Author Archives: Lila

Slaves On The Intellectual Property Plantation, Unite!

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“There is no question that copyright was originally vested by the federal Constitution with the original author, that this is a constitutional protection properly having jurisdiction in federal courts and always has in cases involving interstate commerce like sales over the Internet, and that the 1976 Copyright Act itself acknowledges that “registration is not a condition of copyright protection.”

Yet this decision denies unregistered writers their constitutional right to any copyright protection by federal courts. The ruling contradicts the specific guarantees to copyright protection that is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. It contradicts over 200 years of constitutional protection against copyright infringement for all writers, not just those who choose to register with the Copyright Office.

This decision is a dangerous precedent that must not be allowed to stand. It must be appealed to the full Second Circuit Court of Appeals, and, if necessary, to the U.S. Supreme Court.”

More at The National Writer’s Union on last year’s decision by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals that writers who had not registered their works with the U.S. Copyright Office are denied any access to federal court for copyright protection.

Comment: If you are a writer, you owe it to yourself to make your voice heard on behalf of the write side of this debate.

Ron Paul Revolution: The Stealth Candidate You Never Heard Of…

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“At the very least, the untold parallel story of the Republican primaries, which, for the 99% of you who had no way of knowing, have continued alongside the Democratic primaries, and received almost no coverage. Oddly enough, the Republican primaries would have made a more interesting story because although John McCain has been the “presumptive Republican nominee” since January, as late as last month, McCain barely eeked out 70% in the Pennsylvania primary, with 11% going to Mike Huckabee, who had officially dropped out in February, and 16% for Ron Paul. In Idaho, just last week, Ron Paul received 24% in the Republican primary – an astounding figure considering the public has been fed virtually no information indicating that McCain has any opponents at all! Huckabee has consistently managed to pick up 7-10% in each state, mopping up the core religious right wing remains of the dying Republican generation. But the Ron Paul phenomenon is fascinating to me, because the Republican primaries don’t net proportional delegate representation, as the democrats do. If they did, there would still be a race going on there. As it is, what does the Ron Paul phenomenon portend?

The Republican National Convention in Minneapolis in September may have a big surprise in the form of dissent from within. Only it won’t be liberal Democrats and anarchists in the streets; it will be millions of Republicans who have been trying to register their opposition to the War, to deficit spending, and to the “Imperial Presidency” (or, as Dick Cheney calls it, the “Unitary Executive” – a concept heretofore unknown in the United States). While there are many aspects to Dr. Paul’s libertarian platform that are anathema to my liberal sensibilities, I find it encouraging that so many Republicans are expressing – albeit with no voice afforded them by the media – a desire to return to a form of conservatism that is more rock-ribbed Eisenhower than reactionary Rove….”

More at the Smirking Chimp.

DNA, IQ, and the New Racialism….

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“On Oct. 14, 2007, one of Watson’s former assistants, Charlotte Hunt-Grubbe, wrote an article about him in London’s Sunday Times that quoted him making racist comments about black people by suggesting there are inherent, unalterable biological differences in intelligence between black people and everyone else. The response was swift and impressively devastating. The father of DNA had spoken the unspeakable. Echoing racist remarks that have been used to justify the enslavement and colonization of black people since the Enlightenment (think Hume, Kant, Jefferson, Hegel), Watson’s comments implied that he believed that nature had created a primal distinction in intelligence and innate mental capacity between blacks and whites, which no amount of social intervention could ever change.

He had uttered the unutterable, the most ardent fantasy of white racists (David Duke would wax poetic on his Web site that the truth had at last been revealed, and by no less than the discoverer of the structure of DNA). His words caused a ripple effect of shock, dismay and disgust among those of us who embrace the range of biological diversity and potential within the human community. It was as if one of the smartest white men in the world had confirmed what so many racists believe already: that the gap between blacks and whites in, say, IQ test scores and SAT results has a biological basis and that environmental factors such as centuries of slavery, colonization, Jim Crow segregation and race-based discrimination—all contributing to uneven economic development—don’t amount to a hill of beans. Nature has given us an extra basketball gene, as it were, in lieu of native intelligence….”

More at The Root by a scholar of race theory, Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

The New Exit-Empire Tax….

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“The primary purpose of the Heroes Earnings Assistance and Relief Tax Act of 2008 is to provide a range of tax breaks for veterans. But the law also imposes the first-ever “exit tax” on even moderately wealthy expatriates. I predicted Congress could pass an exit tax bill like this over a year ago, and now it has.

Once President Bush signs this bill, the law will require future expatriates to pay a tax on all unrealized gains of their worldwide estate, including most offshore trusts. And the tax applies not only to former U.S. citizens, but also to long-term green card holders who have resided in the United States for at least eight of the 15 years before they expatriate. (Fortunately, long-term residents can “opt out” of the exit tax, as I’ll explain in a moment.)

How are you supposed to pay the tax without selling your assets? That’s your problem – not the IRS’s – although the bill permits deferral in certain circumstances….”

From The Sovereign Society.

Not So Quiet On the Eastern Front….

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WASHINGTON – U.S. authorities are investigating whether Chinese officials secretly copied the contents of a government laptop computer during a visit to China by Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez and used the information to try to hack into Commerce computers, officials and industry experts told The Associated Press.

Surreptitious copying is believed to have occurred when a laptop was left unattended during Gutierrez’s trip to Beijing for trade talks in December, people familiar with the incident told the AP. These people spoke on condition of anonymity because the incident was under investigation….”

More at MSNBC

 

Immoral Market or Incompetent Marketer?

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As you’ve probably noticed, I’m interested in the way the market operates….and how it intersects with the way we think….. our perceptions, our misperceptions,  our ethics — or lack thereof

Can you be good…. and make good?

