2015: September - December Political Notes - Richard Stallman

2015: September - December Political Notes - Richard Stallman
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Richard Stallman's personal political notes from 2015: September - December
These are my personal opinions and do not speak for the GNU Project, the FSF, or anyone else.
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Each political note has its own anchor in case you
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please report that as you would report any other broken link.
Link Policy
Glossary
31 December 2015
Capitalism
Capitalism in America
: Giving Crazy a Bad Name While Subverting Democracy.
31 December 2015
Pete Hoekstra
Former congresscritter Pete Hoekstra supported NSA surveillance
consistently while in office. He
was shocked
to discover recently
that the NSA listened to him.
31 December 2015
Obama's policies
Obama's policies encourage replacement of coal with fracked gas, but
some US cities
have policies to head toward renewable energy
instead.
31 December 2015
UK's cameras
The UK's parliament
was never consulted
about setting up cameras to
track all car travel.
31 December 2015
Brussels
Scandal in Brussels! Some soldiers and some
thugs
had a sex party
in the office, while they were sleeping there because transport was shut
down.
Why this constitutes a problem or a wrong is not clear to me.
It did not hurt anyone.
31 December 2015
Taliban
Afghan journalists suspect that the attempts on their life come from a
Taliban-supporting "fifth column"
inside the Afghan government
31 December 2015
Global heating
The question is not, "How likely are we to limit
global heating
to
1.5C,"
but rather, "
How much damage will it cause
if we don't?"
31 December 2015
El Niño
Hunger Threatens Millions as
El Niño Causes
Drought And Floods.
El Niño events have occurred for a long time, but this one
comes on top of the effects of 1C of
global heating
California seals
are starving
because sardines have had to head for
colder water.
31 December 2015
Putin's attacks
About 1/3 of the casualties of Putin's air attacks in Syria
are civilians
according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
31 December 2015
OpenJDK
Google
is shifting Android to use OpenJDK
rather than its own Java
implementation which used a reimplementation of Java based on the
proprietary header files of the proprietary Java implementation.
This concrete result is good for the free software community, but the
idea that a compatible implementation of an interface spec might
infringe the copyright on header files is very very dangerous.
Fortunately, the appeals court that made this decision hears copyright
cases only in very rare circumstances.
The FSF urged the Supreme Court not to consider the appeal
because we feared it might sustain the appeal court's ruling,
which would extend this bad decision to the whole US.
31 December 2015
Marijuana
Roughly half the jobs in the US
require
urine tests to detect use of
marijuana. This policy never made any sense, and it is even more
absurd in states which have legalized marijuana.
31 December 2015
Censorship in universities
2015's notorious censorship
attempts
in universities.
A school-sponsored sports team is not a person. I think it is
legitimate for the school to exercize control over what ateam does,
which would be wrong if directed towards an individual student.
31 December 2015
Google's snooping
As usual, campaigns to limit Google's snooping on students through
their schools
demand an inadequate remedy
If the school makes an account in a student's name on a company's
server, or stores any unencrypted information there about the
student's activity, that is already a violation of the student's
privacy.
Parents must go beyond asking "Please sir, may my child have some more
privacy" and organize to put an end to these snooping activities.
In addition, Google services
nearly all require the user to run
nonfree software
(written in Javascript).
31 December 2015
Pentagon
The Pentagon
is deliberately obstructing
the release of prisoners from
Guantanamo with a campaign of persistent non-cooperation.
31 December 2015
Afghanistan
The US commander in Afghanistan says that the US will needs more
troops to
continue propping up
the Afghan government.
The choice, as I expected, is to keep propping it up ad infinitem
or let it fall.
31 December 2015
Thomas Podgoretsky
The UK's Minister for Cruel Deportation
wants to deport
Thomas
Podgoretsky because he made the mistake of visiting the US, having a
stroke and heart attacks there, and staying there until he was well
enough to go home to the UK.
31 December 2015
Tamir Rice
The excuses offered to the grand jury for the shooting of Tamir Rice
beg
questions that were apparently ignored
— for instance, why
didn't they stay a little further away and take a second to understand
the situation.
31 December 2015
Chronicle of Woe
Chronicle of Woe
: US Policing Culture From Iraq and Vietnam to Jon
Burge's Chicago.
31 December 2015
Flawed terrorism
Is Flawed Terrorism Research
Driving
Flawed Counterterrorism Policies?
31 December 2015
US thugs
US
thugs
shot and killed
at least 28 people this year
who were holding pellet guns or BB guns.
I wonder what fraction of them were black.
I suspect
thugs
are more likely to take a pellet gun for a real gun
when it is held by a black.
31 December 2015
Hossein Derakhshan
In 2008, Hossein Derakhshan's blog was so influential that Iran
imprisoned for it. Released in 2014, he encountered an Internet in
which Facebook and Instagram discourage people from looking at any
other web sites. Real discussion
has been replaced
by trivia videos.
31 December 2015
Squatters in London
In London, squatters
occupied
the former mint site to protest
against homelessness.
31 December 2015
Syria
A six-month truce between Assad and rebels
is holding
in parts of Syria.
31 December 2015
Ramadi
Between US air strikes and
PISSI
's
explosive booby traps, Ramadi is
now
mostly a ruin
That's better than what it was a month ago, a stronghold of barbarity.
I expect that the civilian survivors will say so. Helping them get their
voice out, to show young Muslims what a monster
PISSI
is, will help them
resist radicalization.
31 December 2015
Success and failure
Evidence that the
key to success is dealing in a useful way with failure
31 December 2015
UK's budget cuts
The UK's budget cuts
have come back
as tremendous damage.
31 December 2015
US and immigration
The US government
is concealing
parts of its contracts with companies
that imprison immigration violators, specifically the parts that show
how these contracts financiall pressure the government to imprison
more of them.
31 December 2015
DMCA
Prohibiting farmers from repairing tractors is not a side effect of
the DMCA. It
is part of the core
goal.
31 December 2015
Encryption
Americans
must not stand
for officials' advocating China-style attacks
on our encryption systems.
Encryption alone can't protect us from all the sorts of digital
surveillance that are being set up in the US. Encryption won't stop
systems from recognizing your license plate or your face. Encryption
won't enable you to pay anonymously with a credit card, or carry a
portable phone
and not be tracked
31 December 2015
Global heating and tornado
It appears that
global heating
is increasing
tornado damage in the US.
31 December 2015
Zuckerberg
Facebook's Zuckerberg: If You Oppose
Our International Power Grab
You're An Enemy Of The Poor.
I have long challenged campaigns
that prioritize people's internet access over
their freedom
31 December 2015
Methan leak
An enormous methane leak
from an old gas well in California will take months
to shut off.
31 December 2015
Erdogan
I Revealed the Truth about President Erdogan And Syria. For That,
He Had
Me
Jailed.
31 December 2015
Obama
Obama's program to help homeowners faced with foreclosure
did not
function
well, and now
SCROTUS
have abolished it.
31 December 2015
Global heating
UK governments
have repeatedly refused
to confront the way global
heating effects put Britain in danger.
31 December 2015
Tamir Rice
The
thug
that killed Tamir Rice
will not be
prosecuted.
Prosecutors often intentionally throw the fight in the grand jury.
We need a special mechanism for bringing charges against
thugs
that shoot people, or make falls accusations.
31 December 2015 (
Urgent: Protect victims of forced labor
Everyone:
urge
your government
to
sign the treaty to protect victims of forced labor.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
More
information
about the treaty.
If you don't run the Javascript code, you won't see anything in your
browser to show that you signed, but in my case it did in fact work;
you should get a confirmation email.
31 December 2015 (
Japan apologizes to Korean women
Japan has apologized to the Korean women that it
forced
into prostitution during World War II
The Japanese army did that in other places, too, including what is now
Indonesia. After the war, many of these women never went home because
they felt ashamed — in effect internalizing the blame that
(according to their culture) their families would have imposed on
them.
31 December 2015 (
Internet of Things + DMCA
Combining the Internet of Things with the DMCA creates the
Internet
without Good Choices
31 December 2015 (
The TPP
The TPP is
harmful
even if evaluated based on the "free trade" ideology
Of course, that ideology is a mistake because it reduces the effective
power of democracy and increases the effective power of businesses.
Existing "free trade" treaties are part of the reason that the US has
become
a plutocracy
. This is why I advocate
cancelling
them
Part of the article uses the incoherent term
"intellectual
property"
. It is always a mistake, without exception, to group
together copyrights and patents as if they were a single issue. And
that term includes several other laws as well. If you think they are
similar than you don't understand what they really do.
31 December 2015 (
The TSA
No
Social Security number? No passport. Why? Are TSA Actions Subject to
Judicial Review?
31 December 2015 (
Polio vaccination in Pakistan and Afghanistan
Polio vaccination is
advancing
again
in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Extremist groups have stopped
opposing vaccination, and new infections have gone way down.
31 December 2015 (
Seizure of property by thugs
The US has stopped offering local
thug
departments the chance to
seize
people's property and split it with the Federal government
Ironically, this is due to budget cuts imposed by
SCROTUS
31 December 2015 (
Blockade of Yemen
Taiz, in Yemen, is
suffering
from a siege imposed by the Houthis
, within the general blockade
of Yemen imposed by Salafi (*) Arabia and the US.
The US is supporting this blockade (and the bombing and invasion) to
suck up to some private interests, since nothing about the
intervention serves any national interest.
* Officially "Saudi Arabia", but its global support for the repressive
and cruel Salafist form of Islam (which helped inspire al Qa'ida and
PISSI
) is the most important characteristic of that country.
31 December 2015 (
Wind energy
Wind energy is
becoming
the most efficient investment in power generation
Now think of how much faster we would progress towards curbing global
heating if fossil fuels did not enjoy their present
subsidies
31 December 2015 (
Sequestering carbon in the soil
Agriculture
may be able to sequester carbon in the soil.
31 December 2015 (
Israel's "transparency" law
Israel's "transparency" law requires human rights NGO to disclose
their funding, but
right-wing
NGOs have been given exemptions
The transparency requirement, per se, is not unjust, but it is being
applied selectively to oppose human rights.
31 December 2015 (
More Ethiopian journalists arrested
Ethiopia has
arrested
more journalists
and is threatening bloggers.
31 December 2015 (
El Niño + human-caused climate mayhem
Flooding in Britain, record US temperatures and Australian wildfires
result from El Niño
on
top of human-caused climate mayhem
31 December 2015 (
Iraqi army recapturing Ramadi
The Iraqi army is
slowly
recapturing Ramadi
. Most of the PISSI fighters have
fled
leaving a rear guard which seems to intend to slow the army's advance.
The Iraqi army is not defeating
PISSI
's full strength. Nonetheless,
the loss of Ramadi may weaken
PISSI
somewhat.
31 December 2015 (
Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders:
can win the backing of Donald Trump supporters
."
Trump (and others before him) have distracted them into blaming weak
scapegoats. Sanders will show them who they should really be angry
at: the plutocrats.
31 December 2015 (
Deadly US ground beef
Ground beef in the US, if it isn't "organic grass-fed beef", is quite
likely to harbor
antibiotic-resistant
bacteria that kill people
The organic grass-fed beef will cost more, but that won't bother you
unless you eat too much beef (alas, many Americans do).
31 December 2015 (
US airports kicking homeless people out
US airports are kicking homeless people
into
the cold
31 December 2015 (
China adopts encryption back door law
China has adopted a law
requiring
services to hand over encryption back doors
This power seems to exist already in the US; it's what
forced
Ladar Levison to shut down Lavabit
That doesn't mean it is ok for China to do this — or for the US
to do it.
31 December 2015 (
How Peabody Energy exploits poverty
How Peabody Energy
exploits
poverty
to excuse burning coal.
Coal is not going to make poor people better off, beyond a decade or
two. The brunt of
climate mayhem
will fail mainly on the poor —
hundreds of millions of them.
31 December 2015 (
China adopts law against domestic violence
China has adopted a
law
against domestic violence
Chinese society before the revolution was very very sexist.
30 December 2015 (
Urgent: Democratic Party debates
US citizens:
call on
the Democratic Party
to schedule more debates and make them more
visible.
30 December 2015 (
Urgent: Reject measures to "protect" us
US citizens:
call
on Congress
to reject measures to "protect" us at the expense of
our human rights.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
30 December 2015 (
Twitter deletes journalist's tweets
deleted
a journalist's tweets
because a bank asked for this.
30 December 2015 (
Juniper Networks back doors
Evidence that points to
NSA
involvement
in putting the back door in Juniper Networks products.
30 December 2015 (
Taliban in Helmand
The Taliban have taken over
most
districts in Helmand
; Sangin is one of the few still being
contested. They may hope to make it their headquarters.
30 December 2015 (
System of bail in the US
The system of bail in the US
pressures
poor people to plead guilty to crimes they didn't commit
or else it puts them in debt.
30 December 2015 (
Cocaine in "legitimate" capital markets
"Legitimate" capital markets are thoroughly hooked on cocaine; in
laundering
drug money
, London is more important than the Cayman Islands.
30 December 2015 (
War on sites that facilitate sharing
The copyright industry's war on sites that facilitate sharing causes
harm
to users
even when not entirely successful.
Please do not use our enemies' smear term, "piracy", to refer to
sharing.
30 December 2015 (
MPAA Funds Pro-Copyright Scholars
MPAA Funds Pro-Copyright Scholars
to
Influence Politics
30 December 2015 (
Recognition technology
Advances in recognition technology
threaten
to enable tracking
people easily by cameras
through recognizing their faces or
irises.
There is no easy solution to this problem, but since it threatens
oppression
that can make democracy ineffective
, it justifies the cost of a
difficult solution.
30 December 2015 (
Guantanamo
Obama blames Congress for slowing the release of prisoners from
Guantanamo, but he and his staff are
primarily
responsible for the delay
"Guantanamo" has come to stand for "imprisonment without trial", but
they are not the same. Obama talks about "closing Guantanamo prison"
but his method of doing so is to move imprisonment without trial to
the US mainland. That would make it even more unjust. We could hope
that the Supreme Court would consider it more clearly unacceptable
— but what if it did the opposite?
The US must end its imprisonment without trial. Every prisoner in
Guantanamo deserves to get a real, fair trial or be freed.
30 December 2015 (
California's diminishing rainfall
California confronts the question of
how
to manage its diminishing rainfall
Global heating
will make the US midwest hotter and
interfere
with rain
The real solution, the efficient solution, is to cut back on
CO
emissions so that the climate won't get more screwed.
30 December 2015 (
TSA scanner policy
lawsuit
seeks to make the TSA change its policy of requiring some passengers
to go through a scanner.
30 December 2015 (
Game cr…apps
Modern gratis game cr…apps
collect
a wide range of data about their users and their users' friends and
associates
. Even nastier, they do it through ad networks that
merge the data collected by various cr…apps and sites made by
different companies.
They use this data to manipulate people to buy things, and hunt for
"whales" who can be led to spend a lot of money. They also use a back
door to manipulate the game play for specific players.
While the article describes gratis games, games that cost money can
use the same tactics.
All this reinforces the point that proprietary software is software
for suckers.
30 December 2015 (
Warm December
The unusually warm December is making some people concerned about
their
flowering
perennials
, some of which are blooming now instead of waiting for
spring.
However, what concerns me more is that this warm December will not be
so unusual at the end of the century.
30 December 2015 (
Listening machines
Beware
the Listening Machines.
30 December 2015 (
Taking risks during childhood
Should
I let my child take more risks?
" Probably yes, up to a point.
However, you might consider transporting your child by car to be too
dangerous and beyond the limit.
29 December 2015 (
Transportation in the US
Most of the US has been
restructured
around automobiles
. As people get older, eventually they can't
drive any more, so they become stuck at home.
29 December 2015 (
European Patent Office
The European Patent Office hired a surveillance company to
snoop
on its critics
29 December 2015 (
Corporatization of American Red Cross
The American Red Cross spent millions in Haiti to provide shelter
and
built
just six houses with that money
This seems to relate to its
overall
corporatization
29 December 2015 (
US supported creation of Salafist state
In
2013
, the US supported the creation of some sort of Salafist
"Islamic state" in Syria and Iraq as a way to weaken Assad.
Be careful what you wish for.
29 December 2015 (
Juniper Networks back door
Was it the NSA that put the
back
door in Juniper Networks firewalls
It has been trying to attack
antivirus
software
29 December 2015 (
Fingerprints required for cell phone
Bangladesh demands
fingerprints
from everyone that has a cell phone
That would convince me not to visit Bangladesh, if I carried a cell
phone.
29 December 2015 (
Fluoridation of water
There is
no
conclusive evidence
about whether fluoridation of water supply
reduces tooth decay, though there is suggestive evidence that it does.
29 December 2015 (
People's movements tracked in Hyde Park
The UK government tracked people's movements in Hyde Park
through
their mobile phones
This particular project did not record their names, but that would
have been easy to do.
29 December 2015 (
Syrian Islamist fighters in Damascus
2000 Syrian Islamist fighters and Assad's forces have made a deal
whereby the Islamists will
evacuate
an area near Damascus, leaving their heavy weapons
29 December 2015 (
Medical uses of marijuana
Ten
important medical uses
of marijuana.
27 December 2015 (
Social isolation
American society pushes people into social isolation, and
1/4
of American adults have no one they can confide in
. For old
people, loneliness is often fatal.
27 December 2015 (
Work-related diseases
Work-related diseases
kill
50,000 Americans a year
. That's more than are killed by guns, and
terrorism is a pinprick by comparison.
Meanwhile, we could do a lot to reduce work-related diseases
without limiting anyone's human rights.
27 December 2015 (
Endangered species
The US Fish and Wildlife Service has become
more
active in considering endangered species and establishing protection
for them
. The case backlog is decreasing.
Measures like the Endangered Species Act are adequate for dealing with
local threats in a world that is stable overall. Of course, many
countries don't have an Endangered Species Act and many governments
are not able to really enforce such laws. But even if they did, that
won't be enough in the future.
Climate mayhem
will swamp these local
protection efforts, much as rising oceans will swamp sea walls.
27 December 2015 (
Mosquito-borne virus spreading
A mosquito-borne virus in Brazil is spreading, and its spread can be
measured by the thousands of
babies
born with microcephaly
Global heating
effects are indirectly responsible for the spread of
the mosquitos that transmit the virus.
27 December 2015 (
USAF proposed killing civilians in 1959
In 1959, a US Air Force proposal for how to target nuclear weapons on
the Soviet Union
treated
killing of civilians as a goal
26 December 2015 (
Urgent: Investigate death of Sandra Bland
US citizens:
call on
Attorney General Lynch
to investigate death of Sandra Bland.
26 December 2015 (
Urgent: Oregon's national forests
US citizens:
Tell
Congress
not to sell off or cut down Oregon's national forests.
26 December 2015 (
Sanders
Polls show Sanders doing
considerably
better against Trump than Clinton would do
26 December 2015 (
Back Lives Matter protest
A Black Lives Matter protest at the Mall of America was
not
entirely blocked
by the mall management armed with court orders.
Nonetheless, the difficulties they faced show that replacing real
public space with pseudo-public space inside malls is dangerous to
democracy. People should have the right to protest inside malls.
26 December 2015 (
Guber
Seattle has arranged to give
Guber
drivers a
chance
to unionize
This can help the drivers get more pay, but it won't do anything to
reduce the surveillance that passengers are subject to, or save them
from the requirement to run nonfree software.
26 December 2015 (
The range of ideas that fit into Islam
It
takes
a rather large book
to describe the range of ideas that fit into
Islam — except in the opinion of Salafis.
26 December 2015 (
French citizenship
French President Hollande is getting strong criticism for
plans
to take away citizenship from people who were born citizens of
France
His other plans, such as the permanent state of emergency,
seen even worse.
26 December 2015 (
Gmail psychological profiles
Google's Gmail and other connected services create psychological
profiles of every user — and all the people they communicate
with by email. A slowly progressing lawsuit claims that this
violates
California law
You can opt out of this by
changing to
some other mail service
, running your own mail server, and/or
encrypting the text of your emails with the
GNU Privacy Guard
26 December 2015 (
US-Korea "free trade" agreement
The US-Korea "free trade" agreement, if evaluated in the conventional
terms of exports and imports, has been a
big
loss for US exports and US employment
This is on top of the harm that the treaty does to both countries by
undermining
democracy
26 December 2015 (
School voucher system in Sweden
In 1992, Sweden adopted a school voucher system. Since then the
Swedish educational system has become
more
unequal, and less effective
overall.
26 December 2015 (
French journalists in China
China seems to
plan
to expel a French journalist
whose articles in France have
criticized the regime.
26 December 2015 (
The Battle Over Sangin
The Battle Over Sangin Should Teach the West Some
Vital
Military Lessons
. And political lessons, too, about "attempting
cultural change on a management consultant timeline."
I still think the US might have achieved a good outcome in Afghanistan
if
it had refrained from attacking and destroying Iraq
26 December 2015 (
Judaist fanatics
Judaist fanatics in Israel had themselves filmed
celebrating
the murder of an Arab toddler
Judaist, Christianist or Islamist, they are all enemies of human
rights. The worst of them are killers, but the rest are still bad.
26 December 2015 (
India rejects Facebook's power grab
India has
blocked
Facebook's plan
to extend internet service without network
neutrality.
Access to the internet can be good or bad, depending on whether the
internet respects your freedom. If people make the error of assuming
that it is good unconditionally, that can lead them to mistake
Facebook's power grab for a real gift.
26 December 2015 (
Hunger and homelessness in the US
22 US cities reported
high
levels of hunger and homelessness
for the year Sep '14 — Aug
'15.
26 December 2015 (
Poverty in the US permanently stunts IQ
In the US, poverty
permanently
stunts childrens' IQ
, but not in other developed countries.
It is not clear why the US gets different results.
25 December 2015 (
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria in ground beef
Ground beef generally has bacteria all through it, and some of them
can make people sick. Consumer Reports found that US ground beef,
unless it is from 'grass-fed organic beef', often contains
antibiotic-resistant
bacteria
25 December 2015 (
British Muslims blocked from entering US
It appears the US is
blocking
many British Muslims from entering the US
, often in arbitrary
last-minute ways that cause unnecessary trouble and expense.
Blocking 10 family members from traveling because of an objection
to their one relative is especially nasty, and gratuitous.
Because there is no way to find out in advance if you will be blocked
in this way, British Muslims in general are
afraid to buy tickets
to the US
It seems to me that the US should offer a way to ask, before buying
tickets, "Will you allow me to fly there?" If the US responds that
you can go, and blocks you later, it should compensate you for the
costs of your flight and other preparations.
And it is unconscionable to block 11 people because of objections
about one.
25 December 2015 (
Australia's anti-renewable-energy policies
Australia is
slowly
shifting away from the anti-renewable-energy policies
that Abbott
set up.
25 December 2015 (
Russia dropping cluster bombs on Syria
Amnesty International says Russia is
dropping
cluster bombs on Syrian cities
, even on areas of no military
significance.
25 December 2015 (
Illegal spying on activists in Ecuador
Leaked documents say that Ecuador's intelligence agency
illegally
spied on activists
who campaigned against oil extraction in the
Amazon.
25 December 2015 (
Christmas in officially Muslim countries
Some officially Muslim countries have demonstrated their intolerance
of non-Muslims by
banning
visible celebration of Christmas
Will they ban
Grav-Mass
, too?
25 December 2015 (
The "no fly list"
The "no fly list"
punishes
people by surprise
, and people are put in the list based on
"predictive judgments" which can be based on nothing but noise.
25 December 2015 (
Raid in Sangin
Afghan army reinforcements
may
kick the Taliban out of Sangin
If the Taliban melt away when confronted by a relief force, that will
not constitute a victory for the Afghan government. Rather, it will
mean that the Taliban are following through after a large, successful
raid, in accord with standard guerrilla tactics.
To turn this raid into a victory, the Afghan army would need to
surround Sangin and kill the Taliban fighters caught in the trap.
I don't think they will try it.
25 December 2015 (
Shot dead by Georgia thugs
44% of the people shot dead by Georgia
thugs
(since 2010) were either
unarmed
or shot in the back
. That's just the beginning of it.
25 December 2015 (
Prison for throwing stones at car
Israel sentenced Palestinian teenagers to
15 years in prison
after they confessed under pressure to throwing stones at a car.
The car was driven by a family that lives in an Israeli colony in
Palestinian territory. One of the children in the car died from the
attack. The killing was a serious crime, but there is no credible
evidence about who did it.
25 December 2015 (
Israel violates international law
Israel violates international law by taking Palestinian prisoners out
of Palestine. Here's
why
that violation is important
25 December 2015 (
Israel on foreign funding
To the Israeli right-wing,
foreign
funding for Breaking the Silence is an outrage
; foreign funding
for extending colonies in Palestine is just fine.
After Israel arrested Jews who killed Palestinians, fanatical
colonists
attacked
another Palestinian family
. Fortunately not fatally this time.
25 December 2015 (
Palestinian Christians
Palestinian Christians suffer from the occupation like Palestinian
Muslims, but find it
easier
to move elsewhere
25 December 2015 (
Mennonites on occupation of Palestine
Mennonites who visited Palestine
defend
the need for boycott, divestment and sanctions
against Israel's
occupation of Palestine.
24 December 2015 (
Urgent: Tesoro-Savage oil export terminal
US citizens:
oppose
building the Tesoro-Savage oil export terminal in Washington State.
24 December 2015 (
Urgent: toy factories in China
Everyone: call on major toy branding companies to
improve
wages and working conditions
in their factories in China.
24 December 2015 (
Urgent: drone registration site
Does it work to use the US government drone registration site
with LibreJS enabled to block nonfree Javascript code?
Please email your answer to rms on the site gnu.org.
24 December 2015 (
Urgent: stand with Nagpur
Everyone: Stand with the people of Nagpur and tell the World Bank to
stop
pushing privatization of water.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
24 December 2015 (
Charging more for products
Companies tend to
charge
more for their products aimed at women or girls
than for comparable
products aimed at men or boys.
Why should scooters be meant specifically for one sex? There is no
good reason for that. That too is a marketing ploy. Give a girl a
blue scooter, and fight against creeping genderization of everything,
while also saving money.
24 December 2015 (
Adelson buys your newspaper
What If Sheldon Adelson Buys Your Newspaper?
Write
About Him, Then Leave.
24 December 2015 (
Obama's support for "moderate" Syrian resistance
The US military thought Obama's support for "moderate" Syrian resistance
was only helping Jihadis, so it began
feeding
intelligence indirectly to Assad
to help him fight those rebels.
24 December 2015 (
Physical search instead of body scanning
The TSA may
stop
some passengers
from requesting a physical search instead of body scanning.
I don't object to the millimeter-wave scanners now in use, but I still
consider this change dangerous. What if they move to another machine
that is potentially dangerous, as the x-ray scanners were?
24 December 2015 (
Colonies in Palestine
Israel's ambassador to the US has gone out of his way to send
holiday
gifts
made by colonies in Palestine.
24 December 2015 (
Bogus opinion polls
Thailand's dictators
don't
have elections,
but they have bogus opinion polls.
24 December 2015 (
Wearing makeup to appear Asian (or black)
Is it wrong for
Caucasian
actors
to wear makeup to appear Asian (or black)?
The article presents an incoherent mixture of perceived insult, lack
of Asian role models on TV, and loss of work for Asian actors. Any
or all of those issues might be valid, but they are all different,
and mixing them up produces only confusion.
If it is a matter of work discrimination, how about making up nonwhite
actors up to appear Caucasian? All actors' race would cease to matter.
If it is a matter of visible role models on TV, that's a matter of
appearance only. Why does it matter what the actor's real skin color
or appearance is, beneath the makeup?
If you feel insulted, please explain why an actor's makeup constitutes
a statement about Asians, because I don't see that.
24 December 2015 (
Poland's Christianist extremist government
Poland's Christianist extremist government is
undermining
the Supreme Court,
apparently to facilitate a
total
ban on abortions.
I support ending subsidies for IVF; the world has an excess of human
babies and it makes no sense at all to spend public funds on making
more.
Once babies are born, we must make sure they get good food, medical
care, education, and a good home with parents that are not stressed
about a lack of money.
Naturally, the right-wing government plans to cut that. Christianist
extremist don't care about real babies.
24 December 2015 (
The atmosphere as public trust
Officially designating the atmosphere as a
public
trust
might help get some countries to act against global heating.
24 December 2015 (
Exxon's global heating research
Exxon shared its global heating research with other major oil companies
as
far back as 1980.
They have all been knowingly working to make sure the US government does not avoid disaster.
24 December 2015 (
Loss of manufacturing jobs
The loss of manufacturing jobs in the US
is
not inevitable.
It is the result of political choices.
24 December 2015 (
Spending public assistance
The US and various states are prohibiting poor people from spending
public assistance on various expensive habits that
they
can't afford anyway.
The motive might be to fool the public into believing that welfare
recipients really have money for luxury foods such as lobster, on
ocean cruises, or even on tattoos.
If you can barely afford food at all, you will do without those things
anyway.
24 December 2015 (
ARM and IBM teamed up
ARM and IBM have teamed up to make devices that
monitor
and surveil their users.
24 December 2015 (
Libya's new unified government
The UN is moving towards authorizing Libya's new unified government to
invite
Western help to fight PISSI.
An intervention in support of Libyan ground troops has a reasonable chance of success.
24 December 2015 (
Israel considering Putin-style law
Israel is considering a Putin-style law to restrict human-rights NGOs
that
receive
support from European governments.
The President of Israel was
called a traitor for meeting with the New Israel Fund.
24 December 2015 (
Fall of Sangin
The fall of Sangin demonstrates the
futility
of NATO's trying to hold it.
Once the Taliban started to resurge, the US and NATO never had a
plausible plan for defeating the Taliban, since the Afghan government
has never generated enough loyalty to do so. The only question is how
long to prop it up.
24 December 2015 (
Geneva conventions
Increasingly, wars involve bombing
cities
full of civilians,
as countries ignore the Geneva conventions.
24 December 2015 (
Tax loophole
A tax loophole encourages US companies to
increase
pay to their CEOs.
23 December 2015 (
New web error code
A new Web error code has been established
for
legally imposed censorship
23 December 2015 (
Menstruating women treated as "unclean"
In rural India, the menstruating women are still treated as "unclean".
They are
banished
to rude huts outside the village
. Girls miss school.
23 December 2015 (
Boko Haram violence
Boko Haram Violence
Keeping
a Million Children Out of School
, Says UNICEF.
23 December 2015 (
Racist inspired by Trump
A racist inspired by Trump
built
a pipe bomb to attack Muslims with
23 December 2015 (
Antibiotic resistance
Humanity has not acted to slow antibiotic resistance; now it is
"almost too late" to avoid
losing
the most important current antibiotics
The responsibility is the plutocratic state, which obeys agribusiness
and disregards the general good.
23 December 2015 (
Unjust tech
Can
Laws Keep Up with Tech World?
It should be noted that
Amazon
Guber
and
WhatsApp
(proprietary software)
are inherently unjust.
23 December 2015 (
US thugs claim there is a "war on police"
US
thugs
continue to claim that there is a "war on police", violence
against
thugs
continues to be rare.
Marauding
thugs remain the bigger threat
Thugs
kill a lot more Americans than terrorists do; but they do lesser
forms of violence more often than killings.
23 December 2015 (
US wages war against lots of Muslims
In response to occasional crimes by a few Muslims, the US
wages
actual war against lots of Muslims
I should point out that the guns used by Malik and his spouse were not
lawfully purchased in the form he had them, and a
stricter
system of gun control
could have made them difficult for him to
get.
Because the US is waging actual war, its innocent victims greatly
outnumber the victims of Muslim terrorists in the US. Americans are
much more likely to be killed by
thugs
than by terrorists.
Christianist terrorism against US abortion facilities is a more
serious threat because it is concentrated against a few. If you are
an abortion doctor, that danger is large.
23 December 2015 (
Urgent: Don't legitimize Israeli colonies
US citizens:
call
on Congress
to reject a resolution to legitimize Israeli colonies
in Palestine.
23 December 2015 (
DNC reenables Sanders' access to voter data
The Democratic National Committee
reenabled
Sanders' access to voter data
; the Sanders campaign did the
requested investigation and took appropriate action.
23 December 2015 (
Exaggerated idea of level of danger
Lumping together crowd killing sprees with the more common multiple
shootings in families and gangs
gives
the public an exaggerated idea of the level of danger
from the
former.
If shootings cause around 110,000 casualties in the year in the US,
that shows guns are a serious problem, but the sensational killing
sprees are a small part of it.
23 December 2015 (
Violent domestic relationships
Violent domestic relationships
don't
make sense in rational terms
. The victims are so traumatized that
they blame themselves for the other person's violence.
23 December 2015 (
Wild bees declining
Wild bees are
declining
in US agricultural areas
23 December 2015 (
Dealing with terrorist videos
Proposal
for Dealing with Terrorist Videos on the Internet.
23 December 2015 (
Racial disparity in arrests
Study Documents
Extreme
Racial Disparity
in Arrests for Low-Level Offenses [in a US city].
23 December 2015 (
Clinton endorses FBI's take on encryption
Clinton has
endorsed
the FBI's take on encryption
I had already decided not to vote for her if she wins the nomination.
I hope you will join me. But let's try to prevent that issue from
arising. Please support the Sanders campaign.
23 December 2015 (
Force-feeding immigration prisoners
A US court ruled that the US
can
force-feed immigration prisoners on hunger strike
This is a violation of their human rights. A sane person has a right
to commit suicide and a right to fast to death.
Now that the prisoners have been denied the right to hunger strike, I
expect that some will commit quick suicide as a protest.
23 December 2015 (
Playing into hands of terrorists
Treating
every rumor or threat of terrorism as serious
is an effect of fear
and it plays into the hands of terrorists.
23 December 2015 (
Muslim students US schools bullied
Muslim students in US schools, even young ones, face
frequent
bullying that can go as far as physical attacks
Violent attacks against Muslims are
increasing
23 December 2015 (
Sudanese editors face death penalty
Sudanese Editors Face Death Penalty for
'Inciting
an Arab Spring'
In Sudan, only Winter is allowed.
23 December 2015 (
Ill treatment of homeless people
Many people and governments
treat
homeless people like vermin
. Laws that shove them into obscure
corners help others ignore how badly they are being treated.
Ultimately this is done to please store owners (who want them out of
the way) and rich (who don't want to pay taxes to give them homes).
The same rich people are responsible for the policies that make people
homeless.
23 December 2015 (
Prison
Could prison be replaced with a
different
correctional system
23 December 2015 (
Spain's parliament divided
Spain's parliament is
divided
it is not clear who will govern.
23 December 2015 (
Chicago thug may have made false accusation
A video suggests a Chicago
thug
may have made a false accusation about
Alfontish Cockerham
to
excuse shooting him dead
22 December 2015 (
Urgent: Reveal donors to Columbia's CGEP
Everyone:
call on
Columbia University
to reveal all the donors to Center on Global
Energy Policy, since they seem to include Exxon.
22 December 2015 (
Urgent: Free Waleed Abu al-Khair
US citizens:
Call
on
Salafi Arabia
to free human rights lawyer Waleed Abu al-Khair.
22 December 2015 (
Urgent: Track and publish weapons sales
US citizens:
call
on Congress to resume tracking and publishing world weapons sales.
22 December 2015 (
Facebook "real name" policy
Facebook relaxed its "real name" policy, but only
for
people who are being harassed for certain specific reasons
This relieves a very specific acute problem, but does not enable
ordinary people to use Facebook without being tracked.
21 December 2015 (
How government tracks cell phones
How the Government Surveils Cellphones:
Primer
This doesn't include the possibility of using the
universal
back door
to turn the phone into a full-time listening device.
And there is also
extracting
data through WiFi
21 December 2015 (
UK immigration bill
The UK is planning a law that will
make
victims of trafficking afraid to speak up
21 December 2015 (
Undercover thug attacks protester
Montreal protester Katie Nelson recognized an undercover
thug
when he
took off his mask — he was pretending to be a protester —
because he was
one
of the thugs she was already suing for a previous attack on her
So he attacked her again. She is now in the hospital and preparing
another lawsuit.
21 December 2015 (
Right-wing billionaire-owned newspaper
Right-wing billionaire Sheldon Adelson appears to have bought the Las
Vegas Review-Journal just to
set
its reporters to trying to dig up dirt on judges who didn't bow down
to his wealth
More
information
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
21 December 2015 (
UK's anti-sharing thugs
The UK's anti-sharing
thugs
have come down on people who
noncommercially distributed karaoke recordings
because they are
not commercially available
, and
using
a sleazy trick of language to equate this with commercial
redistribution
21 December 2015 (
US alliance with Salafi Arabia
Yemen's civil war, in which the US-backed intervention by
Salafi Arabia
has
made
millions homeless and uses cluster bombs
, shows that the US
alliance with
Salafi Arabia
is a disaster.
21 December 2015 (
Extremist views of Syrian rebel fighters
Most Syrian rebel fighters hold
extremist
views similar to PISSI
, even though they are enemies of PISSI.
This shows that defeating
PISSI
won't eliminate Salafi oppression from
Syria. (There may be no way to do that, in the short term.) However,
those groups might not want to attack outside Syria; it might be
possible to make peace with them.
It will be hard to make peace in a way that includes them and the
secular Kurds.
21 December 2015 (
Punishing old people for falling
A UK local government, squeezed for funds, is
planning
to charge old people every time they need someone to pick them up
after falling
21 December 2015 (
"Smart" watches can tell what you're typing
Malicious code in a "smart" watch can tell what you are typing by
measuring
your arm motion
Anything called "smart", unless all the software is free, is an attack
on your freedom and privacy.
21 December 2015 (
Mandatory minimum sentences
Mandatory minimum sentences are a recent aberration in US history; we
could
get rid of most of them
21 December 2015 (
Dow still leaking pollution in Bhopal
Dow continues to disregard criminal court charges in India and
refuses
to remediate
the pollution that still leaks from its factory in
Bhopal.
I wonder if DuPont has property in India that could be seized if it
merges with Dow. Perhaps a lien could be put on it now, to stop
DuPont from selling it before the merger.
21 December 2015 (
Meeting Paris conference goals
The Paris conference didn't pay much attention to
meat
production
, but to meet the goal requires a big reduction.
21 December 2015 (
Urgent: Abortion clinics
US citizens:
call
on the Department of Justice
to investigate violence against
abortion clinics as terrorism.
21 December 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose Florida fracking bill
Citizens of Florida:
oppose
the state bill
to impose fracking everywhere in the state.
21 December 2015 (
Urgent: Cancel Corinthian College loans
US citizens:
call
on the Department of Education
to cancel all loans to students of
Corinthian Colleges.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
21 December 2015 (
Victory against PISSI
If we fight
PISSI
what
would we want victory to look like
21 December 2015 (
Suicide and depression in the UK
The UK's relentless
pressure
to declare disabled people capable of working
has led to around
600 suicides and over 700,000 prescriptions for antidepressants.
21 December 2015 (
Censorship of history
Cecil Rhodes Was a Racist, But You
Can't
Readily Expunge Him from History
21 December 2015 (
Ending the civil war in Syria
The UN has set up a
conference
of relevant powers
to try to end the civil war in Syria.
Has anyone proposed a solution to protect human rights for all the
ethnic groups and sects?
21 December 2015 (
US drone registration system
The US drone registration system
will
make drone owners' names and addresses visible to the public
21 December 2015 (
US's limits on visa waiver program
Ambassadors from EU countries
warn
of retaliation
for the US's limits on the visa waiver program.
Some have suggested that Europe would retaliate by imposing the same
restriction on Americans, blocking Iranian-Americans etc. That would
be a foolish way to retaliate, since the Americans who support the
recent restriction would be glad to see Iranian-Americans punished.
As retaliation, it would be ineffective.
My suggestion is that Europe should require visas for Americans whose
names begin with "R", or perhaps "Ry". That might be a small fraction
comparable to the fraction of Europeans affected by the new US
restrictions.
Another idea: require visas of Americans related to Republican
congresscritters.
21 December 2015 (
Arrest of Shkreli
Did
government officials tip off reporters
to film the arrest of
Shkreli?
Shkreli is a greedy bastard and we ought to make it illegal to act as
he did with Daraprim. (His arrest was about a
different
matter
.) However, for the issue raised here, he's just one
example among many, and the questions posed apply to everyone.
21 December 2015 (
Surveillance of people in cars in London
Thugs
will
collect
photos in real time of everyone riding in cars
in London.
When the state knows where everyone goes, and who talks with whom,
democracy
cannot
survive
. That doesn't bother the UK government, which is
applying
Republican-style techniques
to effectively eliminate democracy in
the UK.
21 December 2015 (
FBI demands personal information for drones
The FBI
demands a
credit card number
to register a drone, as well as other personal
information.
This puts the drone owners at risk.
21 December 2015 (
PAT-RIOT Act "national security letters"
We now know how broad and sweeping the PAT-RIOT Act "national security
letters" are; and
functionaries
can demand them arbitrarily
21 December 2015 (
Santa Claus confirms NSA attack
Santa Claus Confirms
NSA
Attack on Naughty-Or-Nice Database
21 December 2015 (
DNC's data company
The Democratic National Committee's data company has repeatedly failed
to keep each candidate's data secret from other candidates. One
Sanders staffer accessed some of Clinton's data, and the campaign
fired him for this.
The DNC took the excuse to deny the Sanders campaign
all
access to its own voter information data base
The Sanders campaign has
sued
the DNC for this
21 December 2015 (
Escalation of the War on Sharing
In an escalation of the War on Sharing, a US ISP was
fined
millions for not disconnecting users
that repeatedly did file
sharing.
Sharing
should be legal
21 December 2015 (
Tent cities in the US
Tent cities in the US are the result of
laws
that force homeless people out of downtown areas
21 December 2015 (
Pete Seeger's FBI file
Pete Seeger's FBI File Reveals How the Folk Legend First Became a
Target
of the Feds
21 December 2015 (
Germany can open investigation in US torture
Why Germany
Can
and Should
Open an Investigation into US Torture.
20 December 2015 (
30% of Republicans want to bomb Agrabah
30%
of Republicans
want to bomb Agrabah (a fictional medieval Arab
country).
Only around 20% of Democrats want to bomb Agrabah.
20 December 2015 (
Al Jazeera blocks access to an article
Al Jazeera deleted and
blocked
access to an article it had published
, which criticized Salafi
Arabia's disrespect for human rights.
Here is
the
article
20 December 2015 (
Loss of monkeys and birds
Loss of Monkeys And Birds in Tropical Forests
Driving
Up Carbon Emissions
The problem is that hardwood trees need those animals to disperse
their seeds.
20 December 2015 (
Foreign policy "advice" from a company
A company gives foreign policy "advice" to candidates such as Clinton,
Rubio and Cruz, led and
funded
by companies in the military-industrial complex
The company says this is not lobbying, but that's what it adds up to.
It looks like Sanders is not interested in their "advice".
20 December 2015 (
Martin Shkreli resigns after arrest
Martin Shkreli, whose company Turing Pharmaceuticals raised the price
of Dataprim and blocked companies from making generic drugs, has
resigned after being
arrested
on charges of fraud
in his previous company.
I wonder whether the new management will reduce the price. But either
way his practices of blocking other companies from making generic
equivalents should be made illegal.
20 December 2015 (
Complaints filed against thugs
The Los Angeles Thug Department
investigated
over 1300 claims of bias in 2012-2014
, and judged
not one
of them valid.
Either LA
thugs
are remarkably free of bias, far beyond what humans
would be capable of, or they are protecting each other.
A study of complaints filed against Chicago
thugs
found that
10%
of the thugs got 30% of the complaints
These
thugs
can influence the behavior of other thugs, so it is
important to get rid of them.
Most
thugs
don't beat up or kill without justification, but nearly all
of them will protect other
thugs
that do so. That's why they
generally deserve the name of "
thug
".
Those few who refuse to protect
the violent thugs are the ones who merit the title of
police officer
".
20 December 2015 (
Municipal broadband
SCROTUS
, working to help pricey US ISPs, are
pressuring
the FCC to give up on defending municipal broadband
in the US.
SCROTUS
= Sleazy Congressional Republicans Of The United States.
20 December 2015 (
Girls rescued from FGM in Kenya
Kenyan [
thugs
] Rescue
Hundreds
of Girls Due to Undergo FGM
When I call them "
thugs
",
that doesn't mean everything the thugs do is
bad. It means that occasionally one of them kills someone unjustly
and the rest then try to protect that one.
20 December 2015 (
Nuclear industry waste in Subarnarekha river
India's nuclear industry dumps waste into the Subarnarekha river,
making its water
unsafe
to drink
20 December 2015 (
Don't binge on news about a tragedy
Recommendation:
don't
binge on news about a tragedy
20 December 2015 (
Gun control
The San Bernardino shooters used
large
magazines that are illegal to sell in California
It's not hard to buy them in some other state, perhaps Arizona or
Nevada, and bring them illegally to California. However, if they were
illegal in the whole US, it would really be hard to get them.
The guns were also
modified
illegally so they could fire faster
Those intending to commit murder will not be deterred by fear of
punishment for doing these modifications, but the law could require
designs that make this more difficult to do.
20 December 2015 (
Plain cigarette pack law survives attack
Australia's plain paper cigarette pack law
survived
an attack through a "trade treaty"
This is good news, but many good laws and policies have been destroyed
by these
business-supremacy treaties
, most recently US
country-of-origin
meat labelling
We should get rid of all such treaties.
20 December 2015 (
Congress's budget bill
Congress's budget bill includes
tax
breaks for some big businesses
20 December 2015 (
Global heating damaging lakes
Global heating
is
damaging
lakes around the world
20 December 2015 (
Charter schools forced into Philadelphia
Pennsylvania has passed a law to
force
charter schools into Philadelphia
Charter schools
do
not, in general, provide a better education
but they are great for
profiteering
at public expense
20 December 2015 (
Investigation of UK thug who shot a man
thug
in the UK is
being
investigated
for shooting a man; some say the victim was sleeping
in his car.
As usual,
thugs
are organizing to demand an end to the investigation.
19 December 2015 (
Urgent: Free human rights defender
US citizens:
call
on Obama and Congress
to press for release of human rights
defender Waleed Abu al-Khair, imprisoned by
Salafi Arabia
The country's official name is "Saudi Arabia", but that disguises its
nasty nature.
19 December 2015 (
Snooping cameras with "Facewatch"
"Facewatch" connects snooping cameras in stores to a
blacklist
of faces
We need to abolish this system; I believe it
should
be illegal for anyone to operate cameras in this way
, including
the state, except following a court order to put a camera in a certain
place for a certain period.
19 December 2015 (
Urgent: Disconnect from corrupting funding
Everyone:
Call on George
Mason University
to disconnect from the Koch brothers' corrupting
funding.
19 December 2015 (
Urgent: Clean energy tax incentives
US citizens:
call
on your congresscritter
to renew clean energy tax incentives.
19 December 2015 (
China's president wants help with censorship
The President of China
wants
countries to organize
to censor the internet.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
19 December 2015 (
UK's "bedroom tax"
The UK's "bedroom tax", a cut in benefits for disabled or unemployed
living in apartments judged to have an extra room,
has
pressured lots of people to skimp on food
, but few have moved to
smaller apartments.
That's partly because few smaller apartments are available in the
areas where these people live. Also, some disabled people couldn't
move to an apartment without room for the relatives that take care of
them.
The right-wing government won't mind this outcome. The policy was
meant as an excuse to squeeze the weak, and it has succeeded at that.
19 December 2015 (
Increasing prosecutions in Thailand
As the Thai king gets older and less able, the military is trying to
prop up the royal family's image by
prosecuting
more people
19 December 2015 (
Press ignores Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders Is More Popular Than Trump, But
the
Press Ignores Him
19 December 2015 (
Thugs attack peaceful protesters
Thugs
inexplicably
attacked peaceful protesters
who were responding to the mistrial
of a
thug
involved in Freddie Gray's death.
19 December 2015 (
CWA endorses Sanders
The Communications Workers of America
endorsed
Sanders for president
19 December 2015 (
When thugs are suspected of crimes
When
thugs
are suspected of crimes, they get
better
treatment than everyone else
19 December 2015 (
Global heating screwing up agriculture
Global heating
has
changed
the seasons
in Haiti, screwing up agriculture.
19 December 2015 (
Brazil blocks access to WhatsApp
A court in Brazil
blocked
all access to WhatsApp for 48 hours
WhatsApp requires running a nonfree program, which is a foolish thing
to do; you are making a mistake if you use it. It also involves a
server that will snoop on you for Big Brother. Still, it is wrong for
Brazil to forbid connections to that server.
19 December 2015 (
Hottest year ever recorded
Forecast:
2016
will be the hottest year ever recorded
, beating the previous
record from 2015.
19 December 2015 (
Christian extremists' war on women
How far do Christianist extremists take their
war
on women
when nobody stops them?
19 December 2015 (
Salafi Arabia to execute protester
Salafi Arabia
is
planning
to execute protester Abdullah al-Zaher
, who was 15 years old at
the time, after torturing him into confessing to various crimes.
18 December 2015 (
Why MIT must support student hackers
Star Simpson tells MIT why it must provide support for students who
make harmless technological hacks and are treated to
witch
hunts by panicking ignorant fools
18 December 2015 (
UK's supposed CO
reduction pledge
The UK is implementing its supposed CO
reduction pledge by
reducing
subsidies for solar power
. Just not reducing them as much as was
initially proposed.
In 6 months they will make another reduction.
18 December 2015 (
Burundi
Burundi
On
'Very Cusp' of Civil Conflict
, Warns UN Human Rights Chief.
18 December 2015 (
Overstating efficiency of light bulbs
Lightbulb manufacturers have found an
excuse
to overstate the efficiency
of their bulbs.
18 December 2015 (
"Terrorist" postings or messages
Senate
proposes
to require communications companies to report "terrorist" postings or
messages
(not merely actual threats) threaten human rights, and
companies would have a lot of trouble doing so.
I fear also that only companies that mistreat their users in other
ways will make enough money to be able to hire people to carry this
out.
18 December 2015 (
Extreme overprotection of children
Americans in general have an extreme overprotective attitude towards
allowing children even to
play
in the front yard
. Most Americans think children under 10 are too
young.
This is the effect of massive publicity about dangers that are
very
rare
I suspect this overprotection will tend to make children feel
smothered as well as making them timid.
The requirement to supervise children without a break, and the need to
bring them everywhere they are to go, imposes tremendous stress and
expense on parents. When I was 7 years old, I walked home from
school, used my keys to go in, and amused myself till my mother got
home from work. She did not have to pay for "child care" — I
knew how to read and play without adult help.
I support Sanders's proposal to
tax
the rich more to fund day care
. But we can eliminate a
substantial fraction of the expense by teaching parents that children
don't need to stay in day care for so many years.
18 December 2015 (
Republicans organizing for Sanders
Some Republicans, fed up with plutocracy, are
organizing
for Sanders
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
Interviews
with some of them.
Sanders talks about his
support
among Republicans
18 December 2015 (
Ukraine bans Communist Party
Ukraine has infringed political rights by
banning
the Communist Party
and even the word "communist".
18 December 2015 (
UK leaves big tax evaders alone
The UK is
cracking
down on people that evade small amounts of taxes
while leaving the
big tax evaders alone.
However, the tax dodging that governments choose to permit is
even
bigger
Under plutocratist governments, the purpose of taxes is to serve the
rich and crush the rest.
18 December 2015 (
Congresscritters work for Google
Google funded some congressional campaigns, and the congresscritters
elected performed for Google by
supporting
Google against an EU legal investigation
about abuse of its market
position.
18 December 2015 (
Avoiding global heating disaster
We are making a mistake, relying on some mysterious
"progress"
to save Earth from
global heating
disaster.
Avoiding heating disaster requires a
mobilization
comparable to what would be made for a large war
18 December 2015 (
Congress surrenders to the WTO
Congress used the budget bill as an excuse to surrender to the WTO:
it
voted
to eliminated country-of-origin meat labeling
Don't pretend that Congress would have the courage to defy the TPP.
17 December 2015 (
NSA's register of Americans' phone calls
Senator Cruz suggested that the NSA's register of Americans' phone
calls may actually have
increased
under the misnamed "USA Freedom Act"
Apparently he was not supposed to let us know this.
17 December 2015 (
Tories rigging electoral system
The Tories are rigging the UK's political and electoral system
to
eliminate the possibility of resistance
17 December 2015 (
Prosecution for coat hanger abortion
Tennessee's
prosecution
of a woman for a coat hanger abortion
is the armored unit at the
point of the war on women.
17 December 2015 (
iThings
"Is my iPhone listening to me?" An iPhone seems to have
heard a user's
conversation about where person was going
, and added it to the
user's profile for some Apple service.
The iPhone, like any other mobile phone, tells Big Brother where you
are. Your private destination will be known to the phone network (and
Big Brother) when you get there. Meanwhile, just about all mobile
phones can be made to listen to
all
the conversation around
them, and send it to whoever did this. This is why I call them
"Stalin's dream". Either of these is so vicious that I refuse to
carry one.
However, that snooping doesn't send data to Apple. The possible
listening feature reported here would enable Apple, also, to listen to
conversations around the device.
The iThings are full of nonfree software; Apple controls the software,
and the users don't. You
can
never rationally trust a nonfree program
. Whether or not they
have a functionality that listens for Apple, the device is
full of
malware
A listening functionality would be the sort of thing you must expect,
whether or not it is present now.
17 December 2015 (
Australian equivalent of SWAT
The Australian equivalent of a SWAT team
terrified
13-year-old April Clarke
after they woke her by pointing a bright
light and a gun at her.
17 December 2015 (
Sharif Mobley still alive
Sharif Mobley is apparently still alive, and has been
sentenced
to 10 years in prison
for (reportedly) shooting a prison guard.
17 December 2015 (
Congress trying legalize export of crude
The US Congress is trying to boost
global heating
by legalizing
export
of crude oil
17 December 2015 (
"Reform" for corporate criminals
The Koch brothers sponsor
"criminal
justice reform" for corporate criminals
17 December 2015 (
FTC fails to block mergers
The Federal Trade Commission could block mergers, but Obama's director
of the Bureau of Competition
hardly
ever tries
This is one thing President Sanders could fix on his own.
17 December 2015 (
Republicans propose war crimes
Republicans
propose
war crimes
as a response to PISSI.
You almost might as well join
PISSI
, if you're going to do that.
17 December 2015 (
Stand against sexist insults
Let's stand together against
sexist
insults on social media
I am against limiting freedom of speech, but there is a lot we can do
without going that far.
17 December 2015 (
"Moderate Syrian forces"
The idea of recruiting support from "moderate Syrian forces" is based
on
oversimplification
and confusion
17 December 2015 (
Record High Arctic Temperatures
Record High Arctic Temperatures in 2015
Having
'Profound Effects' on Region
17 December 2015 (
Bernie Sanders beating all Republicans
The subtle way some oppose Bernie Sanders is by trying to convince us
that he can't win — contrary to the polls that show him
beating
all the Republicans
If you would rather have Sanders as president than Clinton,
you should campaign now for Sanders. The worst that can happen
is that Clinton wins the nomination anyway.
17 December 2015 (
Secret trial and gag order
The UK convicted Wang Yam of murder in a secret trial, and has now
forbidden
him to take the case to the European Court of Justice
. He is also
gagged.
17 December 2015 (
Baltimore thugs preparing for repression
Baltimore's
thugs
are
preparing
for repression
when verdicts are announced in the trial of the
thugs
involved in killing Freddie Gray.
17 December 2015 (
Renewable energy roadmaps
We have roadmaps for
providing
the world's power needs with renewable energy
; don't heed the
naysayers.
17 December 2015 (
Urgent: Trump's campaign
US citizens: call on Republican leaders to say they
won't
support
Trump's campaign if he wins the Republican nomination.
17 December 2015 (
Urgent: military force against PISSI
US citizens: call on Congress to vote on an
authorization
for using military force against PISSI.
17 December 2015 (
Thug that killed Darrius Stewart
Witnesses
say
that the thug that killed Darrius Stewart
misrepresented the circumstances of firing the fatal shot;
Stewart was moving away, not threatening the
thug
If
the rest of the
thug
's
story is correct, the thug had just
had a need to defend himself. People cannot digest new information in
a fraction of a second. Perhaps he had no time to consciously digest
the fact that Stewart had started to flee, before firing the second
shot.
17 December 2015 (
Foam for extinguishing oil fires
Foam for extinguishing oil fires contains
toxic
chemicals
; in some towns these have contaminated the drinking water and cause cancer.
17 December 2015 (
Questioning assumption that Qur'an has to be obeyed
Some
Muslims
are questioning the assumption that the Qur'an has to be obeyed.
17 December 2015 (
Prisoners of Assad's forces
Human Rights Watch says
7000
prisoners
of Assad's forces were executed or died after torture.
17 December 2015 (
Different interpretation of Islam
Sudan plans to
execute
25 people for following a different interpretation of Islam.
Shari'a law is an offense against human rights; any state that adopts it is doing an
injustice
17 December 2015 (
UK general election
A Tory claimed that
Obama
sent help
so that the Tory party would win the UK general election.
Obama is a moderate Republican (they used to exist) in the Democratic
Party. That's why I never voted for him.
17 December 2015 (
American Red Cross
The American Red Cross picked up new management from AT&T, which
has "rationalized" the organization with
disastrous results
17 December 2015 (
Comcast hit with $26M penalty
Comcast Hit With
$26M
Penalty
For Dumping Hazardous Waste AND Revealing Personal Customer Info.
17 December 2015 (
Rate of death sentences
The death penalty remains legal in many US states, but the rate of death sentences has fallen by
almost
a factor of 10
since the 1990s.
17 December 2015 (
Threat to privacy
Sites that ask people to give data about their friends are a
fiendish
threat to privacy
17 December 2015 (
Hoax bomb threats
Los
Angeles and New York City
both got hoax bomb threats.
Los Angeles sent all the children home that day, whereas
New York figured out it was a hoax.
Do real bombers
ever
give advance warning?
Aren't these threats invariably hoaxes?
17 December 2015 (
Jews that attacked Palestinians
For once, Israel has treated Jews that attacked Palestinians as
real criminals.
17 December 2015 (
Lexmark workers in Mexico
Lexmark has fired the leaders of a union in Mexico;
the
workers are on strike
demanding a raise of 35 cents an hour.
17 December 2015 (
Abortions at home
Between
100,000
and 250,000
Texas women have done abortions at home, nearly always with drugs.
17 December 2015 (
Bangladesh banned Twitter
Bangladesh has banned Twitter, as well as
many
other
digital communications media.
17 December 2015 (
Iranian missile test
The UN concluded an Iranian missile test
violated
the nuclear agreement
17 December 2015 (
State-imposed bankruptcy government
State-imposed bankruptcy government in Flint, Michigan, switched to
taking municipal water from the polluted Flint River as a measure to
save money, and refused to acknowledge that it was contaminated with
lead. The new mayor of Flint has declared an emergency and residents
are going to
sue the state
The city has moved back to another source of water, but this is too late
for all the young children of Flint.
17 December 2015 (
"Real name" policy
Facebook relaxed its "real name" policy, but only for people who are being harassed for
certain
specific reasons
This relieves a very specific acute problem, but does not enable ordinary
people to use Facebook without being tracked.
16 December 2015 (
Very urgent: Reject budget bill riders
US citizens: phone your congresscritter to vote against the budget
authorization bill if it has
any
riders that change policies
. Whether the changes are for big oil,
for snooping, against Planned Parenthood or against meat labeling,
reject them!
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and
888-355-3588.
16 December 2015 (
Coat hanger abortions
Women in some US states have been
forced
back to using coat hangers
16 December 2015 (
Investigation of Brazilian politicians
Major Brazilian politicians are
being
investigated for corruption
16 December 2015 (
Poland's new right-wing gov't
Poland's newly elected right-wing government is
trying
to seize extra power
by replacing the supreme court.
16 December 2015 (
Danger of accidental nuclear war
William Perry, Bill Clinton's secretary of defense, warns of a new
nuclear arms race and the danger of
accidental
nuclear war
16 December 2015 (
T-Mobile violating Net Neutrality
T-Mobile in the US seems to be clearly
violating
Net Neutrality rules
16 December 2015 (
Life in prison for attempting abortion
A woman in Tennessee
faces
life in prison
for trying to give herself a late term abortion.
I wonder why she did not get an early, safe abortion? Has Tennessee
taken measures to make this so inconvenient that she gave up on it?
16 December 2015 (
DuPont-Dow merger
The DuPont-Dow merger
would
create another seed sales giant
, like Monsanto.
16 December 2015 (
Journalists jailed in Egypt
Egypt Jails
Record
Number of Journalists
(23 as of December 1).
16 December 2015 (
Recording thugs
Spanish journalists will ask the European Court of Human Rights to
overturn the
law
that prohibits photos and videos of thugs
, [del: even ] especially
when they are at their worst.
16 December 2015 (
Decline of Britain's butterfly species
3/4 of Britain's butterfly species have declined, some very much,
in
the last 40 years
. This indicates that many other insect species,
less beloved by humans, have probably declined too — adding up
to an ecological calamity.
16 December 2015 (
School tells boy to cover up shirt
A school in California told a boy to cover up his Star Wars t-shirt
because
it showed a fictional character holding a gun
It may be a reasonable policy to exclude symbols of violence from the
classroom, not because someone else was shot, but rather to avoid
promoting militarism. It could also be a wise policy to prohibit
shirts with commercial advertising, which this was.
Note that they did not punish the boy. US schools punish students for
absurd reasons, even get them jailed, and that is a very harmful
practice; but it did not happen in this case.
16 December 2015 (
Ted Cruz's global heating denialism
Ted Cruz bases his
global heating
denialism on
simple,
clear lies
. Then he attacks the complex solution of regulation,
ignoring the market-based simple solution, a carbon tax.
16 December 2015 (
Muslim scholar defends freedom of speech
A Muslim scholar
defends
the freedom of speech of a Christian preacher
who is being
prosecuted — in the UK — for saying Islam is "Satanic".
Islam has bad aspects, like Christianity and other major religions,
but I would not apply the term "Satanic" to it. Nonetheless, I defend
other people's right to do that.
16 December 2015 (
Algorithms derived from "big data"
Algorithms derived from "big data"
can
come to implement racial discrimination
because the data reflect
the results of discrimination.
The article takes a foolish, naive attitude to companies that collect
data about people, in effect believing their claims that they use it
only
to "serve you better", and neglecting the danger that it
becomes available to others such as crackers and Big Brother. But
even though they ignore the principal injustices of collecting data
about you, their point about another injustice in the use of the data
is important.
16 December 2015 (
Mexican newspapers
Drug trafficking gangs
order
Mexican newspapers what to say
about drug issues.
16 December 2015 (
"Sarcastic" statement a crime in Thailand
In Thailand, even a
"sarcastic"
statement about the king's dog
is a crime.
Don't go to Thailand unless you have an urgent mission for some very
good cause.
16 December 2015 (
The Paris commitments
Claim No Easy Victories. Paris Was a Failure, But
Climate Justice Movement Is Rising
Is it rising faster than the temperature?
If the world takes them seriously, the Paris commitments could
shrink
the fossil fuel industry
and avoid global disaster.
But the fossil fuel industry is still strong and still working to stop
governments from carrying out those commitments properly.
16 December 2015 (
"Criminal insult" charge
An MP in Zimbabwe faces
charges
of "criminal insult"
against strongman Mugabe's wife.
16 December 2015 (
DRM in "smart" lightbulbs
Now DRM is in
"smart"
lightbulbs
If a product is "smart", and you didn't build it, it is cleverly
serving its manufacturer
against you
16 December 2015 (
DEA database of phone calls
The DEA reported to a judge that it has
erased
its massive database of phone calls made within the US
However,
when
phone companies keep these records for the DEA
, that is almost as
bad.
16 December 2015 (
Planted drugs
Some Alabama
thugs
planted drugs on a thousand black men
to put them
in prison. They were motivated by racism.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
16 December 2015 (
Fact-checking
Republicans have learned to make fact-checking useless: when their
claims are shown to be false,
they repeat the claims
and accuse the
media of a cover-up.
Dubya and his men did this
in regard to Saddam Hussein's nonexistent
weapons of mass distruction, and they convinced a lot of Americans.
I am surprised by the idea that CNN is "liberal." I have no TV, but
from everything I have heard, CNN is rather right-wing.
16 December 2015 (
Still Illegal
Obama's Speech
Reminded Americans
That the War with [PISSI] Is Still
Illegal.
16 December 2015 (
Designed to be addictive
If you "can't put down" a mobile device, that's because it was
designed
to be addictive
16 December 2015 (
Emissions tax
Sanders has endorsed a carbon emissions tax.
This is the way to
let the market decide just how and where
to reduce
emissions.
16 December 2015 (
Antisocialist opposition
The
antisocialist opposition won the election
in Venezuela.
People were very unhappy with the shortages, which were caused by
foolish government policies; for instance, subsidies for the prices of
certain foods, which encouraged people to smuggle them into Colombia,
and currency exchange controls.
I fear that the
antisocialists
will eliminate the programs that Chavez
set up for education and medical care. Subsidizing food for the poor
is necessary, and the problems come from the system that the
socialists set upl but I expect the
antisocialists
to end the
subsidies so as to make life hard for the non-rich.
16 December 2015 (
Food supply
Humans' food supply is
dangerously biologically concentrated
three-quarters of our food comes from 12 species of plants and five of
animals,
What's more, the number of different varieties of the plant species
is decreasing.
16 December 2015 (
Question what they are told
The UK says that children who question what they are told, or
criticize
government policy,
are terrorist suspects
16 December 2015 (
Left destitute
Many prisoners in the US are left destitute when they get out of
prison
because
the state sues them for just about everything they have got
or even more.
If this happened to me, I'd withdraw the money as cash and toss it
onto a street, just to spite the state.
16 December 2015 (
Pointing a gun
thug
has been convicted of a felony for pointing a gun at a man's
head. The man had done nothing to warrant attention; the
thug
was
showing off how much power he had
16 December 2015 (
Five San Francisco thugs
Five San Francisco thugs shot Mario Woods dead.
They said he had a
knife and wouldn't drop it — though he made no move to attack
them.
Maybe he did have one.
If I were in that situation, I might be in real danger, even if I were
holding a gun — since I have no training, skill or experience in
such a confrontation. However if five
thugs
with pointed guns think
they are in danger from a man with a knife at his side, they must be
incompetent.
16 December 2015 (
Richest 20 Americans
The richest 20 Americans
own more than half the population
To spread the wealth, vote for progressives.
16 December 2015 (
Constitutional convention
Right-wing groups are 7 states away
from triggering a constitutional
convention that could rewrite the US Constitution in unpredictable
ways.
16 December 2015 (
Sabotage efforts
The
TPP would sabotage efforts to curb global heating
in several ways.
This is a natural consequence of the way it was drawn up. For each
area of business, the US government asked the companies in that area
what they wanted. The fossil fuel companies asked for policies that
will help them.
Fundamentally, control of greenhouse gas emissions is good for the
people, so it's what democracy will do if it works right.
The TPP is a business-supremacy treaty with some secondary support
for unregulated trade. What these treaties do is weaken democracy
and give business more power.
16 December 2015 (
Contraceptive prescriptions
The
states of Washington and California
will allow most women to get
contraceptive prescriptions from pharmacists, without seeing a doctor
first.
16 December 2015 (
Urgent: Investigate Exxon
US citizens:
call
on the attorney general
to investigate Exxon.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
15 December 2015 (
Tunisia represses homosexuals
Tunisia, despite being more or less democratic,
represses
homosexuals
15 December 2015 (
Canadian mining companies
Canadian mining companies operating in Latin America often
trash
the environment and the rights of local inhabitants
15 December 2015 (
Inaction of US Fish and Wildlife Service
The US Fish and Wildlife Service takes action extremely rarely to
protect endangered species. Out of 88,000 proposed projects, the
F&WS approved all of them, and
took
action in just two cases
15 December 2015 (
Municipal broadband networks
Marco Rubio is trying to serve the large US ISPs by
banning
municipal broadband networks
15 December 2015 (
Foreign intervention in Yemen
The foreign intervention in Yemen, led by
Salafi Arabia
(*) and backed
by the US, suffered a setback:
commanders
of the ground troops were killed by Houthis
* I refer to Saudi Arabia this way to highlight how it spreads an
extreme and cruel version of Islam around the world.
15 December 2015 (
Shrimp peeled by slaves
Shrimp exported from Thailand to major multinational front companies
are
often
peeled by slaves
15 December 2015 (
India to continue burning lots of coal
India will make the Paris agreement futile by
continuing
to burn lots of coal
The UK will do likewise if the Tories continue
their
fossil-fool policies
15 December 2015 (
Urgent: Clear labels on GMO foods
US citizens: phone your senators at 1-877-796-1949 to demand
clear, transparent labels on
GMO food
— not QR codes.
15 December 2015 (
Urgent: Stop big pharma's tax dodging
US citizens:
tell
Congress
to stop big pharma's tax dodging.
15 December 2015 (
Democratic Syrian local councils
Some Syrian rebels have set up
democratic
local councils
: dictatorship and theocracy are not the only
options.
15 December 2015 (
The Paris deal
One advance in the Paris deal:
emissions
of armies are now counted
15 December 2015 (
Operation Ceasefire
An effective method of reducing gun violence by gangs is
no
longer in use in the US
because nobody will pay for it.
15 December 2015 (
Global heating deniers lose battle
The
Paris agreement
signals that deniers have lost the climate wars."
Their agents in many governments and institutions are still sabotaging
real progress, but they have lost the battle for society's overall
direction. It was inevitable that would happen once the effects of
global heating
became sufficiently visible. Thus, what they intended
was a delaying action.
Did they succeed enough to cause the slow destruction of human
civilization and Earth's biosphere? Time will tell.
15 December 2015 (
The NRA
Inside
the NRA
: the Officials Keeping Gun Control Laws Off the US Agenda.
Some of their lobbying is done through
disguised
relationships
14 December 2015 (
Urgent: discrimination in car loans
US citizens:
call
on GM
to oppose plans to legalize discrimination in car loans.
14 December 2015 (
License-plate recognition cameras
Free software turns mobile devices into
license-plate
recognition cameras
I've proposed that it should be illegal for
anyone
to set up
a license-plate recognition camera pointing at a public place except
with a specific court order.
14 December 2015 (
Encryption back doors to catch terrorists
Accusing governments of
lying
when
they say that they want encryption back doors to catch terrorists.
14 December 2015 (
"Energy U-turn"
The UK needs to make an "energy U-turn" to satisfy its
Paris
commitments
14 December 2015 (
"Saving" Greece
European
banksters
rather than show Greeks the full extent of what
they demand for "saving" Greece, are imposing it a step at a time.
But Greeks are threatening to
protest
and bring down the government.
14 December 2015 (
Syriac Christian women
Syriac Christian Women Take Up Kalashnikovs to
Fight
PISSI
Bravo!
14 December 2015 (
Climate deal: the pistol has fired
Climate Deal: the Pistol Has Fired,
So
Why aren't We Running?
14 December 2015 (
Nigeria proposing to censor internet
Nigeria is proposing to censor internet communication, making it a
crime to post
"false
information"
. That tends to mean information that the state
doesn't like.
14 December 2015 (
Legacy of death
US Nuclear Weapons Complex Leaves
'Legacy
of Death on American Soil'
14 December 2015 (
Torture of Shaker Aamer
Shaker Aamer rebukes extremists and terrorists, telling them
to
leave the UK if they don't love it.
He's
not alone
Aamer accuses
Tony B'liar
and other UK officials of knowing about his
torture, during which
UK
agents were present
14 December 2015 (
Keep on laughing at Trump
Don't
Ban Donald Trump
. Just Keep on Laughing at Him.
14 December 2015 (
Local councils in Salafi Arabia
17 women have been elected to local councils in
Salafi Arabia
overcoming the tremendous handicaps imposed by that country's
sexist
laws
However, these councils do not even theoretically offer women a path
to changing the laws that oppress them.
Islamic law is fundamentally opposed to human rights, and deserves to
be considered a gross injustice.
14 December 2015 (
Less disposable income
British companies
make
more money
than 15 years ago, and workers have less disposable
income than 15 years ago.
This is
dooH niboR
at work.
14 December 2015 (
Charter schools in the US
Charter schools in the US provide an avenue for private owners get
public money for their
private
businesses
I suppose that's why so many local and state policies to encourage
charter schools were set up: due to pressure from the businesses that
intended to enrich themselves.
Since charter schools do not in general provide a better education
(this supposed benefit was the ostensible reason for them), we should
phase them out. Creating them was a mistake, and those policies were
a mistake.
14 December 2015 (
Raqqa and Mosul are prisons
People living in Raqqa and Mosul say they are now
simply
prisons
Can't they find any guns, any knives, any suicide bombs
with which to kill the
PISSI
militants?
13 December 2015 (
Urgent: Repudiate bigotry
US citizens:
repudiate
Trump's bigotry.
13 December 2015 (
Sweden will finally question Assange
Sweden
will
finally question Assange
about the sex charges against him.
Assange and Ecuador both said years ago that they would
let
Swedish officials question him in the embassy
. Swedish
prosecutors have dragged their feet in a way that confirms that they
are not really interested in justice on these charges, rather using
them as an excuse.
The acts that Assange is accused of doing are
not
"rape" as the term is normally used
. Swedish law is more strict
than in most countries.
13 December 2015 (
Altered history of fiscal crisis
Clinton
uses
an altered history of the fiscal crisis
to excuse her opposition
to the reforms that are really necessary, such as restoring the
Glass-Steagall act.
I read previously that Bill Clinton had no real choice about the
repeal of Glass-Steagall, because it was passed with a
veto-proof
majority
. But this does not excuse anyone from the duty to fight
to bring it back.
13 December 2015
Chat program
A new chat program
tries
to provide privacy
about who is talking with whom.
I'm not an encryption expert, and I can't judge whether it provides
good security.
13 December 2015
Inequality
Inequality
Is Now Killing
[people in] Middle America.
13 December 2015
TPP
How the TPP
Will
Affect You and Your Digital Rights
(if it goes into effect).
13 December 2015
Syria
After some rebels evacuated al-Waer, in Homs,
others
have made
a cease fire with Assad's rule.
13 December 2015
Poland
Poles
held
a large protest
against the recently elected right-wing government
which seems to be trying to twist the constitution.
13 December 2015
1.5C of global heating
With 1.5C of
global heating
the Seychelles may still exist. 2C of
global heating
will
probably inundate
the flat coastal parts of the islands.
They would still have the mountainous inland areas, but couldn't grow
any food there.
13 December 2015
Cell-site simulators
Government, Can You Hear Me Now?
Cell-site
Simulators
Aren't Secret Anymore.
13 December 2015
Bernie Sanders
A number of interesting
points
about
Bernie Sanders.
If Clinton wins the Democratic nomination, I won't vote for her.
She's a plutocratist, part of the problem rather than the solution.
If
we
keep voting for the lesser plutocratist
our government will get more and more plutocratist. I will vote
Green.
I support Sanders because he's not just a lesser evil. He's good.
13 December 2015
Climate
"Until governments undertake to keep fossil fuels in the ground, they
will
continue to undermine agreement
they have just made."
13 December 2015
Atheists in Lincoln
Atheists in Lincoln, Nebraska,
booked
all the exhibition space
in the state capitol building so that no
sectarian exhibit can be presented about Christmas.
It is not right to promote a religion in a state capitol building. It
is also not right to censor any view by cornering the market on places
to present it, but the atheists didn't do that. There must be plenty
of places in Lincoln, outside the capitol, where manger displays for
Christmas can be set up — churches, for instance.
13 December 2015
Paris climate deal
The
main
points
of the deal agreed in Paris.
Paris climate agreement 'may signal end of fossil fuel era',
according
to optimists.
This agreement could very well start a process leading towards truly
curbing
global heating
. I fear
we
can't afford to lose
that time in getting started. The agreement
will still raise global temperatures 3 to 4 degrees centigrade. The
problem is,
it
involves "no action, just promises"
. When a country adopts a
long-term emissions target without policies that will realize it, it
may never adopt suitable policies. By the time the target is not met,
it is too late.
13 December 2015
France's "states of emergency"
France's constitution
may
be changed
to support long-term repressive "states of emergency".
13 December 2015
Unhappiness
Some
research
suggests that unhappiness does not predispose people to illness.
There are distinct questions here:
Factual: does being unhappy tend to cause other sorts of harm
to you?
Moral: is unhappiness something unfortunate that happens to you,
or is it wrong on your part?
The research suggests that the answer to (1) is no. That's fortunate,
for unhappy people. But whatever the answer to (1) is, it does not
mean that being unhappy is blameworthy. If there is no ethical,
reliable way to decide to be happy, then your unhappiness is no more
your fault than an injury or a birth defect.
13 December 2015
H-1B visas
Senator Cruz
is
proposing
to block companies from using H1B visas to bring foreign
workers to the US temporarily for training.
It is a good cause, but his solution operates by closing off H-1B
visas except for very highly paid jobs. I think the solution should
more directly address the problem.
I propose that any company or division hiring H-1B workers should be
forbidden to eliminate any US jobs for the next two years, unless it
has suffered a big drop in gross sales, or to move any work out of the
US or to a subcontractor during that time. Fines for violations
should be very high.
Also, workers who are told to train their successors (and then be
fired) should refuse to train them, or quit immediately. Resisting
oppression calls for some guts.
13 December 2015
Spying companies
Making tech companies spy on their users for the state
is
unamerican, and useless too
An issue not mentioned here is, which criterion is used to define
terrorism? Do attacks on abortion clinics count? They ought to, but
so far the US government is not treating them as terrorism.
13 December 2015
Moral Failure of Computer Scientists
The
Moral Failure of Computer Scientists
: an interview with Phillip
Rogaway.
Perhaps we need a Bulletin of the Information Scientists.
13 December 2015
PISSI
PISSI
seduces naive youths
by
offering a cause and a community
to people who feel that no one
takes them seriously.
13 December 2015
New system for work
It would be good to
change
legally required pension schemes
so that they are not connected
with any particular employer.
The article's picture of the "future of work" shows distortions. "An
algorithm matches you with a gig that optimizes your income
opportunity"? Not likely. Rather, it will optimize the income of the
company that runs it, as it accumulates data about you that it will
sell to someone.
Will you be able to decide when to work? Maybe in theory,
but in practice you'll find out at 08:00 that you have to work
for 4 hours from 11:00 to 15:00 or go without.
13 December 2015
Reliable gene editing
Now that reliable gene editing has been developed, it will certainly
be used to
eliminate
hereditary diseases
. To deny people this remedy would
be too cruel.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
I don't think it is bad in principle to make enhancements using this
technology. However, designing an enhanced human that doesn't already
exist is not as straightforward as replacing a defective gene with its
normal counterpart. Until a number of people with a certain supposed
enhancement grow up, we won't know whether the change is an
enhancement or an impediment.
13 December 2015
CO2 emissions
The carbon emissions commitments of some countries
are
so weak that their emissions will keep increasing
. What should we
do about this?
