In case it matters...

Not that I post all that often anyway, but I'm currently involved in NaNoWriMo. What it means is that I have even less time than usual to comment on stuff, because I'm learning all about this "writing to a deadline" thing. For anyone who cares, my current status is:

Hacking Democracy

HBO's special on how Diebold voting machines are unsafe, unreliable, and a sure-fire recipe for election fraud is now available on Google Video.

Go see it before you vote. If you still believe that voting is anything more than playing the statists' game by their rules, and not a repudiation of your ethics.

Who Are the Cylons?

Just imagine:

You're trying to rebuild your homeland after a devastating war and years of continuous harassment and bombing by the enemy after the war ended.  Just when you are starting to think you might be able to rebuild, the enemy attacks again, and your government surrenders. The enemy claims they are in your homeland to bring you freedom and enlightenment; to bring you a better way of life than the life you had under your old government.

So now you're ruled by a puppet government, which exists solely to rubber-stamp the orders of the invaders. The invaders have taken people from among your own ranks to form a puppet police force to put a "humane" face on the occupation, while doing the dirty work they don't want to be seen doing.

People are disappearing in the night, going into "detention" where they are interrogated, tortured, sometimes simply vanishing, never to be seen again. There are no trials, no courts; the enemy simply declares who is an "unlawful enemy combatant" and they are considered to be guilty from the moment their name is listed.

Some of your own are fighting back, but every time they strike at the enemy, the enemy responds by slaughtering more innocent people. The situation is so desperate that some of your resistance fighters have chosen to fight by strapping on belts of explosives and blowing themselves up in places that they hope will shock and terrify the enemy - and those who collaborate with the enemy.

Through it all, the enemy continues to insist they are "doing God's Will" and that only evil people would choose to resist them. They actually seem shocked and confused that anyone could possibly object to their occupation... detentions... torture... murders... reprisals... disappearances.... They honestly seem to be completely convinced that their cause is so righteous that you'll understand why they "had to" kill your sister, brother, mother, father, daughter, son, or even your entire family.

As I watched the season premier of Battlestar Galactica last night, I realized that it could have been telling the story of the American occupation of Iraq... Vietnam... the Philippines... the Confederacy.... In fact, it reminded me of every case throughout the history of Western civilization where someone has chosen to take up "the white man's burden."

How many repetitions of the same sad story are necessary before those who are "doing God's Will" realize they're not wanted? Will they ever realize they're not wanted?  Probably not. And that's the heart of the tragedy. They're destroying lives by the thousands, all in the name of "doing God's Will" and are so convinced of their own righteousness that anyone who so much as questions it is their enemy.

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

--C. S. Lewis

Day Against DRM

DRM - do you know that term? If you don't, you should.

DRM stands for Digital Rights Management, according to its creators. What it does in reality has nothing to do with rights, and everything to do with restricting your ability to use the software, music, or video that you paid good money for.

Imagine, for instance, you go to the iTunes store and buy a song. Well, if you only own one iPod, that's no problem. But if you own two iPods and you want to put a copy of that song on both of them, the Apple DRM scheme prevents you from doing it.

Or how about buying a CD of your favorite band? Last year, Sony demonstrated graphically what theyDRM is not about protecting anyone's rights. What it is about, is damaging the electronic media you buy so that you can only use it under the conditions the company you bought it from approves of. What it is about is restricting your right to use what you bought in the way you choose to use it.

If you want to know more about DRM, take a look at EFF's Frequently Awkward Questions for the Entertainment Industry as a starting place.

--
"We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was legal." --Martin Luther King Jr.

Congress Destroys American Freedom

A video made by a gentleman in Washington D.C. who tried to show up for a protest on the day Congress voted to repeal the Constitution, and found nobody even cared enough to protest.

America's Future

John Hoffman wrote a story about the death of Habeas Corpus back in October of 2001 that seems rather appropriate to remember today.

Go read it, and think about what has happened in Washington this week.

--
"We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was legal." --Martin Luther King Jr.

