced its own investigation. Expect more to come under the new Congress.

The NLPC's political leanings do mean that you should look closely to determine if this is motivated by Republicans going after a major Democratic fundraiser (Google), but if the accusations have merit, than that motivation is irrelevant. Personally, I believe the accusations have merit. Google is under investigation in numerous other countries, and it's strange for the FTC to throw up its hands and let Google off the hook just because it promises not to do it again. Other companies haven't gotten that treatment. That Obama visited Marissa Mayer's house days before the inquiry's dismissal is another red flag. When there are red flags, you investigate.

Critics of an administration will almost always come from the opposing political party, because a president's supporters often turn a blind eye to shenanigans. That doesn't mean you should rule out the accusations. Administrations are supposed to be held on the fire by their opposing parties; it vets their actions and forces them to justify their behavior, which helps keep the government from overstepping its bounds.

As for Google, well, Slashdot's comment section has become very partisan since the release of Android, and the company seems to do no wrong. When a CEO says your privacy doesn't matter, that right there should be the last straw, but apparently, that is not enough of a lapse in ethics. I believe Google takes advantage of the idea of "open source" to attract the technical crowd, which is not the most objective of crowds when it comes to things they are emotionally attached to. Google is seen as some kind of ally against Microsoft and now Apple, but at what cost?

This is the biggest internet company in the world with perhaps the biggest storehouse of personal information in the world. They should be held accountable for how they treat that data. They should be afraid of making any misstep. It guarantees that they respect their power and the information they're using for their business. Our personal information is a part of us. It's our lives. When that isn't respected any longer, you're not a customer any more. You're a unit in a marketing chart.

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

Ah, so before anyone buys it, we, the people own it. Or the government couldn't auction it off. But original ownership is not the issue, it is regulation of a shared non-physical resource. While I have heard free market schemes for frequency self-regulation, none sound workable, and you haven't even come close to the simplest of these schemes.

In any case, you have made my point for me: we own the airwaves and can do whatever we like with them. Why auction them off when we can lease them, maintain control over them, realize a steady stream of income, and guarantee their use serves our purposes rather than the needs of those wealthy enough to buy them?

Re:This is just propaganda

[spun]

I know what they are. Sometimes, I like to troll trolls. I figure, if they are wasting their time on me, they won't be annoying someone less able to handle it.

"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[Tekfactory]

"Only the heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Idiots would fight a war on twelve fronts."

So lets count them

Google vs. Microsoft (in search) - I'm going to f***ing bury Google
Google vs. Apple (smartphones)
Google vs. Facebook (social networking/open-ness)
Google vs. MPAA (YouTube)
Google vs. ATT/Verizon (FCC Spectrum Auction)
Google vs. Oracle (Java)
Google vs. Patent Office (Patent Reform)
Google vs. Author's Guild (copyright on orphan works)

The shame of it all is most if not all of those fights are worth fighting and very few others are stepping up to the plate.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[icebike]

The interesting thing about that list is I would enlist on Google's side in every single one of them.

Google vs. Net neutrality, not so much.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[bonch]

The interesting thing about that list is I would enlist on Google's side in every single one of them.

I think you just summed up Slashdotters' bias pretty well. On this site, Google can do absolutely no wrong. The CEO flat-out tells you that only criminals care about privacy, and you'll still leap to their side. It's incredible, especially after the bashing that Facebook gets around here.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[icebraining]

Schmidt said his belief is that the core of Net neutrality is the idea that network providers shouldn't be able to favor one particular provider of content over another, but he said that networks should be able to prioritize a content medium, say, voice over video.

"People get confused about Net neutrality," Schmidt said. "I want to make sure that everybody understands what we mean about it. What we mean is that if you have one data type, like video, you don't discriminate against one person's video in favor of another. It's OK to discriminate across different types...There is general agreement with Verizon and Google on this issue. The issues of wireless versus wireline get very messy...and that's really an FCC issue not a Google issue."

Unless they're lying through their teeth, I'm with Google. QoS is fine.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[icebraining]

Google is fighting the MPAA? They wrote a enormously complex content recognition system that checks every frame of every uploaded video against all the videos delivered by the media companies and allows them to block or profit from that video. How is that fighting the MPAA?