Since this is about avoiding global disaster, the response implicitly
proposed in the article (Just give up) is stupid. What we really need
to do is make those countries reduce emissions.
Given the hundreds of millions of deaths this disaster is likely to
cause globally, emitting too much carbon is an act of war. It would
be justified to bomb coal-burning power plants to stop their
emissions, if nothing less can do the job.
13 December 2015
Artificial gene drives
Artificial gene drives
make
it possible to modify entire wild populations of organisms
that
reproduce sexually and don't take long to mature. For instance, we
could modify wild mosquitoes so that they can't carry malaria. We
could wipe out populations of invasive species, such as zebra mussels
or asian carp in the US.
Because it is possible to remove the drive later, if any of the
drive-harboring asian carp got back to Asia where these fish normally
live, we could easily eliminate the drive to protect the species in
the range where it belongs.
13 December 2015
Images generator site taken down
A web site that generated images in the style of handwritten signs
used in the London subway ("Underground")
was
taken down
at the request of the subway. The subway said the site
was being used to generate racist signs and presented this as legal
grounds for censorship. Racist messages are nasty, but it's wrong to
shut down a medium of communication just because some people used it
communicate nasty messages. The UK does not respect freedom of speech
enough, but I hope that this demand was not legally enforceable
there.
would
have refused all along to use a web site to generate parody signs
because doing such a job using someone else's service is SaaSS
(Service as a Software Substitute).
Any digital service automatically gives the service operator power
over its users. This service's operator demonstrated that power when
he shut it down, thus stopping people from making any more signs no
matter what the messages. In addition, users could not freely alter
any aspects of how the service worked, except those for which it
offered explicit settings. The service controlled that too.
The right way to make these sign images, or do any computing job that
involves you alone, is with a free program you run in your own
computer. That way, the program's author does not subsequently have
power over the users once they get copies.
If the developer had released a free program to do this, he would not
have been able to "shut it down" on demand.
13 December 2015
Addiction to video
Young children are getting addicted to video
to
the point that they don't experience much real social
interaction
13 December 2015 (
Growth of racist hate groups in the US
Trump's bigotry is
encouraging
the growth of racist hate groups
in the US.
13 December 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose restriction of web linking
Everyone:
call on the EU
not to restrict web linking.
13 December 2015 (
Urgent: Pardon Jeffrey Sterling
US citizens:
call
on Obama
to pardon Jeffrey Sterling.
13 December 2015 (
Urgent: Stop forced marriages
Everyone:
call
on Burkina Faso
to save girls from being forced into marriage.
13 December 2015 (
Destroying the Great Barrier Reef
Australia's planet-roaster "environment minister", whose mission is to
trash the environment, demanded to be allowed to speak after a
documentary about the Great Barrier Reef, which will be
destroyed
by CO
emissions
along with all the other coral reefs.
It's not just the heat, it's the
acidity
13 December 2015 (
Chicago Mayor's support for killer thugs
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanual hopes to get away with having supported
killer
thugs
by giving an "apology"
without
admitting he did anything wrong
Emanuel is directly responsible, and
he
should resign
After he is gone, Chicago could have a chance to elect someone who
would be mayor during the daytime. Emanuel is just a night-mayor.
13 December 2015 (
Pakistan's fighting against Taliban
Pakistan's fighting against the Taliban has
pushed
many foreign jihadis into Afghanistan
While this may be difficult for Afghanistan, at least it is a sign of
progress.
13 December 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose arms sale to Salafi Arabia
US citizens:
Reps
and Senators
, oppose sale of arms to Salafi Arabia.
13 December 2015 (
Urgent: Include Syrian Kurds in negotiations
Everyone:
call
for including the Syrian Kurds
in multilateral negotiations about
Syria's future.
13 December 2015 (
Injustice of the "no-fly list"
Rejection of a bill to block gun purchases by people on the "no-fly
list" has called attention to the
injustice
of that list
That list is punishment without trial, and if that's not bad enough,
it is punishment secretly sprung on people after they have spent
hundreds or thousands of dollars on nonrefundable tickets they can't
use. No one lawfully present or resident in the US should be blocked
from riding in US airline flights except as punishment for a crime.
As for people not lawfully present or resident in the US, the
government has the option of denying them entry, which is both more
effective and more legitimate than the no-fly list.
Blocking people from buying guns is more legitimate than blocking
people from flying, so it is ok to do that based on weaker criteria.
However, there are limits to what this can achieve. Blocking a small
list of people will not stop attacks by undetectable small teams. But
perhaps nothing can stop that.
13 December 2015 (
Microbeads banned from soap
The US House of Representatives passed a bill to
ban
microbeads from soap and toothpaste
Microbeads are harmful to marine life, and sewage treatment does not
stop them from
getting
into waterways
13 December 2015 (
Chicago thugs
Chicago
thugs
who
shot
Ronald Johnson dead
say he was carrying a pistol. His mother says
the pistol was planted on him after he was shot.
DA Alvarez, following her
general
tendency
, is protecting the thugs.
Neither of them merits our unreserved trust. The
thugs
could be lying
to excuse their actions. The mother could be saying what she wishes
were true. But the fact that witnesses report that
thugs
told them
what to say suggests that the
thugs
are lying.
12 December 2015
Killings by thugs and tax cuts
Relating
killings by US
thugs
to US tax cuts.
12 December 2015
Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow: don't think of trying to work for the NSA so as to
limit its wrongs. Great heroes
have tried and failed
12 December 2015
Low price of oil
The low price of oil is making most oil extraction projects
unprofitable to invest in. It the price stays low,
it will limit
the oil extracted
to the fraction which is cheap to extract.
That's good, but the low price also reduces the incentive to invest in
renewable energy and increased efficiency. And it tends to encourage
investment in burning oil in the future (though that may take years).
Increased tax on oil, or a carbon tax, would give us the best of both
worlds: the extraction projects would still be unprofitable, while
renewables and efficiency increases would be encouraged.
12 December 2015
US stopped a hunger strike
Demonstrating cruelty, the
US government stopped
a hunger strike in an
immigration prison by threatening to force-feed the prisoners.
Remember that most of these prisoners have not been charged with a
crime, let alone convicted. The US keeps them in prison as
preparation for possibly deporting them. It may be legitimate
to deport them, but that is no excuse for force-feeding them.
12 December 2015
DuPont and Dow Merger
The DuPont and Dow Chemical Merger:
Bad Deal
for People and the Planet.
The merger of two large companies that operate in the same areas
reduces competition in all the areas they both operate in.
Splitting that company according to area of operation does
nothing to increase competition in any one of the areas.
Thus, the overall effect is to reduce competition.
12 December 2015
Pinochet's man
One of General Pinochet's men
phoned a talk show to confess to murdering
dissidents
under orders.
I guess his conscience insisted on this. He said that he would have
been
killed if he refused.
12 December 2015
Turkey
On the politics and irrationality of Western responses to Syria:
"So
Why Did Turkey Shoot Down That Russian Plane
?"
12 December 2015
Oklahoma thug
Oklahoma
thug
convicted
of raping 12 women after intimidating them with
is power to threaten them.
12 December 2015
Airlines and global heating
If Airlines Care About [
global heating
They Should Make Everyone Travel
Economy
12 December 2015
Egypt's censorship
Egypt's censorship
is being applied
repressively to all media.
12 December 2015
UK praises China
The UK is sucking up to China so hard that
it praised China on Human
Rights Day
12 December 2015
Decline of US middle class
Figures
demonstrate the decline
of the US middle class.
12 December 2015
US meat production
US meat production
has decreased
since 2009, but use of antibiotics
in farms has increased by almost 1/4.
We're going to pay with our lives for this folly.
12 December 2015
Third Runway
Never Mind a Third Runway
— What Heathrow Needs Is Managed Decline.
12 December 2015
1.5C as maximum target
1.5C of heating as a maximum target
is a lot safer
for everyone than
2C.
The farther heating goes, the more chance of triggering some positive
feedback which would shove it far above 2C.
12 December 2015
Ohio thug
An Ohio
thug
has been indicted
for two different killings.
12 December 2015
Cuban dissidents
Cuban Dissidents
Say 100 Detained in Human Rights Day Protest
Crackdown.
12 December 2015
Raif Badawi on hunger strike
Jailed
Saudi Blogger Raif Badawi
on Hunger Strike.
12 December 2015
US plans to punish Europeans
The US plans to punish Europeans with connections to Iran because of
a murder carried out by by Pakistanis
inspired by Salafi Arabia
However, neither Pakistan nor
Salafi Arabia
are affected by this bill.
I suggest that the European Union retaliate by requiring visas from
Americans whose family name starts with R. Paul Ryan, for instance.
The absurdity of this response will show the absurdity of what the US
is doing.
12 December 2015
Fight against PISSI
The US announces "progress" in fighting
PISSI
, but
the supposed
progress may not mean anything
The US tends to label any "military-age males" killed by air strikes
as enemy fighters, but that's definitely an exaggeration. If air
strikes in Ramadi killed 350 military-age males, we have no idea how
many were fighting for
PISSI
and how many were civilians.
The caution of the army attacking Ramadi is likely to result in fewer
casualties to soldiers, but could cause more casualties to civilians
in Ramadi, which would build support for
PISSI
As for a few leaders killed, such a group can always replace them
as long as more people are volunteering.
12 December 2015
Malaria
People have made great progress against malaria using
insecticide-treated
mosquito nets, but mosquitos
are developing resistance
to
the
insecticides.
If we step up the effort, we could cut off malaria transmission in
some areas.
12 December 2015
Thailand
Thai
Man Arrested
for Facebook 'like' of Doctored Royal Photo.
He supported a campaign that criticized Thai corruption.
After a Thai investigator fled to Australia fearing for his life,
Thailand
looks to charge
him with "defamation" for saying so.
Thailand's repressive government does not care that he said it in
Australia.
To visit Thailand is an act of folly — stay away!
12 December 2015
Volkswagen
Volkswagen explains that the "defeat devices" that faked emissions
levels
for tests
came from a system
that had a tendency to do
this.
12 December 2015
Overprotectiveness
small step against overprotectiveness
: the US "no child left alone"
law has been amended to say that it does not criminalize parents for
allowing a child to walk to school.
12 December 2015
Discussion of Islamic terrorism
Western discussion of Islamic terrorists
studiously avoids
mentioning
how
Salafi Arabia
and Qatar promote their ideology and fund their
attacks.
12 December 2015
US teachers
Some US teachers
are leading their students
to treat Muslim students
as terrorists.
I think it would be useful for non-Islamist Muslims to invent a term
to describe themselves, so that they can say in a positive way what they
stand for, without using a negation. Then, when someone asks them,
"Are you an Islamist", they can say, "No, I'm an XYZ, and proud of it."
12 December 2015
Give away expired food
France
is passing a law
to require supermarkets to give away
"expired" food.
12 December 2015
Sanders on Trump
Sanders
presents
the positive response to Trump's randomly scattered
hatred.
12 December 2015
Mental health care
Mental health care
is unavailable
to half the Americans that need it.
Perhaps as a result, they are more likely to get killed by
thugs
12 December 2015
Global heating
Global heating
threatens to inundate
Tangier Island in the Chesapeake Bay,
turning it first into a marsh, then later into open water.
Only 500 people live their now, but it's not the only place in the US
that is going to be under water.
Spending money to protect each vulnerable place is stupid. We should
spend it to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and thus protect them all
at once.
12 December 2015
Syria
Without Syrians
at the Front And Centre of Talks, There Can Be No Lasting
Peace.
12 December 2015
ACLU
ACLU: FBI Director
Completely Ignores
Anti-Abortion, Right-Wing
Terror, Focuses Exclusively on Muslims.
12 December 2015
UK tax on renewable energy
The UK's government isn't satisfied with eliminating subsidies for
wind and solar energy. Now
it plans to tax
them heavily.
12 December 2015
China
China
has cancelled
the punishments applied to children who were
born in violation of the one-child-per-family law.
I supported limiting families to one child, but it was wrong to punish
the children. They are not responsible for who decided to have them.
12 December 2015
California thug
A woman raped by a California
thug
, under the guise of a "cavity
search",
had the courage to report it
and sue.
12 December 2015
France will not ban Tor
The Prime Minister of France says France
will not ban
public WiFi or
use of Tor.
It is not clear how broad the requirement for companies to break their
client's encryption will be.
12 December 2015
Dow and DuPont
Dow and DuPont
want
to merge.
Large companies should never be allowed to merge. Let's hope that
today's
weakened antitrust laws provide a basis to block it.
12 December 2015
Elections in Venezuela
The Venezuelan right wing has repeatedly accused Chavez of stealing
elections. We see now that
the elections in Venezuela are honest
However, I fear that the
antisocialists
, now in power, will change
that. Republicans in the US have perfected several methods of rigging
elections that they could follow.
12 December 2015
China
China
has arrested
many labor activists in Canton (Guangdong).
12 December 2015
Ivory smuggling
Japan's failure
to act against
ivory smuggling is impeding efforts
to protect elephants.
12 December 2015
Human Trafficking Investigator
Thailand's Most Senior Human Trafficking Investigator to Seek
Political Asylum in Australia
The investigations lead to
people high up in the army and the
thugs
12 December 2015
South Korea
South Korea is becoming repressive: a union leader who sought refuge in
a Buddhist temple
has been arrested
12 December 2015
Feminism
Now that feminism has revived, it can do a lot of good, but also
threatens censorship
I support feminism except when it
starts to attack freedom of speech.
Calling someone a "slut" is nasty, and foolish as well: it presumes a
prudish sexist idea of good and bad sexual conduct. Let's rebuke
anyone who calls anyone a "slut" — we could call then "Taliban"
— but people have a right to say nasty, prudish, sexist things.
No matter how nasty a statement is, censorship is nastier.
12 December 2015
dooH niboR
UK right-wing policies of
dooH niboR
are spreading
hunger.
12 December 2015
Homs
Syrian rebels
evacuated
the city of Homs, under cease fire.
12 December 2015
Antibiotics to animals
Many countries
feed more antibiotics
to healthy animals than the
humans use.
This provokes antibiotic resistance in the bacteria that inhabit the
animals,which spreads to bacteria that can infect humans.
12 December 2015
"Reconciled" CISA
The "reconciled" version of CISA
contains all the worst snooping provisions
approved by the House and Senate.
12 December 2015
US competition law
Anheuser-Busch
is taking advantage
of a gap in US competition law to push
small competitors out of supermarkets.
This shows one more way that US competition law needs to be
strengthened. It should also prohibit the sort o contracts that
Microsoft pushed on PC manufacturers, by which they agree to pay
for a Windows license even when they sell a computer without Windows.
12 December 2015
Thailand's censorship
Under Thailand's tyranny,
any criticism of repression can be twistedly
labeled as "insulting the monarchy"
which makes it a target of repression.
12 December 2015
Vicious ideas
You can't stop vicious ideas, whether those of Trump or those of
PISSI
by
banning
them.
12 December 2015
Alaska permafrost
One quarter of Alaska permafrost
could melt
by 2100 — US
Geological Survey.
Since this would release a lot of methane, we'd be truly cooked.
12 December 2015
FBI director
The FBI director
has returned to demanding
an end to encryption that
really works.
Imagine if someone like Trump becomes president and starts using the
US
spy apparatus to find and imprison scapegoats.
12 December 2015
Louvre
Activists
protested at the Louvre
against its acceptance of sponsorship
from an oil company.
Isn't it cute how the oil company sums up plutocratic rule: "In recent
years, the relationship between business and society has changed."
Protests like this are very important for turning fossil fuel
companies into the pariahs they deserve to be. Having dealings with
those companies should make a person or organization the object of
general scorn. This is necessary because it will reduce their
plutocratic power to block necessary action to avoid disaster.
12 December 2015
CISA
Librarians and privacy advocates
oppose
CISA together.
12 December 2015
Ramie Abounaja
Ramie Abounaja displayed a Palestinian flag from his dorm window, so
George Washington University
sent a thug
to make him take it down,
then made some unclear disciplinary accusation against him.
It is formally prohibited to hang flags from a window,
but students that hang other flags never get bothered.
12 December 2015
War in Ukraine
The war in Ukraine
has quieted down
since August; the cease-fire has
held.
It is no longer serves Putin's purposes to heat it up.
A total of 9,000 deaths are estimated.
12 December 2015
Senate's torture report
While Obama's officials refuse to read the Senate's torture report,
Republicans
are trying to destroy
all copies, so as to cover up US crimes.
12 December 2015
Germany pays fascists
Germany
is still paying
pensions to those still living of 37,000
Spaniards who fought for Hitler.
12 December 2015
Encryption
"Everything
you need to know
about encryption: Hint, you're already using
it."
This article exhibits a blind spot that is common in writing about the
issue:
namely, it is unwilling to consider that the US government's official use
of
a back door might be for evil.
I'm not willing to maintain that blind spot. What if we have President
Trump,
or someone like him?
12 December 2015
Scapegoat the Internet
Trump and Clinton
are both scapegoating
the internet.
12 December 2015
American housing
Community land trusts and public housing
can make life better
for people
that privately owned housing.
12 December 2015
Diesel generators
The UK
is promoting
diesel generators over renewable generators.
12 December 2015
Afghan army
The Afghan army is having trouble winning support from the people
because it kills
too many civilians.
12 December 2015
Visa restrictions
The US is on track
to make it inconvenient
for Europeans to enter the US
if they have visited Iraq, Syria, Iran or Sudan.
This will hit Europeans who participated in humanitarian, diplomatic
and business activities in those countries. Yet another US attack
against
Medecins Sans Frontières.
Ironically, it will also hurt any Europeans that worked for the US
mercenary companies such as Blackwater (or whatever it's called
today).
12 December 2015
US thugs
The FBI
will start counting
people killed by
thugs
in the US.
12 December 2015
Sanders about fossil fuels
Sanders
states how he will achieve
big cuts in US fossil fuel
emissions, as well as banning some of the most dangerous or polluting
forms of fossil fuel extraction.
12 December 2015
Sanders
Sanders
told reporters
not to neglect US poverty and injustice out of
obsession with how to deal with
PISSI
12 December 2015
Global heating disaster
Humanity
must invest
7 trillion dollars a year to avoid
global heating
disaster.
That is 20 times what we invested in this in 2014.
Fortunately, we can get most of that 7 trillion by taking it from
investment in fossil fuel use.
12 December 2015
Trump
A danger from Trump
is that he makes
serious bigots seem within the range
of normal views.
12 December 2015
Gun control
Gun killings in the US today
are running at half the rate
of 20 years ago.
Americans need not feel terrified of being shot.
Although the total death rate from shooting is going down,
the death rate from multiple shooting incidents is rising.
Common sense gun control measures can't make multiple shooting
impossible, but could reduce how often they happen.
Also, prohibiting large magazines nationwide would eventually make
them scarce. That would reduce, in many cases, the number that a
shooter can succeed in killing.
12 December 2015
Philip Coleman
Philip Coleman was lying on a cot in jail when Chicago
thugs
came into
his sell and
repeatedly tased
him. Coleman died shortly after.
12 December 2015
Global heating
Global heating
denialists for hire, by the hour,
to write reports
to support planet-roasters.
12 December 2015
Cease-fire in Syria
There
may be a real prospect
of a cease-fire in Syria among the
sides other than
PISSI
12 December 2015
Windows 10
Microsoft
is attacking
computers that run Windows 7 and 8,
switching on a flag that says whether to "upgrade" to Windows 10
when users have turned it off.
This, by the way, reaffirms the presence of a universal back door
in Windows 7 and 8.
12 December 2015
Oil Fuels War
Oil Fuels War and Terrorists Like [
PISSI
]. The Climate Movement
Can
Bring
Peace.
12 December 2015
TPP
Clinton:
will you take actions
to oppose the TPP?
12 December 2015
PISSI
Foreign recruits
continue
flowing to
PISSI
It is very important to cut off the flow, since
PISSI
's training turns
many somewhat-confused people into expert soldiers. But the only way
to do it is to close the border with Turkey. Erdogan won't do it, so
it
has to be done by ground troops on the Syrian side.
12 December 2015
Paris climate conference
Saudi Arabia
is trying
to poison the Paris climate conference.
China and India
are also blocking
a strong agreement.
12 December 2015
Disabled people
The UK
is planning to cut the support
for disabled people, supposedly
to give them an incentive to do the work that they can't do.
11 December 2015 (
Urgent: Endorse a president
US citizens:
tell
Democracy For America
who you suggest it should endorse for
president. (I chose Sanders.)
11 December 2015 (
Human rights violations in Rio
Rio Olympics
Linked
to Widespread Human Rights Violations
, Report Reveals.
When the games start, other forms of harshness are likely to start,
including chasing away street vendors so certain elect businesses can
get the spectators' business. Meanwhile, there may well be new
systems of surveillance and new harsh laws that will be permanent.
The city of Boston
wisely
killed Boston's bid
to hold Olympic games.
11 December 2015 (
Planned highways and railroads in Africa
Planned highways and railroads in Africa
could
destroy the currently roadless ecosystems
they run through.
11 December 2015 (
Demand for ivory in China falling
Demand for ivory in China is
falling
which bodes well for elephants.
The question is whether this is due to a change in attitudes or only
to China's current economic slump.
11 December 2015 (
Legalizing MDMA
MDMA (Ecstasy) is already quite safe, but
legalizing
it would make it even safer
11 December 2015 (
Forcible return of exiled Chinese dissidents
Several countries are
forcibly
handing exiled Chinese dissidents to China
. They include
Thailand, and even Vietnam, which is not generally friendly with
China.
11 December 2015 (
Canadian oil exports
Even without the cancelled Keystone XL pipeline, Canadian oil exports
via the US have
almost
doubled since a year ago
11 December 2015 (
How Trump attracts support
Much like
PISSI
with its beheading videos, Trump attracts support by
proposing
shocking actions
His reaction is
what
PISSI hopes to provoke
. So is the success of bigots in French
elections.
11 December 2015 (
Zuism
Iceland has its own counterpart to Pastafarianism: Zuism worships
ancient Sumerian gods, and
will
give its members a refund of their mandatory tax surcharge to support
churches
11 December 2015 (
Australian islands being flooded
As Australia pushes for more coal export, some Australian islands are
gradually being flooded, and
changing
weather is killing their crops
11 December 2015 (
Enforcement of Geneva Conventions
Proposing
a mechanism
to enforce compliance with the Geneva Conventions.
11 December 2015 (
PISSI's loss of profitability
A commentator suggests that
PISSI
's loss of profitability
might
make the groups that support it split apart
11 December 2015 (
Trump cites unscientific poll
Trump Cites
Unscientific
Poll From Fringe Group
in Call for Banning Muslim Immigration.
11 December 2015 (
Liberate scientific knowledge
Calling on the public
to
liberate scientific knowledge through forbidden sharing of the
articles and books that embody it.
11 December 2015 (
Tortured in Egypt, imprisoned in Australia
Mubarak's
thugs
tortured Sayed Abdellatif into confessions that appear
to be false, but Australia uses them as an
excuse
to imprison him
11 December 2015 (
England hit hard with floods
Global heating
is
hitting
England hard with great floods
that would have been extremely rare
in the past.
The government continues going all-out to make this worse.
11 December 2015 (
The Paris conference
10
criteria
for judging whether the agreement from the Paris
conference will do what needs to be done.
11 December 2015 (
Finland considers universal basic income
Finland is considering a
universal
basic income
11 December 2015 (
Disagreeing with Putin
A "liberal" Russian TV channel which disagrees with Putin is being
examined for
"extremism"
11 December 2015 (
1.5C limit for global heating
The
US, China, Canada and the EU
are supporting a 1.5C limit for
global heating
It is necessary to make India accept this target. Flooding other
countries is an act of war; perhaps the US and China should convey to
Modi that they will preemptively bomb India's coal-burning power
plants to stop India from flooding cities such as New York,
Washington, Miami, Nanjing and Shanghai.
Of course, this would be hypocritical if the US and China don't
do their share to prevent the flooding.
10 December 2015 (
Global heating denial
Fossil fuel companies continue funding denialism. Fortunately, one of
their events in Paris was a
risible
failure
I fear the companies that are
"sponsoring"
the Paris climate negotiations
are having a lot more influence.
10 December 2015 (
Renewable energy plan for Africa
A large renewable energy plan could
lead
Africa away from fossil fuels
This could make life better for many people in Africa, but
if we don't make India drop its plans for burning coal, people may not
be able to live there at all.
10 December 2015 (
The WTO
The WTO
will
try to fine the US a billion dollars
unless it abolishes
country-of-origin meat labels.
Let's abolish the WTO instead. The WTO's purpose is to undermine
democracy in all the countries that have signed it, transferring power
from the legislature to multinational businesses.
The plutocratists try to distract us from this effect by comparing
exports and imports, which slips in the assumption that the interests
of Americans are nothing but a matter of total economic consumption.
Even aside from questions of whether the economy is sustainable,
economic growth in all countries doesn't help most people if it is
achieved in a way that benefits the rich at the expense of the
non-rich. To prevent that, we need to make laws that assure the
wealth is spread around and that businesses don't hurt the public.
These laws are precisely what "free trade" treaties attack. They also
make it hard to maintain unions.
Don't let the plutocratists distract you from the real issue at stake.
And please organize now to
defeat
the TPP
10 December 2015 (
Global greenhouse emissions
Global greenhouse emissions
fell
in 2015
, but they are still so high that disaster will result; and
the decrease may not last.
10 December 2015 (
UK rightwing gov't plans for universities
The UK's rightwing government plans to reduce universities to the
status of
training
institutions for the "labor market"
09 December 2015 (
New Spanish Pun
El jaguar muerde
08 December 2015 (
Urgent: Make oil and gas extractors pay
US citizens:
Support
the BLM's proposed rule
to make oil and gas extractors pay for all
they extract.
08 December 2015 (
Urgent: Emanuel and Alvarez's resignation
Everyone:
call on
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and prosecutor Anita Alvarez
to resign.
08 December 2015 (
Urgent: Day in court for torture victims
US citizens:
call
on the attorney general
to let victims of US torture have their
day in court.
07 December 2015 (
More government snooping
Clinton, like the Republicans, wants more
government
snooping.
She wants to pressure companies into bypassing encryption.
Her bogus premise is that we should keep increasing snooping
until it identifies in advance all attacks by small groups.
But
no
amount of surveillance
is enough to do that, so she will always
have an excuse to demand more surveillance.
Vote for Sanders for president.
07 December 2015 (
Hypothetical crimes
The UK spy agency argues it should be allowed to spy on people with
hardly
any limits,
and attack their computers, just because the hypothetical
crimes are really bad.
Note the similarity between the argument in favor of massive
surveillance and the argument in favor of torture: that it "just might
someday" make it possible to prevent a crime. But neither
massive
surveillance
nor
torture
really does this.
07 December 2015 (
Malaysia approves security law
Malaysia Approves Security Law Amid Warning It Could Lead to
Dictatorship.
France is following the
same
path;
I fear for France.
07 December 2015 (
Greenhouse gases emitted by airplanes
Crackpot theories about
"chemtrails"
are distracting people from the dangerous greenhouse gases emitted by airplanes.
Here's a conspiracy theory. Maybe the "chemtrails" idiocy was funded by the
Heatland Institute
(*) through ALEC.
* It calls itself the "Heartland Institute", but since its goal is to make the Earth hotter,
"Heatland"
fits it better.
07 December 2015 (
Disobeying terms of service
A US appeals court endorsed a
narrow
interpretation of the CFAA:
disobeying terms of service is not a crime.
This might have saved Aaron Swartz from being
hounded to death.
7 December 2015
Muslims
Muslims in London
have started a campaign against fanaticism
telling a fanatic who attacked someone in a train that he is not
a real Muslim.
7 December 2015
Surveillance technology
Advancing surveillance technology
threatens
to make it impossible to
do anything that the state does not follow.
7 December 2015
War on PISSI
The US and France
may attack PISSI in Libya
, where it is expanding
and is viewed by most of the public as merely an occupying army.
However, we
should take care not to consider its expansion in Libya as
a sign of weakness
in Syria and Iraq.
Many have lost wars by underestimating the enemy.
7 December 2015
UK Government
The UK government
is eager to bomb someone
, saying it must try to
protect Britons from terrorism even if that is ineffective or
backfires. Meanwhile, it rejects the effective measures to protect
the British people from the larger threat of
global heating
7 December 2015
Arable Land
Earth
Has Lost a Third of Arable Land
in Past 40 Years, Scientists Say.
We're riding the Earth too hard, and we can't keep it up for long.
7 December 2015
Religions
Christianist terrorists, like Islamist terrorists,
believe
that their religion authorizes
any sort of crimes.
7 December 2015
Canadian thugs
The Canadian national
thugs
want to access personal data
without warrants.
7 December 2015
Elon Musk
Elon Musk
condemns
the 5 trillion dollars a year in damage that the fossil
fuel industry is not being forced to pay for.
7 December 2015
Nuclear power
James Hansen and some other scientists
say nuclear power is needed
to end carbon emissions.
I respect James Hansen, but I think he
is mistaken. To develop
nuclear power at the rate he proposes would require ignoring safety.
He is talking about hypothetical advanced reactors that could only
work many years from now, and certainly won't be available soon.
This amount of nuclear power would be so expensive that it would be
cheaper to build an excess of renewable energy, plus power storage
capacity.
7 December 2015
SCROTUS
Another
SCROTUS
budget bill rider
would allow
increased consolidation
in US television.
SCROTUS
= Sleazy Congressional Republicans Of The United States.
7 December 2015
Janet Alder
After Janet Alder's brother was killed by UK
thugs
, she started
campaigning for justice, and
thugs started snooping
on her life
looking for some way to throw dirt on her.
If it is impossible to convict the
thugs
in charge of this operation,
the law must be changed so that next time a conviction is obtained.
7 December 2015
Businesses' lies
Businesses surround us with
little lies
that no one expects us to take
seriously. This can devalue truth in general.
7 December 2015
Sanders' tax plan
Sanders' tax plan for multinational companies
would raise
all the money
the US needs for its infrastructure.
I hope he will put a lot of the revenue into renewable energy.
7 December 2015
Damage of global heating
Multinational oil companies
face an investigation
for complicity in
causing the damage of
global heating
7 December 2015
Drone attack whistleblowers
The US mainstream media
ignore
the drone attack whistleblowers.
7 December 2015
Faking violence
When someone was stabbed during an art event in Miami,
witnesses
thought the attack was theater
, part if the performance.
Faking violence as a hoax or "art" can indirectly hurt people by
confusing society about how to react. It should not be illegal, but
it is wise to disapprove of it.
7 December 2015
Laquan McDonald
The official statements of several
thugs
about the murder of Laquan
McDonald
were lies
— and the video proves it.
Is it a crime
to report falsely?
7 December 2015
Banning for no-fly listed people
Democrats proposed a law to ban people on the no-fly list from buying
guns,
and
SCROTUS blocked it
as a denial of due process.
The no-fly list is already punishment without due process. Being
stopped
from flying is more of a punishment than being stopped from buying a gun,
and this is why the no-fly list must be abolished, or else redesigned
so that people are only placed in it by a court's judgment.
At that point, it could also be applied to purchase of guns.
7 December 2015
NSA snooping
The NSA still
has the power to snoop massively
on Americans,
never limited as the Constitution calls for.
We have evidence from France and the US that this power doesn't
prevent terrorist attacks anyway.
7 December 2015
US parents
US parents
would rather their children see violence
than sex.
7 December 2015
Indian energy plans
Modi talks about boosting solar power in India, but
he still plans
to double
coal extraction.
To some extent, the new coal mines in India will replace coal imports.
However, continuing to burn so much coal will bring disaster regardless
of where it is mined.
7 December 2015
Hello Barbie
A week with Hello Barbie: it constantly tells you what good friends you
are,
then
asks you for personal information
Seems designed to manipulate children into giving personal data.
7 December 2015
Active Investigations
Why 'Active Investigations' Don't Justify
Keeping Police Video Secret
7 December 2015
Global heating
By 2050,
global heating
will disrupt
food production in every region
of the world. This will add to the harm done by population increase.
7 December 2015
Clinton Super PAC Donor
Clinton Super PAC Donor
is Former Goldman Exec and Foreclosure Crisis
Profiteer
Clearly he expects her not to clamp down on the power of the
banksters
7 December 2015
TPP
The TPP
would prohibit laws
requiring certain products come with
source code, which is needed for their security and for users' right
to repair.
7 December 2015
Censorship in Thailand
The tyranny of Thailand is demonstrated by
repeated censorship of New
York Times articles
that can hardly be said to actually criticize the
Thai monarchy.
7 December 2015
Terrorism
Many Americans
are too quick to assume a killing is terrorism when the
killer is a Muslim
, but drag their feet against acknowledging
Christianist terrorism.
I use the term "Christianist" for Christians that want to impose laws
that come from their religion, by analogy with "Islamist". Only a
fraction of Christianists and Islamists are violent, but all are
enemies of human rights.
7 December 2015
Brazil women
Brazil
has advised
women not to get pregnant now, because a virus once
in a rare while causes microcephaly.
It ought to be possible to abort the very few fetuses that develop
microencephaly, but I suppose Brazil doesn't respect women's rights
that much.
On the other hand, a substantial reduction in births would be quite
useful too.
7 December 2015
MSF clinic bombed
US-supported
Salafi Arabia
bombed
an MSF clinic in Yemen.
7 December 2015
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, which is a total tyranny,
is ordering all internet users
to install back doors
in their computers.
This goes only a little beyond how the UK plans to attack all internet
users.
7 December 2015
Burundi
The tyrant of Burundi
demands
that everyone join his party; those
who don't are beaten. Those who try to flee are killed if caught.
7 December 2015
Moral Character of Cryptographic Work
The Moral Character of Cryptographic Work
Encryption alone cannot protect our privacy from all the systems of
snooping that have been set up in today's "free" countries —
only partly from some. We need to
redesign systems
so that they do
not accumulate data about people other than court-designated suspects.
7 December 2015
Population growth
Human population growth
continues to threaten humanity
, as it is on a
collision course with the food shortages that
global heating
does and
will cause.
If we don't want people to remain poor, we must make fewer of them.
7 December 2015
CO2
We must go beyond "zero carbon emissions" and
actively reduce
the
CO2 level in Earth's atmosphere.
The urgency is in the first step. Once that is done, reducing the CO2
level may prevent the subsequent inundation of some of the cities that
are threatened.
7 December 2015
Maria Hasankolli
Maria Hasankolli overslept and her 8-year-old child walked to school.
She
faces ten years
in prison for this unconscious act.
When I was 8 years old, I walked to school every day. So did everyone
else in my school. But that was in Manhattan. Perhaps these nasty
fools think that Connecticut is a more dangerous place than Manhattan.
7 December 2015
Trade In Services Agreement
The secret negotiations for the Trade In Services Agreement
propose
to
prohibit subsidies, or any sort of preferences, for renewable energy.
This is typical of how "trade treaties" betray the people:
subordinating
everything that really matters to business interests.
This is
based on the
leaked text
of one chapter.
6 December 2015
Thugs deleted footage to cover up murder
Thugs
deleted
part of the Burger King store's security video recording
in order to cover up the murder of Laquan McDonald.
6 December 2015
Court case over Facebook data storage in the US
A European court case demands that Facebook
cease sending Europeans' data to the US
6 December 2015
Corporations exempting themselves from tax
Around the world corporations are
exempting themselves from taxation
forcing too much tax burden onto individuals, especially the non-rich.
In the past, countries have been weakened because too much property
ended up in the hands of untaxable churches. Churches or
corporations, it's the same phenomenon.
6 December 2015
On trial for handing out jury pamphlet
Prosecutors
stretch laws and ignore the constitution
to attack people that distribute information from the Fully Informed Jury
Association
about the purpose of juries.
When someone is on trial for handing out a pamphlet, I wonder whether
the pamphlet must be entered in evidence for the jury to examine.
6 December 2015
Westerners who fight PISSI prosecuted
Westerners who fight along with the Kurds in Syria and Iraq, against
PISSI
, are
often prosecuted
just like those that fight for
PISSI
6 December 2015
Urgent: reject spending bills with Republican riders
US citizens: phone the White House at (202) 456-1111 and leave a
message for President Obama, calling for rejecting spending bills with
nasty Republican riders.
Whether they are tax breaks for companies, or attacks on Planned
Parenthood, or attacks on the environment, or attacks on food labeling
requirements, or anything else, Obama should reject them one and all.
6 December 2015
SCROTUS preparing tax breaks for businesses
While
SCROTUS
continue to cut spending that helps people, they are
preparing
big tax breaks
for businesses.
6 December 2015
Thirty meter telescope cancelled
The thirty meter telescope, which would have been by far the largest
telescope
in the northern hemisphere,
has been cancelled
because some of the ground it would be built on is considered "sacred".
Faith has, apparently, triumphed over knowledge.
Can any other place can be found to build this telescope?
Another telescope, even larger, is planned for Chile, where it will be
able to observe the southern skies — but parts of the northern
skies will be outside its range.
6 December 2015
Zuckerberg helps himself
Zuckerberg "donated" most of his assets — to a
new corporation he owns
And he calls that "charity".
6 December 2015
Trudeau only good compared to predecessor
New Canadian PM Trudeau looks great on
global heating
, but only
because he is
compared with the over planet-roaster Harper
6 December 2015
Chicago Mayor in murder coverup
Chicago Mayor Emanuel seems to have tried to
cover up the murder of Laquan McDonald
in order to get the black vote for reelection as mayor.
I gave to Chuy Garcia's campaign. I hope he wins next time.
6 December 2015
UK decides to bomb PISSI
The UK decided to bomb
PISSI
in Syria, a gesture that will have
negligible military effect
I'm not necessarily opposed to gestures, but gestures are not a valid
reason to kill people.
6 December 2015
James Hansen calls for increasing fee on emissions
James Hansen calls for a
predictably increasing fee
on carbon emissions.
6 December 2015
Sanders' proposal for affordable college
How Bernie Sanders proposes to
make college affordable
for masses of Americans, as we did before.
The other candidates are too much in cahoots with the rich.
6 December 2015
US extremists trying to cut off women from contraception
US Christianist extremists are trying to
cut off American women from contraceptives
but pretend this isn't so.
6 December 2015
Urgent: please donate to the Free Software Foundation
Everyone: please
donate
to the Free Software Foundation.
6 December 2015
SCROTUS threatens with government shutdown
SCROTUS
are planning to
threaten a government shutdown
to abolish some of the laws that regulate
banksters
SCROTUS
stands for Sleazy Congressional Republicans Of The United
States.
6 December 2015
Demanding resignation of Chicago Mayor
Demanding the
resignation of Chicago Mayor Emmanual
6 December 2015
Climate negotiators hope physics will make concessions
The climate negotiators in Paris hope that nature (physics) will make
concessions, if they
show good intentions
6 December 2015
Safe zone for PISSI
Turkey wants to set up a
"safe zone"
in Northern Turkey — safe
for
PISSI
, that is. Thus, the Kurds are opposed to it.
6 December 2015
Prosecution of US torturers
Human Rights Watch demands
prosecution of US torturers
6 December 2015
Prison for Â3D printer files
A state in of Australia will
imprison people
for having 3D printer files for making a gun.
It is legitimate to prohibit making guns, but any law that makes it a
crime to have a copy of some published work is tyranny. It subjects
innocent people to great danger from anyone that wants to get them
in trouble.
6 December 2015
Trump exploits the internet
Trump exploits the internet with speeches that are a series
of clickbait. They
don't need to be coherent
to succeed.
I occasionally use Google search, but Google never knows who I am. If
you do the same, then your Google search is the same as mine; Google
can't tell us apart.
6 December 2015
South Korea repressing labor protesters
The President of South Korea is
repressing labor protesters
and tried to associate them with hypothetical terrorists.
6 December 2015
Myths about Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks, whose arrest sparked the Montgomery bus boycott,
was a mature lifelong activist who had
plenty of experience
6 December 2015
Airstrikes don't change much
People in Raqqa say that
airstrikes alone don't change much
Aside from Russian airstrikes, which often hit civilians.
6 December 2015
ALEC organizing sabotage of climate plans
ALEC, funded by fossil fuel businesses, is trying to organize
Republican-controlled US states to
actively sabotage US plans
to avoid
global heating
disaster.
6 December 2015
UK Tories adapting Republican gerrymandering
The UK Tories are
adapting Republican techniques
of voter suppression and gerrymandering to make the UK government
nondemocratic.
6 December 2015
Truth shines through North Korean propaganda movie
A Russian director, authorized to make a deceptive North Korean
propaganda movie,
found a clever way
to show some of the truth.
6 December 2015
UK cuts mean no parks, libraries, museums
Right-wing cuts in the UK mean no parks, no public libraries, no
museums, no place for young people to
do anything but get in trouble
6 December 2015
Paying to keep forests standing
Rich Countries Should Pay to Keep Tropical Forests Standing.
Avoiding global disaster will be well worth the price, but there are
two issues that we must resolve:
Making sure the money spent really preserves the forests.
Making the rich and the multinationals pay a fair share of tax,
so they can't shrug the cost of this onto the non-rich.
Paying a price to preserve forests is one thing; assigning them a
value in money is another. It is a mistake to see the issue in the
narrow economic terms such as "ecosystem services" and "buying them".
That encourages people to treat them as fungible.
6 December 2015
Richest 10% produce half of emissions
The World's Richest 10% Produce Half of Global Carbon Emissions.
The US must do a lot more to switch to renewable energy.
This calls for spending money, perhaps instead of some weapons.
6 December 2015
Egyptian journalist charged for talk about rebels
Another Egyptian journalist has been
charged with "spreading false news"
for giving a talk about the Islamist rebels in the Sinai.
6 December 2015
China to cut emissions from electricity
China
states the plan
to make huge cuts in CO2 emissions from electricity by 2020.
This would be a real step forward, but don't forget the emissions
from transport, home heating, factories, and agriculture.
6 December 2015
Struggle to protect marine species
The slow struggle to establish protection of marine species threatened
by overfishing takes place in the shadow of the CO2 threat to
wipe out entire ecosystems and families
6 December 2015
US troops in Syria likely to make things worse
Sending independently operating US combat troops to fight in Syria
invites making things worse
6 December 2015
A Turkish Gollum
Repression in Turkey has reached the point where a state employee
has been fired
for comparing Erdoğan's face to that of Gollum.
When Erdoğan doesn't understand is that he is the one bringing
Turkey into
disrepute.
6 December 2015
Putin expelling Turkish citizens
Putin is
expelling Turkish citizens
from Russia in the harshest possible way,
clearly meant as a gesture to prove what a
bully
he can be.
The reasons stated for this action include bullshit, plus an
accusation that is probably true: that Turkey is protecting
PISSI
's
oil export trade.
Both Turkey and Russia
must be lying
about what happened in the downing of the Russian jet.
6 December 2015
Loan companies force spyware on borrowers
Loan companies, in Africa and the US, make would-be borrowers submit
to total surveillance by
installing spyware
in their phones.
I think we need laws to prohibit companies from requiring or even
asking customers (including borrowers) to run any nonfree software.
A "smart" phone is a computer. If your computer runs nonfree
software, it is someone else's tool to mistreat you. There are
smartphones that can run the free operating system Replicant in the
main or "application" processor, but all mobile phones have nonfree
software, at least in the radio communication processor.
6 December 2015
Fined for refusing fingerprinting
An arrested protester in Paris has been
fined for refusing to be fingerprinted
Bravo!
However, I do not approve of throwing bottles or cans at the
thugs
This plays into the hands of repressors.
05 December 2015 (
Schoolchildren's personal data
Many schoolchildren in the US are being told by their schools to use
mobile computers with proprietary software, and the machines typically
give the
children's personal data to some company
(often Google or Apple).
If a school makes an account in a student's name with a company, it
has already violated that student's privacy. If the account does not
have the student's name or other personal details, sending it
unencrypted information about the student's school work violates that
student's privacy.
These mobile computers always run nonfree software. Parents shouldn't
allow their young children to be given nonfree software by anyone.
I was surprised that the EFF legitimizes the term "the cloud", which
is meant to cloud people's thinking about letting companies have their
data and do things with it. There is no cloud, only computers
belonging to various companies. The term "cloud" is intended to
encourage people not to ask, "Which company is getting which data,
what does it do with that data, and which country's jurisdiction is it
under?" Please, EFF, stop encouraging this cloudy thinking.
05 December 2015 (
Salafi Arabia's expensive PR campaign
Salafi Arabia
's expensive PR campaign has
close
ties to the Clinton campaign
05 December 2015 (
The hard way to curb global heating
Billionaires' investments in
centralized,
subsidized and profitable energy long-shots
are the hard way to
curb
global heating
05 December 2015 (
Investigation of insider trading
Republicans in Congress are
trying
to sabotage an investigation
against some of them for insider
stock trading.
05 December 2015 (
Imprisoned in Guantanamo by mistake
After 13 years the US has admitted it put Mustafa al-Aziz al-Shamiri
in Guantanamo prison
by
mistake
, but still won't let him go.
05 December 2015 (
Claims made by Tamir Rice's killer
Tamir Rice's killer was allowed to testify to his own grand jury. He
made
claims
that can't fit the timeline shown by the video
05 December 2015 (
How to fight PISSI
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn
applies
practical sense
to the question of how to fight PISSI.
05 December 2015 (
Obama plans to use US troops against PISSI
Obama
plans
to station US troops in Iraq
to attack PISSI independently.
While I think the aim of attacking
PISSI
is legitimate, using US
troops to do it is asking for trouble. Do they speak Arabic?
05 December 2015 (
Chicago thug chief fired
Chicago's
thug
chief has been fired for
helping
to protect a thug from punishment for murdering Laquan McDonald
05 December 2015 (
"Male" and "female" brain features
Features in a human brain, which may have a form that is typically
"male" or one that is typically "female",
can
change with experiences
, sometimes in 15 minutes.
This suggests that the reason it is most common for the feature to
have a certain form in males or in females is that males and females
tend to have certain kinds of life experiences.
05 December 2015 (
Tobacco company bribery
A global tobacco company
bribed
officials and politicians
in various African companies to
undermine laws intended to reduce smoking.
Big Tobacco
Targets
the Young in Poor Countries
— with Deadly Consequences.
05 December 2015 (
Chicago DA protects thugs from prosecution
It is no surprise that Chicago DA Alvarez prosecuted Laquan McDonald's
killer only when compelled to. She shows a pattern of
going
to any length to protect thugs from prosecution
, even prosecuting
victims for complaining.
She also defends false convictions, even harassing law students who
are working pro bono to investigate them, on the principle that the
system should never admit a mistake.
05 December 2015 (
Murder of Union organizers in Honduras
Union organizers in Honduras face murder, in which
employers
may be involved
. The government, set up by the
US-backed
coup
, is firmly on the side of the businesses.
05 December 2015 (
Poor Americans
Poor Americans are
not
lazy
. They work harder (on the average) than people who have more
money.
05 December 2015 (
Former head of DIA says US reacted stupidly
General Flynn, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency,
admitted
that the US reacted stupidly
in response to the September 2001
attacks.
05 December 2015 (
Protest for climate defense in Paris
Ten
thousand protested peacefully
for climate defense in Paris,
forming a human chain in defiance of the state's ban.
I love the way Naomi Klein says what's what.
After that, thousands of people formed a
protest
march
Unfortunately, the black bloc turned that into a riot.
We need public defiance — with discipline.
05 December 2015 (
Teacher and staff sit-in at CUNY
Teachers and staff at the City University of New York have held a
sit-in and are
moving
towards a strike
05 December 2015 (
Assad's forces bomb MSF hospital
Assad's forces
bombed
an MSF hospital
, and bombed again a few minutes later to kill
medics aiding the victims.
05 December 2015 (
India's ban on The Satanic Verses
A minister in power when India banned The Satanic Verses says the ban
was a mistake — but the book
remains
banned
05 December 2015 (
Bombing PISSI not enough
Bombing
[PISSI] Is Not Enough — We'll Need to Talk to Them Too
If we can have a peaceful relationship with a state as cruel and
barbaric as Salafi Arabia, in principle we can do the same with
PISSI
05 December 2015 (
Distrust of thugs
People
More Likely to Report Suspected Violent Extremists 'If They Trust
Police'
05 December 2015 (
Climate refugees
Global heating
is already sending climate refugees
fleeing
to Dhaka from rural Bangladesh
4 December 2015 (
Planned parenthood
Planned Parenthood employees
receive
death threats constantly
4 December 2015 (
Uruguay
Uruguay
gets
over 50% of its energy from renewables
4 December 2015 (
Public shootings
For gun manufacturers, public shootings are
good
for business
4 December 2015 (
Discrimination against women
At least 155 countries still have laws that
discriminate
against women
04 December 2015 (
Fish disappearing from Cambodia's Tonle Sap
Fish are disappearing from Cambodia's giant lake Tonle Sap. 1/3 of the protein eaten by Cambodians
comes
from those fish.
04 December 2015 (
Dow's new dual pesticide
The EPA should carry out independent tests of the effects of Dow's new dual pesticide, not accept
Dow's
own experiments.
04 December 2015 (
Licenses to carry concealed guns
Michigan
has made it easier for possibly dangerous people to get licenses to carry concealed guns.
Gun nuts say they are opposed to the government's "taking their guns
away." But this shows that their goal is not a matter of keeping guns,
but rather expanding the possession and use of guns.
(There may be some guns that ought to be taken away from everyone.)
04 December 2015 (
Uncertainty about climate change
Greater uncertainty about climate change means bigger risks and
more
reason to act.
If we don't want to take a foolish bet, with civilization at stake,
we must work hard enough to make survival almost certain.
Paris Climate Talks: Vulnerable Countries Demand
1.5C
Warming Limit.
We all need this, because we can't measure the distance to the
cliff — all we know is that
we
are heading towards it.
04 December 2015 (
Ways to counter PISSI
list
of possible ways to counter PISSI.
Only the gullible thought that killing Osama bin Laden was going to
achieve anything. (And the US should have captured him and put him
on trial, since it was in a position to do so.)
04 December 2015 (
Poverty means lower life expectancy
In the UK, poverty means a lower life expectancy.
Up
to 16 years less.
04 December 2015 (
Shkreli would not lower drug price
Shkreli, the drug gouger who said he would lower the price,
did
not really mean it.
Just before Thanksgiving he announced he would not lower it.
The asshole is to blame for his own actions, but we should not allow
him to get away with them. Specifically, we should not allow him
to take measures to block manufacture of equivalent generics.
04 December 2015 (
Public policy journalism in the US
Public policy journalism in the US is now available only to insiders and businesses willing to pay
high
subscription fees.
04 December 2015 (
Today's Republicans
Today's Republicans make
Dubya
look good on one specific issue: he refused
to stir up public hatred towards Muslims in general. However, this virtue
was the exception to
many
other forms of cruelty and injustice
towards American Muslims.
04 December 2015 (
Blackberry will cease operations in Pakistan
Blackberry, in an act of
unusual
courage,
will cease operations in Pakistan rather than betray all its customers.
The UK wants to make such companies secretly betray all their customers.
04 December 2015 (
US cooperation with Kurds
US
soldiers
are fighting in Iraq in close cooperation with Kurds.
I don't see any danger in this. They are fighting on battlefields
against enemy soldiers, and few civilians will be killed. This
is not the sort of situation where the danger of intervention lies.
04 December 2015 (
President of the Maldives
The elected president of the Maldives, Mohammed Nasheed, cannot contribute
to saving humanity from global heating disaster. He is
in
prison,
overthrown by tyrants that work in cahoots with the fossil fuel industry.
I have to wonder whether fossil fuel magnates arranged the coup to
remove an inconvenient hero of humanity.
04 December 2015 (
Kidnapped and burned to death
Israelis who kidnapped a Palestinian and burned him to death
have
been convicted of murder.
It is good that Israel can still do justice for some cases of violence
against Palestinians. How sad that so many are ignored.
04 December 2015 (
Likely to be killed by a thug
US thugs have killed
1000
people
so far, this year.
An American is much more likely to be killed by a
thug
than by a terrorist.
04 December 2015 (
Christianist terrorist attack
The latest Christianist terrorist attack
murdered
two people
who were visiting the Planned Parenthood clinic.
Anti-abortion Christianist terrorism in the US has got much worse since the
deceptive
attack videos
that were aimed at Planned
Parenthood.
04 December 2015 (
New Atheists
Some of the New Atheists have become supporters of
right-wing
Christianist policies.
I am disappointed with them.
For the most part, in the West, Christianity is willing to coexist
with non-Christians. But Christianism, as a political movement, is
dangerous. There are plenty of Christian fanatics who are prepared to
lie to stir up
terrorism
against abortion providers.
04 December 2015 (
Spin failure in Paris
People are already trying to spin failure in Paris as the start of a
"long
road"
to curbing global heating in the future.
If only we had that much time to do the job! Slowness now will make
doom come faster and harder. This article seems to reach for
self-delusion to avoid despair.
04 December 2015 (
EU participation in "peace process"
Now that the EU has stopped Israel from passing off products of colonies
in Palestine as "Made in Israel", Netanyahu has
retaliated
by cancelling EU participation in the "peace process".
The joke is that the "peace process" involving the EU is pure theater,
just like the one that the US tried to broker. Netanyahu used them to
pretend
he wanted peace.
Now he has "canceled" the remaining one, pretending
that that makes a real difference and that it is a real punishment
for the EU. Who knows, he may fool a few dumb klucks.
Netanyahu is pretending to have sabotaged a real peace process as an
act of blackmail. If he had really done that, it would be despicable
of him — but since it was a sham anyway, he hasn't really done
anything. Somehow he claims that his pretense puts the EU in the
wrong.
All this would be risible if the occupation and its effects were not
so tragic.
The sham "peace process" shielded Netanyahu effectively from pressure
for peace, while he made sure it would never get anywhere. Its demise
is one shield stripped away.
04 December 2015 (
NSA's legal authority
The NSA's legal authority to collect everyone's phone call records in the US
has
just expired.
Will the NSA really stop?
I don't think phone companies should be allowed to keep records of
all of everyone's phone calls, either.
04 December 2015 (
Kurdish human rights defender assassinated
A prominent Kurdish human rights defender was assassinated
while
talking to the press.
We don't know whether the Turkish state was responsible for the Elci's
assassination, but we know it was responsible for his completely
indefensible prosecution. The Turkish state has often engaged in
violence, even fatal, against opposition political groups; this has
gone on for decades.
Erdogan's party seems to have got
PISSI
to help out with a couple of
handy bombings of Kurdish rallies. That doesn't prove it arranged the
assassination, but I doubt it would have scrupled to do so.
04 December 2015 (
ALEC and global heating disaster
ALEC,
with
the support of Ben Carson,
continues to sabotage attempts to avoid global heating disaster.
ALEC has lost over a hundred sponsors, but it still gets plenty of
money from the Koch brothers.
04 December 2015 (
Protest messages in Paris
People are looking for
clever
ways
to express protest messages in Paris.
I suggest the way that the civil rights movement used: walk with a
sign, chanting, and
dare
the authorities to interfere
04 December 2015 (
TPP and TTIP
The TPP and TTIP, ostensibly meant to "liberalize trade" but designed
mainly to give business more power, can sabotage efforts to avoid
global
heating disaster.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: Electronic Communications Privacy Act
US citizens: phone your representatives and senators to support
full reform of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act,
requiring
a search warrant in all cases.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: don't let Republicans put riders in a spending bill
US citizens:
phone
your senators
and say, don't let Republicans put
riders in a spending bill to do nasty things such as exclude Syrian
refugees, or attack Planned Parenthood, or cancel network neutrality.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: support diplomacy in Syria
In the US: call on the TV show
Face
the Nation
to have some guests that support diplomacy in Syria.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: investigate attacks on abortion providers as terrorism
US citizens: call on the
Department
of Justice
to investigate attacks
on abortion providers as terrorism.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: denying global heating
Everyone: call on the Philippes to start soon their
investigation
into companies suspected of dishonestly denying global heating.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: stop terrorist suspects from buying guns
US citizens: call on Senator McConnell to
support
a law
to stop identified terrorist suspects from buying guns.
02 December 2015 (
Saddam did not have weapons of mass destruction
Dubya and B'liar
ignored
an expert report
saying that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction.
This does not surprise me. After so much effort to manufacture a lie,
why would they have cared about the truth?
02 December 2015 (
"Prosperous" cities expensive to live
Many "prosperous" cities are so expensive to live in that ordinary workers can only rent
8-hour
shifts in a bed.
02 December 2015 (
Fight PISSI directly
Some Republican senators want to send US troops to fight
PISSI
directly.
They are right that defeating
PISSI
requires ground troops, but
Westerners that don't speak Arabic won't be able to do it. Many will
hate the civilians, call them by ethnic slurs, and dehumanize them.
They will have frequent misunderstandings with civilians they can't
talk with, often fatally. The civilians will consider
PISSI
the
lesser evil.
How do I know? Because we saw this happen in Iraq just 10 years ago, and
this
is what PISSI came out of.
For Turkish troops to fight
PISSI
is a pipedream, since they'd have to
mutiny first. Erdogan has been
protecting
PISSI's communications.
He wants to attack the Kurds, and PISSI has proved helpful in this.
Troops from Salafi Arabia might fight
PISSI
, but they would spread
Salafism which is the basis of
PISSI
's ideology. Troops from Egypt
might do the job.
02 December 2015 (
The power of repeated lie
Trump demonstrates the power of the repeated lie, as his supporters too claim they saw the
nonexistent
TV broadcasts.
This wasn't the first time. Dubya succeeded in convincing many Americans
that Saddam Hussein had had
weapons
of mass destruction
in 2003, even though US inspectors after the conquest said he didn't.
02 December 2015 (
"Endanger the public order"
The French state has given itself the power to abolish any
organization that does things that "might" prove useful to others that
"endanger the public order" (for instance, criminals or protests).
Organizations that promote encryption, or provide a place for people
to meet and talk without being listed to,
might be banned.
In addition, may be made a crime simply to look at a web site that the state
calls "terrorist".
A state like this, systematically crushing freedom, does more harm
over the long term than the terrorists it claims to be protecting
people from — unless repression also fuels the terrorists,
which is possible.
02 December 2015 (
Clinton wants more war
Clinton wants more war against PISSI,
never
mind strategy.
She is also against fixing the problems in the US medical system which
exist because of the compromises Obama made to insurance companies.
02 December 2015 (
Pushing a cashless society
Why The Powers That Be Are Pushing A
Cashless Society.
This is partly speculative, and I am not sure it is true, but it might be true.
02 December 2015 (
Global heating denialism
Global heating denialism has seeped into several
public
school textbooks
in California.
We must suspect this reflects the influence of some rich denialist, such
as Exxon or a Koch brother or the
Heatland Institute
02 December 2015 (
Multinational digital companies
Multinational digital companies screw the rest of us out of
millions
of dollars in taxes.
In the US, this adds up to $130 billion a year.
This is why America can no longer do things right: the wealthy in
America have
stopped
providing funds
for what America needs to do.
To the extent that international agreements about taxation get in the
way of fixing this problem, states must defy the agreements and fix
the problem anyway. But that requires voting out the politicians who
would rather say they can't do this than dare to try.
progressive
tax
on a business's gross income could help fix this.
02 December 2015 (
Right-wing rhetoric
Right-wing rhetoric calling for killing abortion doctors translates repeatedly into
murderous attacks.
The term "pro-choice" represents a weak decision not to defend
abortion itself. The issue here is not "choice", it is the right to
get an abortion when you want one.
02 December 2015 (
Labour Party against bombing Syria
The
UK
Labour Party
is turning against bombing Syria.
The question is not whether to consider
PISSI
an enemy, but rather
what to do about that. Is it wise or ethical to drop bombs on people
as an act symbolic participation, without a strategy to win, in a way
that is likely to strengthen the enemy by
killing
lots of civilians
which would aid PISSI's recruiting as well as being an injustice in itself?
Cameron responds to these questions with "but the symbol is so
important!" and "I have a rabbit in my hat".
The problems presented by the Raqqa exiles are so complex that there
may not be way to avoid all of them. However, ignoring them is
a recipe for doing harm and losing.
02 December 2015 (
French banned from marching
The French, banned from marching to demand defense of Earth's climate,
are making
pile of shoes
to symbolize the march they would have done.
It would be more effective to defy the ban and march anyway.
A substantial climate protest in Paris was taken over by "black bloc" people that
wanted
to fight with the thugs.
I can't disagree with what they said, but it was a stupid choice of
tactics. A nonviolent confrontation, maintaining the moral high ground,
would have put the state in the wrong, but this senseless violence gave
the state a victory.
In past protests, the "black bloc" was infiltrated by
state
provocateurs.
Perhaps that occurred this time too.
02 December 2015 (
Nuclear safety regulations
Companies designing "advanced" nuclear reactors want safety regulations
taken
out of their way.
Then nothing would stop them from making us guinea pigs for their
radioactive experiments, just when the nuclear power is becoming
pointless because of the tremendously superior efficiency of renewable
energy.
02 December 2015 (
Flaws of Alcoholics Anonymous
Confronting the flaws of Alcoholics Anonymous — not limited
to insisting people surrender to a "higher power"
even
though they know there isn't one.
02 December 2015 (
Bottom-fishing and dredging
Modern bottom-fishing and dredging equipment destroys
precious
sunken ships,
as well as the
life
on the bottom.
02 December 2015 (
Future of work
Predicting that work will become more precarious, lower paid, and involve intrusive surveillance,
for
those who can find work at all.
I don't use computer systems that want me to talk to them, except when
I'm talking to a company's computer by phone. In that case, I expect
the company to know and remember what I say. But when it comes to my
own activities, the server company that would translate the speech to
text has no right to know, let alone remember, what I say.
I will also refuse to use a "fitness tracker" that reports to anyone
other than me.
02 December 2015 (
Thugs' avoidable feeling of "danger"
How thugs created an avoidable feeling of "danger" in dealing with
Tamir Rice.
02 December 2015 (
Women's rights defenders murdered
Women's rights defenders
murdered
for their activism in 2015.
02 December 2015 (
Arundhati Roy meeting Edward Snowden
Arundhati Roy
reports
on meeting Edward Snowden, and ideas about refugees.
The recent actions of the French government and recent statements of
Republican political candidates show how right Snowden is.
02 December 2015 (
Conversing through digital devices
Conversing mainly through digital devices may have to do with the
decline
in ability to empathize
seen in young Americans.
02 December 2015 (
Shooting at Colorado Planned Parenthood
A man shot people at Planned Parenthood in Colorado because he had been stirred up by
deceptive
attack videos.
He's also identifying fetuses with babies, which is a common
irrationality among those that want to ban abortion.
The main terrorist threat in the US comes from fanatics like those,
who call themselves "pro-life" but they mean "life for fetuses —
not for real human beings."
02 December 2015 (
US social decay
The common theme in US social decay: redesigning various systems to privilege the rich and
push
the rest down.
02 December 2015 (
Unhealthful food
Poverty, in today's social system,
forces
parents to feed their children unhealthful food.
Healthful food
costs too much, requires time and skill to cook that these parents
don't have.
It may not even be on sale in many urban areas where the stores are geared
towards those that don't cook.
To touch on the unrelated topic of the last section of the article, I
see nothing wrong with protesting a speaker by theatrically walking
out of the talk. As long as the protest doesn't compel everyone to
participate, those who want to hear the speaker can do so.
02 December 2015 (
Anatomy of the Deep State
Essay:
Anatomy
of the Deep State.
The US government is deadlocked, but the president
and the executive spy and war agencies are allowed
to do almost anything with no checks.
02 December 2015 (
Western response to PISSI
Uri Avnery: the western response to
PISSI
is feckless and absurd
because politicians don't think straight about the problem.
Meanwhile,
Netanyahu
is working to confuse them.
02 December 2015 (
Prostitution in Morocco
Many Arab countries have banned a film presenting prostitution in Morocco,
and the people who made the film are receiving
death threats.
02 December 2015 (
Etat d'urgence climatique
From
France:
"Etat d'urgence climatique: mobilisons-nous!"
02 December 2015 (
Fasting on Thanksgiving
Fasting on Thanksgiving in solidarity with the
hunger-striking
prisoners of Guantanamo.
02 December 2015 (
Extraction of ground water
California has failed to limit farmers' extraction of ground water.
They are pumping so much that the land is sinking up to
inches a month
in some places.
The unequal sinking is destroying infrastructure.
If normal rainfall returns for a few years, these farms may turn into
lakes. But they will dry out again, more or less forever, in a few
decades.
02 December 2015 (
Future global heating
The foretaste of future global heating did not discourage
large
climate marches
in Australia and New Zealand.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: Call for arresting Trump
US citizens:
call for arresting
Trump
for inciting violence.
02 December 2015 (
Urgent: Press Turkey to free journalists
US citizens:
call
on Obama and Congress
to press Turkey to free the journalists
prosecuted for reporting on arms smuggling to Syria.
02 December 2015 (
Banning anonymity
The idea of preventing terrorist attacks by collecting more data
and banning anonymity is inherently impossible.
It can oppress dissidents very well, and crush protests,
but
can't
distinguish a small group of terrorists from any small group of
friends
02 December 2015 (
New Zealand bows to business
The bow-to-business government of New Zealand sabotaged efforts to
reduce obesity, because they might interfere with the
profits
of fat-food establishments
. (That seems a more accurate term than
"fast food").
The excuse these bow-to-business politicians use is, "If it is
possible for heroic people to resist, there is no need to help the
rest." I've seen people use the same excuse to justify letting
companies lure and pressure people into being surveilled.
02 December 2015 (
Thugs want to prosecute for mockery
Australian
thugs
illegally searched for
mocking
statements made by Rhys Liam Halvey to his friends
. They wanted
to prosecute him for mockery.
The
thugs
withdrew the case against Halvey when a judge
threatened
to expose their illegal methods
of searching for what Halvey had
said.
That doesn't seem like enough of a punishment for them.
But supposing they had not used those illegal methods, supposing they
had been able to find Halvey's mocking statements in a legal way,
wouldn't Halvey have the right to mock them?
Doesn't Australia have any vestige of freedom of speech?
02 December 2015 (
Deforestation in Brazil
Deforestation in Brazil has
increased
16%
02 December 2015 (
Australia imprisons refugees without telling why
Australia imprisons refugees for years
without
telling them why
02 December 2015 (
Bombing PISSI in cities can backfire
Bombing
PISSI
in the cities it holds
can
backfire
02 December 2015 (
EU bowing to Turkish blackmail
The EU, desperate for Turkish help in reducing migration of Syrian
refugees, is at the point of
bowing
to Turkish blackmail
Providing money to support the Syrian refugees in Turkey is both wise
and ethical, but aside from that, this is a terrible mistake. Turkey
keeps open
PISSI
's
lifeline for
money,
arms and foreign recruits
. To defeat PISSI requires, one way or
another, a confrontation with Turkey.
02 December 2015 (
Pamplona calls for murder investigation
The city of Pamplona
calls
for an investigation
into Franco's murders.
02 December 2015 (
The election in Burma
The election in Burma was
not
free for the Rohingya minority
, whose candidates were banned.
02 December 2015 (
Proprietary software in drones
The US may require proprietary software in every drone, to
implement
surveillance and a back door
The article says the location of every drone will be sent to "the
cloud", meaning "don't ask who will store this data or for how long."
I think it's not a good idea to fly a drone in a cloud.
Avoiding drone collisions is important, but it can be done using local
communication which doesn't track them all. Keep in mind that it
won't be hard to disconnect this system entirely. Criminals will
easily be able to overcome the system; it won't be able to directly
stop them from doing anything. Its total surveillance and back door
will fall on non-criminals, who would cooperate willingly with a less
nasty system that would achieve the same goal.
02 December 2015 (
Repressive state of emergency in France
The state of emergency in France has become
repressive
People have been arbitrarily placed in house arrest, blocked from
working, for no apparent reason. This includes the leader of a
charitable organization that helps Muslim prisoners.
But repression is not limited to Muslims. Many people suspected of
planning climate protests have been
raided
and arrested
too.
These repressive actions have nothing to do with the officially stated
goal of preventing more terrorist attacks. The French
thugs
know full
well that these climate defenders are not terrorists. Their goal is
to crush anyone who would dare to
disobey
— because, to
a tyranny, disobedience is worse than terrorism. Terrorism offers
tyranny an excuse, but disobedience can make tyranny weaker.
The harm done to France by this attack on liberty will dwarf that of
the terrorist attacks — only to be dwarfed in turn by the global
heating disaster that this repression is helping to increase.
02 December 2015 (
Cameron's Drive to Bomb Syria
Cameron's Drive to Bomb Syria Is
Macho,
Foolish And Must Be Stopped
Jürgen Todenhöfer: I Know [
PISSI
] Fighters.
Western
Bombs Falling on Raqqa Will Fill Them with Joy
The proposed response has one problem. We can't "help" Turkey seal
the border through which
PISSI
because Turkey secretly supports and
arms
PISSI
. The border would have to be sealed despite Turkey's
interference.
02 December 2015 (
Attempts to block freedom of communication
Western attempts to block freedom of communication on the internet are
providing
cover to China in doing the same thing
02 December 2015 (
UK data retention plans
UK data retention plans are
based
on outdated ideas
of what is technically feasible or not.
02 December 2015 (
Having multiple lovers
Famous men who have many lovers are called "prodigious" while
women
who do likewise are sneered at
I can't tell from this information whether Ms Murdoch was promiscuous;
that's not the same as having multiple lovers.
02 December 2015 (
Salafi Arabia
Salafi Arabia
executes
terrorists and peaceful dissidents
— to those religious
fanatics, the difference is insignificant.
02 December 2015 (
Effect of global heating on birds
Global heating
is systematically
pushing
birds away from the equator, or up mountains
Those that run out of somewhere to go will become extinct.
01 December 2015 (
Urgent: Reject special prejudice
US citizens:
call on
Senators
to reject laws that would impose special prejudice
against Syrian refugees.
01 December 2015 (
Urgent: Condemn racism
Everyone:
call
on Republican candidates
to condemn racism in their supporters and
in other candidates.
01 December 2015 (
Turkey torturing Syrian refugees
Turkey is
torturing
Syrian refugees
into "voluntarily" leaving.
01 December 2015 (
Venezuelan candidate assassinated
An opposition candidate in Venezuela was
assassinated
in a rally
I don't know whether the socialist party is responsible for the
killing, but it has arrested and blocked a number of opposition
candidates in the past. Their current leaders do not have the stature
of Chavez, and they don't seem to know how to correct policies that
have bad consequences.
01 December 2015 (
Pissing on train station wall in Germany
A train station in Germany proposes to discourage pissing on a wall by
making
streams of liquid bounce back
I sympathize with those who want to discourage pissing on these walls,
but I have to wonder why so many people piss there. Does the train
station have toilets? If so, why don't homeless people use them? Is
there some obstacle?
A person in Germany confirmed that pay toilets are the usual in
Germany, and that's why people piss on walls. Instead of spending
lots of money on piss-reflecting surfaces, they should spend it on
giving people a proper place to use the toilet.
01 December 2015 (
Making cities porous
How
to make cities, neighborhoods and buildings porous
rather that
monofunctional and controlling.
01 December 2015 (
Attacks on Israelis by Palestinians
This year, Palestinians have frequently attacked Israelis. Many of
the attacks have occurred at
crossroads in Palestine where Israelis travel between the (illegal)
colonies in Palestine and Israel
Those colonies are the root of the current violence. They are not a
mere provocation, but a tremendous injustice. They were established
as a scheme to
take
Palestinians' land and water and drive Palestinians to flee
Netanyahu has used them to
make
sure peace negotiations would be a sham
The US should demand that Israel tear down those colonies, and should
put its money behind it. Aid to Israel should be proportional to the
decrease in size of the colonies, until they are gone.
01 December 2015 (
The TTIP
A central goal of the TTIP is to
export
massive amounts of tar sands oil from Canada to Europe
, with
disastrous effects world-wide.
The TTIP is a business-supremacy deregulation treaty, and it would
abolish the regulations that currently ban import of tar sands oil
because it is so toxic.
Business-friendly politicians will find no end of opportunities to
betray the public in the name of "growth" (for the rich) and other
goals that are not important enough to justify the harm they will do.
Americans, vote for Bernie Sanders for president. He will kill the
TTIP.
01 December 2015 (
UK prosecuting people who went to fight PISSI
While the UK bombs
PISSI
, it continues to prosecute
people
who have gone to fight PISSI alongside the Kurds
01 December 2015 (
Replanting mangrove forests
Replanting mangrove forests
may
reduce the coastal damage caused by El Niño
01 December 2015 (
Protesters block entrance to Heathrow
Protesters against airport expansion blocked an entrance to Heathrow
airport, and spoke about the need to
curb
flying in general to put brakes on global heating
01 December 2015 (
Suicide advisor resigns as doctor
Suicide advisor Philip Nitschke resigned as a doctor
so
he can continue giving suicide advice
to people who want to die.
01 December 2015 (
Journalists face "espionage" charges
Turkish journalists are facing
charges
of "espionage" and "divulging state secrets"
for publishing that
Turkey armed Islamists in Syria.
Calling this a "state secret" implies the report is true.
However, it an act of tyranny to prosecute them,
whether the statement is true or not.
01 December 2015 (
"Nation building"
The US used to be able to build anything and do a pretty good job.
Nowadays, when it tries
"nation
building"
, it gets everything wrong. But the corruption extends
to the US too.
The reason the US could build anything in the 50s and 60s
is due to the high tax rate placed on rich people and businesses
under that Republical socialist, President Eisenhower.
01 December 2015 (
Co-responsibility for terrorism
A UK politician
dares
to blame B'liar
for provoking terrorism with an unjust war.
Terrorism is wrong, and the terrorists are always responsible for that
wrong; however, when the terrorism was provoked by an even larger
wrong such as launching a war based on lies, those who did that are
co-responsible for the terrorism as well.
01 December 2015 (
Carbon emissions from Unilever
Unilever
says
it will become "carbon positive"
in regard to its direct energy
use by 2030.
This does not mean, however, that its products would be carbon
positive. Its suppliers and its shipping may account for the majority
of their emissions footprint.
01 December 2015 (
Wearable thermometer
A new thermometer allows parents, and probably various businesses too,
to
monitor
a child's body temperature all the time
01 December 2015 (
Peace
You Won't Win a War Against [
PISSI
If
You Don't Know What the Peace Looks Like
I disagree with one point.
PISSI
is an army; there is no good in
underestimating the enemy. But that is not crucial to the article's
point, which I think is valid.
01 December 2015 (
Wasting your money
Beware, if you choose what to buy based on a symbol of what sort of
person you like to think you are! You are being
manipulated
by subtle psychology into wasting your money
. And it could be
lot
of your money.
There is one situation where buying a product to communicate a
symbolic message to others is rational and wise: to support a worthy
cause.
1 December 2015 (
Strong marijuana
Very strong marijuana can cause serious harm to long-term users,
but prohibition
makes
it hard to get milder forms
1 December 2015 (
Whaling
Japan Under Fire Over Decision to
Resume Whaling
1 December 2015 (
Microsoft
Microsoft Once Again
Disregards
People's Settings and Abuses Them
, Again Pretends It's Just an Accident.
1 December 2015 (
Paris Attacks
Paris Attacks Plot Was
Hatched
in Plain Sight
1 December 2015 (
The human brain
Every human's brain is a
mosaic
of male and female characteristics
1 December 2015 (
'War' on Terrorism
Why a 'War' on Terrorism
Will
Generate Yet More Terrorism
30 November 2015 (
Very urgent: No prize for Netanyahu
US citizens: phone the White House and urge Obama not to give
Netanyahu any military consolation prize for failing to block the
nuclear peace deal with Iran.
Israel
carries out collective punishment
and
continues
expanding colonies in Palestine
30 November 2015 (
US media system
The business-dominated, concentrated US media system is
not
the only possible system
Many other countries have a lot of newspapers, and even though some
are dominated by right-wing thought, they have exceptions too.
US "public" media are also business-dominated, because many programs
depend on funding from business or from business owners such as the
Kochs. This too is not inevitable; it developed in the 1990s. Now a
Koch is on the WGBH-TV board, in a position to limit coverage of
global heating
so as to protect the effectiveness of
the
Kochs' paid denialism
30 November 2015 (
Hype and exaggeration about terrorism
It's proper for news media to cover terrorism, but they don't need to
hype
and exaggerate
in a way that plays into terrorists' hands by
traumatizing the public.
30 November 2015 (
EPA cancels approval of toxic pesticide
The EPA has
cancelled
its approval
of the latest toxic pesticide, which certain GMOs
were designed to operate with.
30 November 2015 (
Sanders on US immigration policy
Sanders says he will
fix
the cruelties
of US immigration policy.
30 November 2015 (
Gaps in report about attack on MSF
MSF says that the Pentagon's report about the attack on the MSF
hospital in Kunduz has
suspicious
gaps
, while showing procedures that amount to negligence.
I pointed out some instances of
negligence
30 November 2015 (
Prison for letting child play outside
A mother in Sacramento is
threatened
with six months in prison
for letting her child play outside the
house.
The point that the child is in far more danger riding in a car with a
parent is especially cogent. American society is tied up in knots by
obsession with some rare and unlikely dangers, such as child-snatching
and terrorism.
30 November 2015 (
Statistics for "sex trafficker" arrests
US statistics for arrests of "sex traffickers" are
grossly
inflated
: most of them are sex workers and customers. Some pimps
that aren't traffickers are also included.
30 November 2015 (
Banning strong encryption
Don't
fall into the trap
of agreeing that banning strong encryption
would be justified if terrorists or criminals ever use it.
30 November 2015 (
Turkey's downing of Russian plane
On
the
significance
of Turkey's downing a Russian plane.
The article doesn't mention it has been standard Russian practice for
the past few years to probe many countries' borders persistently. In
a way, that's asking for a violent response. However, that changes
things only slightly.
30 November 2015 (
Climate meeting in France excludes public
By
banning
the public parts of the climate meeting
, France decided that the
people hardest hit by
global heating
should not be heard.
Bravo for the Swedish government official who wasn't totally
distracted from impending global disaster by a crime that killed 130
people. The danger of
climate mayhem
, perhaps
100
million killed by 2030
, and far more afterward, dwarfs that of
terrorism.
Indeed, the terrorism is a part of the effect of
global heating
's
climate mayhem
, which
created
the impetus for the Syrian civil war
, which in turn led to
PISSI
I urge those in Paris to
defy the
French state and march anyway
30 November 2015 (
Fertilizer polluting lake in Wisconsin
The cultivation of cranberries in Wisconsin pours fertilizer into the
nearby lake. This pollution
kills
the fish and makes the lake water unsafe
Would diverting the waste into a holding pond solve the problem?
Would the pond have to grow each year, or could it be used to separate
the fertilizer and apply it again?
30 November 2015 (
UK has no strategy for defeating PISSI
The UK government is determined to bomb
PISSI
in Syria as a symbolic
gesture of commitment — never mind that there is
no
strategy for actually defeating PISSI
Britons are
planning
protests against this bombing
A proper campaign to defeat
PISSI
militarily would probably include
air attacks as well as artillery and infantry. I would support the
bombing of
PISSI
fighters. However, bombing with no strategy and few
militarily justified targets will achieve nothing and tend to kill
civilians.
