Friday, June 29, 2007

 

Supreme Court OKs retail price fixing by manufacturers

Link to article in the Los Angeles Times
Until today, the nation has had an unusually competitive retail market, in part because antitrust laws made it illegal for sellers or manufacturers to agree on fixed prices. The Supreme Court, in a 1911 case involving Dr. Miles and his patented medicines, had said that price-fixing agreements between manufacturers and retail sellers were flatly illegal.

Another item that might encourage people to think before voting in the next election.
- Frank

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Roberts steers court right back to Reagan

Link to article at USATODAY.com
Long-standing precedents were discarded or reinterpreted. Government interests prevailed over individual rights. Business won at the expense of consumers and workers. And people on the fringe, such as rabble-rousing students and atheists, lost out.

A bit ironic, as current ass backward decisions and those making them, would never have been possible without the the past rulings they are so quickly corrupting.

For you youngsters out there: Reagan, among other things, managed to block ALL federal programs supporting solar energy research. The mind boggles just imagining the U.S. being energy independent, doesn't it?
- Frank

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Thursday, June 28, 2007

 

FTC Nixes Net Neutrality

Link to article at consumeraffairs.com
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has turned thumbs down on net neutrality.

In a report on broadband availability and connectivity, the FTC found little reason to protect consumers and content providers from attempts by large telecommunications providers to charge more for faster delivery.

First the White House and now the Internet - the Terrorists within are winning.
- Frank

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Tuesday, June 26, 2007

 

Norman Mineta Confirms His Testimony [re: 9/11]

Link to article at jonesreport.com
Mineta says Vice President Cheney was "absolutely" already there when he arrived at approximately 9:25 a.m. in the PEOC (Presidential Emergency Operations Center) bunker on the morning of 9/11. Mineta seemed shocked to learn that the 9/11 Commission Report claimed Cheney had not arrived there until 9:58-- after the Pentagon had been hit, a report that Mineta definitively contradicted.

Norman Mineta revealed that Lynn Cheney was also in the PEOC bunker already at the time of his arrival, along with a number of other staff.

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Scholars urge Bush to ban use of torture

Link to original article at MSNBC.com
WASHINGTON - President Bush was presented with a letter Monday signed by 50 high school seniors in the Presidential Scholars program urging a halt to "violations of the human rights" of terror suspects held by the United States.

Too bad they didn't urge him to resign and have himself arrested.

- Frank

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Monday, June 25, 2007

 

Calling Cheney's Bluff

Link to original article in The Nation 
Illinois Congressman Rahm Emanuel has come up with the right response to Dick Cheney's attempt to suggest that the Office of the Vice President is not part of the executive branch.

The House Democratic Caucus chairman wants to take the Cheney at his word. Cheney says his office is "not an entity within the executive branch," so Emanuel wants to take away the tens of millions of dollars that are allocated to the White House to maintain it.

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'It is time to put right the wrongs' re: Lockerbie bomber

Link to article at Scotland on Sunday

EVIDENCE against the Lockerbie bomber was fabricated and manipulated on both sides of the Atlantic, according to leaked defence documents which appear to undermine the conviction of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi.

Investigators for Megrahi claim to have compelling new evidence of widespread tampering with evidence, missing or overlooked statements, and a concerted attempt to lead investigators away from the original Iranian-backed suspects and towards Libya.

This sure "smells" like the U.S. is trying to recycle this sham and use it as an excuse for attacking Iran.

- Frank

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Iraq's Unseen War: The Photos Washington Doesn't Want You To See

Link to article at SPIEGEL ONLINE - News
This is a war the Bush administration does not want Americans to see. From the beginning, the U.S. government has attempted to censor information about the Iraq war, prohibiting photographs of the coffins of U.S. troops returning home and refusing as a matter of policy to keep track of the number of Iraqis who have been killed. President Bush has yet to attend a single funeral of a soldier killed in Iraq.

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Wednesday, June 20, 2007

 

"Dirty Sweet - Baby Come Home"

Cool new video, by Dirty Sweet!


 

Beauty in binary / Book shows computers in all their geeky glory

Link to original artical at SFGate.com
"I got wrapped up into the beauty of the machines, the human aspect of the machines," said Richards, a former newspaper photographer who shoots on a freelance basis these days. "I was struck by how much we are reflected in the design. The intricate wiring reminded me of the veins and arteries in our own bodies.