What are Audio ID and Video ID?
        YouTube's state-of-the-art technologies let rights owners:
                * Identify user-uploaded videos comprised entirely OR partially of their content, and
                * Choose, in advance, what they want to happen when those videos are found. Make money from them. Get stats on them. Or block them from YouTube altogether.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[darien.train]

Jesus you're dense. A preference for one entity's actions over another is not bias you twit. You sound like a petulant child.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[Anonymous Coward]

> "Only the heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Idiots would fight a war on twelve fronts."

That phrase implies voluntary choices - being on the attack.

Further, most of the non-google sides of your list are attacking multiple targets (besides google). I mean, fuck, you're listing Microsoft here. Microsoft! The same Microsoft that has been on the attack on every even tangentially related market for decades!

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[Anonymous Coward]

The CEO flat-out tells you that only criminals care about privacy

It's amazing how many times you get away with posting this crap. People have shown this to be false, in response to you, smth like 20 times in the last 3 months now.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[Anonymous Coward]

No, their CEO did not say that.

During an interview, aired on December 3, 2009 on the CNBC documentary "Inside the Mind of Google", Eric Schmidt was asked "People are treating Google like their most trusted friend. Should they be?" His reply was: "I think judgment matters. If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place, but if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines including Google do retain this information for some time, and it’s important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that that information could be made available to the authorities."

In other words, "you have nothing to fear from Government information requests if you have nothing hidden".

I understand your deep-rooted desire to demonize Google, but stop propagating falsehoods.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't read that at all. He agrees with their position in those fights and even has an exception. Doesn't sound like fanboyism to me.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[HeckRuler]

The CEO flat-out tells you that only criminals care about privacy

Bullshit. Cite that sonovabitch. Post a link, do it.
Oh, but you can't, because you're spouting bullshit. Schmidt reminded people that he's bound by law, and rightly so, to hand over search history to the cops.

Let me be REAL clear about this. People have views and opinions on subjects. They feel a certain way or have predictions about how things are going to play out. They go out and tell other about this views. They provide explanations, examples, links, quotes, and arguments to help convince others. Some people have good insight and others are convinced and share their views. Some arguments are not compelling, and no one cares. And others still are so balls to the walls crazy that people take the opposite view. People rally against said craziness. This is what you have done.

You are bending the truth past the point of breaking. What you have said is factually untrue. I'm not sure why you said what you did. Perhaps you're lying. Perhaps you are quoting someone else, like an inflammatory headline, or a talking head, and never looked it up yourself. Perhaps you read his quote and somehow you twisted and redefined his words to mean what you wanted them to mean. Regardless, the only thing you've done is make me believe that some people have an irrational hatred of Google, and that half the crap out there is FUD.

Now, Google has a MASSIVE potential for evil. If they all showed up to work with goatees one day, they could trample a lot of people. Just like Microsoft. Just like any government. And as soon as you can point to some actual factual evil-doing, like their opt-out Buzz, or taking over the name "Go", then I'll shift my views of them a little. But this only makes me trust them more.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[naoursla]

A different view of Net Neutrality is that you pay for a certain quality of service and the carrier cannot discriminate against you based on who you are talking to or what you are talking about.

Video, audio, and text all have different requirements for quality of service.

The goal is to prevent a company like Comcast from degrading a stream from YouTube in order to promote their own video service (or to hold YouTube random for a larger share of the advertising profits).

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[icebraining]

And that's what Google is saying...

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless Youtube, a video streaming site, is competing with Cable, a video streaming application. Suddenly, everyone is saying:
"I'd rather pay $60 a month for my cable subscription. The $20 a month netflix subscription is cheap, and the selection is good, and the control is great, but it takes far too long just to be able to watch something."

Alternatively, you could have multiple different protocols for doing the same kind of thing. The line isn't so clear, now, is it?

Additionally, how do you deal with encrypted traffic? Pick the lowest priority? That seems pretty dangerous to anyone on a corporate VPS. And if they don't, then everyone on the less prioritized services can just switch.

QoS is a good idea, but it needs work in order to be neutral and effective.

Re:"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts."

[naoursla]

Not exactly...

Google is saying that you should be able to differentiate based on the content of the packets. If you are playing video they can give your more bandwidth. That implies they could also give you less bandwidth.

For me, Net Neutrality means I pay for a Quality of Service regardless of what I am sending. I don't want to pay for a contract that says I get X mps unless it is video in which case I get X-Y, but you can pay more to get X+Y for video.