30 November 2015 (
Snooping with Hello Barbie
Crackers can
take
over a Hello Barbie to listen to the kids in the room
. They can
listen all the time.
It's a lot like a
portable
phone
This is what you must expect from devices with proprietary software
and a network connection. It's the Internet of Snooping Things,
Telemarketers, Cheaters, and worse.
30 November 2015 (
Sweden's fossil fuel challenge
Sweden Is Challenging the World to
Go
Fossil Fuel-Free
30 November 2015 (
Bushfires in Australia
As Australia suffers
"horrific"
bushfires
, will the Australian government agree to greenhouse gas
measures to limit how much worse they will get?
30 November 2015 (
The "dying cat" rhetorical switch
The
"dying
cat" rhetorical switch
— blocking consideration of an
important, uncomfortable issue by bringing out a very emotional issue
and arguing about which is more important.
29 November 2015 (
Urgent: Israeli colonies in Palestine
US citizens: oppose the plan to make the
Export-Import
Bank
support building more Israeli colonies in Palestine.
29 November 2015 (
Urgent: rebuke Governor Baker
Massachusetts citizens: rebuke Governor Baker for saying he wants to
exclude
Syrian refugees from Massachusetts.
29 November 2015 (
Urgent: preserve network neutrality
US citizens:
phone
congressional leaders
to preserve network neutrality.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
29 November 2015 (
Urgent: unauthorized poetry in Saudi Arabia
Everyone:
call
on Saudi Arabia
not to behead a poet for unauthorized poetry.
29 November 2015 (
Brazilian bloggers shot dead
Two Brazilian bloggers have been shot dead,
apparently
for criticizing local politicians.
29 November 2015 (
Ebola overwhelmed World Health Organization
Ebola Overwhelmed the World Health Organisation:
It
Must Never Happen Again.
29 November 2015 (
Trump's latest bullying
Trump's latest bullying:
mocking
a reporter
for a visible disability.
However, Trump's bullying goes far beyond mockery. He incited his
supporters to
physically
attack
a Black Lives Matter protester who came to his campaign rally.
He should be arrested and charged for this, and I hope soon
to post a link to a petition to that effect. If he loses
the Republican nomination, and chooses to run independently,
he should start the Childish Bullies Party.
29 November 2015 (
Impunity of thugs in Chicago
Measuring impunity for thugs in Chicago:
only
4% of complaints
made against them are upheld by the thug department.
60% of the complaints were made by blacks, but only 25% of the
complaints upheld were made by blacks.
29 November 2015 (
Australia's government proposes Reaganomics
Australia's government proposes to apply Reaganomics by reducing tax
rates — for businesses only. Benefits of this are supposes
to
trickle
down to the people.
29 November 2015 (
Murder of Laquan McDonald
Call on officials that tried to minimize the murder of Laquan McDonald to resign, and
call
for a special prosecutor.
29 November 2015 (
ISIS That Has Made It
Saudi
Arabia,
an ISIS That Has Made It".
29 November 2015 (
Blocked roads into Crimea
Interviews with people in Ukraine, near the Crimean border, where they
have blocked the roads leading into Crimea,
which
puts pressure on Putin.
29 November 2015 (
Caterpillar back doors
Caterpillar vehicles have
remote
shut-off back doors.
29 November 2015 (
Thugs prosecution delayed for 400 days
The
only
reason
the Chicago thug that killed Laquan McDonald is
getting prosecuted is that a court ordered release of the video
showing the killing. The prosecutor delayed the release, and the
prosecution, for 400 days.
I don't think we can trust that prosecutor to make a sincere attempt
to win a conviction.
29 November 2015 (
Global heating denialist organizations
A textual study found evidence that global heating denialist organizations were
working together.
29 November 2015 (
"Criminal justice reform"
The push for "criminal justice reform" ran into trouble because liberals
want to reduce prosecution of individuals, while the Koch brothers only
want
to
reduce prosecution of corporations.
29 November 2015 (
Pervasive anxiety about security
Pervasive anxiety about security helps right-wing politicians make budget
cuts
that
make everyone's lives insecure.
These budget cuts are likely to kill a lot more people than terrorists,
even if you consider only the suicides.
29 November 2015 (
Cruise missile fired at ceramics factory
Salafi Arabia fired a UK-made cruise missile at a ceramics factory,
for
no apparent military reason.
29 November 2015 (
Shelling MSF hospital in Kunduz
The US Army says that the crew of the plane shelling the MSF hospital
in Kunduz thought they were in a different place attacking a different
building. Their inability to recognize the error was due to several
systems that were
nonfunctional
or even missing.
Do the rules say that the crew was
supposed
to continue the
mission despite such problems? If so, the US is asking for such
mistakes, and must be considered responsible due to negligence.
29 November 2015 (
Protest next to Guantanamo prison
Americans will protest next to the Guantanamo prison,
across
the border in Cuba.
Cuba does not respect human rights
either,
but as a patriotic American I am most pained by these crimes when
they are committed by my own country.
29 November 2015 (
Thug that killed Laquan McDonald
The
thug
that killed Laquan McDonald could easily have remained at a
greater distance where McDonald could not possibly have hurt him.
If he felt "threatened",
his
own incompetence was to blame.
Will the
thugs
who erased the video be prosecuted for obstruction of justice?
That is called for.
29 November 2015 (
Punishing people who express ideas
France is trying to kill ideas by
punishing
people who express them.
Here in the US, it is possible to speak honestly about the holocaust.
There is plenty of evidence proving that it occurred. See, for
instance, the book Hitler's Willing Executioners, by Daniel Goldhagen,
and Story of a Secret State, by Jan Karski.
However, no honest statements about that question are possible
in a country such as France, that imposes censorship on the subject.
France also bans free discussion of the question of the
genocide
of the Armenians.
29 November 2015 (
Shots at Black Lives Matter protesters
Racist terrorists fired shots at Black Lives Matter protesters.
The protesters were in a camp,
doing
nothing noteworthy to anyone,
but most of them were engaged in protesting while black.
Thugs were present and
did
nothing to catch the shooters.
Because the shooters were whites?
(I will post about Trump later.)
A particularly vicious
thug
refused to call an ambulance for the
wounded protesters, then claimed that being shot by white supremacists
was
what the protesters wanted.
Perhaps the
thug
was projecting — he was the one who wanted the
protesters to be shot.
Then other
thugs
came and sprayed the wounded protesters (and those
trying to care for them) with mace.
29 November 2015 (
Persistent drought in Somaliland
In Somaliland,
global heating
has brought a persistent drought.
The
people cannot survive there.
They deserve help, but if Somaliland can no longer sustain its
population, the requisite help includes contraception. Under such
circumstances, each birth causes a death.
29 November 2015 (
Uzbekistan's tyrant
Uzbekistan's tyrant seems to seek to kill a dissident living in Sweden.
Not having killer drones to send there, he sends
human assassins.
29 November 2015 (
banned sales of bottled water
A university banned sales of bottled water, and found that consumption
of bottles increased —
people
bought soda and juice instead.
A hefty deposit on each plastic bottle might be effective for reducing
bottles while not making an incentive to choose something other than
water.
29 November 2015 (
Two-faced Exxon
Two-faced Exxon: the
Misinformation
Campaign
Against Its Own Scientists.
29 November 2015 (
Mine waste dams
Brazil's standards for mine waste dams are inadequate;
several
such dams have burst,
and the mine waste is a lot more harmful than water from a reservoir.
29 November 2015 (
Organs available by default in Wales
Wales will assume by default that any dead body's organs
are
available for use to save living people.
29 November 2015 (
Fanatics beat teenager to death
Christian fanatics in New York beat a teenager to death because he wanted to
leave
their church.
Saudi Arabia says
it
will do the same thing
to a poet who said he wanted to leave their church.
Saudi Arabia's form of Islam, Salafism, is poison.
PISSI
is its most
extreme form, but it's a threat to human rights
in any form.
I will try out referring to that country as
Salafi Arabia
29 November 2015 (
Towns for Jews where Bedouin now live
Israel
plans
to build towns for Jews where Bedouin now live.
These Bedouin are Israeli citizens but they don't have equal rights.
29 November 2015 (
Sponsors of Paris climate conference
Major sponsors of the coming Paris climate conference have
big
investments in fossil fuel, even in coal.
If this conference does not reach an adequate agreement, some
countries that will be devastated by
climate mayhem
might launch
last-ditch military attacks at the fossil fuel facilities that are
trying to kill them.
29 November 2015 (
Merger between Pfizer and Allergan
A merger between Pfizer and Allergan would reduce competition, increase
drug prices especially in the US, and
help
Pfizer taxes.
The US should make it quite difficult for major companies to merge,
and it should tax both domestic and foreign companies (when operating
in the US) more.
29 November 2015 (
Cuts in welfare
The UK government has investigated how cuts in welfare will hurt poor families,
and
is keeping the conclusions secret.
29 November 2015 (
Eating less meat
Eating Less Meat Isn't Just Good for You,
It
Could Save the Planet.
29 November 2015 (
Human Rights
The UK says it will start applying human rights concerns in its
foreign policy —
but
not to Salafi Arabia of course
29 November 2015 (
Bypassing censorship
Tor gives people in Bangladesh
way to bypass tight censorship.
Many supposedly "free" countries censor the internet, including France and the UK.
29 November 2015 (
Clean energy future
The Clean Energy Future: a roadmap for
moving
the US to renewable energy
and expanding jobs.
29 November 2015 (
Urgent: Human-readable GMO labels
US citizens:
phone
Senator Stabenow's office
to oppose the plan to put GMO labels
into non-human-readable QR codes.
29 November 2015 (
Surveillance of voters
Surveillance of voters
enables
campaigns to say different things to different groups of people
and effectively cover up the difference.
29 November 2015 (
Solar storm could destroy electrical grids
A powerful solar storm, like one that happened in 1859, could
destroy
electrical grids world-wide
. It could take ten years to rebuild.
Preparing to reduce the damage is part of the government's job.
To do its job, it needs to collect more taxes — from those
that are paying too little.
29 November 2015 (
Pakistan's Electronic Crime Bill
The
Sorry
Tale of the PECB
, Pakistan's Terrible Electronic Crime Bill.
29 November 2015 (
Quiet electric cars
The US
may
require quiet electric cars to make sounds
to warn pedestrians and
cyclists.
29 November 2015 (
Global heating
Fossil Fuel Companies
Risk
Wasting $2tn of Investors' Money
, Study Says.
Developing Countries Will Need
$270bn
More
to Adapt to [2C of] Climate Change.
29 November 2015 (
Chicago thug charged for murder
A Chicago
thug
has been
charged
for murdering Laquan McDonald
McDonald was perhaps carrying a knife when the
thugs
confronted him,
but he never tried to attack them. A group of 8
thugs
with guns
should not have had to kill him preemptively in case he might, just
might, try to attack them with a knife. They could have waited for
such an attack to start before they shot.
Prosecution of killer
thugs
in the US is
on
the rise
, but what we really need, to change the situation, is to
change the way
thugs
are
trained
to kill at the first suspicion
(especially if the person has a
skin
color that tends to inspire suspicion
).
29 November 2015 (
UK's "fit for work" tests
The UK's "fit for work" tests have
normalised
the suffering of sick and disabled people
I think this is a goal of the Tories, not merely a byproduct of
spending cuts. Tories believe poor people are morally inferior and
suffering is what they deserve.
29 November 2015 (
Primates on endangered species list
More
Than Half
of the World's Primates on Endangered Species List.
29 November 2015 (
Attack on US water supply
Polluters are using the bill to exclude Syrian refugees as an
opportunity to
attack
US water supply
29 November 2015 (
Refugees in EU countries
Sweden has
taken
all the refugees it can cope with
, and now refuses to accept more.
EU countries are
diverting
foreign aid
to pay for the refugees they have admitted.
29 November 2015 (
Mistaken accounting
Economists have claimed that advancing technology enables more
production with less in the way of material inputs. But this was just
a mirage produced by
mistaken
accounting
29 November 2015 (
Alberta's green economy plan
Alberta's green economy plan sounds great, but it
protects
tar sands extraction for too long
29 November 2015 (
Colorado Shooter
Our Culture And Laws
Enabled
the Colorado Shooter
, Whatever His Motive.
28 November 2015 (
Urgent: Condemn proposed repression
US citizens:
Condemn
Trump's proposed repression
of US Muslims.
28 November 2015 (
Urgent: Congressional Review Act
US citizens:
Thank
or criticize your senators
for their votes on the Congressional
Review Act.
28 November 2015 (
MIT Cozies Up to Fossil Fuels
Rejecting
Campus Consensus
, MIT Cozies Up to Fossil Fuels.
28 November 2015 (
Global heating denial
The denialists who claimed they had found a
"hiatus"
in global heating applied criteria that were rather loose
28 November 2015 (
Downed Russian fighter plane near Turkey
Turkish planes
shot
down a Russian fighter plane
near the Turkey-Syria border.
Turkey and Russia have been enemies for centuries. They are also at
odds in regard to Syria. Erdoğan
quietly
supports and protects PISSI
, while Putin supports Assad and may
now actually want to fight
PISSI
due to the
bombed
airliner
. To have Russian planes operating near the Turkish
border is going to be a danger spot.
Russian troops are
fighting
a Turkic minority in Northern Syria
28 November 2015 (
Decline of butterfly numbers
Neonicotinoid
pesticides are associated
with decline of butterfly numbers.
28 November 2015 (
Trump wants to torture
Trump wants to torture suspected terrorists
for
sheer sadism
28 November 2015 (
Texas thugs charged with homicide
Texas
thugs
have been arrested and charged with negligent homicide for
squeezing
a prisoner by the neck and then pepper-spraying him
. He died
shortly thereafter.
28 November 2015 (
Proposed US regulations for drones
The proposed US regulations for drones are a
disaster
28 November 2015 (
Municipal use of fossil fuel energy
Various cities are
pledging
to stop municipal use of fossil fuel energy by 2050
These pledges may stimulate the climate defense movement, but in
practice the time scale is too long for them to make much difference.
What matters is to get rid of most fossil fuel use sooner rather than
later.
28 November 2015 (
Vatican corruption
The Committee to Protect Journalists says the Vatican should drop
charges
against two journalists who investigated Vatican corruption
The Vatican should focus on eradicating the corruption, and thank
those who helped shed light on it.
28 November 2015 (
Snooping
To stop terrorist attacks, the state doesn't need to snoop on
everyone. It's enough to
watch
those that are already known and suspected
Many tech companies are allying to
oppose
state demands for back doors
Most of these companies don't deserve your trust, for other reasons.
You must not rely, for your privacy, on
proprietary software
28 November 2015 (
Austeria
Welcome to Austeria — a Nation
Robbing
Its Poor to Pay for the Next Big Crash
28 November 2015 (
Black lives matter
Why responding to "black lives matter" with
"all
lives matter"
is a statement of racism.
Responding with "all lives matter" misrepresents the position of the
anti-racists, pretending that their slogan "black lives matter" means
"only black lives matter". But they don't say, or mean, "only".
Properly understood, "black lives matter" is not racist at all. It is
a compact way of saying that "black lives matter just as much". It is
a rebuke to the covert, racist "black lives don't matter" movement,
which few overtly endorse but many act to support.
28 November 2015 (
The lockdown of Brussels
The lockdown of Brussels is
starting
to chafe
It's an overreaction which serves
PISSI
's purposes.
28 November 2015 (
Censorship in Poland
Poland's new right-wing government is
starting
to censor the theater
28 November 2015 (
Climate mayhem in Somaliland
In Somaliland, [
climate mayhem
] Is Now a
Life-Or-Death
Challenge
28 November 2015 (
Thugs having sex pretending not to be thugs
If it is just to imprison a woman for having sex pretending to be a
man, why not imprison an
undercover
thug that has sex pretending not to be a thug
28 November 2015 (
Alberta to tax carbon emissions
Alberta will impose a
tax
on carbon emissions
. The article does not make it clear whether
this covers fuel
burned
in Alberta or fuel
extracted
in Alberta.
27 November 2015 (
Urgent: Buy Nothing Day
Everyone: celebrate
Buy
Nothing Day
today.
26 November 2015 (
New Pun
Medieval ICs
25 November 2015 (
Urgent: Close "revolving door"
Everyone:
call on
Goldman Sachs
to close the "revolving door" that carries its
employees into US government service.
25 November 2015 (
Urgent: Tighten laws for buying guns
US citizens:
call
for tightening laws
for buying guns so that terrorist suspects
can't buy them.
25 November 2015 (
Urgent: Stop torture in Tibet
Everyone:
call
on China
to
stop torture in Tibet.
25 November 2015 (
Urgent: No more mass surveillance
US citizens:
call
on Obama
: no more mass surveillance.
See also
25 November 2015 (
Australia's greenhouse gas emissions
Using technicalities, Australia will claim it has met its commitment to
reduce greenhouse gas emissions; never mind that they are actually
increasing
25 November 2015 (
Fungibility and the Loss of Demandingness
The View from Hell:
Fungibility
and the Loss of Demandingness
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
I don't know how to summarize this one, so I could only quote
its title. It is a fascinating idea.
25 November 2015 (
Pharmaceutical ads
The American Medical Association
has
called for a ban
on direct advertising of pharmaceuticals.
25 November 2015 (
Let's Not Get It Wrong This Time
Let's Not Get It Wrong This Time:
The
Terrorists Won After 9/11 Because We Chose to Invade Iraq, Shred Our
Constitution
25 November 2015 (
Torture of prisoners in Bahrain
Bahrain makes a practice of torturing prisoners. The UK
looks
the other way
. So does the US.
25 November 2015 (
Human Ponzi Scheme
Human Ponzi Scheme of
Population
Growth
Can't Go On For Ever.
25 November 2015 (
Trump and Carson advocate torture
Trump and Carson
explicitly
advocate torture
They are appealing to the worst side of Americans by saying that since
PISSI
is evil, we should be evil too.
Obama opened the path to this by
failing
to prosecute Dubya and his henchmen for their torture
. As a
result, Trump and Carson expect they can get away with this crime.
25 November 2015 (
Barbaric cruelty
Analyzing the situational factors that led to a form of Islamism that
incorporates
barbaric
cruelty
There seems to be an aspect of human nature that includes dehumanizing
enemies. What is unusual about
PISSI
is that it dehumanizes nearly
everyone.
25 November 2015 (
Home robot sends what you say to Amazon
The home robot that listens to you, and
sends
everything you say to an Amazon server
Don't fool yourself by calling it
"the
cloud"
25 November 2015 (
NSA bulk collection of emails
The NSA "shut down" its bulk collection of emails, but only because it
had
found
another way to get them
25 November 2015 (
Arab "allies"
Arab "allies" against
PISSI
are
not
doing much to fight PISSI
25 November 2015 (
Easiest method of economic sabotage
The easiest method of economic sabotage is to
phone
and say you put a bomb on an airplane
There have been real bombs on airplanes, but was there
ever
been a case where a bomb threat call was made for a flight that had a
real bomb?
25 November 2015 (
Weeding robot
A fast weeding robot could
reduce
farm work and herbicide usage
I think this sort of efficiency improvement is a good thing provided
that those who become unemployed can share in the resulting bounty.
In the past, automation handled only a limited range of work, so many
new jobs were created and unemployment did not result. But now we are
likely to automate away all the jobs most people can get.
25 November 2015 (
Speed cameras
Speed cameras
systematically
issue speeding tickets illegally
25 November 2015 (
Thieving thugs
In 2014, US
thugs
took
more money
and property from the public than burglars took
25 November 2015 (
Unionizing in Juarez, Mexico
Factory workers in Juarez, Mexico, are trying to
start
unions
The aim of "free trade" treaties is to enable manufactures to create
the lousy working conditions of Juarez. They do this by threatening
to move production elsewhere unless workers lie down and take it.
This is why we must abolish the "free trade" treaties. We must pin
down production to some country (whichever one it may be), so that
workers in each country have the chance to campaign for better wages
and working conditions.
25 November 2015 (
Urgent: Pressure to fight PISSI
US citizens: call for
pressure
on Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar
to start really fighting PISSI.
In the case of Turkey, this is really pressure to
stop
supporting PISSI
25 November 2015 (
Restoring power to the people
Ralph Nader: Candidates for public office, especially at the state and
national levels, are never asked this
central
question of politics
: "Since the people are sovereign under our
Constitution, how do you specifically propose to restore power to the
people in their various roles as voters, taxpayers, workers and
consumers?"
Sanders spontaneously presents his answer to at least part of this
question.
25 November 2015 (
"Biodegradable" plastics
"Biodegradable" plastics
may
not biodegrade in the ocean
— and the label might encourage
littering.
25 November 2015 (
Foreign policy experience
Clinton's
foreign policy experience
provides plenty of reasons not to vote
for her.
Clinton's vote for attacking Iraq was a bad decision, but it was not a
"mistake". It reflects her bad general positions. I won't vote for
Clinton, any more than I would vote for the Republican candidates.
While Sanders is not my ideal candidate in regard to foreign policy,
he is superior to everyone else in the race.
25 November 2015 (
WTO forbids "dolphin-safe" labels on tuna cans
The WTO decided that protecting dolphins by allowing tuna cans to
carry a "dolphin-safe" label is a
forbidden
"obstacle to trade"
This stems from the wrong fundamental values of the WTO, which place
business profit above everything important.
The TPP would further strengthen the power of businesses to attack
measures to protect the environment. We need to abolish all the
existing
business-supremacy treaties
, but we are still on the
defensive. First we need to block the TPP, the TTIP, and the TISA.
If you have not done so, I urge you to contact your elected officials
to call for rejection of the TPP. We must not put democracy in a
trance
25 November 2015 (
UK's housing problem
The UK's housing problem comes from
allowing
the rich to make homes into investments
. Even some conservatives
see this.
The conservatives' proposed solution is unnecessarily nationalist.
Increasing taxes on large houses and apartments, especially those that
are no one's primary residence, would do the same job without
discriminating against anyone. That would also encourage foreigners
to sell the real estate investments they have already bought.
25 November 2015 (
Talking to bank over internet unsafe
In the UK,
talking
to your bank over the internet is unsafe
, because if someone
steals your password and uses it to take your money, the bank holds
you responsible.
Does anyone know whether the situation is the same in the US?
25 November 2015 (
Confronting PISSI
Confronting
PISSI
does not call for revenge, or destructive gestures, or
cruelty. It
calls
for a strategy
Anxiety
to Defeat [PISSI] Must Not Dictate the West's Military Strategy
25 November 2015 (
Traditions of oppression
Acceptance of other ethnic groups and their religions
must
never include acceptance of their traditions of oppression
I agree with the author about this issue, but I think he is making a
mistake by claiming that "progressive liberals" take the other side.
Some do, but I call myself "progressive" and "liberal", and I don't.
25 November 2015 (
UK thug infiltration of dissident groups
The UK
thugs
(except the department in London) refuse to commit to
stop
infiltrating
dissident groups and pretending to love female members
25 November 2015 (
PISSI manipulation
Since
PISSI
's
strategic goal is to make Muslims and non-Muslims hate
each other, we must
refuse
to be manipulated
into doing so.
25 November 2015 (
Effects of global heating
Around the world, the effects of
global heating
are
hurting
people
25 November 2015 (
Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité
Paris Attacks: Security and Surveillance Cast a
Dark
Shadow over France's Love of "Liberté" and
"Fraternité"
I've been using those two words in France to rebuke the state
for decades now.
25 November 2015 (
Convention on Children's Rights
The US is the
only country that has not ratified
the UN Convention on
Children's Rights.
25 November 2015 (
Medical records privacy law
The US medical records privacy law doesn't apply to many kinds of
medical
data
including the data collected by exercise trackers
This is a problem because of exercise trackers that contain
proprietary software and are designed to send the user's personal data
to a company site.
Such products are essentially unethical
and people should not be surprised when the
proprietary software
turns out to be malware
The US medical records privacy law (HIPAA) is totally inadequate when
it comes to government access to your records.
25 November 2015 (
Fanatics in Mississippi
Christian fanatics in Mississippi fired a teacher
for allowing a
student
to demonstrate, with a cucumber, the correct way to put on a condom.
The Christian fanatics want to keep teenagers ignorant of this
so that they will get pregnant, and then the fanatics can claim
that proves they should not have had sex.
Do you think I am exaggerating? All that is literally true.
25 November 2015 (
Pfizer tax rate
Pfizer misleads about the tax rate it pays by
not mentioning most of
its income
25 November 2015 (
Texas state textbooks
Texas officials
refused
to allow academics to check state textbooks for falsehoods
Miseducating children is their goal.
25 November 2015 (
Tracking
Trump
wants
to track all Muslims in the US but opposes tracking all guns
25 November 2015 (
Urgent: Sentencing Reform Act
US citizens:
ask
your congresscritter
to support the Sentencing Reform Act.
25 November 2015 (
Hostility towards Muslims
General hostility towards Muslims is
spreading
in the UK
, whereas in the US Trump called for making all Muslims
carry
special
ID cards
This is just what
PISSI
hoped to achieve.
25 November 2015 (
"Right to be forgotten"
The EU is considering a
directive
to extend the current "right to be forgotten"
, which is currently
a right for person P to demand that some pages be removed from
searches for the name P, so that it would cover comments that others
post which say things about P.
This would turn it it into a system of censorship.
25 November 2015 (
Local back doors in mobile devices
Baseless
Calls to Expand Surveillance
Fit Familiar, Cynical Pattern.
A law has been proposed to require a
local
back door in all mobile devices
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
Once the back door was leaked, anyone who stole your device would be
able to decrypt its disk.
When citizens can't keep secrets from the state,
democracy
is in danger
25 November 2015 (
Fighting PISSI
The UN Security Council
called
for all countries to fight PISSI
I am in favor of fighting
PISSI
, but not in stupid ways.
25 November 2015 (
Saudi court sentences poet to death
Saudi Court
Sentences
Poet to Death
for Renouncing Islam.
25 November 2015 (
CNN "suspends" correspondent for opinion
CNN "suspended" a correspondent for
expressing
the wrong opinion off the air
25 November 2015 (
The practice of "swatting"
Congress is considering a law to make it a serious crime to
send
a SWAT team to someone's house by making a false report
I don't think this will put an end to the practice of "swatting". It
is too easy to make these false reports. Meanwhile, the practice is
made easier by
thug
departments that use SWAT teams too readily. The
lower the bar for sending the SWAT team to raid your house, the less
someone needs to do to get them to send it.
25 November 2015 (
Surveillance using stringrays
A US court has
imposed
strict limits
on surveillance using stingrays (cell tower
simulators).
I expect that the Supreme Court will eventually decide the question.
Even if stingrays were banned, or did not exist, the government could
get their location records from the phone company. For me, that is
too intrusive already.
25 November 2015 (
The "gray zone" of mutual tolerance
The
"gray
zone" of mutual tolerance
that PISSI wants to eliminate is what we
should defend.
25 November 2015 (
Civilian casualties
The Pentagon admitted, in very bureaucratic language, that
perhaps
some civilians were killed
in one of its air attacks against
PISSI
It is impossible to fight a war and totally avoid civilian casualties.
This attack was aimed at soldiers and hit some civilians that were
near them. I don't think it was a war crime.
But I can't believe that only two attacks in Syria have killed
civilians. No army can be that close to perfect. Thus, I suspect the
US is still covering up civilian casualties. In addition, the
standoffish and bureaucratic language of the Pentagon's statement is
likely to offend the very people it is trying to mollify.
PISSI
kills civilians brutally and shamelessly. In regard to violence
in Syria and Iraq, the US is ethically far above
PISSI
. That's not
sufficient. The US should be frank about civilian casualties. The US
must properly respect civilians' lives.
However, the comparison between the US and
PISSI
is pertinent in a
different way. Civilians under
PISSI
's
rule will make that comparison
when choosing sides. If we want them to regard
PISSI
as occupiers, we
need to think about how they will judge us and
PISSI
24 November 2015 (
Urgent: Defeat anti-environment riders
US citizens:
Call
on Congress
to defeat anti-environment riders in spending bills.
24 November 2015 (
Urgent: No more Goldman Sachs insiders
US citizens:
demand
no more
Goldman Sachs insiders in the Federal Reserve management.
24 November 2015 (
Islamist fanatics attack hotel in Mali
Islamist fanatics attack a hotel in Mali and
took
hostages, killing some
24 November 2015 (
Murder of human rights activists in Colombia
Over
700 human rights activists
have been murdered in Colombia in the
past 20 years.
24 November 2015 (
Deforestation in the Amazon
Deforestation in the Amazon
threatens
extinction for thousands of tree species
that live only there.
Global heating
is likely to wipe out large parts of the Amazon
rainforest, through drought and fire.
24 November 2015 (
Syrian free software leader Bassel Khartabil
Rumors
say that imprisoned Syrian free software leader Bassel Khartabil is
going to be executed by Assad's men.
Unfortunately there is no better source of information about whether
this is true. Syrian
thugs
are even more secretive about their
killings than US
thugs
24 November 2015 (
US thugs frequently steal
US
thugs
only occasionally hit, kick or kill people, but they are
very
frequently stealing
under the cover of law.
24 November 2015 (
Ultrasonic surveillance audio
TV commercials now include
ultrasonic
surveillance audio
, meant to be detected by malware in any nearby
mobile device.
The main wrong here is in the malware, which should be prohibited.
However, television regulators should prohibit the inclusion of these
sounds in broadcasts.
The hypothetical example in China is silly, because it is easy for Big
Brother to determine that several cell phones are in the same place,
just through the normal tracking that is done. This tracking, and the
remotely-enabled capability to listen on all conversations in the
room, are why I call those phones "Stalin's dream", and the main
reason why I refuse to carry one.
24 November 2015 (
Bill to reduce corporate tax
Senator Warren
blasted
Congress's bill to reduce taxes for multinational corporations
The low taxes on businesses and rich people are the cause of all the
US's fiscal problems.
24 November 2015 (
French gov't attack on human rights
La Quadrature du Net describes the French government's
blitzkrieg
against human rights
Amnesty International
criticizes
it
too.
24 November 2015 (
Republican candidates' apps
Certain Republican candidates distribute apps that
collect
lots of personal data
, even the user's contact list.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
These apps are proprietary software, so they are
software
for suckers
. They run on proprietary platforms that are also
software for suckers. For that reason alone, it's foolish to run
them, and wrong to develop them. I won't reject a candidate for
having such apps, because I know they are following the usual
standards of Americans. But I hope you will learn to reject nonfree
apps and nonfree platforms.
24 November 2015 (
Methane-charged undersea permafrost
Methane-charged undersea permafrost is
becoming
active in the Arctic Ocean
This suggests we are approaching the point where lots of methane will
be released, causing
global heating
positive feedback.
24 November 2015 (
UK thug department apologizes
A UK
thug
department has apologized for the
undercover
thugs
that infiltrated various dissident groups by forming long-term
relationships with women in the groups
The thug department has not admitted encouraging the
thugs
to form
such relationships, but that could hardly be false when so many did
it.
24 November 2015 (
Protests against racism
Protests against racism have
spread
to many US universities
There are many things that universities can do to reduce racism,
but one demand they should reject is to punish the
expression
of racist views
When students demand the university "suspend" Professor Swain, they
advocate conduct comparable to that which
Professor
Salaita
received.
I agree more or less with Professor Salaita's controversial
statements. I mostly disagree with Professor Swain's controversial
statements (*). But whether you or I agree with someone's views is
beside the point. We must respect people's rights to express views
whether we agree or disagree, and that includes professors.
* I think that Islam is dangerous in some situations, and the same
applies to Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and even occasionally
Buddhism. Or rather, the
bad
aspects of human nature can find in religion a field to express
themselves
24 November 2015 (
Antibiotic resistance
What
we must do
to confront antibiotic resistance.
24 November 2015 (
Adapting the Marseillaise
Adapting the Marseillaise to the
greatest threat to civilization
23 November 2015 (
Urgent: Join climate defense rallies
Join a
climate defense rally
near you, or start
one.
23 November 2015 (
Urgent: Curb global heating
Everyone:
call
on world leaders to take strong action to curb
global heating
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
23 November 2015 (
Asylum for threatened cultural treasures
France
will offer asylum
to cultural treasures threatened by fanatics.
23 November 2015 (
Bahrain refuses to prosecute thugs
Bahrain Refuses to Prosecute
Police
Who Tortured Journalist
23 November 2015 (
Pulling CO
out of the atmosphere
Technologies
being developed today
might be able to pull large amounts of
CO
out of the atmosphere.
23 November 2015 (
Heat stress and deaths of farm workers
Heat
stress could be responsible
for the death of many farm workers in
Central America.
Global heating
is going to
make
people less productive
in most of the world.
23 November 2015 (
Water damage due to global heating
Our 1C of
global heating
has
quadrupled
weather damage to historic properties
in the UK.
23 November 2015 (
Massive incarceration in the US
Massive incarceration in the US goes
beyond
the war on drugs
The topic is too big, and I know too little about it, for me to have
an overall opinion. All I can say is that we need to eliminate
private prisons, and that we should release most convicts that have
become so old that they are not likely to commit crimes again.
23 November 2015 (
Thugs tase man to death
Thugs
killed
Linwood Lambert by tasing him 20 times
, then lied about the
circumstances.
They could have just left him alone, since they did not think he had
done anything wrong.
23 November 2015 (
Evidence of corruption in unions and NGOs
Suggestive evidence that unions and NGOs, such as the League of
Conservation Voters, have endorsed Clinton
even
though Clinton doesn't support their cause as well as Sanders
Maybe they have been corrupted.
23 November 2015 (
What Elsevier considers "stealing"
Elsevier Says
Downloading
And Content-Mining Licensed Copies Of Research Papers
'Could Be
Considered' Stealing.
This isn't the last straw. Elsevier's last straw was years ago.
I urge academics to refuse to review papers for any Elsevier journal
except when there is a specific overriding moral imperative to do so.
23 November 2015 (
US ISPs undermining net neutrality
US ISPs are undermining network neutrality by
giving
special deals to certain sites and then charging more for access to
everywhere else
23 November 2015 (
Detroit thug convicted
A Detroit
thug
has been convicted of attacking Floyd Dent. The thug
punched
Dent 16 times in the head
, for no evident reason.
23 November 2015 (
Minneapolis thugs beat up protesters
Thugs
in Minneapolis
beat
up two women
who were protesting the killing of Jamar Clark.
23 November 2015 (
US attack drone controllers
US attack drone controllers have developed a
callousness
towards killing civilians, even children.
23 November 2015 (
Trump wants special ID cards
Trump wants to require Muslims to carry
special
ID cards
It is unamerican to require people to carry ID cards.
Why not make them wear armbands with a star and crescent?
23 November 2015 (
French intelligence knew Paris attackers
French intelligence
knew
several of the Paris attackers
. If the goal was to prevent these
attacks, total surveillance of everyone was irrelevant.
23 November 2015 (
Repression in Morocco
Morocco
uses
unjust pretexts
to repress journalists and human rights defenders.
23 November 2015 (
FBI entrapment
The FBI entrapped Eric McDavid into a fantastic bombing scheme, then
lied
to convict him and concealed evidence to support the lie
When he asked for an explanation for the illegal concealment of
evidence, the US responded by threatening to jail him again.
This is what the FBI means when it says it "protects" us.
23 November 2015 (
Sale of genetically modified salmon
The FDA has
approved
sale
of genetically modified salmon.
I expect that these salmon are safe to eat, because there is nothing
that would tend to make them dangerous. However, the defenses against
contaminating
wild salmon genetically
are not enough. The company wants to get
to market now, not in several years after developing more levels of
defense. Thus, the company will always tend to take insufficient
precautions.
23 November 2015 (
Livestock population
The livestock population is
increasing
faster than the human population
and is a big environmental
threat.
The statements in the article about limiting human population growth
are self-contradictory. It says, "When there is almost nothing to be
done, there is no requirement to act," but then shows that the world
could reduce human population growth quite a bit. I am glad I have
contributed to this goal by
having no
children myself
, and I recommend you think about it too.
23 November 2015 (
France attacking itself
France passed an "emergency" law
permitting
the state to impose house arrest on anyone with no judicial review,
and examine any computer without a warrant
Poor France, attacking itself at a level that mere terrorists cannot
reach.
23 November 2015 (
UK gov't keeps global heating advancing
The UK government is
going
all-out
to keep global heating advancing.
23 November 2015 (
Rallies for climate protection
Rallies for climate protection are planned
around
the world
instead of the banned march in Paris.
Activists should
defy
the ban and march in Paris anyway
. There are too many lives at
stake here to let the government's minor short-term concerns get in
the way.
22 November 2015 (
Urgent: Regulate oil well emissions
US citizens:
call
on the EPA
to regulate methane emissions from old and new oil
wells.
22 November 2015 (
Doctors in UK's NHS to strike
Doctors in the UK's National Health Service have
voted
to strike
, as the government's program of spreading poverty and
stress targets them.
22 November 2015 (
Stateless in the Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic arbitrarily deprived of citizenship
four
generations of people born in that country if they are of Haitian
ancestry
. Many of them are not Haitian citizens, and if they can
get into Haiti it is only because that failed state can't control its
borders.
22 November 2015 (
The craving for revenge
You
Needn't
Crave Revenge
After Attacks like Those in Paris. I Didn't After
9/11.
What I crave is to
defend
against the follow-on attack which targets our freedom
22 November 2015 (
Renewable energy in tropical countries
Many tropical countries are
investing
heavily in renewable energy
22 November 2015 (
Male-female sex-change
Germaine Greer
had
to struggle to be allowed to speak in a UK university
. She says
that a male-female sex-change operation doesn't produce a real woman,
and many condemn her views.
I think Greer is right in a narrow sense, but perhaps wrong at a
deeper level.
What is the difference between a typical man and a typical woman?
It's actually many miscellaneous differences. Changing one of them in
a man won't produce a woman. Changing several of them might result in
a close-enough woman.
Not all men are alike, and not all women either. Perhaps the man that
wants to be a transsexual starts out woman-like on some of those
points.
22 November 2015 (
Curfews
Various countries are
shutting
down city streets and parks at night
. This narrows the life of
the city and narrows human rights.
Other cities are
promoting
walking on the streets
22 November 2015 (
Housing crisis in Europe
Europe is suffering from a lasting
housing
crisis
This is part of the reason I have not encouraged European countries to
take in lots of refugees. They have not got enough housing or enough
jobs for their current population. If they don't adopt policies to
create a lot more housing and jobs, the refugees will have to compete
with the poor for too little.
22 November 2015 (
DA wants back door in mobile devices
The
Paris attackers did
not use encryption
, it seems.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
Meanwhile, a district attorney
wants
to require back door in all operating systems for mobile devices
Doesn't he know that
all
mobile phones already have them
Just as in 2001, the next target is our freedom!
22 November 2015 (
CMU's Tor-cracking investigation
CMU says that the FBI didn't pay for its Tor-cracking investigation,
but
refuses
to answer any more questions
Maybe it was paid for by some other US agency rather than the FBI.
22 November 2015 (
Myth of genetic determinism
Our culture is
erecting
a myth of genetic determinism
Note that it is clearer to make a clear distinction between a cell's
genetic sequence and its epigenetic tagging. They are both found in
DNA, but they are quite different.
22 November 2015 (
Emails with embedded URLs
If you allow emails to embed URLs, you're asking to be
mistreated
I normally look at an email via the ASCII text in it. On the
occasions that I look at HTML, I render it with lynx, which ignores
anything embedded. None of these tracking methods work on me, and if
you use this method, they won't work on you either.
22 November 2015 (
Conservatives attracted by subjection of women
Conservative westerners are attracted by
Islamists'
subjection of women
22 November 2015 (
Urgent: Investigate climate fraud
US citizens:
call on the
SEC
to investigate Exxon's climate fraud.
22 November 2015 (
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria
Many bacteria are
developing
resistance to the last line of antibiotics we have left
This was caused by feeding the antibiotics to pigs.
All sorts of surgery will become quite dangerous if we don't develop
new antibiotics — and stop farms from ruining them!
22 November 2015 (
Workers protest Clinton's failure
Walmart workers protested Clinton's
failure
to endorse a raise in the minimum wage
22 November 2015 (
Shoot-to-kill Won't Make Us Safe
Shoot-to-kill Won't Make Us Safe from Terror —
Just
Sorry
22 November 2015 (
Prepare for peace
French Pirate Party:
If you
want peace, prepare for peace
22 November 2015 (
US to sell more weapons to Saudi Arabia
The US will sell repressive, Islamist Saudi Arabia
over
a billion dollars more
in weapons.
Human Rights Watch calls on the US to stop selling bombs to Saudi
Arabia because it is
dropping
them on Yemen and killing lots of civilians
Saudi Arabia, a US "ally", seems to have
helped
start the Islamist armed revolt in Syria
, aided by US "ally"
Turkey
Meanwhile, Saudi money has been
behind
the spread of Wahhabism
, the extremist and oppressive form of
Islam that has been pushing out the more humane forms of Islam.
22 November 2015 (
Iran dismantling nuclear program
Iran Starts Dismantling Nuclear Programme,
Says
UN Watchdog
22 November 2015 (
Neonicotinoids
Neonicotinoids found to
impede
pollination by bumblebees
22 November 2015 (
Warning from former US drone operators
Former US drone operators warn that
US
drone attacks are important recruiting forces
for PISSI and
terrorists.
22 November 2015 (
UK climate and energy policy
Is UK Climate And Energy Policy
Hypocritical
or Just Incompetent
22 November 2015 (
Islamists
It's a mistake to say that the US (or France) is at war with "radical
Islam". Even most radicals
don't
want to attack western countries
Islamists are not necessarily violent enemies of anyone, but their
views make them political enemies of human rights.
22 November 2015 (
Extremist parties in Israels gov't
Extremist parties that call for demolishing the al-Aqsa mosque are now
included in Israel's government. It is
not
wild imagination to suppose they might actually do it
Building the "third temple" is part of
what
US Christian nuts think is necessary to bring about their prophesied
apocalypse
. I suspect that some of them are spending millions to
help those parties.
22 November 2015 (
Jailed Palestinian minors
Israel jails Palestinian minors
as
young as 8
in painful conditions and arbitrarily hampers them from
talking with their families.
I expect that most of these minors are teenagers, but some really are
children.
22 November 2015 (
Harassment faced by Palestinians
Palestinians living in part of Hebron face
additional
harassment
designed to drive them to abandon their homes.
Israeli troops
forced
international human rights activists out
of the apartment they had
rented in Hebron.
These activists serve as witnesses to how Israelis officially and
unofficially treat Palestinians, which makes their presence
inconvenient. In practice, the state supports the
repeated
pogroms carried out by Israeli fanatics
22 November 2015 (
Collective punishment
Demolishing
a family home
because one person in it committed (or is accused
of) a crime is an unjust collective punishment.
Israel says it will carry out unjust collective punishment on any
family, but in practice it's
only
done to Palestinians
. And it already has inspired relatives to
respond with violence.
21 November 2015 (
Urgent: Release videos of killer thugs
Everyone:
demand
the release of the videos
showing the killing of Jamar Clark.
21 November 2015 (
Urgent: Diplomacy to end Syrian civil war
US citizens:
support
Kerry's efforts
for diplomacy to end the Syrian civil war and
target
PISSI
21 November 2015 (
Urgent: Network neutrality
US citizens:
phone
your senators
against riders in a spending bill to eliminate
network neutrality.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641
and 888-355-3588.
21 November 2015 (
Neonicotinoid pesticide approval cancelled
A US appeals court
cancelled
the approval of neonicotinoid pesticide sulfoxaflor
, saying that
the EPA must first properly test its effects on bees.
21 November 2015 (
Spain wants to arrest Israeli officials
Spain wants to arrest
Israeli officials and ex-officials
responsible for the deadly
attack on the Mavi Marmara.
21 November 2015 (
Reducing our combustion of oil
The Norwegian oil company Statoil has
given
up on drilling in the Chukchi Sea
The US government
postponed
a sale of oil leases in US public land
These are victories, but we will need lots more of them. We must
reduce our combustion of oil, reduce it to zero in not too much time,
to avoid
climate mayhem
21 November 2015 (
PISSI wants war
PISSI
wants a war between all Muslims and all non-Muslims. How we can
avoid
falling into PISSI's trap
21 November 2015 (
Declining wages in the US
The US has made substantial progress towards the goal of equal pay for
equal work, because of the
fall
in the income of men
21 November 2015 (
Turkey keeps PISSI's supply lines open
Turkey
could
cut off PISSI's supply lines
, but Erdoğan threatened war against
the Kurds just to keep those lines open.
21 November 2015 (
Borqa bans
Several African countries have
banned
borqas to prevent hiding bombs under them
21 November 2015 (
Reduced funding for coal
The OECD countries
agreed
to reduce funding for coal power
in other countries, but Japan
blocked eliminating this funding.
This may do some good, but it is not the sort of vigorous action that
could save civilization from global disaster. To risk civilization's
survival for a comparatively small short-term goal, such as improving
access to electricity in some poor countries, is foolhardy. It won't
help the people of those countries to get electricity in the next
decade, then wiped out in 70 years.
Besides, solar power is much better for providing electricity to
dispersed rural populations.
I have to suspect that Japan's representatives were working for the
coal interests and what they said was just an excuse.
21 November 2015 (
Global heating
2C
of global heating is probably too much
, except under unlikely
assumptions.
21 November 2015 (
Killing people by remote control
What it is like to be a
US
drone pilot
and kill hundreds of people by remote control.
21 November 2015 (
France bans rallies for climate defense
France has
banned
rallies during the climate conference
This decision is short-termist folly. Rallies for climate defense are
necessary for public safety. Terrorists could at worst kill a few
hundred people in a rally.
Global heating
is likely to kill
hundreds
of
millions
of people
, though over a longer time.
I urge activists to march anyway and dare the state to stop them.
21 November 2015 (
Attackers were European citizens
It appears the Paris attackers were
all
European citizens
— most have been identified, and they
included no refugees or visitors.
21 November 2015 (
Refugees
To
Turn On Refugees Because Of Paris Is Weak And Absurd
21 November 2015 (
Victims of PISSI's attack
In France, the victims of
PISSI
's attack
include
Muslims
In Syria and Iraq, most of
PISSI
's
victims are Muslims. Ordinary
Muslims and
PISSI
are natural enemies.
21 November 2015 (
France making the same mistakes as the US
Will France now commit the same errors and wrongs that the US did
after the September 2011 attacks?
It
has already started to
21 November 2015 (
Whales killed in marine sanctuary
An Australian court found a Japanese whaling company guilty of
killing
whales in an Australian marine sanctuary
It may not be easy to make the company pay the fine.
21 November 2015 (
Secret interpretation of CISA
A secret interpretation may make CISA even
worse
than its wording appears
. The ACLU is suing to find out.
21 November 2015 (
Boko Haram still setting off bombs
Boko Haram is still setting off bombs in cities and
causing
hundreds of casualties
21 November 2015 (
High levels of CO
impede good thinking
High levels of CO
in the air
impede
good thinking
Global heating
is not likely to raise the general world CO
level enough for this to happen. But it can already happen inside a
building in a city, and with
global heating
, the problem inside
buildings in cities will get worse.
21 November 2015 (
Protests in Washington
Protests in Washington are
aimed
at the US Trade Representative
, the office that promotes
antidemocratic treaties such as the TPP.
21 November 2015 (
Harming children's academic success
Parents that
make
unreasonable academic demands
on their children tend to harm their
academic success.
20 November 2015 (
Another reason to vote for Sanders
Another reason to vote for Bernie Sanders for president:
Clinton
wants more war
Haven't we learned
how
stupid this is
Whereas Sanders recognizes that
climate
mayhem is a bigger danger than today's terrorists
20 November 2015 (
Curtailing Liberty Provokes Terrorism
Curtailing
Liberty Provokes Terrorism
20 November 2015 (
Science museums and planet roasters
Several important science museums have
stopped
accepting funds from planet roasters
20 November 2015 (
PISSI
Does
PISSI
] Direct Attacks or Inspire Them — And Why That
Matters
20 November 2015 (
CIA and NSA try to smear Snowden
The CIA and NSA
have
not found anyone trying to start a terrorist attack in the US
But they pretend they have, in order to smear Snowden.
20 November 2015 (
Bombing PISSI
Countries are joining the bombing campaign against
PISSI
, not because
more planes would achieve a military objective, but
as
a symbol
We
Accept That Russian Bombs Can Provoke a Terror Backlash. Ours Can
Too
I am not a pacifist. Effective military action may be justified even
despite blowback. But effective military action tends to be
concentrated on enemies, so it causes less blowback. Reflexive,
ill-calculated military action "because we must bomb something" will
tend to be self-defeating.
PISSI
hopes to provoke Western reactions that would create a war
between the West and all Muslims.
Some politicians are eager to fall into this trap.
19 November 2015 (
Employment
Global
developments
in employment.
19 November 2015 (
Greenhouse gas footprints
When a company tried to reduce the greenhouse gas footprints of its
products, that turned out to be a
big
challenge
We need a carbon emissions tax so that the market will factor in your
greenhouse gas footprint.
19 November 2015 (
Just what terrorists hoped to achieve
The assassinations at Charlie Hebdo have
elevated
hostility towards Muslims in France
— just what terrorists
hoped to achieve.
19 November 2015 (
Climate defense march in France
France
may
block a large climate defense march
in the name of safety.
Global heating
is a far bigger danger than PISSI.
If we can't overcome the plutocrats and make states take adequate
action to curb
global heating
, we might as well be dead.
19 November 2015 (
Russian airliner destroyed by terrorist bomb
It is now ascertained that a
terrorist
bomb destroyed a Russian airliner over the Sinai
, killing 224
people.
19 November 2015 (
Fossil fuel divestment sit-in at Stanford
Stanford Students Begin 'Indefinite'
Sit-in
over Fossil Fuel Divestment
19 November 2015 (
Activists charged with "rebellion"
The dictator of Angola has charged activists with "rebellion"
for
a book reading event
. The book was about nonviolent resistance.
19 November 2015 (
Urgent: Postal banking
US citizens:
call on the postmaster
of the USPS
to implement postal banking.
19 November 2015 (
Total surveillance
Total surveillance is giving France so much data that the
real
terrorists can hide in the plain sight of the national panopticon
19 November 2015 (
Mine waste in Brazil
The ecological damage from the mine waste in Brazil could last
decades and when it reaches the ocean, it will
threaten
ecologically vital areas
19 November 2015 (
Tasers
It is
not
clear that tasers reduce either killings or injuries
from the
actions of
thugs
19 November 2015 (
Attacking PISSI
France is
sending
an aircraft carrier
to increase the number of planes it can use to
bomb
PISSI
There are some fishy things here. Why use an aircraft carrier
rather than sending additional planes to the land base in Jordan?
Operating planes from a carrier must be more expensive than operating
them from the ground.
And what's the use of more planes if it is hard to find good targets
to attack?
On the other hand, the US seems to have found an important vulnerable
point:
the
trucks PISSI uses for smuggling oil
If
PISSI
is indeed a gang that raid and loots to propagate itself to
loot again, then it can be forced into collapse if it can't get loot
and can't sell oil.
Capturing
PISSI
's
territory near the Turkish border is strategically
crucial. However, trying to do this with Western troops would
backfire terribly.
18 November 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose war on drugs
Citizens of Massachusetts:
Oppose
a bill to ramp up the war on drugs.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
18 November 2015 (
Witnesses see thugs shoot handcuffed man
Protesters blocked a highway after
thugs
in Minneapolis
shot
a black man dead
. Witnesses say he was in handcuffs, but the thugs
say he wasn't. Who do you believe?
18 November 2015 (
Repressive Wahhabism
Accusing Saudi Arabia of poisoning the Muslim world with repressive
Wahhabism
18 November 2015 (
PISSI
PISSI
, the
pirates
of the desert
Cole's point that it is impossible to "contain"
PISSI
can be literally
correct, but not in the way he asserts. It may be that a stable
situation in which
PISSI
exists for a long time under containment is
impossible; if so, that suggests that containing
PISSI
would lead to
its collapse, as it could no longer do profitable raids.
18 November 2015 (
UK faces ecological derangement
The UK faces
ecological
derangement all over
, as a result of the 1C of global heating we
have already caused.
18 November 2015 (
Coal
Coal is
not
an effective way to extend access to energy
, even ignoring that it
could cause ecological disaster.
Just eliminating coal combustion isn't enough to avoid the disaster;
it's just the first step.
18 November 2015 (
FBI-CMU "research" on Tor
The Tor Project says that the FBI-CMU "research" to identify Tor users
was a
fishing
expedition
, aimed at finding anyone they could accuse of anything.
18 November 2015 (
Chinese companies bottling glacier water
Chinese companies are hurrying to
bottle
water from Himalayan glaciers
before global heating melts them.
Ok, that is a slight exaggeration.
18 November 2015 (
Collective punishment
Israeli troops carried out a collective punishment,
demolishing
a house in a refugee camp
; local Palestinians threw stones at
them, so the Israeli troops shot and killed some of them.
Collective punishment is always an injustice. In my estimation, the
culpability in this incident falls entirely on the Israeli troops.
They cannot claim the justification of self-defense for shooting if
they were on a mission of wrong.
18 November 2015 (
PISSI's hate for civilization
PISSI
Hates
Middle Eastern Civilisation Too
18 November 2015 (
Governments of the World Agree
Lauren's Blog Redux: "Governments of the World Agree:
Encryption Must
Die!
18 November 2015 (
Using attacks as excuse to skip debate
UK anti-privacy activists
seek
to use the Paris attacks as an excuse
to skip debate about new
mass surveillance powers.
Each terrorist attack, anywhere in the world, provides an excuse for
Big Brother to say we should surrender more freedom so he can
"protect" us. Aside from the danger of tyranny, which exceeds that of
terrorists, it's
not
even clear that increased surveillance would achieve its goal
There is no limit to how many people a tyrannical state can kill,
torture, or imprison. We need a state, for the
many
essential things that states can do
, but we must make sure it
remains under our control, and we
can't
do that if it knows everywhere we go and everyone we talk with
Prohibiting expression of opinions, "advocating" this or that, is a
form of tyranny. When "extremism" is prohibited, will plutocrats
declare rejection of plutocracy "extreme"? We be prosecuted for
advocating a return to democracy?
18 November 2015 (
Cease-fire between Assad and his enemies
The US and Russia have
agreed
to ask the UN to broker a cease-fire
between Assad and his
enemies.
18 November 2015 (
The inequality created by the Tory gov't
Britain's previous Tory prime minister
rebukes
the current Tory government
for the inequality it has created.
18 November 2015 (
US history of keeping Haiti down
More about the Haitian election and how it relates to the
US
history of keeping Haiti down
18 November 2015 (
Massive surveillance
Raising consciousness about massive surveillance:
do
you dare call a number that's possibly on an NSA suspicion list?
Reading stallman.org might do the same thing.
18 November 2015 (
Businesses pretend to have feelings
Businesses pretend to have human feelings …
to
exploit grief.
The Facebook feature praised in the article is
also a way of manipulating users: after any sort of disaster, they
are under pressure to be used by Facebook because not doing so would
suggest they were among the casualties.
18 November 2015 (
Warning against violence
A former hostage of PISSI
warns
against the mistake
of playing into its hands with ill-calculated violence.
18 November 2015 (
Reduced elephant poaching
Kenya has succeeded in
driving
elephant poaching way down.
18 November 2015 (
Saudi-US coalition
The Saudi-US coalition is
bombing
the cultural history of Yemen to bits.
18 November 2015 (
Attempt to block research
Republicans are trying to
block
students from doing research
on the effect of Republican abortion-harassment laws.
16 November 2015 (
Call it PISSI
Why
it is important
not to call PISSI by the names it gives itself.
It's the same reason we shouldn't call sharing "piracy", or call the
prohibition of sharing "protection".
16 November 2015 (
Software to recognize microexpressions
Software has been developed to
recognize
human microexpressions
. Most people (maybe all) will be unable to
hide their feelings from these.
This may be good in some circumstances, and bad in others. Even if
everyone has access to this, it will tend to reinforce the power of
those with more power already.
16 November 2015 (
Campus thugs
Why
Campus Cops Are So Dangerous
16 November 2015 (
Prison for spraying children with watergun
New Mexico has sentenced a man to
18
years in prison
for spraying children with a watergun containing
water mixed with his semen.
People should not do this, mainly because if they have some disease,
there is a small chance they could transmit it this way. But if he
didn't have a disease, I can't see that it did them any harm, or why
they should be called "victims". This was not really "sexual
contact".
16 November 2015 (
Kurdish journalist imprisoned by Australia
Kurdish journalist Behrouz Bouchani fled Iran because he was going to
be imprisoned for his work. Now he is
imprisoned
by Australia for being a refugee
16 November 2015 (
Americans' medical coverage
Many Americans' medical coverage has such a high deductible that they
still
can't afford medical care
These insurance plans may be worth their price, because in the event
of hospitalization or a major illness they might save the people far
more than $3000. But these people are in such a desperate situation
that they can't afford to make rational investments.
16 November 2015 (
Haitians protesting rigged election
Haitians are
protesting
massively
against the rigged presidential election.
16 November 2015 (
Winter snowpacks shrinking
Global heating
is
making
winter snowpacks shrink
; declining water supply will affect two
billion people.
16 November 2015 (
NATO's responsibility for torture
The ICC
seems
to be investigating
NATO's responsibility for torture in
Afghanistan.
16 November 2015 (
Portland bans new fossil fuel infrastructure
Portland, Oregon, has
banned
all new fossil fuel infrastructure
The whole world ought to do this.
16 November 2015 (
Toxic mine waste in Rio Doce
As toxic mine waste slowly flows downstream in the Rio Doce, it
poisons
water and kills fish
Some towns are emptying as people in them have no water. What I
wonder is, how long will it take before the river water is safe again?
Will it be weeks, or decades?
Talking of "slow-motion environmental catastrophe", the whole world is
facing an even slower one.
16 November 2015 (
Tor "research" at CMU
Tor
Says Feds Paid Carnegie Mellon $1M to Help Unmask Users
Comp sci "research" aimed at sabotaging Tor reflects
an
ethical
blind spot
16 November 2015 (
Chances of experiencing abuse from thugs
When black Americans deal with a
thug
, their chance of experiencing
abuse from the
thug
is
twice
that of white Americans
16 November 2015 (
Progress against massive state surveillance
ACLU:
Thanks
to Snowden
, we are making slow progress against massive state
surveillance.
16 November 2015 (
Corrupt and phony armies built by the US
The Afghan army and Iraqi army and Syrian rebel army that the US spent
millions to build turned out to be
as
corrupt and phony as the construction projects it paid for
16 November 2015 (
Smoking at home
The US government is considering a
ban
on smoking in public housing
Tobacco is death, and I implore tobacco smokers to quit; but it is
wrong to ban people from smoking in their homes.
16 November 2015 (
Prison for pretending to be male
Gayle Newland has been sentenced to
years in prison
for having sex with a woman while pretending to be
male.
This verdict seems totally absurd to me. What next? Will people be
sentenced to prison for having sex while pretending to be rich? While
pretending to be blonde?
16 November 2015 (
Supporting Israel while condemning occupation
Most British Jews strongly support Israel, and
condemn
Israel's occupation policies and refusal to make peace
16 November 2015 (
Vote-rigging in Haiti
Accusations of vote-rigging in Haiti with
UN
complicity
16 November 2015 (
Professor fired for political views settles lawsuit
Professor Salaita, fired by the University of Illinois for his
political views, sued; the university has now
paid
him a large amount of money, but he still does not have a job
there
. He comments that the injustices that motivated his
controversial tweets have not been corrected.
16 November 2015 (
Fraudulent foreclosure of home
A Texan family won $5 million in damages for the
fraudulent
foreclosure of their home
— one home among 6 million that US
banksters
stole.
Too bad the Obama regime was
on
the side of the fraudsters
16 November 2015 (
Black Lives Matter tweets
The State of Oregon
systematically
investigated everyone that tweeted
in support of Black Lives
Matter.
16 November 2015 (
Fungus wiping out bats in the US
A fungus
spreading
steadily across the US
is wiping out bats.
The absence of bats will have grave ecological consequences. If some
bats survive, it it will take a century for the bat populations to
recover.
16 November 2015 (
Ali al-Nimr being denied medical care
Ali al-Nimr, sentenced to death for a peaceful protest, is
being
denied medical care in prison
Please
sign the
petition
for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Saudi
Arabia.
16 November 2015 (
Walmart workers fasting a protest
Walmart workers are fasting as a protest against
wages
that don't pay them enough to afford lunch
16 November 2015 (
TSA agents look for drugs in luggage
The US government admits that TSA agents
actively
look for drugs in luggage
They are supposed to search a bag if an x-ray scan shows something
that looks like drugs.
15 November 2015 (
Urgent: colonies are not part of Israel
US citizens: Thank Obama for standing up for the EU's requirement
not to label products of Israeli colonies as "Made in Israel" and
for
recognizing
that these colonies are not part of Israel.
15 November 2015 (
Urgent: shun television news
I urge everyone to shun television news for the next few days. There
were terrorist attacks yesterday in Paris, and footage is likely to be
shown.
Repeatedly watching footage of terrorist attacks can traumatize. I
know someone in California who became afraid to go outdoors in 2001,
after repeatedly watching pictures of the September 2001 attacks.
Whatever you want to know about the attacks, you can find in text.
15 November 2015 (
Urgent: stop suppressing research
US citizens: tell the
Department
of Agriculture
to stop suppressing scientific research.
15 November 2015 (
Urgent: free imprisoned protesters
Everyone: call on the
government
of Burma
to free imprisoned protesters.
15 November 2015 (
Anti-racist activists and free speech defenders
Anti-racist activists and free speech defenders must reconcile
to
support a free society.
15 November 2015 (
Mormon "mass resignation"
Mormons plan a "mass resignation" to protest the Mormon Church's policy
demanding children renounce their
same-sex parents.
15 November 2015 (
Award for avoiding lethal force
The LA thugs' union has
condemned
an award for avoiding lethal force.
This award is meant for police officers whose job is to "serve and protect".
Thugs
think they should get awards for killing citizens.
15 November 2015 (
FSF's LibrePlanet event
The FSF's LibrePlanet event, which will be held in March, is
looking
for people to propose sessions.
15 November 2015 (
Jihadi John and court of law
Jeremy Corbin: it would have been far better for us all if
Jihadi
John
had been held to account in a court of law.
I agree. Killing someone proves he was vulnerable. Convicting him in
a fair trial proves he did wrong.
I do not think killing him was wrong under the circumstances; there
was no feasible way to arrest him. Corbyn did not say it was wrong to
kill Jihadi John, but his political enemies are pretending that he
did.
By contrast, the US could have
arrested
and tried Osama bin Laden,
so it should have done so rather than kill him.
15 November 2015 (
Inaudible sounds from ads
Some web advertisements
play
inaudible sounds
to be picked up by proprietary malware running
on other nearby computers so as to determine that they are nearby.
It is unlikely free software will do this, but malware introduced
by an attack could do it.
I conclude that access to a microphone needs to be controlled like
access to a camera. Applications should need special authorization to
use the microphone.
15 November 2015 (
Divestment from fossil fuels
Piketty
calls for divestment from fossil fuels before the Paris climate conference.
15 November 2015 (
Laws of war
We must follow the laws of war even against enemies
that
reject them completely.
15 November 2015 (
Mosquitoes in November
Global heating means mosquitoes in November in
New York City.
15 November 2015 (
Torture by crucifixion
prisoner
facing execution in Egypt reports on torture by crucifixion.
He was convicted along with around 500 other people, clearly a joke of a trial.
15 November 2015 (
Assistance to the homeless
Some parts of the US have set up funds to provide
various
small assistance to the homeless.
The trust funds established by the New Jersey law are good, but the
stamp tax (as the colonists called it) is a regressive way to fund it.
It would be better to tax the rich for this.
Some places go further and provide housing
to
all homeless people.
15 November 2015 (
Giving money to stop refugees
Giving Money to Eritrea and Sudan to Stop Refugees
is
Almost Satire.
The corrupt repression of those countries is what drives the people
to flee.
15 November 2015 (
Destruction of natural environment
Businesses that destroy the natural environment
often
use slaves to do it.
15 November 2015 (
PISSI expelled from Sinjar
Some of the inhabitants of Sinjar are
returning
to the city,
from which PISSI has been expelled.
15 November 2015 (
Burma's National League for Democracy
The National League for Democracy, Aung San Suu Kyi's party,
has
won a majority in Burma
even counting the seats that the military gets.
15 November 2015 (
Church faces investigation
The Catholic Church in Australia made a statement opposing same-sex
marriage, and faces a criminal investigation, because
"offensive"
statements are a crime in Australia.
I probably disagree with a lot of things the Church said, but I support its right to say them.
15 November 2015 (
Binding climate agreement
France reproached Kerry for trying to abandon the goal of a binding climate agreement
before
the Paris conference even starts.
If the US doesn't want one, it can surely make sure there isn't one,
or that it doesn't count for anything.
15 November 2015 (
End to student debt
Students in the US
protested
in many cities
demanding an end to student debt.
15 November 2015 (
Background checks for gun buying
States with more background checks for gun buying
have
fewer mass shootings.
15 November 2015 (
Greenland megaglacier
Greenland's Zachariae Isstrom megaglacier has started breaking up, a
process likely to raise sea level
half
a meter over just three decades.
Nothing we can do (short of
engineering considerable global cooling) can stop this.
Another neighboring megaglacier could do likewise as
global heating
continues, which would cause another half meter of sea level rise.
Every glacier that feeds into an ocean is likely to have similar
points of no return, that we will reach at some point.
15 November 2015 (
Hindu Taliban
Anish
Kapoor:
India Is Being Ruled by a Hindu Taliban.
15 November 2015 (
Don't trusk bankers
Society must not learn to trust
bankers!
15 November 2015 (
UK's Environment Agency
The UK's Environment Agency has become feckless and
fails
to enforce pollution laws.
I suppose this is Tory policy.
15 November 2015 (
Austerity suicides in the UK
Austerity seems to have caused around
1000
suicides
in the UK.
Many had despaired from being forced to apply uselessly for jobs they
correctly thought they could not get.
15 November 2015 (
Corrupt dealings of Scott Walker
More
corrupt
dealings
of Scott Walker come out.
15 November 2015 (
World Health Organization criticized the TPP
The World Health Organization has
criticized the TPP.
15 November 2015 (
Medicins sans Frontieres' report
Médicins sans Frontières' report on the attack on its
hospital shows that the US air attack
concentrated
on the main building
where operations were then being done.
There could hardly be any armed Taliban lurking in the building unseen.
Anyway, unarmed MSF guards maintained full control of the
grounds. The
US
excuse
— which would be insufficient if it were true — cannot be true.
15 November 2015 (
UK curbing "extremism"
The UK wants to curb "extremism" by
censoring it.
All the UK government has is a censor, so all publications look like…
15 November 2015 (
Battle against Texas pipeline
After White House Rejects Keystone XL, Battle Against
Larger
Texas Pipeline
Intensifies.
15 November 2015 (
PISSI's violence helps Erdogan
Although Erdoğan says PISSI is an enemy, PISSI's violence in Turkey seems
directed
to help him.
And PISSI seems to be able to attack its enemies in Turkey.
15 November 2015 (
NSA massive data collection
A court decision is a
symbolic
condemnation
of NSA massive data collection.
It might help against other NSA data collection in the future.
15 November 2015 (
Urgent: EPA's CO
emission limit plan
US citizens:
write
to your senators
to urge them to leave the EPA's CO
emission limit plan alone.
15 November 2015 (
Burst dam in Brazil
A dam burst in Brazil,
releasing
mine waste that washed away houses and killed people
The toxic wastes might kill people in the long term, but I have no
idea how many.
The US
doesn't
have adequate regulations for mine waste dams either
15 November 2015 (
Confidentiality agreements
Many large US companies now impose confidentiality agreements to
bar
employees from revealing wrongdoing to the US government
The SEC is
taking
action against this
15 November 2015 (
Toxic PCBs in the SF Bay
Monsanto Accused of
Knowingly
Polluting SF Bay with Toxic PCBs
15 November 2015 (
Torture in China
Amnesty International says that China
still
regularly tortures prisoners
: especially human rights activists
and Falun Gong believers, as well as officials accused of corruption.
The Chinese government resists efforts to try to stop torture, and
so
does the US government
We Americans can't do much to stop torture in China, but we ought to
be able to stop it in the US.
14 November 2015 (
Spying by German intelligence
German intelligence spied on
the
FBI, the French foreign minister, and UNICEF
14 November 2015 (
India's planned fossil fuel increase
India's planned fossil fuel increase will
break
the world's carbon budget
This suggests the world should make a deal in which India reduces
fossil fuel use, and other countries pay for renewable energy
development in India.
14 November 2015 (
Social media stars
For social media stars, paid by companies that want to connect with
their fans, not only their clothing but even their relationships may
be
designed
to get more fans to sell
14 November 2015 (
Mistreatment in juvenile prison
Experience cleaning up a juvenile prison, in which the prisoners and
the guards faced sexual harassment and the prisoners were
treated
horribly
Mistreatment was not rare, it was the usual case.
14 November 2015 (
Personal data in remote storage
Microsoft
offers
European users services that keep their data in a European computer
run by a European trustee company
, so that the US government has
no jurisdiction over them.
This is a sensible solution for that one specific problem. It does
not alter the point that it's unwise to entrust your personal data to
any remote storage.
It also
does
not make Microsoft's proprietary software acceptable
, or excuse
its
malicious
functionalities
14 November 2015 (
Global heating hitting Tibet
Global heating
is hitting Tibet:
glaciers
and permafrost are melting visibly
14 November 2015 (
43 years in solitary
Albert Woodfox has spent 43 years in solitary, and will be kept there
further until his surrealistic retrial,
to
stop him from organizing other prisoners
14 November 2015 (
Burma's election
The National League for Democracy
has
done very well in Burma's election
, and looks set to win a
majority in parliament even despite the 25% of seats set aside for the
military.
14 November 2015 (
Privatization
"Public-private partnerships" are touted as an easy way to get
infrastructure built, but they are a form of privatization which
drains
the treasury later
We simply must tax the rich more.
14 November 2015
Comcast admitted data caps unrelated to network congestion
Comcast
admitted internally
that its data caps have nothing to do with network congestion.
They are not traffic-shaping, but market-shaping. Comcast is taking
advantage of the lack of competition in the US network market.
Wireless networks are too close to a monopoly to be allowed to set
their own rules. They should be regulated as utilities.
14 November 2015
UK snooping bill is last debate before mass gagging
The UK's snooping bill is
the
last policy discussion about
surveillance before the mass gagging.
If this bill passes, no debate will be allowed; the entire subject
will be secret.
14 November 2015
FAA can't properly inspect US airlines
Major US airlines have
offshored heavy maintenance
to facilities
that the FAA can't properly inspect, and in practice does not try.
Maintenance workers in the US report serious flaws.
There is no reason to allow US-flag airlines to do maintenance outside
the US except in emergencies.
14 November 2015
Ban on prohibiting customers from giving honest reviews
The Senate is
considering a bill
to ban companies from using contracts
to prohibit customers from saying anything bad about the company.
That would be good.
Will the bill ban attempts to use copyright to do this?
Will it ban imposing arbitration on customers?
14 November 2015
SCROTUS trying to legalize car loan discrimination
SCROTUS
are trying to
legalize a kind of racial discrimination
in car loans.
14 November 2015
Large companies monopolise US H-1B visas
Large outsourcing companies have figured out how to use the US H-1B
visa program to
bring foreign teams to the US
so there are no visas available for other businesses.
14 November 2015
USDA meat inspection
An
undercover video
shows that the USDA's new, "more efficient" meat
inspection is almost no inspection at all.
14 November 2015
Cancellation of citizenship without trial
Australia's exile bill would still permit
cancellation of citizenship
without a trial.
14 November 2015
General strike planned in Greece
general strike against austerity
is planned in Greece.
14 November 2015
Australia to deport resident of 50 out of 51 years
Australia plans to
deport Ian Whiteman
who has lived in Australia since
he was one year old, to a country he hardly knows.
This because of a crime that caused no damage but is considered
"serious".
Deportation of criminals is justified, sometimes, but not in
a cruel and mindless fashion. A person whose only family ties
are in Australia, and who could easily have become a citizen,
should not be deported if not likely to be a repeat criminal
or if some other country is not "home".
Stopping his parents from visiting him is cruel also.
Several people will be
deported to New Zealand
because of membership in an arbitrarily banned motorcycle club.
14 November 2015
Face recognition in Walmart
Walmart
tried using face recognition
to compare everyone in the store
to a list of faces of known shoplifters.
If this works, and it is extended a few small steps, I see a danger
that anyone who has ever shoplifted will never be able to buy
groceries again — in any store. This could be a choice between
a death sentence and life imprisonment.
For the most part I don't see a problem in having Walmart (or some
other store — I refuse to buy from Walmart, after all) scan my
face and not keep records of it. What I object to is if someone scans
my face on the street and keeps track of where I go. Especially if this
is done by the state.
14 November 2015
Paris climate conference set up to fail
The Paris climate conference has been
set up to fail
just as Copenhagen was, with governments making efforts to spin failure
as
success.
14 November 2015
PEN calls on US to stop prosecuting whistleblowers
PEN calls on the US government to
stop prosecuting whistleblowers
under the Espionage Act.
14 November 2015
Anti-racism campaigns in US universities
Campaigns against racism are
spreading to other US universities
"Mizzou" seems to be an affectionate nickname referring to the
University of Missouri, used by people who work or study there. Since
I have no relationship with that school, for me to use that nickname
would mean pretending to an intimacy I don't have. Thus, I call
the school by its official name.
14 November 2015
No legal obstacles to ending Guantanamo
There are
no legal obstacles
stopping Obama from ending the indefinite
imprisonment of Guantanamo, if he wanted to.
14 November 2015
Raising minimum wage accompanied by decreased unemployment
Raising the minimum wage is often accompanied by
decreased unemployment
14 November 2015
14-year-olds charged over sex video
Two 14-year-olds in New York State
face felony charges
for making a
video in which one of them has sex with someone else. Other students
they sent the video to are being punished as well.
Provided the other star was involved voluntarily (information not
available), then I think it is wrong to punish any of them.
It is even more clearly wrong to punish students for receiving a
message containing the video. And parents that examine their
children's phones to see if they have been sent sexts are held by this
twisted law to have
committed the same "felony"
Any law making it a crime to possess a copy of some text, photo or
video
is injustice, pure and simple.
14 November 2015
UK increasing subsidy of fossil fuels
The UK is giving
increased subsidies
to fossil fuels.
So this is why they have to make so many families homeless and
hungry.
14 November 2015
Urgent: make election day a national holiday
US citizens:
call
for making election day a national holiday.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
14 November 2015
Urgent: support goal of zero nuclear weapons
US citizens:
call on presidential candidates
to support the goal of global zero nuclear weapons.
14 November 2015
UK Snooper's Charter would endanger security researchers
The Snooper's Charter would
endanger computer security researchers
in the UK.
There might be one way around this. If you publish info about the
back door you found, encrypted, on a foreign site, and send the key to
another foreign site that will publish the information in several
months no matter what you subsequently say or do, you might then be
safe discussing the matter with some foreign colleagues with
a view to publishing it in a better way with better checking.
Of course, it's nuts to make security researchers go through these
steps to protect themselves from state repression.
14 November 2015
Making pointless apps or solving real problems
Never Mind Pointless Apps — Our Best Minds Should Be Solving
Real Problems.
This is not to mention that those apps are usually
nonfree software
and often
malware
as well.
14 November 2015
Modern slavery found in any industry
Modern slavery can be
found in any industry
Employers want immigrants to undercut wages for everyone else.
Sometimes the immigrants are entirely willing. Sometimes they are
threatened, exploited, or imprisoned. Either way, the overall result
is that business owners around the world get more money, and workers
get less.
14 November 2015
UK journalists imprisoned in Indonesia
Two British journalists imprisoned in Indonesia say that naval officers
paid close attention to their case, while the UK's
supposed help was incompetent
Even though they had money to pay for some privileges in prison, they
could not avoid the dirty food, and they could not get medicine when
they got sick.
14 November 2015
Forced confession of Timothy Johnson
Timothy Johnson was convicted of murder based on a false confession,
then
exonerated as there was no real evidence against him. He says that the
thugs
dangled him off the side of a bridge
to get him to confess.
They also laid false charges against his parents to put pressure on
him.
14 November 2015
Beheading of Afghan Shi'ites
Someone, presumably supporters of
PISSI
murdered some Afghan Shi'ites
by beheading them.
In response, crowds tried to storm the presidential palace, crying
"Death to [President] Ghani, death to the Taliban."
I don't see why they want the former; but if Afghans remain fired up
to fight the Taliban, they may have what it takes to defeat the
Taliban.
14 November 2015
Hack reveals illegal surveillance of prisoners
A company that handles prisoners' phone calls, including with their
lawyers, records them all. Even when
prisoners talk with their lawyers
Someone just got these recordings and leaked them.
Leaking them en mass was wrong, but not as wrong about what this
company (Insecurus?) did.
14 November 2015
Vandana Shiva on 'fail-anthropy'
The West's 'Fail-Anthropy'.
14 November 2015
Colorado single-payer health care initiative
Colorado is
considering a ballot initiative
for single-payer health care.
I am concerned that this is not a large enough step to work. Many
low-paid workers have been forced to be "independent contractors", and
I think many of them can't afford to contribute 10% of their pay for
medical care.
I don't see how health care for the unemployed would be covered, and I
don't see anything to push gouging prices down. Perhaps the scheme
has measures for this which are not mentioned in the article.
If not, I think it won't work.
14 November 2015
UK's hidden family homelessness
In the UK, ever
more families are becoming homeless
(even though the adults are working), and put into cramped shelters.
In the US, homeless families don't get shelters.
14 November 2015
Republicans debate how to prevent wage increases
Republican candidates
debated why and how
to stop American workers from
getting a wage.
Trump effectively admitted that globalization driven by business
interests imposes poverty on most people. This globalization is not a
natural phenomenon; it was imposed by those business interests through
bad laws and worse "free trade" treaties. So let's get rid of those
laws and treaty.
It is true that wages, and benefits, encourage employers to replace
workers with machines. We can reduce this problem by funding Social
Security and unemployment benefits from taxes that are independent
of employment — taxes that businesses will have to pay even if
they replace all workers with machines.
However, we must also block the forms of automation that would put
many people out of work, until we establish a universal basic income
so that people don't need employment.
14 November 2015
2050 future history
On the Verge of the Great Unraveling.
14 November 2015
Saudi Arabia releases 74 year old
Saudi Arabia compassionately released 74-year-old Karl Andree, who had
been sentenced to 350 lashes for
possession of drugs
(specifically, wine).
The US has stopped repressing people for carrying wine, but you can
get
imprisoned for having other drugs.
14 November 2015
NYC solitary confinement and pepper spray
New York City's replacement for solitary confinement turns out to
be more or less
solitary confinement with pepper spray
13 November 2015 (
American applies for asylum in Canada
Kyle Lydell Canty has applied for asylum in Canada
because
of racism in the US
13 November 2015 (
Modi's Hindu-nationalist government
Modi's Hindu-nationalist government
presides
over repeated lynchings
and attacks the pluralist basis of the
Indian state.