- Mark Richards (Author)

Some beautiful photos, and lots of history. Click Link to Buy it Now. - Frank

Core Memory: A Visual Survey of Vintage Computers


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Tuesday, June 19, 2007

 

NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg Leaves GOP

Link to original article at SFGate.com

"I think the country is in trouble," Bloomberg said, citing the war in Iraq and America's declining standing globally.

"Our reputation has been hurt very badly in the last few years," he said. "We've had a go-it-alone mentality in a world where, because of communications and transportation, you should be going exactly in the other direction."

Amen!

- Frank

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Dvorak Uncensored - Apple CEO Steve Jobs Pisses on New York Magazine with Slam E-Mail

Link to original Dvorak Uncensored posting

Normally Jobs doesn’t get this carried away. Is the letter legitimate? I can assure you it is. Apparently this article got under Jobs’ skin to an extreme. The backstory according to the gossips in the business is that Heilemann was refused an interview with Jobs and decided to do the New York Magazine article to get back at him. I have not confirmed this assertion.

Contains the unedited Jobs memo.

- Frank


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Anthony Bourdain - encyclopedia article

Link to TheFreeDictionary article

Anthony Michael (Tony) Bourdain (born June 25, 1956 in New York City) is an American author and executive chef of Brasserie Les Halles in New York City. Currently, Bourdain is the host of the Travel Channel's culinary and cultural adventure program, ; however, his love of food began at a young age, during a trip to France with his family. He was on an oyster fisherman's boat and tried his first oyster; ever since, he has traveled the world in search of food good and bad, and has shared his results with the public.

Always fascinating to read/view/listen to Tony's escapades.

- Frank


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Friday, June 15, 2007

 

Blackwater Heavies Sue Families of Slain Employees for $10 Million in Brutal Attempt to Suppress Their Story

Link to original article at AlterNet

Over 300 contractors have been killed in Iraq with very little inquiry into their deaths. The families claim that Blackwater is attempting to cover up its incompetence, its cutting of corners in favor of higher profits, and its over billing to the government. Due to lack of accountability and oversight, Blackwater's private army has been able to obtain huge profits from the government, utilizing contacts established through Erik Prince's relationships with high-ranking government officials such as Cofer Black and Joseph Schmitz.

Blackwater - The poster child for corruption, incompetence, and terrorism - proudly funded and supported by our equally corrupt, more incompetent, and more terrorist-like White House Administration.

- Frank


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Wednesday, June 13, 2007

 

AT&T willing to spy for NSA, MPAA, and RIAA

Link to original article at ars technica

There's a certain creepiness to having one of the country's largest IP networks doing deep packet inspection and monitoring, but consumers who value their privacy can always go somewhere else, right? Not necessarily. In addition to running a massive network of its own, AT&T runs a good chunk of the backbone infrastructure in the US. It's a rare bit of traffic that can make it to its destination without passing on to an AT&T-owned network. If the company deploys its anti-piracy technology to all data passing through its networks, AT&T's "solution" could affect most US Internet users.

It is frightening to see how lame regulators have allowed this ugly empire to re-infest the country/world.

- Frank


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Tuesday, June 12, 2007

 

Munitions Dumping at Sea

Link to original article at Deep Sea News

"The Army now admits that it secretly dumped 64 million pounds of nerve and mustard agents into the sea, along with 400,000 chemical-filled bombs, land mines and rockets and more than 500 tons of radioactive waste - either tossed overboard or packed into the holds of scuttled vessels."

Just ask almost any former seagoing Navy person for more examples.

- Frank


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Ten million gallons of toxic gunk trapped in the Brooklyn aquifer is starting to creep toward the surface. How scary is that?

Exploring the Massive, Viscous Oil Blob That Lies Just Beneath the Streets of Greenpoint -- New York Magazine

it was a mix of gasoline, solvents, and associated poisons bubbling up from the very ground: a thin dribble that betrays the presence of a supertanker’s worth of the stuff submerged in the age-old geology of Greenpoint. It’s actually more than a century’s worth of spills, leaks, and waste dumped by oil companies that has pooled into a vast underground lake, more than 55 acres wide and up to 25 feet thick. First discovered by the U.S. Coast Guard in 1978, the Greenpoint spill has been estimated at anywhere between 17 million and 30 million gallons—three times more oil than the Exxon Valdez spill. That makes it the largest known oil spill in American history.