More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[spun]

They are a front: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=National_Legal_and_Policy_Center

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Attila Dimedici]

So, basically they are a right wing version of Media Matters or Center for American Progress?

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[blackraven14250]

Considering that Media Matters isn't about creating misinformation, but rather about debunking misinformation perpetrated by others, I think there's at least a bit of a difference.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[spun]

No, the NLPC seem to be more focused on the specific corporate competition and political enemies of the two founding members. They aren't left or right really, they are the attack dogs of two rich guys.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[clarkkent09]

Media Matters describes itself as a "progressive" center dedicated to "correcting conservative misinformation" financed by a left wing billionaire George Soros (who by the way made his billions in currency speculations on a scale that bankrupted a country). Sounds fair and balanced to me.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[spun]

No one asked if it sounded fair and balanced. I believe the assertion was that they correct misinformation. Yes, they correct misinformation put out by the right and not the left, but their goal is to get the truth out, not to make money for two old rich guys, which is what the NLPC is for.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Bill_the_Engineer]

To be fair, sourcewatch.org is operated by the "Center for Media and Democracy" which was founded by John Stauber and currently led by Lisa Graves.

John Stauber is a liberal activist, and Lisa Graves worked for Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy. And from her website "She previously served as the Senior Counsel for Legislative Strategy at the American Civil Liberties Union, where she led the ACLU’s lobbying efforts on national security issues affecting civil liberties, including the Patriot Act reauthorization debate."

I'm not saying that I disagree with Lisa Graves or John Stauber, nor do I believe that their work isn't important. However, I think it's funny that the parent called the NLPC a front organization by citing a website operated by liberals. Incidently the NLPC fully discloses that they are "conservative watchdog" group.

My point is that despite the political ideology of the activist group, sometimes they do bring up a valid point. I think it shows poor judgment on the part of the Democrats and especially the Obama administration for attending a Google CEO's fundraiser while the FTC had an open inquiry against Google. We condemn the Republicans for doing similar things, we should hold the Democrats to the same benchmark. I think the timing is even more unfortunate when the FTC end the inquiry in Google's favor within a week of the event. Obama should have known better and graciously declined the invitation.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Attila Dimedici]

Do you take everybody at their word? Just because they say they are about debunking misinformation doesn't mean that they don't create misinformation. Media Matters spends a lot of time "debunking" information they don't like.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you people have another bogeyman? George Soros is your Emmanuel Goldstein.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[clarkkent09]

He is the leading financier of the left in the US so why not him. Plus he's a true natural born slimy scumbag if there ever was one so we feel we are doing the world a favor even regardless of politics.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[spun]

Ah, so you've bought the right wing propaganda about Soros hook, line and sinker. Let me ask you, what are George Soros' activities and feelings regarding communism, and why? If you don't know how Soros feels about communism, you know nothing about the man. Here's a hint: if communism is left wing, then Soros isn't.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[hey!]

In what way are they a right wing version of Media Matters? Does everything boil down to nothing more than "my side vs. your side?"

Media Matters is an attempt by people on the left to balance what they see as right wing media bias. You may think that is absurd; maybe it even *is* absurd. But they don't pretend to be anything other than a one sided source of information. It says so right on their about us page:

Media Matters for America is a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.

So right there if you're a conservative, you *know* what they're promoting is from your point of view liberal nonsense. If you are a moderate, you *know* Media Matters is giving you half the story because *they told you that*.

Now here's an except from NLPC's "About Us":

NLPC was founded to promote ethics, and to give the Code [of Ethics] the visibility it deserves.

The author of the Code is Sen. Paul Douglas (D-IL) who served from 1948 to 1964. A "Sense of Congress" resolution that passed on July 11, 1958 urged adherence to the Code by all government officials.

Golly, sounds *bipartisan* ("all government officials), or maybe even *Democrat leaning*, doesn't it?

I think there's a big difference between openly arguing one side of a question and arguing one side while pretending to be fair and balanced. But perhaps some have reached the point where "public discourse" means picking the lie you'd prefer to believe.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Attila Dimedici]

If you knew any history of the Democratic Party, you would realize that in the 1960s there were many who espoused the ideals of the today's right in the Democratic Party at that time. As a matter of fact, many of the Democratic politicians from the 1960s would be too far to the right of today's Democrats to be electable.
So, because an organization supports principles that were originally espoused by a Democrat that today are only espoused by Republicans (you know, ethics in governmnet), they are deceptive for referencing said Democrat?