13 November 2015 (
Legal Battles to Protect The Environment
Legal Battles to Protect The Environment
'Easier
to Fight in China Than the UK'
13 November 2015 (
Labels for products made in Israel's colonies
The EU has adopted requirements that products made in Israel's colonies
in Palestine must be labeled specially,
not
as "Made in Israel"
Of course, the purpose of this labelling is discrimination —
like all such required labelling. The discrimination in this case is
not against Israel, but against its violations of international law by
setting up colonies in Palestine and settling Israelis in them. This
labelling will help people practice a narrow boycott against those
colonies, much narrower than the boycott of nearly all Israeli
institutions that Palestinians have called for.
I support the boycott of products of those colonies ("settlements").
13 November 2015 (
Angolan dictatorship
The independent Angolan dictatorship has
picked
up the practices of the former Portuguese dictatorship
that ruled
Angola as a colony.
13 November 2015 (
Captive orcas
A writer describes how
seeing
a captive orca made him ashamed
This article is packed with idiocy, such as the misused cliche
"playing god", which is irrational even in its usual meaning.
However, I agree with its basic point that it is cruel to cage orcas.
13 November 2015 (
Senate's CIA torture report
The US government has
ordered
executive branch agencies not to read
the copies of the CIA
torture report that the Senate sent them.
This is based on a bizarre and twisted legal excuse, so it's clear
that the goal is to stand up for torturers and torture.
13 November 2015 (
Effects of Tories' spending cuts
The Tories choose not to see or believe
the
effects of their spending cuts
13 November 2015 (
Sale of endangered lizards as pets
The sale of exotic, endangered lizards as expensive pets
could
wipe out those species
13 November 2015 (
The 1965-66 massacre in Indonesia
Survivors of the 1965-66 massacre in Indonesia
continue
trying to open investigation
into those events, and continue to
face censorship.
13 November 2015 (
Australia's funding of coal
Australia may block an
OECD
deal to stop funding coal
13 November 2015 (
US upgrading some nuclear bombs
The US is
upgrading
some nuclear bombs
to make them more "usable".
That is going in the wrong direction.
12 November 2015 (
The resistance at University of Missouri
The University of Missouri had started attacking women's rights and
was mistreating all its students. Resistance was widespread, and the
black football players were
joined
in resistance by a large fraction of the campus
12 November 2015 (
Unlawful killings by Israeli forces
Amnesty: Israeli Forces in Occupied Palestinian Territories
Must
End Pattern of Unlawful Killings
Some of these Palestinians had attacked Israelis. Others hadn't done
anything wrong.
Amnesty's point is that even when they had attacked someone with a
knife, that doesn't call for shooting them when it was possible to
arrest them, let alone for killing them by denying them medical care.
12 November 2015 (
Drug traffickers and palm-oil planters
In Honduras, drug traffickers and palm-oil planters are
working
together to take land from indigenous people and deforest it
12 November 2015 (
Imprisonment without trial in the US
Congress blocked Obama's plan to "close" the Guantanamo prison by
moving
imprisonment without trial to the US itself
Obama's plan might perhaps be a scheme to end imprisonment without
trial by supposing that the Supreme Court would grant them habias
corpus. If so, it would be great provided it works — but with
our current authoritarian Supreme Court, I would not count on that.
12 November 2015 (
Maldive state of emergency
The Maldive "president" has
cancelled
the state of emergency
12 November 2015 (
Australia's privatized refugee prison
Australia imprisoned Iranian refugee Fazel Chegeni in the
privatized
Christmas Island prison
, apparently forever. He died trying to
escape, and the other prisoners responded by rioting and destroying
parts of their prison.
Thugs
moved in and regained control
, but it's not clear that's a good
thing.
12 November 2015 (
The UK's Snooper's Charter
The UK's Snooper's Charter
imposes
a gagging requirement
on everyone ordered to snoop on people.
This is "the last policy discussion about surveillance before the mass
gagging."
"Note that this section is absolute: it does not have exceptions, for
example in relation to the public interest: such as the ability to
discuss the benefit or downsides of part interception activities; no
exception for talking about this to MPs, or other democratic
representatives; or even to exculpate anyone who otherwise would be
wrongfully found guilty."
12 November 2015 (
US thugs trained to shoot without thinking
US thug departments train
thugs
in how to shoot, but not in how to
resolve a crisis without shooting. And the training says to shoot
fast,
without
taking time to think
. No wonder that's what they do.
Then the Supreme Court upholds an
extreme
level of immunity for them
, so they are almost certain to get away
with killings.
12 November 2015 (
Prejudice against sex workers
Moroccan actress Loubna Abidar played a sex worker in a film which
Morocco banned. Then she was
attacked
by a mob on the street, and hospitals would not admit her
. She
fled the country.
I blame these events on the prejudice against sex workers. The film
made prejudiced Moroccans uncomfortable by showing that sex workers
exist there, so they took it out on her.
Many other laws reflect this prejudice, which I have never understood.
12 November 2015 (
Portuguese celebrate
Portuguese celebrate because an anti-austerity coalition
is going to take power
12 November 2015 (
Saudi bombing accusation
The ICRC accused Saudi Arabia (backed by the US) of intentionally
targeting
hospitals in Yemen.
12 November 2015 (
Urgent: Israel-Palestine conflict
US citizens: ask congresscritters to sign the
Ellison-Yarmuth-Dingell
letter
calling for a political resolution to the Israel-Palestine conflict.
12 November 2015 (
Urgent: FDA nomination
US citizens: phone your senators to oppose Obama's nomination of
Robert
Califf
to head the Food and Drug Administration.
He is too much in bed with the pharma companies to regulate them properly,
and we must suspect he wouldn't want to try.
12 November 2015 (
Urgent: don't move Guantanamo to the US
US citizens:
Phone
your congresscritter
and say, don't move Guantanamo
prison to the US. Each prisoner should be tried in a civilian US
court, or freed.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
12 November 2015 (
Urgent: support the SAVE Benefits Act
US citizens: call on members of Congress to support the
Benefits Act.
12 November 2015 (
Urgent: methane pollution
US citizens:
call
on the EPA
to take strong action against methane pollution.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
12 November 2015 (
Urgent: reject the TPP
US citizens: call on Congress to
reject
the TPP.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
12 November 2015 (
Forced medication
mental
health bill
now in the US Congress would lead to forced medication.
12 November 2015 (
Thugs' unofficial slowdown strike
When thugs say they are deterred from doing their job by the danger
citizens' videos will reveal their unjust violence, it amounts to
threatening
an unofficial slowdown strike
to demand restored impunity.
12 November 2015 (
UK Snooper's Charter
Where the
UK
Snooper's Charter
is leading.
12 November 2015 (
Facebook app scanning photos
Facebook's app has started
scanning
photos
people take with their phones.
The article says "camera", but that word is misleading; cameras do not
have a Facebook app installed in them. This applies only to phones and
tablets.
I suspect the face recognition is done by sending the photos to a
Facebook server. If so, the server could do other things with those
photos. It could save them and send them to Big Brother. From now on,
when people want to snap me with a mobile, I will verify it does not
have a Facebook app installed before I say yes.
12 November 2015 (
House Anti-Science Committee
House Anti-Science Committee Attempts to Suppress
Climate
Change Studies.
One way to fight back is by replacing the weak term that the denialists
chose, "climate change", with something stronger such as "global heating"
or
climate mayhem
".
12 November 2015 (
Linking as violation of copyright
The EU is considering a law to declare linking to a page a
violation
of copyright.
It is too bad that the article uses the enemy's propaganda word,
"protection",
to refer to copyright.
12 November 2015 (
UK's attack on end-to-end encryption
The UK's attack on end-to-end encryption is serious, and
its
denials are clearly lies.
It wants to force computer manufacturers
and sellers to sabotage users' computers on demand to make their data
decryptable.
However, encryption done in proprietary software
can't
be trusted anyway.
Whether or not a state can force the company
to sabotage it, the company might do so on its own initiative at any
time. You can't rationally trust nonfree programs: they do computing
for suckers.
When the author says "the services you and I use", apparently assuming
that you and he use software you and he can't rationally trust, he
says he's a sucker and he assumes you are too.
12 November 2015 (
Blood shed for oil
Nigeria
Must Own Up
to the Blood Shed for Oil.
The officials responsible for the murder of Ogoni environmental activists
20 years ago have not been punished or even censured, and some remain
in positions of power today.
12 November 2015 (
European Court of Human Rights
The European Court of Human Rights ruled against freedom of speech
by
endorsing
censorship of opinions and even views about history.
Evidently
it doesn't fully support human rights. Respecting freedom of
speech means respecting the right to state views we oppose.
Antisemitism is prejudice against a group of people which (in the
usual interpretation) includes me. I disapprove of it, but I respect
people's right to state that opinion or any other.
When a state mandates a specific position on a factual question, that
makes it impossible to discuss that question frankly in that country.
12 November 2015 (
Hossam Bahgat freed
Egyptian journalist Hossam Bahgat
has
been freed.
The article does not indicate whether the charges, publishing something
that displeased the state, have been dropped.
12 November 2015 (
Jail for sexting
Teenagers are
threatened
by laws
that could jail them for sexting or inviting others to sext them.
I think it is unkind to pressure someone to sext, and I would not do
that, even though pressuring is not equivalent to forcing. However,
it is simply wrong to punish adolescents for sexting, or anything else
sexual that they willingly do. Sex is the normal preoccupation of
adolescents.
12 November 2015 (
Leprosy in India
Although leprosy is curable, people in India whose bodies show harm
done by the disease face various sorts of
discrimination
and cruelty.
I am shocked by the point about "grounds for divorce". Does India
still require people present "grounds" if they want a divorce?
If so, the change that's needed here is to eliminate that requirement.
12 November 2015 (
Dual citizens convicted of terrorism
Australia
will take citizenship away
from dual citizens convicted of terrorism crimes.
At least it is limited to those actually convicted. The previous proposal
would have allowed officials to do this without a trial.
12 November 2015 (
Unauthorized immigrant children
A US appeals court
overturned
Obama's executive order
against deporting certain unauthorized immigrant children.
I don't want a large amount of immigration to the US, but people who were
brought as children and have spend many years in the US should be allowed
to become citizens.
The right-wing concern about
"anchor
babies"
is due to a fear that is not based on facts.
12 November 2015 (
Rightwingers Push 'Moral' Coal
Rightwingers Push 'Moral' Coal Only After They Doomed a
Truly
Moral Alternative.
The fossil fuel magnates pay lots smart but selfish people to say all
sorts of bogus things in favor of using fossil fuels. We will see through
them all, but will we do it soon enough to prevent disaster?
12 November 2015 (
Violent thug received light sentence
The
thug
whose gratuitous violence seems to have caused the death of
Matthew Ajibade has received a light sentence
including
15 weekends in jail.
Still, if every violent
thug
were sentenced this way, it might be enough
to deter their violence.
12 November 2015 (
250,000 euro fine for Facebook
A Belgian court will fine Facebook 250,000 euros per day unless it stops
tracking
people that don't have Facebook accounts.
The issue is that Facebook sends some visitors cookies. It is not
clear that the court realizes that Facebook also tracks people who
merely
see
a "Like" button.
12 November 2015 (
Suing the World Bank
Indian
fishermen and farmers
are suing the World Bank for investing in
a giant coal-fired power plant where they live. The World Bank says it can't
be sued in US courts.
Investing in burning coal is planet-roasting behavior. Young people,
who may well be killed by
climate mayhem
, have grounds to use force
to block the activities that threaten their lives.
12 November 2015 (
EU directive to limit trade in wildlife and toxic waste
The UK has
killed
an EU directive to limit trade in wildlife and toxic waste.
12 November 2015 (
Netanyahu never supported a Palestinian state
Netanyahu Has Never Actually Supported a Palestinian State,
Despite
What He Told Obama.
12 November 2015 (
Saudi Arabia emptied its aquifer
Saudi Arabia emptied its aquifer for agriculture; now all its wells
are dry and it has no more agriculture.
California
is following the same path.
12 November 2015 (
Fraternity Sues Rolling Stone
UVA Fraternity Sues Rolling Stone for $25m over
Retracted
Rape Article.
12 November 2015 (
Speed eviction of families
Europe's banksters demand Greece
speed
eviction of families that can't pay their mortgages,
or its creditors
won't get the next next batch aid.
It's a mistake to call these payments "aid", if that means aid for Greece.
12 November 2015 (
Sex crimes common among US thugs
Sex crimes are
common
among thugs in the US
12 November 2015 (
Door to KGB building set on fire
A Russian performance artist set fire to the door of the building used
by what was formerly called the KGB, to point out that it's
still
there and still dangerous
The author understates the danger from UK spy organizations. What
they threaten to do, when they violate privacy, is
imprison
journalists' sources and thus endanger democracy
. Even if they
don't torture people like Russian and
US
spy organizations
, that is still a terrible threat. Besides, the
UK spy organizations
did
hand
over people to Qadhafi for torture
12 November 2015 (
The Divisive Manipulator Who Charmed the World
Narendra
Modi
: the Divisive Manipulator Who Charmed the World.
12 November 2015 (
Employees of HK publisher disappear
Four employees of a Hong Kong publisher have
disappeared
separately. This is apparently the work of Chinese agents, perhaps
with the help of Thailand.
12 November 2015 (
UK's surveillance bill
The UK's surveillance bill would give the state the
power
to order companies to sabotage end-to-end encryption facilities that
they provide to users
This is one more reason why you shouldn't trust a nonfree program for
encryption, on top of many other reasons. Basically, nonfree programs
cannot deserve your trust; they do computing for suckers.
12 November 2015 (
Wasted development aid money
Development aid money is mostly wasted since
only
a tiny fraction goes to the local organizations that actually do
work
12 November 2015 (
Politicians' excuse for inequality and surveillance
Blaming
inequality and massive surveillance on digital technology
is a
handy excuse for politicians that want to increase inequality and
surveillance.
12 November 2015 (
Pollution in Ogoniland
Pollution in Ogoniland is just
as
bad now as it was 20 years ago
when Nigeria executed protest
leaders.
10 November 2015 (
Burmese constitution rigged
The National League for Democracy won the election for parliament in
Burma, but
the
constitution has been rigged
so as to limit its political power.
10 November 2015 (
Protecting US teens from radicalization
Suggesting
a way
to protect US teens from radicalization that won't backfire.
10 November 2015 (
1C of global heating reached
Global heating
has reached 1C, and is
still
accelerating
10 November 2015 (
Poor people's children disposable to plutocrats
For plutocratist politicians, poor people's children are
disposable
just blame all the consequences of poverty on their parents.
10 November 2015 (
Urgent: Keep fossil fuel in the ground
US citizens:
call on
Obama
to keep fossil fuels in the ground.
10 November 2015 (
Obama offers to meet Netanyahu
Obama
offered
Netanyahu a meeting
, and used it to show he will do nothing to
pressure Netanyahu to end the
perpetual
occupation of Palestine
Netanyahu will continue the occupation until he faces enough pressure
to make him change. If I were president of the US, I would tell
Netanyahu that Israel will get US aid for one purpose only: building
replacements in Israel for the colonies in Palestine, and demolishing
those colonies.
10 November 2015 (
Enslaved migrants on palm oil plantations
"Palm oil: why do we care more about orangutans than
migrant
workers
?"
It's simple. An individual migrant worker has more rights than an
individual orangutan; but orangutans are an endangered species
while humans are reproducing like weeds.
However, that question is purely theoretical; there is no practical
reason to compare the two, because it's easiest to protect them both.
Anything we do to prevent the enslavement of migrant workers on
palm oil plantations will protect the orangutans, by discouraging the
spread of palm oil plantations.
10 November 2015 (
Thais accused of "insulting" royals dead
Two Thais accused of criticizing the royal family have
died
in prison
Merely accusing them of this "crime" is an injustice.
10 November 2015 (
Corrupt US state legislators
Corruption is
common
in US state legislators.
10 November 2015 (
Storm and drought in Europe
Storm
And Drought
: What Europe Has to Fear from [global heating].
10 November 2015 (
NSA's use of operating system bugs
The NSA reports most of the bugs it finds in operating systems,
but only
after
a delay while it uses them to attack computers
10 November 2015 (
Journalist charged with publishing news
Hossam Bahgat, Egyptian journalist and human rights activist, has been
charged
with "publishing false news"
"False news", in Egypt, means anything that doesn't come from the
state.
10 November 2015 (
Yemeni children's game called airstrike
Yemen: 'The children have a game called airstrike in which they
fall
to the ground
'.
How long before they start playing "suicide bomber"?
10 November 2015 (
Rejection of Keystone XL
Obama reportedly decided 2 years ago to reject Keystone XL, but
waited
for a "politically opportune time" to announce it
Curbing
global heating
is a battle against time. If he had rejected
Keystone XL earlier, the rejection would have boosted our side
sooner.
10 November 2015 (
French Pun
Trocadero
10 November 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose building oil terminals
US citizens:
oppose
building oil terminals
in Washington State.
I used this as my text.
The Keystone XL pipeline has been cancelled. Please don't allow it to
be replaced with oil trains to Washington State. We need to keep the
tar sands oil in the ground, to avoid toxic spills and disastrous
global heating
Oil trains will also cause fires repeatedly.
10 November 2015 (
Urgent: Protect marine mammals
US citizens:
protect
marine mammals
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
10 November 2015 (
Urgent: Defeat the TPP
US citizens:
call
on Congress
to defeat the TPP.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
In the text of the letter, I replaced "Trans-Pacific Partnership" with
"TPP", and added "This is a partnership of corporations to attack
democracy, with some secondary and unimportant effects on trade."
10 November 2015 (
SCROTUS delaying appointment of ambassadors
SCROTUS
are
delaying
the appointment of 32 US ambassadors
, as a harassment technique.
10 November 2015 (
Safety for pedestrians in Mexico
Mexican real-life "superhero" Peatónito
campaigns
for safety for pedestrians
10 November 2015 (
The Crotch Brother fights spread of solar power
A deceptive campaign in Florida to check the spread of home solar
power just got a boost from a
secret
donor
Since we don't know who the donor is, we can make up a fictional
name for him without lying. We could call him "John Doe", or "The
Crotch Brother".
10 November 2015 (
Football players on strike
Black football players at the University of Missouri have gone on
strike
demanding
the resignation of the university president
, who has not done much
against racism on campus.
They are powerful because they bring in a lot of money to the school,
and they are trying to use this to do some good. Bravo for them, but
I think it is a shame that many Americans are obsessed with the
artificial struggle of football and thus distracted from the real
struggle against the plutocrats.
The strike is getting
support
from others on campus
, and the president
has
resigned
10 November 2015 (
Haiti's presidential election
One of Haiti's presidential candidates, who came in second in the
first round of voting, says the election was
rigged
by Martelly
10 November 2015 (
UK surveillance bill
The UK's surveillance bill threatens investigative journalism
by
putting sources in danger
Here's a
case
in point
Another bill would attack journalism on another front, by
hampering
freedom of information access
10 November 2015 (
Dubya
Donald Trump dares to point out that
Dubya
left
the US wide open to the September 2001 terrorist attacks
, even
cancelling precautions that Clinton had set up.
This was
more
widely acknowledged 10 years ago than it is now
I will not take as certain that
Dubya
didn't do any worse things in
regard to the attack. His official investigation of the attacks was
weakened
and then
corrupted
I support the demand for a
new
investigation
09 November 2015 (
Urgent: close gun sale loopholes
US citizens: call on Obama to use executive orders
to
close some gun sale loopholes.
09 November 2015 (
Urgent: end subsidies for fossil fuels
Everyone:
demonstrate
on Nov 14
to end subsidies for fossil fuels.
09 November 2015 (
Urgent: don't include fracking in climate "solution"
US citizens: call on officials
not
to include fracking in any climate "solution".
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
09 November 2015 (
Urgent: ending gerrymandering
US citizens:
stand
for ending gerrymandering.
09 November 2015 (
UK's housing crisis
The UK's housing crisis could be solved if the disused buildings were made
available to live in. Instead,
Tory
policy is to put squatters in jail.
09 November 2015 (
McCarthyism in the UK
The UK's plans to chase "extremists" out of positions of influence
remind
me of McCarthyism.
09 November 2015 (
Journalists in Zimbabwe arrested
Journalists in Zimbabwe were arrested for accusing officials of corruption
(participating
in hunting of elephants).
09 November 2015 (
Local social relationships
When globalization destroys local social relationships, it sparks
local rivalries; these can attract to previously unimportant religious
or ethnic differences and turn into
hatred
and violence.
09 November 2015 (
Web services deny users' rights
A project sets out to summarize how various web services deny users' rights through their
and conditions.
I doubt that competition will be effective for eliminating nasty
conditions. The overall level of competition in this field is too
low.
I think we need laws to limit what conditions essential digital
services can impose. And rather than judging violations themselves,
they should have to go to court in order to cut off service to anyone.
09 November 2015 (
Censorship in Bali
The writers festival in Bali was forced to cancel sessions about the
1965 massacre, but people discussed it anyway, and
condemned
the censorship.
09 November 2015 (
"Special" violent intelligence operations
Australia's secrecy about "special" violent intelligence operations extends to the point of
refusing
to say whether there have been any.
If an Australian agent on one of these operations kills your child,
you will need to escape from Australia before you can safely say so.
09 November 2015 (
EU's proposed trade secrets directive
The EU's proposed trade secrets directive bows down to business at the expense of
journalism,
workers, and public safety.
Trade secrecy is harmful to the public interest, and one of the
supposed purposes of the patent system is to discourage trade secrecy.
How about discouraging it by not adopting laws to facilitate it?
09 November 2015 (
Privacy of reading on the internet
The UK's threat to the privacy of reading on the internet is
extremely dangerous.
So is the surveillance exercised by snooping web sites.
We
must put an end to all of it.
09 November 2015 (
Thugs face murder charges
The thugs that killed 6-year-old Jeremy Mardis face charges of
second-degree murder.
They should be prosecuted also for their false accusations.
09 November 2015 (
Sell out to fracking
Denmark's government wanted to sell out to fracking,
but
the people organized and blocked it.
09 November 2015 (
Democratic Socialism
Many
famous Americans
do or did support Democratic Socialism.
09 November 2015 (
Unions reducing inequality
Unions are very effective at reducing inequality and preventing dooH niboR laws,
according
to an IMF study.
09 November 2015 (
Proposed oil export terminals
The summary of public comments about the proposed oil export terminals in Washington State
mysteriously
omits some comments that indicated dangers.
09 November 2015 (
Shot dead while lying wounded
Mahdi Mohammad Ramadan al-Mohtasib was shot dead by an Israeli soldier
as
he lay on the ground, already shot and wounded.
09 November 2015 (
Bedouin village of al-Araqib
Israeli bulldozers have knocked down the Bedouin village of al-Araqib
90
times in just 5 years.
Each time, the villagers return and rebuild.
09 November 2015 (
The 'Ferguson Effect'
The 'Ferguson Effect' Is Just
Ploy to Reduce Scrutiny of the Police.
09 November 2015 (
Myths about the "Free market"
Six myths about the
"free market".
The market system is a useful tool, but if all you have is a market
system, everything starts to look like it's for sale.
09 November 2015 (
Secret imprisoning by Assad
Amnesty accuses Assad's regime of
secretly
imprisoning 60,000 people.
Some were tortured.
Their relatives can't get any information about them, except underground.
09 November 2015 (
Restrain spies with total access
You can't trust judges to
effectively
restrain
spies equipped with total access.
The experience with the
FISA
court
shows this is true in the US as well.
09 November 2015 (
"Voluntary self-regulation"
As states bind themselves by treaty not to regulate businesses, they
are left with no tools except to ask them to "voluntarily
self-regulate". And this method usually fails, because businesses
don't really carry out the self-regulation.
"Governments are liberating global corporations from the rule of law and
leaving them to
rip
the world apart.
09 November 2015 (
Snooping agencies' contacts for complaints
US snooping agencies were ordered to set up contacts for complaints,
but
they have ignored the order for 17 years.
09 November 2015 (
Curb global heating
Canadians are already campaigning to press the new prime minister
to
take real action to curb global heating.
I wish they would replace the term "climate change", imposed by
Dubya's officials because it downplays the danger, with
one
that does justice to the importance of the issue.
09 November 2015 (
Impunity of thugs
The impunity of thugs in the US goes to absurd lengths: a thug who
shot a tased man who was lying on the ground face down was
acquitted
because she said she was afraid of him.
Even if he had had pulled a gun, and shot, he was not likely to hit her
under those circumstances.
Next time, a
thug
will say, "Yes, he was sitting on the ground with his hands
in the air, but I was afraid he would think deadly thoughts and kill
me with telepathy." And get acquitted.
US
thugs
kill so many people because they have been taught to kill
whenever they see even a shadow of a shade of a threat. We have to
change that training and that attitude. There are other countries
that teach a
different approach.
9 November 2015
EU low-tax deals
Several EU countries
want to keep
their sleazy low-tax deals with
multinational companies secret from investigating MEPs.
9 November 2015
Websites leaks Data
Nine Out of Ten of the Internet's Top Websites Are Leaking Your
Data
To data brokers, that is.
I follow the recommendations at the end of the article.
9 November 2015
Guantanamo
Obama wants to "close Guantanamo prison" by
transferring imprisonment
without trial
to Colorado.
This would normalize imprisonment without trial, which is bad;
however, it might also make it easier for these prisoners to get the
benefit of the US constitution in the courts.
The US must try or release each of these prisoners.
9 November 2015
New libre journal
The whole staff of the Elsevier's paywalled journal Lingua
have quit
to start a new libre journal
9 November 2015
Facebook bans Tsu
Facebook found another social network to be a source of spam links, so
it banned all mention
of that site's name anywhere.
9 November 2015
Private prisons
A perverse law requires the US government to keep at least 34,000
possibly-unauthorized immigrants in prison at any time,
regardless of
whether there is any good reason
to do so.
The motive for this law seems to be to assure the profits of private
prisons.
Hundreds of prisoners in one of these private prisons are on hunger
strike. The prison company says there is no hunger strike, but the
leaders of the supposedly nonexistent strike
are being punished
with
solitary confinement, persistent cold, isolation from their families,
etc.
These prisoners have not been convicted of a crime, and some will win
appeals and be granted US residency. Although the prison executives'
motive for punishing them for not eating is obvious, they have no
grounds to do so.
9 November 2015
President of Haiti
Who Will the
U.S. Declare
President of Haiti This Time?
9 November 2015
Bullies
A teacher in Kansas showed a film in class to open students' eyes to
what it feels like to be bullied for homosexuality
has faced bullying from
right-wing parents
, but has decided not to resign.
Bravo! Resigning would endorse the bullies' position.
9 November 2015
UK government
The UK government
plans to prohibit
renting out a bedroom smaller than
6.5 square meters.
This will make the housing shortage a little worse, though not as much
as
the other bad things that it is doing. Rather than subdivide a bedroom,
several people will sleep in the same bed, medieval style.
The government's responsibility is to make enough space for people to
live in
available at a decent price. As long as it fails to do this, people
will suffer one way or another.
9 November 2015
Death rates increased
For 15 years, death rates among middle-aged white men in the US
have
increased
: this now adds up to half a million additional deaths.
The natural explanation is that
dooH niboR
policies made their lives
collapse.
It should be noted that blacks still have it even worse.
9 November 2015
US middle class
US retailers recognize that most Americans
can't afford
to buy much.
9 November 2015
US economy
The US economy
is rigged in many ways to redistribute wealth to the
rich
Let's pass laws to take it back from them.
9 November 2015
MSF hospital bombed
One day before the US bombed the MSF hospital in Kunduz, a US official
asked if any Taliban were "holed up" there. The MSF said
that the only
Taliban there were disarmed patients
being treated.
The MSF in Kunduz called their US army contact about the attack,
but the attack continued
for
45 more minutes.
MSF reminds the US that
wounded
patients in a hospital are not legitimate military targets.
9 November 2015
Credit cards
US officials
continue trying
to shut down or pressure organizations by
intimidating credit card companies.
The article makes a mistake when it refers to "johns who engage in
trafficking". When prostitutes are trafficked, pimps are typically
involved in the crime, but johns probably not.
9 November 2015
Violence escalation in Hebron
Israeli soldiers shot and killed an old Palestinian woman who was
driving a car in Hebron. This
seems
to have provoked retaliation on various occasions.
9 November 2015
Turkey and Syrian rebels
Seymour Hersh reported in 2014 that the sarin attack in Syria,
attributed to Assad's army,
was actually a false-flag attack carried
out by Turkey
in connection with al-Nusra (al-Qa'ida).
He also said that the US had armed Syrian rebels in cooperation with
Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar since 2012, exporting arms from Libya
by way of the Benghazi consulate. The US stopped this after the
Benghazi consulate was attacked, but the other three countries
continued.
8 November 2015
Interview with Chomsky
An
interview
with Noam Chomsky.
8 November 2015
FBI claims to have given up on demanding back doors
The FBI says it has
given
up on demanding back doors
in encryption software.
That doesn't mean it won't try again next year.
8 November 2015
Danger of increasing rubber production
Increasing rubber production could lead to
massive deforestation
and extinction of many species.
8 November 2015
Ben Carson's crazy religion
Ben Carson's religion is
more crazy than fundamentalist
8 November 2015
Arundhati Roy on murder of secularists in India
Arundhati Roy says she was not shocked by murder of secularists in
India,
because that's
what she expected
of this government.
8 November 2015
Opponents of new constitution in Nepal stage import blockade
Opponents of Nepal's new constitution are trying to force it to
change the constitution by
blockading imports
from India.
8 November 2015
Could Assad become Schröinger's Dictator?
Could Assad become
Schrödinger's dictator
politically alive and politically dead at the same time?
8 November 2015
St. Louis lawsuit targets fine system
Lawsuit Targets Rapacious City Fine System in St. Louis Community.
8 November 2015
Israeli videos of violence against Palestinians
Israelis
revel in videos
in which real soldiers or
thugs
, egged on by rabid
mobs, really shoot harmless Palestinians.
Arabs in Israel know that anyone can murder them with impunity.
All of Israel is Ferguson for them.
8 November 2015
TPP allows banks to sue for compensation
The TPP will allow banks to
sue for "compensation"
for any regulations they don't like, including possible reinstatement
of the Glass Seagall Act.
8 November 2015
US policies drive people to suicide
Cruel US policies are driving many middle-aged white males to
commit suicide
Sad to say, the relatives of these men probably won't associate
the effect with the right-wing cause.
The article speculates that blacks are better able to cope with
poverty;
they may be psychologically or socially ready for it.
8 November 2015
Carson lied in autobiography
Ben Carson
admitted lying
in his autobiography about being offered a scholarship to West Point.
Such lies have ruined many a career, but right-wing crazies are often
immune.
8 November 2015
Sanders and Warren propose to close tax loophole
Senators Sanders and Warren proposed a bill that would
close a tax loophole
for hedge funds and give the money to retired people, disabled people,
and
veterans.
Some of the added tax money would go into the Social
Security trust fund.
8 November 2015
Summary of TPP injustices
One page
summarizes many specific injustices and damage of the TPP.
This is in addition to the general injustice of allowing companies to
sue governments for reducing their profits.
8 November 2015
Experiment finds secular children more altruistic and judgmental
psychological experiment
found that children from secular families
are more altruistic and more harsh in judging other people than
children from Christian and Muslim families.
Since many psychological studies turn out to be irreproducible
results,
I would not treat this as thoroughly established based on one study.
8 November 2015
Obama rejects Keystone XL pipeline
Obama
has rejected
the Keystone XL pipeline.
Although he ultimately made the right decision, the fact that he took
years to make it means that this is not greatly to his credit.
Obama now has a bigger climate decision to make, in the Paris climate
summit, and so far he is not pushing very hard to avoid disaster.
The
Keystone XL Pipeline Defeat Is One Goal in the Game, And We're Way
Behind.
8 November 2015
UN predicts millions of climate refugees
The UN predicts
millions of climate refugees
8 November 2015
UK threatened to act against Muslim Brotherhood
The UK took action against the Muslim Brotherhood
under pressure from a threat
by the UAE to cut arms purchases.
8 November 2015
Urgent: boycott, divestment and sanctions against Saudi Arabia
US citizens:
call for
boycott, divestment and sanctions against Saudi Arabia.
8 November 2015
Illegal oil palms on burned forest lands
Palm oil palms have already been
illegally planted
on recently burned Indonesian forest areas.
If complicated supply chains make it hard to stop this, then the
supply chains must be simplified, whether the companies want this or
not. Since the CO2 emissions from these fires threaten all
civilization, force is certainly justified.
8 November 2015
Google location history and law enforcement
Now that Google has made location tracking a feature, the state can
subpoena a person's location history
going back years.
Communicating with a service from your own computer using a mobile
device,
and not going through Tor, is for suckers.
8 November 2015
EU snooping borders
Injustices
in the EU's proposal for snooping borders.
8 November 2015
India orders Greenpeace India to shut down
India has ordered Greenpeace India to
shut down
8 November 2015
Emission target pledges only half of what is needed
The carbon pledges of the world's countries are
only half
what's probably needed to remain under 2C of heating.
8 November 2015
No Israel-Palestine peace deal while Obama in office
Obama has acknowledged that there is
no prospect of a peace deal
between Israel and Palestine while Obama remains in office.
The reason for this is that Obama has no intention of doing what is
required for a peace deal: putting pressure on the Israeli government.
Netanyahu is against peace
and will reject it as long as the US lets him get away with that.
8 November 2015
Only renewable electricity in Lower Austria
Lower Austria, one of the states in Austria, now uses
only renewable electricity
This does not mean it has eliminated greenhouse gas emissions. It
still
burns fossil fuel for other purposes, and that must be reduced next.
8 November 2015
Netanyahu spokesman calls Iran deal 'antisemitism'
Netanyahu's new spokesman called the Iran nuclear deal
"antisemitism."
This is part of Israel's persistent dishonest campaign of labeling
anything but blanket support for Israeli policy as "antisemitism".
8 November 2015
Nuclear energy too slow to develop
Nuclear energy is
too slow to develop to play
a substantial role in
avoiding
global heating
disaster. It is so expensive that it sucks
money away from the efficient renewable energy that we should be
building as fast as possible.
8 November 2015
Exxon investigated by New York State
New York State is
investigating
Exxon's climate lies.
8 November 2015
VW admits to deception about fuel consumption
Volkswagen
admits
understating the fuel consumption of some car models.
8 November 2015
Thug lies after shooting self
Another US
thug
shot himself
(not fatally) and then claimed someone else had shot him.
Perhaps this is the true "Ferguson effect": encouraging
thugs
to lie
even more than before.
8 November 2015
Incompetence of Theater of Security Agency
The
Theater of Security Agency
is
pitifully incompetent
at finding weapons and explosives.
8 November 2015
Consequences of Iraq war
Analyzing the consequences
of Bush's conquest of Iraq.
8 November 2015
Turkish editors charged for edgy headline
Two Turkish editors
published an edgy headline
and are charged with starting a rebellion.
This insane exaggeration reminds me of how
Aaron Swartz
was treated in the US.
Bogus charges resulting from exaggeration are wrong in any country.
8 November 2015
Urgent: prevent Grand Canyon shopping mall
US citizens:
oppose
the plan to build a big shopping mall next to the Grand Canyon.
8 November 2015
Seattle democracy vouchers
Seattle's
innovative public campaign
funding system lets each voter dispose of $100 to municipal campaigns.
Also in Seattle, children are
suing the state
for not limiting CO2 emissions.
There's a significant chance that
global heating
, by 2070, will cause
catastrophe, and kill them.
8 November 2015
Keeping ex cons out of public housing
Obama has slightly
softened the policies
that usually keep ex cons out of public housing.
A century ago, ex cons could get most kinds of work, and were not
excluded from most places to live. This helped them go straight.
8 November 2015
Letting kids play on the beach
Vacationing parents
face charges
for leaving their children on the
beach, from which they would walk back to the campground along a
footpath.
8 November 2015
Pentagon pays for patriotism
The Pentagon
pays professional sports
to promote a militarist version of "patriotism".
If patriotism is love of one's country, then the core of patriotism is
campaigning to make that country deserve to be loved.
07 November 2015 (
Urgent: Peace negotiations for Syria
US citizens:
call
on congress
to support peace negotiations for Syria and support
compromise rather than continued war.
07 November 2015 (
Urgent: Investigate Exxon's lies
US citizens:
call for
an investigation
with a view to prosecuting Exxon for lying about
the danger of
global heating
07 November 2015 (
President Bush 1 bored without war
President Bush 1
felt
bored with his job
once he didn't have a war to make it exciting.
07 November 2015 (
UK ministers uninformed about digital snooping
Nick Clegg, former UK deputy prime minister, says that
very
few ministers were informed
about massive digital snooping.
07 November 2015 (
False "intelligence" about WMDs
The US government funded the Iraqi National Congress which
generated
false "intelligence"
that reported Saddam Hussein had weapons of
mass destruction.
This gave the Bush regime raw material for its distorted intelligence
reports, which we now know were used to provide "reasons" for a war
that Bush had already decided to launch (but pretended he had not).
07 November 2015 (
Afghan gov't makes deal with corrupt banker
The Afghan government
made
a business deal with a banker that is in prison for corruption
07 November 2015 (
UK to kill renewable energy products
The UK's planet-roasting government
plans
to kill off community-scale renewable energy products
07 November 2015 (
Text of the TPP
Obama has published the text of the TPP, and it would
give
foreign companies the power to demand relaxation of food
inspection
, even to demand approval of GMOs and demand that they
not be labeled.
It's literally a treaty to allow
Treacherous Plutocratic Poison
It provides
handouts
to fossil fuel companies
. For instance, they could sue states and
cities that ban fracking.
It
criminalizes
whistleblowers
that reveal a company's criminal "trade secrets",
such as for instance that cigarette companies knew that their products
caused cancer and that Exxon knew its products caused
global heating
This in addition to prohibiting breaking digital handcuffs
It's too bad that article adopts enemy propaganda terms such as
"protection"
"Digital
Rights Management"
, and weak terms such as
"digital
locks"
Sanders points out that companies could demand
"compensation"
for increases in the minimum wage
Here are
many
other bad things
that have just been discovered in the text.
This should be no surprise. The TPP was designed to be a corporate
supremacy treaty, mislabeled as a "trade agreement", and that's what
was designed.
07 November 2015 (
Investigation of drug companies sabotaged
SCROTUS
has sabotaged a congressional
investigation
into drug companies that greatly increase prices
07 November 2015 (
Cheney wanted to use nuclear weapons
Cheney
wanted
to use nuclear weapons
against Iraq and Iran.
07 November 2015 (
Arrogance of US thugs
US
thugs
have organized
pressure
campaigns against prominent people that criticize them
even a
little.
They are arrogant as well as
dishonest
07 November 2015 (
Restoring the Voting Rights Act
Another variation on restoring the Voting Rights Act has been
proposed
Most Republican officials are
in
favor of voter suppression
. They want power, and regard democracy
as an obstacle. They appointed people to the Supreme Court that would
overturn crucial parts of the Voting Rights Act, and having won that
victory over poor and minority US citizens, they are not going to give
it up.
07 November 2015 (
Restrictions on Palestinians in Hebron
"It Will Become a Prison": Palestinians of Hebron Required to
"Register" in Preparation for
Severe
New Restrictions
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
This is in the name of "protecting" a group of Israeli fanatics that
insisted on living in the middle of an Arab town, and got the
government's support to keep them there at any cost (to Palestinians).
Meanwhile, Israel
closed a
Palestinian radio station in Hebron
, accusing it of "incitement"
to violence.
The
Israeli
actions that support keeping those fanatics in Hebron
do more to
incite Palestinian violence than any radio station could.
A former Israeli soldier, who was stationed in Hebron, says more or
less the
same
thing
The Israeli's use of a colony in Hebron as the base for continued
ethnic cleansing of the surrounding neighborhood of Hebron is a
microcosm of the
policy
of the occupation as a whole
Israel
continues
authorizing additional extensions
of its colonies in Palestine.
07 November 2015 (
New Pun
New pun: "Argonne Street"
06 November 2015 (
Wikipedia editing
A supporter of Deepak Chopra criticizes
Wikipedia's
practice in editing the page about him
Chopra's metaphysical statements are unsupported by what is actually
known in quantum physics. They are extraordinary claims, and would
require extraordinary proofs. Proofs would entail a systematic series
of experiments that Chopra hasn't reported doing. This is
pseudoscience, and it is good that Wikipedia makes this clear.
It is also true that patients may die from using "alternative
medicine" instead of scientific medicine — Steve Jobs is perhaps
the most famous example of this, though we are arguably
better
off without him
— and it is Wikipedia's responsibility to
point this out.
However, some of the practices described in the article do seem wrong
to me. Two clear examples are those about the Yoga section and the
bibliography. That's why I am posting this note.
Real scientists sometimes propose
strange
metaphysical hypotheses
, but they recognize that these are
speculative and don't present them as certain truths.
I am disappointed that the article refers to Wikipedia as "open
source", thus misrepresenting the meaning of "free" in "free
encyclopedia".
06 November 2015 (
Urgent: No Trump on SNL
Everyone:
call on NBC
not to have Donald Trump host Saturday Night Live.
6 November 2015
Science of the Seance
Science of the Seance
: Why Speaking to Spirits is Talking to Yourself.
It seems unjust to convict Anna Stubblefield of sexual assault, since
she believed she had been given positive consent.
6 November 2015
Australia's face database
Australia's face database
lends itself to creeping tyranny
, and there is
nothing to block the creep.
6 November 2015
Ravil Mingazov
A Guantanamo prisoner, Ravil Mingazov,
wants to join his family
in
England. A US court found there was no evidence to justify holding
him in prison.
6 November 2015
Thugs using tasers
Many US
thug
departments
are sloppy about using tasers
, and every so
often this kills someone — usually someone who was unarmed and
no danger to anyone.
6 November 2015
Blacks excluded from juries
US prosecutors
systematically exclude
blacks from juries using various
forms of deceit.
6 November 2015
Censorship in Lebanon
Censorship of criticism of religion
afflicts Lebanon
too.
6 November 2015
US Special Forces
A US special forces team in Afghanistan
seems to have tortured
dozens
of prisoners and killed 17 of them.
6 November 2015
UK's snooping bill
The UK's snooping bill
offers "protections" with loopholes
so big
that they are hardly meaningful.
The bill
is deceptive
, presenting so-called safeguards
that are not what they appear to be.
6 November 2015
Curbing global heating
A tax on flying
could raise a lot of money
for dealing with
global heating
But we would be fools to spend it on "adapting" when we could instead
spend
it on
curbing the problem
itself.
Curbing
global heating
is a very profitable investment.
The US should go in a lot more.
6 November 2015
Global heating warning
Scientists
warned President Johnson
about
global heating
in 1965.
6 November 2015
Corals
A research project
is trying to breed
corals that can cope with heat
and acidity.
If the project is successful, it might preserve a few of the hundreds
of species of corals. It's better than nothing, but it would be far
better
to curb our CO2 emissions.
6 November 2015
Sculpture in honor of Ken Saro-Wiwa
A sculpture in honor of Nigerian activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was
executed by a military dictatorship 20 years ago,
was seized
by the
Nigerian government on account of its political message.
6 November 2015
High rents
San Francisco voters
rejected
an initiative to limit how many days per
month a room can be rented out.
I am not sure this would have helped the problem of high rents at all,
but at best it would have done a tiny bit.
What San Francisco needs is lots and lots of housing construction.
But the home owners don't want that.
6 November 2015
Automated jobs
Bank of America says that half the jobs in the US
might be automated
in the next 20 years.
Plutocratist rulers will use this as an
opportunity to cut wages for
the remaining jobs, and will shuffle the surplus humans around until
they die.
6 November 2015
Louisiana thugs
Louisiana
thugs
shot
at driver Chris Few, and killed him and his son.
The are obfuscating the situation by saying that maybe Few had a
gun and shot his own son, but this seems to be pure fabrication.
The
thugs
have admitted that Few was not shooting at them (he
didn't have a gun). They claimed Few was backing up his car towards
them, but the evidence shows
that
was false too
6 November 2015
Fingerprints in EU
The EU
is proposing
to take the fingerprints of visitors to the EU.
I think that would mean a lot of countries I would never visit again.
6 November 2015
Federal war on marijuana
Sanders
has introduced
legislation to end the federal war on marijuana,
leaving the decision about its legality clearly to the states.
6 November 2015
Thug
The
thug
who attacked and paralyzed Sureshbhai Patel, an old man who
was simply walking next to his son's house,
has had a deadlocked jury
for the second time.
This indicates that some aspect of the
system needs to be changed.
6 November 2015
Corporate tax dodging
The EU
must stop
member states from competing to offer businesses the biggest
opportunities for tax dodging.
6 November 2015
Murdoch
Murdoch
has fired
hundreds of employees of the "National Geographic"
magazine, which he bought from the National Geographic Society.
This suggests that all the worst fears about what he would do it
are true.
6 November 2015
VolksWagen
VW
says
that some of its cars emit more CO2 in real use than in tests.
6 November 2015
Burma
The Rohingya minority in Burma
have been blocked
from voting and from running
for office.
6 November 2015
Keystone XL pipeline
The US
rejected
TransCanada's request to delay consideration of the
Keystone XL pipeline.
This means that Obama can make the decision, if he does not delay it
instead.
6 November 2015
Marijuana legal in Mexico
Mexico's Supreme Court
ruled
that growing and smoking marijuana are legal.
6 November 2015
PISSI
PISSI
may have brought down
a Russian airliner with a bomb smuggled on
board.
It may have been difficult, but if they did it, it was not impossible.
6 November 2015
Clinton
Clinton
distorts
Sanders' words as an excuse to call him racist and sexist.
6 November 2015
Maldives
To prevent an opposition rally, the Maldives government
has declared
"state of emergency".
The leader of the opposition is the legitimately elected president, who
was
removed
in a coup.
6 November 2015
al-Sisi
Egyptians
protested
al-Sisi in London, since he has crushed all dissent
in Egypt.
5 November 2015
US thug suicide
A US
thug
committed suicide, making it look like murder, because
he
was about to be caught stealing
from charity.
Other
thugs
tried to use this to condemn Black Lives Matter.
5 November 2015
Sanders
Sanders
has proposed
a bill to close off fossil fuel extraction from
US public lands.
5 November 2015
Fracking
The UK
has cancelled
its push to impose fracking in "Sites of Special
Scientific Interest".
That's good, but fracking elsewhere can poison the water for people
and farms.
5 November 2015
Vatican
Corruption and peculation
are rife
in the Vatican.
5 November 2015
Koch brother
A Koch brother
admits
that he expects something in return for his
campaign contributions.
In fact, he gets plenty for them.
5 November 2015
Iran's religion
Iran
admits
sentencing two poets to around 10 years in prison for
"insulting religion".
If you want to see a worse insult against Iran's religion, their
sentence is one.
If their appeals are not successful, it may be time for an
international poetry campaign to insult Iran's religion for its
censorship.
5 November 2015
Indonesia
British journalists
were sentenced to short prison terms
for making a
documentary in Indonesia that the Indonesian government didn't like.
Their local employees might be jailed for years.
In the name of avoiding inconveniences,
public protests in Jakarta have
been limited to unusual "free speech zones"
and required to keep quiet.
Shame on Indonesia for this censorship.
5 November 2015
Renewable energy
Renewable energy not only helps avoid disaster,
it also helps spread
the wealth
5 November 2015
Nauru
Australia
says
it is unhappy about the multiple human rights violations
of Nauru.
If Australia were serious about this, it could easily make Nauru
change its policies. I suspect that Australia has encouraged these
policies so as to cover up the treatment meted out to the refugees
Australia sends to Nauru.
5 November 2015
Ohio and marijuana
Ohio voters
defeated a corrupt proposal
to legalize marijuana,
perhaps because they didn't like the corrupt aspect.
5 November 2015
Beer brewing
Traditional beer brewing
has
ceased to function
in Belgium because of global heating.
5 November 2015
PM of Romania
The prime minister of Romania
has resigned
because of protests against
corruption.
5 November 2015
Chinese coal consumption
China
appears to be underreporting
coal consumption by as much as 17%.
5 November 2015
Australia's government
Australia's right-wing government is no longer led by a suppository,
but it still plans increased
dooH niboR
. Now
it plans a big increase
in VAT (a kind of sales tax)
, which will put the burden mainly on the
poor.
What's really called for is an increase in income tax for high
earners,
or the progressive income tax on businesses that
I've proposed
5 November 2015
University education
Students
protested
today in London demanding a return to gratis university
education.
5 November 2015
Taliban
The Taliban
have an assassination program
for journalists.
5 November 2015
Encryption
The UK
plans to ban
companies from offering encryption they can't break.
If big companies surrender to this, other countries will make the same
demand.
The UK's
new attack on privacy
, spelled out.
5 November 2015
Food waste
Conservative food use-by dates
tend to generate
food waste.
I would not blame the supermarkets so much. They will face public
criticism when goods don't last to their "use by" dates.
It is no use urging people to learn and remember rules about how long
food lasts. The fraction of people who regularly cook is much less
nowadays, and those who don't do this won't be motivated to learn them.
We will inevitably depend on what the supermarket says.
5 November 2015
US thugs
When US
thugs
rape, the
victims hardly ever report it
They believe, and I suspect they are right, that the other
thugs
will defend the rapists.
5 November 2015
Monsanto
The EPA concluded that glyphosate is not an endocrine disruptor, but
the evidence
was
provided by Monsanto
, which means we can't rely on it.
5 November 2015
Lead generators
People who do Google searches for "need money fast"
see ads for
companies called "lead generators"
that put them on a list of
potential suckers.
If you do a Google search in a way that doesn't hide who and where you
are,
including use of Tor, not specifying any account, and blocking cookies,
you do seem to be a sucker.
5 November 2015
Israeli "settler"
A fanatical Israeli "settler"
set
fire
to Palestinians' olive trees while a team from Rabbis for
Human Rights was trying to protect them by serving as witnesses.
Official firefighters did not arrive soon, so the president of Rabbis
for Human Rights tried to put the fire out himself. The fanatic did
not like this and tried to stab him.
The
thugs
took their time arriving, making sure the fanatic could get
away, and then called the Rabbis presence a "provocation" against the
fanatics.
I have to wonder if the firemen stayed away because coming to put out
this fire would have been considered a "provocation".
5 November 2015
Arabs in Jerusalem
Israel has been slowly cutting off the non-central parts of Jerusalem
where
Arabs live, and those Arabs themselves. Recently
it became clear
that this
is aimed at the goal of cutting them all off.
5 November 2015
Israel
East Jerusalem has one hospital, so wounded Palestinian protesters all
go there. Israel
has recently been raiding the hospital
and harassing
the doctors, even shooting tear gas inside the hospital.
They could kill patients that way.
5 November 2015
Qadhafi
Qadhafi's forces
did not massacre civilians
in the Libyan rebel cities
they recaptured.
When Clinton warned there would be a massacre in Benghazi, this claim
had no support
from intelligence.
The intervention was,
it seems,
intended simply to remove Qadhafi from
power
. Although for a time it appeared to lead towards democracy,
it led to chaotic violence that spread beyond Libya.
I've decided to spell the name "Qadhafi" because that follows the
standard
transliteration of Arabic. "Gaddafi" is more common, but not correct.
5 November 2015
Liberal media
Right-wing US politicians
invented
the "liberal media" claim in the
1950s. In fact, the US mass media were predominantly right-wing then,
before, and since.
5 November 2015
"Death to America"
Ayatollah Khamenei
says
that the slogan "Death to America" refers to
US policies and arrogance, not the the American nation.
This makes a big difference. If Iran declares a wish for genocide
against Americans, we would have to consider Iran an enemy. But when
it condemns only how the US government treats and has treated Iran
(and possibly some other countries), Americans can easily recognize
valid points in that criticism. This provides a basis for patriotic
Americans to push for the changes in the US needed for reconciliation
with Iran.
The remaining cause of friction between the US and Iran has to do with
the Iranian regime's oppression of Iranians. Progressive Americans
really care about these injustices. US plutocrats probably don't.
If the US were to support Iran totally, that would be wrong,
just as it is wrong for the US to support Saudi Arabia and Egypt
today.
When Khamanei dies, there may be an opportunity for diplomats to
lead
both countries to correct their wrongs.
5 November 2015
China moves to clean energy
Christiana Figueres, the UN's head climate official, says that China
is trying very hard to move
to clean energy, while the US is
dragging
its feet.
In China, the state is a plutocrat. In the US, private plutocrats
control the state. As a result, China is capable of making an
investment for long-term good, while the US is blocked by the
plutocrats.
5 November 2015 (
Domestic violence
The UK government is treating help for women facing domestic violence
as
it is treating renewable energy
4 November 2015 (
Jewish-Arab peace
Calling for a
Jewish-Arab
peace and justice party
in Israel.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
4 November 2015 (
Birth control education
Non-extremist imams in Afghanistan
teach
the use of birth control.
04 November 2015 (
Banned book in Ukrainian library
Russia says
it
arrested the director of the Ukrainian library
because it had
a banned book. The deputy director says that the banned book in question
was not theirs; that Russian thugs planted it to frame them.
We don't need to ask which one is telling the truth, because the
Russian state is wrong either way. It is wrong to ban books.
04 November 2015 (
Selling "smart guns" in the US
Companies that try to sell "smart guns" (with access control) in the
US have faced
violent threats.
The access control in these guns is not DRM, because it is under the control of the gun owner.
04 November 2015 (
Replacing the FISA court
Chelsea Manning calls for replacing the FISA court with courts that will make it their mission to
resist
unreasonable searches.
Limiting access to digital dossiers is not sufficient to protect
whistleblowers from being identified. We need to
redesign
digital systems
so that they don't collect digital dossiers, except about
court-designated targets.
04 November 2015 (
Detroit thug prosecuted
A thug from near Detroit shows how much violence a thug can get away with in the US.
Finally
he is being prosecuted.
04 November 2015 (
UK transfers spending from poor people
As UK transfers its spending from poor people to nuclear power plants,
more people are homeless. In once city,
volunteers
have organized to give
them breakfast.
That will work for a while, but as the Tories continue cutting further,
many of those now giving will join the hungry or the homeless.
As Aneurin Bevan said,
the
Tories are lower than vermin.
04 November 2015 (
Apples censored Chaos Congress app
Apple censored an app to display videos presented at the Chaos
Communications Congress
because
it did not censor presenters as Apple demands.
Apple's censorship is wrong, now as always, and designing computers as
platforms for censorship should be illegal.
However, it is also wrong to make proprietary apps for the iThing.
The Chaos Computer Club should do its streaming on the World Wide Web
using a freedom-respecting video format.
04 November 2015 (
TransCanada and Keystone XL
TransCanada has tried to delay its application to build the Keystone XL
pipeline,
hoping
to defer the decision to the next president.
Perhaps it is betting the next president will be bought. Or perhaps
it's no longer profitable. Obama may still be able to veto it if he
wishes.
I often referred to Keystone XL as the "planet-roaster pipeline",
because it would enable the export of a decisively dangerous
amount of tar sends oil.
This does not mean that avoiding the Keystone XL will make us safe.
We need to leave 80% of the world's known fossil fuels in the ground,
just to keep
global heating
to under 2C. There are many fossil fuel
projects that could roast our planet, many chances to fail.
In the real World Series, humanity vs plutocrats, humanity is losing.
We need to win nearly every game from here on.
04 November 2015 (
"Cloud passports"
Australia's latest horrible idea:
passports
that are only data in a server.
They call them "cloud passports", using the standard buzzword.
There is no "cloud" — only other people's computers.
The passport data would be stored in some computer, but whose?
And how will that computer be run?
Storing passports as data in some server will eliminate the problem
that tens of thousand of passports are lost or stolen (mostly lost)
individually, and introduce the problem that millions could be stolen
at once digitally.
I suspect this will also involve a lot more biometric data than now.
04 November 2015 (
Imprisonment for criticizing chief minister
An Indian singer faces possible life imprisonment for
criticizing
the chief minister of Tamil Nadu state.
The chief minister, in India, is the equivalent of a governor in the US.
I don't agree with the singer's position in favor of banning alcohol.
I have no idea whether the chief minister profits from sales of
alcohol. It is not clear whether the singer accused the chief minister
personally, or the state government, of getting profits from alcohol.
What is important is that saying such things must not be a crime.
04 November 2015 (
Drink less soda
Soda
companies
fund "health" organizations to corrupt them so that
they won't take action to lead people to drink less soda. They also
promote campaigns for people to exercise more, so as to deny space
to campaigns to drink less soda.
Soda with sugar leads to obesity, but
soda
with sugar substitutes is not innocuous;
they tend to confuse the brain.
04 November 2015 (
Urgent: Close loophole
US citizens: call for closing the
carried
interest loophole
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
04 November 2015 (
Retreat of ice in Western Antarctica
Researchers say that ice in Western Antarctica is
irreversibly
retreating
— there is no way to prevent it from raising sea
level by 3 meters, though that will take centuries.
04 November 2015 (
US foreign policy
In many countries, the US practices a foreign policy that is
wicked
(and absurd too)
04 November 2015 (
Inequality
Why
Every Environmentalist Should Care about Inequality
03 November 2015 (
French Pun
New pun: Le
climat d'Alger
03 November 2015 (
Urgent: Prosecution of Exxon
US citizens:
call
for prosecution
of Exxon for fraudulently denying global heating.
03 November 2015 (
Urgent: Discharge petition for gun-control
US citizens:
call on
Pelosi
to file a discharge petition for a gun-control bill.
This discharge petition is a step towards reducing the number of
discharges of guns.
03 November 2015 (
LA thug sentenced to prison
An LA
thug
has been sentenced to prison because he
let
his deputies beat up a man
who came to visit his brother in jail.
The rule that visitors can't bring portable phones may be legitimate,
but there is no reason to beat them up if they have one. Anyway,
doesn't each prisoner have a cell phone?
03 November 2015 (
Pentagon spending
Pentagon Spent $43m on
'World's
Most Expensive Gas Station' in Afghanistan
03 November 2015 (
The Migrant Crisis
There's
No
Perfect Answer to the Migrant Crisis
. We need to change foreign
policies that have destabilized so many countries and driven millions
to flee.
03 November 2015 (
Replacements for chlorofluorocarbons
The replacements for ozone-destroying chlorofluorocarbons
turn
out to be powerful greenhouse gases
; we need to switch again.
03 November 2015 (
Conviction based on secret evidence
Wang Yam was convicted of
murder
in the UK by a secret court
. Why is the evidence secret? That's
a secret too.
Wang Yam is now trying to appeal to the European Court of Human
Rights, but the government has arbitrarily vetoed this.
03 November 2015 (
Discussion of sex-work trafficking in Wisconsin
A discussion of sex-work trafficking in Wisconsin has been totally
confused, because it is based on blindly
labeling
work by teenagers as "trafficking", and equating their customers to
pimps
Thus, when the article talks of "rescuing" minors from sex work, we
can't tell how many have indeed been rescued from pimps, and how many
saw their customers arrested and felt compelled to pretend to be
grateful.
No good can come from willful blindness about this difference.
Minors that do sex work are called "trafficked" even if they do it by
choice and have the option to stop at any time. No wonder that,
according to the article, many of the minors that are "rescued" from
"trafficking" choose freely to go back to it. Maybe they chose it
freely the first time, too.
The article acknowledges that they do this because their other options
are very bad. That's where they could use some help. But the state
of Wisconsin won't give them that.
I wonder how much of their problems are due to Wisconsin's Governor
Walker and his
attacks
on aid to the disadvantaged
, as well as
political
ethics requirements
and
campaign
finance laws
His policies are just the thing to force poor people into some sort of
underground economy.
03 November 2015 (
The Antarctic ice sheet
The Antarctic ice sheet is gaining thickness inland due to
increased
precipitation there
This doesn't alter the observed rise in sea level, so it means the
increase is coming from some other unknown source.
03 November 2015 (
"Sequester" imposed as "compromise"
SCROTUS
and Obama imposed the "sequester" as a "compromise" to cut the
US budget in all areas. Now they have a new "compromise" that expands
the war budget, while
threatening
Social Security and Medicare
Selling oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, when the low price
suggests buying it instead, is sabotage of the treasury. "Buy high,
sell low" is stupid, except when (as here) it is worse than stupid.
Ultimately, plutocratist politicians betray the country to their
paymasters.
SCROTUS
stands for Sleazy Congressional Republicans Of The United
States.
03 November 2015 (
Buddhist extremists in Burma
In Burma, Buddhist extremists
attack
women's rights, sex education, and any discussion about sex
The Buddha would advise those monks to question their attachment to
those prejudices.
I expect there is a word in Burmese for "vagina", but it was omitted
from the dictionary because it is considered too rude.
03 November 2015 (
Mandatory fun
Mandatory, organized fun as part of a job is a form of
manipulation
Japanese companies pushed this to extreme lengths. Someone I know,
who had no tolerance for alcohol and had to avoid it, had no choice
but to work for a government lab, because all companies would require
him to get drunk as part of "leisure" activities.
03 November 2015 (
Renewable energy investment cut
The suppository of all carbon emissions, Tony Abbott, succeeded in cutting
renewable energy investment in Australia by
almost
1/3
03 November 2015 (
Global heating
Even 2C of
global heating
will do great harm. Drastic action is
needed to avoid
climate mayhem
, and it
doesn't
look like leaders are prepared to do it
It isn't certain that 2C of heating is possible. It might be that
once warming goes beyond 1.5C (or 1.75, or 1.25, or some such amount),
a positive feedback will kick in and push the heating up to 2.5C (or
3C, or 4C, or 5C, or some such amount). We are playing with fire, and
the only certainty is that we must stop.
03 November 2015 (
Ukraine's Russia-supported rebels
Ukraine's Russia-supported rebels are
unhappy
now that Putin is dialing down that war
03 November 2015 (
Election rigging in Haiti
Haitian President Martelli is
using
government vehicles painted with Red Cross markings
to carry false
ballots to rig the election.
03 November 2015 (
Global heating and the Pacific Islands
Pacific Islands Make
Last-Ditch
Plea to World Before Paris Climate Change Talks
They will be inundated, and their people have no recognized right to
go anywhere else.
03 November 2015 (
Turkey's election
Erdoğan's party won the
election
in Turkey
. His war and his repression of the press have paid off,
leading
Turkey towards tyranny
Monitors say that
Turkey's
election was unfair
03 November 2015 (
Money from Haiti's supposedly empty treasury
Haiti's US-imposed president Martelli unilaterally
gave
each minister a golden parachute of $46,000
, although the treasury
is supposed to be empty.
03 November 2015 (
School thug's violent attack on teenager
The
whole
dirty story
about the school thug's violent attack on the orphaned
teenager because she would not give her phone to the teacher.
The teacher, the principal, and then the
thug
, were all defending the
principle of total obedience.
03 November 2015 (
Wolf-whistles and compliments
The
clash
of two world-views
about wolf-whistles and compliments.
In the posted highlights of the hours of
video
made by a woman walking in New York City
, some men were very pushy
and wouldn't take no for an answer. That's clearly harassment. Even
some brief remarks were harsh in their attitude. It is unkind to
treat someone that way.
However, there is no need to consider kind complements as harassment.
This is not a subjective question. You can get offended when someone
says "hello", but that doesn't mean we consider your offense justified.
03 November 2015 (
Billionaires suppress criticism
Billionaires including the Koch brothers
suppress
criticism by donating money
to universities, museums, public TV,
etc.
The Gates Foundation has done something similar
in
the field of US education
For a university to do what Florida State University did, and let
donors choose their professors, is a despicable surrender.
It would be well for students there to picket the economics
department ever year for this.
02 November 2015 (
New Pun
New pun: "Trinidadian"
2 November 2015
Marijuana
Ohio
proposes
to legalize selling marijuana, only for certain specific
companies that have invested in advance.
2 November 2015
Anti-Knowledge
The 'anti-Knowledge' of the elites in Washington
goes unchallenged
by the established press.
2 November 2015
Racial profiling
Standardized tests
can have the effect
of racial profiling.
The English Regent's Exam tests for a real skill, and the people who
fail that test really lack that skill. Is that important? That
depends on what they are going to do.
I speak French well enough to give speeches, have useful meetings with
public officials, and write articles for publication (though they
require editing by others). But I could not pass the French
equivalent of the English Regent's Exam, because there are many French
words and idiomatic expressions I don't know, and many references I
would not catch.
Would my failure on that hypothetical test be significant? Is my
command of French adequate or not? That depends on what activity I am
going to do. For understanding le Canard enchainé, I am hopelessly
incompetent; for championing free software in French, I seem
reasonably capable.
Likewise, whether someone's failure on the English Regent's Exam is a
real shortcoming depends on what you want that person to do. If it is
to have sophisticated conversations in English the way an educated
native speaker can, it is a real shortcoming and you should look for
someone else. For college study in a field other than English, the
failure at that exam may not matter.
2 November 2015
SXSW
SXSW cancelled panels about online harassment, giving way to online
harassment. In response to criticism,
it has brought
them back, and
added more.
Gamergate Didn't Fade Into Obscurity. We Just
Stopped Noticing
Its Existence.
It is cowardly to cancel an event because of threats —
especially online threats, which are generally nothing but bombast.
2 November 2015
UK's ash trees
A fungus
is going to kill
90% of the UK's ash trees. Should genetic
modification be used to make ash trees that can survive the fungus?
It seems plausible to me. These trees won't be fed to people, and
pesticide won't be used on them; that eliminates two of the main
issues. Furthermore, since the wild type is being wiped out anyway,
there is no need to be concerned that it will be contaminated by the
inserted gene.
2 November 2015
Female Bosses
Hurrah for Female Bosses, But
Let's Not Forget
Their Cleaners.
I would go further. What matters about the people corporate
boardrooms is not their gender, but that they have too much power and
get too much money. The poorly-paid female employees, and male
employees too, deserve a higher wage.
2 November 2015
Phone call metadata
The state
can learn
a lot about you from your phone call metadata.
2 November 2015
Spying Systems
6 Spooky Ways Local Law Enforcement
Is Watching
You.
I think we must
prohibit
several of these systems.
2 November 2015
UN Climate Summit
Upcoming UN Climate Summit
Can't
Overlook
China's Support of Global Coal Power.
2 November 2015
Thugs
When US officials prosecute
thugs
thugs organize retaliation
, in the
form of private and even official noncooperation, as well as frame-ups.
This is why they all deserve the name of "
thugs
". Anyone in
Albuquerque who claims the honorable title of
police officer
" should
validate that claim by publicly denouncing these retaliation campaigns
and affirming that
thugs
shouldn't get away with murder.
2 November 2015
Wall Street banks
Moving your money out of the big Wall Street banks
can be 20 times
as effective as it appears
2 November 2015
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress
approved
several specific three-year exemptions
to the DMCA's prohibition on breaking DRM (digital restrictions
management).
However, since the exemptions do not allow distributing the means to
actually do so, they may in some cases be impossible to take advantage
of.
The campaigns for these exemptions are a harmful distraction which
saps energy from what we really need: to repeal what the DMCA says
about DRM. It should be a crime to make systems with DRM.
The article uses the ill-advised term "digital locks" to refer
to digital restrictions mechanisms. See the explanation
of why that term is a bad analogy, and please join me in not using
it.
2 November 2015
Corporations United
The
Corporations United
(*) decision
allows companies to tell their
employees how to vote
, and one big investor is trying to do this
through all the companies he invests in.
This shows why we need a constitutional amendment that denies across
the board that corporations are entitled to human rights — not
just in regard to campaign spending.
* The front group used the misleading term "Citizens United"; there is
no reason for us to join it in misleading people about what it
represented.
2 November 2015
Republicans
Republicans in several state legislatures
have passed laws
to pre-empt
cities from regulating areas such as minimum wage and fracking; and they
remove local voter initiatives from the ballot, so that the city cannot
challenge the validity of the state's pre-emption.
2 November 2015
NSA
A German investigation
has determined
that the NSA spied pervasively on
the German government.
2 November 2015
Intellectual Freedom in UK
Intellectual freedom in in the UK
is threatened
by the right-wing state
and by left-wing students.
2 November 2015
Somalia
Now that the Somali pirates have been suppressed, illegal foreign
fishing
boats
have returned
to the area.
2 November 2015
Shaker Aamer
Shaker Aamer
suffers
from PTSD and will need years of treatment.
01 November 2015 (
Urgent: no tax break for BP
US citizens: insist that BP get
no
tax break from its damage payments.
01 November 2015 (
Urgent: the People's Climate Test
US citizens:
call
on Obama
to adopt the People's Climate Test.
01 November 2015 (
Urgent: rules for labeling meat
US citizens: call on the Senate to maintain the rules for
labeling
meat by country of origin.
01 November 2015 (
Forest fires make people sick
Indonesia's forest fires, a scheme for deforestation, have made
half
a million people
sick in the region.
01 November 2015 (
Publishers and writers attacked in Bangladesh.
Four more secularist publishers and writers have been
attacked
in Bangladesh.
01 November 2015 (
A limit on standardized tests
Obama said he has become disenchanted with standardized tests, and proposes a limit on them —
but
not a real reduction.
The issue is not how many hours students spend
taking
the
tests, but how much their studies are shaped around the tests, and
how the tests are used.
Bigger
policy changes are needed.
01 November 2015 (
Black Lives Matter protests
The FBI director admits he has
no
objective basis
for claiming that Black Lives Matter protests
caused a recent increase in crime. But he will blame them anyway.
He also blames the fact that people can use videos to demonstrate the
crimes that
thugs
commit. His argument is that anything that makes
thugs
hesitate to beat people up and lie about it constitutes an
impediment to their work.
01 November 2015 (
Forest fires threaten Orangutans
Indonesia's Forest Fires Threaten
Third of World's Wild Orangutans.
01 November 2015 (
"Sanctions" against the unemployed
The UK
refused
to investigate
whether "sanctions" against the unemployed are
achieving any of their supposed purposes.
01 November 2015 (
Throw stones and we hit you with gas
Israeli troops told Palestinians: "Throw stones and
we
will hit you with gas until you all die
— the youth, the
children, the old people…You will all die. We will not leave
any of you alive."
Palestinians are already being killed regularly by tear gas.
01 November 2015 (
State court elections
Money Flooding State Court Elections
Threatens
the Promise of Equal Justice.
01 November 2015 (
US options in Syria
How
presidential
candidates
stand on the US options in Syria, which all have major drawbacks.
The article has one section entitled "'Safe zones' and special forces",
but the section discusses only the safe zones, not special forces.
01 November 2015 (
Borrowing money to get an abortion
Women in Ireland and Northern Ireland have to borrow money
so
they can travel to England to get an abortion.
The way to end the stigma placed in Ireland on abortion is for women
to talk about their abortions unapologetically. It is imperative for
women in Ireland to stop acting ashamed.
01 November 2015 (
Doing business with Al-Sisi
Al-Sisi offers Britain the
sort
of tyrant
that Britain is accustomed to doing business with.
"I got 643 days of torture [in Egypt]. My tormentor gets
Cameron's
red carpet."
01 November 2015 (
Tap water not safe
Parts of the US no longer have tap water that is
safe to drink.
01 November 2015 (
Thugs' persecution
Lesbians occasionally bear, like blacks,
the
brunt of thugs' persecution.
01 November 2015 (
Transparency and privacy
Transparency for the State,
for the Rest of Us.
01 November 2015 (
Diets and weight loss
Diets generally
do
not achieve much weight loss.
Low-fat diets are the least effective, but perhaps that is because
low-fat food products have added sugar.
01 November 2015 (
Ending the death penalty
Sanders
calls
for ending the death penalty, legalizing marijuana, reducing
incarceration, and helping ex-cons get back into society.
01 November 2015 (
Repression in US public schools
The
thug
's
vicious attack on a sitting high school girl is the extreme
example of a systematic repression imposed in US public schools
generally. Any student can be punished or suspended for minor or even
fantasy "wrongs",
but
black students generally face worse treatment.
Suspension from school is extremely frequent: high schools suspend, each year,
almost as many students as they graduate. Smaller punishments are probably
far more frequent.
This system resembles a training program for living in an occupied
country, and students could understand it as such. The
thugs
in the
schools are soldiers in the occupying army, and the school officials
are the local collaborators, quislings (that's why they order quizzes).
The teachers are mostly sincere, trying to provide what education they
can under the occupation which they cannot defy, but that is easier
said than done.
The goal is to make trouble for the occupation without letting the
soldiers figure out who did it or how.
01 November 2015 (
US to assist Syrian Kurds
Obama is sending a
contingent
of US special forces
to assist the Syrian Kurds.
This seems like a good idea to me. A limited amount of help for the
Kurds could make a big difference for them in fighting
PISSI,
while avoiding the harm that a large US intervention force would do.
If the Kurds can cut off
PISSI
from the Turkish border, it would crimp
PISSI
's funds (obtained by selling oil) and recruitment (foreign
recruits come through Turkey).
Obama
should ask Congress for approval
of the US intervention against
PISSI. I expect he would easily get approval. The point is to maintain
the system of checks and balances.
01 November 2015 (
Suspected of setting fire to churches
A black man is suspected of
setting
fire to churches near Ferguson.
01 November 2015 (
Netanyahu's realm of lunacy
Uri Avnery says: in blaming the holocaust on a factional Palestinian
leader, Netanyahu went beyond the realm of dishonesty and
manipulation,
into
the realm of lunacy.
01 November 2015 (
Pregnant refugee Abyan
Australia will give pregnant refugee Abyan
another
chance to get an abortion.
01 November 2015 (
US foreign policy lies
Even Sanders goes along with
official
US foreign policy lies
some of the time.
Chavez won elections honestly, but his successor, Maduro, represses
the opposition increasingly as it grows in strength.
Sanders doesn't do everything right, but he's a lot better even on
foreign policy issues than the other candidates.
01 November 2015 (
Extremism is a form of patriarchy
Sara Khan tries to convince British Muslim girls to
reject
extremism
because it is a form of patriarchy.
I strongly dislike religious extremism, in any religion, even in the
Church of Emacs. However, people have a right to profess those views,
and it is wrong to prohibit them. The UK government has trashed so
many human rights already that I expect the worst.
01 November 2015 (
Neonicotinoids harm bees
A scientific review finds that
experiments
demonstrate
that neonicotinoids harm bees, but it is not yet proved
that they are responsible for colony collapse.
Since bees are crucial to agriculture, and to the survival of many
species of plants, we can't afford to risk it.
01 November 2015 (
Recording of browsing history
The UK government is about to demand
ISPs
record everyone's browsing history.
01 November 2015 (
New St Louis stadium
An NFL team wants to
drain
St Louis of millions
for a new stadium; a movement of citizens opposes the fans.
NFL teams are businesses. It's too bad so many Americans direct their
loyalty at businesses.
01 November 2015 (
Indian "climate of intolerance"
Major Indian historians have condemned the "climate of intolerance"
that encourages violence and censorship of dissent from
Hindu
nationalist ideology and myths.
01 November 2015 (
Market-dominated university system
UK students will protest to oppose the adoption of a
US-style
market-dominated university system.
01 November 2015 (
Shaker Aamer returned to Britain
Shaker Aamer has been
released
from Guantanamo
and has returned to Britain.
Rebellious officials in the Pentagon
delayed
his release for 5 years
by refusing to let him go back to the UK.
He is going to
sue
the British government
for complicity in his imprisonment and torture.
He certainly deserves compensation, but if the UK government settles the case
to avoid exposure of its wrongs, that will not do justice.
01 November 2015 (
"Unarmed civilian protection"
"Unarmed civilian protection" persuades armed groups in South Sudan
to
refrain from violence,
at least some of the time.
01 November 2015 (
Assad fired missiles at a market
Assad's forces
fired
missiles at a market
and killed at least 40 people. I would expect
most of them were civilians.
01 November 2015 (
Indonesia is burning
Indonesia
Is Burning.
So Why Is the World Looking Away?
01 November 2015 (
Urgent: Replace CNN commentator
Everyone:
call on
CNN
to replace commentator Harry Houck, who never saw a violent
thug
he didn't like.
01 November 2015 (
Criminalizing criticism
Criminalizing criticism of officials
threatens
democracy in Malaysia
Democracy in Malaysia was never very strong, which makes it even more
vulnerable now.
01 November 2015 (
Large forest fire in the Amazon
A large forest fire is
burning
in the Amazon "rainforest"
, and has been burning for two months.
This suggests o me that there is not as much rain as there normally
used to be.
Large parts of Brazil have suffered from an
unprecedented
drought
Global heating
could play some role in this, but the cutting down of
much of the forests are responsible for both.
01 November 2015 (
Current carbon pledges
The UN says that current carbon pledges will probably keep global
heating to
under
3C
That is still taking too big a risk. Even the 2C target is somewhat
arbitrary, since we don't know it will avoid disaster (or
positive-feedback tipping points that would push warming further).
In addition, without an enforcement mechanism, we can't be confident
all the countries will carry out their unilateral pledges.
01 November 2015 (
Internet censorship in US universities
Various
organizations demand internet censorship in US universities
to
eliminate racist statements and insults.
I find some of those statements disgusting — others are merely
foolish — but censorship is far more disgusting.
The scariest thing is that this sort of censorship has already become
deeply implanted in many otherwise free countries. And in some of
them, such as France and the UK, it is spreading to other kinds of
censorship.
01 November 2015 (
Jailed for talking to children
Pennsylvania has jailed a man for
telling
children on the street that he was on the way to a cabin in the
woods
A paranoid US parent, who has probably heard exaggerated stories about
the
nearly
nonexistent "stranger danger"
, reported this as suspicious.
Perhaps
thugs
regarded the man as dangerous because he is autistic
and could not rebut the suspicion.
01 November 2015 (
Haiti's election
Haiti's "president" Martelly is
trying
to impose a successor by rigging the election
The US imposed Martelly through
blatant
contempt for the Haitian
electoral system
01 November 2015 (
Guber for piecework "journalists"
Following
Guber
, a new service
matches
up PR companies with piecework "journalists"
that will take pay to
write their press releases into "news articles".
I call it
"Guber"
because it pays
drivers peanuts, but there are many reasons why we should refuse ever
to use
Guber
01 November 2015 (
Censorship on the rise
Censorship
on Rise as Global Internet Freedom Continues Downward Spiral
01 November 2015 (
Gulf of Maine too warm for cod
The Gulf of Maine is now
too
warm for cod to live there
This area of the sea used to be a major cod fishery, though they were
mostly wiped out by overfishing a few decades ago. Massachusetts must
now replace the
Sacred Cod
with
Sacred Car.
31 October 2015 (
NSA snooping collateral damage
Challenging the NSA to say
how
many Americans it snoops on
as collateral damage.
31 October 2015 (
Asylum for Edward Snowden
The European Parliament voted symbolically
in
favor of offering asylum to Edward Snowden
. It has no power to
actually do this, but it is good to endorse his cause so visibly.
I think the US should welcome Snowden home with a medal.
