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"Thanks in large part to a national campaign launched by the nonprofit Institute for Justice, property owners have a powerful, knowledgeable ally. In many places, the group has helped secure for homeowners and small business owners precisely those property rights that we all thought we had to begin with."
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/08/19/Opinion/Eminent_domain_may_be.shtml
"A member of a federal agency notorious for its corruption enters an elevator in the office building where he works. Inside the elevator he encounters another officer, both arms filled with contraband he has stolen from an evidence room. He is taking it out now, to sell on the street."
http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2007/tle431-20070819-05.html
"Most states hate it: 17 have passed legislation rejecting REAL ID, and many others have such legislation somewhere in process. Now it looks like the federal government is upping the ante, and threatening retaliation against those states that don't implement REAL ID...."
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/08/us_government_t_2.html
"Free will and free persons. Ron Paul will not likely be giving personal support to strippers, in dollars or encouragement, but he supports, in legislation, their right to be free."
http://reason.com/blog/show/122148.html
"The city is like an acid trip gone bad. On electronic signs on overpasses one sees that the Threat Level is Orange--kind of scared, but not yet with the screaming shaking gollywoggles. What does that mean? What do you do in Condition Orange that you don’t do in Condition Green? (Actually Green seems not to exist. The point appears to be to keep people in a constant state of moderate anxiety,) ... I get the impression that it is a response more to boredom than to peril. Life is pretty tedious going to the cubicle farm every day. Living in an imaginary war zone relieves the ennui. The Homeland Security people, not exactly a scintillating crew, get to feel important, have a sense of mission and maybe even be noticed. In a meaningless life, the chance to go mano a mano with bin Laden, even if only by tilting at trash cans, is better than nothing."
http://www.fredoneverything.net/DCAgain.shtml
"It matters not that conscription is slavery, plain and simple. It matters not that perpetual war cannot create peace. It matters not that victory was declared in Iraq a couple thousand dead GI’s ago. What matters is this: I believe that there is a limit to what Americans will tolerate. When enough of us are homeless, unemployed and broke and they try to force our sons to be their patsies, to kill and to die for the machine of government, I think there will be some blood flowing and it won’t be in Iraq . It’ll be right here at home in the streets."
http://www.strike-the-root.com/72/fontana/fontana2.html
"[I]t's significant that Asheville authorities are finding it difficult to identify a specific offense with which to charge Phillips. That difficulty is symptomatic of institutional dishonesty: The Asheville Police Department can't afford to admit that it arrested Phillips because of the content of his sign, rather than because of some danger [his] protest posed to the public."
http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2007/08/amerika-2007.html
"It seems clear the government could have tried and convicted Padilla back in 2002, which leaves intelligence gathering as the remaining excuse for his 43 months of legal limbo. Maybe Padilla provided valuable information, although his junior position in Al Qaeda (assuming he even could be considered a member) and the disdain of the organization's leaders suggest otherwise."
http://www.reason.com/news/show/122100.html
"The state will always find ways to increase its own power and thus to find new ways to oppress the slaves it calls 'citizens' or 'residents.' The latter are not, contrary to popular myth, the privileged majority included in the big family of the state. Rather, they are the ones forced to pay for their own oppression, which makes them true losers. ... It is the mix of each and every individual’s specific interests that makes market society so beautiful and stable: the fact that each individual has to rely on no one but himself to 'fight' for his interest means there is no fixed structure available from which the costs of specific interests can be levied on other people. Voluntarism is demanded – voluntary agreement is the only way to profit in the truly freed market."
http://www.strike-the-root.com/72/bylund/bylund1.html
"Fundamentally, it's much easier to tailor legal arrangements to suit the societies they serve than it is to engineer societies to conform to preexisting business models and artificial (yes, artificial) though useful constructs like copyright. If people want electric light, it makes no sense to insist on selling them lamp oil, and if they want (and can create easy access to) shared music and video files, it's just smart business to find a way to make money off of that desire rather than wage a losing campaign to bludgeon consumers into purchasing CDs and DVDs."