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[l0ungeb0y]

Ahhh, NLPC means National Legal and Policy Center. I was thinking it was an acronym for a Bush era program "No Laptop Per Child"

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[0xdeadbeef]

Ha, ha, good old ad hominem, just another way of admitting that you've lost the argument.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Goody]

But if it's a conservative slimy scumbag, everything is cool because all's fair when you're fighting the left.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Goody]

If you knew any history of the Democratic Party, you would realize that in the 1960s there were many who espoused the ideals of the today's right in the Democratic Party at that time. As a matter of fact, many of the Democratic politicians from the 1960s would be too far to the right of today's Democrats to be electable.

And likewise the conservatives of the 80s would be unelectable by teabaggers and conservative Christians currently driving the Republican bus.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Attila Dimedici]

You mean the conservatives from the 80s that were elected by conservative Christians?

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[Goody]

And your point would be....?

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[hey!]

Well I do know the history of the Democratic Party and Paul Douglas was not one of the people you refer to. Not by a long shot.

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[emarkp]

Wait, you trust MMA as a partisan organization which responds to partisans of the other side. And they commit just as much fraud in selective quoting and editing as they claim to point out on the other side.

Why do you trust this partisan organization over other partisan organizations? Just because they're on your side?

Re:More Info on the NLPC, they are DIRTY

[spun]

They do not commit fraud in selective quoting and editing. Unless you can point to a specific example? I'm sorry, the facts have a liberal bias, and organizations biased towards liberalism are biased towards reality. I am also biased towards the truth. I trust them because they tell the truth, not because they are on any particular side. It isn't my fault that one side relies on lies, distortion, and fear-mongering, and the other side doesn't.

History tell us...

[brennanw]

...that if the current administration's relationship with Google is like the relationship the previous administration had with Haliburton, then it's OK.

Ooops, did I type that instead of just thinking it?

nonsense

[unity100]

'plenty of people' here being random citizens around the internet. not any notable organization. leave aside an organization that is entitled national policy center for anything.

Re:nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

I could call my dog "National Policy Center for Rodent Control" -- it doesn't mean he decides how the entire country should prosecute his assault on rats and squirrels.

It's a safe assumption that any organization calling themselves "National Policy" anything is full of puppets who hope to influence the populace by marketing the agendas that the politicians have already decided they want to implement.

Less cynically, they may just be sleazebags who hope to influence policy decisions by sounding more important than they are, but I rather fear the more cynical outlook is more likely to be true.

Re:nonsense

[unity100]

doesnt matter.

back in bush era, even shitty private 'think thank' companies werent able to talk about any wrongdoing as such. thats my point. to be honest, actually, the name of this company suggests they are probably right wing oriented. hence, no surprise.

Dem Johns vs. GOP Johns

[Compaqt]

Though both parties are basically the same old same old, you have to hand it to the Dems--they have cooler masters: Hollywood, Google, and Apple.

Compare R's: US Chamber of Commerce. Bo-ring.

Re:Dem Johns vs. GOP Johns

[bonch]

Yeah, but Republicans smoke cigars in dimly-lit conference rooms. That is classy as fuck.

Re:Dem Johns vs. GOP Johns

[mujadaddy]

Plus, blackjack. And hookers!

Errors in summary

[Snowblindeye]

Democratic fundraiser at Google CEO Marissa Meyer's home

Eric Schmidt might be surprised to find that Google has a new CEO ;)

I know this is Slashdot, but could we get basic facts right in the summary? Marissa Mayer is a Google VP, not the CEO

I know, I must be new here...

Re:Errors in summary

[Lumpy]

He is a tea-party radical, they get the right to make shit up ans spew it all over as fact. did you not get the memo?

Re:Errors in summary

[Anonymous Coward]

This is an amusing trend I have seen in many press articles:

Anyone who works for a company who is used as a source is promoted to "executive". Thus if they had some low-level Googler comment on something he will be cited as "Google executive".

I see this as a continuation of this trend. Marissa Meyer is promoted from "executive" to "CEO". :-)

Re:Errors in summary

[mjwalshe]

no its quite correct Eric is a front every so often Marissa dresses up in the nurse uniform and wheels himround the googleplex where he says "your all doing very well" before taking him off for his after noon nap.

Google "Grace Brothers" if you don't get the Joke

Re:Errors in summary

[Asdanf]

Maybe the misspelling of her name cancels out the error in her title?