31 October 2015 (
Deforestation and Ebola
Deforestation
May
Have Started West Africa's Ebola Outbreak
".
31 October 2015 (
Soviet Union sentimentalized in Russia
In Russia, everything about the Soviet Union is being
sentimentalized
even prison camps and executions.
31 October 2015 (
Solitary confinement in California
California has limited solitary confinement in prisons, but it is
still
done in jails
, where many of the inmates have not been convicted
of a crime. Sometimes it is done "for their protection".
31 October 2015 (
China relaxes one-child policy
China has relaxed the one-child policy,
allowing
all families to have two children
This policy has done tremendous good for the Chinese people, and for
the world as a whole. Perhaps China has gone through the demographic
transition and the policy is not needed any more. If so, that's nice,
and partly the consequence of having that policy.
The "demographic catastrophe" is an exaggeration. If there is a
shortage of labor in China, factories can move to India, which has
plenty of poor people who could use jobs.
With modern medical care, old people who are still well can delay
their retirement. If there is truly a shortage of labor in China,
those older workers can fill the gap. That won't cause harm.
The situation where delaying people's retirement is unjustified is
when there are too few jobs, as in the US. In these circumstances,
requiring old people to keep working
forces
younger people into unemployment
As for men that can't find female mates, they should learn to share.
31 October 2015 (
B'liar's lies
Laying out
the
evidence
proving that Tony B'liar lied about Iraq's weapons
programs to create an excuse for the war he and
Dubya
had already
decided to launch.
31 October 2015 (
Reduced US military spending
If the US reduces its military spending,
what
other related policy changes should it make
31 October 2015 (
Corporate-supremacy treaties
Alfred-Maurice de Zayas says that corporate-supremacy treaties such as
the TPP
contradict
the UN charter
. This could be used to argue that parts of them
are void.
31 October 2015 (
Tory contempt for Britons that go hungry
The Tories express
open
contempt for Britons that go hungry
, and the food banks that help
them when the state will not.
Aneurin Bevan had it right: the
Tories are
lower than vermin
I hope they are sentenced to experience the same hunger, some day.
But not their children.
31 October 2015 (
Koch brothers want to permit more corruption
The Koch brothers are
running
a campaign in Wisconsin
for laws to permit more corruption.
31 October 2015 (
Urgent: Richland schools
Everyone: call on the Richland schools
to
change the practices hat put students in danger from thugs in their schools.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
Here's the
historical
background
of these practices, which created today's school-to-prison pipeline.
31 October 2015 (
Urgent: prosecute thug that attacked student
Everyone: call for
prosecution
of the
thug
that grabbed and attacked the sitting high school student.
31 October 2015 (
Urgent: government contractors
US citizens: call on Obama to require government contractors to
disclose
their political spending.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
31 October 2015 (
Urgent: cancel approval of sulfoxaflor
Everyone: call on the European Commission to
cancel
its approval
of a new neonicotinoid pesticide, sulfoxaflor.
31 October 2015 (
Afghans flee to Europe
Thousands of Afghans flee each day, trying to get to Europe.
They
fear the Taliban will win
If all of them joined militias to fight the Taliban, they would defeat
it. But the government does not inspire that kind of loyalty.
31 October 2015 (
North Korea sent forced laborers to foreign countries
Reportedly North Korea has sent 50,000 people as
forced
laborers to foreign countries,
including well-known tyrannies, but also Poland.
How could this be occurring in Poland, a part of the EU?
31 October 2015 (
Library director arrested
The director of the Library of Ukrainian Literature, in Moscow, has been arrested
because
the library has banned books.
31 October 2015 (
Poachers kill vultures
Poachers that kill mammals in Africa kill vultures too.
The
lack of vultures can cause disaster.
31 October 2015 (
Indonesia is biggest CO2 emitter
Indonesia
is temporarily the biggest CO2 emitter
due to large forest fires
that were intentionally set for the purpose of deforestation.
The motive for the deforestation is to produce palm oil.
The deepest lesson here is that if we don't take strong measures,
there will be less and less room for anything but human activities to
survive, until eventually
global heating
destroys civilization. Then
a large fraction of the human population will die, and the rest will
swelter in poverty.
31 October 2015 (
Selahattin Demirtas and HD Party
The history of
Selahattin
Demirtas and the HD Party.
Erdogan's men blame the two most notorious bombings of Kurds on
PISSI,
and this could be true, but it doesn't mean Erdogan's men were not
involved. Turkey under Erdogan has given PISSI
considerable
support,
including allowing free passage to jihadi recruits.
Erdogan's censorship has
convinced
most of the public
that the Kurds carried out the bombing.
This reminds me of how
Dubya
's
support from right-wing US mass media
convinced many Americans that
Saddam
Hussein collaborated with al-Qa'ida.
31 October 2015 (
Refugee in Australia hanged himself
A refugee in Australia hanged himself
because
he feared being deported.
31 October 2015 (
Thugs seized journalist's laptop
UK thugs seized the laptop of a BBC journalist who was
interviewing
people in PISSI.
31 October 2015 (
US national dept
The US could deal with its national debt by making a few
trillion-dollar
platinum coins.
If the US expanded its money supply too far, whether this way or via
debt as it currently does, eventually that would cause high inflation.
But there is a substantial way to go before that happens.
31 October 2015 (
Nuclear was averted in 1962
In 1962, during the Cuban missile crisis, a US nuclear missile team
received erroneous orders to launch. The commander of that team saw
something fishy and verified they were sent by mistake,
thus
averting a nuclear war.
There have been many other near escapes, including that of the bombs
that could easily have detonated
when
they fell over the US.
We can't rely on lucking out every time, so we can't regard
the current
nuclear
deterrent situation as safe.
30 October 2015
Shao Jiang will not be charged
London protester Shao Jiang
will face no charges
The minister in charge of
thugs
refused to comment on the arrest of
Shao Jiang, saying that to do so would interfere with the
"investigation". This is obvious bullshit for two reasons; but now
that there is no more "investigation", what excuse will he give?
30 October 2015
Fire season in US west getting longer
The
lengthening fire season
in the US west, caused by
global heating
is replacing forests with shrubs.
30 October 2015
Sanders proposes to remove marijuana from Schedule I
Bernie Sanders proposes to
remove marijuana from Schedule I
so that states could legalize it and it could easily be prescribed.
30 October 2015
EU caves in to auto industry
EU Caves In to Auto Industry Pressure for Weak Emissions Limits.
30 October 2015
Clinton remains a militarist
Clinton remains a militarist, and
wants
more US intervention
in Syria now.
30 October 2015
Abbas appeals to UN for protection
Mahmoud Abbas Appeals to UN for International Protection for
Palestinians.
30 October 2015
UK destroying public libraries
Now the UK is
destroying
public libraries.
30 October 2015
Massacres committed by Mexican thugs
Survivors report
two
massacres
committed by Mexican thugs.
30 October 2015
Violence against art and humans
"When Isis
blew
up three captives
tied to the Temple of Baalshamin's columns, it
proved the inseparability of violence against art and violence against
humans."
30 October 2015
Thugs' contempt for rape victims
When victims of domestic violence or rape call
thugs
for help, they
often
receive contempt
or even legal trouble.
30 October 2015
If Exxon told the truth about global heating
Imagine
If Exxon Had Told the Truth on Climate Change.
For one thing, activists wouldn't be using the term "climate
change", which was
imposed
by political supporters of Big Oil
precisely because it is vague
and doesn't clearly present the danger.
30 October 2015
Slave labour in the supply chain
The UK will require large companies to
publish
the policies they use
to avoid buying from firms that use slave
labor.
This will not automatically end the problem, since these policies
may have clever loopholes and may not really be carried out. Or they
may be null. Nonetheless, this may help.
It would be more effective to prohibit the importation of goods
made with slave labor.
30 October 2015
Why are drugs illegal?
David Nutt:
Why
are drugs illegal
David Nutt was a scientist advisor to the UK government about drug
policy.
30 October 2015
Turkish thugs attack media offices
The Turkish government's
thugs
attacked
the offices
of an opposition media group with TV channels.
It is talking about prosecuting more newspapers after the
election.
30 October 2015
Animal dung and the ecosystem
Large animals' dung fertilizes plants; by killing them off, humans have
damaged
ecosystems
30 October 2015
Helping Eritreans
Arguing that it is a mistake to try to help Eritreans to remain
in Eritria, because
the
state is too oppressive
What should we do in such situations? There is the obvious option
of invading, but how can we tell if that would make things worse?
30 October 2015
SE Asia to lose labour productivity to global heating
Southeast Asia could
lose
16% of its labour productivity in 30 years
due to the effects of
global heating
I am not sure if this really applies to Singapore, because people
live and work in air conditioned areas there.
30 October 2015
Curbing global heating creates jobs
Curbing
global heating
provides a way to
make
lots of jobs
— economic growth focused on the non-rich.
30 October 2015 (
Urgent: attacks against Planned Parenthood
US citizens: call for a
terrorism
investigation
into the series of
attacks against Planned Parenthood facilities.
30 October 2015 (
Prosecuted US thugs
A dozen US thugs have been prosecuted this year,
yet
the proportion of deaths leading to charges remains small.
Few of the thugs that are prosecuted are
convicted.
The UK seems to make a much firmer line towards
thugs
that commit crimes.
30 October 2015 (
Permanent oppression of Palestinians
Netanyahu says he intends to continue Israel's occupation of Palestine
indefinitely.
By rejecting both an independent state of Palestine and equal rights
in Israel for Palestinians, he chooses permanent oppression,
and no longer even hides it.
Palestinians have no partner for peace, so they are turning towards the idea of a
competition
of birthrates.
The ultra-orthodox Israelis and the right-wing fanatics are competing
back, bringing the prospect of an overpopulated country which can't
survive at all, especially if
global heating
goes to work.
30 October 2015 (
Chevron paid judge to lie
Chevron's US case against Ecuador (to avoid paying the damages Chevron
owes for pollution from oil wells) was based on one corrupt witness, a
former judge in Ecuador,
who
has now testified that Chevron paid him to lie.
It appears that the US judge that presided over the trial split hairs so as
to find in Chevron's favor despite the untrustworthiness of this witness.
I wonder what convinced him to do that.
30 October 2015 (
Global heating could start wars
The Pentagon is very concerned that
global
heating could start more wars in the near future.
30 October 2015 (
Legal aid for ex-cons
The US must give all ex-cons legal aid in getting over the
barrier
separating them from a life of non-crime.
While I agree, I think we need to do much more. Mere legal aid won't
enable ex-cons to have an option other than stealing food.
30 October 2015 (
Shao Jiang and his wife
London thugs have not told protester Shao Jiang and his wife what
"conspiracy"
they suspect him of.
30 October 2015 (
"Health savings accounts"
Ben Carson
wants
to abolish Medicare and Medicaid.
He would replace these with
"health savings accounts", which only America's shrinking middle class
could afford to put money in.
He also compares women that want abortions to
slave owners.
30 October 2015 (
Boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel
France has made it a
crime
to advocate boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel. France
has adopted the bogus position that this constitutes anti-semitism.
(In fact, the campaign explicitly rejects the idea of boycotting Israeli
individuals, let alone Jews in general.)
You can't find a clearer form of political repression than that.
As it happens, France still permits advocating sanctions against any
other country, but that does not alter the principle at stake here.
30 October 2015 (
Protest against thug murders
Director Quentin Tarantino joined a protest against thug murders, saying
"I'm
on the side of the murdered."
New York thugs respond by calling for a boycott of his films.
What is notable here is the way
thugs
organize to attack anyone that
doesn't bend over backwards to overlook their violence.
I recommend staying away from Tarantino's films, because I find the
(fortunately fictional) violence in them hard to bear.
30 October 2015 (
Meta-analyses of antidepressants
Meta-analyses of tests of antidepressants have been pervasively corrupted
by influence of big pharma companies,
and
that affects their results.
30 October 2015 (
Senate rejects CISA amendments
Senate Rejects All CISA Amendments Designed To Protect Privacy,
Reiterating
That It's A Surveillance Bill.
30 October 2015 (
Prosecution of Leopoldo Lopez
A Venezuelan prosecutor says that the government planned to prosecute Leopoldo Lopez
before
his supposed crime was supposedly committed.
30 October 2015 (
Thug that shot Zachary Hammond
The thug that shot Zachary Hammond
will
not face charges
even though video contradicted his statements about the reason.
It appears Hammond was really committing a crime, and had driven his
car at the
thug
(which was a real threat to him), but the threat had
already ceased when the
thug
killed him.
30 October 2015 (
Germaine Greer
I Get Why Women Are Angry — But I Still Want to Listen to
Germaine Greer.
30 October 2015 (
Sugar and children's health
conclusive
experiment
shows that sugar is much worse for children's health
than the equal number of calories from other sources.
This argues for imposing a tax on sugary drinks.
Note that
sugar
substitutes
are also bad for people.
30 October 2015 (
Torture and massive surveillance
US courts used flimsy excuses to
deny
justice
in cases about torture and massive surveillance.
30 October 2015 (
Global carbon price
The Paris conference has
given
up
on establishing a global carbon price. It seems they are not
even thinking about the carbon tax that we
really need.
30 October 2015 (
European "network neutrality"
The European Parliament adopted a "network neutrality" directive that is
too
weak and vague to do much good.
30 October 2015 (
Ground combat against PISSI
Obama is planning to
increase
US ground combat against PISSI.
US troops cannot defeat
PISSI
on the ground, just as they could not
defeat the Sunni resistance in Iraq in the last decade. They can only
suppress it locally temporarily.
However, he is also willing to include Iran in negotiations about the
future of Syria.
This might unblock some log jam.
29 October 2015
Planned Parenthood raids
Texas raids on Planned Parenthood are
collecting patients' health records
29 October 2015
Americans worry about everything but climate
Americans worry about nearly
all sorts of problems
more than about
climate mayhem
I suppose that's because they have short time horizons.
The danger of
global heating
will grow across decades, but unless
you're living in certain drought areas, the chances it will hurt you
in the US in the next few years are small.
29 October 2015
Charged for assault with baby carrot
A student who
threw a baby carrot
at a teacher faces criminal charges.
This is the school-to-prison pipeline at work.
29 October 2015
US admiral punished by promotion
US Admiral Losey
punished subordinates
for no reason, but his punishment is a promotion.
29 October 2015
Value of CEOs
CEOs get too much credit (and blame) for a company's success (or
failure). In 70% of the cases, the results
were due to chance
29 October 2015
Obama campaigns against debt relief
The Obama regime
campaigns against debt relief
for US students.
29 October 2015
Bankster crime impossible to prosecute
Modern
bankster
crime is often
impossible to prosecute
because it is so complex that juries can't understand it.
Such complexity provides many places for fraud to hide, so I suggest
regulating banks by limiting them to the simpler practices of the
past.
29 October 2015
UK to remove children based on secret evidence
The UK's extremist government plans to
take children away
from their parents, if the parents are suspected of possibly
radicalizing them in the future. This will be done based
on secret evidence that the parents cannot challenge.
29 October 2015
Rules for workers' compensation
US companies have found a way to
write their own rules for
workers' compensation, which enables them to pay less or even nothing to
workers
that are injured.
29 October 2015
Saudi prince evades justice
A Saudi prince, accused of rape by his domestic servants, has
inexplicably not been charged
with rape.
One must suspect political influence was brought to bear.
29 October 2015
Church arsons in St Louis area
Arsonists have burned
five black people's churches
in the St Louis area.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
29 October 2015
Car pollution cap
UK, Germany And France Lobbying for Weakened Cap on Toxic Car
Pollution.
Companies always argue that they will make less money
if we don't give them more and more and more leeway.
29 October 2015
Sanders' political revolution
Bernie Sanders Is Actually Quite Serious About This 'Political
Revolution' Thing.
He sees the same factors that have made many Americans cynical,
but instead of responding with defeatism, he calls on Americans to
do what is required to overcome them. Americans, do it!
29 October 2015
Heating harms productivity
Society has done little to adapt to the
global heating
of the past
50 years or reduce the harm it has done to productivity.
29 October 2015 (
Bombing campaign in Yemen
Saudi bombs
destroyed
an MSF hospital in Yemen. The article does not tell us whether the attack was an accident.
Over 90% of the people killed by this bombing campaign — and by
the other explosive weapons of both sides — are
civilians.
Since this bombing campaign is endorsed and supported by the US, the US
is indirectly responsible. If the US and Saudi Arabia had not launched
this campaign, the Houthis would have won the war in Yemen and there would
be less fighting there now — perhaps none.
29 October 2015 (
Dam in Cambodia
Local and foreign activists have blocked construction of a dam in Cambodia
that
would have harmed endangered species.
29 October 2015 (
Al-Sisi's UK visit
UK opposition leaders call for
cancellation
of the invitation for al-Sisi to visit the UK.
29 October 2015 (
Indonesia returning to censorship
Indonesia is returning to the censorship of the Suharto era,
under
the influence of the military and Islamists.
An Indonesian exile was deported to Sweden for trying to visit the
mass grave of his family, slaughtered in the massacre of 50 years ago.
Assuming he was an Indonesian citizen who fled, I wonder on what
excuse they could deport him from Indonesia. Did Indonesia revoke
his citizenship when it was unable to murder him?
29 October 2015 (
'Too much medicine'
When Is Saving a Life 'Too Much Medicine'?
This
Is a Lifelong Test for Doctors.
It seems to me that Davey died as a person long before he arrived in
the hospital. His wife must have spent some time taking care of a
zombie (though not dangerous like fictional ones) because she couldn't
bear to recognize that that's what he had become.
I saw my father once after he had got Alzheimer's, and he could barely
recognize me. I concluded that he was dead. It was painful to see
him that way, but since he was not going to remember it, it wasn't
doing him any good; and didn't mean anything to me except to show me
that he was dead. I missed him but there was no point visiting his
occasionally walking corpse.
29 October 2015 (
Portugal's right wing party
Although the anti-austerity parties have a majority in Parliament,
Portugal's president asked the right wing party
to
form a government
(which it can't possibly succeed at).
29 October 2015 (
Thug manhandled student
A thug, apparently with a chip on his shoulder,
grabbed
a high school student and manhandled her
when she did not obey
his demand for her to leave her desk.
This is the school-to-prison pipeline at work.
What was the
thug
doing in the school? Was there any legitimate reason
for him to be present there?
29 October 2015 (
Postal banking in the US
Sanders explains the
need
for postal banking in the US.
29 October 2015 (
Egypt arrests journalists
Egypt
Arrests Three Journalists in Five Days,
Whereabouts of Two Unknown.
29 October 2015 (
Heating-denialist congressman
A heating-denialist congressman wants to investigate NOAA's emails
about calibrating older and newer temperature measurements.
He
doesn't like the results they demonstrate.
29 October 2015 (
NSA spy trojan
Top German Official
(or
rather his computer)
Infected by Highly Advanced Spy Trojan with NSA Ties.
29 October 2015 (
"Building bridges" between Israel and Palestine
It is too late for
"building
bridges"
between Israel and Palestine to do any good. Substituting
that for pressure is misguided.
I used to try to invite Israelis and Palestinians to work together on
free software, hoping this would aid the cause of peace. But Israel
since 2000 has become too right-wing for anything like this to help.
29 October 2015 (
Biggest hurricane in western hemisphere
The biggest hurricane ever seen in the western hemisphere was the result of
El
Nino piled on global heating.
El Ninos come and go, but we are driving the base temperature they
rest on steadily upward. In a few decades, the current record sea
temperature will be incredibly low for this time of the year.
29 October 2015 (
Active MSF hospital
More evidence
suggests
that the US military knew the target was an active MSF hospital.
29 October 2015 (
Anti-austerity parties in Portugal
Anti-austerity parties have won a
majority
in Portugal's parliament.
29 October 2015 (
Netanyahu's bizarre gaffe
Netanyahu's bizarre gaffe — scanning the horizon with binoculars
without removing the lens caps —
shows
the dishonesty of his character.
29 October 2015 (
Heat waves in the Persian Gulf
By 2070,
global heating
could expose the land around the Persian Gulf
to heat waves that are
fatal to humans.
29 October 2015 (
Journalists in Yemen
Journalists are being repressed heavily in
Yemen.
29 October 2015 (
Urgent: Black Lives Matter
US citizens:
call
for a Democratic presidential debate
about Black Lives Matter.
29 October 2015 (
Urgent: Investigation of CIA torture
US citizens:
call for a
special prosecutor
to investigate CIA torture.
29 October 2015 (
Urgent: Reject Jewish National Fund
Everyone (but particularly Jews and those of Jewish descent):
reject the Jewish
National Fund
, which funds land-grabbing and practices housing
discrimination.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
29 October 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose DARK Act
US citizens:
call on
Democratic senators
to stand firm against the DARK Act.
29 October 2015 (
Facebook lobbying for CISA
Facebook Quietly
Lobbying
for CISA While Being Shielded by Trade Associations
29 October 2015 (
Tory fracking plans
The Tories plan to permit fracking
in
areas important to water supply and biodiversity
29 October 2015 (
Coal mining
Calling
for a world-wide ban
on expansion of coal mining.
29 October 2015 (
Higher education in the US
Higher Education [in the US]:
Capitalism
At Its Most Despicable
29 October 2015 (
Carcinogenic foods
The World Health Organization warns that
bacon,
sausages and ham are carcinogenic
Although there is strong evidence that they sometimes cause cancer,
the magnitude of the risk is
much
less than the danger of smoking
29 October 2015 (
Russian submarines patrolling communication cables
The US says that Russian submarines are
patrolling
intensely
around undersea communication cables.
This may be true, but I doubt that Russia is interested in cutting
these cables. What would be the point of doing so? That would
alienate the whole world, not just the US.
Standard intelligence strategy is, "Don't block the enemy's
communication, listen to them." We already know that the NSA taps
cables; I suppose Russia is looking for ways to do likewise.
29 October 2015 (
High rents in London
With the high rents in London, people
can't
even afford private beds
29 October 2015 (
Protesters block large UK coal mine
Protesters have
blocked
a large UK coal mine
owned by a global heating denialist.
29 October 2015 (
Solar-thermal electric plants in Morocco
Morocco is building large solar-thermal electric plants
that can
keep
producing electricity for hours after sundown
The idea of exporting solar electricity from Morocco to Saudi Arabia
seems silly to me, simply because it would be more efficient to site
the solar generators in Saudi Arabia than to transmit the electricity
there from afar. Can the electricity be used to condense water
out of the air and grow plants?
29 October 2015 (
South Park explains gentrification
South Park explains
gentrification
Once in India I stayed in a hotel called South Park. Apparently the
TV show was not known there. There is also a chain of fine Bengali
restaurants in India called "Oh! Calcutta!". The people who work
there do not know about either the theater piece or the painting that
made the name notorious. It was a lot of fun giving them copies of
the painting and the publicity photo of the theater piece.
29 October 2015 (
Prosecution of women for being raped
The UAE
prosecutes
many women for being raped
This is among the most extreme of the many injustices of Islamic law,
which generally displays contempt for human rights, especially those
of women.
28 October 2015 (
Election in Haiti
The
background
of Sunday's election in Haiti.
28 October 2015 (
iThing users' data
The US government argues, in court, that Apple is obliged to
make
iThings decrypt users' data
because Apple claims it owns the
software running in them.
28 October 2015 (
Government searches in Wisconsin
In Wisconsin, many government searches were carried out
ordering
the targets not to tell anyone
, not even their lawyers.
Some of these searches appear to have been part of the investigation
of Governor Walker for campaign finance violation. It was correct to
investigate them, but people should not have been told not to tell
their lawyers about it.
28 October 2015 (
Israel using excessive force
The US government hinted that Israel was
using
excessive force against Palestinian protesters
, but timidly pulled
back after a reprimand from Netanyahu.
Alarm Grows over
Summary
Executions of Palestinians
Sometimes it is necessary to shoot a person who is trying to kill
others. The problem is that Israeli troops do this whether or not it
is necessary, even to innocent victims.
28 October 2015 (
Israel pushing Palestinians
Israel
arrests
Palestinian activists to prevent protests
Netanyahu is trying to push Palestinians to use violence because that
makes
it easy to put them in the wrong
. Israelis can get away with
violence against Palestinians, by
the
state
and by
groups
of fanatics
, but the world condemns all Palestinians when some of
them are violent.
28 October 2015 (
Concentration of wealth by policy
Poverty today is not a natural problem — it results from
plutocratic
policies that concentrate wealth
28 October 2015 (
Europe
Europe Is
Becoming
an Undemocratic Continent
Where Force Matters More Than Law.
28 October 2015 (
Prohibitions on sleeping in the UK
As cruel policies make more Britons homeless,
US-style
prohibitions on sleeping
are following.
The article says that this ban would only apply to people who are
offered a place to sleep and refuse it. Not many homeless people
would refuse a decent place to sleep, so why bother to prohibit this?
There has got to be some sort of catch in it.
28 October 2015 (
Putin's control over Russian media
Putin directly controls nearly all Russian media, the few exceptions
being foreign-owned, and Putin is now
getting
rid of those
28 October 2015 (
New Pun
New Pun:
"The dependable friend"
27 October 2015 (
Urgent: cancel Keystone XL
US citizens: tell Obama to stop farting around and
cancel
the Keystone XL pipeline.
27 October 2015 (
Urgent: stop McTeachers Nights
Everyone: call on McDonald's to stop the McTeachers Nights where
school
teachers teach bad eating habits to their students.
27 October 2015 (
Urgent: undersea oil drilling
US citizens:
call
on Obama
not to allow more undersea oil drilling in US waters.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
27 October 2015 (
Urgent: Felda uses slave labor
Everyone: call on Standard Chartered
not
to lend money to Felda,
which uses slave labor.
27 October 2015 (
UK thugs assume blacks are criminals
The president of the National Black Police Association has
direct
experience
with how UK thugs assume blacks are criminals.
27 October 2015 (
Thugs beat up Donovan Gardner
As
thugs
beat up helpless Donovan Gardner, TV commentators
disagreed about
whether
this abuse was justified.
27 October 2015 (
Radioactive waste caught fire
An old
radioactive
waste dump
in Nevada caught fire.
27 October 2015 (
UK welcomes neo-Nazi
The UK Gets Set to Welcome Ukrainian Neo-Nazi
Andriy Parubiy.
27 October 2015 (
Syrian refugees
Why Syrian refugees
increasingly
try to get to Europe.
27 October 2015 (
PISSI and the conquest of Iraq
B'liar admits that without the conquest of Iraq, which he and
Dubya
engineered,
PISSI
would not exist.
27 October 2015 (
Flaws in car software
Congress threatens to
prohibit
security research into flaws in car software.
The article fails to mention the car owner, but that person should
also be allowed to study and change the software in the car.
Here are
recommendations
for changing the bill.
27 October 2015 (
Car-to-car communication
It is not easy to design car-to-car communication systems
that
don't allow tracking all the cars.
27 October 2015 (
Send fewer to prison
Some US
thug
officials
want to send fewer criminals (and non-criminals) to prison.
27 October 2015 (
Resentment for US conquest of Iraq
Iraqi
PISSI
fighters that have been captured usually don't understand
Islam very well, and most of them are motivated by
resentment
for the US conquest of Iraq.
The US-backed
destruction
of Yemen
could motivate lots more bitter young men to fight for PISSI in the same way.
27 October 2015 (
Disintegration of Libya
Arguing that the disintegration of Libya was
inevitable
once Ghadhafi was overthrown.
This may have been true — but the article overlooks the point that
the west did not start the civil war in Libya. Libyans did that.
The western intervention initially prevented Ghadhafi from massacring
the rebels of Benghazi, then was redirected toward defeating him.
You can argue that Libya would be better off today if Ghadhafi had
reimposed his power and killed the rebels. The author of the article
would probably assert that. I can't say it wasn't true. However, we
must be skeptical of the hindsight that claims something was
predictable.
27 October 2015 (
Liberal Party in Canada
The Liberal Party in Canada probably has no intention of giving
Canada the progressive vision it appeared to promise, but perhaps
Canadians
can pressure it to do so.
There is nothing to lose by trying.
27 October 2015 (
Phone calls for prisoners
The FCC has slashed the cost of interstate phone calls for prisoners
by
a factor of as much as 100.
They remain shockingly expensive by modern standards.
Meanwhile, gouging is still allowed on phone calls within a state.
27 October 2015 (
Putin mistranslated
What Putin says appears much nastier when
mistranslated.
27 October 2015 (
Kurdish fighters captured by PISSI
US
troops joined with Kurds
to rescue Kurdish fighters captured by PISSI.
The rescue is a good outcome, and I hope the US will cooperate
increasingly with the peshmerga. However, I hope this does not mean
the start of a continuing US ground intervention.
27 October 2015 (
If Jesus lived in UK today
If Jesus lived in the UK today,
he's
be punished for "extremism".
Christians have committed plenty of extremist oppression, when they
have political power, but I am not sure that can be blamed on Jesus,
given that we know little about what he actually said and did. The
earliest documents were written many decades after he died.
27 October 2015 (
Palau's protected marine area
Palau is creating a
giant
protected marine area.
27 October 2015 (
Bombed hospitals in Syria
Russia has bombed
three
hospitals in Syria,
so far.
27 October 2015 (
Timber from illegal logging
The EU's program to stop import of timber from illegal logging
is
not working.
27 October 2015 (
Genetic engineering and software development
Why genetic engineering
is
not much like software development.
27 October 2015 (
Fight climate change for global stability
Fight Climate Change for Global Stability,
Say
US Defence And Diplomacy Leaders.
27 October 2015 (
Ozone limits too high
The EPA disregarded medical advice and proposed limits for ozone
that are
too
high to avoid causing health problems.
26 October 2015 (
Urgent: don't hide truth from investors
US citizens: Tell the Securities and Exchange Commission:
Don't
help Wall Street hide the truth from investors.
26 October 2015 (
Urgent: oppose CISA
US citizens: phone your senators
to
oppose CISA.
26 October 2015 (
Urgent: stop dehumanizing Palestinians
Everyone:
call
on the New York Times
to stop dehumanizing Palestinians
and cease covering the Israeli-Palestinian violence in a one-sided way.
26 October 2015 (
Urgent: oppose the DARK Act
US citizens: phone your senators
to
oppose the DARK Act.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
26 October 2015 (
Repression of West Papua
Indonesia's repression of West Papua includes
frequent
rapes of the indigenous women.
As a practical matter, journalists are still effectively excluded.
26 October 2015 (
"Stop and frisk" scheme
The US Border Patrol operates checkpoints inside US territory as an
arbitrary
and irresponsible "stop and frisk" scheme,
which appears to
be intended to catch drugs rather than unauthorized aliens. And it
does not keep proper records of what it does.
If they want to search your car, all they need to do is tell the
"drug-sniffing dog" to act as if it had sniffed some drugs.
26 October 2015 (
Falsified "benefits of coal"
The International Energy Agency is about to publish a
report
lauding falsified "benefits of coal", as a "disinformation tool".
26 October 2015 (
"Caring" for old people with robots
To save money, companies propose to "care for" old people with robots
and no human contact —
while
spying on and managing their every move.
26 October 2015 (
Manipulating elections through search results
Google can easily manipulate election outcomes through search results.
It might be doing so
without
anyone's intentionally trying.
26 October 2015 (
UK sabotages protests
The UK systematically sabotages protests by arresting
protesters and giving them bail conditions
barring
them from future protests.
26 October 2015 (
Roll-back of tuition fees increase
South
African students
protested massively and won roll-back of a tuition fees
increase.
26 October 2015 (
Fired under government pressure
Under US government pressure, professors are being fired for
academic
discussion of issues relating to sex.
26 October 2015 (
Lobbyists' in Democratic convention
The Democratic National Committee is now giving lobbyists
privileged
participation in next year's convention.
26 October 2015 (
Press repeats Ryan claims
Paul Ryan, hypocrite and bullshit artist, often gets the press to
repeat
his claims uncritically.
26 October 2015 (
Kidnap and torture of Colombian union organizers
Oil
companies in Colombia
work with the paramilitares to kidnap and
torture union organizers.
Leaked Map
Reveals
Big Gas Eyeing Most Biodiverse Place on Earth.
26 October 2015 (
Worked to death in Saudi Arabia
Domestic workers in Saudi Arabia take a risk they will be
worked to death.
26 October 2015 (
Lego censors Ai Weiwei
Lego refused to sell in bulk to
Ai
Weiwei
for an art project.
Fortunately,
others have offered to give him the Lego pieces he needs
for that art work.
Shame on Lego for censorship.
26 October 2015 (
Our chance to defeat Polio
Our Chance to Defeat Polio
Once
And for All.
26 October 2015 (
Iranian exile Shappi Khorsandi
Iranian exile Shappi Khorsandi talks about growing up in London and worrying
that
her father would be assassinated.
26 October 2015 (
Shao Jiang's house raided
Shao Jiang protested at Tiananmen Square, then fled to Britain.
UK
thugs raided his house
, apparently because he protested the visit
of Chinese strongman Xi Jinping.
He was arrested too, just for holding a sign. Protesters who held
Tibetan flags to protest Xi Jinping's visit to London
were
also violently arrested.
Looks like Britain has a new "special relationship". Will Cameron become
Xi's poodle?
UK
thugs
arrested housing activist Lisa McKenzie for allegedly
helping someone else
put
a sticker on a building.
McKenzie says they picked her out because of her organizing role in
the campaign.
26 October 2015 (
EU breaks environmental pledge
TTIP: EU Negotiators Appear to Break Environmental Pledge in
Leaked Draft.
More info.
26 October 2015 (
Civilians killed by US drone strikes
The New York Times and Washington Post are
Ignoring
Civilians Killed by US Drone Strikes.
26 October 2015 (
Give up confidentiality for medical data
A drug company will require patients,
unless
they pay the exorbitant full price,
to give up confidentiality for their medical data.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
This is an illustration of why "you must get the subject's permission"
is not good enough to protect privacy.
26 October 2015 (
Fires started in Indonesia
Large fires in Indonesia are
deliberately
started
in order to eliminate rainforests to make room for palm oil plantations.
This not only causes respiratory illness, even in Singapore and Malaysia;
it also emits so much CO2 that it is globally significant.
A large Indonesian palm oil producer has
adopted
a policy to protect forests.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
This is just a first step, since we can't take for granted that
companies will keep their promises.
26 October 2015 (
Pro-Israeli fanatics
Pro-Israeli fanatics
attacked
a journalist in Paris.
26 October 2015 (
Convicted executives of failed banks
Iceland
has convicted the executives of failed banks for their frauds,
and sentenced them to prison.
26 October 2015 (
Israel provoked Palestinians
Uri Avnery
reports
on how Israel provoked Palestinians to the string of knife attacks,
and how Israelis lynched an innocent man in response to one of them.
26 October 2015 (
China's long game
The Best Lesson China Could Teach Europe:
How
to Play the Long Game.
Although democracy is pretty sick in Europe and the US, there remains
much more than in China.
26 October 2015 (
ACLU's lawsuit against NSA
A US court quashed the ACLU's lawsuit against NSA's massive surveillance
on the grounds that
the
NSA doesn't admit it does the massive surveillance.
26 October 2015 (
Weak supervision of charter schools
US government money is handed to charter schools
(privatized
"public schools")
with weak supervision. Millions have gone to schools that
never even opened.
26 October 2015 (
Marijuana research
US government restrictions are
blocking
research into the effects of marijuana.
26 October 2015 (
Ryan wants to abolish large parts of US government
Paul Ryan wants to abolish large parts of the US government —
the
parts that help people rather than killing people.
26 October 2015 (
Second-hand smoke and tooth decay
Second-hand smoke seems to encourage
tooth
decay in babies.
26 October 2015 (
Arse visits London.
A giant Chinese arse
visits London.
25 October 2015 (
The felony murder rule
In most US states, having
any
sort of connection with a crime, in the course of which someone else
kills someone
, can get you convicted of murder.
This seems thoroughly unjust in most cases.
25 October 2015 (
Twitter to help companies track people
Twitter is going to help companies
track
the movements, actions and views
of people talking about their
products.
Perhaps this is part of why Twitter has been making trouble for users
that try to connect through Tor so as not to reveal where they are.
Twitter will not show those companies the movements of individuals,
but it will have to show those to the US government.
25 October 2015 (
Parents of Furkan Dogan sue Ehud Barak
The parents of Furkan Dogan, who was killed when Israeli troops
attacked a Gaza aid boat, have
sued
then-minister-in-charge Ehud Barak
25 October 2015 (
Best temperature for economic productivity
The
best
temperature for economic productivity is 13C
. As the average
temperature rises above that, productivity goes down.
The US and China are at that peak now, so
global heating
will harm
productivity in both. However, places that are already hotter will
suffer a bigger decline.
25 October 2015 (
Guatemala's judicial system
UN help has enabled Guatemala to make its formerly corrupt and useless
judicial system
work
honestly
25 October 2015 (
Saudi death sentences
72%
of Saudi Death Sentences Handed Down for Non-Violent Crimes
25 October 2015 (
Fewer acorns from oak trees
When spring is warm, oak trees produce
fewer
acorns
25 October 2015 (
Investigation of Wisconsin Governor
The Wisconsin Government Accountability Board members used private
email accounts (which was lawful) while trying to investigate Governor
Walker, because they couldn't trust their state email accounts not to
be monitored by his men.
Having arbitrarily quashed the investigation (apparently because
Walker was guilty), Walker's Republican allies in the legislature are
citing
this as an excuse to eliminate the Government Accountability
Board
No constitutional arrangements are strong enough to prevent shameless
scoundrels from destroying them.
25 October 2015 (
Urgent: reject GMO wheat
US citizens:
call
on the USDA
to reject GMO wheat.
25 October 2015 (
Urgent: cancel purchase of F-35
Everyone: call on Justin Trudeau to cancel Canada's purchase of the
overpriced
and troublesome F-35 fighter.
25 October 2015 (
Urgent: the killing of Tamir Rice
Everyone:
call
for a special prosecutor
for the killing of Tamir Rice.
25 October 2015 (
Phone and internet data retention
Germany
has instituted phone and internet data retention again. The new retention
is shorter and has safeguards that might protect
against the danger. However, it may also criminalize receiving leaked
information from whistleblowers.
25 October 2015 (
Model for democratic socialism
There is no need to point to Scandinavia as a model for democratic socialism.
The ideas have been
advocated
in the US
for centuries.
25 October 2015 (
Fanatical Muslims in Indonesia
Fanatical Muslims in Aceh, Indonesia, attacked a Protestant church,
as
part of a campaign to dismantle them.
Shari'a law tramples human rights. It hits women especially hard, but
it hits men also. It is an inexcusable injustice.
25 October 2015 (
Global heating endangers snow leopards
Global heating endangers snow leopards: the snow they blend in with is
melting.
25 October 2015 (
Tory voter suppression
A Tory voter suppression scheme may be
thwarted.
25 October 2015 (
Social pressure for political correct speech
Ben Carson wants the US government to
censor
universities
to resist social pressure for political correct speech.
25 October 2015 (
Properties confiscated by Nazis
Stephan Templ reminded Austria about properties confiscated from
Austrian Jews by Nazis; the state seems to have punished him by convicting
him of a
theoretical
crime that didn't really occur.
25 October 2015 (
Protect Palestinians under occupation
Proposing an
international
force
to protect Palestinians under Israeli occupation.
25 October 2015 (
14 days to argue against a fine
The UK says it will give
unemployed
people
14 days to argue against a fine before imposing the fine.
This change may make the system less cruel, but it may still run
people ragged.
25 October 2015 (
Filtering the internet in Yemen
The
Houthis
are filtering the internet in Yemen.
I suppose that their main enemy, Saudi Arabia, filters the internet too.
25 October 2015 (
Generic replacement for Daraprim
A company has found a way to sell a generic replacement for Daraprim
and
undercut
Shkreli's gouging price.
25 October 2015 (
Extra money to NHS
The Tories promised extra money to the UK's NHS, taking it from public
health services. Cutting them will put extra burden on the NHS and
cancel
out the benefit.
25 October 2015 (
Future demand for fossil fuels
The International Energy Agency projects future demand for fossil fuels
which are
systematically
exaggerated.
Fossil fuel companies use these figures
to influence government policies.
The Tories are
killing
off
the UK's booming renewable energy sector.
25 October 2015 (
National Defense Authorization Act
Obama
vetoed
the National Defense Authorization Act because of provisions
that would interfere with closing Guantanamo prison.
We often use "Guantanamo prison" as a stand-in for the unjust and
un-American practice of imprisonment without trial. It is not clear
whether, when Obama talks about "closing Guantanamo prison", he means
ending imprisonment without trial, or just moving it elsewhere.
25 October 2015 (
UK fawns on China's repressive rulers
As the UK fawns on China's repressive rulers,
one
British lawyer confronted participants
in the expensive support
rally that Chinese officials organized in London.
If you want to see the video, please don't let it lead you to run
nonfree software (Flash or JS code) or be used by
Facebook.
25 October 2015 (
Demonizing whistleblowers
A UN special rapporteur takes governments including the US to task
for
demonizing
whistleblowers they ought to protect.
25 October 2015 (
US-supported massacre in El Salvador
Just after University of Washington Center for Human Rights sued the CIA
about a possibly US-supported massacre in El Salvador, someone
stole
its computer
which held testimony from survivors of the massacre.
The article does not say whether they had a backup copy elsewhere.
They are afraid that the stolen data could be used for reprisals.
It is too bad they did not encrypt the data with GPG.
They did have backups, but apparently
did
not keep the files encrypted.
25 October 2015 (
"Moral case for coal"
Australia's "moral case for coal" was developed by a PR flack for
the Koch brothers as a last-ditch attempt to keep humanity headed
towards
maximal
climate mayhem.
25 October 2015 (
Prison for Exxon Execs?
Prison for Exxon Execs? Lawmakers Seek Probe of Oil Giant for
Hiding
Knowledge of Climate Change.
25 October 2015 (
1965 Indonesian massacre
Government pressure forced a
writers'
festival in Bali
to cancel events concerning the massacre of a million Indonesians in 1965.
25 October 2015 (
Signs of hunger
The American Academy of Pediatrics says doctors should
check
their child patients
for signs of hunger.
This is the result of the plutocratist policies that have spread poverty
in the US.
25 October 2015 (
Accused of witchcraft
In Papua New Guinea, women
accused
of being witches
are tortured,
sometimes to death.
24 October 2015 (
UK dumps poor people onto food banks
As food banks step in to fill increasing gaps in the UK's welfare
system, the state
dumps
more of the poor onto them
24 October 2015 (
ACLU suing Biloxi
The ACLU is suing Biloxi, Mississippi, for
running
a debtor's prison
24 October 2015 (
Children of non-Catholics in Ireland
Children of non-Catholics
face
exclusion from school
in Ireland because around 95% of schools are
run by the churches.
24 October 2015 (
Crowdfunding for court costs for poor people
A crowdfunding project
raises
funds for court costs
for poor people in the UK to sue.
24 October 2015 (
The good that abortions do
Abortion clinics publicize
the
good that abortions do
24 October 2015 (
Raids marijuana dispensaries
A US court
ordered
an end to federal raids
against state-licensed California medical
marijuana dispensaries.
24 October 2015 (
Laws against "hate speech"
Laws against "hate speech" are
dangerous
in various countries including the US.
24 October 2015 (
Waiting for help while black
thug
, not in uniform,
shot
Corey Jones dead
as Jones was waiting for help beside his disabled
vehicle.
The story told by the
thug
is not credible, and information is not
being released.
Thugs
are to murder of blacks
as priests are to sexual abuse.
24 October 2015 (
Internet shut off to sabotage protests
The Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville)
shut
off the internet to sabotage protests
24 October 2015 (
Back door in Western Digital disk drives
"Self-encrypting" disk drives do the encryption with
proprietary
firmware
so you can't trust it. Western Digital's "My Passport"
drives have a back door.
24 October 2015 (
Nomination for SEC commissioner
Obama has nominated an
SEC
commissioner recommended by Senator Warren
24 October 2015 (
Killer robots
Killer robots may be just a few years in the future, if we don't set
up a
treaty
to stop their development
24 October 2015 (
The US and Russia in Syria
The US and Russia have set up a
system
to avoid fighting each other in the air
over Syria.
24 October 2015 (
Housing for the poor and homeless in UK
To provide housing to the poor and homeless, the UK needs to increase
the tax on expensive houses and thus
encourage
the wealthy to release space to others
24 October 2015 (
Fukushima reactor cleanup worker develops cancer
A Fukushima reactor cleanup worker has developed
cancer
attributed to the radioactivity
24 October 2015 (
Homelessness in Hawaii
Hawaii Follows Los Angeles in
Declaring
State of Emergency Over Homelessness
24 October 2015 (
Pyrex
New pun: Pyrex
23 October 2015 (
Urgent: buying guns
US citizens: Obama,
stop
abusive boyfriends from buying guns.
23 October 2015 (
Urgent: legal representation for poor people
US citizens:
support
an investigation
of the lack of proper legal representation for
poor people charged with crimes in the US.
23 October 2015 (
Urgent: ban fracking
US citizens:
Call
on your state
to ban fracking.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
23 October 2015 (
Urgent: no bottled water in national parks
US citizens: call on Congress to
defend
bottled-water bans in national parks.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
23 October 2015 (
Dislike for the very rich
The very rich are
very
lonely
, being disliked by the many people they impoverish.
Many of them have a callous attitude towards the non-rich, which will
inspire even more dislike.
23 October 2015 (
Pogrom against Palestinians
Armed
fanatical "settlers"
launched a pogrom against Palestinians trying
to harvest their olives, wounding some of them, then started a fire.
Israeli troops watched this and told the Palestinians they need a permit
to pick their olives, then kept Palestinian firefighters away.
23 October 2015 (
Growth in CO2 emissions
The proposed Paris pledges would stop the growth in CO2 emissions,
but
would fail to reduce them.
That is still the road to disaster.
23 October 2015 (
Historians pound Netanyahu
Netanyahu tries to
falsely
blame
the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem for Hitler's decision to exterminate
Jews. Historians pound him for this.
23 October 2015 (
Data base of Facebook photos
Australia
is planning
to collect photos from Facebook for a national data base.
23 October 2015 (
Janitors in UK's Foreign Office
Subcontracted janitors that clean the UK's foreign office have
responded to a series of cruel laws
by
organizing a union and planning to strike.
23 October 2015 (
Sunscreen is killing coral
Sunscreen
is killing young coral organisms
in reefs near tourist areas.
Sunscreen in sewage released into the ocean
also
contributes to the problem.
But this doesn't matter much if we're going to
wipe
out the reefs entirely.
23 October 2015 (
Carbon pollution
Carbon Pollution:
the
Good, the Bad, the Ugly, And the Denial.
23 October 2015 (
Harper's attack on science
Harper's attack on science in Canada went so far that government
scientists' union is campaigning for
contract that respects scientific integrity.
The Liberal Party says it will reverse these changes.
23 October 2015 (
Russian military support
Russia is giving military support
to
the Afghan government and that of Tajikistan.
Russia, unlike the US, has a real interest in propping up the Afghan
government indefinitely.
How many ironies there are here. If the US had not attacked Iraq,
PISSI
would not exist and fanaticism in Afghanistan would not go
beyond the Taliban's level.
23 October 2015 (
Pollution by diesel cars
Diesel cars emit
more
NOx pollution
than a bus or a large truck.
23 October 2015 (
Publicly funded elections
Even some executives and lobbyists now advocate
publicly
funded elections for the US.
23 October 2015 (
UK nuclear plants owned by China
The UK has made a
crazy
deal
to build nuclear power plants to be owned by China.
23 October 2015 (
Human rights investigators in Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan is
arresting
and beating up
human rights investigators.
23 October 2015 (
Israel's territorial expansion
Israel's
unending
war
against occupied Palestine is not for its security but for territorial expansion.
In East Jerusalem, Israel's policy amounts to
gradual,
slow ethnic cleansing.
23 October 2015 (
Illegal tax-dodge
The EU has ruled that a common
multinational
tax-dodge
set up through Luxembourg or the Netherlands is illegal. Many large companies will
have to pay lots of tax.
23 October 2015 (
Driving out unauthorized immigrants
The UK plans to drive out unauthorized immigrants
by
making it impossible for them to rent housing.
23 October 2015 (
Voice commands over radio
Clever hackers discovered they can give
voice
commands
silently to other people's phones by radio.
23 October 2015 (
Sea level rise
According to conservative models, sea level
could
rise over a meter by 2100
. This would be disastrous for many
islands, whose people could be forced to stay there and die, and for
big cities such as Miami, New York, Houston, New Orleans, and
Guangzhou (Canton).
However, these models may be underestimates. Others say
meters of rise
is possible in this century.
This is uncertain; we might get lucky and have just one meter of rise.
Should we bet on that, or should we take precautions?
22 October 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose use of neonicotinoid
Everyone:
call on Pop Secret
and Pop Weaver
to use corn made without neonicotinoid pesticides.
22 October 2015 (
Urgent: Carcinogen classification
US citizens:
call
on California
to classify glyphosate as a carcinogen.
22 October 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose FDA appointment
US citizens:
object
to appointing pharma insider Robert Califf
as head of the FDA.
22 October 2015 (
Prosecution for "hate speech" in France
The leader of the French extremist party Front National is being
prosecuted
for "hate speech"
This prosecution is an injustice. What Le Pen said is a ludicrous
exaggeration, but she has a right to say it.
22 October 2015 (
Wasteful practices considered "masculine"
Many American men consider
wasteful
practices
to be "masculine" and therefore refuse to give them up.
22 October 2015 (
Anti-nuclear activist hounded into exile
Russia has
hounded
an anti-nuclear activist
into exile.
22 October 2015 (
Proposed UK laws attack human rights
Proposed UK laws to discourage "extremism"
attack
human rights
22 October 2015 (
Israel continues collective punishment
Israel continues collective punishment,
demolishing
the homes of families of killers
22 October 2015 (
Conservatives in Canada defeated
The Conservatives in Canada were
defeated
by the Liberals
In regard to
global heating
, it is
not
clear this is much of an improvement
22 October 2015 (
Punishing web sites for failing to censor
It is
dangerous
to punish web sites or journalists for failing to censor "terrorism".
22 October 2015 (
Nauru allows foreign reporter in
Finally Nauru allowed a foreign reporter in. Apparently he was
chosen
for his political views
22 October 2015 (
Japan to continue killing whales
Japan is going to disregard the World Court and
continue
killing whales
for bogus "scientific research".
22 October 2015 (
Failure of Libyan unity government plan
The Libyan unity government plan has failed —
one
government is Islamist and the other isn't
22 October 2015 (
Chicago's Homan Square torture station
Some of the victims of Chicago's Homan Square torture station are
suing
the city
It's not enough to make the city government pay for this.
The
thugs
who tortured people, who denied them access to lawyers,
must be prosecuted for this.
22 October 2015 (
US drone registration
US drone registration
may
exempt short-range toys
22 October 2015 (
Italian writer charged with "incitement"
Italian writer Erri De Luca was
charged
with "incitement"
after he stated the opinion that sabotaging a
new train tunnel would be legitimate.
I have nothing against building a fast train line from Turin to Lyon;
indeed, I wish it were operating now. But it is tremendously
important that people be free to say they think that violating some
law is legitimate.
22 October 2015 (
Extradition request used to harm Assange
After Assange invited Swedish prosecutors to question him in the
Ecuadorian embassy, the
UK
urged Swedish prosecutors not to do this
. "Please do not think
that the case is being dealt with as just another extradition
request."
More confirmation that this case — regardless of its actual
merits — is being used as an excuse to harm Assange.
22 October 2015 (
Censorship in Belarus
Defying
censorship
in Belarus, where publishers must get state permission
for each new book.
A similar system in England in the 16th century was the origin of
today's copyright.
22 October 2015 (
UK subsidizing nuclear power
The UK is
cutting
subsidies for solar power
but pushes ahead with subsidies for
nuclear power.
22 October 2015 (
Dubya and B'liar's agreement
Even in 2002, as
Dubya
and B'liar
pretended
they had not already agreed to invade Iraq
, there was evidence of
the truth that they had done so.
22 October 2015 (
Latest bogus argument for burning coal
The
latest
bogus argument for burning more coal
— for rural poor who
are not on the electric grid and thus can't make use of coal anyway.
Solar power is what those people could really use.
22 October 2015 (
Former CIA agent arrested in Portugal
Former CIA agent Sabrina De Sousa,
accused
by Italy of participating in a CIA kidnaping
there, has been
arrested in Portugal and may be sent to Italy.
She was convicted in absentia, and I think she will get a new trial if
she is delivered to Italy.
This is so juicy!
22 October 2015 (
Massive non-internet surveillance in the US
The EFF summarizes several systems of governmental massive
non-internet surveillance in the US.
- eff-police-primer.pdf
It doesn't mention remote-viewing cameras mounted at fixed sites,
but these do massive surveillance in places such as New York City.
Merely putting limits on the use of the massive dossiers that these
systems collect about each person is not sufficient to reduce
our level of surveillance to below that of the Soviet Union.
We need to eliminate
these systems or redesign them so that
they can only "see" court-designated targets.
22 October 2015 (
Prosecution of corporations down
The US Justice Department prosecutes fewer corporations nowadays,
though the
number
of potential cases has risen
22 October 2015 (
Thug body cameras
Putting body cameras on
thugs
won't
help without good policies for their use
I've proposed an automatic system to
stop
thugs from turning them off before attacking people
22 October 2015 (
Abortion in Ireland
Campaigning
to legalize abortion
in Ireland, where women have been killed by
the ban.
22 October 2015 (
Interesting political proposals
An interesting set of
political
proposals
, which I agree with nearly all of.
22 October 2015 (
Imaginary future US debt
SCROTUS
have
directed
the Congressional Budget Office to publish alarmist figures
about
imaginary future US debt.
SCROTUS
Sleazy Congressional Republicans Of The United States.
22 October 2015 (
Permission to post on the internet
The UK government
wants
to require unions to get advance permission
from the state before
posting on the internet.
22 October 2015 (
UK doctors and teachers quitting
The UK's relentless attack on public sector salary and working
conditions is
driving
doctors, teachers, and even thugs to quit
22 October 2015 (
Pro-conservation
Sherry Turkle: "I am not anti-technology, I am
pro-conversation
".
21 October 2015 (
US and Russia both fighting in Syria
The US and Russia are both fighting in Syria, and
could
get into war by accident
I find it peculiar that people in the West defend Putin's intervention
on behalf of Assad. Assad is a mass murderer and doesn't deserve
support. Alas, his main enemies (al-Qa'ida and
PISSI
) are just as
bad.
21 October 2015 (
CISA would encourage weak security
CISA, supposedly a bill to improve companies' cybersecurity, would
actually
encourage
weak security
21 October 2015 (
US gov't to require drone registration
The US government
plans
to require registration of all drone aircraft
Does this include even toys?
21 October 2015 (
Bernie Sanders' position on US wars
Bernie
Sanders' position
on the various US wars.
21 October 2015 (
Dubya and B'liar's agreement to invade Iraq
A US document (written by Colin Powell) shows that
Dubya
and B'liar
agreed to invade Iraq
year before the actual attack
— so their claims this was not
true were lies.
21 October 2015 (
Australian government's priorities
The Australian government is aware that it puts refugees into prisons
where their treatment ranges from cruelty to rape, so its priority is
to
prevent
any information about this mistreatment from leaking out
. Lawyers
and journalists are kept out by the puppet regime of Nauru. Workers
who observe crimes are threatened with imprisonment if they report
these crimes.
Nauru
confiscated
the employees' phones and computers
so that they could not talk to
journalists.
I suggest that ex-employees seek asylum in another country and then
report the crimes they have seen.
21 October 2015 (
The TTIP
The TTIP (
This Treaty Is Plutocratic
) is
likely
to require Europe to drop its food safety standards
21 October 2015 (
Feeding homeless people in Houston illegal
In
Houston It's Illegal to Feed the Homeless and for the Homeless to Feed
Themselves
The law against taking things from garbage bins does wrong to others,
too, including freegans, and would tend to cause more waste of food
and other useful trash.
21 October 2015 (
Abortion
Missouri Republicans
want
to require women to get permission from the father of the fetus
before they can get an abortion. If they were raped, they would have
to prove it.
How about requiring women to get permission from the father of the
fetus in order to
not
get an abortion?
21 October 2015 (
Koch brothers' tar sands lease in Alberta
The Koch brothers own the
largest
tar sands lease in Alberta
. They must be paying politicians to
support Keystone XL.
21 October 2015 (
Urgent: Remove US troops from Afghanistan
US citizens:
call on
Obama
to remove US troops from Afghanistan.
We achieve no good by propping up a government that can't inspire
enough loyalty to defeat the Taliban.
21 October 2015 (
TPP calls for destroying your computer
The TPP calls for
destroying
your computer, if you break DRM
. This would even apply to
security researchers who study devices with DRM or that have
locked-down software.
21 October 2015 (
Unreplicable economics research
A study finds that
half
of economists' papers' results can't be replicated
even with
cooperation from the authors.
Professor Sussman taught me in the 1970s that publishing the data that
the paper is based on is part of proper science.
21 October 2015 (
Thug tases store clerk for no reason
thug
tased
store clerk Damian Words for no reason
, then lied about it.
Words is suing the city, but that will not punish the
thug
. If Words
wins the suit, the city's taxpayers will pay, not the culprit.
Thugs
that lie must be prosecuted for it, and jailed.
21 October 2015 (
Google Books fair use victory
More about the Google Books
fair
use victory
21 October 2015 (
Faux News "terrorism expert"
Faux News
"terrorism expert" who claimed to have worked for the CIA
was
arrested
for telling the same lie to the US government
21 October 2015 (
Fewer arrests for marijuana in the UK
Budget cuts in the UK have one great benefit:
fewer
people are being arrested for possession of marijuana
21 October 2015 (
UK fawns over Chinese ruler
The UK
goes
to great lengths
to welcome the ruler who is crushing freedom in
China. "This fawning insults the people of both countries."
21 October 2015 (
Egypt's parliamentary election
Egypt's parliamentary election has
no
real opposition candidates
21 October 2015 (
Appeal for peace from a Palestinian
A Palestinian appeals to Israelis and Palestinians to choose
peace
instead of military occupation
21 October 2015 (
Canadian tar sands pipeline blocked
Indigenous peoples in Canada are
blocking
a tar sands export pipeline to the Pacific Ocean
21 October 2015 (
Refugee dumped by Australia
Refugee Mohammad Albederee, dumped by Australia in Papua New Guinea,
has been on hunger strike for six months because he
could
not get medical care
21 October 2015 (
Deported for taking painkillers
Australia
deported
a paralyzed New Zealander away from his family
which lives
entirely in Australia, because he committed the crime of taking
painkillers without prescription.
The general policy of deporting non-citizen residents that have
committed serious crimes that harmed others seems valid to me, but it
shouldn't be done rigidly. Taking pain killers doesn't harm others,
anyway.
21 October 2015 (
Ordinary Palestinians attacking Israelis
Apparently ordinary Palestinians are
suddenly
flipping and attacking Israelis suicidally with knives
It seems that they can't bear the occupation any more, and see no
effective way of campaigning to end it, so they do this.
By contrast,
when
Israeli "settlers" attack Palestinians
, they do it in organized
groups.
21 October 2015 (
Conservatives defeated
The Conservatives in Canada were
defeated
by the Liberals.
In regard to global heating,
it
is not clear this is much of an
improvement
21 October 2015 (
Rhino poachers
Kruger Park rangers have killed hundreds of rhino poachers, but
more
keep coming
21 October 2015 (
Turkey and Erdoğan's oppressive strategy
An
analysis
of Turkey and Erdoğan's oppressive strategy.
21 October 2015 (
Historic sites in Kosovo being destroyed
Many
old
Serbian churches and historic sites
in Kosovo are being desecrated
or destroyed.
Since the Albanian Kosovars won control of Kosovo, they should now
put their anger at Serbs to rest.
21 October 2015 (
Pope supports squatters' group in Rome
The pope sent a letter of support to an squatters' group in Rome that
occupies
buildings to help the poor
21 October 2015 (
Hawaii kicks homeless people out of tent city
Hawaii
kicked
300 homeless people out of a tent city
, and plans to compensate
this by building housing for a fraction of them.
It would be kinder to build housing first and invite some of the
homeless people to move to it.
21 October 2015 (
Protesters in UK face deportation
UK residents from other EU countries face
deportation
from the UK for participating in nonviolent protests
21 October 2015 (
Mistaking a fetus for a baby
There is a perverse movement among women to think that they should
carry
fetuses
with Downs' syndrome
to term, rather than abort them and try
again.
The overall effect is to increase the number of people that have
Downs' syndrome. I see nothing virtuous in that. The current fetus
is no more worthy than one without Downs' syndrome that they might
conceive later.
Next, people will take thalidomide to demonstrate how they can love
babies born without limbs.
Remember, a fetus is not a baby.
21 October 2015 (
Collecting newly discovered species
Why
scientists need to collect examples
of newly discovered species of
birds (and other animals).
20 October 2015 (
Ban on drilling in American Arctic waters
Obama has
effectively
banned
oil drilling in American Arctic waters.
We pushed and pushed for this, and he eventually did it.
20 October 2015 (
Book scanning ruled fair use
Google's book scanning has been
ruled
fair use
I was one of many who objected to the proposed settlement
between the Authors' Guild and Google, which would have given Google
alone the right to do such scanning.
20 October 2015 (
Ankara bombing
Ankara Bombing And the
End
of the Turkish Republic
20 October 2015 (
Pictures and videos of food
Pictures and videos of food
can
make people overeat
20 October 2015 (
UK thug corruption or racism?
Did corruption play a role in getting UK
thugs
to
try
to frame someone for the murder of Stephen Lawrence
, or was it
solely racism?
20 October 2015 (
Small children and guns
About
once a week
, a small child in the US shoots people with a gun.
20 October 2015 (
"Defamation" of parliament a crime in Kenya
Kenya has made it a
crime
to "defame" members of parliament
, for instance accusing them of
corruption.
20 October 2015 (
Slot machines
How slot machines are designed to be
addictive
for a certain segment of the population
20 October 2015 (
Snowden refutes Clinton's false claims
Snowden
refutes
Clinton's false claims
about what he could have done.
20 October 2015 (
Corporate supremacy treaties
The new wave of corporate supremacy treaties, which
allow
foreign companies to sue governments in secret
, "is tantamount to
a revolution against law, it is retrogression in terms of legality and
predictability, a no-man's land of arbitrary arbitrations."
19 October 2015 (
Urgent: EU citizens: net neutrality
EU citizens: phone your MEPs to defend net neutrality. A
recommendation from the Pirate Party says to tell your MEPs, "Please
in any case make a stand FOR net neutrality on 27th of October; this
means: If Martin Schulz allows amendments to the telcom-package, which
regulates net neutrality & roaming, then vote for the amendment of
Julia Reda, and if Martin Schulz doesn't allow amendments to the
telecom-package, then vote against the telecom-package."
It came with this link for making a call gratis:
19 October 2015 (
Urgent: Canadians: defeat the Conservatives
Canadians:
dozens
of reasons
to defeat the Conservatives, and a suggestion for how.
19 October 2015 (
Sanders rejects donation from drug gouger
Sanders
rejected
a donation offered by drug gouger Shkreli
19 October 2015 (
CISA
Many large internet companies have
come
out against CISA
, the "cybersecurity" bill that would encourage
those companies to "voluntarily" hand over people's data to Big
Brother.
19 October 2015 (
Clinton "supports" social security
Clinton says she "supports" social security, but there is
something
fishy in the details
19 October 2015 (
Polls suggest Sanders won debate
Polls
suggest that Sanders won the debate
, but pundits say it was
Clinton.
19 October 2015 (
Obama's drone-based assassination program
The leaks about
Obama's
drone-based assassination program
show that the "precise" system
for finding targets is actually quite unreliable, and the "limited"
criteria are actually sloppy.
Drones, used on the battlefield, are not morally different from
airplanes or artillery. Drones used for assassination are a
completely different issue.
What sort of
investigation
is needed?
19 October 2015 (
FBI persecuting sex workers
The FBI is
persecuting
sex workers
and disguises it as freeing victims of trafficking.
Occasionally the campaign does free victims of trafficking, which is a
good thing, but they could do that without persecuting other sex
workers.
18 October 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose voter suppression
Everyone:
Call
on Alabama
to cancel its efforts to stop blacks from voting.
18 October 2015 (
In the spirit of Mother Teresa
India has legalized adoptions by unmarried people. In response,
Mother Teresa's orphanage has shut down all adoption of it inmates, in
effect
using
them as hostages
This is entirely
in the
spirit of Mother Teresa
, who
used
poor Indians to boost the Catholic Church
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
18 October 2015 (
Copyright on science experiments
Selfish scientists use copyright to
prevent
replication of an experiment
18 October 2015 (
Abortion
Connie Bryson describes
the
abortion that she had, illegally
— a horrible experience
that no women should have to have recourse to.
18 October 2015 (
Microsoft forcing Windows 10 on users
Users report Microsoft is
forcing
them to replace Windows 7 and 8
with all-spying Windows 10.
This seems to involve use of a back door in Windows 7 and 8.
18 October 2015 (
Australian treatment of refugee
Australia
dumped
Somalian refugee Abyan in Nauru, where she was raped, and brought her
back to Australia for an abortion
— then sent her back to
Nauru before a court could rule on whether she could stay there.
18 October 2015 (
Egypt to discourage an oppressive practice
Egypt's government will require women to
uncover
their heads in certain special circumstances
I think limited measures of this sort are a legitimate way to
discourage oppressive practices imposed by social pressure.
The article is wrong about the goddess Isis — far from being
crushed by worship of Ra and turned into a demon, her cult spread
along with that of her brother/husband Osiris, and then under Roman
rule spread around the empire (without Osiris). It was intolerant
Christianity that put an end to worship of Isis.
18 October 2015 (
Babies dying in the UK
Babies
in homeless families
are dying in the UK.
As the government tightens the vice on the non-rich in general, some
people inevitably get squeezed out the sides of the vice. It's part
and parcel of what the Tories want to achieve.
18 October 2015 (
Making war to win domestic support
If Chinese become restive, future Chinese rulers decide to
attack
someplace to win domestic support
18 October 2015 (
Urgent: regulate methane strictly
US citizens:
call
on the EPA
to regulate methane strictly.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
18 October 2015 (
Urgent: end predatory prison phone charges
US citizens: call for an end to
predatory
prison phone charges
18 October 2015 (
Web advertising
Web advertising that tracks users
also
exposes them to attacks.
18 October 2015 (
Long duration of copyright
The long duration of copyright hampers
creative
production
of the great plays of the 20th century.
18 October 2015 (
Writing the TPP
Obama says that "we" are writing the rules of the TPP. But this "we"
does
not include you or me.
The TPP is not really about trade anyway. It's really an
antidemocratic
corporate supremacy treaty
with a little about trade on the side.
18 October 2015 (
Fracking and premature births
A study found that pregnant women in Pennsylvania were
40%
more likely
to give birth prematurely if they live near a very active frack well.
18 October 2015 (
Stop the fanatical "settlers"
Uri Avnery:
the
real battle for Israel
is to stop the fanatical "settlers" from taking over.
18 October 2015 (
Ethiopian bloggers acquitted
Ethiopian bloggers were
acquitted
of charges.
18 October 2015 (
Planting forests to make El Nino milder
Deforestation makes El Nino more severe;
planting
large forests can make it milder.
18 October 2015 (
US Border Patrol
US Border Patrol agents can search anyone's car; they just have to say
the
dog told them to do it.
18 October 2015 (
Casualties from drone attacks
An
anonymous
whistleblower
reveals that the US is systematically lying about casualties from drone attacks.
In particular, US authorities knowingly label unidentified civilian
dead as "enemy combattants", thus inflating the "body count" while
disguising the numerous civilian casualties.
Amnesty International says this calls for a
specific
investigation.
18 October 2015 (
Alternatives to imprisonment
Texas is using alternatives to imprisonment,
as
a way to save money.
It could save additional money by investing in education, in prenatal
care, in abortion, in contraception, and in a welfare system that
saves families from stress.
18 October 2015 (
CIA's water torture
The CIA used a form of water torture on
additional prisoners.
18 October 2015
Angolan rapper on hunger strike
An Angolan dissident rapper, imprisoned for "planning to overthrow the
government", has
been on hunger strike
so long that his health is affected.
18 October 2015
Secret courts and laws in UK
The UK
increasingly uses secret courts
and develops a body of secret laws.
18 October 2015
Opting for war without end
Obama pledged to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan, but he can't
find a way to do it without letting the Taliban win, so he is
opting for a war without end
18 October 2015
Australian intelligence defied prime minister
The prime minister of Australia in 1974 ordered Australian intelligence
to
cut its ties
with the CIA. Australian intelligence disobeyed the order.
18 October 2015
Europe-wide VW recall
VW Announces Europe-Wide Mass Recall Over Emissions Fix.
18 October 2015
Sequencing the DNA of newborns
A hospital
sequences sick newborns' DNA
to diagnose them in 26 hours.
The article suggests that in the future hospitals should sequence
every baby's DNA. This could be a bad idea. There's a chance that
the data will be medically helpful to them, a chance it will hurt
their prospects for insurance, and a chance of exposing them to state
injustice.
18 October 2015
Microwave camera to see through walls
microwave camera
being developed at MIT can see people through walls.
What do we need to put in our walls to block this camera?
I think screens on a window will probably block microwaves
except perhaps for the lowest wavelengths.
18 October 2015
Ugandan presidential candidate under house arrest
A presidential candidate in Uganda has been
placed under house arrest
to stop him from holding public campaign rallies.
18 October 2015
EPA to reduce use of hydroflourocarbons
Obama will
direct the EPA
to reduce use of hydrofluorocarbons, which are
immensely powerful greenhouse gases.
18 October 2015
Rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria
Many common surgical operations, and chemotherapy for cancer,
will become dangerous
if we don't stop the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
If we end the tightly-packed factory farms for meat, and eat less
meat, we will need fewer operations, and we will be less likely to die
of an infection when we do need one.
18 October 2015
Restaurants to abolish tipping
Some notable New York restaurants will
abolish tipping and pay higher wages
to waiters.
I am totally in favor of this.
18 October 2015
Saudi siege deprives Yemen of drinking water
A Saudi siege has
deprived Yemen of drinking water
which risks making many people sick.
This could kill more people than the bombs.
18 October 2015
Fetal tissue research
Planned Parenthood decided to
stop accepting reimbursements
for collecting
fetal tissue for research — for no reason except that right-wing
lies
have made it appear dirty.
I hope this will not crimp the supply
of fetal tissue for research
to
develop cures for diseases
18 October 2015
ECHR rules on genocide denial ban
The European Court of Human Rights ruled that Switzerland could not
make it a crime
to deny the genocide of the Armenians.
This may overturn the French law that prohibits denying the genocide
of the Armenians. Alas, the court found an excuse not to apply this
principle universally to all questions about history.
Here in the US, we can speak freely on the issue. From what I have
read, I do believe there was a genocide of the Armenians. However,
freedom of speech includes the right to say otherwise. I greatly
admire
Hrant Dink
who was assassinated for affirming the genocide
of the Armenians, and condemned the French law because he respected
the freedom to state the opposite opinion.
Many nations have committed great crimes — Turkey is far from
unique. Every nation should admit its crimes, so it can pay its debt
to humanity and move on.
18 October 2015
Hong Kong thugs
Hong Kong
thugs
have been charged with
beating up a protester
Hong Kong is not really a democracy, but here it is putting the US to
shame.
18 October 2015
Sex workers kept back by criminalization
"Sex work criminalization means potential employers and landlords treat
me as a person who was
arrested for prostitution
not a survivor."
18 October 2015
Catholic hospital risks woman's life
A Catholic hospital put a woman's
life in danger
by refusing her a tubal ligation because "that's sterilization".
Catholic doctrine says that women should get pregnant even if it is
likely to kill them.
We should give Catholic hospitals three choices: disconnect from
religious
rules, sell to secular owners, or shut down.
18 October 2015
Lumping in Kurds with PISSI
Erdoğan's men are trying to
associate Kurds with PISSI in the public mind
by talking about them together.
Never mind that the Kurds are secularist rather than Jihadi, and that
the Kurds and
PISSI
are at war in Iraq and in Syria.
18 October 2015
Pharma companies neglect less profitable diseases
As pharma companies merge, they
neglect diseases that kill lots of poor people
in favor of trying to make the next viagra.
The idea of giving these companies "incentives" to do research is a
dead end. They spend the money instead on advertising, and on
corrupting doctors
research
and
scientific journals
We should tax the companies more so we can fund the research that
is really important.
Human beings that care only about their own gain are antisocial. We
rebuke them, even shun them. It is a mistake to acquiesce to totally
selfish behavior from a company. Indeed, the idea that a company's
only duty was to its shareholders is a
recent change imposed by right-wing domination
in the 1970s, companies were supposed to value
others, such as employees, customers, and the public.
18 October 2015
Random violence against Arabs
An Israeli wanted to carry out random violence against Arabs, so he
stabbed a stranger
who turned out to be an Israeli.
This is an unusual example, but killing of Arabs goes on all the
time.
18 October 2015
Lack of birth control kills
Lack of birth control
kills thousands of women and children
religious organizations must act on compassion and offer birth control.
18 October 2015
Conservative climate reporting
Propaganda Trumps Journalism in Conservative Media Climate
Reporting.
18 October 2015
Death penalty in Indonesia
In Indonesia, people are tortured into signing confessions, convicted
in careless trials, then
executed
18 October 2015
Graffiti drone
graffiti drone in Mexico
campaigns against the president.
It is a fun hack, but I think automating graffiti
in unfair. If we stand for it, businesses will do it.
18 October 2015
Not so independent consultants
The "independent" consultants that said it was "reasonable" to shoot
Tamir Rice dead are
not really independent
and they closed their eyes to important questions.
18 October 2015 (
Parents organize against climate catastrophe
Parents are
organizing
to protect the climate
for their children.
18 October 2015 (
Brazilian internet tracking bill
Brazil is considering tracking all internet users and
blanket
deletion of criticism
of any person or organization.
18 October 2015 (
The barbarism that threatens Canada
The barbarism that threatens Canada
comes
from the Conservative Party
Canadians, look at the US, see how bad right-wing policies are, and
save your country from them.
18 October 2015 (
Tracking drivers' emotions
State Farm Insurance envisions
tracking
drivers' emotions
as well as their driving.
Getting a patent on this noxious idea does not mean implementing it.
Patents on business methods should not be allowed, not even on
business methods that should not be used.
18 October 2015 (
NYC building more flood defenses
New York City is building more flood defenses, but refuses to confront
the certainty that they
won't
be enough a few decades from now
If it did, it might lend more impetus to the vital efforts to reduce
sea-level rise.
18 October 2015 (
Repression in Morocco
Morocco systematically
represses
journalists and human rights defenders
18 October 2015 (
MRI scan for Julian Assange
Ecuador
Asks
Britain to Allow Julian Assange 'Safe Passage'
for MRI Scan.
18 October 2015 (
Playboy's suppression of nude women
Playboy's suppression of nude women is a
step
back towards medieval repression
. Fortunately it won't change
much.
18 October 2015 (
Wealth inequality
The 1% of wealthiest people now own
50%
of the world's wealth
18 October 2015 (
Injured US woman sues nephew
An injured US woman
sued
her nephew
— perhaps to get her medical bills covered by his
family's homeowner's insurance.
18 October 2015 (
Checkpoints set up in Jerusalem
Checkpoints have been set up in Jerusalem to
keep
Palestinians out of Jewish neighborhoods
This is likely to make daily life difficult for thousands of
Palestinians; they may be unable to get to work.
There will be no checkpoints to protect Palestinians in Palestine
from fanatical Israeli "settlers" and their
"price
tag" attacks
18 October 2015 (
Risk Is Essential to Childhood
Risk Is Essential to Childhood — As Are
Scrapes,
Grazes, Falls And Panic
Which means that the state had better stop forbidding parents to let
children play on their own.
18 October 2015 (
Massive surveillance in Australia
Australia has imposed
total
tracking of internet contacts and phone locations
, pretending as
is customary that this is to "fight terrorism".
The US has a similar system of massive surveillance of internet
contacts and
phone
locations
. Wherever it is done, it is the same injustice.
18 October 2015 (
The Web becoming dangerously ephemeral
The Web is becoming
dangerously
ephemeral
and may be unsuited to the purpose of keeping humanity's
knowledge.
18 October 2015 (
Subtle lies spread about Snowden
Clinton, in the debate, spread
subtle
lies
about Snowden.
18 October 2015 (
India's Hindu-sectarian gov't
India's Hindu-sectarian government is
encouraging
violence against secularists and non-Hindus
. Leading Indian
artists are calling attention to this.
18 October 2015 (
Turkey's motives in Syria
Turkey, Russia,
PISSI
and the Kurds —
and
the US
18 October 2015 (
When a thug shoots an innocent person
When a
thug
shoots an innocent person, the legal standard
assumes
that the thug's life is the only one that matters
18 October 2015 (
DNA collection
Ancestry.com is
collecting
DNA from the public and sequencing it
If your relatives do this, it could be
dangerous
for you
18 October 2015 (
Being near a bank while black
DC
thugs
grabbed
Jason Goolsby violently
after someone thought it was suspicious
that two black youths would be seen near a bank.
Aren't blacks supposed to use ATMs to withdraw money?
18 October 2015 (
Anticipation of climate mayhem
Pacific
Nations Beg for Help
for Islanders When 'Calamity' of [climate
mayhem] Hits.
18 October 2015 (
Exxon's global heating lie
Exxon's
global
heating lie
was an unparalleled act of evil.
18 October 2015 (
Charities abolished by Egyptian gov't
The Egyptian government has abolished the charities of the Muslim
Brotherhood, on which many poor people depended, and
equated
defense of human rights with "terrorism"
. All with
US
support
18 October 2015 (
GCHQ allowed to spy on parliament members
GCHQ has been given
official
permission
to spy on members of parliament.
This will be a big help to them in constructing false accusations to
sabotage
the parties they don't like
18 October 2015 (
Journalists threatened by Taliban
The Taliban openly say they
will
make war on journalists
Bad as the US has been in Afghanistan, the Taliban is much worse; it
kills
a lot more civilians, too
, and rejects on principle the idea that
it shouldn't do so.
16 October 2015 (
Urgent: Voting Rights Amendment Act
US citizens:
support
the Voting Rights Amendment Act.
16 October 2015 (
Evictions in Bologna
Right wing government in Bologna is evicting anarchist squats to make
room for
emptiness
16 October 2015 (
Goodness and unselfishness
People
generally
underestimate
the goodness and unselfishness of most other people.
16 October 2015 (
Earlier biological spring
Biological spring will happen
weeks earlier
(in most of the US) by 2100.
16 October 2015 (
Facebook income tax in the UK
Facebook has started paying income tax in the UK.
About
$6,000 worth
16 October 2015 (
Election fraud in Canada
Election fraud in Canada,
tied
to Conservative Party
16 October 2015 (
Killer thug acquitted
One of the
thugs
that killed Matthew Ajibade was
already
acquitted of manslaughter
Ridiculous!