I am an Unlawful Enemy Combatant

Well now, isn't this special? According to the version of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that was written by the Bush White House and passed by the House of Representatives, the definition of "Unlawful Enemy Combatant" is so broad that ALL of the following classes of people are at risk of being declared "Unlawful Enemy Combatants" under the act, if it passes as written:

• Any attorney representing any of the "detainees" at Guantanamo or any of the other American prisons established in support of the Bushevik war
• Any person who has given as little as $5 to a charity working with orphans in Afghanistan or Iraq, that turns out to be associated in some fashion with someone who might be a member of the Taliban or Al Qaeda (say, someone who works at the charity bought gas from a gas station owned by the second cousin of the landlord of the brother of a member of either group).
• A tourist wearing an anti-Bush t-shirt at a public location, such as the Statue of Liberty
• A protester at an immigration rally
• Someone handing out anti-tax fliers on April 15th
• An anti-government blogger

Not only does the act have an insanely broad definition of "Unlawful Enemy Combatant", but thanks to the bastards who voted against Senator Specter's amendment that would have stricken the following clause from the bill, it also revokes the right of habeas corpus for anyone affected by the "Unlawful Enemy Combatant" designation:

"No court... shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination."

Congratulations, you bastards. If you actually pass this abomination, you've just given the office of the President more power than King George ever dreamed of.

--
When you let people do what they want, you get Woodstock.
When you let governments do what they want, you get Auschwitz.

The Boulder Pledge

Under no circumstances will I ever purchase anything offered to me as the result of an unsolicited e-mail message. Nor will I forward chain letters, petitions, mass mailings, or virus warnings to large numbers of others. This is my contribution to the survival of the online community.

Roger Ebert, Boulder Colorado 1996

--
When you let people do what they want, you get Woodstock.
When you let governments do what they want, you get Auschwitz.

McCain-Feingold Incumbent Protection Period

That's right, boys and girls. It's that time of year again, when the only people allowed - by federal law - to comment on matters of national import are those already in office, "mainstream media" outlets, and those who are willing to put up with Uncle Sam digging through their underwear drawers for signs of partisan sponsorship.

You want to comment on what the Chimpanzee-in-Chief is doing? Oops! You're a federal criminal! You want to talk about the law Congress is currently trying to shove through that would eliminate habeas corpus for anyone who is even accused of terrorism? Gotcha again! Hell, if you just want to talk about the fact that the Violence Against Women Act bans anyone who receives federal money from utilizing any form of domestic violence programs other than those based on the "Duluth Model", and explicitly excludes male victims of domestic violence from any programs that receive federal funding, you're screwed again.

Well, guess what? If I'm going to be classed as a criminal because I believe the First Amendment applies to my ramblings in this space, I'm going to make the most of it. I hereby declare this blog to be a Free Press, published whenever I damned well feel like publishing it, as recognized and protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution for the United States of America.

-- 
When you let people do what they want, you get Woodstock.
When you let governments do what they want, you get Auschwitz.

King George of America

An interesting, and far too accurate, comparison between George W Bush and King George the III, can be found at King George of America.

It's really worth your time to read and think about it.

Welcome to Laputa

Why Laputa? Three reasons, actually.

1. I'm a fan of Jonathan Swift. Unlike so many commentators who write today, he was able to both convey a message and be entertaining at the same time. Some of his writing reads as if he dipped his pen in pure aqua regia, and I have no doubt that if he were writing today, he'd be the recipient of enough death threats to paper his walls.
2. I'm a fan of Hayao Miyazaki. Even the Disneyfied version of Miyazaki's Laputa deserves recognition for both its storytelling and its art.
3. In my own writing, the main setting of most of my stories is an anarcho-capitalist nation which was named Laputa by its founder, in a deliberate slap against the oppressive governments surrounding it. In my stories, just like in the real world when reading what Swift wrote, those who most need to get a clue from it are too blind to see it.

So, you can expect to find mostly rants, political and philosophical stuff here. I don't claim to be a commentator of the same order as Lew Rockwell or L. Neil Smith, but occasionally I just need to be able to spout off, whether anyone else reads it or not.