The company motto says it all for me

[Anonymous Coward]

Do No Evil.

Re:The company motto says it all for me

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Common mistake, the slogan is orally pronounced, which came out of the googlers storied oral tradition in which they would recite search results from memory over the campfire as their roast beast slowly rotated on the spit.

Its actually:

Do know evil.

Let no good deed go unpunished

[mcrbids]

The wi-fi situation wasn't a case of Google "getting caught" - it was a case of them noticing the data being collected had more than they had wanted and being up front and open about its disclosure. And in the latter case, it's basically never a good idea to prosecute as it shows good faith, and attacking people for good faith effort only encourages bad faith. Nobody in their right mind wants that!

We provide technology solutions. Despite all our care and attention otherwise, mistakes get made. And when they do, it's our policy just to say what happened, how we fixed it, and whether or not we think it violates TOS. This simple act creates trust and goodwill because by casually acknowledging that your pants were down in the first place, everybody realizes that they're just happy you pulled them back up and quickly lose interest.

Re:Let no good deed go unpunished

[secretcurse]

Furthermore, the people they collected the data from were BROADCASTING IT INTO THE PUBLIC STREETS. It's been beaten to death here, but just to say it one more time, if I stood naked in my front yard yelling my banking details I wouldn't expect privacy. If I set up a loudspeaker to play a recorded message with my banking details, I wouldn't be surprised if someone overheard. Why would I be surprised if someone read my plain text intarweb packets that I willfully throw into public space? Ignorance of the technology is not an excuse. If you don't understand a WiFi router well enough to know you need at least basic encryption and refuse to seek out the help of a professional when you set up a network, you shouldn't have the right to bitch when someone reads the packets you broadcast into public.

Re:Let no good deed go unpunished

[Ogive17]

"it was a case of them noticing the data being collected had more than they had wanted and being up front and open about its disclosure"

How do you collect more data than you want? This isn't a case of they only were hoping for 100 people to respond to their questionaire but got 1000 responses.

Don't get me wrong, I don't feel sorry for people who leave their wi-fi open to the public. But I can't see how this data collection was an accident on Google's part as you make it sound.

Re:Let no good deed go unpunished

[Anonymous Coward]

Kismet default captures all unencrypted wireless traffic.

Re:Let no good deed go unpunished

[mcrbids]

Pretty dang easy, btw. 'Just record the signals, we'll process them later' is a good start, followed up by jr employee thinking that doing so was a good idea, until sr exec says "what the h377 were you thinking!" As a close second.

Glad to see...

[Lumpy]

That the insane are still running about and blabbering their mouths.

Let's ignore that every other country has found that google did not wrong and dropped the issue.

Has the economy made the nutjobs all riled up? Why have they came out of the woodwork over the past 2 years? Previously we would all have wrote off these kinds of people as complete nut-jobs and publicly ridiculed them.... Now they get airtime on Fox News. And we get 1/2 hour talking head discussions....

Next up on CNN: Is Obama the secret #2 Al-Quida operative right hand man to Osama? Also what is your cat telling your neighbors about you... Investigative reports look at "SPY PETS"

It's like the Onion became mainstream news.

GOP to GOOGLE

[Anonymous Coward]

So. You are funding the other guys with $30,000 a head dinners, are ya? Well, if you don't give us the same, then we'll sick the legal dogs after ya! Not saying that the Repuublican, GOP party is trying to blackmail Google into giving them money or anything, its just, you know, the business of politics when the GOP *does* look at how much Halliburton is funding the phrase "Drill Baby Drill", or how much the Koch brothers are funding them. And when they see this, and then look at Google, well, its just not right that Google gets away with funding so much for the Dems and they don't see anything. Google has lots of money, and the GOP sure could use some, now that they are paying off the election. And if Google doesn't stop funding the other guys and start funding them, then BOY! The GOP is going to give Google "A Thumpin'"(tm). Oh there's some of that privacy stuff acting like so much smoke. But back to the money. Google has to start buying loyalty from the ruling party, and damn quick! The GOP attack dogs are out, and dammit, they expect corporations to pay for their loyalty. If they give enough (and it had better be a lot), then the problems of the GOP attack dogs landing on them for every little thing goes away.