15 October 2015
Putin and Obama's war tactics
The history of
Obama's war tactics
now adopted by Putin in Syria.
15 October 2015
Vietnamization of Iraq and Afghanistan
The US-trained Afghan army, like the US-trained Iraqi army, shows a
tendency to panic and run
when attacked by numerically inferior forces.
I predicted
years ago
that this would follow the path of Vietnamization.
15 October 2015
Republican hurricane damage
Years of
Republican misrule
set up South Carolina to make the hurricane
do a lot more damage.
15 October 2015
Tortured to death
Thugs
in Savannah
tortured Matthew Ajibade to death
The torture included
tasing his genitals while he was strapped down.
15 October 2015
Listed town destroyed
Saudi Arabia has
destroyed a UNESCO-listed medieval town
in Yemen.
This town was not as precious as the 1800-year-old city of Palmyra,
which in turn was not precious as the 4000-year-old sites in Iraq
that were looted
after the
Bush forces
conquered Iraq.
But that does not excuse the Saudi actions.
15 October 2015
Keeping Antarctica cool
It's not too late to
stop Antarctica from melting
… if we try really hard.
It is
too late to save Miami and New Orleans
from eventual inundation.
But many other cities can still be saved, if we act strongly enough.
15 October 2015 (
Hawking on robots and wealth
Stephen Hawking agrees: if the robots make our goods without need for
our work,
the
goods must be provided to all
15 October 2015 (
Chinese students used as unpaid workers
Chinese schools force their students to
work
in factories without pay
15 October 2015 (
Israel and Palestine
Israel has
arrested
and imprisoned 650 Palestinians in October
and the month is less
than half over. The arrested people have been denied basic human
rights.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
Since Palestinian violence against Israeli civilians who are doing
nothing wrong is well reported, it should be noted that Israeli
violence against Palestinian civilians who are doing nothing wrong has
been going on for a few years now, and
continues
15 October 2015 (
No DRM in JPEG
There's No DRM in JPEG —
Let's
Keep It That Way
15 October 2015 (
Imprisonment without trial in the US
Obama is trying to "close the Guantanamo prison" by
shifting
imprisonment without trial to the US
That would make things even worse, in principle. However, it's
possible that the prisoners' presence on US territory would lead the
Supreme Court to rule that they must be charged or freed. On the
other hand, the Supreme Court might essentially abolish the rule of
Habias Corpus.
15 October 2015 (
Voting in Wisconsin
Wisconsin Republicans want to permit unlimited secret money in
political campaigns, cripple ethics and election law enforcement and
make it
harder
for many people to vote
In the Republican Party's ideal world, only millionaires could vote.
14 October 2015 (
Urgent: More debates for candidates
US citizens:
call
on the Democratic Party
to hold more debates for the candidates.
14 October 2015 (
Urgent: Prescription Drug Affordability
US citizens:
support
the
Prescription Drug Affordability Act.
14 October 2015 (
Big business designing tax loopholes
Now the Tories Are
Allowing
Big Business to Design Their Own Tax Loopholes
14 October 2015 (
Marine food chains
Marine Food Chains
At
Risk of Collapse
14 October 2015 (
Amnesty International condemns Syrian Kurds
Amnesty International condemns the Syrian Kurds of
driving
Arabs to flee their villages
The Kurds say this is because there were
PISSI
supporters in those
villages.
14 October 2015 (
Erdoğan's tyranny
Erdoğan's
censorship
and "anti-terror" tyranny
makes it hard for Turks to voice their
opposition, and their distrust for the state.
Turkish opposition says the government left the peace rally
without
protection
14 October 2015 (
The Japanese massacre in Nanjing
Japan
condemns
UNESCO
for recognizing the Japanese massacre in Nanjing.
Whether the victims numbered 300,000 or merely 100,000 is a detail
there is no need to argue about. Japan should stop denying its war
crimes, just as the US and other countries should.
14 October 2015 (
The sugar/food lobby
How the sugar/food lobby
campaigns
against efforts to discourage excess sugar consumption
, which is
very harmful to health.
13 October 2015 (
Giving voice commands to a computer
Giving voice commands to a computer means that
server records them all
In this case, I won't accuse Google of snooping, since users know
that they are talking to a Google server. But I do think it is foolish
to use such a thing.
13 October 2015 (
Yes Men's Snowden hoax
A new Yes Men hoax: presenting Edward Snowden, live in the US,
saying
he had been pardoned
13 October 2015 (
Women confront taboo and stigma
Women directly confront the taboo and stigma attached to many aspects
of
their
bodies and sexuality
13 October 2015 (
Gender roles
Not everyone wants to live the
male
or female gender roles
13 October 2015 (
Cambodian daughters rented for "domestic work"
In Cambodia, parents
regularly
rent their 13-year-old daughters for 2 months of "domestic work"
then everyone is disgusted when the girls return from 2 months of
prostitution.
Note how irrational condemnation of non-virgin girls plays a crucial
role in this system.
13 October 2015 (
Afghan women campaign against misogyny
A group of
300
Afghan women
campaigns against the Taliban ideology of misogyny.
13 October 2015 (
UK cancels plan to operate Saudi prisons
The UK has cancelled its
offer
to operate prisons for Saudi Arabia
, rejecting the way Saudi
Arabia treats prisoners.
13 October 2015 (
Flight MH17 shot down by Buk missile
The official investigation concludes that flight MH17 was
shot
down by a Buk missile
. It did not address the question of who
fired it.
I think it is pretty clear that the Russian proxy rebels fired it,
thinking they were firing at a Ukrainian fighter plane.
The rebels did not have fighter planes, so Ukraine's army would have
had no occasion to make that sort of mistake.
In an apparent coverup, someone operated on the flight captain's
corpse,
removing
some of the foreign objects that killed him
. The only ones in a
position to do that were the rebels.
13 October 2015 (
Designers of CIA torture sued
Torture victims and relatives of a dead victim have
sued
the psychologists
who designed the CIA's torture.
13 October 2015 (
Methane release from melting permafrost
IPCC climate models do not take account of the effects of
methane
release from melting permafrost
What that means is, avoiding 2C of heating requires even more
emissions reductions than previously supposed.
The reductions plans now on the table were already
insufficient
13 October 2015 (
Dildo protest in Texas
Students in Texas, where it is a crime to carry a dildo but legal to
carry a gun,
will
protest carrying dildos
"[Dildos are] just about as effective as [guns in] protecting us from
sociopathic shooters, but much safer for recreational play."
13 October 2015 (
Melting Antarctic ice
Antarctic Ice is Melting So Fast the
Whole
Continent May Be at Risk by 2100
13 October 2015 (
Jason Rezaian
Reporter Jason Rezaian has been convicted of espionage in Iran, after
bizarre
and unfair trial
If the US gets its hands on Edward Snowden, it will convict him of
espionage after a bizarre and
unfair
trial
13 October 2015 (
Monsanto's "science"
Monsanto claims its critics are opposing science. But Monsanto seems
to have
bent
scientists
to make that appear to be the case.
13 October 2015 (
Contradictions of US policies
Five
ironic
contradictions
of US policies.
12 October 2015 (
HD party refuses to respond with violence
The HD party has
refused
to respond with violence to Erdoğan's violence
Even if the AK party didn't arrange the Ankara bombing and the one in
Suruç
plenty of other violence against the opposition is clearly its
responsibility.
12 October 2015 (
Journalist faces prison in Thailand
A journalist faces prison in Thailand
for
having a flak jacket and helmet
, which are sensible tools for
covering violence committed by others.
12 October 2015 (
The US's hospital bombardment
Oxfam and 23 other charities support MSF's
demand
for an investigation
of the US's hospital bombardment by the
International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission.
12 October 2015 (
American college students
American college students nowadays have
trouble
coping
. Perhaps it is due to helicopter parents, but it might
also be because they are rationally anxious about the harsh and
hopeless plutocratist society they will graduate into.
12 October 2015 (
Children kidnaped and brainwashed
Terrorists kidnap children to
brainwash
them into suicidal fanatics
12 October 2015 (
PISSI's hatred of ancient buildings
PISSI
's hatred of ancient buildings
comes
from Saudi Arabia
12 October 2015
Urgent: ban golden parachutes
US citizens: call on Obama to
insist on no "golden parachutes"
for anyone he appoints to federal office.
12 October 2015
Not showing up to testify
A woman has been
jailed in Florida
for not showing up to testify to
the trial of the man she lived with, who she accused of attacking her.
What I think about is, why is she unwilling to testify? Is it due to
financial dependence on him? Is she terrified he will take revenge?
What is needed to really help her?
12 October 2015
Bankster prosecution
An Irish
bankster
who
helped cause the financial crisis
faces prosecution.
12 October 2015
Turkey internet censorship
Turkey
censored the internet very hard
to block discussion of the bombing of a peace march.
12 October 2015
Tobacco lobby
The European Union has an
explicit policy
of giving businesses special influence in how to regulate them.
Turns out the tobacco companies lobbied hard for that.
12 October 2015
UK teacher shortfall
UK schools are
running short of teachers
This article does not say why, but I suspect it's due to the
harsh policies
that the state has imposed on schools and teachers.
12 October 2015
Bottled water waste
How bottled water companies are
trying to stop US national parks
from putting an end to bottled water sales.
In the US and other countries with safe water supplies, bottle water
is
a foolish waste. Please stop buying bottled water!
12 October 2015
Disastrous TTIP
What I said before about the TPP and secrecy was an understatement.
It appears the TPP
really says
that country A can order country B to
quash a lawsuit, to cover up the secrets of country A.
This would be another nail in democracy's coffin.
The TPP imposes
unjust US-style copyright
rules, so in the US it would
be an obstacle to repeal of the DMCA. In addition, it attacks
journalism.
The leak also shows that the TPP would give pharma companies
additional
power (though not as much as they demand). This would
kill people
Some of these articles make the mistake of adopting the pharma
companies' and copyright industry's
propaganda term
"intellectual property".
That term spreads confusion
every time it is used. If others use it, we should not help our
enemies by repeating it.
12 October 2015
Urgent: investigate MSF hospital bombing
US citizens: call on Congress to
support
the Ellison-McGovern-Lee-Grijalva letter
for an independent
investigation of the bombing of the MSF hospital in Kunduz.
12 October 2015
Uploading brains
We are
very far from being able
to capture all the crucial information
in a brain, which would be needed to upload it.
The article speaks only of neurons, but the astrocytes also engage
in communication in ways that we don't understand very well. They too
may be part of what makes you you.
12 October 2015
Erzats Nobel prize
Despite having an ersatz "Nobel" prize,
economics is not a science
12 October 2015
Indigenous Peoples Day
Some US states and cities
celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day
as well as, or instead of, Columbus Day.
It is true that there was discrimination against Italian-Americans,
but
that is fortunately a thing of the past, and no reason to cling to
Columbus Day now.
12 October 2015
Overthrowing Assad
The US
shouldn't try to do more
to overthrow Assad. It is paying too much
attention to that goal already.
12 October 2015 (
Urgent: global heating action
In the US: participate in a
global heating
action protest on Oct 14
if you can find one near you.
The site where they are announced does not work without Javascript
so I cannot recommend looking there.
12 October 2015 (
Urgent: deforesting Indonesia
Everyone:
call
on Pepsico
to stop deforesting Indonesia.
12 October 2015 (
Urgent: investigate voter-suppression move
US citizens: call on Attorney General Loretta Lynch to
investigate
Alabama's latest voter-suppression move.
12 October 2015 (
Urgent: oppose the TPP
Canadians:
call
on your political parties
to oppose the TPP.
12 October 2015 (
Israel's Domination of Palestinians
Israel's Domination of Palestinians
Makes
Violence Inevitable.
Don't forget that Israeli "settlers" have been carrying out violence against
Palestinians regularly for some years — so-called
"price
tag"
attacks.
That's not to mention the seizure of Palestinians' land and water.
12 October 2015 (
Dalits in Berdo Ka Baas
Dalits in Berdo Ka Baas
are
afraid to go to school,
after the teacher beat up one of them
for touching a plate of food belonging to a non-Dalit.
12 October 2015 (
Antibiotics to farm animals
California has restricted administration of antibiotics to farm animals.
This will now
require
a prescription.
Thus, they can be used to cure specific animals but could not be given
by default to all animals.
If only we had adopted this law 30 years ago, we might still have some
antibiotics that no diseases are resistant to.
12 October 2015 (
Dirt on Clinton
Bradley Podliska, former investigator for the Congressional probe into
what went wrong when Benghazi was attacked, says that
SCROTUS
told him to look for dirt on Clinton rather than to do an unbiased investigation.
There are signs that Clinton did bad things, such as supporting the
coup in Honduras, but
SCROTUS
is not interested in investigating
those.
12 October 2015 (
Abolish tax havens
We
must abolish tax havens.
12 October 2015 (
Coral reefs are vital
Coral Reefs Are Not Just Pretty —
They
Are Vital to Life.
12 October 2015 (
Greenhouse gas pledges
Experts warn: the greenhouse gas pledges offered so far for the Paris
conference are
insufficient
to keep heating within 2C.
We don't know that keeping heating under 2C will avoid disaster.
If we are wise, we will do even more to reduce the heating as much as we can.
Research suggests that
global heating
might lead to big sudden climate
changes when
certain
tipping points are reached.
12 October 2015 (
"Letter from Moscow"
A forged "letter from Moscow", which helped defeat Labour in the
1920s,
was
written by someone who later worked for MI6.
This gives rise to suspicions that MI6 helped arrange for the forgery,
helping the Tories against Labour.
12 October 2015 (
Russian air strikes
PISSI
took advantage of Russian air strikes
to
capture territory
from other enemies of Assad.
12 October 2015 (
Sectarian and ethnic lines in Iraq and Syria
Israelis strategists have proposed since the 1980s the goal of making
Iraq and Syria split along sectarian and ethnic lines.
Perhaps
the US intended to do this.
Other countries such as Saudi Arabia might have wanted it too, and
influenced
Dubya
to invade Iraq.
12 October 2015 (
Divest from coal
California
has required pension funds to divest from coal.
12 October 2015 (
Thugs that attacked Thabo Sefolosha
New York
thugs
broke Thabo Sefolosha's leg for the hell of it, then
prosecuted him on false charges.
This
time, they lost.
A lawsuit against the city will not punish the individual
thugs
that
attacked Sefolosha. Didn't they commit gross bodily harm? Jail them
for it!
Imagine a world in which
thugs
can't get away with breaking anybody's
leg.
12 October 2015 (
Reducetarianism
Reducetarianism is a movement
to eat less meat.
12 October 2015 (
Supporting dictators in the Middle East
The US has returned to its old policy of supporting dictators in the
Middle East in the name of
"stability".
With secular opposition crushed, people may turn to jihadis as the only
plausible way to oppose the dictators.
12 October 2015 (
TPP "intellectual property" chapter
Wikileaks has published the final TPP "intellectual property" chapter, and
it is
even
worse than we knew.
It says that countries can suppress lawsuits
in order to keep companies' embarrassing information secret.
The term "intellectual property" represents
fundamental
confusion,
so
any agreement, law or plan formulated based on that term is sure to be a bad one.
12 October 2015 (
Chicago convicts probably innocent
Four men convicted of murder in Chicago were probably innocent,
according to a city investigation, but the prosecutor insists on
keeping
them in prison anyway.
12 October 2015 (
Cleveland thugs may be fired
The Cleveland
thugs
that killed an unarmed couple in their car will not
be punished, but they may be fired.
Or maybe not.
12 October 2015 (
Protest against TTIP
250,000 people protested in Berlin against the proposed corporate supremacy,
TTIP
(This Treaty Is Plutocratic).
12 October 2015 (
Bomb in a peace march
A bomb in a
peace
march in Turkey
killed dozens of people.
The regime could have set this bomb; it has engaged in lots of other
violence, including (it appears) the attack that was its
excuse
for resuming war with the PKK.
Turks are protesting,
blaming
the state for this attack
and condemning Erdogan's suppression of media criticism.
12 October 2015 (
Head of the FDA
Sanders rejects Obama's nominee to head the Food and Drug Administration,
who
has ties to big Pharma.
12 October 2015 (
Extracting natural gas sets off earthquakes
Extracting natural gas in the Netherlands sets off earthquakes, and these
have made many houses
uninhabitable.
12 October 2015 (
Punished for not praying
Parents in Swainsboro, Georgia, are
suing
because their child was punished for not joining in prayers.
12 October 2015 (
"Damaging" a military vehicle
Vyara Glaser is being prosecuted in London for "damaging" a military vehicle.
She wrote on it with
washable
ink,
as a protest.
11 October 2015 (
Sanders gun control
Sanders
explains his views on gun control.
11 October 2015 (
Search warrants for data
California has a new law requiring that the state get search warrants
before accessing people's digital data,
in
their own devices and in online services.
This is good, but it is not enough to excuse avoidable collection of data
about people. I will continue to pay cash so as not to be tracked.
11 October 2015 (
Libya's rival governments
Libya's two rival governments
have
agreed to unite.
I hope that this works.
11 October 2015 (
Sony Music rootkit
It's
been ten years
since Sony Music infected the world with its rootkit.
11 October 2015 (
Copyright on yoga poses
A US appeals court ruled that a sequence of yoga poses (such as Bikram yoga)
cannot
be copyrighted.
Copyright law explicitly covers only creative details of expression,
not anything with practical significance.
11 October 2015 (
Video of a public talk destroyed
Purdue University destroyed the video of a public talk, on US
government orders, because
the
talk's slides showed material from Snowden revelations.
This is part of the US government's policy of refusing to recognize
that formerly secret information has been published. It sounds like
sheer insanity, but it has
real
repressive consequences.
Universities must reject secret government research entirely
if it comes with conditions that apply to the rest of the university.
11 October 2015 (
Companies' arbitration systems
The US Supreme Court has given companies more power by allowing them
to impose their choice of arbitration systems
on
employees and even customers.
11 October 2015 (
Reasons for Amerindian alcoholism
The reasons Amerindians have high rates of alcoholism are
high
rates of stress, trauma, and poverty.
11 October 2015 (
Pope meeting with Kim Davis
Conjecture: conservative Catholic officials
tricked
the pope
into meeting with Kim Davis.
11 October 2015 (
Prohibiting collecting data
Wyoming has
adopted
a law
specifically prohibiting collecting data (such as water
quality) to report to government agencies.
10 October 2015
Boarding pass bar codes
The bar codes on airplane boarding passes have
lots of personal information
Don't just throw them away.
10 October 2015
Punished for complaints
Prisoners in Pennsylvania that file legal complaints about abusive
treatment are
punished with violence
torture, and self-contradictory
criminal charges.
10 October 2015
Driving while black
NYC
thugs
put Kamilah Brock in a mental hospital
because she claimed
to work in banks and own the BMW she was driving — while black.
10 October 2015
Right to inspect code
Defendants Should Have the Right to Inspect the Software Code Used to
Convict Them.
10 October 2015
Nuclear data waste
Collections of
personal data compared with nuclear waste
potentially dangerous for a long time.
10 October 2015
Organised censorship campaign
US students and professors that criticize Israel's occupation of
Palestine
face pressure from an organized network
that uses gifts,
threats, and bogus legal complaints to promote censorship in schools.
10 October 2015
TPP standards without enforcement
The TPP has labor and environmental standards, but
without enforcement
so countries could ignore them. Meanwhile, the power it
gives to foreign companies has a strict enforcement mechanism
attached.
10 October 2015
Punishment by smoke
A French prisoner
won damages
because he had to share a poorly ventilated
cell with smokers.
10 October 2015
3d printed gang war
The biggest crime gang in Japan has split, and if it develops into
a gang war, they might
use drones or 3d-printed guns
to fight it.
It seems plausible that sophisticated gangs will make and use
3d-printed guns, but I have a feeling (though I can't prove it) that
most crazy mass shooters will be deterred by the difficulty.
I am almost certain that few depressed people will 3d-print guns in
order to shoot themselves. If you're depressed, you're not going to
go to such effort.
Thus, I don't believe that 3d printing makes gun control obsolete.
10 October 2015
Effect of prohibiting drugs
One
effect of prohibiting drugs
is that you can't be sure the drug is
pure. This has killed at least a thousand Americans, perhaps far more.
10 October 2015
Predatory lenders
12 congresscritters
got "donations" from payday lending companies
just before or after they sponsored bills to restrain the Consumer
Financial Protection Bureau from curbing the companies' abuses.
10 October 2015
Fetal tissue research
US religious nuts (who are numerous) want to
ban research using fetal tissue
because the tissue comes from abortions. Since this research
is necessary for progress in some areas of medicine, their fanaticism
could kill your children or even you.
10 October 2015
Ben Carson's gun fantasy
Ben Carson claims that Jews could have prevented the Holocaust,
if only they had had guns
This is an absurd fantasy. The Jewish minority in Germany could not
have defeated the state and the majority of Germans with personal
guns. Nor could Jews have defeated the occupying German army in other
countries. It took a stronger army to do that.
Some Jews who were young and fit joined resistance groups, but those
groups could not defeat the German army on their own. They could only
weaken it with guerrilla tactics. They could not have protected the
rest of the Jews.
In the Warsaw ghetto, the Jews did have guns, and they fought
tenaciously for their lives. They threw back a German division
… but ultimately they lost. The Germans had reinforcements and
resupply, while the Jews did not. I think those Jews realized that
the best they could hope for was to go down fighting.
10 October 2015
Burma peace talks
Burma has
accused China
of asking rebel groups to reject a peace deal.
10 October 2015
Abortion stigma
Eight women
talk about their abortions
to reject the stigma on abortion.
10 October 2015
Belarusian media repression
Belarus continues to
repress the media
10 October 2015
Malaysia arrests lawyer
Malaysia arrested a lawyer who
criticized
the prime minister's corruption.
10 October 2015
OECD proposals
The OECD's
proposals for reform
of how businesses are taxed are small
changes and would not solve the problem.
I have
a solution
for this.
10 October 2015
US gives up on Syrian rebels
The US has
given up
on training non-jihadi Syrian rebels,
since that didn't work. But it does not have a better plan.
The only useful plan that I can envision is to reinforce the Kurds,
but it is clear that the US is unwilling to do that.
10 October 2015
Compromised crypto
The Obama regime
has backed off
on the idea of requiring back-doors in
products that do encryption.
They may try again at any time.
10 October 2015 (
Urgent: support the Dingell-Ellison letter
US citizens: phone your congresscritter to support the Dingell-Ellison
letter, calling on Obama
to
restrain Saudi the attack on Yemen and pursue diplomacy.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
10 October 2015 (
Urgent: Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act
US citizens: support the
Sentencing
Reform and Corrections Act.
10 October 2015 (
Urgent: vote against TPP
US citizens:
call
on representatives
to vote against the TPP.
10 October 2015 (
Urgent: Support regulation of guns
US citizens:
support
regulation of guns.
10 October 2015 (
Book fair rebukes Saudi Arabia
It falls to a book fair to rebuke Saudi Arabia for its
plan
to execute a protester.
10 October 2015 (
Bias against blacks
The American Bar Association's president
explains
many ways that the US legal system is biased against blacks.
10 October 2015 (
Student unions' "no platform" practice
Julie Bindel
condemns
the student unions' "no platform" practice that has banned her from debates at UK universities.
I disagree with Bindel about sex work and some other issues. As for
whether posing nude is a way to liberate women, that's complicated
because patriarchy is complicated. It includes pressure for women to
be ashamed of their bodies, and a tendency to judge women solely in terms
of sex and attractiveness. Posing nude resists the former but may
promote the latter.
Regardless of whether I agree with her, I think it is wrong to exclude
her from speaking at UK universities.
10 October 2015 (
Campaign finance laws
Wisconsin Republicans are embarrassed that Scott Walker apparently
violated campaign finance laws, so they are going to
repeal the laws.
10 October 2015 (
Companies repeat wrongdoing
Why do companies repeat the same wrongdoing
after
being caught?
I'd say it's because the punishments are insufficient to dissuade
them.
10 October 2015 (
Violence by Jews and Arabs
Individual Jews and Arabs
continue
violent attacks.
I wonder why Israeli soldiers shoot to kill when Palestinians throw stones
or roll burning tires at a fence. Wouldn't tear gas suffice?
10 October 2015 (
Ebola's long-term damage
Many Ebola survivors have
long-term
damage,
and they may transmit the virus sexually.
10 October 2015 (
Work harder and die younger
The
Tories
want Britons to work harder and die younger, like Americans.
10 October 2015 (
Use of microbeads
California has
banned
use of microbeads in some products, because they get into waterways and harm wildlife.
10 October 2015 (
California's snowpack
California's snowpack is at a record low level; apparently it has
never been so low
in 500 years.
Global heating
appears to be involved.
10 October 2015 (
Price of Daraprim
Shkreli said he would reduce the price of Daraprim,
but
then he didn't.
This seems to have been a PR manipulation false promise,
like when Amazon
promised
to stop remotely erasing books in Swindles.
10 October 2015 (
Restarting the Gulag
Svetlana Alexievich: The Gulag can be restarted
at
a moment's notice.
09 October 2015 (
Assassination ordered by US-backed dictator
Chilean dictator Pinochet directly ordered the assassination of exile
Orlando Letelier, who
was
in exile in the US
The US backed Pinochet
before
and during his coup
, and afterwards too I suppose.
09 October 2015 (
Urgent: Suspend loans to Uzbek government
Everyone:
Call on the World
Bank
to suspend loans to Uzbek government because of its use of
conscript labor.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
With Javascript disabled, it was not immediately clear that the page
had worked, but it had in fact worked — I got a confirmatory
email.
09 October 2015 (
Insulting religions
Salman Rushdie warns that western intellectuals
cater
too much
to Muslims that demand others not insult them or their
religion.
I see
plenty
to disapprove of in lots of religions
, though some of them are
quaint.
09 October 2015 (
Urgent: Investigation of attack on MSF
US citizens:
call on
Obama
to allow an independent investigation of the attack on
Médecins Sans Frontières in Kunduz.
09 October 2015 (
Urgent: Ban fracking on public lands
US citizens: call for
banning
fracking
on public lands.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
09 October 2015 (
Mass coral bleaching event
The current
mass
coral bleaching event
could result in the biggest coral die-off
humans have recorded.
But it will only get worse in subsequent decades. By 2030, such
events could occur annually.
In addition to thousands of species that live in them, coral reefs
provide a value to the human economy estimated at
trillion dollars per year
. Around a billion human beings live on
sea food, and a lot of that food
comes
from coral reefs
09 October 2015 (
Urgent: Mountaintop removal standards
US citizens:
demand
strict environmental standards
for mountaintop removal coal
mining.
09 October 2015 (
Mobbing a shooter to stop the shooting
Ben Carson is being condemned for recommending that people
mob
a shooter to stop the shooting
Carson could be right on that point: fighting back, the crowd could
limit the number of people that the shooter can kill. When the
shooter's magazine is empty, the crowd will stop him from reloading.
It is a mistake to claim that that statement blames the victims. It
isn't about blame at all — it is practical advice. As for the
blame, that falls on the killer in any case.
I think this advice applies to many situations where people are
subject unjustly to violence. Think of the Stonewall riot. Think of
evictions.
The rest of what Carson said is
mistaken
09 October 2015 (
New Democrat Party
Canadians,
vote
for the New Democrat Party
— it is the most likely to reject
the TPP.
I wish it took a firm stand, but even partial opposition is better
than none.
9 October 2015
Tax reforms
"An unfair global tax deal backed by the world's richest countries
will
do little
to curb tax dodging by multinational firms in developing
nations."
9 October 2015
Saudi planes attack party
Saudi planes
attacked
a Yemeni wedding party and killed three men who
were going to get married.
Amnesty International
has condemned this intervention and called on the
US to stop supporting it
9 October 2015
New financial crisis
The IMF
suggests
that another financial crisis is coming because
bubbles will have to pop.
Furthermore, governments have failed to fix the broken banking system.
Banksters
have resisted fixing it.
9 October 2015
UK solar power industry
The UK government
is triumphing
over the UK solar power
industry.
9 October 2015
Israel and Palestine
Violence
in Israel and the Palestinian Territories: "Can leaders on
both sides contain the violence?"
Containing the violence cannot be the sole goal: justice is required
too,
and that means ending Israel's occupation of Palestine.
9 October 2015
England rivers
We don't think of England as arid, but in parts of England rivers
sometimes
dry up
Where they do flow, they're poisoned.
9 October 2015
Civil disobedience at Paris summit
Massive civil disobedience
is planned
for the Paris climate
conference, to demand that they really solve the problem.
9 October 2015
Putin's men torture
Russia
has forced
the Committee Against Torture to close, through unjust fines.
Now Putin's men can torture just like CIA agents.
9 October 2015
Fossil fuels
Investments in equipment and infrastructure for using fossil fuels
risks
being a total loss.
9 October 2015
China's Citizen Scores
China's Nightmarish Citizen Scores
Are a Warning
For Americans.
A warning of what Facebook could be turned into.
8 October 2015
Homeless suing Sarasota
The ACLU is helping homeless people
sue Sarasota, Florida
to overturn the law prohibiting sleeping in public.
Police
Sweep Dozens Of Homeless Out
Of Former Seattle Times HQ Where
Developer Plans High-Rises.
8 October 2015
Patriot Coal
Patriot Coal's bankruptcy will
deprive some coal workers
of their health care.
This "coal company" was split off specifically so as to go bankrupt
so that Peabody Energy would escape paying their pensions.
8 October 2015
Assault on the poor
Cameron's "
assault on poverty
will help poverty in the UK
by making 200,000 additional working families poor.
8 October 2015
Clinton doubts the TPP
Clinton has
started expressing doubts
about the TPP, though not on fundamental grounds.
I am glad about this change, because it will help defeat the TPP, but
I think she is making a political calculation, unlike Sanders' sincere
stand.
8 October 2015
Urgent: block oil drilling in Mexican Gulf
US citizens: tell Obama
not to allow
more oil drilling in Gulf of Mexico.
8 October 2015
Canned pumpkin slump
Global heating
is
gradually harming the production
of canned pumpkin.
This year, due to bad luck, there won't be enough.
8 October 2015
Urgent: tell Chicken of the Sea to clean up
Everyone:
tell
Chicken of the Sea
to clean up its treatment of fish and fishermen.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
8 October 2015
Urgent: support gun control
US citizens:
tell Congress
that your "thoughts and prayers" are not
enough — we want real action to control guns.
8 October 2015
Urgent: oppose DARK Act
US citizens:
phone your senators
to oppose the DARK Act.
It would abolish state and local regulations on GMOs, including
requirements to label them in food.
8 October 2015
Urgent: oppose intervention in Syria
US citizens:
oppose
the Republican-Clinton proposals
for a bigger military
intervention in Syria.
8 October 2015
Urgent: call for rejection of TPP
Everyone:
call for rejection
of the TPP.
08 October 2015 (
Prosecution of repressive politicians
The UN works with the government of Guatemala to
prosecute
corrupt and repressive politicians
08 October 2015 (
Inequality in South Africa
Although apartheid has ended, inequality in South Africa
keeps
increasing
08 October 2015 (
Oil extraction from Bolivian land
Indigenous people in Bolivia are
campaigning
to stop oil extraction from their land
, and meeting with
repression from the
thugs
08 October 2015 (
Israel demolishing family houses
Israel is
punishing
the families of Palestinians that killed Jews
, by demolishing
their family houses.
Collective punishment is repression, not justice.
08 October 2015 (
Autonomous killer robots
The US and UK are
trying
to block or delay
a UN treaty to limit autonomous killer robots.
08 October 2015 (
Killings by thugs
Prematurely ruling some killings as "suicide by cop" prejudges
the
question of whether the thugs were justified or not
in killing
those people.
08 October 2015 (
US nurses denounce the TPP
US nurses
denounce
the TPP
08 October 2015 (
The US empire
Howard Zinn on the
US
empire
08 October 2015 (
BP to get tax deduction
Billionaire Polluters
has to pay 20 billion dollars for the Big Spill,
but it will get
billion back as a tax deduction
08 October 2015 (
Protesters "observed" through sniper rifles
Thugs
in Manchester, UK, were posted to
"observe"
protesters through the telescopes of sniper rifles
The
thugs
spokesman said, "Don't worry, they aren't there to shoot."
But why is it necessary to observe protesters through powerful
telescopes?
08 October 2015 (
Thugs get backlash in donut stores
Thugs
got some
backlash
from Black Lives Matter in donut stores
. Donut unto
others…
To refuse to serve
thugs
is going too far, but reminding them of their
responsibilities is legitimate.
08 October 2015 (
Effective handling of guns
It is hard to use your own gun to stop a massacre. It
takes
special training to stay calm and not be confused by the stress and
fear
people feel in such situations. In practice, you usually
shouldn't even try.
More
information
08 October 2015 (
Guns vs abortion
Imagine treating men that want to get a gun
like
women that want to get an abortion
08 October 2015 (
SCROTUS cancels national park fund
SCROTUS
cancelled the
fees
that offshore oil and gas extractors paid
to fund national parks.
08 October 2015 (
"Supply-side Jesus"
Right-wing US Christians worship the
"supply-side
Jesus"
08 October 2015 (
Computer companies that endorse the TPP
Computer companies that
explicitly endorse the
TPP
: Apple, Facebook, HP, Intel, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, Qualcomm,
Xerox.
Supporters also include Disney, Time Warner, Wal-Mart, Target, Gap,
Exxon, Chevron, Mars, Kraft, Coca Cola, Monsanto, Procter & Gamble.
08 October 2015 (
Using the Hobby Lobby decision
People with religious convictions in favor of abortion rights might be
able to use the Hobby Lobby decision to
justify
ignoring the Republican laws that make it hard to operate an abortion
clinic
08 October 2015 (
The TPP
Why is
Donald
Trump's tax plan ridiculed
but the TPP deal gets a pass?
08 October 2015 (
US bombing of Médecins Sans Frontières
The US has now
changed
its story 4 times
about bombing Médecins Sans
Frontières.
It is difficult to hit a moving target.
This attack was
probably
a war crime
08 October 2015 (
Europeans' personal data on Facebook
The European Court of Justice ruled that Facebook (and other
companies)
cannot
send Europeans' personal data to the US
More
information
08 October 2015 (
Fiorina's "abortion" video
Fiorina's "abortion" video
actually
shows a miscarriage
, not an abortion.
08 October 2015 (
Israeli "outposts"
Netanyahu's government has
retroactively
authorized
large "outposts" built by Israelis in Palestine, without Israeli authorization.
Thus he demonstrates that Palestinian President Abbas's statements are correct.
08 October 2015 (
Supporters of Palestinian BDS
Supporters of the Palestinian
boycott-divestment-sanctions
movement
face systematic harassment from an organized group which
says it aims to intimidate people. The harassment is often followed
by threats of violence.
The University of California is being pressured to impose
unconstitutional
censorship.
08 October 2015 (
History of Israel/Palestine
A textbook that presented Israeli and Arab descriptions of the history
if Israel/Palestine, side by side,
was
rejected in both Israel and Palestine.
08 October 2015 (
Destruction by climate mayhem
Australia has killed a
UN
plan
to help people move to escape destruction by climate mayhem of the land where they live.
The Australian government, while cutting back on efforts to curb
global heating
thus endeavors to make people drown on the islands and
shores that will be flooded.
I suspect the specific reasoning behind this is that supporting this
plan would mean admitting that
global heating
will cause a problem.
08 October 2015 (
Israeli raid of Hospital
Israeli
troops in disguise
raided a hospital in Palestine and carried
off a patient. The troops tried to disable the security cameras but
did not get them all.
08 October 2015 (
MSF hospital in Kunduz
Medecins Sans Frontieres demands an
independent
investigation
of whether the US violated the Geneva conventions by bombarding
the MSF hospital in Kunduz.
Why is U.S. refusing an independent investigation if it's so clear its hospital airstrike was an
"accident"?
Other US attacks on
civilian
facilities.
In Vietnam, the US
sought
out hospitals
as targets for bombing.
08 October 2015 (
Mentally ill people
In the UK, all the services that helped mentally ill people cope with life
mean that requiring them to work is in some cases
killing them.
Britons, the
banksters
will kill you, one way or another, if you don't
defeat them.
08 October 2015 (
In prison for "endangering" the fetus
Amanda Kimbrough was sentenced to
ten
years in prison
for "endangering"
the fetus she was carrying. This is the latest right-wing excuse
for punishing women by pretending that a fetus is a human being.
Ms Kimbrough did something very bad: she chose not to abort a fetus
known to be badly deformed. However, she wasn't prosecuted for that
(and it doesn't serve the right-wing agenda to prohibit that).
08 October 2015 (
Apple's $181B overseas
If Apple Didn't Hold $181B Overseas,
It
Would Owe $59B in US Taxes.
And many other big companies likewise.
08 October 2015 (
Indonesian forest fires
Indonesian Forest Fires on Track
to
Emit More CO2 Than UK.
08 October 2015 (
Imprisoned for miscarriages
Women
in El Salvador
have been sentenced to as much as 40 years in prison
for having miscarriages, which were presumed by the state to be abortions.
08 October 2015 (
Federal aid for South Carolina
Senator Graham wants federal aid for South Carolina, which has been
hit hard by a hurricane, and can't recall why he voted against giving
aid to New Jersey when it was in a
similar situation.
08 October 2015 (
Cindy Hahn's video of thugs
Cindy Hahn made a video of thugs and suffered
violent
retaliation,
followed by false accusations.
08 October 2015 (
Access to abortion
Bills in various US states would impose
restrictions
on obtaining viagra
or vasectomies. The idea is to illustrate the wrong of laws that impede access to abortion.
I think these bills are good as argument, but it would be wrong to adopt them,
just as it is wrong to adopt laws to impede abortion.
08 October 2015 (
Structure of the economy
A futurologist
unwittingly
shows
how bad the current changes in the structure
of the economy could be, if we don't use democracy to stop them.
08 October 2015 (
Tracking by Verizon
Verizon, sued for inserting tracking headers into users' web browsing,
is
about to track them even harder.
08 October 2015 (
Traditional freedoms of readers
A major UK bookstore chain will stop the
self-defeating
sales
of the Amazon Swindle.
The Amazon Swindle
swindles
users out of the traditional freedoms of
readers of books.
07 October 2015 (
Urgent: warrants for phone location data
US citizens:
call
on California
to require search warrants for phone location data.
07 October 2015 (
Urgent: oppose bigger intervention in Syria
US citizens: Phone your senators to oppose a bigger intervention in Syria.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
I am not opposed to all kinds of intervention in principle. I'm opposed
to useless bloodshed, and Syria is not worth fighting Russia over.
07 October 2015 (
Urgent: confirming federal judges
US citizens: phone Senator McConnell's office at 202-224-2541 and say,
start confirming federal judges.
07 October 2015 (
Nauru refugee 'release'
Nauru Refugee 'Release' Shows Neither Detention (of refugees) Nor
Drawn-Out Processing
Were
Ever Necessary.
07 October 2015 (
Final TPP deal
Users Have Been Betrayed in the Final TPP Deal —
Help
Us Tell Washington How You Feel.
07 October 2015 (
Facebook's "authentic names"
campaign
to pressure Facebook to stop requiring its users to give their "authentic names".
07 October 2015 (
Legalized assisted suicide
California has legalized assisted suicide, but
only
for the terminally ill.
People who are bedridden and condemned
to years of useless suffering are
excluded.
07 October 2015 (
Pentagon bombing of hospital
The Pentagon is
having
trouble
spinning its bombing of the MSF hospital
so as to deny its responsibility for the act.
Afghan
Doctor Slaughter Pulls Back Curtain
(on the casualties US interventions keep on causing).
Occasionally war is an intelligent and necessary policy, but most US
wars don't make anything better.
07 October 2015 (
Dropping leaflets over NSA
Drone Flies Over
NSA
Complex in Germany,
Dropping Leaflets.
07 October 2015 (
Syria's "moderates" disappeared
Syria's "Moderates" Have Disappeared … and
There
Are No Good Guys.
Actually, there are
some
(mostly) good guys: the
revolutionary Kurds.
07 October 2015 (
Earth's rising population
Earth's Rising Population
Spells
Trouble Ahead.
07 October 2015 (
Violence against Israelis
Palestinians are so
desperate
and hopeless
that some of them are engaging in random acts of violence against Israelis.
Negotiations are hopeless as long as Israel is dead set against peace,
but the US could change that.
07 October 2015 (
US method of intervention
"Arm the opposition" has become a standard simplistic US method of
intervention. But it usually
does not work.
07 October 2015 (
Record-breaking rain and floods
Global
heating
made the record-breaking rain and floods in South Carolina worse.
07 October 2015 (
Offshoring of profits
New
tax rules
to stop offshoring of profits were weakened by UK lobbying.
07 October 2015 (
Suffering in Yemen
US officials won't turn their attention to the
suffering
the US is helping Saudi Arabia to cause in Yemen.
This could be related to
Saudi
Arabia's paid PR in the US.
07 October 2015 (
Radiation around Chernobyl
The residual radiation around Chernobyl is
not
as bad for wild animals
as the presence of humans would be.
It is good news that the radiation doesn't do worse harm, but this
doesn't imply that we should consider the area safe to live in or
farm.
07 October 2015 (
Shaker Aamer's torture
Britain's Role in Shaker Aamer's Torture
Demands
an Inquiry — Now.
07 October 2015 (
Endangered cactus
1/3
of the world's cactus species
are endangered by human demand for exotic houseplants.
07 October 2015 (
Racism by white people
We're All Racist. But Racism by White People
Matters More.
07 October 2015 (
Organized American Atheists
Organized American Atheists are starting to campaign for
abortion rights.
07 October 2015 (
Definition of "terrorist"
The
US
and Russia
both twist the definition of "terrorist".
Terrorists are people that try to gain their ends by threatening or
committing violence against civilians. Maybe all the armed groups in
Syria are terrorists, except perhaps the Kurds.
07 October 2015 (
Mayor of Stockton's computer
The Committee for Public Safety (officially "Department of Homeland
Security"
confiscated
the computer of the Mayor of Stockton, then kept him
prisoner until he handed over the passwords).
I don't think they have a legal right to demand passwords.
07 October 2015 (
Dairy farming
Dairy farming, when carried to excess, causes
major
environmental degradation
Don't forget the
methane
that the
cattle
produce
07 October 2015 (
CIA-shielded Salvadorean officer
The CIA continues to shield the
Salvadorean
officer whose troops committed a US-backed massacre in 1981
, now
that he faces a criminal investigation for it at home.
07 October 2015 (
US publishes excuses for bombing hospital
The US has published a
series
of false excuses
for bombing the MSF hospital in Kunduz,
suggesting that they are inventions rather than facts.
07 October 2015 (
Lords Resistance Army weakened
The Lords Resistance Army has been weakened, but
remains
dangerous
. We should finish it off.
07 October 2015 (
Easter Island no-fish zone
Making
a giant no-fish zone
around Easter Island.
07 October 2015 (
Urgent: Careful investigation of GMO corn
US citizens:
call
for a careful investigation
of Monsanto's new pesticide-resistant
GMO corn.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
07 October 2015 (
Urgent: Ban toxic fire-retardants
US citizens:
call
on the Consumer Product Safety Commission
to ban toxic
fire-retardants.
07 October 2015 (
Universal total surveillance
China uses universal total surveillance to
punish
people who communicate with dissidents
or other undesirables.
07 October 2015 (
Banksters colluding to manipulate market
Banksters
have been
found
colluding
to manipulate a market — again.
07 October 2015 (
Computer imitation of people's voices
Computers can now imitate a chosen person's voice
well
enough to fool software and other persons
07 October 2015 (
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse Wants to Make the Computer Fraud and Abuse
Act
Even
Easier to Abuse
07 October 2015 (
Lead in the water in Flint, Michigan
The water in Flint, Michigan, has so much lead that it
poisons
children who drink it
07 October 2015 (
Massive protest against cruel UK policies
massive
protest
against cruel policies greeted the Conservative Party
meeting in the UK.
07 October 2015 (
US bombardment of MSF hospital
The US
claims
that Taliban were firing from the MSF hospital. MSF says this is
false.
Afghan officials say the Taliban were in the hospital's "extensive"
garden; if so, why did the US keep bombarding the hospital instead?
07 October 2015 (
Helping Planned Parenthood
Four
ways
people can help
Planned Parenthood.
07 October 2015 (
Student suspended for bag of sugar
Akros Middle School suspended student Iverson Sibley for having a bag
of sugar and flavoring. The staff had thought at first that the bag
contained cocaine. When they found out what it really was, they felt
that
punishment already decided on had to be carried out
Some courts and officials take the
same
attitude towards the death penalty
. "The system, by definition,
can't be wrong."
07 October 2015 (
The TPP
The disputes among the governments in the TPP negotiations are about
how to manage and control trade —
for
the benefit of which companies
07 October 2015 (
Guns on campus
State laws that require colleges to allow guns on campus
did
not prevent the Oregon school shooting
07 October 2015 (
Ai Weiwei finds suspected listening devices
Ai Weiwei found suspected listening devices in his studio, and posted
photos
of them
07 October 2015 (
Guns
Guns give people an
illusion
of strength and security
07 October 2015 (
UK and Saudi Arabia bad for human rights
The UK and Saudi Arabia made a
deal
to get themselves voted onto the UN Human Rights Council
The UK is not as bad as for human rights Saudi Arabia, but it is
getting
there
07 October 2015 (
The danger faced by Americans
"In the United States, you're more likely to be
crushed
by falling furniture
than killed by a terrorist—but try telling
that to Washington."
It might appear that Americans are safe and secure, if you ignore the
big danger we face: poverty spread by plutocracy.
07 October 2015 (
GMO cotton and farmers' suicides
The
complicated
relationship
between GMO cotton and farmers' suicides in India.
Based on the information in the article, it appears that Bt cotton was
among the last steps in the process that led farmers to ruin in
some regions.
05 October 2015 (
Tuberculosis drug development
Although millions have tuberculosis,
drug
companies are not interested
in developing new drugs to cure it.
They want to develop drugs people will have to take over and over.
05 October 2015 (
Innocent people forced to plead guilty
The UK has made innocent people plead guilty by means of US-style
plea
bargaining and heavy fines
for those who don't plead guilty.
05 October 2015 (
Time for New New Deal?
In the US, Is It Time for a
New New
Deal
Increasing the birth rate would be bad, but proper gratis provision of
birth control and abortion would be able to prevent that byproduct.
05 October 2015 (
US bombs Médecins Sans Frontières
The US bombed Médecins Sans Frontières in Kunduz
for
over 30 minutes
as the charity's staff called for a halt.
It is impossible to completely avoid such errors in war, but the US
may not have done enough to avoid the attack or to halt it.
05 October 2015 (
Right to do computer security research
Berkeley report on
US
legal threats
to the right to do computer security research.
05 October 2015 (
Argentina has proposed a
horribly
long extension of copyright for photos
. Via Libre, a good free
software organization, is organizing against this.
The Bern Convention is bad, and rather than scurrying to obey it,
countries should tear it up.
05 October 2015 (
Intermediary liability protections
EFF: Breaking
Section
230's Intermediary Liability Protections
Won't Fix Harassment.
05 October 2015 (
Opponents of raising minimum wage
How Opponents of Raising Minimum Wage
Pit
Workers Against Each Another
05 October 2015 (
Stopping gun massacres in the US
Eight
Ways
to Stop Gun Massacres in the US.
05 October 2015 (
The Diderot effect
The
Diderot
effect
: buying one "cool" product can manipulate you into feeling
you need a bunch of other "cool" products to add up to a new "cool"
lifestyle.
I think it's silly to buy anything with the idea it will change
something else.
05 October 2015 (
Teenage prisoners bribed by prison thugs
Miami prison
thugs
made a habit of bribing teenage prisoners to beat
up other teenage prisoners. Then one was
beaten
to death
05 October 2015 (
The Logo Sea Turtle
Proposing
the Logo Sea Turtle — for Whales
05 October 2015 (
Urgent: support gun control laws
US citizens:
phone
your congresscritter
to support gun control laws.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and 888-355-3588.
05 October 2015 (
Urgent: support diplomacy in Syria
US citizens:
call
on the Senate
to support diplomacy in Syria.
05 October 2015 (
Federal Trade Commission
The Federal Trade Commission is starting to act against companies that
make customers sign promises
not
to criticize the company.
This practice is part of a larger range of unjust practices, which
also includes imposing arbitration agreements on customers or on
employees.
05 October 2015 (
Black children in Wisconsin
Wisconsin
is hell for black children.
Madison, the capital, is
egregious: around 3200 black children age 10-17 live there, and
thugs
arrested such black children 1000 times last year. They are arrested
for protesting, for running, for picnicking.
05 October 2015 (
Vulnerable to enslavement
The US issues special visas for temporary immigrant workers that are
tied
to a single employer,
which makes them vulnerable to enslavement.
05 October 2015 (
Impossible to release from Guantanamo
Congress
is trying to make it essentially impossible to release anyone
from Guantanamo prison, even prisoners who have been officially cleared
of all suspicion.
The US must release or try each and every one of the prisoners in
Guantanamo, because imprisonment without trial is tyranny.
05 October 2015 (
Standards for ozone pollution
The EPA has
tightened
standards for ozone pollution a little, but it's far less
than doctors say is needed to protect human health.
05 October 2015 (
Exclude tobacco from TPP
There is a
proposal
to exclude tobacco from TPP rules — the ones
that would allow companies to sue governments over any laws that
interfere with their profits. But tobacco companies are pressing hard
to be included, so they can block measures to restrain the promotion
of their deadly product.
This is just a sample of the evil spirit of
Treacherous Plutocratic Poison
05 October 2015 (
Philanthrocapitalism
Billionaire "philanthrocapitalism" is so powerful that it buys the support
of entire fields of endeavor; hardly anyone dares question its
decisions.
When Gates referred to opponents of computational idea patents
as "communists", I think he meant me.
This
was my response.
Unfortunately the article falls into repeating the confusion term
"intellectual
property"
that Gates himself uses. Please don't ever use that term.
05 October 2015 (
Resolving the Syrian civil war
The Nation's views on resolving the Syrian civil war through
negotiation.
I mostly agree, but I think we should support the revolutionary Kurds more.
They are the only side in Syria that isn't made of monsters.
05 October 2015 (
Thugs with SWAT training
Ferguson's
thug department
made itself more repressive by overpromoting
thugs
with SWAT training.
In other words, the psychological side effect of militarization was
what counted.
05 October 2015 (
When a baby's life begins
Why Science
Can't
Say
When a Baby's Life Begins.
I think it is better not to try to save a premature baby
if it will probably have major defects. If it makes sense
to prohibit harming a fetus, that should apply to this.
05 October 2015 (
"Internet of things" means snooping
The "internet of things" could mean being snooped on by
roommates
or family.
It could promote even more intrusive and pressuring control
of children by their parents, with never a moment on their own.
04 October 2015 (
Canada Surveillance
Canadian artists say
they
will vote for whoever will repeal the recent
massive surveillance law.
04 October 2015 (
Global [heating]
World's Energy Systems
At
Risk From Global [heating],
Say Leading Firms.
04 October 2015 (
UK poverty
Today's UK workers
will
face poverty when they retire.
04 October 2015 (
Death penalty
An
enormous
dispute
has arisen about how to get drugs for executions in the
US.
I can't see why people object to the specific method, rather than
objecting to the
death
penalty
04 October 2015 (
Harassment by "child protection" agencies
We are shocked at reports of how "child protection" agencies harass
and threaten white parents, but they do it
lot more often to black parents
They need to relearn that their job is to deal with abuse of children,
and failure to overprotect is not abuse.
04 October 2015 (
French mass surveillance bill
Civil
Rights Groups Condemn Draft Mass Surveillance Bill to be Adopted in
France
04 October 2015 (
Gentrification
How gentrification is
making
New York and other great cities boring
, except for the very rich.
04 October 2015 (
Dumb, unbiased systems
A dumb system is an
unbiased
system
. If they make it "smart", we can't trust it to be fair.
However, the recommendation for "transparent" code in cars is
insufficient — what we need is free software,
software
that the users control
04 October 2015 (
When a man loves a bonobo
When a man loves a
bonobo
04 October 2015 (
Religious extremism in Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia benefits from Western support so it can carry out its
barbaric
religious extremism
04 October 2015 (
Bans on GM food crops in Europe
14
European countries
have decided to ban genetically modified food
crops.
Genetically modified food crops are not inherently and inevitably bad.
In practice, they tend to do harm because they (1) use lots of
pesticide and (2) spread patent pollution. With companies pushing for
them, their effects on consumers, farm workers and wildlife are
not tested properly.
04 October 2015 (
Liberal Mormons
Liberal Mormons can
switch
to an alternative church
04 October 2015 (
Rape not regarded as crime by Kenyan thugs
In Kenya, the
thugs
do
not regard rape as a crime
04 October 2015 (
Mandatory minimum sentences
A bipartisan senate bill
proposes
to cut back
on mandatory minimum sentences.
It
doesn't
do enough
04 October 2015 (
Planned Parenthood
Planned Parenthood provides
medical
services for men
, too.
04 October 2015 (
Charlie Hebdo
People outside France rushed to criticize the satire in Charlie Hebdo
without understanding its
anti-fascist
basic idea
I don't personally know Charlie Hebdo very much; I never read it
myself.
04 October 2015 (
Burundi
Burundi
Is Burning
— Help Us Put Out the Fire Before It's Too Late.
I don't know enough about Burundi to have any idea what sort of help
might make things better rather than worse.
3 October 2015
Humanitarian assistance
The need for humanitarian assistance is ballooning, and the
organizations that
provided it are
stretched to the limit
This is not surprising: too much human footprint is pushing everything
to the limit.
3 October 2015
Pope did not support Davis
The Vatican says that Pope Francis
did not give support
personally to Kim Davis.
3 October 2015
Vigilante virus
A vigilante virus
tightens the security
of systems it enters, and appears to do nothing nasty.
To be truly ethical, it should make all its source code available
(under a free license, of course), and should ask before it changes
things.
3 October 2015
Ebola still active
Ebola is
still infecting people
in Sierra Leone.
Is the vaccine ready?
3 October 2015
Hypocrisy regarding Saudi regime
The US
smears its name
by supporting the Saudi regime, whose cruelty resembles
PISSI
The Saudi regime even
destroys ancient relics
too — mainly those from early Islam.
3 October 2015
Data protection ruling
The European Court of Justice ruled that an internet-based company
which specifically markets to any particular country and has operates
in that country
must follow that country's data protection rules
for citizens of that country.
This decision looks correct to me. The multinational Companies should
not be able to shop around between countries for the weakest data
protection and apply that to everyone. Meanwhile, smaller companies that
operate in one country will still be covered only by that country's law,
even though they sell to people in other countries.
3 October 2015
Amazon monopoly
Amazon will
try to kill Google and Apple video streaming products
by not listing them for sale.
Those products are just as proprietary, and probably just as nasty, as
what Amazon offers. People shouldn't buy or use any of them.
However, that doesn't detract from the main point of the article: that
Amazon's market power is dangerous.
I urge people
not to buy anything from Amazon
under any circumstances.
I have never done so.
3 October 2015
Corruption of private medicine
An NHS physician
describes the corrupting influence
of private medicine.
3 October 2015
No drone apology
The Obama regime is going to the mat to
avoid apologizing to Faisal bin Ali Jaber
whose family was killed in a drone attack in Yemen.
3 October 2015
Bogus arguments
Robert Reich: the Washington Post attacked Sanders' plans for health
care
and education, with
bogus arguments
based on misrepresentation
of the facts.
3 October 2015
Miles per gallon lieware
Many cars advertise high miles per gallon and
don't seem to deliver
Is this
another case of lieware
or do they use only physical hacks?
DRM and the DMCA are
additional barriers
to investigating lieware.
3 October 2015
Academic PR of GMOs
collection of emails
revealed by a freedom-of-information request
seems to show Monsanto organizing many professors to publish and speak
in favor of GMOs, often claiming dubious benefits.
3 October 2015
Helping al-Nusra
Richard Parry
says that Israel is secretly helping al-Nusra
(a part of al-Qa'ida) in Syria.
It doesn't state evidence; I would not put this past Israel but I
don't consider the claim proven.
The larger question is, what should the US do in Syria?
The article does not even consider the possibility of aiding the one
side that isn't monstrous — the revolutionary Kurds.
3 October 2015
Expensive drugs
'We Could Have All These Drugs Available at Generic Prices'.
Bad policies, which cater to Big Pharma, make drugs too expensive.
3 October 2015
Temporary workers
Toys 'R Us used
special visas to bring in temporary workers
to study American workers' jobs. Then it fired those workers.
Workers need to have the guts to say "I will quit now rather than
later." And the fortitude to organize unions. And to vote against
any anti-union politicians.
3 October 2015
Reaganism
Reaganism Has Been The Problem — Bernie Sanders Is The
Solution.
3 October 2015
Crime to collect data
Wyoming has made it a
crime to collect data
(for instance, pollution
measurements) from open land and report the data to government agencies.
The law's motivation was undisguised corruption by businesses that
want to pollute.
3 October 2015
Funding for abortions
Organizations
campaign to repeal the law
banning federal funding for abortions.
It is vital to demand more than mere preservation of the status quo.
To defend the status quo is to set up a discussion in which every
possible compromise is a change for the worse.
3 October 2015
Fertilizer lobby
The "fertilizer lobby"
campaigns against plans to reduce global heating
due to agriculture.
3 October 2015
Thugs tracking politicians
UK
thugs
tracked MPs
including Jeremy Corbin.
Snooping on Labour politicians has a
long history
in the UK.
3 October 2015
Pretend peace negotiations
Israel's most senior diplomat has recently
rejected outright the idea
of a Palestinian state.
Netanyahu did this around the time of the election. The US can no
longer
go along with Israel's pretend peace negotiations. It looks like Obama
has
decided to completely drop the question.
I think this calls for an
increased level of private pressure on Israel
to make peace.
Meanwhile, students that criticize Israeli policy face
organized censorship and intimidation on campus
including false accusations of "antisemitism".
The New York Times
understates the success
of their movement.
3 October 2015
Killer robots
Killer robots are
already being built
3 October 2015
Scientist fired for criticism
Canadian scientist Tony Turner was
fired for criticizing
right-wing science
saboteur
Harper outside work,
so he will spend full time
campaigning against the Conservatives.
3 October 2015
Growing privacy concern
Americans are
becoming more concerned
about how digital technology harms their privacy.
If we want to get privacy back, we need to stop giving companies the
choice about how much privacy we can have.
3 October 2015
Mass shootings
Mass shootings (four or more people shot) are
happening over once a day
in the US.
The overall US murder rate is still much lower than it was in the 90s.
But the rise in mass shootings indicates a systemic problem.
3 October 2015
Indian electricity pledge
India
offers a pledge
to get 40% of electricity from renewables by 2030.
This is comparable to many other inadequate pledges. Electricity is a
small
fraction of energy use in India.
3 October 2015
Eliminating the NHS
The legal framework for
eliminating the NHS in the UK
has already been put in place, with no public debate.
Actual privatization and elimination is proceeding rapidly.
The Tories'
goal
all along
has been to eliminate most medical care
for the people that don't matter to them (the non-rich). They don't
admit this, but their
actions
show it.
3 October 2015
Thugs macing students
A court says Birmingham
thugs
violated students constitutional rights
when
pepper-spraying them for arguing
The vicious cruel intentions of the
thugs
are proved by the way they
acted afterward to maximize the students' suffering.
3 October 2015
Perils of self-driving cars
Self-driving cars offer tremendous advantages. We must fight to
prevent them from imposing dangers
such as total surveillance of the
passengers, and proprietary software for the driver or the passengers.
We must prevent them from being operated as a
Guber-style taxi system
if, as
Guber
does, it requires users to run nonfree software to call a
car and to pay for the ride.
We must insist that, if you buy a car, you can change the software in
it.
3 October 2015
Campaign finance reform
Sanders is raising a lot of campaign funds in small donations, not from
billionaires — but
we need campaign finance reform
anyway.
3 October 2015
Alabama voting rights
Alabama passed a law requiring voters to have state ID, then
closed the offices where most blacks live
3 October 2015
Media refugee hype
An
artificial media hype bubble
about refugees collecting in Calais to
push their way into the UK has vanished, illustrating how the media
can focus attention on distractions by making them look big.
3 October 2015
Indonesian massacre
50 years ago, the Indonesian army
stirred up a massacre
that killed up to a million people, with implicit US support.
The numbers killed are uncertain because Indonesia has discouraged
investigation of the massacre.
3 October 2015
Turkish journalist attacked
Turkish journalist Ahmet Hakan, who has criticized the regime, was
attacked by a gang
outside his home. This was clearly a targeted
political move, presumably arranged by Erdoğan's
thugs
3 October 2015
Dangers of lieware
Samsung TVs seem to
burn more energy in real use
than in official tests.
Is it because of lieware?
There are gray areas at the edges of lieware, which mislead in the
same way but perhaps were not designed specifically to do so.
Compare with the issue of how banks
could generate illegal practices
such as refusing home loans to blacks or in certain neighborhoods,
through algorithms without explicitly programming them to exclude
specific groups or neighborhoods.
3 October 2015
Endocrine disruptors
The International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics warns that
we are
filling the environment with chemicals
that can have harmful effects at very low levels.
I presume this refers to endocrine disruptors, among others.
These chemicals are not poison in the usual sense; there is no danger
you will ingest enough today to make you immediately sick. Rather,
they cause birth defects, cancer, and various impairments, over the
long term.
02 October 2015 (
Cities facing annihilation
Several cities face slow annihilation, many of them due to
global
heating effects or local ecosystem degradation
It appears Miami's politicians represent the fools that hope to sell
their assets to a bigger fool who won't realize it's a rip-off.
02 October 2015 (
Afghan army recaptures most of Kunduz
The Afghan army says it has
recaptured
most of Kunduz
after heavy fighting.
I'm impressed.
02 October 2015 (
Prisoners tortured by Assad's men
Smuggled official photos show that Assad's men
tortured
lots of prisoners to death
02 October 2015 (
Treacherous Plutocratic Poison
Various plutocratist governments are trying to finish the TPP, but
there is a disagreement about
whether
it should allow tobacco companies to sue governments about laws to
reduce smoking
This is not a quirk. It reflects the basic spirit of the treaty,
which is why it is a mistake to think that fixing a few details might
make it better than nothing. It is
Treacherous Plutocratic Poison
and its purpose is to give companies more power against democracy.
We must kill it!
02 October 2015 (
Moscow winding down war in Ukraine
Moscow is
winding
down the war in Ukraine
, and might be considering peace.
It seems that Putin started it for political purposes, and is willing
to throttle it up and down as suits him politically. The economic
sanctions could even be working (which they wouldn't if Putin
considered the war inherently important).
02 October 2015 (
Mexican gangsters extradited to US
Mexico has extradited some gangsters to the US, since even Mexico's
highest-security prison is
too
corrupt to hold them
02 October 2015 (
Rio de Janeiro thugs
Thugs
in Rio de Janeiro have been arrested for
killing
a teenager and putting a gun in his hand
. They were so careful as
to shoot the gun after that, to create false evidence supporting their
claim that he had fired it.
02 October 2015 (
Britons demand license for cancer drug
Britons demand that the state issue a compulsory license for a
very
expensive cancer drug
, that the NHS can't afford.
02 October 2015 (
Microsoft malware
Microsoft accidentally posted a "test" upgrade for Windows 7 which seems
to have
lot more malware in it than ordinary Windows
. There is no way to
tell just what it does.
Everyone makes mistakes, and I don't think this mistake constitutes a
reason to condemn Microsoft in particular. (There are plenty of such
reasons in things that Microsoft intentionally does, from
making
nonfree software
to many
malware
functionalities
.)
However, this does show that forced automatic unblockable updates,
such as imposed in
Windows
10
, is not the security solution that people take it for.
02 October 2015 (
War on Sex Trafficking
The War on Sex Trafficking
threatens
to enmesh large numbers of Americans who are not traffickers
This article compares it to the War on Drugs.
The two cases are not identical. People who are forced into
prostitution suffer a real wrong, whereas drugs are not human and
can't suffer. However, in both cases a conservative drive to punish
whenever they can find an excuse comes into play, and provokes a
response that can do great injustice.
02 October 2015 (
Jailed mentally ill Americans
Many Americans with mental illness are jailed for a long time over
minor crimelets. Jamycheal Mitchell was jailed for 5 months for
stealing a few snacks, waiting for transfer to a mental hospital, and
died
of neglect
02 October 2015 (
Teaching "yes means yes" in high school
Teaching the idea of "yes means yes" in high school
respects
human rights
, unlike imposing that as a standard for punishment in
college, and will reach far more people.
It could also provoke less hostility and be received better.
02 October 2015 (
UNESCO world heritage sites threatened
Mining and fossil fuel extraction
threaten
nearly 1/3 of the natural UNESCO world heritage sites
02 October 2015 (
Rio de Janeiro bans Guber
Rio de Janeiro has
banned
Guber
I call it
Guber
because it pays drivers peanuts,
but it does many other things that are likewise unjust,
including
surveillance of its
users
02 October 2015 (
Sheriff of Tulsa County indicted
The sheriff of Tulsa County has been indicted for
trying
to protect a killer thug from prosecution
It is extremely important to show
thugs
that there are consequences
for this sort of thing, since this is the most widespread thuggish
practice found among
thugs
Most thugs are not disposed to commit
violence themselves, but nearly all will support the lies that violent
thugs
tell to gain impunity for their violence.
02 October 2015 (
Pope fires up campaign against LGBT rights
The pope's meeting with Kim Davis has fired up the antiabortionist
campaign to fight against LGBT rights through
refusing
to do their jobs
. based on misguidedly
applying
the notion of "conscientious objection" to a situation it does not
fit
As we fight back against this, we may be able to target other forms
of religious tyranny in the US, such as the Catholic hospitals that
endanger patients' lives in the name of fetus adoration.
02 October 2015 (
Corrupt banking system
The banking system
almost
crashed in 2007
because it had become corrupt in its structure:
every bank trader has an incentive to cheat clients and take mad risks
with its investors' money, and they are so powerful that they defy
governments.
I am confident we can defeat the
banksters
, if we have sufficient
political will to cancel any treaties that they try to hide behind.
02 October 2015 (
Homeless people on trial
Manchester, England, is putting homeless people on trial, saying that
their tents are an illegal protest. The homeless people say they are
just trying to shelter from rain, after they were stopped from
sleeping under a bridge. They
face
two years in jail
If they were not protesting, they should have been, and it is wrong to
punish homeless people for protesting a state that makes them
homeless.
If you find the presence of homeless people on the street inconvenient
or annoying, remember that being homeless is a lot worse.
02 October 2015 (
Another flagrant liar running for president
Flagrant liar Carly Fiorina
should
not be elected president
We've had plenty of those as president and they have done lots of
harm.
02 October 2015 (
Obama and Putin both wrong on Syria
Why
Obama and Putin are Both Wrong
on Syria.
02 October 2015 (
US Border Patrol cruelty cover-up
The US Border Patrol
destroyed
videos
, which a judge had ordered handed over, to cover up its
cruel treatment of prisoners.
02 October 2015 (
Arrests for possession of marijuana
Despite decriminalization of marijuana in several states, and
legalization in a few, over
700,000
Americans were arrested in 2014
for possession of marijuana.
02 October 2015 (
Fossil fuel extraction in Alberta
The new elected leader of Alberta talks about winding down fossil fuel
extraction —
in
a century
Doesn't she understand?
02 October 2015 (
Russia bombs US-supported Syrian rebel group
Russia is
bombing
one of the Syrian rebel groups that the US supports.
02 October 2015 (
Reducing flow of plastic waste into ocean
plan
to reduce
the flow of plastic waste into the ocean.
02 October 2015 (
Election campaign funding
Report:
Matching
[government] Funds [for election campaigns]
Would Give Huge Boost
to Sanders, Cruz and Carson.
02 October 2015 (
Obama claims to have "ended" wars
Obama keeps claiming to have
"ended"
the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq
. As late as July, he made this
claim.
02 October 2015 (
Off-duty thug and son attacked by thugs
thug
off duty and not in uniform, was relaxing with his son when He
saw a driver flee from the scene of a car crash (which is a illegal,
for good reason).
Instead of shooting the driver, he tackled the driver. Several more
thugs
showed up, so they beat up and arrested the first thug, perhaps
because he is black. Not yet satisfied, they
beat
up and arrested his son
, who is probably also black.
I wonder what happened to the driver.
02 October 2015 (
Don't talk to thugs without a lawyer
In the US, if you have any relationship to a crime, before telling
thugs
anything at all
always
consult a lawyer
02 October 2015 (
Judge dismissed for shielding refugee
A British judge was put under investigation (and then quit) because he
paid,
himself, a destitute refugee's fine for not paying a previous
fine
. The refugee would have been jailed, then charged more fines
for being jailed, unless he managed to steal enough money to pay all
the fines.
This is similar to the situation that residents of Ferguson, and
millions of Americans, find themselves in, as cities, starved of money
because rich people and businesses no longer pay taxes, find ways to
gouge
the poor
. But this judge, unlike those in Ferguson, recognized it
was wrong. He followed the law but shielded the refugee himself, and
for this was dismissed. Shame, England!
01 October 2015 (
Solitary confinement without trial
Nidal Abu Aker, imprisoned by Israel without trial in solitary confinement,
has stepped up his hunger strike by
refusing
to drink water
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
A human cannot live long without drinking. Perhaps he is willing to
die rather than spend years in solitary confinement under an occupying
regime.
01 October 2015 (
Independent Palestinian state
A poll finds that Palestinians have
mostly
given up hope on negotiating an independent Palestinian state
, and
are ready for an armed uprising.
Armed rebellion against a military occupation is not in itself
terrorism, but they will face the temptation to engage in terrorism as
well.
01 October 2015 (
Right-wing imposition of unjust policies
Right-wing
domination
of US media
is crucial to their imposition of a long series of
unjust policies.
01 October 2015 (
Epidemic response time
Will
the world react more swiftly
to the next epidemic than it did to
Ebola?
01 October 2015 (
Having children is not a necessity
It is a mistake for the government to support
uterus
transplants with public funds
Likewise it is counterproductive for the government to support
in-vitro fertilization, or anything else to help people make babies.
The world does not have a shortage of young humans.
Having children is not a necessity of life. It is a desire that some
people have. We should not treat a lack of children as tragic, any
more than we treat the lack of some cheaper luxury, such as a Humv or
a yacht, as tragic.
01 October 2015 (
Prohibition of marijuana
Prohibition of synthetic substitutes for marijuana, together with
continued prohibition of marijuana in most of the US, may be partly
responsible for the recent
increase
in murder rate
Has the murder rate increased in Colorado?
01 October 2015 (
UK and reparations for slavery
FAQ
about the UK and reparations for slavery.
The UK does deserve credit for banning slavery, a traditional practice
which had existed since long before England came be.
01 October 2015 (
Indonesia's human rights violations
Indonesia's president Widodo, who promised to confront Indonesia's human
rights violations,
has
not kept his promise
The article accepts without comment the idea that there is something
bad about being an Atheist. One of Indonesia's human rights
violations is that being an Atheist is not recognized; citizens must
claim adherence to one of the six officially approved religions.
01 October 2015 (
NYC Mayor calls for divestment from coal
Mayor de Blasio
called
on the city's pension funds
to divest from coal.
01 October 2015 (
Americans' fingerprints taken by crackers
million Americans' fingerprints
were taken by crackers out of the
US government's records.
Thus, as the FBI
collects
and holds ever more Americans' fingerprints
, even from Americans
not accused of any crime, it exposes Americans to danger from
criminals as well as from the state.
01 October 2015 (
UK locks barn door after the jihadis are out
The UK's
sanctions
against Britons that went to fight for PISSI
are ludicrous —
locking the barn door after the jihadis have got out.
PISSI
deserves all the hate it gets (though it makes no sense to
exempt Saudi Arabia), but purely symbolic public expressions of hate
won't defeat it.
01 October 2015 (
US wants to expand search powers
The US wants to expand its search powers so that it can subpoena a
part of the data on a hard drive, then
fish
through all the rest of the data for something to prosecute
01 October 2015 (
Campaign helps surveillance agents quit
A campaign supported by whistleblower Thomas Drake offers to
help
surveillance agents quit the NSA and GCHQ
01 October 2015 (
Urgent: prosecute Exxon
US citizens:
call
on Obama
to prosecute Exxon for lying about the danger of global heating.
01 October 2015 (
A share of the reduced pie
Right-wing strategy, after reducing what is available to the non-rich,
is to make them fight among themselves for a share of the reduced pie.
To win, the non-rich
must
refuse to be divided.
01 October 2015 (
Judging loans based on Facebook data
Would it be legal for a bank to deny a loan
based
on Facebook data about you?
The article suffers from the common confusion between inventions and
patents. The method of judging loans based on a person's Facebook data
is an invention. The patent is a government-created monopoly that
might stop or hinder some companies from using the invention. Patents on
business practices are really a form of computational idea patent, so
they should not be allowed.
But that is a separate issue from the issue raised by the proposed
method. Innovations can be good or bad.
What worries me most about this proposed method is that it might
pressure people to be used by Facebook.
01 October 2015 (
Suing Saudi Arabia
US
court
denied the possibility of suing Saudi Arabia for involvement in
the September 2001 attacks.
01 October 2015 (
Records of Syria's past
Defending
the records of Syria's past
from PISSI, and from others that just
want to steal it.
01 October 2015 (
Visa for journalists
Indonesia threatens to imprison British journalists for five years
for having entered on tourist visas
to
make a documentary.
It is wrong to require special visas for journalists. One must
suspect that this is a scheme to conceal dirty deeds. (In the case of
the other journalists trying to cover West Papua, we can be sure of
that.) All the governments,
including
the US,
that have such a policy, deserve a rebuke.
01 October 2015 (
Retaking Kunduz
The Afghan army has sent
reinforcements
to the outskirts of Kunduz but the soldiers lack the morale and fighting spirit to fight to retake
the city.
As for the death of an important Taliban leader, that sort of thing
causes only a small setback to an army with strong morale.
The Afghan government has the same weakness that the South Vietnamese
government had: everyone knew its main purpose was corruption, so it
could not inspire the sort of loyalty that motivates soldiers to risk
their lives.
01 October 2015 (
Thug that shot Zachary Hammond
The thug that shot Zachary Hammond first told him,
"I'll
blow your...head off,"
as Hammond was looking away.
01 October 2015 (
Advice to Saudi prisons
Corbyn calls on the
UK
government
to stop providing advice to Saudi prisons.
Evidently the advice is not doing much, if any, good.
01 October 2015 (
Trump's tax cut for the rich
Trump proposed a big tax cut for the rich.
To
poor working Americans,
he offers to cut their tax rate from 0% to 0%.
01 October 2015 (
Petition to kill TTIP
3 million EU citizens have signed a petition to kill the TTIP,
and
it
may get killed.
That would leave several other corporate supremacy treaties in the works:
TPP
TISA
CETA
and perhaps others.
01 October 2015 (
Protecting from pesticides
The EPA has
improved
regulations
for protecting farm workers from pesticides.
01 October 2015 (
Global heating
Current pledges for the Paris climate conference
would
still lead to 3.5 C of global heating.
01 October 2015 (
US laws shaped by rich people
Rich people have reshaped US laws and business practices, across the
board, to
benefit
the rich and push the rest else down
It is unfortunate that the article uses the confusing term
"intellectual
property"
, lumping together laws whose requirements and operation
are totally different.
01 October 2015 (
Tax avoidance by big companies
Big companies have managed to avoid
2/3
of the taxes they ought to pay to US states
. This starves the
state governments of funds.
01 October 2015 (
DEA agents unpunished for taking bribes
When DEA agents were found with prostitutes in Colombia, the head of
the DEA had to resign, but
few
agents have been punished
I don't think it matters in the slightest if US agents have fun with
prostitutes. However, if the prostitutes are paid by organized
criminals, that's bribery. Why haven't those agents been prosecuted
for taking bribes?
01 October 2015 (
Demonizing the poor
Republicans have found another way to demonize the poor:
prohibit
buying meat and fish with food stamps
01 October 2015 (
UK's "work program"
The UK's "work program"
bullies
unemployed young adults to submit useless job applications
and be
exploited for no pay.
01 October 2015 (
Obama And Putin's chilling handshake
Chilling Handshake Between Obama And Putin, While Syria
Disintegrates
01 October 2015 (
Don't tell stores who you are
If you give a store your email address, it can now use that to
give
Google information about your interests
Don't be tracked — pay cash, and don't tell the store who you
are.
01 October 2015 (
Exxon's harm concealed since 70s
Now that it is established that Exxon's scientists
recognized
the likelihood and danger of global heating back in the 70s
, it is
time for a RICO investigation of these companies for carrying on while
concealing the harm they knew they were doing.
01 October 2015 (
Courts seek excuses to disregard facts
Courts everywhere
seek
excuses to ignore newly presented reasons why someone should not be
punished
. A court in Afghanistan ordered a murderer to be hanged,
although the law said he should not be executed since he was a minor
when he committed the crime. The court said his birth certificate was
presented too late.
In other words, the court found an excuse to disregard an undisputed
fact.
I think it is a distraction to focus on details of the criminal, such
as age or sanity. The death penalty is
wrong
in all cases
01 October 2015 (
Kunduz captured
The Taliban
captured
a provincial capital, Kunduz
This is starting to look like Viet Nam.
30 September 2015 (
Reparations for slavery
Jamaica
Calls
for Britain to Pay Billions of Pounds
in Reparations for Slavery.
France should repay to Haiti
the
ransom it demanded
to allow Haiti to escape from slavery.
30 September 2015 (
Carbon emissions due to shark culling
Humans have nearly eliminated sharks; this can have a surprising
byproduct:
lots
of carbon emissions
Humans have nearly eliminated sea turtles, too. Does that reduce
carbon emissions?
30 September 2015 (
Manipulation of metal prices
The US and Switzerland are
investigating
large banks
for manipulating the price of metals.
Too bad the US has a policy of not putting
banksters
in jail.
30 September 2015 (
Social mobility in America
In America,
the
Poorer You Are, the Poorer Your Children Will Be
. The rich have
nearly eliminated social mobility.
30 September 2015 (
UN agency calls for censorship
UN Women, a UN agency for empowerment of women, has called for a
world-wide
system of censorship
to be applied to the internet so that people
can be stopped from threatening or insulting women.
It does this by conflating insults with "violence".
30 September 2015 (
Urgent: no gifts for Wall Street
US citizens:
tell
Congress
not to give Wall Street any gifts.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
30 September 2015 (
"Carbon lock-in"
"Carbon lock-in": investment in oil, gas or coal extraction tends to
create
economic
forces
that demand we extract it.
30 September 2015 (
Fiorina endorsed torture
Carly Fiorina has endorsed torture, specifically
waterboarding,
and further makes the claim that it gets true information rather than falsehoods.
Shame on the Guardian for suggesting that there is any doubt that it
is torture.
She also brags about
providing
servers
for the NSA's massive general surveillance.
No one would be safe if she is president.