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Security researchers: Safari for Windows not so secure

Link to original article at CNET News.com

Within hours of Apple's public release of the beta for Safari 3.0 for Windows, three security researchers independently found holes within the new browser.

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TJX data theft leads to money-laundering scam

Link to original article at USATODAY.com

With credit cards supplied by an unnamed recruiter, they bought gift cards in $400 increments — just below the $500 limit that requires a manager's approval. At one store, they hauled out 60 $400 gift cards.

Back in Miami, they went on extravagant shopping sprees. In one, Escobar purchased $112,000 in goods with gift cards. Authorities estimate the group acquired $1 million in goods.

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Monday, June 11, 2007

 

A Shocking Idea: Nerves Might Run on Sound, Not Electricity

Link to original article at Wired.com
Most people know that nerves work by passing electrical currents from cell to cell. But you might be surprised to learn that no one knows exactly how anesthetics stop nerves from carrying pain signals.

That's why two scientists believe that we really don’t know how nerves work after all.

According to their controversial theory, electricity is just a side effect of how nerves really operate: by conducting high-density waves of pressure that resemble sound reverberating through a pipe.

Here is a book that touches on similar ideas - Frank:

This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession

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GOP Blocks Gonzales No-Confidence Vote

Link to original article at SFGate.com

In addition to the controversy over fired prosecutors, lawmakers of both parties have long complained that Gonzales allowed Justice to violate civil liberties on a host of other issues — such as by carrying out Bush's warrantless wiretapping program.

One veteran Republican said Gonzales had used up all his political capital in the Senate.

"There is no confidence in the attorney general on this side of the aisle," said Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Specter voted to move the resolution forward, but he said many of his GOP colleagues would not because they feared political retribution. 

Honor among thieves?

We've got the insane running the asylum and the criminals running the justice system.

- Frank

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Would Electing Giuliani Be Like Electing A Smarter Version Of Bush?

Link to original blog entry at Dvorak Uncensored
Here and there, stories from New Yorkers keep popping up that say Rudy isn’t what the rest of the country think he is. Or, should I say, his publicity machine makes us think he is. If he gets nominated and wins, will we have been fooled again like we (ahem, some of us weren’t!) were with Bush?

Rudy giuliani is a true American hero, and we know this because he does
all the things we expect of heroes these days — like make $16 million a
year, and lobby for Hugo Chávez and Rupert Murdoch, and promote wars
without ever having served in the military, and hire a lawyer to call
his second wife a “stuck pig,” and organize absurd, grandstanding
pogroms against minor foreign artists, and generally drift through life
being a shameless opportunist with an outsize ego who doesn’t even
bother to conceal the fact that he’s had a hard-on for the presidency
since he was in diapers. In the media age, we can’t have a hero humble
enough to actually be one; what is needed is a tireless scoundrel, a
cad willing to pose all day long for photos, who’ll accept $100,000 to
talk about heroism for an hour, who has the balls to take a $2.7
million advance to write a book about himself called Leadership. That’s
Rudy Giuliani. Our hero. And a perfect choice to uphold the legacy of
George W. Bush.

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Keith Olbermann - Special Comment

Our government: No Liberals or Conservatives, just cowards and traitors.
- Frank

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Court rules against enemy combatant policy

Link to original article at USATODAY.com

"To sanction such presidential authority to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain civilians, even if the President calls them 'enemy combatants,' would have disastrous consequences for the constitution — and the country," the court panel said.

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What exactly happened that day in Fallujah?

Link to original article at USATODAY.com

In Iraq, the Bush administration has pushed the use of private contractors to an unprecedented level and assembled a civilian force of 126,000 people to support 146,000 U.S. troops, according to Defense Department and industry figures.

Private contractors often can finish jobs "better and faster" than the military, says Steve Schooner, an Army reservist and a law professor at George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C., who specializes in government procurement law. "If you say, I need X now, they'll go out and hire more people, buy more trucks, get more planes."

A complication in the Iraq war, he says, is the heavy dependence on armed contractors. The government has no formal oversight policies that "embrace mercenaries," he says.

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Wednesday, June 06, 2007

 

Reporter Arrested on Orders of Giuliani Press Secretary

Link to original article at jonesreport.com
The arrest-- which clearly violated the First Amendment-- was recorded from two separate camera angles, including a live feed recorded remotely-- so the episode is on record in the event that police destroy or lose tapes seized from Lepacek in attempt to obfuscate the facts of the incident.

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