Quite frankly my dear,

[Iburnaga]

To be frank, if someone is broadcasting unencrypted data then Google has done no wrong by mining that information. Had they of been actively circumventing encryption to do so I could see a case in that but this was naked data. You don't sue someone for invasion of privacy when you paint your home with your secrets.

Thanks!

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Slashdot user "spun,"

Thank you for your kind words! Please continue to fight the good fight for us and do as much as you can to dismiss any accusations against the company. By attacking the messenger, it will distract people from considering any points they may have raised. Given Slashdot's swing to the left, people will completely ignore that the FTC dismissed its inquiry days after our fundraiser if you talk about right-wingers. Turning this into a Republican versus Democrat debate will make people forget the point and ignore our favorable treatment from the administration.

We've been working very hard to defend ourselves on Slashdot using anonymous posters, but it always adds more validity when a registered account speak on our behalf. It took a lot of pull to avoid the kinds of fines that the FTC gave Twitter, and I wouldn't want to undo all that hard work. It would make me look bad in front of Obama at our next party!

Ciao,
Eric Schmidt
Google CEO

P.S. I see that there's an email from your grandma in your inbox. Better say hi! ;-)

Re:Thanks!

[spun]

Fuck google. They are a big corporation who, like any corporation, would fuck its grandma for a buck.

Don't even try that shit with me, you punk ass AC.

Shit no one cares about

[Infonaut]

Then by definition shouldn't Wikipedia be out of operation already, because nobody cares to use it?

It's really only useful for shit no one cares about.

What about the RIAA ties?

[Anonymous Coward]

What they should really investigate are all the MAFIAA ties with RIAA lawyers and such.

Those are far more worrisome...

Bush/Cheney and Halliburton

[Doc Ruby]

I don't see any evidence that this NLCP has ever called for investigating Halliburton. Even though the Bush/Cheney corruption with Halliburton was catastrophic for the country and totally obvious.

This NLCP attack is the kind of rightwing propaganda is the kind known as false equivalence. Rightwingers cook up some Democratic target to equate to some well known rightwing evildoer. The Clinton impeachment is a good example: Republicans live the legacy of Nixon resigning rather than face impeachment for very serious crimes, so they impeach a Democratic president the first chance they get. That way Republicans and the stupid people producing and consuming the mass media Republicans dominate can say "both sides do it", about either corruption/crimes or contrived impeachment. Even though there is no legitimate comparison between the two. For good measure, rightwingers will meet legitimate calls for Bush/Cheney's impeachment for lying us into the Iraq War by dismissing it falsely as equivalent to the Clinton impeachment. And it works: Clinton was impeached, Bush/Cheney were not.

And when Republicans impeach Obama on some nothing, they will claim falsely that it's equivalent to some Democratic action that is nothing of the kind.

Meanwhile, Bush peddles some fictional delusion book about his presidency, Halliburton continues to rape the world and the US (Gulf drilling catastrophe, anyone?) because it was never properly investigated, convicted and barred. Google continues to lead America's functional economy, and Obama continues to lead the US out of the hellhole Bush/Cheney and Halliburton dragged us into.

Your Republican America at work.

Re:Bush/Cheney and Halliburton

[spun]

Doc! I haven't seen you in a while! Where you been?

Re:Bush/Cheney and Halliburton

[Doc Ruby]

Working. And taking time off while Slashdot's signal:noise ratio went through the floor. Now it's back on the floor, and worth wasting some time here.

Re:Bush/Cheney and Halliburton

[spun]

Cool. I missed you. You're not like the other people here in the trailer park.

Re:Bush/Cheney and Halliburton

[Raenex]

You guys are two peas in a pod.

Re:Bush/Cheney and Halliburton

[spun]

Two big old commie peas in a socialist pod drizzled with fine anarchist sauce.

No

[Doc Ruby]

No, they're not. Except insofar as "false" is a wrong version of "true".

Re:No

[Attila Dimedici]

Really, I didn't think that Media Matters was that bad, they don't always lie.

I thought it was Eric Schmidt

[sneakyimp]

Since when is Marissa Meyer google's CEO?

Re:I thought it was Eric Schmidt

[Pop69]

Yeah, if the writer can't even get a basic fact like that correct, reading the article itself promises to be fairly pointless

LIAR

[Doc Ruby]

No, you lie.

Media Matters received its first ever donation from Soros last month, after years of you Republicans lying, say he was financing it all along. Meanwhile, you Republicans have your fraud network financed by billionaires like the Koch brothers who also finance Republican campaigns, lately secretly through the Citizens United rules that dominated the election that just passed.