30 September 2015 (
Harassment by bad players
In a video game, the male players that
harassed
female players
tended to be those who played badly.
30 September 2015 (
Marine protected area
New
Zealand
will create a vast marine protected area.
30 September 2015 (
Strike of NHS doctors
In the UK, cuts to doctors' salaries are driving many doctors to quit
the NHS. But first they are going to
try
going on strike.
30 September 2015 (
Insulting Shaker Aamer in the media
Expect US officials to start insulting Shaker Aamer in the media,
to discredit what he says about
how
he and other prisoners in Guantanamo were tortured.
You may find my song parody,
Guantanamero,
pertinent in this context.
30 September 2015 (
Lawsuits over environmental damage
The UK government plans to make lawsuits over environmental damage
so financially dangerous that
people
won't dare sue.
30 September 2015 (
Security-breaking by US government
The US government, when it can justify a warrant,
has
many ways to get
the data from someone's computer.
Even if we assume it only does
good, and ignore its potential for bad, it can't possibly justify
banning encryption.
Please don't call security-breaking
"hacking".
The right name for that is "cracking."
30 September 2015 (
Bombing of wedding in Yemen
A wedding in Yemen has been
bombed.
The article does not say which country's planes did it, but it was some US ally.
In Iraq, the wedding was bombed
by US planes.
30 September 2015 (
Drilling in Chukchi Sea
Shell
gave
up
on drilling for oil in the Chukchi Sea, saying test
wells did not find enough oil. Perhaps this is an excuse, a deniable
way to yield to public pressure.
30 September 2015 (
Pledge for greenhouse gas reduction
Brazil has
pledged
a big reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2025.
It is still not enough to save our ecosphere, but at least it is
getting serious.
30 September 2015 (
Same-sex marriage licenses
The illogically defended Kim Davis's refusal to sign same-sex marriage
licenses, incorrectly calling this
"conscientious
objection".
The concept of "conscientious objection" applies to jobs people are
compelled to do, such as when they are conscripted into the army.
Conscripts that object to killing cannot avoid it by resigning from
the army, so they have campaigned for and won the right to do some
other duty, such as being a medic.
This is not pertinent to Kim Davis because nobody is conscripted to
work as a county clerk. If Davis doesn't want to do that job, she can
simply resign.
Although the pope continues the
opposition
to birth control and abortion, he is putting the main emphasis elsewhere.
30 September 2015 (
Erdoğan's repression
Erdoğan's repression has pervasively
undermined
the Turkish state and courts
30 September 2015 (
UN calls for social media censorship
The UN Broadband Commission for Digital Development calls for state
licensing of social media platforms, which would be required to
censor
every post before it goes up
That goes beyond even the actual Chinese censorship.
30 September 2015 (
UK to send troops to Somalia
The UK will send troops to Somalia, ostensibly for
training
the Somali army
, and calls this "keeping the peace".
It is dishonest to speak of "keeping the peace" during a civil war.
30 September 2015 (
Cameron addresses pig sex allegations
Cameron
says
he never screwed a dead pig
. He was saving himself for when he
would screw millions of living, human non-rich Britons.
30 September 2015 (
Conversion of CO
to useful products
Some industries convert CO
to
useful
products
. This is a fine thing to do, but we would have to do it
on a tremendous scale for it to slow
global heating
30 September 2015 (
UK gov't exploiting Syrian refugees
The UK's right-wing government is cynically exploiting Syrian refugees
as an
excuse
to get more involved in war
30 September 2015 (
Lessons from Podemos
Lessons from the Spanish political party,
Podemos
30 September 2015 (
Pope in US prison
The pope spoke in a US prison and
called
on the US to care about what happens to prisoners
I hope we can make US politicians start funding rehabilitation
programs again. Putting an end to private prisons,
as
Sanders proposes
, is a necessary step but would not, alone, offer
prisoners help in rehabilitation.
However, we need to further than this. In order for ex-cons to go
straight, we need to stop excluding them from nearly all opportunity
other than crime.
30 September 2015 (
EU-US subpoena'd data
The proposed EU-US agreement on cooperation in regard to subpoena'd
data
lacks
basic protections
30 September 2015 (
Democracy protests in Hong Kong
The massive democracy protests in Hong Kong a year ago
did
not achieve their goals
; people disagree about whether they have
achieved anything.
30 September 2015 (
Bombing PISSI
Dropping a few bombs on
PISSI
is now
de
rigueur for some countries
It is dishonest for these countries to claim that they are "defending
themselves" with this. With the US already bombing
PISSI
, the extra
bombs those countries can drop will not change anything; it is only
symbolic. Defeating
PISSI
can't be done by dropping a few more bombs.
29 September 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose anti-net-neutrality rider
US citizens:
oppose
a new
anti-net-neutrality rider by Sep 30.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
29 September 2015 (
Investigation of Saudi war crimes
The UN is
considering
investigating Saudi war crimes in Yemen
. The Saudi king is using
its money to try to prevent this.
29 September 2015 (
US to keep troops in Afghanistan
The US will keep
10,000
troops in Afghanistan for another year
. Perhaps for another
decade or two.
29 September 2015 (
Pope rebukes austerity
Pope Francis, addressing the UN,
rebuked
austerity and oppressive lending
Many countries are subjugated by repayment of loans that were unjustly
made in the first place.
He also asserted that
the
environment should have rights
. Humanity and the environment are
interconnected, so damaging one damages the other.
29 September 2015 (
Neglected elderly women in South Korea
In South Korea, old women become prostitutes for old men, because
they
have no other income
29 September 2015 (
Hassled by thugs for wearing shirt
From time to time, Americans are hassled by
thugs
for
wearing
a shirt with some Arabic writing on it
Ironically, the shirt in question was made by an anti-war group.
29 September 2015 (
Student union in UK blocks speech
A student union in the UK has
blocked
Maryam Namazie from speaking at a university
. Namazie defends the
human rights of non-Muslims and ex-Muslims against repressive Muslim
rule.
Subsequently the student union
changed
its decision
and will permit Namazie to speak.
29 September 2015 (
Tell Jesus to stop
Mother Teresa told a woman, "Suffering, pain, sorrow, humiliation,
feelings of loneliness, are nothing but the kiss of Jesus, a sign that
you have come so close that he can kiss you." Her response: "Tell
Jesus to stop."
Catholic hospitals in the US have a similar
attitude
towards suffering patients
29 September 2015 (
Human rights of migrants in Australia
The UN Special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants cancelled a visit
to Australia, because the government would not promise not to
prosecute
people for speaking to him
Compare this with Israel, that
blocked
a UN mission to investigate war crimes
in Gaza.
29 September 2015 (
Peace deal between Islamist rebels and Assad
Islamist rebels, allied with al-Qa'ida, have made a
tentative
peace deal
with Assad.
29 September 2015 (
Right-wing irrationality and obtuseness
A clear example of how systematic right-wing irrationality and
obtuseness
wins
battles by repeating false insults.
29 September 2015 (
Republicans
If Republicans care about human life, why don't they celebrate
avoiding
war with Iran?
29 September 2015 (
Urgent: say no to the TPP
US citizens:
say
no once again to the TPP.
We have not won yet!
29 September 2015 (
Urgent: ban privatized prisons
US citizens:
call
on Congress
to ban privatized prisons.
29 September 2015 (
Urgent: tobacco control committee
Everyone:
Urge
the Philippines Congress
to kick the tobacco industry
representative off the state's tobacco control committee.
29 September 2015 (
Cancer near nuclear power plants
The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission
cancelled
a study
meant to check
for high levels of cancer within a few km of nuclear power plants.
The author of this article
says
that this was done to avoid embarrassing
the nuclear industry with a positive result.
I don't know whether the result is likely to be positive, but the
cancellation stinks.
29 September 2015 (
Imprisonment of mothers of newborns
US mothers of newborns face imprisonment for long periods of time
if
they take drugs,
even prescription drugs, that are judged harmful to fetuses.
There are many practices that pregnant women would do best to avoid,
but imprisoning women for not avoiding them only makes things worse.
29 September 2015 (
Privacy protection in Europe
The EU must stop letting European companies entrust their data to
US servers, but that's only the first step. The EU needs to establish
sufficient
privacy protection
for users when the data is in Europe.
In my opinion, countries should not allow services to be designed as
excuses to collect data about people.
29 September 2015 (
Bogus plan to reduce greenhouse gas
The
new prime minister of Australia
has committed to defend a bogus
plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, ignoring the objections that
he himself pointed out before.
29 September 2015 (
GCHQ profiles of internet users
GCHQ profiles the internet usage of nearly every internet user. This
includes
browsing, searching, emails, internet radio listening, and more.
29 September 2015 (
Corporations United decision
The Supreme Court's right-wing majority
bent
over backwards
to come up with the Corporations United decision.
(The plaintiffs' organization was officially known as "Citizens United",
a demonstration of the dishonesty at the root of their cause.)
29 September 2015 (
Men stab, rape and kill
Men Stab, Rape and Kill Women Because They Can. It's Time to Say
They Can't.
People who claim that those who are raped are responsible for it are
probably failing to
distinguish
between moral responsibility and practical responsibility.
29 September 2015 (
Volkswagen lieware
Volkswagen says that only a small team of engineers was responsible
for the lieware.
Some
are skeptical of this claim.
29 September 2015 (
Netanyahu the fear monger
Uri
Avnery:
Netanyahu the fear monger can't use the hypothetical
Iranian nuke any more, but he will find someone else.
29 September 2015 (
NSA's mass internet spying
How the NSA's Mass Internet Spying
Poisons Society.
29 September 2015 (
Increased surveillance
The
German government
plans to spend lots of money to increase
surveillance of everyone.
29 September 2015 (
Unique IDs and surveillance
Germany is considering requiring every
"thing"
connected to the internet to have a unique ID.
That is a horrible idea, since it would tent to cement total surveillance.
29 September 2015 (
Poisonous snakes
More than
100,000
people a year
are killed by poisonous snakes, and no one
keeps track of how many. And the company that makes antivenin has stopped.
29 September 2015 (
False accusations against Planned Parenthood
Planned Parenthood supporters threw condoms at
Carly
Fiorina,
who made false accusations against Planned Parenthood.
29 September 2015 (
North Atlantic currents
An unprecedented
large
mass of cold water
in the North Atlantic
threatens to shut down the currents, including the Gulf Stream.
28 September 2015 (
Urgent: No mortgages for gougers
US citizens:
call
on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
to stop selling mortgages to
gougers.
28 September 2015 (
Urgent: Student debt
US citizens:
call
on the Department of Education
to declare a moratorium on
garnishing Social Security payments for student debt.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
28 September 2015 (
Secret lobbying against car emission tests
The UK government has
secretly
lobbied
against an EU proposal to require realistic tests of car
emissions.
28 September 2015 (
Snooping Barbie
A Barbie doll
connected
to a company's server
can converse with a child and get lots of
personal data about that child.
28 September 2015 (
Harlem's homeless people
Harlem residents are pushing homeless people out, while they have
nowhere
to go
28 September 2015 (
No compassion for immigrant children
The UK government has no compassion for people brought or sent to the
UK as children, without permission, who have no other home to go to.
They are run through an expensive wringer,
paying
lots of money to file requests that get turned down
The US is similar, which is one of the issues proposed for
immigration
reform in the US
. This stalled a few years ago when Republicans
turned against it.
27 September 2015 (
Chile prevents disaster
Chile shows how
planning,
and enforcing strict building codes
, can prevent an earthquake
from becoming a disaster.
27 September 2015 (
The term "Anthropocene"
An excerpt from the book "Adventures in the Anthropocene" displays the
twisted
pride
I warned that the term might inspire.
It is not too late to change to a name that won't inspire pride, such
as "Thermocene", "Pyrocene" or "Obscene". All that is required is for
a few prominent scientists to stop believing the self-fulfilling
prophesy that "it is too late".
27 September 2015 (
Malaysian court lifts ban on publications
A court in Malaysia asserted independence from the authoritarian prime
minister by
ordering
that some magazines can resume publication
27 September 2015 (
Gouging the poor in the US
The latest clever idea for gouging the poor in the US:
make
them pay to "rent" a radio tracking ankle bracelet
from a company,
when on bail.
Antonio Green decided to go back to jail as the cost of this destroyed
his life.
You might wonder why they make someone wear a radio tracking device
when on bail for unpaid traffic tickets. Perhaps the motive for this
practice is to enrich the company. When officials sign a deal like
this with a company, one must suspect that they have an interest in
it.
27 September 2015 (
War on Women's rights
Cruel fallout from the right-wing War on Women's rights: women who
take any sort of drug while pregnant are
imprisoned
for many years
27 September 2015 (
Food stamps for whites, not blacks
Ohio's governor offers food stamps to
poor
rural whites that vote for him
, but not to poor urban blacks that
vote Democrat.
27 September 2015 (
Killed for not paying parking ticket
David Stojcevski was jailed for not paying a parking ticket, then
killed
by inhumane treatment by thugs
that paid no attention as he died.
27 September 2015 (
School privatizers
School privatizers
consider municipal
bankruptcy
an opportunity to seize and chew up public school
systems.
27 September 2015 (
Secret support for coup in Honduras
Hillary Clinton
secretly
supported the coup in Honduras
, while publicly claiming to oppose
the coup.
This continues all the worst foreign policy practices of the US.
I do not want someone like this as president.
Without Clinton's subtle support, the coup might have been reversed as
recently occurred in
Burkina
Faso
27 September 2015 (
Australia trying to make schools harass
The Australian government is trying to make schools
harass
potential nonviolent environmental "terrorists"
who might do
things such as spiking trees to prevent logging.
This is no surprise. The Australian government
works
for the companies that do things such as mining and logging
27 September 2015 (
Thailand plans internet filter
Thailand is planning a
new
central filtering system
for the internet.
27 September 2015 (
Restraint on thugs undermined
The right-wing Supreme Court has
undermined
the main restraint on thugs' illegal investigations
— the
exclusionary rule.
26 September 2015
Syrian rebels and al-Qa'ida
US-trained Syrian rebels
traded some of their US-provided supplies
to al-Qa'ida, in exchange for not having to fight al-Qa'ida.
The US training activity for Syrian rebels is not a serious effort,
only a pretense. An "army" so small, and so little pugnacious, that
it faces this sort of extortion would make little difference against
Assad's forces which they are supposedly intended to defeat.
26 September 2015
Urgent: tell Democrats not to cave in
US citizens:
call on Obama and Congressional Democrats
not to yield to Republican hostage-taking.
26 September 2015
Growth without gas
The OECD countries have had
16% economic growth
with a greenhouse gas emissions reduction of 6%, over 10 years.
Keep in mind that economic growth, as such, does not necessarily make
the economy better for people in general. That result occurs only
when the growth is distributed so as to reduce poverty and suffering,
which may or may not be the case. Since 2008, that has generally
not
been the case. This is a separate issue, and doesn't
invalidate the article's point, but we should not say "Growth,
hooray!"
26 September 2015
Mystery disappearance
A year later, the disappearance of 43 Mexican students is
still a mystery
lost among hundreds of such mysteries in a state pervaded by
gang corruption.
26 September 2015
Urgent: support Prescription Drug Affordability Act
US citizens:
support
the Prescription Drug Affordability Act.
26 September 2015
Urgent: warn EPA against weak regulations
US citizens:
tell the EPA
that the proposed new regulations for toxic
pesticides are not strong enough.
26 September 2015
Urgent: call for climate agreement in Paris
Everyone:
call
for a strong climate agreement
in Paris.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
26 September 2015
Urgent: undo corporations united
US citizens: Call for
amending the constitution
to reverse the "Citizens United" decision.
I think "corporations united" is a more fitting name for it.
26 September 2015
New ivory ban
The US and China agreed on
new rules for ivory
to try to discourage the killing of elephants.
26 September 2015
Aging
Aging
is the great holocaust.
26 September 2015
Timbuktu monuments
A religious fanatic
will be tried in the Hague
for destroying a historic Muslim monument in Timbuktu.
26 September 2015
Unproved drug claims
The major pharma companies are gouging in the US, and their gouging
appears small only when compared with the super-gouging of Daraprim.
Even worse, US drug companies are arguing in court that their "freedom
of speech"
entitles them to make unproved claims
about what their drugs will do.
This is an additional reason why we need a constitutional amendment
that says that human rights do not apply to fictitious "persons" such
as corporations.
26 September 2015
Urgent: free cartoonist Atena Farghadani
Everyone:
call on Iran
to free imprisoned cartoonist Atena Farghadani.
26 September 2015
VW lieware
The Internet of Things would mean that any "thing"
might be acting maliciously
The VW lieware is the first example.
26 September 2015
Urgent: support referendum on abortion
Citizens of Ireland:
sign the petition
for a referendum to legalize abortion.
26 September 2015
Cod recovery
Protection measures have
helped cod start to recover
in the North Sea.
26 September 2015 (
Thug response to pointed finger
Keith McLeod was shot dead by a Baltimore
thug
who claims he had to
protect
his life from McLeod's pointed finger
My first response is to wonder what really happened.
Thugs
sometimes
tell the truth, but in situations like this we must not presume they
did.
Supposing things happened as reported, McLeod was asking for some kind
of confrontation, but that is no reason for his summary execution. A
finger doesn't shoot bullets, and saying "I'm going to kill you" does
not put someone's life in immediate danger. If the
thug
reacted as if
they did, he must have been predisposed to kill.
26 September 2015
Campus free speech
The University of California may adopt a rule to
expel students for "antisemitism"
interpreted as criticizing Israel in certain ways.
It is wrong to expel students even for statements of real
antisemitism, or any other form of bigotry, or any other position that
some disagree with. The very idea of trying to stop "hate speech" is
inimical to human rights.
26 September 2015
Israeli soldiers attack press
Israeli soldiers
attacked journalists
and destroyed their equipment.
26 September 2015
Russian troops in Syria
Due to the geography, Russian ground troops in Syria
will mostly fight groups opposed to PISSI
rather than
PISSI
26 September 2015 (
Des poissons peuvent abimer une rivère
New pun: Des poissons
peuvent abimer une rivère
26 September 2015 (
Waking prisoners every half hour
California has limited the use of solitary confinement, but screws
continue
to drive prisoners crazy
by waking them every half hour.
26 September 2015 (
"Redskins" controversy
School officials are "investigating" a teacher who explained the controversy
over the name "Washington Redskins" by
comparing
"redskins" with "niggers".
Teachers should not use insulting racial terms, but it is ridiculous
to order them not to explain to their students what racism is.
26 September 2015 (
Aamer to be released from Guantanamo
Shaker Aamer will probably be
released
from Guantanamo in a month.
The US's treatment of him has been
abominable.
The Obama regime
continues
to conceal
what prisoners say about how they are treated.
26 September 2015 (
Colombia and FARC peace
Colombia's second-worst terrorist group, the FARC, has
agreed
to peace with the state.
The worst terrorist group, the paramilitares that are linked to the
military and to former president Uribe, has only pretended to demobilize.
26 September 2015 (
El Nino and California's drought
El Nino's strong rains may not relieve California's drought,
as
the water may not soak into the dried earth.
26 September 2015 (
Social housing sell-off
Why
the
UK
Must Fight Tooth And Claw Against Social Housing Sell-Off.
26 September 2015 (
100% renewable energy by 2025
Greenpeace proposes a
plan
for the world to move to 100% renewable energy by 2050. This means
ending use of fossil fuels and nuclear energy.
26 September 2015 (
AVG user data
AVG says that its
anti-virus
program
will collect data about users for AVG to use.
Simply removing the user's name from a data record does not prevent
others from reassociating it with the user, and in practice
it
is common to do that.
This program is gratis,
but
not free software.
It is commonplace for such software to
mistreat its users.
26 September 2015 (
"Safe harbor" fiction
The principal advisor of the European Court of Justice said that the
"safe harbor" fiction, which allows European organizations to entrust
personal data to US companies,
should
be declared invalid.
26 September 2015 (
Drug-price hikes
Drug-Price Hikes Don't Lead to Better Cures.
We
Must Find Another Way Forward.
26 September 2015 (
Abolish death penalty
Pope's
Call
to Congress
to Abolish Death Penalty Comes at a Critical Moment.
26 September 2015 (
China cap-and-trade
China will start a
cap-and-trade
system
for carbon emissions.
This could be a big help in curbing
global heating
, or it might do
nothing at all. A cap-and-trade system tends to be ineffective when
the economy shrinks, and corruption can make it a no-op
as
happened in Europe.
By contrast, a tax on substances and activities that emit greenhouse gases
is easier to enforce, and has its effect even if the economy shrinks.
Here's a
proposal
for a different way to do cap-and-trade, using a fixed
total carbon emissions budget. Would that avoid the flaws? I don't
know. But I think it is important
to design the system so that the budget can be reduced.
26 September 2015 (
Medical insurance deductable amounts
US medical insurance deductable amounts (what you have to pay in bills
before you start to be covered)
are
rising 7 times as fast as wages.
26 September 2015 (
Volkswagen's disguised pollution
If Volkswagen used "defeat devices" in all countries,
its cars' disguised pollution is likely to kill
between
74 to 400 people per year.
A far larger number become ill, miss days of work, etc.
26 September 2015 (
Coral Triangle in danger
100 million people live on
seafood
from the world's major coral area,
the Coral Triangle.
Global heating
puts the reefs, and their usable
animal life, in danger.
26 September 2015 (
Tunisia's economy
PISSI
's
terror attacks have
destroyed
Tunisia's economy.
Perhaps the US should donate money to employ people in Tunisia, partly
to defeat
PISSI
and partly to give young Tunisians an alternative to jihad.
26 September 2015 (
Urgent: Call on SEC Chair to recuse self
US citizens:
Call
on SEC Chair Mary Jo White
to recuse herself from choosing an
important subordinate, because of her personal conflict of interest.
26 September 2015 (
Segregation in US schools
The Supreme Court under its right-wing majority has
nearly
eliminated the possibility of taking action for school
desegregation
Meanwhile, US schools are becoming
increasingly
segregated again
26 September 2015 (
Lessons in how to please a lover
Women are publishing, through a web site,
descriptions
of how to give them sexual pleasure
. It appears that a certain
kind of rough and unrealistic porn has given boys and even men the
wrong idea about the question. (I think it is a mistake to narrow the
word "porn" to this particular kind of porn. Any work designed to
arouse sexually is porn.)
Some teenagers have the good fortune to learn how to please a lover,
and they move on to a life of sexual success. Others have worse
fortune and have to wait years, even decades, to learn this. It is so
sad, and so unnecessary. This is why I think every high school (and
perhaps middle school too) should offer practical hands-on lessons in
how to please a lover. Every graduate should have a basis to be
confident that, "Anyone that I make love with will be glad we did."
26 September 2015 (
Released Guantanamo prisoner to be tried in Morocco
Younous Chekkouri was sent from Guantanamo to Morocco, where he
faces
a likely unfair trial
I don't object in principle to handing over prisoners of the US
for trial in other countries. But we should make sure that the
trial is a fair one.
25 September 2015
Biden opposes abortion
Biden
opposes abortion
and only reluctantly advocates allowing abortion rights.
We cannot trust a person like that to defend abortion rights.
25 September 2015
Carly Fiorina
Carly Fiorina's supporters have
produced a phony video
to support her false claims about Planned Parenthood.
In the right-wing echo chamber, lies are as effective as truth.
25 September 2015
Sleeping on buses
Homeless people must now sleep on the street in London, as the
government's pressure on the poor builds up on all sides. Some lucky
ones
get a bus ticket from a charity
so they can sleep on a night bus.
25 September 2015
Terrorism studies
A student in the UK was questioned as a suspect for
reading a textbook about terrorism
in the university library.
He's lucky to have been reading it in the library, because if he had a
copy
in his possession, he
could
have been prosecuted
for it.
25 September 2015
Border thug indicted
A US border
thug
has been indicted for
shooting and killing a Mexican
standing on the other side of the border fence.
25 September 2015
Pope rebuked Congress
The pope
rebuked Congress
for the military-industrial complex and the wars
that it fuels.
25 September 2015
Emissions cheating
Many car companies cheat on emissions tests and mileage tests, and
European
governments are often complicit
in the cheating.
25 September 2015 (
Urgent: Action to curb global heating
US citizens: phone your congresscritter at 888-907-6639 and call for
action to curb
global heating
We can build on the momentum created
by pope's speech.
You can cite the pope if you wish, but I don't think that is crucial.
His support is a big help, but the world's climate scientists are
pertinent authorities.
25 September 2015 (
Urgent: Price of Daraprim
US citizens: call on the hedge fund manager that increased the price
of Daraprim by 50 times to
put the price
back where it was
A vague statement that he will lower the price somewhat
should not suffice to take the heat off him.
25 September 2015 (
The Saudi monarchy
Ten
Reasons to Oppose
the Saudi Monarchy.
25 September 2015 (
Billionaires' privatized "charter schools"
A gang of billionaires are
conspiring
to convert half the schools in LA
to nonaccountable privatized
"charter schools".
25 September 2015 (
NY thug expected to plead guilty
A New York
thug
is expected to plead guilty after
walking
up to a car and shooting someone in it, for no rational reason
But will his punishment be anything more than a paid vacation?
25 September 2015 (
California thug attack
Emilio Mayfield, who was attacked by a
thug
on his way to the bus who
then accused him of jaywalking,
did
not in fact jaywalk
Not that jaywalking would excuse the attack.
25 September 2015 (
Copwatch
Explaining how
Copwatch
activities
work and what they achieve.
24 September 2015 (
Urgent: oppose CISA
US citizens:
phone your
congresscritter to oppose CISA.
We have to fight hard now, because Apple, Microsoft, Adobe, and
Symantec just endorsed the bill.
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are 202-224-3121, 888-818-6641 and
888-355-3588.
24 September 2015 (
Urgent: negotiations about Syria
US citizens: call on your congresscritter to sign
Rep
Himes's letter
calling for negotiations about Syria.
24 September 2015 (
Syrian cartoonist tortured to death
Syrian cartoonist
Akram
Raslan
was apparently tortured to death in Assad's prison.
24 September 2015 (
TTIP and regulation of toxic chemicals
The TTIP (This Treaty Is Plutocratic) would
strip
local government
of the power to regulate toxic chemicals, including
fracking fluids and pesticides.
Responding to criticism of the TTIP, which would offer foreign
companies the opportunity to sue when European laws get in their way,
the European Commission has proposed to change a few details of the
plan,
such
as its name.
Offering foreign companies this power would be damaging and wrong.
Offering domestic companies this power would be damaging and wrong.
It's good that the TTIP won't offer domestic companies this power.
Even better, it should not offer this power to foreign companies
either.
Then they might as well cancel the whole thing.
24 September 2015 (
End population growth
Paul Erlich
notes
that ending global heating won't be enough unless we
also end human population growth.
Humanity has postponed the disaster that Erlich predicted, by lowering
its birth rate, but population continues to grow and the danger is not
gone. To lift all humans out of poverty, we need to redirect some of
wealthier humans' income to the poor; but this won't work if the poor
humans keep making more poor humans.
24 September 2015 (
Bribed Judges in Ghana
A journalist in Ghana made videos of
34
judges accepting bribes.
24 September 2015 (
Flawed car emissions tests
UK, France and Germany
Lobbied
for Flawed Car Emissions Tests.
24 September 2015 (
Clinton's weak plans
Clinton made a
proposal
for greenhouse gas reduction, which is not very strong.
Clinton says she wants to
limit
gross increases in drug prices,
but her plan
appears to be weak. Sanders has a real plan.
24 September 2015 (
US lost its democracy
Jimmy
Carter acknowledges
that the US has lost its democracy.
24 September 2015 (
"Real ID"
The US government is once again trying to
bully
US states into cooperating
with "Real ID", which turns drivers' licenses into more
rigid
mechanisms of control.
The US will surely back down on this threat if any state refuses to
comply with the demand. We should make sure states do not. Indeed,
we should urge other states to
stop
complying with Real ID.
24 September 2015 (
Fingerprint records
Crackers obtained fingerprint records for
5.6
million Americans
when they broke the security of government computers.
24 September 2015 (
Journalist charged with "subversion"
Another
Turkish journalist
has been arrested and charged with "subversion".
24 September 2015 (
Supreme Court majority
Over 10 years, the right-wing majority on the Supreme Court
has persistently
served
the powerful at the expense of other Americans.
24 September 2015 (
Bullet-list presentations
Arguments that bullet-list presentations
undermine
careful thought and make it hard to notice errors.
24 September 2015 (
Training "moderate" Syrian rebels
Shortly after the US sent 70 trained Syrian rebels into Syria,
one
is reported to have defected to al Qa'ida.
The idea of training "moderate" Syrian rebels is just a fig leaf.
What the US needs to do is stop shielding Saudi Arabia, which spews an
extremist form of Islam around the world; but Obama is
extending
US support for Saudi Arabia.
24 September 2015 (
Ferguson commission
The Ferguson commission
did
a serious job
and recommended almost 200 changes
in laws to eliminate the pervasive injustices observed in Ferguson and many
other places in the US.
24 September 2015 (
The Glossip case is crumbling
The Case Against Richard Glossip Is Crumbling,
But
He
Is Still Scheduled to Die in a Week.
24 September 2015 (
US nuclear bombs and missiles
US construction of nuclear bombs and missiles is hidden in the
"Department of Energy", but
it's
actually done by companies.
These companies spend millions on lobbying to spend too much money
on nuclear bombs and missiles.
24 September 2015 (
Excuse to shoot 14-year-old
After New Jersey
thugs
shot 14-year-old Radazz Hearns, they needed an
excuse, so they claimed he had a gun. After days of searching they
found a gun,
150
feet away,
and claimed Radazz had thrown it there.
I hope Radazz's injuries do not foreclose his brilliant career in shot
put.
24 September 2015 (
Coca Cola's distraction campaigns
Coca Cola has been caught funding distraction campaigns so people
will
think about exercise rather than what they eat.
24 September 2015 (
Advantage of national health service
One advantage of a national health service is that it can
push
down the price of medicines.
But this is not working as well as it used to in the UK.
24 September 2015 (
"War on cops"
After each
random
blip
in killings of US thugs, they claim it is a "war on cops".
24 September 2015 (
Sep 2001 "remembrance ceremony"
James Roux went to a "remembrance ceremony" for the Sep 2001 attacks
because his father was killed in them. When he found a "program of
military force",
he
protested.
Thugs arrested him and framed him
(as usual for
thugs
), and right-wing media lied about him.
24 September 2015 (
Canada should pull out of TPP
Canada's prime minister admitted that, in the TPP, he's working for
auto parts companies. He also implied he would accept a bad deal for Canada
in
order to serve them.
The criticism of Harper concedes too much to the TPP. It endorses the
mistaken idea that the TPP is a trade deal, and that Canada ought to
try to negotiate a "good deal". The TPP is a corporate supremacy
treaty, and its whole purpose is to benefit companies at the expense
of democracy. Instead of getting distracted with details, Canada
should pull out.
23 September 2015 (
Global system for trading permits
Some oil companies ask for a
"global
price on carbon"
, but if this means a global system for trading
permits, we see from the failure of the
European
example
that that approach is too easy to game.
23 September 2015 (
DOJ shirking its duties
The US "Department of Justice" is shirking its duties by
not
prosecuting CIA torturers
23 September 2015 (
Thugs invade housing project
Dozens of
thugs
invaded a housing project in London to
evict
the hundreds of residents
, making most of them homeless.
People are personally responsible for the actions they agree to be
paid to do. The
thugs
who did this cannot excuse it by saying that it
was their job.
Can anyone find out, and publish, the identity of these
thugs
? They
should be shunned and despised by all good people, until they
apologize and resign from their jobs.
23 September 2015 (
UN human rights panel
Travesty
Saudi Arabia as head of a UN human rights panel. Even worse travesty:
the US "welcomes" that.
23 September 2015 (
On-line advertising
Cory Doctorow suggests a way to protect on-line advertising: a
special
privileged tracking snoop that we would all decide to trust to track
us
If I can't visit a site without being tracked, I won't visit it.
If I won't visit it, I don't mind if it disappears.
My solution is to pay sites anonymously to visit them.
23 September 2015 (
Egypt pardons two imprisoned journalists
Egypt has pardoned the
two
imprisoned al-Jazeera journalists
That's only a small step towards reestablishment of a free press.
23 September 2015 (
Clinton's hesitation
Clinton
now
opposes
the Keystone XL pipeline.
While this is obviously the right position on that issue, her slowness
to adopt it means she hesitates to support proper action against
global heating
Other pipelines for shipment of tar sands oil
also
need to be blocked
23 September 2015 (
LA homeless
LA plans to spend $100 million on the homeless, but since that's
nowhere near enough to house them, people worry it could just mean
shoving
them out of the way
23 September 2015 (
Pope rushes canonizing Junipero Serra
Pope Francis is
rushing
the process of canonizing Junipero Serra
, and could just as easily
slow it down for reconsideration.
23 September 2015 (
Pope condemns death penalty
Víctor Hugo Saldaño is surely a murderer, but he was sentenced to
death because of his race. The pope has taken up the cause of
commuting his sentence,
condemning
the death penalty as unjust
I agree.
23 September 2015 (
Apple bans apps that endorse abortion
Apple
systematically
bans apps
that endorse abortion rights or would help women find
abortions.
This particular political slant
affects
other Apple services
23 September 2015 (
Copyright on "Happy Birthday to you"
A US court ruled that Warner/Chappel
does
not have a copyright
on the words of "Happy birthday to you".
It is conceivable that someone else has one, but it is unlikely that
this could ever be established.
23 September 2015 (
China demands backdoors
China
demands
US companies give it backdoors into computers and software
The clear need to resist this demand from China should show why we
need to resist the same demand when it comes from the US.
23 September 2015 (
US college administrative staff
US colleges and universities
keep
increasing the number of administrative staff
. This is part of
why they are now so expensive.
High salaries for executives and managers also contribute.
23 September 2015 (
Plans to take from UK's working poor
The UK government plans to
take
12 billion pounds in government support
from the working poor, and
give them 4 billion pounds of increased wages with a raise in the
minimum wage.
It adds up for a big heap of
dooH niboR
23 September 2015 (
Russian planes helping Assad's army
New Russian planes are
helping
Assad's army fight PISSI
I suppose they will be used against the other forces in Syria, such as
al Qa'ida and any remaining non-jihadi Arab rebel groups, and maybe
even Kurds, though I think they are not close to Assad's slice of
Syria.
23 September 2015 (
ShoutYourAbortion
The ShoutYourAbortion campaign puts an
end
to the compulsory expression of regret about abortions
When defenders of abortion rights treat abortion as a drastic step,
when they dwell on sadness that a woman needed the drastic step rather
than rejoicing that she wasn't forced to have a baby, they hand the
anti-abortion movement a victory. It is a mistake to use the slogan
"pro-choice", because that implies reluctance to defend the abortion
itself.
23 September 2015 (
Urgent: Deny funding to two Democrats
US citizens: call on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee
to deny funding to
the two
Democrats that voted to defund Planned Parenthood
23 September 2015 (
Urgent: Tax hedge funds properly
US citizens: call on the US government to
tax
hedge funds properly
so as to provide support for Syrian refugees
in countries near Syria.
23 September 2015 (
Urgent: Country-of-origin meat labeling
US citizens: call on the Senate to
preserve the
requirement
for country-of-origin meat labeling.
23 September 2015 (
CO
and methane from melting permafrost
A model suggests melting Arctic permafrost will release
hundreds
of billions of tons
of CO
and methane during this
century.
23 September 2015 (
Falsified US intelligence reports
US intelligence analysts say they were specifically
"bullied"
to distort their reports
to exaggerate success against PISSI.
In addition to outright falsification, the US government is repeating
the Vietnam-War distraction of citing enemy body counts as if they
counted for something.
PISSI
can easily recruit replacements;
attrition simply is not effective against
PISSI
23 September 2015 (
Sheriff's office lies to excuse murder
The
entire
Bastrop County sheriff's office
colluded in lying to excuse the
murder of Yvette Smith.
23 September 2015 (
Thugs quick to pull out guns
Witnesses in Boston
convinced
a couple of thugs to put away their guns
when they were dealing
with a small crazed unarmed woman who was resisting arrest.
Both of the
thugs
were too quick to go for their guns. Apparently
that is a habit; I think that is the culture of
thugs
nowadays, and
maybe reflects how they are trained. If your first response to any
shadow or shade of a threat is to grab your gun, one day you're going
to shoot someone for no good reason.
23 September 2015 (
Poorly-paid teachers in US universities
Most teachers in US universities are
poorly-paid
part-timers
. Some are trying to unionize.
The growing expense of college in the US is going to the
administrators whose numbers keep increasing.
It would be interesting to ask colleges to list the ratio of total pay
and benefits for teachers to total pay and benefits for non-teachers.
23 September 2015 (
Civil war in Egypt
The
fighting
between Egypt and Islamist rebels in the Sinai
has become an overt
civil war. Civilians are accused by each side of supporting the other
side.
Because Egypt has
criminalized
independent reporting of news about the fighting
, the state's
reports of success do not tell us who is really winning this war.
Human Rights Watch says,
"Destroying homes, neighbourhoods and
livelihoods is a
textbook
example of how to lose a counterinsurgency campaign
."
23 September 2015 (
Volkswagen emission test cheat
Volkswagen has admitted
programming
its car engine computers to detect the EPA's emission tests
, and
run dirty the rest of the time.
It wasn't just a little. Cars exceeded emissions standards by up to
35 times, in real driving.
23 September 2015 (
High Brazilian officials sentenced
High Brazilian officials were
sentenced
to long prison terms for corruption
23 September 2015 (
Forced marriage
The
UK is trying very hard
to protect girls (typically of Pakistani
descent) from being forced into marriage by families.
23 September 2015 (
Save your life for $50,000
The gouger who increased the cost of the drug
Daraprim
50 times says, in effect, "If something is going to save your life, it
should cost you $50,000."
Most Americans can't raise $50,000 to save their lives. Others can
do it once, but then they will be broke and perhaps homeless.
People are impressed with what Clinton said, but Sanders advocates
the larger reform that would take care of this problem and many more.
23 September 2015 (
Mulanje cedars of Malawi
The Mulanje cedars of Malawi
are
nearly wiped out.
Humans cut them down at a high rate, and they
grow back very very slowly.
23 September 2015 (
Walker is out of the race
Scott Walker is out of the Republican race,
despite
lots of money from a few rich people.
Rich people's money for a certain candidate doesn't guarantee
victory, but if it is hard to win without rich people's money, all the
major candidates will tend to be plutocratists. No matter which
plutocratist wins, we lose.
Thus, I support Sanders.
23 September 2015 (
Seabird populations
Seabird populations
have
fallen 70% in the past 60 years,
due to various human activities
that tend to kill them.
Side effects of
global heating
could wipe out many species of
seabirds.
23 September 2015 (
Rejection of abortion stigma
Women
are speaking up about their abortions,
to reject the stigma that
right-wingers want to put on it.
The
idiotic
things
anti-abortionists say to women who talk about having
abortions, and people who advocate abortion rights.
23 September 2015 (
El niño
El
niño
might end California's drought, and cause natural
disasters in other countries in the Pacific.
23 September 2015 (
Save Sumatran rhinos
Sumatran rhinos
will
go extinct
if we don't save them soon.
23 September 2015 (
Religious freedom and public service
Human rights organizations
address
how far a person's religious freedom should apply when carrying out
functions to serve the public.
23 September 2015 (
Mistreatment of Younous Chekkouri
When the US
released
Younous Chekkouri from imprisonment in Guantanamo, the soldiers
blindfolded and chained him for 10 hours of transport.
That is a strange way to treat someone after concluding there was
no reason to imprison him in the first place.
Now Mr Chekkouri is imprisoned in Morocco.
23 September 2015 (
Illegally denying asylum
US border
thugs
regularly
turn back refugees from Central America,
illegally denying them a
chance to ask for asylum.
When they come from Honduras, the US is partly responsible for the
conditions that drove them to flee.
22 September 2015 (
Urgent: EACH Woman Act
US citizens:
support the EACH Woman
Act
, to provide abortion coverage to all US women.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
22 September 2015 (
"Fit to work" in the UK
Michael O'Sullivan committed suicide after the UK government (or its
private hatchet-company)
ruled
he was "fit to work"
. He apparently could not bear to face the
rat-race of futile job applications and punishments that the UK calls
"support to return to work".
No system can perfectly avoid mistakes. The UK's austerity government
applies great pressure to rule people "fit to work", even
applying
quotas
, which makes this kind of mistake very likely.
22 September 2015 (
Pope Francis
Americans may be disappointed if they hope Pope Francis will make
substantial changes in
religious
doctrines
22 September 2015 (
Tsipras set up to fail
Yanis Varoufakis:
The
lenders are the real winners in Greece
— Alexis Tsipras has
been set up to fail."
22 September 2015 (
Fossil fuel subsidies
Fossil fuel subsidies amount to
$200
billion a year
22 September 2015 (
No-fly list
Fear of the no-fly list is a powerful factor for
intimidating
people in the US
22 September 2015 (
BP: Boost Petroleum
In Europe, BP is the
worst
of all the saboteurs
opposing policies to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions.
BP could stand for "Boost Petroleum".
22 September 2015 (
Imprisoned writers of China
Now that western "leaders" are more interested in China's business
than China's freedom, it
falls
to writers
to call on Xi Jinping to free the imprisoned writers of
China.
22 September 2015 (
Indonesia offers to cut emissions
Indonesia offers to
cut
emissions by 40% by 2030
if it is given financial aid.
That is starting to reach the level of cut that might really make a
difference. The wealthier countries must fulfill their responsibility
and must tax global business to do it.
22 September 2015 (
Money buys US elections
Correcting
a naive attempt to claim that money doesn't buy US elections.
22 September 2015 (
Increase in drug prices
Pharma companies are making some old, proven drugs
so
expensive that the prices will kill people
These drugs are no longer patented, but the makers control the
distribution of the drug so that would-be competitors can't get
samples. We should make such anticompetitive behavior a felony.
(I wonder if it already is.)
22 September 2015 (
Freedom of speech in British universities
Freedom of speech in British universities is
under
attack from the right-wing government and from leftist students
The National Union of Students' "no platform" policy started out as a
campaign to refuse to legitimize talks by fascists and racists, and
officially that's
still
how it operates
. However, nowadays its real activity is to
prevent
or shut down talks
by adherents of a range of views that certain
leftist groups disagree with.
When a speaker proposes to do great harm to people it is
understandable that they protest the speaker forcefully. Once in a
while, the community's opposition
may
interfere with a speech
, but they did not stop the guest from
speaking. A systematic effort to prevent someone from giving speeches
is going too far.
22 September 2015 (
Defectors from PISSI
Suggestion:
protect
and aid defectors
from PISSI.
22 September 2015 (
Threats to freedom of speech in the UK
Freedom of speech is threatened in the UK by the
state
and by private intimidation
Sometimes private intimidation takes advantage of state laws that
impose censorship. The UK libel reform campaign (successful except in
Northern Ireland) was needed because UK
libel
law lent itself to censorship
Laws against "hate speech" are also wrong in themselves, because they
punish expression of some opinions. They must be repealed.
The UK has many other unjust censorship laws, such as the one against
"extreme
pornography"
for which no justification other than prudery has
been offered, and the one against
possessing
documents considered suspicious
. They must all go.
21 September 2015 (
Urgent: Wildfire Disaster Funding Act
US citizens:
support
the Wildfire Disaster Funding Act.
21 September 2015 (
Urgent: drilling in Nova Scotia
Everyone:
call
on Canada
not to let Shell drill in the Atlantic near
Nova Scotia.
Shell wants to be allowed 21 days to even start to cap the well, if
there is a blowout.
21 September 2015 (
Urgent: oppose Cardin's bill
US citizens: call on your senators not to sponsor
Cardin's
bill
which is designed to kill the nuclear deal with Iran.
21 September 2015 (
Urgent: oppose anti-abortion bill
US citizens: call on your senators to
oppose
the anti-abortion bill HR 36.
21 September 2015 (
Syriza's not-quite-majority
Syriza
won the Greek election,
with about the same not-quite-majority as before.
Greeks may have decided not to blame Syriza for surrendering to the
banksters
economic war. I think, however, that Greece will suffer more
from this capitulation, over a longer period.
21 September 2015 (
FBI's fingerprint database
The FBI plans to keep fingerprints from everyone that gets a
background check, and put them in a
searchable
database
along with criminals' fingerprints.
The FBI also wants to build up a searchable face recognition data base
from
photos taken on the street
This looks like the first step in a plan to track all Americans.
We must campaign to stop it.
21 September 2015 (
Identification in Australia
Australia
plans
to check people's faces against national ID data bases to identify them.
This is dangerous because it is unreliable, but it would be even more
dangerous if it were reliable. You can hardly trust the Australian
government, with its
harsh
laws
against whistleblowers, not to use this
power for evil. What that government calls "national security"
is just as likely to mean "national repression".
21 September 2015 (
Climate emergency
James Hansen says that we face a
"climate
emergency"
because positive feedback loops can cause global
heating to speed up.
21 September 2015 (
Deletion of historic data
The Canadian government has stealthily and systematically
destroyed,
corrupted or stopped collecting data
necessary to manage Canada's
economy or protect Canada's environment.
Deletion of historic data sabotages future historical research.
21 September 2015 (
FBI's arbitrary demand for data
Nicholas Merrill won a case to cancel of the
gag
order
which said he could not talk about the FBI's arbitrary
demand for data from his business. But it's not final — the
government will appeal this decision.
21 September 2015 (
Extreme poverty in the US
Around two million Americans live in
extreme
poverty,
with an income of 2 dollars a day or less.
They are essentially compelled to commit crimes to survive, though
they may not like that.
Welfare benefits are no longer available to people in that
situation. When President Clinton proposed his "welfare reform", it
was clear that it would lead to this. That is why I did not vote for
Clinton in 1996.
21 September 2015 (
Attempted self-fulfilling prophesy
As right-wing Democrats see Sanders advance, their
last
argument
is the attempted self-fulfilling prophesy, "Sanders can't
win".
They also claim that the US has "moved to the right", but really it is
only the government and the media that have moved to the right. Most
Americans
continue
to support
the policies Sanders champions.
21 September 2015
Ta-Nehisi Coates
Ta-Nehisi Coates,
to
his son
: 'In America, it is traditional to destroy the black
body'.
21 September 2015
Burkina Faso
Protests in Burkina Faso
convinced
the military coup leaders to step down.
21 September 2015
NHS
The UK's previous health minister says the NHS
is
about to collapse
, due to the Tories' disguised attempts to destroy it.
21 September 2015
Seas
Our Seas
Are
Being Degraded
, Fish Are Dying.
If we keep this up, it will hurt us too.
21 September 2015
Ahmed Mohamed
The school officials and the
thugs
never
really thought
Ahmed Mohamed had a bomb. They wanted to pretend
they thought he had a bomb.
Treating US schools as preparation for prison
reflects
the attitude that children are a threat, not our future.
21 September 2015
Thug departments
Missouri
has
authorized
companies to run
thug
departments. Their staff would have the same
legal powers to arrest people and take their property, and I suppose
the same extralegal powers to beat and kill people and get away with
it.
21 September 2015
Disabled and Jobless
The Disabled and Jobless
Need
Help
, Not Harassment.
20 September 2015 (
New Orleans debtors prison
New Orleans has been sued for
systematically
jailing the poor to make them pay fine after fine
20 September 2015 (
Security cameras promote distrust
Security cameras to watch your children
won't
make them safe
, they just promote and exploit distrust for
everyone.
20 September 2015 (
Pope to canonize Junipero Serra
The pope is about to canonize Junipero Serra, who
established
Spanish missions in California that operated on a system of slave
labor
Serra generally has a very positive image; the missions he
established have been made into big tourist attractions.
20 September 2015 (
Student punished for official's mistake
A school in Virginia
kicked
out a student for a year
because he brought a leaf to school from
a Japanese maple tree. A school official thought it was marijuana.
The crucial point here is not that the official made a mistake, but
that once he knew it was a mistake, he still insisted on punishing the
child. This attitude towards mistakes characterizes the most cruel
and self-righteous officialdoms. We see it when people are convicted
of crimes and then proved innocent: the legal system resists
exonerating them. And now, under the guise of "zero tolerance", we
see it in schools.
Even if it
had
been fairly harmless marijuana — or even
some dangerous poison — that would be no reason to punish the
child for it in such a harsh way. A reprimand ought to be enough.
20 September 2015 (
Elimination of privatized prisons
Sanders'
bill
to eliminate privatized prisons
would also forbid gouging on
prisoners' phone calls.
20 September 2015 (
Walker wants partisan Government Accountability Board
Scott Walker and Wisconsin Republicans want to make the Government
Accountability Board partisan,
so
that they can stop it from investigating any crimes they may
commit
20 September 2015 (
Cell phone tracking
Government Argues:
If
Your Mobile Phone Provider Knows Where You Are, Why Shouldn't We?
My conclusion is, the cell phone company should not be allowed to
record where you have been, absent a court order to keep track.
20 September 2015 (
Arrests in Indonesia for setting forest fires
Indonesia has
arrested
executives
, including one from Asian Pulp and Paper, for setting
forest fires.
20 September 2015 (
Greek puppet government
The new Greek "government" will have no autonomy; its actions will be
directed in great detail by the
banksters
. It will be a
puppet
government of occupation
Anyone that wants to run to be the puppet does not deserve a vote.
But not every party has agreed to this. The part of Syriza that voted
against the capitulation has not agreed.
Patriotic Greeks resisted German occupation in the 1940s; maybe there
are ways to resist the
banksters
' occupation with underground
activity.
Greece needs to increase its domestic production of food so that it
can survive a siege after cutting ties with the EU. Perhaps Greeks
can organize underground ways to interfere with food imports, so as to
increase the market for local farmers. Is it possible to steal
durable food and stockpile it?
20 September 2015 (
Audit of mortgage assignments in Seattle
An audit of a sample of mortgage assignments in Seattle found that
all
of them were done illegally
, thus void. If that sample is
representative, nearly all foreclosures there are invalid, and that
has perhaps been the case for years.
20 September 2015 (
Rhinoceros species on verge of extinction
Several rhinoceros species are on the verge of extinction.
What
can be done to save them?
I think that synthetic rhino horn could work if it is much cheaper
than natural rhino horn — and similar enough to fool purchasers.
Anyone who claimed to sell "natural rhino horn" would probably cheat.
In the long term, even if we eliminate the threat of poaching, not
much wildlife will remain if humans convert all wild areas into farms
and cities. We must curb human population growth to enable most wild
species to survive.
20 September 2015 (
Repression against protesters
US
thugs
pick
on protesters
as well as blacks; the repression against Occupy
Wall Street protesters has not ended.
Don't
Just Fire Officer James Frascatore — Arrest Him
The head of the New York
thugs
' union says that Amy Goodman is
unamerican for saying that. He also
claims
that we don't understand the dangers that thugs face
However, everyone who is black, or tries to exercise the right to
protest, is fully aware of the danger from
thugs
20 September 2015 (
Deaths caused by defect covered up by GM
GM sold cars with a defect that killed 124 people in accidents. GM
knew
about the defect and covered it up
rather than fixing it. The US
settled the dispute for a fine that GM can easily afford, and did not
prosecute anyone.
20 September 2015 (
ACLU suing Honolulu
The ACLU is suing Honolulu for
systematically
throwing away homeless people's belongings
No one wants to be homeless. They are being stepped on by life.
A city should prioritize kindness to the homeless.
20 September 2015 (
Mandatory overprotection of kids
A court in British Columbia says it is
illegal
to leave a child under 10 alone for any period of time
Overprotectiveness is now mandatory.
When I was 8, the occasional hours alone after I returned from school
(on foot in Manhattan) were times I could study or play in peace.
20 September 2015 (
"Zero tolerance"
When Ahmed Mohamed was arrested for his clock, prejudice may have
played a role, but
"zero
tolerance" played a role too
If someone brings a real bomb into a school, that is a real threat and
calls for a real response. But there was never any serious reason to
believe Ahmed's clock was a bomb, and the
thugs
must have seen quickly
that it lacked the crucial ingredient of any bomb: explosive.
So why arrest him then? "Zero tolerance", the idea that being
mistaken for a threat makes you guilty.
20 September 2015 (
Twitter gives priority to tracking trolls
Twitter has
rejected
anonymous communication
, saying that it gives priority to tracking
trolls rather than protecting dissidents.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
For instance, Twitter
blocked
Magnus Hedemark's account because he used it through Tor
The article suggests that this includes blocking access to his old
tweets.
This is one reason why you should
never
cite a tweet by means
of a link to twitter.com. Proper practice is to copy it directly into
your article, like any other quotation.
An additional reason for this is so that Twitter does not get
information about who reads these quotes and the article where you
cite them.
says
it blocks the accounts because their postings look like spam
. But
if you're willing to consider blocking an account, surely you could
first try some less abrupt response that would teach the user about
the perceived problem.
20 September 2015 (
UK to make life impossible for migrants
To make life impossible for unauthorized migrants, the UK
plans
to make it impossible for them to rent housing or drive a car
20 September 2015 (
Th new Australian PM
The new Australian prime minister, who 5 years ago called for moving
to renewable energy sources, has
changed
sides
20 September 2015 (
California thug perversity
A California
thug
went
wild against a teenager who was walking in a bus lane towards his
bus
The
thugs
will try to excuse this by applying a perversely strict
standard to the teenager's conduct and a perversely loose standard
to their own.
20 September 2015 (
Urgent: End Arctic oil leases
US citizens:
call on
Obama
to let Arctic oil leases expire and not issue new ones.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
20 September 2015 (
Urgent: End slavery
US citizens:
support
the Business Supply Chain Transparency on Trafficking and Slavery Act
of 2015.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
With Javascript disabled, the page does not acknowledge that you
have signed, but it does work.
20 September 2015 (
Trump trying to exploit groundless fears
Donald Trump is trying to exploit
groundless
fears about vaccines
. This will do harm even if he loses.
He is also giving support to
lies
about Obama's birth and religion
20 September 2015 (
Congress in prudish tizzy
Congress is in a tizzy because US air marshals
made
porn videos with prostitutes using government-issued phones
As far as I can see, they didn't cheat the taxpayers, or do wrong
to anyone. It should not be a scandal. It would be wrong to punish
anyone for shocking some prudes.
The article mentions a disability claim that is being investigated.
That is a different issue.
20 September 2015 (
Urgent: Kick out fossil fuel interests
US citizens: call for kicking fossil fuel interests out of the
Paris
climate negotiations
20 September 2015 (
Urgent: Oppose H.R. 1737
US citizens:
ask
your congresscritter
to oppose H.R. 1737, which would top the
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau from blocking racist practices in
car loans.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
20 September 2015 (
Egyptian tour bombed
Mexican tourists say their Egyptian tour was
bombed
five times across three hours
. Apparently the ground forces that
identified them as tourists was not in communication with the air
force.
Mistakes like this tend to happen in war. A poorly trained force
makes more of them, but there is no way to avoid them. Basically,
tourists and war zones shouldn't mix.
20 September 2015 (
Hungarian thugs beat up journalists
Hungarian
thugs
beat up
seven
journalists covering the movement of refugees
20 September 2015 (
Facebook surveillance data
Facebook will start making real use of
surveillance
data gained via Like buttons
, even about people who are not useds
of Facebook.
The EFF campaign proposes a partial solution. In this case, a full solution
is available: use a browser such as
IceCat
which blocks
Like buttons and the other similar third-party tracking schemes.
20 September 2015 (
China demands digital back doors
China is demanding foreign companies
build
back doors into digital products
. That injustice in China offers
a lesson to Americans about why it would be an injustice in the US.
The article uses the vague confused term "intellectual property",
which can mean so many unrelated things that in this context
it has no clear meaning at all.
20 September 2015 (
US wages not increasing
US wages are
still
not increasing
, belying claims of a "recovery".
20 September 2015 (
Cost of mass incarceration
The
cost
to society
of mass incarceration is much larger than the cost of
running prisons.
Over half of former prisoners remain unemployed five years later.
They'd need a conscience of iron to resist crime when it's the only
opportunity they will ever get.
20 September 2015 (
LebLibraries Tor node back on
The library of Lebanon, New Hampshire, will resume running its Tor
node,
standing
up to the US government campaign to eliminate privacy
20 September 2015 (
More suffering imposed on Honduras
The IMF has
imposed
more suffering on Honduras
. The likely result is for thousands of
Hondurans to sneak into the US.
Instead of militarizing the US border, the US could tell the IMF
to lay off Honduras.
20 September 2015 (
Bill to ban private prisons
Sanders and other senators have proposed a
bill
to ban private prisons
19 September 2015 (
Nixon's election
Nixon arranged to
sabotage
Vietnam peace talks in order to get elected president in 1968
The evidence comes from an official whose secret report is still
secret.
LBJ privately called it "treason". Whether it is literally treason, I
don't know, but it is clear Nixon betrayed his country to gain control
of it. And the following elected Republican president
did
likewise
19 September 2015 (
Nothing to hide, something to fear
The arrest of Ahmed Mohamed illustrates one reason why
people
with nothing to hide do have something to fear
Here are
some
more reasons
19 September 2015 (
Heat records
Every
month this year has set a heat record
, so 2015 will almost surely
be the hottest year ever measured by humans.
I don't think the record will stand for many years.
19 September 2015 (
TSA baggage locks
The
Theater of Security Agency
does not care that it foolishly
showed
how to unlock all the TSA-permitted baggage locks
. The TSA's
comment is that this doesn't endanger airline security, which misses
the point that they've wiped out passenger's baggage security.
The TSA recognizes there is essentially
no
threat against airlines
, and the TSA would be
ineffective
against it if there were one
19 September 2015 (
Cameron fossil-all-the-way
Cameron confirmed that he's fossil-all-the-way by
appointing
an oil consultant as his "energy and environment" advisor
The consultant will advise on how to convert the environment into
exhaust.
19 September 2015 (
Degradation of farmland
The
cost
of degradation of farmland
is 1/6 of the human world's production.
We can't keep degrading a vital resource at this rate and continue
producing as much as we do. We need to improve this, but we also need
to stop increasing the human population.
19 September 2015 (
Evangelical Christian won over by Sanders
Sanders' talk at the fundamentalist university won over one
evangelical Christian who is now his
passionate
supporter
If we ignore the question of whether a god exists, and consider only
ethics, Christianity has a good side and a bad side. Here we see the
good side in pure form.
19 September 2015 (
Bill proposed to protect workers
Democrats have
proposed
a bill
to have the National Labor Relations Board actively protect
workers from wage theft, etc.
19 September 2015 (
Illegal deforestation in Burma
Demand from China has
accelerated
illegal deforestation
in Burma.
19 September 2015 (
PAT-RIOT Act
The first victim of the PAT-RIOT Act explains how the secret snooping order
cut
him off from his family for a decade
The last person quoted misused the word "fulsome". He meant "full".
19 September 2015 (
Hungarian thugs beat up reporters
Hungarian
thugs
beat
up two reporters
that crossed the border with a bunch of refugees.
19 September 2015 (
Obama's medical care program
US government programs including Obama's medical care program
are
helping
millions of people climb out of poverty
However, millions of Americans remain in poverty. These programs
are not sufficient in their present form.
19 September 2015 (
Uruguay pulls out of Trade in Services Agreement
Uruguay has
pulled
out of the Trade in Services Agreement
, one of the corporate
supremacy treaties now being negotiated.
Hooray for Uruguay, but now we have to make our own countries pull out
of it too.
19 September 2015 (
Peacekeepers
What's
the Point of Peacekeepers When They Don't Keep the Peace
19 September 2015 (
Global heating denial
The students and faculty of Flinders University are still fighting to
prevent a
government-funded
global heating denial center
from being established there.
19 September 2015 (
Mozambique's minefields demined
Mozambique's many minefields have been demined, after
30
years of work
Demining is a hard and dangerous job, but as long as the mines remain,
they tend to kill people from time to time. Especially children.
A few scattered mines may remain because no one knows about them.
19 September 2015 (
Case against Ahmed Mohamed dropped
Ahmed Mohamed
will
not face criminal charges for making a clock
Note how the idiots tried to blame Ahmed for their own stupid mistake.
That's exactly what Massachusetts
thugs
did to Star Simpson.
Fortunately this time they had to drop it.
19 September 2015 (
Arrested for homemade clock
Ahmed Mohamed was arrested for
making
a clock and bringing it to school in Texas
The teachers and the
thugs
had no reason to think it was anything but
the clock it really was. They arrested him because, he being a
Muslim, they decided to regard him as a probable terrorist.
This idiocy is not limited to Texas. A similar thing happened to Star
Simpson in Boston, who was punished for an
absurd
"crime"
19 September 2015 (
Food waste
The US Department of Agriculture will strive to
cut
food waste in half
19 September 2015 (
Clinton's emails
Did Clinton's private emails
conceal
something about Haiti
18 September 2015 (
Damage to marine life
Human Activity
Pushing
Marine Life to the Brink of Collapse.
18 September 2015 (
Children fled Boko Haram
1,400,000 children have been sent away from the areas
where
Boko Haram might kidnap them
18 September 2015 (
Crush PISSI
Uri Avnery calls for allying with Assad
(and the Kurds) to crush
PISSI
18 September 2015 (
Urgent: republication of orphan works
US citizens: tell the Register of Copyrights you want
serious plan
to allow republication of orphan works.
Since orphan works are not the only ones for which copyright is too
restrictive, I also suggested that the best thing to do is to legalize
noncommercial redistribution of all published works. I also suggested
as a way
to distribute any money people must pay as licenses for the scheme.
18 September 2015 (
Drug tests
Scott Walker wants
drug
tests for people applying for food stamps,
as if anyone that smokes pot deserves to starve.
Occasionally smoking pot does not incapacitate a person. Why should
it even matter, unless you're looking for someone to demonize?
18 September 2015 (
Medical insurance mergers
Mergers between US medical insurance companies could paradoxically be
a good thing.
If
they all merge
, the resulting organization could be
nationalized and merged with Medicare.
18 September 2015 (
Trump's speaking technique
Donald Trump's speaking technique is a form of
"negging"
— meant to pressure the American people into bed with him.
18 September 2015 (
Fast food
Each day,
1/3
of US children eat fast food
I would guess that they include many poor children, whose parents
have trouble paying for fast food but can't provide anything else,
because they are working long hours, because they have no cooking
facilities, or because nothing else is available in their "food
desert".
18 September 2015 (
Olympic Games in Korea
The Olympic Games organizers in South Korea
knocked down
500-year-protected forest with trees even older. They say they will
make another one on the same site after the games.
This reminds me of a Roman joke. When Mummius looted Corinth, he
confided some famous old art works to a ship captain for transport and
said, "Remember, if you damage these, you will have to provide
replacements just like them."
18 September 2015 (
Discussion on fighting PISSI
Russia has asked
to
discuss
fighting PISSI with the US.
PISSI
is the Pseudo-Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.
18 September 2015 (
Reagan's deal with Iran
Some
evidence
that Reagan made a deal with Iran to keep holding American
hostages so that Jimmy Carter would lose the election.
18 September 2015 (
Glossip's execution postponed
Richard Glossip's execution has been postponed 2 weeks to
reconsider
whether he is guilty.
18 September 2015 (
American wages
American Wages
Remain
at 1997 Levels
as Recovery Fails to Lift Middle Class.
18 September 2015 (
Air pollution
Air pollution kills more people than
malaria and HIV.
18 September 2015 (
Syrians trained by US
With half a billion dollars, the US has trained
"four
or five"
Syrians to fight against PISSI.
The only plan that might succeeds is to help the Kurds strengthen
themselves, but Obama clearly is unwilling to do that, so he chooses
among the useless plans.
18 September 2015 (
Critic of Moroccan repression
Journalist Ali Lmrabet
continues
to criticize Moroccan repression in Western Sahara,
despite being
imprisoned, banned from journalism, and exiled.
18 September 2015 (
Anti-privacy US officials
Anti-privacy US officials are praying for a terrorist attack, or
something they can spin as one, to get an opportunity
to
attack our freedom some more.
About 5 million people die each year in the US. Each death is
unfortunate, but death will happen to all of us. If someone kills a
few more, is that a reason to tear up vital freedoms? We need to
remember that an all-seeing government is the bigger danger.
18 September 2015 (
Fracking of wildlife sites
Almost
300
scientifically important English wildlife sites
are at risk of being fracked.
Fracking won't poison the water in all of them, just some fraction.
18 September 2015 (
Social media damages mental health
Around 1/5 of teenage girls are so caught up in
addictive
corporate social media
that it damages their mental health.
This should not be too surprising. These apps are proprietary
software, designed by companies to manipulate their users.
It is common to many fields of production that designers make
their products
as
addictive as possible.
The addictiveness of these networks constitutes success in their eyes.
18 September 2015 (
Record low for Arctic sea ice area
The year's minimum Arctic sea ice area is
nearly
a record.
Only three years (all recent) have reached a lower level.
18 September 2015 (
Sanders' single-payer medical system
Bernie Sanders' single-payer medical system would cost a little over
half what the US spends today, but the
Wall
Street Journal
compares it with zero rather than with our current system.
18 September 2015 (
Criticizing Corbyn
Corbyn advocates making the UK a republic, so he kept silent at a
ceremony as "God Save the Queen" was sung. Plutocrats are spewing
dishonest
venom
over this.
They will throw any sort of insults, trying to make him look bad.
Then they will criticize him for being the target of their smears.
Corbyn had to act
according
to his views,
or become another dishonest politician.
I don't have any opinion about that issue. I am concerned with the policies
of the British government, not about who is the symbolic head of state.
18 September 2015 (
Species-specific pesticides
Small
interfering RNA molecules
could be used as species-specific pesticides.
This would work on crops that are not genetically modified, by spraying
on the RNA.
Getting them into the cells of the targeted species is a difficulty.
An idea that occurs to me is to build them into a genetically modified
version of a virus that targets that pest species.
The RNA molecule might randomly interfere with other genes in other
species. However, the virus probably won't get into cells of most
other species. With two keys that need to fit two locks, the chance
of affecting other wildlife would be much less.
The idea is very interesting, but it is not without danger to the
environment. It could also conceivably hurt humans — that is
unlikely but needs to be tested.
I don't trust Monsanto to test this carefully, because its interest is
to be careless.
18 September 2015 (
Phone designed to track users
The Moto X phone was designed to track users
more
than any phone before.
The article assumes readers value convenience more than freedom, but I hope
that's not true of you.
17 September 2015 (
Urgent: Water supply appropriation
Everyone: call on the World Bank to rule that the
people of El
Salvador can appropriate water supplies to their real needs
rather than to mining companies. Human rights must prevail over
business interests.
17 September 2015 (
Sea level rise
Australian aborigines care in oral transmission of history has preserved
accurate reports of the
huge
sea level rise that ended 7,000 years ago
Sea level rose 120 meters, or almost 400 feet, because of global
heating (the end of the ice age).
17 September 2015 (
Overfishing of tuna and mackerel
Overfishing of tuna and mackerel have knocked their populations down
by
3/4
in 40 years
17 September 2015 (
Mosquitoes in the Arctic
Even 2C of
global heating
will
increase
the mosquitoes in the Arctic by 50%
17 September 2015 (
Australia's new right-wing PM
Australia's new right-wing prime minister is less wacky than Abbott,
but he
still
represents dooH niboR
17 September 2015 (
UK anti-union bill
The UK
anti-union
bill
, that would make strikes nearly impossible, is a militant
attack on workers.
But this approach is typical of today's right wing. The Tories don't
admit they intend make poor people homeless; they do it with a bunch of
cuts
and pressures
. They don't say that they intend to make disabled
people starve if they can't work, rather than find excuses to punish
them by
denying
them disability support
. They claim to support greenhouse gas
emission reduction while launching a series of
attacks
against programs to achieve this
Likewise, the US right wing, since it can't block abortion by
prohibiting abortion, creates
arbitrary
requirements
that are impossible for clinics to meet.
17 September 2015 (
US and Australian subsidies for coal
Ending US and Australian subsidies for coal
would
slash carbon emissions
17 September 2015 (
UK sexual "assault" conviction
A woman in the UK has been convicted of sexual assault because she had
told
her lover she was male
Whatever we think of this pretense, it clearly was not "assault". If
they want to make gaining sexual consent via misrepresentation a
crime, they should pass another law and call it something else.
But what kinds of misrepresentation should be criminalized? Claiming
to be over 16? Claiming to be under 30? Claiming to be a virgin?
Claiming lots of experience? Claiming to be unmarried? Claiming not
to have other lovers? Claiming to have been at work the previous
Tuesday night? Claiming a high income? Spending like a person with a
high income? Claiming to have read a certain book? Pretending to
have read it but without an explicit claim? Wearing a padded bra or
platform shoes? Wearing a wig? Dyeing hair? Cosmetics?
If a prostitute lies about what is on offer, that is false
advertising, but not assault.
17 September 2015 (
US global influences
Obama has deftly rebuilt US global influences,
mending
relationships with countries that were hardened enemies
Unfortunately, some of the steps also build the influence of
multinational corporations that the US bows down to.
Reducing Chinese influence is to a large extent a good thing, when you
consider the
pervasive
corruption
and deepening
political
repression
of the Chinese state. But the US is not immune to
these things; industries including
fossil
fuel extraction
pharma
medical
care
publishing
and plenty of others have corrupted the US government, while
massive
surveillance
threatens US democracy. We can't take for granted
that the US will be better than China.
17 September 2015 (
Iranian troops in Syria
Iranian troops are in Syria,
fighting
against militias that support al-Qa'ida
As long as they are not fighting the revolutionary Kurds, I won't feel
much outrage. The sad thing about Syria, since several years ago, the
main military powers are all monsters.
17 September 2015 (
Traffic fatalities decrease in Colorado
Traffic fatalities in Colorado
have
decreased since it legalized marijuana
17 September 2015 (
Who would Jesus vote for?
Bernie
Sanders' speech
to students at a Protestant fundamentalist
university.
I'd suggest inviting them to think about who Jesus would vote for. If
a historical Jesus said things like what the gospels report (which is
not at all established), I think he would vote for Sanders.
17 September 2015 (
Shackling minors accused of crimes
Most US states
automatically
shackle all minors accused of crimes
, regardless of whether there
is any reason to do this.
17 September 2015 (
Developing water shortages
The Paris climate conference is
not
paying attention to developing water shortages
The most important conclusion to draw from today's droughts is the
same one that we draw from all the other consequences of global
heating: we should launch a crash program to cut emissions.
Alas, this is precisely what many governments have already decided not
to do.
The second most important conclusion is that we need to limit human
births, if we don't want deaths due to water shortages (and crop
shortages) to limit population.
16 September 2015 (
FBI's encryption horror stories
FBI
Keeps Telling Purely Theoretical Encryption Horror Stories
Even if there were some real ones, it would amount to a smaller
danger than the danger of a state that watches everyone.
16 September 2015 (
The death penalty
It looks like murderer Sneed
claimed
Richard Glossip pressured him to commit the crime
, so that Glossip
would be executed instead of Sneed.
This sort of thing seems not to be unusual.
16 September 2015 (
Thugs shoot first, think later
Once again,
thugs
shoot first, think later. This time they saw a man
with a phone and
instantly
assumed it was a gun
The victim is Hispanic; whether unconscious racism played a role in
the hasty action is not clear from this article.
16 September 2015 (
Thai journalist imprisoned without trial
A prominent Thai journalist has been
imprisoned
without trial
for an "attitude adjustment". His attitude towards
the military regime was not slavish enough.
16 September 2015 (
Massive attack on Turkish media
Erdoğan's men
seized
all copies of a Turkish magazine
He is massively attacking Turkish media that dare criticize him.
16 September 2015 (
Employee tracking
A company in California is getting sued for
trying
to track an employee outside work
16 September 2015 (
Refuge for torturers and war criminals
Will the US become the refuge for
all
the world's torturers and war criminals
It is already the refuge for American war criminals such as
Bush
and Cheney
16 September 2015 (
Privatization of government services
To replace privatized public housing with expensive condos, a UK
company offered a wheelchair-bound man an
inaccessible
replacement apartment
Since he rejects that useless offer, he gets one more option:
homelessness for him and his family.
This is an instance of how privatization of government services
creates both opportunities and pressure to cheat people. In practice,
those companies get their profit by underserving the public and/or
paying workers less.
There may be some public services that don't really need to exist as
public services, but the rest should not be privatized.
16 September 2015 (
Deadly bombing in Thailand
The Thai government says that a
deadly
bombing
was human traffickers' revenge for a crackdown, and was
not motivated by politics.
16 September 2015 (
US chicken processing plants
Working in a US chicken processing plant is
hell
on the workers
, because they are forced to work too fast.
16 September 2015 (
Edelman stops global heating denial work
The PR company Edelman has been
pressured
into ending its work for global heating denialism
Thanks to those who signed
the
campaign
which helped bring this about.
16 September 2015 (
More reason to fight Uber
Uber could be a sign of what
privatized
city governance
might be like.
All the more reason to fight it.
16 September 2015 (
US ignored deal to replace Assad 3 years ago
3 years ago, a Russian ambassador offered a deal by which Assad would
be replaced. It appears the US distrusted and
ignored
the deal
I would not put great faith in Putin, but such deals don't always
depend on faith.
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: the need for network neutrality
All experts:
explain
to US court
the need for network neutrality.
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: marine national monuments
US citizens: Tell President Obama to designate
the
New England coral canyons and seamounts, and Cashes Ledge,
as marine national monuments.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: defend Planned Parenthood funding
US citizens: Congress, defend Planned Parenthood funding; —
don't
surrender it as a "compromise".
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: oppose the pro-fossil energy bill
US citizens:
call
on the Senate
to oppose the pro-fossil energy bill.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: Arbys employees
Everyone: tell Arbys,
stop
helping thugs bully your employees!
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: end garnishing of Social Security
US citizens: call on Obama to end garnishing Americans' Social
Security benefits
to
repay student loans.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: public editor for National Geographic
Everyone: call on National Geographic Magazine
to
appoint a Public Editor.
This might reduce the harm done by letting
Faux News
take control of it.
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: investigate Malaysian whitewash
US citizens: call on your congresscritter to investigate whether
Malaysia was whitewashed
to
grease the skids for the TPP.
16 September 2015 (
Urgent: Alaskan wildlife refuge
US citizens:
oppose
government plans
to build a road through an Alaskan wildlife refuge.
That they plan to spend our money on it is adding insult to injury.
16 September 2015 (
Iran's law
Iran's law compelling women to hide their bodies is supposedly so men
won't be attracted to them. But the
"solution"
doesn't work.
I think it actually backfires by causing men to obsess over what
they cannot see.
16 September 2015 (
"Female" chatbots
Leaked messages indicate Ashley Madison staff discussed how to
mislead
customers and the State of California about its "female" chatbots.
About 35% of the messages men paid to send to "women" were actually to
chatbots, and real women numbered about 5% of the men.
"Lesbian" chatbots occasionally sent messages to each other,
like making the doctor program talk to itself.
16 September 2015 (
Starbucks toilets
thug
complained after the barista in a Starbucks would not give him
special
permission to use the toilet
unless he bought something.
For once, I am on the side of the
thug
. Perhaps the thug complained
because he expected privilege, but use of a toilet should not be a
privilege. That Starbucks' policy is nasty no matter who it applies
to. Every establishment with a toilet for customers should offer its use
to anyone who is not causing trouble.
16 September 2015 (
US "terrorists"
A US
right-wing
troll
gave bomb-making advice to someone he thought
was an Islamist extremist, to bring about a terrorist attack this September 11.
Such an attack would have provided an excuse for additional attacks
on Americans' freedom. The PAT RIOT Act didn't get them everything they want.
Instead he got arrested.
In general, the US "terrorists" that the FBI arrests are
feckless
Walter Mittys
that the FBI has to cajole into their "threats",
but there is finally one exception.
16 September 2015 (
Thug attack in court
A Denver prosecutor has been ordered to explain to a judge why he didn't
prosecute a thug who gratuitously
attacked
and maimed a man in the court.
16 September 2015 (
Foreign military bases
The US has hundreds of foreign military bases, which harm Americans
by
facilitating wars as well as costing lots of money.
16 September 2015 (
Wikipedia's "partnership" with Elsevier
Wikipedia has a started a damaging "partnership"
with
parasitic publisher Elsevier.
For editors to
see
Elsevier articles is not particularly
harmful, but
making links
to them would work against
Wikipedia's goal, as well as strengthen the power of a company
that strangles science.
I think Wikipedia should prohibit links to sites with strict paywalls,
and automatically delete them and block insertion of new ones.
16 September 2015 (
Avoid deafening whales
The US Navy has been ordered
to
limit loud sonar
to avoid deafening whales.
16 September 2015 (
Tax on financial transactions
Brazil's president is dealing with a
budget
deficit,
and plans to handle half of it with a tax on financial transactions.
At least she is getting things half right, unlike the right-wing governments
that take it all out on the poor.
15 September 2015 (
Urgent: No RFIDs in driver's licenses
Residents of California:
phone
your state legislators
to oppose S.B. 249, which would impose
tracking RFIDs in driver's licenses.
Say you don't want to have
any
tracking device in your
license. These "enhanced" drivers licenses are actually sabotaged
drivers licenses, and they shouldn't exist at all.
15 September 2015 (
Urgent: Red Cliffs Desert Reserve
US citizens:
call on
Congress
not to push a road through the Red Cliffs Desert Reserve.
15 September 2015 (
Manus Island refugee prison
The refugees Australia imprisons on Manus Island
have
to buy their own medicine after guards attack them
, and they can't
afford both that and food.
What's happening is that Australians don't want to admit most
refugees, but since explicitly rejecting them would violate a treaty,
Australia concocts underhanded, deniable, even
secret
pressures to push them away.
See
this
other article on refugees
15 September 2015 (
UK's tests of fitness to work
The UK's anxiety-provoking tests to see if someone is fit to work
trigger
relapses of multiple sclerosis
15 September 2015 (
UK businesses want more corporate welfare
UK businesses want to replace taxes on businesses that emit lots of
CO
with
subsidies
for businesses that emit less
Supposedly this is for the sake of simplicity. We're not supposed to
notice that it adds up to an increase in corporate welfare payments.
Anyone who gets fooled by this must really want to get fooled —
like a plutocratist pollutician.
15 September 2015 (
Turkey's rabid nationalist ruler
Across Turkey,
mobs
have attacked offices of the HD Party, while the army attacks Kurdish
towns
The author fears that Erdoğan will sabotage the coming election,
perhaps by preventing Kurdish regions from voting, or set the election
aside entirely.
The US ought to disconnect itself from Erdoğan, so that it can
support the Kurds in Syria and Iraq and thus destroy
PISSI
, and at the
same time support democracy in Turkey. The success of the HD Party
shows that Kurds and Turks could live together under democracy if only
there were no rabid nationalist ruler to prevent it.
15 September 2015 (
ISPs of Portugal to rat on customers
The ISPs of Portugal have made a deal with the copyright industry to
"voluntarily"
rat on their customers
15 September 2015 (
Burundi independent newspaper
Burundi seems to be
creating
excuses to close
the main remaining independent newspaper.