Is conscience always tugging at your bottom-line like a whiny brat?

Should it?

The Triple Bottom Line comes up with some answers:

“It seems as if there’s a bit of angst among believers in sustainable business over the demise of Nau, an apparel company based in Portland, Oregon, that aimed to make and sell outdoor clothes and sportswear made from recycled materials using environmentally friendly business methods. “Is this a bad omen for sustainable startups?” wonders at least one blogger.

For what it’s worth, my answer is No. The failure of Nau reflects less the inherent weakness of the sustainable business concept and more a series of miscalculations made by the company’s management, most of which had nothing to do with environmentalism or social consciousness but rather with plain old business sense.

As this article details, Nau committed some of the same management blunders that have doomed thousands of other startups. They counted on a website to generate 50 percent of their sales, then dawdled over repairing the site when it proved to be awkward and difficult to use. They chose not to make their products available through traditional retailers, thereby eliminating a potential source of vitally-needed early revenue. They decided to “mute” the appearance of their logo on their garments, eschewing a powerful tool for building brand awareness and loyalty.

And most dangerously, they overspent, especially on personnel: “Among the 60 employees at [Nau’s] Pearl District headquarters, about 10 held the title of vice president or higher . . . Most hailed from large companies such as Nike.” In other words, they hired pricey talent accustomed to big-company perks and working conditions–always a risky choice for a brand-new company.”

(Read more here)

The Red Tape Chronicles on ID Theft

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“Like arriving home to see a broken window, Holli knew something was wrong when she pulled up the statement from her new 401(k) account and saw a stranger’s name there. Under her name and account information, she found a second name: Paulino Rodriguez. But was it an accident, random vandalism or a serious crime? She opened the virtual door to her account and sorted through the broken glass. Her worst fears would soon be confirmed.

After some frantic research, Holli pieced together part of the story. Rodriguez, the 401(k) Web site revealed, lived in Escondido, Calif., about 90 minutes south of Holli’s home in Fountain Valley. He was a restaurant worker in an Escondido Burger King. This was no prank — though Holli would soon feel like several government agencies, corporations and a criminal were having fun at her expense. She was a victim of something experts call Social Security number-only identity theft, generally committed by immigrants who don’t have the necessary credentials to work legally in the U.S….”

More at MSNBC’s The Red Tape Chronicles.

Comment: 

When people get treated like numbers, the numbers get gamed. More evidence that large, polyglot states are inherently unworkable.

Bad Subjects On The Right Not to Drive…

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“I certainly don’t’ fault people for using cars or supporting their right to drive, because like every other critic of automobility, I recognize that there are few options for people to do otherwise. But that’s exactly the point that automobile critics are trying to make: people are significantly limited in their ability to choose between different forms of mobility. Pro-automobile advocates love to talk about the ‘right to drive’ or the ‘freedom’ to travel, but they never talk about the freedom to choose any other mode of transportation—particularly ones that don’t pollute the Earth or require an infrastructure that engulfs most of the usable public space in our cities. Pro-automobile advocates don’t like to talk about how automobile accidents are the #1 cause of death for people between the ages of 4-34, killing approximately 43,000 people a year. Nor do they address the fact that the 2.9 million annual injuries caused by auto accidents costs our society roughly $230 billion a year. Even when people aren’t getting maimed or killed, the literal financial costs of automobility are staggering. According the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, traffic congestion collectively costs an average of $168 billion a year and the Texas Transportation Institute estimates that the 75 largest metropolitan areas experienced 3.6 billion vehicle-hours of delay, resulting in 5.7 billion US gallons (21.6 billion liters) in wasted fuel and $67.5 billion in lost productivity, or about 0.7% of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product. One would think that this raw financial data alone would surely convince people that there are better ways to simply get around. However, it’s hard to make informed decisions about transportation when groups like the Reason Institute can utilize major news outlets to push their agenda.”

More here at Bad Subjects.

Barry Dyke On the Corruption of Bank-owned Life Insurance

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“Barry Dyke, a New Hampshire investment adviser who has studied BOLI, said other banks will likely face losses. “It’s a much bigger issue,” he said.

Bank-owned life insurance had been seen as a safe place for banks to invest their capital but it’s grown increasingly risky, said Dyke, president of Castle Asset Management LLC. “What has happened is banks took a really good thing and corrupted the purpose,” he said.

The insurance writedowns is one of a number of missteps that has plagued Wachovai in recent weeks. It reached a $144 million settlement with regulators over its ties to telemarketers and has said it expects a $1 billion charge in the second quarter because of the accounting of controversial leasing tax shelters.”

More at the Charlotte Observer, from our friend Barry Dyke, whose “Pirates of Manhattan” is selling like hot-dogs at a ball game just off his own website, with no big-time New York agent, no big-time New York publishing house, no big web seller like Amazon, no big bookstore chain like Borders, or anything else but his own lung power on local radio shows. Way to go, Barry.

Brits Buying in New South Wales

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People from the UK are among the most prolific buyers of property in Australia, new figures have revealed.

According to the Real Estate Institute of Australia, Britons are third-largest group of foreign property buyers in the country, reports Homes Overseas.

Statistics from the group showed that British investors bought more than £1.27 billion worth of property in Australia last year.

This accounts for more than a tenth of the overall amount of foreign investment in Australia attracted last year.

Britons were only outnumbered by people from Singapore, along with investors from the US.

Figures showed that New South Wales was one of the main hotspots for foreign buyers during 2007, along with Queensland.

Collectively, these two regions were said to account for nearly half of the overseas investment in Australia last year.

This comes after the country was described as a “safe bet” for investors by the Foreign Property Buyer website.