Of course it sounds "fair and balanced" to you, because it's an endless pile of Republican lies, just like the Fox "News" that uses that fraudulent slogan.

Re:LIAR

[blackraven14250]

Maybe because Fox News is the De Facto communications wing of the Republican party. You know, if there were no association and they were actually remotely fair and balanced, there wouldn't be so many people mentioning them when it comes to politics.

Re:LIAR

[clarkkent09]

I don't lie, I might be wrong but if so I am honestly wrong. First of all, technically I am right because he just donated $1 million to them so they ARE financed by him. Secondly, you are being pretty naive if you think that overt donation directly from his pocket is the only kind there is. For example, Soros laughably claims that the donations made by his Open Society Institute are not actually made by him and it's a totally separate thing. OSI has spend over $5 billion over the years on liberal causes, including a lot of goups which in turn create or fund things like media matters. Without having time to research the matter, here is one example: OSI donates $1 million to The Tides Foundation in 2005. The Tides Foundation donates $1 million to Media Matters in 2005. Nothing to do with Soros, right?

Re:LIAR

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean fair and balanced like ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and Comedy Central? I'm so tired of whiny liberals that moan about Fox News because it's to the right of their views. Waaaa, waaaaa, waaaa. Maybe their obsession to Fox News has something to do with who they are.

Re:LIAR

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

WRONG!

I preface my statement "In Soviet America..." The reality is that the Republican Party is the de facto Government annex of Fox News!

I am not engaging in Hyperbole. Corporations in cartel - such as Murdoch's - OWN both parties, and their candidates. Fox hires R's, outright. When it comes to agendas Mudoch calls the tune - not craven politicos.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=19&media_outlet_id=2

The link is from FAIR. If you want a real and CUTTING critique of media failure in bias, method and funding? Go to FAIR. They slice through the NPR corporate/military stooge agenda, just as surely as they do Fox's.

Re:LIAR

[clarkkent09]

Ha, ha, good old ad hominem, just another way of admitting that you've lost the argument. Note the pathetically childish and uncivil behavior by the left towards the Tea Party candidates and Conservatives in general throughout the last election campaign. It worked out really well.

Re:LIAR

[blackraven14250]

Maybe it's because none of the above are unbiased, but all except Fox do nothing more than spew talking points constantly and have every Republican candidates on the payroll as hosts and advisers. How many Republican presidential and vice presidential candidates from the 2008 election are employed by Fox? (Here's a hint: nearly every single one) Now how many Democratic candidates are employed by all of the rest of the stations you listed combined? (Here's another hint: none)

Just for reference, I have no problems with me being genetically superior to you because I can look at facts and use my brain in a manner not consistent with party doctrine, but I'm not going to be the one to say it. I'll leave that up to you. Or, rather, you already said it.

Re:LIAR

[IICV]

Uhm, I hope you realize that the second largest shareholder (not donor, actual owner of the company) of Fox News is a Saudi Arabian prince who, according to Fox News, may have ties with terrorists?

Look, just because people give money to causes they approve of doesn't automatically make those causes suspect. You should also critically examine the material they put out, not just who funds them.

Re:LIAR

[sumdumass]

Dude, give it up. we are in an age when Science can be debunked or ignored or even left standing unchallenged after someone questions the claim because someone worked for an oil company, or some company that worked for an oil company 20 years ago.

You won't be able to convince people that others are just like them and act in their own interests. Everything has to be associated with the evil of the day (for or against) and nothing can be further from their own truth. Perhpas this is because they operate on an agenda too, perhaps it's because they haven't grown up and gotten off the third grade detective show investigative reporter kick. I don't know but it's a sign that the entire world is becoming increasingly paranoid and it mostly exists within their own heads. Attempts to change that is pretty much futile. You just have to ignore the idiots, pay attention to the seemingly innocent, and investigate the claim independently of the favorite agenda driven party of the time.

Re:LIAR

[scot4875]

Yeah, the right is *completely* above childish, uncivil behavior.

Get over yourself.

--Jeremy

Re:LIAR

[vux984]

Note the pathetically childish and uncivil behavior by the left towards the Tea Party candidates and Conservatives in general throughout the last election campaign. It worked out really well.

Childish and uncivil describes the teaparty too.

What was your point?