15 September 2015 (
UN punishes whistleblowers
The UN
punishes
whistleblowers
much as the US does.
15 September 2015 (
Extreme bleaching event in Hawai'i
Hawai'i's coral reefs are facing an
extreme
bleaching event
due to the unusual heat of the water. It is 2C to
4C hotter than usual.
If two bleaching events in successive years is deadly, 50 years from
now nearly every year would be a hot enough to cause a bleaching
event. But it won't matter by then, because the
increased
level of CO
in the water will kill all the coral
15 September 2015 (
Pushing to do things faster
Ralph Nader: pushing to do most things faster
makes
people do many things worse
Nader doesn't notice that massive surveillance is one of the wrongs
done by ordering things on line.
The only thing I really wish I could do faster is
answer
my email
. But there is no hope of that — it's the thinking
that takes most of the time.
15 September 2015 (
Appeasements
It's a mistake to refer to legislative "compromises" between free
states and slave states, before the US civil war; since the free
states mostly gave slave states what they wanted, in response to
threats to secede, these are properly call
"appeasements"
15 September 2015 (
The Internet of Things
The Internet of Things doesn't inherently have to be an Internet of
Telemarketers and Snoops. It could be made of
personal
devices which keep the users' personal data to themselves
, while
receiving published data from businesses.
The only practical way to ensure the devices don't snoop is
if
their software is free
Many baby monitors (internet-connected cameras, really) have been left
vulnerable to
snooping
by unknown third parties
The immediate cause is bad design, but the root cause, in some cases,
is routing the video through the server of a company that shouldn't be
trusted with a view of the inside of your home.
15 September 2015 (
Edward Snowden's path to whistleblowing
Edward Snowden explains the
experiences and
thought path
that led him to blow the whistle on US massive
surveillance of essentially everyone.
It is interesting that there is proof that another whistleblower
exists within the NSA. I wonder if someone has heeded the patriotic
exhortation that I put in my emails.
[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies, ]]]
[[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
15 September 2015 (
Prosecution for corporations' crimes
The US Justice Department now says it
will
try to prosecute executives responsible for corporations' crimes
President Sanders, if supported by Congress, would put real teeth into
this policy.
If a company stalls for time until its employees can't be prosecuted,
is that obstruction of justice?
15 September 2015 (
Data retention a liability
For companies, data that isn't essential is a
liability
If that helps convince companies to keep less data about people,
that's a good outcome. But we should not let our privacy rights be
defined by the interests of companies. Human rights should take
priority over business interests, and
is a human right
15 September 2015 (
Koch brothers' point man
Scott
Walker
is the Koch brothers' point man for nearly eliminating labor unions in the US.
They want to drive nearly all workers into poverty.
15 September 2015 (
Racism makes teenagers sick
New Study: Racism Can Make [Teenagers] Sick —
for
the Rest of Their Lives.
15 September 2015 (
Sierra Nevada snowpack
The thin Sierra Nevada snowpack of last winter was the thinnest
in
at least 500 years,
according to a study based on tree rings.
15 September 2015 (
Jeremy Corbyn opposes war
Jeremy Corbyn, new leader of UK Labour,
is
a peace activist.
He seriously opposes US/UK militarism and wars. He even dares to
criticize Saudi Arabia and Qatar for promoting jihadis in Syria.
I don't oppose war under all circumstances (I don't know whether
Corbyn does either), but I agree with most of his criticism
of what the UK and US actually do.
I support arming the Kurds, and the women that
PISSI
has raped, to
fight
PISSI
, but that's not what the US and UK consider doing.
15 September 2015 (
Letters written by Koch
Koch Industries
wrote
letters
which congresscritters then signed their names to.
15 September 2015 (
Funeral for a pet
Don't fall for the pressure to
spend
a lot of money
on a funeral for a pet.
Or a human being — all that matters is remembering the person who died,
not material trappings.
15 September 2015 (
New Australian PM
The Australian right-wing government has switched prime ministers, and
the new leader
Turnbull
formerly favored strong action against global heating.
However, that may not matter, since he says he doesn't plan to change
the current policies.
15 September 2015 (
Prisoners in San Jose
Prisoners in the San Jose jail say that it is common for the guards to
punch and beat them; the only unusual thing about beating Michael Tyree
is
that he died.
15 September 2015 (
Charges by Erdogan
Erdogan has charged the co-leader of the HD Party, which supports
human rights, with
"crimes"
such as terrorism and "insulting Turkishness".
In effect, Erdogan has declared open war on democracy in Turkey. He
is the biggest insult to Turkishness that has ever been seen. I hope
that Turkishness defeats Erdogan.
15 September 2015 (
US fraudulent foreclosure
The US fraudulent foreclosure scandal
has
spread
into the US system of property records.
15 September 2015 (
Pakistan's official censorship
Pakistan's official censorship is now backed by military threats
to
fabricate
accusations against journalists.
15 September 2015 (
Germany to reimpose border controls
Germany has been overwhelmed with refugees and will reimpose border
controls, effectively
ending
the Schengen free travel zone
There was no way that the welcome for refugees could continue
indefinitely. There simply can't be room for millions of migrants.
Thus, when there are so many people fleeing, we need to address the
causes, which include
climate mayhem
wars
(many created or made worse by the
US)
local
tyranny
, and
corporate
land grabs
Those are the immediate causes that make people flee, but there is
also the deeper long-term cause:
world population
growth
. We need to reduce the birth rate to the point where the
human population starts to decline.
15 September 2015 (
Sulfoxaflor
An appeals court
overruled
the EPA's approval
of a new neonicotinoid pesticide, sulfoxaflor.
It is ironic that the chemical was given a name suggesting the flowers
that would kill bees if this pesticide has been used on them.
15 September 2015 (
Climate safety agreement in Paris
US Republican leaders are now
actively
campaigning against
any climate safety agreement in Paris.
15 September 2015 (
US policy towards war journalists
The US government's policy towards journalists covering a war: if
their coverage doesn't suit the US, they are
considered
spies and may be shot on sight
The US
did
exactly that to some al-Jazeera journalists
in Iraq.
More
information
RT is a propaganda outlet for the abuse of power. So is
Faux News
That doesn't justify shooting their reporters.
14 September 2015 (
Freedom of speech
In 2007, Brandeis University tried to discipline a professor
for
explaining the pejorative term "wetback"
. This led to a dispute
between the faculty senate, which defended him, and the administration
which judged that this was "harassment".
Hindley did not really make a racial slur, but what if he had? In
general, real use of racial slurs should not be formally punished.
Freedom of speech includes the freedom to say nasty and foolish
things.
Teachers are a special case, though; they should not gratuitously
insult their students and should not set an example of racism.
The faculty-administration dispute was resolved as the administration
agreed
to give somewhat more respect to faculty decisions
, but Brandeis
never rescinded its
unjust
decision against Hindley
In 2014, people
attacked
him for describing the Israeli occupation of Palestine as "ethnic
cleansing"
and comparing it to the holocaust.
The occupation does include slow ethnic cleansing on certain parts of
annexed Jerusalem and the West Bank, but comparing it to the holocaust
is an exaggeration. Israel does not do things that would ever kill
millions of Arabs. Nonetheless, he has a right to say such things
on the faculty mailing list.
14 September 2015 (
Self-undermining warnings
An example of a widespread self-undermining way of warning about
dangerous practices — in this case, the insecurity of letting
companies have your personal data: to say that
"we"
all do it
I suppose the writers see this as a way of chumming up to the readers
so that they will pay attention, but it defeats the purpose, because
it tells readers, "Of course you use those disservices? Everyone
does. No one would expect you to do otherwise."
Use of the term
"the
cloud"
compounds the problem. The only "cloud" is in the minds of
people who formulate their thoughts in terms of a "cloud".
Readers will go away thinking, "What a shame we are all trapped in
this" rather than "I am going to stop now!"
14 September 2015 (
US training allies with histories of abuse
U.S. Special Forces
Expand
Training to Allies With Histories of Abuse
14 September 2015 (
Camp Clark and the Demise of Free Speech
Camp
Clark and the Demise of Free Speech
14 September 2015 (
Austria moving towards total surveillance
Austria is
moving
to legislate nearly total surveillance
Austrians,
take action here
Governments around the world are launching a broad front pre-emptive
attack against the privacy needed for democracy and the press to
function.
14 September 2015 (
Crimes of the old Tunisian regime
Parts of the Tunisian state are
blocking
investigation of crimes of the old regime
This is perhaps because the new president comes from a group linked to
the old regime. I fear it is taking advantage of terrorist attacks to
permanently clamp down on human rights.
14 September 2015 (
Study of genetically inherited trauma
The study that found that children of holocaust survivors inherited
evidence of stress was
too
small and not well designed
. It may be invalid.
14 September 2015 (
Yazidi women to fight PISSI
Yazidi women have
formed
a militia
to fight PISSI(*).
I suggested
arming
PISSI's escaped female captives
. The US didn't, but the
Revolutionary Kurds did. The US doesn't help the Kurds because it is
more interested in being nice to Erdoğan and the sectarian
Iraqi state than in defeating
PISSI
PISSI
Pseudo-Islamic
State in Syria and Iraq
14 September 2015 (
Guantanamo prisoners denied rights
As Tariq Ba Odah wastes away in Guantanamo, the US government
denies
him rights he is entitled to
either as a military prisoner or as
an arrested person.
A few dozen prisoners in Guantanamo may have committed real crimes.
There are a few handfuls who might fight against the US if released
— but given the thousands of jihadis now fighting for
PISSI
these few would change nothing. Some of them might find
PISSI
so
barbarous (by the standards of the jihadis of 2000) that they fight
against it.
It would be better to release all the prisoners in Guantanamo
immediately, than to undermine everyone's human rights and the rule of
law by continuing to holding them without a fair trial.
I have no objections to holding some to prosecute them in a proper
court, where there are grounds to do so.
14 September 2015 (
Trusting government with encryption
Why We
Positively, Absolutely, Can't Trust the Government with
Encryption
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
14 September 2015 (
Overprotective parenting
Overprotective parenting may be steering the US into a "culture of
victimhood" in which people are
quick
to perceive slights, but can't resolve the disputes on their own
I say "may" because I don't consider this proven. And there is
another side to the issue. In the past, while some groups of children
learned to relate well, others bullied or were bullied, and the
bullied children who couldn't find a way to protect themselves on
their own learned that they were helpless.
However, there seems to be some truth in the article's point.
14 September 2015 (
International bankruptcy system
The
UN
General Assembly gave its support
to setting up an international
bankruptcy system.
The General Assembly has little power, so mainly this applies pressure
to those countries, such as the US, which are blocking the plan. I am
sure the US will stop blocking it if we elect Sanders president. That
is one thing that the president can change alone.
14 September 2015 (
Euthanasia
The Netherlands
allows
people to get assistance for euthanasia under a broad range of
circumstances
I think that euthanasia assistance should be available to anyone whose
situation or condition makes suicide effectively impossible for that
person. We don't need to give help to others, since they can commit
suicide without help if they choose to. But we should make sure that
no one is denied that choice by practical obstacles.
I feel sad for each person who needs euthanasia to avoid a fate worse
than death, but I understand the choice.
However, I am not suicidal. I would choose to live forever, if I
could do so in good enough health to make it a worthwhile and
productive life. But that technology is not likely to be invented
soon enough for me.
14 September 2015 (
Protest leader charged with absurd crimes
After a truck almost ran into community leader Wesley West, who leads
Black Lives Matter protests in Baltimore, the
thugs
charged
him with absurd crimes
, reminiscent of
China
or
Azerbaijan
14 September 2015 (
American prudery
Cormega Copening is being
charged
in North Carolina as an adult for making sexy pictures of Cormega
Copening, because Cormega Copening is a minor
It's another example of America's prudish and twisted attitude towards
teenagers and their natural occupation, sex.
14 September 2015 (
LA garment companies cheat workers
Garment workers in Los Angeles may not get the benefit of the
increased minimum wage, because those companies
flout
labor law frequently
From a short-term perspective, a job where you are overworked, injured
and then cheated might seem better than no job at all. It might seem
like valid reasoning to say we should tolerate companies that cheat
workers in the US, rather than have those companies move and cheat
workers in some other country.
Taking a longer view, why are those the only choices? Because of
acceptance of that short-term reasoning.
I see no reason to allow importation from countries where workers are
treated so badly. We should tear up the plutocratic treaties that say
we "have to" allow this.
14 September 2015 (
Chilean state to sign the TPP
President Allende warned against the power of multinational
corporations, and fought against them in Chile. Now the Chilean state
is planning to complete their victory over Chile, by
signing
the TPP
Don't make the mistake of calling the TPP a "trade treaty"; its main
purpose is to give those companies the ultimate power and rewrite laws
to suit them.
14 September 2015 (
Assessing schools
There are
ways
to assess a school
, other than giving the students standardized
tests.
However, the focus on assessing schools, and assessing teachers,
misses the point that many schools in the US don't get enough funds.
Moreover, the children in them are growing up in poverty, which means
they are also
under
daily stress
. It is very hard for a school to overcome the
mind-damaging
effects
of such upbringing.
In effect, arguing about assessing the school is a way to draw the
conversation away from those issues.
14 September 2015 (
Urgent: Tor Node
Everyone:
urge the Kilton library to turn its Tor node back on
14 September 2015 (
Fire conditions in California
Fire conditions in California are
nearly
explosive
: a fire grew from 1 sq mile to 100 sq miles in one day.
14 September 2015 (
Officials who don't want to perform duties
Some states have passed laws that allow local officials to stop
performing any marriages, so that they
won't
have to perform same-sex marriages
No individual is coerced to hold public office in the US. If these
officials don't want to perform some of the duties of their offices,
they need only resign, and they will no longer have that duty.
14 September 2015 (
Labour Party's new leader
The
leftist
candidate Jeremy Corbyn
won the leadership of the Labour Party.
The "New Labour" Party set up by
Tony B'liar
was a right-wing party
Tory Lite. Even when it won, the people didn't win, they only lost
more slowly.
Here is
what
Corbyn stands for
Two vital issue not mentioned here are curbing
global heating
and
curbing surveillance. I would like to see where Corbyn stands on
those.
Recommendations
for what Labour must do now.
I would like to see Labour and the Green Party merge.
14 September 2015 (
Sharks still overfished
Despite a reduction in catching sharks only for their fins, sharks are
still
being overfished
14 September 2015 (
India covering up murder and torture
India is
covering
up murder and torture
committed by hundreds of soldiers and thugs
in Kashmir.
14 September 2015 (
Iraqis protest gov't sectarianism
Iraqis are
protesting
against government aligned with sects
I hope that this is serious, and not a movement of Shi'ites looking
for a way to take all the offices.
14 September 2015 (
Paramilitaries trained by US Special Forces
American Special Forces Are Still Conducting Training for
Some
of Africa's Most Notorious Paramilitaries
14 September 2015 (
School uniforms
Rules for girls' school uniforms
spread
prudish attitudes
about female bodies.
I wish today's students were inclined to go on strike against school
uniforms, but (according to what I have read) they have been brought
up to an attitude of
desperate
competition
combined with immaturity.
14 September 2015 (
Riding bicycles while black
Someone in a wealthy town in Massachusetts
called
911
simply because some black kids were riding bicycles.
14 September 2015 (
"Urban Shield" trade show
Campaigning to end the "Urban Shield" trade show which
promotes
massive surveillance and militarization of thugs
14 September 2015 (
Burning all fossil fuels
A model predicts that burning all fossil fuels
would
melt the entire Antarctic ice sheet, eventually
. This would raise
sea level around 160 feet, adding to the 60 feet or so that would come
from the Greenland ice sheet. Most of today's large cities would be
inundated.
The complete melting would take many centuries, but
even the first dose is a bad problem.
14 September 2015 (
Prudery
Prudery alert, men are being
castigated
for saying their daughters are attractive
This comes out in the middle of a dispute about a female lawyer who
publicly rebuked a male lawyer for privately saying that her profile
photo was "stunning", at a time when they had no business to discuss.
Sexism sometimes takes the form of a man's refusal to take a female
colleague seriously as a professional. Such refusal is a pattern that
occurs over time. It can take the form of focusing on the female's
appearance rather than the professional matters at hand.
A statement of attraction is sometimes part of such a pattern of
disrespect, but not always. It might be an expression of being swept
away by beauty (it would be if I said it), a polite attempt to put the
woman in a good mood (this was standard etiquette), or looking for a
date. None of those is inherently incompatible with professional
respect.
Professional women have encountered many compliments that were part of
a pattern of sexist disrespect, so they have learned to associate the
two. Hear a compliment, suspect disrespect. It is not an absurd
suspicion, but that doesn't mean the man is guilty.
Since the compliment isn't
necessarily
disrespect, why not
wait a while and see if that man respects you or not?
14 September 2015 (
$15 minimum wage in NY
After ordering a $15 minimum wage for fast food workers, NY Governor
Cuomo proposes to legislate a
$15
minimum wage for all workers in New York State
14 September 2015 (
Seattle teachers' strike
Parents
in Seattle give support
to the teachers' strike.
14 September 2015 (
NHS doctors overstressed
The Tory's plan to kill the NHS by underfunding it has caused many doctors
to be overstressed and
plan
to take early retirement
14 September 2015 (
Evictions for calling 911 too much
Many cities in the US have
laws
to evict tenants that call 911 too much
. The ACLU got rid of this
in Pennsylvania.
13 September 2015 (
New York City thug
One New York City thug has a history of
beating
people up and pepper
spraying them,
then arresting them, for no reason.
12 September 2015 (
Urgent: support more negotiations with Iran
US citizens: call on Obama and Congress
to
support more negotiations with Iran.
12 September 2015 (
Urgent: Amazon and glyphosate
Everyone: call on Amazon to
stop
selling Glyphosate.
I urge people not to buy anything from Amazon, for
many
reasons
unrelated to this, and I will continue to do so even if this campaign is successful.
I hope you do the same. There is no incompatibility between that
and signing this petition.
12 September 2015 (
Urgent: end forfeiture
Citizens of California: phone your assembly member and call
for
passage
of the bill to end forfeiture
(i.e., seizure of assets)
unless the person involved is convicted of a crime.
The bill does not go far enough: it allows the assets to be seized
first and the person prosecuted later. If your car is seized and you
lose your job, and thus your home, you might plead guilty so to get a
place to stay in jail.
But it should still be passed, as a first step.
12 September 2015 (
Declining violence rate
The overall rate of human violence
continues
to decline.
Even counting the contributions of
PISSI
, the number of people killed
by violence is less now than it was 10 years ago. It has been declining
ever since the second world war.
12 September 2015 (
Spying on Russian users
Apple has allegedly agreed to
store
data
about Russian users in Russia so that Putin can spy on them.
Most Russians, those who have nothing particular to fear from the US
government, would be safer with their data in the US. Most Americans,
those who have nothing particular to fear from the Russian government,
would be safer with their data in Russia.
12 September 2015 (
Poor health caused by poverty
The poor health and life expectancy caused by poverty
falls
on everyone that isn't rich,
to some degree.
12 September 2015 (
Secret trial for opposition leader
Venezuelan opposition leader
Leopoldo
Lopez
was sentenced to a long prison
term after a secret trial.
It is not implausible that a Venezuelan opposition leader would
conspire with the US to commit some sort of crime; in fact, that
happened ten years ago. But that alone doesn't mean Lopez did so, or
make it legitimate to convict him of doing so other than with proof in
a fair trial.
12 September 2015 (
Rosy reports of fighting PISSI
Clapper is
suspected
of pressuring a Pentagon intelligence analyst to deliver rosy reports of fighting PISSI.
12 September 2015 (
Military cooperation with Iran
The US is not interested in military cooperation with Iran, although
that
might be the way to defeat PISSI.
12 September 2015 (
Blocking wind farms
The UK's
fossil
fool government
is now blocking sea-based wind farms
as well as land wind farms.
12 September 2015 (
Cancer study cancelled
Nuclear power lobbyists
convinced
the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to
cancel a study of cancer rates in the vicinity of US nuclear power
plants.
That agency is considering adopting a
theory
that low doses of radiation are good for people.
To have real facts about the matter might get in the way.
12 September 2015 (
Inundation of Pacific islands
Australia and New Zealand
rejected
the complaints of
Pacific Island nations that will be inundated by
global heating
The callous Australian ministers
joked
about the coming inundation,
when they thought they were not being recorded.
12 September 2015 (
Abortion and contraception's moral good
Abortion and contraception are a tremendous moral good: the
gateway
to a world in which every child born is born healthy, and is wanted by
unstressed and prepared parents.
12 September 2015 (
Let Vanunu go
Mordechai Vanunu was sentenced to
house
arrest
for giving an interview.
Israel should let Vanunu go.
12 September 2015 (
Snooping by Maldives government
The Maldives government
snooped
on deposed president Nasheed's
conversations with lawyers.
The Maldives government is hardly legitimate, but the UK government
has done
similar
things,
and I'd expect the US has too.
12 September 2015 (
Ghost fishing gear
Ghost gear — abandoned or lost fishing nets and traps —
goes
on catching fish,
which die as a result. The losses are enormous.
Fishermen must be made responsible, one way or another, for the damage
or cost imposed by their discarded or lost gear. Perhaps autonomous
vehicles could be designed to collect it, and the cost borne by fishermen
through taxes.
12 September 2015 (
Nagging to install Windows
Microsoft is
nagging
some users
to install Windows 10.
12 September 2015 (
New trial for Zach Anderson
Teenager Zach Anderson, who was sentenced to
25
years of public scorn
for having sex with a girl who said she was 17 years old, will have a
new trial.
The judge in the first trial condemned Anderson for participating in a
general sexual culture that the judge detests. I have my doubts about
the wisdom of hook-up culture, but that's no reason for prohibiting
it, let alone cracking down on individuals for participating in it.
Two UK teachers that had an affair in an office in the school where
they taught have been
banned
from teaching,
and the stated reason is
only that a lot of people are expected to think that there was
something wrong with that.
Apparently punishment need not be justified by an actual wrong.
Prejudiced disapproval by others is considered sufficient reason.
12 September 2015 (
Conditions in Eritrea
The UK government
falsified
a study of conditions in Eritrea
to create an excuse to send back Eritrean refugees.
The people who did the field work have resigned, condemning the way
their work was distorted in the report.
12 September 2015 (
Cap fossil fuel extraction
world-wide plan
to cap fossil fuel extraction could be best
for oil consumers as well as fossil fuel companies.
12 September 2015 (
Fossil fuel stock
The University of California has sold
200
million dollars of fossil fuel stock,
but not on principle — it judges them
not to be a very good investment.
If a drop in demand just happens to reduce the use of some fossil fuels,
that may help us avert disaster, but we'd be fools to count on that to
do the whole job.
12 September 2015 (
Fines for empty houses
Barcelona has fined banks for
leaving
some houses empty.
If applied on a large enough scale, this could do a lot of good.
But the UK needs a much broader policy, heavily taxing anyone
that owns a dwelling that isn't anyone's primary residence.
12 September 2015 (
Hiding emails
Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server, perhaps to hide important
State Department emails,
continues
a tradition followed for decades.
We don't know whether she hid anything important, but Bush regime officials
certainly did so.
11 September 2015 (
Exotic Tropical Diseases
Global heating is bringing
exotic tropical diseases to the US.
11 September 2015 (
UN intern
A UN intern in Geneva
was living in a tent because he could not afford
to rent any place to live
. Shockingly, he felt compelled to resign
when this became news.
Why should he resign? He didn't do anything wrong.
11 September 2015 (
Massacre of protesters
Egyptian officials responsible for the massacre of protesters
might be
arrested
if they visit London
11 September 2015 (
Chemical weapons
Kurds say that
PISSI
is
using chemical weapons now
11 September 2015 (
Bulldozed protesters
A driver bulldozed through a group of protesters in Ferguson with an
SUV, and a protester kicked the SUV as it passed. The kicker faces 4
years in prison;
the driver was not charged at all
11 September 2015 (
Spies
At last, some recognition that the "internet of things" will mean that
every thing in your life spies on you
11 September 2015 (
Solitary confinement
Chelsea Manning may be put in solitary confinement as
a punishment for
absurd "crimes"
11 September 2015 (
Bicycles
The City of Los Angeles will promote use of bicycles.
The City of Los Angeles is a small part of the urban area we think of
as "Los Angeles". And, sad to say, living in that area and
socializing with friends — unless you met them in your
neighborhood — require travelling a lot more than 3 miles. The
area needs a train system that will really reach everywhere, and it
needs to condense from single-family homes into apartment buildings.
11 September 2015 (
Sanders responds
Sanders responds to Black Lives Matter
pressure with several important
plans to end systemic imposed inequality.
Many of these measures are vital for other reasons.
11 September 2015 (
Swedish prosecutor
Julian Assange rebuked the Swedish prosecutor for letting 5 years go
by
without bothering to interview him
in London.
Whatever Assange may have
done
in Sweden, it is clear that
the Swedish government is not really interested in prosecuting him or
potentially punishing him for that. Rather, it is using the
prosecution an excuse to harm him.
11 September 2015 (
Egyptian photographer
Egyptian photographer Shawkan has been
imprisoned for two years
11 September 2015 (
Oil money
Azerbaijan is using its oil
, and oil money, to get European
governments
to overlook its tyranny.
11 September 2015 (
Mosquitos
In Greenland, in addition to melting the ice,
global heating
has
caused
a big increase in mosquitos
, which now endanger caribou.
11 September 2015 (
Boston thugs
Boston thugs
rebuked
(erroneously) Obama for supposedly not caring if
they are killed, but really what bothers them is that Obama is also
concerned about non-
thugs
. The thugs consider that a lack of the
respect they deserve. It may tend to erode the impunity they currently enjoy.
I hope so.
11 September 2015 (
Comcast PR
Vox Media published an
"article"
which was really PR for its big investor, Comcast.
It's not the first time Vox did something like that.
11 September 2015 (
Gulf Stream
Melting Arctic ice (including that of Greenland, which is fresh water)
might
slow
or shut down the Gulf Stream,
which would expose the US and
European Atlantic coasts to great cold in winter.
11 September 2015 (
Poverty in Europe
Poverty
is spreading in Europe
, the natural result of policies that reduce
workers' rights and social support.
11 September 2015 (
National Geographic
National Geographic's magazine, TV channel and other media
have
passed under the control of Faux News.
Faux News
has already injected embarrassing things into the National
Geographic TV channel, which has for some years been run jointly with
Faux.
It would have been better to shut down the magazine than let it become
a propaganda outlet.
11 September 2015 (
Inequality is killing
A prominent doctor says that inequality in the UK is killing
550
people every day.
That is 200,000 per year, making the September 2001 attacks look like
a pinprick.
11 September 2015 (
Ancestry.com
Don't let Ancestry.com analyze your DNA — it will use the
information in ways that can do
various
kinds of harm.
11 September 2015 (
Republican power-broker
Republican presidential candidates
seek
support
from a Republican power-broker who openly supports plutocracy over democracy.
11 September 2015 (
Assisted suicide
California's assembly
to
legalize doctors to assist suicide,
but only for those expected to die anyway within 6 months.
Once again, people facing a future of years of untreatable pain or years
of immobile helplessness have been left out.
11 September 2015 (
Women's prospects
Women's Prospects
Limited
by Law
in 155 Countries.
11 September 2015 (
Russia'a new base
Russia is building a new base
near
the border with Ukraine
to support the Russian troops fighting inside Ukraine.
11 September 2015 (
Clinton's militarism
Clinton says that Obama has been
insufficiently
militaristic.
She says she will be much quicker to invade, and will deny Israel nothing.
If that's what she says when Sanders in the race, imagine much more militarism
if she defeats Sanders' challenge and becomes president.
11 September 2015 (
Bin Laden's victory
Osama bin Laden's
colossal
victory:
giving US politicians a chance to
unleash endless wars abroad and military tyranny at home.
11 September 2015 (
Pope's political views
Pope Francis's
political
views
are great, with one giant exception:
women's control of
whether
to have babies.
11 September 2015 (
Paranoia in Australia
A man asked a 12-year-old for directions in Australia.
A bystander interpreted this as a threat, and so did the
thugs
who seek witnesses for this
non-event.
I thought this paranoia was limited to the US.
11 September 2015 (
Toxic wastewater
Another
danger from fracking:
spills of toxic wastewater.
10 September 2015 (
Sanders leading in Iowa
Sanders has
taken
the lead over Clinton
in the Iowa primary.
10 September 2015 (
Fossil fuel lobbyists
Fossil fuel lobbyists
killed
California's bill to reduce gasoline use 50% by 2030.
Another victory for those who want to fry the Earth. Technological
civilization may collapse in 2080, but at least we will avoid gas
rationing 10 years from now.
If the lobbying campaign builds opposition to monitoring of where
people drive, we may be able to use that for something positive. We
need to reform and regulate car manufacturers, insurance companies,
car rental companies, license plate recognition cameras, and toll
payment systems.
10 September 2015 (
Lobbying to block fracking regulations
The UK is lobbying secretly to
block
EU environmental safety regulations on fracking.
The UK government is the lackey of fossil fuel companies,
putting on a front of supporting renewable energy.
10 September 2015 (
Inequality in Nigeria
The growing inequality spread by global business means that in Nigeria, as in the US,
economic
growth excludes most people.
10 September 2015 (
Defending land in Brazil
A tribe in Brazil is
defending
its land
from illegal loggers by fighting them, because the government has done nothing.
10 September 2015 (
Turkish MPs stopped by the army
Turkish MPs
tried
to enter
the besieged town of Cizre and were stopped by the army.
10 September 2015 (
Netanyahu in the UK
Netanyahu, visiting the UK, meets protests calling for him to be
arrested and tried.
The occupation of Palestine, wrong in its own terms, has also played a
role in inspiring Islamism. In effect, the occupation pulled, while
Saudi Arabia pushed.
10 September 2015 (
Evidence for corruption
A UN commission gathered the
evidence
on which the president of Guatemala was indicted for corruption.
10 September 2015 (
New Pun
New pun: The Painting Whale
10 September 2015 (
New Comic
New Comic
British politics
10 September 2015 (
Corruption in Egyptian schools
Mariam Malak says that her school (in Egypt)
swapped
her exam paper with someone else who paid to pass the exam
10 September 2015 (
NYC restaurants to label salty dishes
New York City will require restaurants to
label
dishes that have lots of salt
10 September 2015 (
New Zealanders protest book ban
New Zealanders are
protesting
forcefully
against the banning of a children's book.
10 September 2015 (
Women imprisoned by Saudi diplomat
Two Indian women, recruited as domestic servants for a Saudi diplomat,
were freed from
imprisonment
in his apartment
and said he had repeatedly raped them.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: end US coal leasing
US citizens:
call
for an end to US coal leasing.
I said, If the lessees had to pay enough to cover the damage of mining
and burning coal, they wouldn't want the coal.
09 September 2015 (
Possession of "extreme pornography"
Lawyer
Myles
Jackman
defends people in the UK charged with possession
of "extreme pornography", while campaigning to repeal that law.
People are often prosecuted for copies they received unsolicited and
did not know about, or tried to delete.
But even if we consider only people who possess the images
intentionally, the law is unjust and dangerous. No attempt has been
made to show that those people are hurting others. The only
justification offered for prohibiting "extreme pornography" is that
many people find it disgusting to see — and that is no
justification at all.
The precise details of what this law prohibits
are
absurd,
but the details are a side issue. Any law that prohibits possessing
copies of some sort of work is dangerous to people in the same way.
Throw the dice, and if you roll 4 or less, go to prison!
09 September 2015 (
Trump promotes racism
A Mexican-American
fears
Donald Trump can win the election by
promoting racism, and reports he seems to be already encouraging
expressions of racism.
09 September 2015 (
Imaginary criticisms of Planned Parenthood
SCROTUS
's
hearings about imaginary criticisms of Planned Parenthood
are unabashedly
one-sided:
Planned Parenthood is not even invited.
09 September 2015 (
Homosexuality in Africa
Homosexuality of various kinds was accepted in Africa until
Christianity
brought condemnation.
It is, however, a mistake to speak of "true African culture", just as
it is a mistake to speak of "true American culture" or even "true
Yoruba culture". The one universal in human culture is that any group
may adopt ideas and practices from other groups of humans. We must
reject the idea that some practices belong to a particular descent
group, or that a certain descent group is obliged to stick to certain
cultural practices.
09 September 2015 (
Funds for refugees
The
Tobin Tax
could provide plenty of funds for refugees.
It could also support education and poor people in our own countries.
We need to make the wealthy pay more tax.
09 September 2015 (
Microsoft's data
Microsoft is appealing a
US
court order
to hand over data stored in Ireland. Microsoft realizes
that losing this would make individuals and
companies outside the US reluctant to store their data in any
Microsoft server.
Of course, they should be reluctant to do that for other reasons.
While I hope Microsoft wins this case, a defeat might help dispel the
"cloud" in the minds of many users that leads them to confide their
data to companies' servers.
09 September 2015 (
Popular Unity party manifesto
The
manifesto
of the Popular Unity party in Greece.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: Stop endless wars
US citizens:
call
on Obama
to stop the endless wars needed to get fossil fuels.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: The Iran deal
US citizens:
call
on reps Grayson and Wasserman Schultz
to support the Iran deal.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: Stop Arctic oil lease sales
US citizens:
call
on the US
to cancel future Arctic oil lease sales.
09 September 2015 (
Burundian opposition leader assassinated
A Burundian opposition leader was
assassinated
We must suspect the president/tyrant ordered it done.
09 September 2015 (
Internet censorship
Putin's
internet censorship lesson
: a tyrannical government does not need
to control every byte on the internet to prevent unpleasant news from
reaching the general public.
09 September 2015 (
Sleep-deprived students
A neuroscientist calls for starting school at 11am to
let
students sleep later
09 September 2015 (
Turkish sniper thugs
Turkish
thugs
are now
authorized
to shoot protesters
, and snipers shoot even non-protesting Kurds
just for walking in the street. A town has been surrounded by
thugs
who shot people trying to go to a hospital.
It sounds like occupied Palestine.
09 September 2015 (
Back doors for government
Back doors introduced for one government's use
can
easily become open to others.
09 September 2015 (
Argentine prosecutor was murdered
Tests
show
that Argentine Prosecutor Nisman was murdered.
09 September 2015 (
Weather in 2070
This year's dry conditions in the Pacific Northwest will be typical weather
in 2070, and the amphibians there will be in
big trouble.
So will the trees, unless we curb our greenhouse emissions fast.
09 September 2015 (
Methylmercury in the food chain
Global heating, and the melting of Arctic sea ice, is spreading
toxic
methylmercury
which gets into the food chain.
I suspect it will concentrate in predators higher up in the food chain, which
are the species humans typically eat.
09 September 2015 (
Training Syrian rebels
The US recognizes that training Syrian rebels was a flop, and says
it
will do better.
To succeed at this would require training thousands, and they'd need
real combat experience to get good. Where could they get that combat
experience without being cut to bits? Perhaps if they joined up with
the Kurds.
09 September 2015 (
Corruption and the UK government
Corruption by banks
is
built into the structure of the UK government.
09 September 2015 (
Discrimination against atheists
A notary working at a bank refused to notarize forms for American Atheists.
This
refusal may have been illegal.
The article has a misleading title, because the beginning is written
in a way that is too clever.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: End use of Irish tax loophole
Everyone:
Call on
Etsy
to stop using the Irish tax loophole.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: Solar power promotion
Everyone:
call on
Warren Buffett
to stop attacking home solar power promotion
anywhere.
09 September 2015 (
China concert bans
China shows a pattern of
banning
concerts by bands that have in any way acknowledged the Dalai
Lama
. It even tries to intimidate activities in other countries.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: Workplace Democracy Act
US citizens:
support
Sanders' Workplace Democracy Act.
09 September 2015 (
Urgent: $15/hour for Walmart workers
Everyone:
call
on Walmart
to pay workers $15 an hour and give them full-time
work.
09 September 2015 (
Germany orders Facebook censorship
Germany has ordered Facebook to follow
German
limits on freedom of speech
Freedom of speech includes the freedom to criticize, offend, insult or
mock any person, or any group of persons. It includes freedom to say
things that you despise, and things that I despise, even things that
we both despise. Most countries do not respect freedom of speech very
well.
What we see is that as commercial communication platforms move from
offering service to people in lots of countries to actually doing
business in lots of countries, they become subject to ever increasing
censorship.
Thus, the growth of any communication company into a global business
is inherently dangerous to freedom of speech, regardless of the details
of that company.
09 September 2015 (
British supporters of PISSI targeted
The UK
targeted
and killed some British supporters
of PISSI, in Iraq. Is this a
sensible strategy?
Was it legitimate to kill them with a missile? In practice,
PISSI
and
the UK are fighting a war, and in those circumstances it is morally
justified for the UK to kill
PISSI
fighters. Were these men PISSI
fighters? The articles I have seen have not given that information.
The UK government says that they were
talking
about committing crimes in the UK
. However, that's not the same as
waging war, and is not grounds for killing them in Iraq.
It seems they did not even have concrete plans. If they were talking
in a vague way about committing crimes in the UK at some indefinite
time in the future, that shouldn't even be a crime until they make it
concrete.
09 September 2015 (
Ohio abortion clinics
Ohio has created excuses to shut down nearly all abortion clinics.
The next absurd restriction is to
ban
abortion of fetuses with Down's syndrome
This is apparently meant to ensure the birth of people who will vote
Republican.
09 September 2015 (
Sleeping pods for homeless people
A proposal to deploy sleeping pods for San Francisco's homeless people
is
blocked
by lack of cooperation
The criticisms officials present in the article may be valid in a
narrow sense. They might be valid reasons to change something in the
plan. But they are not valid reasons to give up.
Officials, if these shelters look like dog houses, could you make them
look different?
If we ought to do better, does that mean you should do nothing?
If Gopman's ego is a problem, have you tried to do the project
without him?
It appears these objections are being used as excuses.
09 September 2015 (
US to investigate special forces unit
The US will investigate a special forces unit that
appears
to have systematically murdered prisoners
in Afghanistan.
09 September 2015 (
Berry farm workers organizing
Berry farm workers in Mexico and the US are
organizing
to demand more than hunger wages
Bravo for the striking farmers that fought back when Mexican
thugs
attacked them.
The ones that
thugs
ought to be arresting are the business magnates
that try to create "the world's berry company", or "the world's XYZ
company" for any value of XYZ. Back before Reagan, when anti-trust
law was more than a hollow shell, they wouldn't have dared announce
such a goal.
09 September 2015 (
Dogmatic crusading prudery
A private tutor who had a long sexual relationship with an eager
teenager, 20 years ago, is
now
described as "abusing" and "assaulting" him
. Thus speaks the
voice of dogmatic crusading prudery.
The "victim" recognizes that he enjoyed his first sexual relationship.
He probably learned a lot from it. I wish I had had such a chance for
learning about sex when I was a teenager.
We don't have enough facts to be sure, but I suspect that the reason
he claims now that it hurt him is that he was swept along by the
general revulsion against such sexual relationships into believing
that something bad had been done to him.
Once he started looking for bad, he could surely find some. No doubt
the relationship was not ideal. Probably she didn't love him, just
wanted sex with him. Some aspects may have been disappointing.
That's normal in any relationship, and especially any first
relationship, but if you're predisposed to find "abuse" you can
perceive any disappointment it as a sign of such.
08 September 2015 (
Urgent: extraction from public lands
US citizens: call for making oil and gas extraction companies
really
pay
for extraction from public lands.
08 September 2015 (
Urgent: funding of global heating denial
Everyone: call on
big
coal companies
to disclose their funding of global heating denial.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
08 September 2015 (
Urgent: support breaking up big banks
US citizens: Support
Sanders'
plan
for breaking up the big banks.
08 September 2015 (
Urgent: limit federal "forfeiture"
US citizens: call for limiting federal "forfeiture"
to
people convicted of a crime.
"Forfeiture" without criminal conviction is punishment without trial
and should be considered unconstitutional.
08 September 2015 (
Urgent: decriminalize hemp
US citizens: call for
fully
decriminalizing industrial hemp.
08 September 2015 (
Threat to free press in Ecuador
Ecuador's president Correa unofficially
threatens
the free press.
08 September 2015 (
Illegal logging in Peru
Peruvian officials ignore a massive illegal logging business, which
is
easily
seen from the air.
08 September 2015 (
Turkey/PKK escalation
The fighting between Turkey and the PKK
is
escalating.
Turkey is accused of starting the fighting with a
false-flag
attack
against the PKK, and people suggested that this was Erdoğan's maneuver
to
increase his party's vote
in the elections that would come.
I think everyone in Turkey — not just the Kurds — deserves
independence from Erdoğan's government.
08 September 2015 (
Novel banned in New Zealand
New Zealand has
completely
banned a published novel.
It doesn't matter that the novel won an award. Banning even a crappy book
is wrong.
That Christian bullies are behind this doesn't alter the wrong,
but does mean they share the moral onus of the wrong.
It is dangerous to get this book from Amazon, since that requires
identifying yourself. Get a copy of the e-book from someone that has
one; that is the only mode of distribution of this e-book that doesn't
do wrong to the person it is offered to.
08 September 2015 (
Prosperity and the homeless
San Francisco's prosperity, for some, leaves no room
for
those who become homeless.
A sufficient infusion of money would fix most of this, if it were spent
on toilets, on SROs, and on the mental health facilities that some homeless
people need.
08 September 2015 (
Likely to be killed by thugs
In California, a black male is
times more likely
to be killed by thugs than a while male.
Although we don't know the cause in each case, I am sure this is due
in one way or another to racism. It may be unconscious. A
thug
sees
a black man and feels threatened; a
thug
sees a bulge in a pocket and
immediately thinks, "It's a gun." Then the
thug
shoots. What it adds
up to is a practice of "shoot first, ask questions later", which is wrong
to apply to anyone.
08 September 2015 (
Deforestation rate still high
The rate of deforestation
has
been cut by half since 1990.
but it is still too high.
08 September 2015 (
Climate mayhem and refugees
Failure to Act on Climate [Mayhem] Means an
Even
Bigger Refugee Crisis.
08 September 2015 (
Journalists convicted in Egypt
Peter Greste and two other journalists were convicted in Egypt of
ridiculous
"crimes"
that would not have violated any law, even
supposing they had really occurred.
But if there had been a law against journalism in this way, it would
be tyrannical. Even requiring journalists to register is an injustice.
08 September 2015 (
British Airways' pay cut
British Airways is making huge profits but just imposed a
25%
pay cut
on flight attendants.
BA says it will fire them all, then rehire them for a "new job" with a
different name and lower pay.
I hope workers shut down the whole line, but it is hard to do this
when the government is anti-worker.
08 September 2015 (
Income profile of US families
A new, clever, but perhaps misleading way of studying the income
profile of society, based on
comparing
the income of the mass of
families over time,
shows that under presidents Reagan and Clinton,
the incomes of most individual American families rose steadily. Under
Bush I, and since 2001, incomes have fallen for most families.
This is interesting, but it is the wrong way to measure how the
economy is treating workers. It opens the way to an illusion
comparable to the
Shepard
tone,
in which each worker's income rises all the time, but the overall
income profile of society does not change at all (or even goes down).
Based on the article, it seems that this is what happened to the US
economy under Reagan and Clinton: almost everyone's individual income
slowly rose as the income profile of society fell.
The customary measurement of income profile is done by comparing
workers of any given age group in different periods — for
instance, workers of age 25 today with workers of age 25 in the 1970s,
1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. The result shows how society's treatment of
people in a certain situation has changed over time. That is what
matters for public policy.
08 September 2015 (
Israeli demolition orders
Israeli demolition orders cover
17,000
Arab buildings
in West Bank.
08 September 2015 (
Permanent income in Alaska
Alaska has invested income from oil leases in an endowment
to
permanently provide a basic income.
The funds for this don't have to come from oil leases.
08 September 2015 (
Labor Day 2050
Labor Day 2050: How Unchecked Global Warming
Threatens
Labor Productivity.
The companies that are making us roast the Earth are probably
connected with those that want to replace these workers with robots.
The robots won't slow down, so the unemployed humans can lie down
and survive on less food.
07 September 2015 (
Rate of violent crime down
Violent crime has not increased due to protests in Ferguson. Even
violent crime against
thugs
has not increased due to protests in
Ferguson. On the contrary, the rate of violent crime is
down
this year
Evidently we need more protests to bring the rate of violence down
further.
07 September 2015 (
Scientists got paid to lobby for GMOs
Monsanto has used its money
to
get scientists to lobby for GMOs.
07 September 2015 (
Disappeared students in Mexico
Mexico's
official explanation
for the 43 disappeared students is not just false, it's impossible.
07 September 2015 (
Stopping an autonomous car
It's easy to make an autonomous car stop — for any amount of
time —
by
sending it a signal that it mistakes for a pedestrian.
This may not matter for most cars. After all, you can stop the subway
system for ten or 15 minutes by standing in a door. Mostly, people
are cooperative enough not to do this. But it might be dangerous in
some special cases.
07 September 2015 (
Corporate profit centers
Turning
National
Parks
into Corporate Profit Centers.
I think it is a shame to sell naming rights for stadiums or other
civic buildings. That act says, "Everything about us is for sale",
and the only reason it happens is that we stopped taxing those
companies enough.
07 September 2015 (
Funds to cope with climate mayhem
Wealthy countries pledged 10 billion dollars to help poor countries
cope with the beginnings of climate mayhem, but
almost
6 billion of the funds have not been provided.
Basically, spending money to cope with
climate mayhem
is a foolish
approach. We can afford it now, but as mayhem gets worse the costs
will double, and double again, and eventually it will be too much.
The only approach we can afford is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
07 September 2015 (
Orphan works and the TPP
The TPP would (it appears) ban a simple legal change that would reduce the danger of
republishing
many copyrighted works.
The article ends with an absurd statement that this "might not be
enough for me to want to throw out the whole deal" — as if there
were something good in it! But the
Treacherous Plutocratic Poison
is
nothing but bads. It is a collection of wrongs proposed by the big
businesses that helped write it.
As for the orphan works, what we should do is legalize sharing copies
of all published works, then let people go to work on them.
07 September 2015 (
Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior
A French diver apologizes for his part in
sinking
the Rainbow Warrior.
07 September 2015 (
Extent of deforestation
Deforestation in 2014 eliminated an area of forests equivalent to
twice
the size of Portugal.
07 September 2015 (
Childhood in the US
Childhood [in the US] Has Become
Period of High-Stakes Preparation for Life in a Stratified Economy.
"If Americans want to live the American dream, they should go to Denmark."
07 September 2015 (
Proposed Thai constitution
The Thai military
have
failed
to get civilians to accept a proposed new constitution
that would allow the military to take control again.
07 September 2015 (
Censorship by Gucci and MPAA
Gucci and the MPAA are both engines of
broad
internet censorship.
We shouldn't get distracted by which one was first.
07 September 2015 (
Torture in Burundi
Burundi's president/tyrant
is
using torture against political opposition.
07 September 2015 (
French Pun
Confession
amoureuse
07 September 2015 (
Punitive reactions to teenage sexting
The punitive reactions to teenage sexting, and teenage sex, are tied
up with the consequences of
two
prejudices
: against male homosexuality, and against females that
don't deny their heterosexuality.
07 September 2015 (
Self-censorship
Knowledge alone is next to useless in countries whose rulers enforce
self-censorship
07 September 2015 (
Glyphosate
California has listed glyphosate as a
carcinogen
This is a step towards limiting use of glyphosate.
07 September 2015 (
NPR denies presence of Bernie Sanders
NPR commentator Mara Liasson, discussing the Democratic nomination
race, not only didn't mention Bernie Sanders — she effectively
denied
his presence in the race
I've had a feeling since the 90s that "NPR" stands for
"Non-Progressive Radio". Its criticisms of President Clinton
frequently came from the conservative direction.
If you listen to an NPR station, call or write to say you'd like them
to present Democracy Today to counterbalance All Things Conservative.
07 September 2015 (
"Crime" of using strong encryption
The main "crime" of the British journalists arrested in Turkey is that
they
used
strong encryption
Obama and Cameron want to follow the same tyrannical path of
denying
privacy to journalists
(nowadays everyone is sometimes a
journalist), and to you and me.
07 September 2015 (
US-backed intervention in Yemen
The US-backed intervention in Yemen includes lots of
ground
troops from the UAE and Bahrain
Bahrain's regime crushed peaceful protests with the help of Saudi
Arabia. It is thoroughly despicable.
It is strange to claim that shooting a missile at an ammunition dump
is "cowardly". What they could one say about bombing a city?
07 September 2015 (
Arson attack against Planned Parenthood
An
arson
attack
against Planned Parenthood.
07 September 2015 (
Occupation of Palestine
Teachers in Israel are
threatened
with dismissal
if they are found to oppose the occupation of
Palestine.
07 September 2015 (
Radiation levels near Fukushima down
In one town near Fukushima, the radiation levels have gone down and
the inhabitants are
allowed
to return
07 September 2015 (
Afghan women's rights
Afghan
Activists Urge Donors to Make Aid Conditional on Women's Rights
07 September 2015 (
India to ban large vials of diclofenac
India will
ban
large vials of diclofenac
, to protect vultures.
07 September 2015 (
Sleep monitors
Samsung has a product to
monitor
whether someone is asleep
. People will start checking on their
lovers this way.
Don't use a sleep monitor that sends data to a company!
07 September 2015 (
Syrian refugees
Just as Syrians are fleeing to Europe en masse, the wealthy countries
gave them another reason to do so:
they
have not given the UN enough to provide them with food where they
are
06 September 2015 (
Urgent: support Planned Parenthood funding
US citizens:
call
on Democrats
to support Planned Parenthood funding firmly.
06 September 2015 (
Urgent: leave the oil in the ground
Everyone: call on Obama
to
leave the oil in the ground.
In a market-based economy, the way to reduce demand is to
make the product expensive. Leaving oil in the ground will
help do that. Taxing it more will be even more effective.
06 September 2015 (
Urgent: Craigslist and ivory
Everyone: call on Craigslist
to
make sure it isn't used for selling ivory.
06 September 2015 (
Urgent: Rename National Airport
US citizens:
call
on Boehner
to support putting George Washington's name back on National Airport.
I have never accepted referring to National Airport with the
name of the man who redirected America towards poverty,
and whose response to terrorists that kidnaped Americans was
to trade weapons for their release.
06 September 2015 (
Urgent: criminal record of job applicants
US citizens: call on Obama to tell Federal government employers
to
stop asking job applicants about their criminal record
before considering them as candidates.
06 September 2015 (
Fossil fuel reserves
Executives of fossil fuel companies
get
rewarded
for increasing the company's known reserves, regardless of whether those reserves can
ever be used.
06 September 2015 (
Social assistance for convicts
The US punishes people for life after they get a criminal conviction,
in many ways. One is
denying
various forms of social assistance.
These people are also permanently excluded from many kinds of
employment. The jobs that they can get don't pay a living wage, which
means that without some sort of social assistance, they are almost
compelled to try more crime.
06 September 2015 (
Resistance to standardized tests
Popular resistance against standardized tests in New York State: 20%
of the students that were suppose to take the test
refused
to participate.
06 September 2015 (
Preacher faces prosecution
A Christian preacher in the UK faces prosecution for saying that Islam
is "Satanic". He refuses to retract and
dares
the state
to put him in prison for stating his views.
The UK doesn't respect freedom of speech very well.
I would not call anything "Satanic", not seriously, because that
accusation presumes that devils exist. But there is
plenty
to condemn as evil in various religions.
06 September 2015 (
Copyright extension in Canada
Canada's corrupt government snuck a
20-year
copyright extension
into the law as a rider on a budget bill.
A constitution that permits an irrevocable attack on people's rights
to be made so easily needs to be amended. It must be possible to
shorten copyright just as easily as to lengthen copyright.
06 September 2015 (
Children watching screens
A study in the UK found that children who spend more time watching
screens (TV, games, videos)
have
substantially lower test scores.
This doesn't prove the watching causes the lower scores.
06 September 2015 (
Pushing students into debt
US universities are
campaigning
to push students even further into debt.
06 September 2015 (
Wind power vs. fracking
The UK Tories bend over backwards to block wind power, saying they are
protecting from having to live near wind turbines. And they impose
fracking against the will of people who live nearby.
Curiously,
poll shows
that Britons (even Tories) would much rather have wind farms nearby than fracking.
This confirms that the government is working for the fossil fools
rather than for the country or the people.
06 September 2015 (
Charging according to zipcode
Princeton Review charges more or less for tutoring
according
to the student's zipcode.
It's not illegal, but it ought to be.
06 September 2015 (
Hunger strike in Chicago
Chicagoans are on hunger strike against
the
intended closure or privatization
of their local high school.
06 September 2015 (
Newsman shot in Egypt
British newsman Mick Deane
was
shot by an Egyptian sniper
after his bulletproof vest was confiscated
without explanation as he entered Egypt.
This gives rise to a suspicion that it was all a scheme to kill him.
06 September 2015 (
Dishonest sting videos
The dishonest sting videos aimed at Planned Parenthood
have
inspired arson attacks.
06 September 2015 (
Killings of thugs
Republican candidates are trying to find a few killings of thugs
on
Black Lives Matter.
While I deplore the murder of a
thug
that is not more important than
the murder of any other person.
As for a more general "anti-police culture", the
thugs
have brought
that on themselves through their actions.
06 September 2015 (
Paris climate deal not strong enough
Under
half of a list of business magnates polled
say a deal from the
Paris climate conference would lead them to change anything.
That's an indication that it is not likely to be a strong enough deal
to solve the problem.
06 September 2015 (
Sierra Leone's medical system
The world must help Sierra Leone strengthen its medical system
now,
not
wait for the next epidemic.
06 September 2015 (
Greenpeace in India
The Indian government has banned
foreign
donations to Greenpeace
— again.
The Supreme Court overruled the ban, the first time.
06 September 2015 (
Creating money without inflation
The US, Europe, Japan and China have been creating lots of money for years,
without
any inflation.
This thoroughly refuses the usual right-wing economic argument that
"you can't increase the money supply without causing hyperinflation".
However,
we
do need some inflation,
to reduce the value of the debts
that have been imposed on people, cites and countries by dishonest banking
practices.
06 September 2015 (
GPS dependence
Dependence on a GPS navigator leads some people's navigational
skills
to atrophy.
06 September 2015 (
Guatemala's president resigns
Guatemala's President Perez Molina, a graduate of the School of the Americas,
has resigned.
The School of the Americas used to teach torture and repression to
the officers of repressive governments.
06 September 2015 (
Living on $2 a day
Hundreds of thousands of US children
now
live on under 2 dollars a day.
For some, this continues for years.
06 September 2015 (
Meta-analysis of shooting
A meta-analysis (of studies without real shooting or real people as
targets) finds that
white
people are quicker to shoot someone if the someone is black.
06 September 2015 (
Preventing clean energy from succeeding
How Charles Koch
Prevents
Clean Energy Businesses From Succeeding.
06 September 2015 (
Escaped refugees
The Refugees Who Fled to Australia to Escape Torture
only
to End up Trapped Indefinitely on Manus.
06 September 2015 (
Teens arrested for photographing their own lovemaking.
Two US teenagers
face
felony charges for taking photos of their own
lovemaking.
06 September 2015 (
Prison thugs face charges
California prison thugs face charges, perhaps murder; it appears
they
beat a prisoner to death.
06 September 2015 (
New Pun
New pun: Sleeping hackers
05 September 2015 (
New limits on freedom of speech
Australia is planning new limits on freedom of speech. The government
wants to ban "advocating genocide",
apparently
to be understood in a very loose fashion.
According to the article, what Hizb ut-Tahrir advocates is political
change, not genocide. It advocates a lousy and unjust political
system that wouldn't respect human rights, but then, so do Republicans
(though they don't go quite as far). Freedom of speech includes the
right to advocate such political systems.
The group's leader appears to have made anti-semitic statements.
Bigotry is expression of an opinion — a despicable opinion, in
my view, but that should not make it a crime.
05 September 2015 (
Grooming children for credit card use
Banks are grooming children for credit card use
starting at age 5.
If you use credit cards to pay, you are likely to spend more than if you
pay cash. You can prevent that effect with self-discipline, but you
can't stop them from tracking you.
05 September 2015 (
Exiling Australian citizens
Australia has (it seems)
narrowed
the plan to exile citizens with dual citizenship,
by limiting
it to those that actually fight for terrorist groups that Australia
considers enemies.
It is legitimate to punish people for that, by imprisonment for
instance, but taking away citizenship is the wrong way to punish any
sort of crime. In addition, it can force people to go to a place
where they will be tortured.
I also see a slippery slope here, in that if exile is tolerated in any
kind of case, politicians will propose to extend it to other cases.
I don't think that exile would deter or prevent crimes more than
imprisonment. Meanwhile, if some accused stay away from Australia to
avoid being tried and imprisoned, that achieves the same effect as
exiling them without the moral onus of imposing exile.
05 September 2015 (
Girls' careers in science
Toys for girls, and marketing messages for them, encourage passivity
and
steer
girls away from science careers.
05 September 2015 (
Pacific bluefin tuna
Warning over Pacific Bluefin Tuna Stocks as
Japan
Meeting Ends in Stalemate.
05 September 2015 (
Employees moving to government service
Hillary Clinton
finally
gave support
to the law to ban private bonuses to employees moving to government service.
Her reluctance reflects the fact that her heart is not really in the
cause of weakening plutocracy. (I don't expect her to try very hard
to get such a law passed.) Her stance has been clear for a long time,
and I still won't vote for her.
05 September 2015 (
Manpower temps
Manpower continues to cheat and underpay temps
working
indirectly for US government agencies.
05 September 2015 (
Warrants for tracking phones
US federal agencies will henceforth usually
need
to get warrants
to use stingray devices that track all the cell phones in a region.
I fear that the exceptions will allow this to be done in the most
dangerous possible cases: protest rallies.
Meanwhile, the phone company also tracks the movements of each phone,
making them available retroactively. Thus, I still consider it
unacceptable to carry around a portable phone.
05 September 2015 (
Target for emissions reduction
California's
assembly
is about to vote on a very strong target for greenhouse emissions reduction.
05 September 2015 (
Thug indicted for murder
A Virginia thug has been indicted for
first
degree murder.
05 September 2015 (
Banned documentary in Congo
The "Democratic Republic" of the Congo
has
banned a documentary
about
a doctor that treats women who have been raped by soldiers and militia
as part of the long-running civil war there.
05 September 2015 (
Recording everything we say
What if you record, as text, everything you say?
Would
that be convenient, or dangerous?
With free software, if you choose to record your vocal utterances in
your computer, you will be able to keep your transcript encrypted
so that you control when and how it is used.
But if you use someone else's server to convert the text to speech,
which is an example of
SaaSS
(service as a software substitute), that someone else will have your transcript from the get-go.
05 September 2015 (
Paris climate action
The inadequate pledges countries have made for the Paris climate action meeting
would
make heating of more than 2C inevitable.
07 September 2015 (
"Dangerous to children"
A 14-year-old boy in Britain
has
been put on a "dangerous to children" list
for sending a nude
photo of himself to a girl the same age.
"Inappropriate" is a keyword for "We want to punish you for this even
though we can't point at anything in it that did wrong to someone."
It is true that sending someone a nude photo of yourself can have bad
consequences. There are inherent bad consequences: for instance, the
person you sent it to might resent receiving it. I wouldn't risk sending
a nude photo of me to a woman unless I knew positively that she would
take it favorably — and I'd have to look somewhat more attractive
than I actually do.
But there are also artificial consequences, like being put on the list.
05 September 2015 (
US unions and civil rights movement
Remembering how
US
unions worked together with the civil rights movement.
05 September 2015 (
China's corruption and pollution
China's economic advance has been based on uncontrollable corruption
and irreparable pollution,
often
producing things that go to waste.
Some of the article's claims may be too strong. I've seen plenty of
passengers in the Chinese high speed trains that I have been in.
Nonetheless, it provides an explanation of why even the draconian rule
of the Chinese Communist Party, which can crush dissidents, can't stop
the corruption or the pollution.
05 September 2015 (
Extreme cold in US Northeast
Global heating
caused the extreme cold in the US Northeast last winter,
and
that
cold is going to get worse for quite some time,
until the general heating overcomes it.
05 September 2015 (
Grand Rapids, Michigan
Rich people's government has made Grand Rapids, Michigan,
laboratory for dooH niboR.
Even bus rides are more expensive
for poor residents, who are now always on the edge of being broke.
05 September 2015 (
Real people impersonated by agencies
In the US, state agencies
sometimes
impersonate real people in the net.
05 September 2015 (
Thugcam servers
Typical thugcams today apparently have an additional fault:
they
transmit everything immediately to a server.
That means there is no way for the camera to be on but ultimately not
keep certain periods of the recording.
The
system I have proposed
does not require "cloud infrastructure".
It will save the recordings locally.
05 September 2015 (
Nuclear compromise with Iran
With 34 senators supporting the nuclear compromise with Iran, this
could be a breakthrough against the power of the
Israeli
militarists' lobby.
I support Israel, as such; that doesn't mean I must support the way it
treats Palestinians in occupied territories.
04 September 2015 (
Petraeus' bright idea
General Petraeus' bright idea is
to
arm al Qa'ida to fight PISSI.
They seem to be determined not to arm the revolutionary Kurds,
though they don't talk about the possibility.
04 September 2015 (
Abortion 'Forgiveness'
The Pope's Abortion 'Forgiveness' Is Good Politics,
but
Changes Nothing for Women.
I see it as a step in the right direction. Perhaps it will be
followed by other steps.
04 September 2015 (
Missing bodies from Chechen war
20 Years after Chechen War,
Families
Still Searching for Missing Bodies.
I am sorry about people's deaths, but when your friends or relatives
die, don't be obsessed with their corpses. The ancient Egyptians were
foolish about this, but you don't have to be like them.
04 September 2015 (
Protect Australian penguins
To protect Australian penguins from foxes
is not easy.
I suggest another solution: invite the rich people from England that
want to resume fox hunting to go to Australia to do it.
04 September 2015 (
Global race to the bottom
The "global race to the bottom", predicted by opponents of
business-dominated globalization, is hitting Europe hard,
eliminating
its social protection for workers' rights.
I must point out that making too many humans is a part of the cause
of this problem. The current population survives by
overusing
the Earth's natural systems.
04 September 2015 (
High limits for emissions
Australia's limits for greenhouse gas emissions
have
been set so high
that they won't cause any reductions.
04 September 2015 (
Endangered Australian animals
Unthoughtful
supporters of animals
have condemned the plan to protect
endangered Australian animals by getting rid of many
European-introduced feral cats.
04 September 2015 (
Accusations of "terrorist propaganda"
Erdogan has
accused
journalists from a major media group
of "terrorist propaganda",
as well as the CEO who is probably safe in Britain.
In some ways this is a good sign. It suggests that Erdogan is getting
desperate, and doing things that may make Turkish voters turn against
him even more.
04 September 2015 (
Nitrogen-fixing bacteria
Climate mayhem will affect
crucial
"nitrogen fixing" ocean bacteria.
This is not necessarily going to mean disaster — the other
nutrients these bacteria consume will remain available to everything
that eats these bacteria. Also, bacteria adapt fast. Still messing with
such things is one more risk we take by heating up the Earth.
04 September 2015 (
Destitution in Gaza
The UN reports that the bombardment and blockade of Gaza have
effectively eliminated its ability to produce what people need to
live, and
reduced
everyone to destitution.
04 September 2015 (
Use of cluster bombs
PISSI (
),
Syria, Ukraine, Russia, Sudan, and Saudi Arabia
have
all used cluster bombs in recent years.
PISSI
">
The Pseudo-Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.
04 September 2015 (
Capitalism and global heating
Tony Abbott and Nancy Klein both say it's impossible to preserve
capitalism and avoid global heating disaster. They disagree in
whether
capitalism is worth the disaster.
I disagree with them, because today's rapacious "damn the environment
(and the workers), full speed ahead" capitalism is not the only
possible kind. It is not the only kind we have tried. I have seen
rapacious capitalism replace more benign forms of capitalism, as it
crushed the countervailing forces such as democracy and civil society
that used to hold it in check.
It is a mistake to equate "capitalism" with the modern rapacious kind
of capitalism, because that writes off the possibility of pushing
capitalism back into a form we can control and live with, the way we
control and live with fire.
The reason today's rapacious capitalism blocks action to avoid climate
disaster is that it amounts to plutocracy. Where the fossil fools
control the media and their money buys the polluticians, they can veto
political will for the necessary changes. We must, one way or another,
bring back democracy, and that requires ending plutocracy.
To be sure, clipping capitalism's claws won't be easy. But neither
would getting rid of it — and that would raise the question of
what to replace it with.
04 September 2015 (
Treatment of fast food workers
"Fast food" was based on
making
workers more efficient and paying them less.
It has advanced
through legal changes that permit worse treatment of workers.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
04 September 2015 (
Violence against tenants
In the UK, there is such a housing shortage that landlords often
harass tenants and
some
even commit violence against them.
Strict policing of landlords would help, but what the UK really needs
is enough available housing.
04 September 2015 (
Israel monitors BDS organizations
Israel
has
a special unit
to "monitor" organizations that advocate boycott,
divestment and sanctions against Israel.
Israel says that this campaign is somehow linked to violent
resistance, Palestinians in the West Bank that support that cause are
called in for interrogation, apparently to intimidate them.
I don't support a boycott of Israel in general, but I do support a boycott
of products made in the Israeli colonies in the West Bank (which violate
the treaties that govern military occupation).
04 September 2015 (
Redistributing income
Robert Reich
proposes
to share all income from patented or trademarked
businesses with the public, as a form of redistribution that couldn't
be evaded by accounting tricks or offshoring.
It might work, but I think my proposed solution,
progressive tax on business income,
would also resist such tricks while applying to more
businesses. It would also pressure big businesses to split up.
04 September 2015 (
"Voluntary" cybersecurity
Now that we have proof that the US has corrupted "voluntary"
cybersecurity programs to spy on people, it is even clearer that the
"voluntary" program of CISA
is
an excuse for more spying on people.
04 September 2015 (
Rules for shooting stonethrowers
Netanyahu plans
to
loosen the rules
for shooting Palestinian boys that throw stones.
Israeli soldiers have been ignoring the rules already, to kill
Palestinians who were simply running away.
04 September 2015 (
Keyless ignition
Carmakers Sued Over
'Deadly'
Keyless Ignitions.
Plaintiffs say the engine could be running without the user's knowing,
filling up a space with carbon monoxide.
04 September 2015 (
Surveillance camera monitors
Male surveillance camera monitors use the cameras to follow pretty women. The Chilean solution:
hire
only women to run them.
If we want to have cameras pointed at our streets for security,
they
must be security cameras, not surveillance cameras.
4 September 2015
Record floods
The
record
floods in Texas and Oklahoma
were bigger due to
global heating
4 September 2015
Planned Parenthood
On the dishonest splicing used to
create a false picture of Planned
Parenthood,
and how it can fool people.
4 September 2015
Carcinogenic e-cigarettes
Around half of e-cigarettes
produce dangerous levels of formaldehyde
and/or acetaldehyde
, which are carcinogens.
Some of them produced 100 times the maximum level allowed in California.
4 September 2015
Iran deal
The Iran deal now
has
enough support in the US Senate to assure
it will be adopted.
4 September 2015
San Antonio killing
San Antonio
thugs
shot
a black man who was standing still with his hands
in the air.
4 September 2015
Texas killing
Someone shot a
thug
in Texas; as a non-sequitur,
the thugs took this
as an excuse to smear Black Lives Matter.
4 September 2015
World tree count
Humans have
eliminated
roughly half the trees that the Earth had
a few thousand years ago.
4 September 2015
Ukraine
Ukraine needs to
get
rid of Soviet government practices more than
Soviet statues.
03 September 2015 (
Torture charges pressed in Canada
Canada has pressed charges against the Syrian officer that tortured
Maher Arar,
but
not
yet against the Americans that kidnaped him and handed him over to
Syria for torture
03 September 2015 (
Genetically engineered salmon
Most US supermarket chains have agreed not to sell genetically
engineered salmon.
Costco
is one of the holdouts
I think it is unlikely that the genetically engineered salmon would
harm humans that eat them. But harm to wild salmon is a
real
possibility
. There are many other things that could go wrong,
which we would not know how to fix.
03 September 2015 (
Politicians who don't understand physics
Politicians that approach
global heating
like politics as usual don't
understand that
physics
won't meet them half way for the sake of a deal
03 September 2015 (
Laws changed for fossil fuel
Governments set on extracting fossil fuels are
changing
laws so they can ram this down people's throats
Australia
and the
UK
have also changed laws to stop people from preventing extraction of
fossil fuel.
03 September 2015 (
Mother convicted of endangering child
A New Jersey mother was convicted of endangering a child that she
left
in the car for 10 minutes
. The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled her
case was judged wrong.
The article explains the biased thinking that considers bizarre
unlikely dangers as crucial in some cases and insignificant in others.
03 September 2015 (
Mongolia turning into desert
Global heating
is
turning
Mongolia into a desert
, which is a big problem for Mongolians.
03 September 2015 (
Israel leaving Palestinians homeless
Israel demolished the Palestinian village of al-Khdeirat,
leaving
100 people homeless
Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, fanatical "settlers"
seized a Palestinian
building
These demolitions are often
carried
out with hardly any notice
so as to destroy the Palestinians'
movable possessions too.
03 September 2015 (
Pacifist and activist sues Israel
British pacifist and activist Gary Spedding is suing in Israel
to
reverse his exclusion from that country
, which was done citing
absurd reasons.
03 September 2015 (
Israeli courts protect rights some of the time
Israeli courts carefully protect the rights of the accused when Jews
are accused of pogroms against Palestinians. The rest of the time,
not so much
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
Thus, it seems almost impossible for those guilty of such pogroms
to face any punishment.
02 September 2015 (
Urgent: stand up for real journalists
Everyone:
call
on the US press corps
to stand up for real journalists rather
than anti-rational billionaire candidates.
02 September 2015 (
Urgent: protect Bryce Canyon
US citizens: call for
protecting
Bryce Canyon from coal mining.
02 September 2015 (
Urgent: discrimination based on religion
US citizens: call on Obama to have the Attorney General reconsider
the conclusion that
discrimination
on the basis of religion is legitimate.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
02 September 2015 (
Urgent: free political prisoners in Vietnam
Everyone: call on Vietnam
to
free political prisoners in the coming amnesty.
02 September 2015 (
Solitary confinement of "gang leaders"
California has agreed to stop keeping supposed "gang leaders" in
long-term
solitary confinement.
The article errs in supposing that these prisoners are really
associated with gangs. That is what they are
accused
of, but
all
sorts of silly criteria
are used to determine who is a "gang
member".
02 September 2015 (
Advertising of sex workers
Repression
against services that enable sex workers to advertise hits them hard.
02 September 2015 (
Massive wildfires in US
The
massive wildfires in the US
have burnt over 2000 square miles.
As we keep turning the heat up, it will get bigger. Do people want to
bet on which year 20,000 square miles will burn?
02 September 2015 (
Temple of Bel
The Fate of the Temple of Bel Is a
Symbol
of the Tragedy Engulfing Syria.
02 September 2015 (
Charges for murder of Niloy Chakrabarti
Five Islamists
have
been charged
with murdering secularist blogger Niloy Chakrabarti.
02 September 2015 (
Toys and imagination
Fewer
toys
can be good for children's imagination.
A few years ago I visited a friend who had a typical large American house,
with several rooms littered with piles of toys. I was shocked, but I suspect
most Americans would find it normal.
02 September 2015 (
Real women on Ashley Madison
The number of real women on Ashley Madison
was
probably more than previous analysis concluded.
Data to determine
their number is not available in the leak.
However, it is clear there were at least 70,000 "female" chatbots.
02 September 2015 (
Lobby for the Emir of Qatar
Tony B'liar's wife lobbied Hillary Clinton
on
behalf of the Emir of Qatar.
The article does not show whether Clinton did anything wrong in regard
to this, but it seems sleazy on Ms B'liar's part.
02 September 2015 (
Shooting a moving car
US
thugs have shot 30 drivers dead this year,
ignoring guidance that
it's a bad idea to shoot at a moving car.
02 September 2015 (
Shrinking glaciers
Glaciers shrank in the 20th century, but now
they
are shrinking twice as fast.
02 September 2015 (
"Debt relief" in IMF terms
"Debt relief for Greece", in IMF terms, means only
stretching
out the payments.
02 September 2015 (
Working conditions in Burma
"Free trade" means clothing companies anywhere in the world
get
the benefit of the horrible working conditions in Burma.
02 September 2015 (
Sea-level rise
James Hansen and other scientists warn that sea-level rise is likely
to accelerate fast in the future, and could amount to
10
feet (3 meters) within 50 years
. Or maybe somewhat more or less
time.
I write this in the Chilean port city of La Serena, substantial parts
of which seem to be less than 3 meters above sea level. Oops.
If you're feeling really lucky, you could decide to bet that their
prediction won't happen ever.
02 September 2015 (
Australia's immigration prison
Naomi
Klein
"I'm a lot more shocked by the fact that migrants made
refugees by wars that your government and my government have
participated in are sent to islands so far away, locked away with no
hope so they take their own lives."
I don't think we need to ask which of these outrages is worse.
02 September 2015 (
Azerbaijan journalist faces imprisonment
Azerbaijan Journalist Khadija Ismayilova,
faced
with imprisonment for exposing corruption
, says she will continue
even in prison.
The court mercifully sentenced her to "only"
7.5
years in prison
02 September 2015 (
UK's housing shortage
Economic growth alone will not fix the UK's
housing
shortage
Proper taxation of houses, including higher taxes for any home that
isn't a principal residence, would get the job started.
02 September 2015 (
"Anti-terrorism" laws
Turkey is the latest country to use "anti-terrorism" laws for
repression
The
US does it too
, and it is wrong in any country.
In this case, Turkey's (i.e., Erdogan's) aim is to hide his violent
attacks against Kurds.
The violence started with an attack in the city of Suruc, which was
attributed to
PISSI
but may have been a
false
flag attack by the Turkish government
02 September 2015 (
Thugs and self-proclaimed psychics
Self-proclaimed psychics are a total failure in helping criminal
investigations, but
thug
departments are very slow to learn this lesson
02 September 2015 (
Iran bars music director
Israel was unable to stop Daniel Barenboim from conducting in Iran,
but
Iran's
government won't let him in
02 September 2015 (
Google accused of rigging search results
Google
faces
accusations in India and Europe
of rigging search results to favor
its own sites.
It would be easy to achieve this result intentionally without
explicitly writing lines of code that say "prefer this Google site".
Some minor details of the Google site could raise the site's priority.
02 September 2015 (
Manipulation of public opinion
How the apartheid government of South Africa
spent
millions to manipulate public opinion
in the US and Europe.
02 September 2015 (
Obama says the right things
Obama, visiting in Alaska,
called
for urgent action to curb global heating
Obama is saying the right things; he should make his actions match his
words.
02 September 2015 (
Journalists in Thailand acquitted
Journalists in Thailand were
acquitted
of the crime of "defaming the Navy"
in reporting on suspicions of
its involvement in human trafficking.
This is a good outcome, but the root of the problem is in making
defamation a crime. Freedom of speech includes the right to offend,
criticize, insult, even mock any institution, any practice, any
belief, and any person.
02 September 2015 (
Plastic objects inside seabirds
In some parts of the ocean,
90%
of seabirds
have plastic objects inside them.
02 September 2015 (
Studies funded by pharma companies
Some pharma companies are fighting hard to
keep
disappointing results of patient studies secret
Since it is established that the involvement of pharma companies
corrupts the outcomes of these studies, we should cut them off from it
completely. Instead of letting them fund the studies, the government
should tax them and use the tax funds to do the studies.
02 September 2015 (
Heat wave in Europe
The long heat wave in Europe, and the associated drought, has
spoiled
harvests and forced power plants to close
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
01 September 2015 (
Police standards
If police departments in the US had the same standards for employees as fire departments,
we'd
have police officers instead of thugs.
The US needs to reevaluate what their job consists of, and especially
how many of them are needed. To hire as many as we have now requires
scraping the bottom of the barrel. We no longer have a high overall
crime rate, and if we ended the war on drugs, we'd have a lot less
crime of all kinds.
01 September 2015 (
Personal data of students
Several US states
have
passed inadequate laws
to protect the privacy of personal data of students in school.
These laws are inadequate because companies should not get
any
personal information about
any
students.
Schools should keep these data, and delete anything that does not need
to be kept.
01 September 2015 (
"Transparency" for TTIP negotiations
The EU promised "transparency" for the TTIP negotiations, but arranged
to interpret that in a way
that
adds up to nothing.
Even MEPs can't see anything meaningful.
The first level of dishonesty about this treaty is the idea that it is
about "free trade". It's really about giving companies more power and
democracy less power. That's why I call them "corporate supremacy
treaties".
01 September 2015 (
Harm to effective privacy
The practice of publishing anything salacious that we hear other
people saying
does
significant harm to effective privacy.
We should distinguish between proof of something really bad, like
violence carried out by a
thug
from mere clickbait such as a couple's
breaking up.
01 September 2015 (
Rotten judicial system in Egypt
The
conviction of three Al-Jazeera journalists in Egypt
is a sample
of a thoroughly rotten judicial system.
Egypt is one of the countries that I would love to visit, if it were safe.
But I don't feel I would be safe from imprisonment there now.
01 September 2015 (
Leftist condemnation of science
Chomsky
refutes
the perverse postmodern leftist condemnation of science and even rationality.
[Reference updated on 2018-03-27 because the
old
link
was broken.]
01 September 2015 (
Filling out tax forms
H&R Block Lobbied
to
Make Tax Forms Harder for Low-Income People to Fill Out.
01 September 2015 (
Trump and white supremacy
Donald
Trump is the New Face of White Supremacy.
01 September 2015 (
Escape from poverty
Never in US history have most people earned enough to escape from poverty
based
on their wages alone.
I think the article confuses the point by saying that they "were" poor.
What happened, and the article makes it clear when read carefully,
is that when they weren't poor it was because debt was supporting them.
01 September 2015 (
Divest from fossil fuels
The city of Newcastle, Australia, which is the world's biggest coal
exporting city, has decided to divest from fossil fuels, recognizing
that
the
coal business has no future.
01 September 2015 (
Curbing global heating would save money
Citibank says curbing global heating would save
tens
of trillions of dollars,
not even counting the avoided costs of global heating.
Alaska natives say that
global heating
has caused drastic changes that are
destroying their way of life,
and
we need to stop it now.
01 September 2015 (
Government inquiry of Nauru
Australia's prison in Nauru
treats
children so horribly
that even a government inquiry says no children should be there.
What will Abbott do next? Remove the children and leave their parents
on Nauru? That might be cruel enough to be his next step.
The plan to send refugees to Cambodia has failed and
Cambodia
has cancelled it.
01 September 2015 (
US-backed war in Yemen
The US-backed war in Yemen
has
blocked delivery of food and medicine,
endangering millions.
01 September 2015 (
Chinese human rights defenders
Families of disappeared Chinese human rights defenders
call on the state
to tell them where their relatives are.
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