Re:LIAR

[Anonymous Coward]

Citation please? I'm sorry, but my Google searches are not bringing any results that clearly mention any of the candidates employed by Fox news so far, but there is still quite a list to go, but since you seem to know already, could you tell me how you learned this?

Re:LIAR

[Goody]

There's certainly bias at the networks you list but they don't come anywhere close to Fox. Fox has been specifically engineered to cater to conservatives and provide news from an obvious right wing point of view. Anyone who thinks ABC, NBC, CBS, etc. come close to Fox needs to put down the crack pipe. At ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN there's an occasional fart. Fox runs a 7x24 manure spreader.

Re:LIAR

[blackraven14250]

First, who do you think is viable for a 2012 Republican bid that isn't working for Fox other than Mitt Romney? They pay Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, and Mike Huckabee - literally everyone GOP other than Romney that is a major candidate for 2012 who isn't currently an office holder.

Second, did you forget that after the 2008 election, Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, and Karl Rove all joined Fox as regular contributors? You know, McCain's VP, the guy 2nd in the primary race, and the guy who orchestrated the previous 8 years of the Republican Era.

Re:LIAR

[emarkp]

...After years of receiving money through Soros organizations. This is the first time Soros name is on the check without the cash flow being laundered first.

it's just that "do evil" is too short for a slogan

[Anonymous Coward]

I just hope that this dispels any myth, once and for all, that Google is just a tool of the system.

Wait, just like Halliburton?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who has the United States invaded at the behest of Google??

It's about to get even worse

[elrous0]

Sadly, even on the left, many Democrats who were known for standing up to corporations (more than most of their colleagues, anyway) were defeated in this election. The saddest loss was Russ Feingold, one of the leading voices of net neutrality, consumer rights, and privacy protections in Congress.

The ideologs have won.

[ohiovr]

The biggest corporations getting the greatest grease for their squeeky wheels. Who da thunk it??? Yes keep fighting each over about your silly notions of conservative vs liberal democrat vs republican. In the end you all lose.

Re:The ideologs have won.

[imric]

And your answer to this is what, exactly? To join the Tea Party and vote Republicans back in? I am so sick of people trying to act as if they their understanding and cynicism gives them a superioror POV when they actually have no answers at all, and no will to pursue them if they did.

Have a nice day.

Oh stow it already.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is more like the Bush ties to Microsoft; the Bush Justice Department pretty much let MS off the hook after Clinton had them by the balls. I didn't see any investigantions into that, either.

Why would there be? In spite of the usual Slashdot masturbation, it's quite clear that if someone had offered a better browser (witness Firefox), IE would've been toast. And the idea that Microsoft - a software company - should be forbidden from distributing their own software to their customers, goes against all sanity. Well, whatever - that was aeons ago, as the tech world counts years, so I'll just say:

Gods above and below, man - I know Slashdot is home of the raging Linux kiddie, forever with training panties in knots - but drop it already.

Congrats to Ms. M[ae]yer!

[dacut]

Promoted from VP to CEO by a single /. summary! Too bad she had to butcher her name in the process.

(For future reference, "executive" -- as the article states -- does not necessarily mean "CEO"...)

Gored Oxes

[Anonymous Coward]

Quaint, seeing how politics makes 'ethical' slashdotters into run-of-the-mill hypocrites. My reference is less slanty than your reference!

End the stupidity

[Anonymous Coward]

I am so sick of watching morons like you people cheer for "your team" and bash the "bad guys". Any time someone brings up something shady done by the current administration all of the stupid Democrat cheerleaders have to jump around and shake their pom-poms "what about all the stupid things Bush did, HUH? HUH?" SHUT THE FUCK UP!

First, why is it that it is always assumed that when one disagrees with the current idiots-in-power, they must have approved of the previous idiots-in-power? "Oh, so you don't like what the Obama administration is doing? You're a racist, teabagging, redneck fool who wants to suck Bush's dick!" Guess what, you're a fucking moron!

Neither of the mainstream parties have been following the will of the people. This is why we keep seeing huge swings in the vote.

Stop voting for career politicians. Isn't it clear to any of you sheeple yet that whatever team your rooting for isn't on your side? The two parties have what appears to be different rhetoric, but they both in the end (after some REAL SERIOUS saber rattling) promote the same agenda. Think about Guantanamo, think about warrant-less wiretapping, think about the wars that haven't ended...

Wake the fuck up! End the stupidity!