http://www.tuccille.com/blog/2007/08/mp3s-just-want-to-be-free.html
"So what can be done about it? The answer is only three words long, but implementing it could take many years and require something like a civil war: abolish limited liability, which is the legal means by which people who own and operate corporations evade moral and monetary responsibility for what they do. Get rid of it, and corporations will shrivel in size and power as if blasted by a nova."
http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2007/tle431-20070819-02.html
"A self-described 'somewhat combative pacifist and cooperative anarchist,' Ms. Paley was a lifelong advocate of liberal social causes. During Vietnam, she was jailed several times for antiwar protests; in later years, she lobbied for women’s rights, against nuclear proliferation and, most recently, against the war in Iraq."
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/08/23/3369/
"[I]sn't 50 different solutions to our heath care problems better than a one-size-fits-all, nationwide plan that may not work? I'm not advocating socialized medicine, but I believe the debate over free markets vs. government intervention should take place at the state, not the federal level."
http://partialobserver.com/article.cfm?id=2650
"When Jenna Jenks prepared to give birth this summer, her objective was to avoid going to a hospital. When the Binghamton resident was a child, her aunt Carol Jent made a big impression upon her when she had a baby at home."
http://www.pressconnects.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?
AID=/20070819/LIFESTYLE/708190313/1004/LIFESTYLE
"Should black people accept government's dereliction of its first basic function, that of providing protection? My answer is no. One of our basic rights is the right to defend oneself against predators. If the government can't or won't protect people, people have a right to protect themselves. You say, 'Hey, Williams, you're not talking about vigilantism, are you?' Yes, I am. "
http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/wew/articles/07/liberalviews.htm
"Calls for secession have been growing in Flanders, which possesses most of the country’s wealth and population. Some say Flanders should be reunited with the Netherlands, which it borders. A poll indicates the Dutch would welcome Flanders back."
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/219139.aspx
"We appear to live in a republic. But look closely; it’s clearer every day that we live in a de facto autocracy. President Bush has managed to amass an astounding amount of power simply by scaring the American people and Congress into thinking that our continued existence as a society depends on giving him carte blanche."
http://mwcnews.net/content/view/16293&Itemid=1
"Secret History points out that the United States discovered, in essence, a cheaper, safer, and more efficient method of creating, running, and looting an empire. Instead of expensive, long-term military occupation of a target nation, Americans found that bribes and threats to existing leaders would often do the trick; when that failed, staging a coup or assassinating the uncooperative leader and then backing a corrupt replacement could usually get the job done."
http://www.strike-the-root.com/72/allport/allport8.html
"The new calculus is 'the greatest good for the greatest number' as determined by the wielders of power. On the basis of this new law, not written by Congress but invented by the Injustice Department and made precedent by the Padilla jury's verdict, the U.S. can lock up people based on the percentage of crime committed by their race, gender, income class, or ethnic group."
http://www.antiwar.com/roberts/?articleid=11471
"Managing relations with Russia would always be a challenge, even absent the ambitions of Putin and his siloviki. But in a display of the perverted genius peculiar to Washington, the Bush Regime has not only cultivated the worst elements of Russia's ruling clique, its behavior has provoked understandable concerns among the long-suffering Russian people and provided their rulers with a plausible foreign enemy."
http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2007/08/briefly-considered-red-phoenix-rising.html
"When evil is so basic and so pervasive, it must be rejected. Thus, for instance, if the 'choice' is between Clinton and Giuliani or Romney, the only honorable and civilized choice is to vote for neither, or to vote for a third party candidate who has not rejected civilization altogether. Of course, if the goal is simply to get a member of one's tribe into the White House, such principled concerns will not arise, since those concerns did not exist in the first instance."
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2007/08/war-corporatism-and-torture-forever-or.html
"All public policies are related. Okay, that may be a slight overstatement, but there's a point here. A politician's credibility on one public issue -- and thus the disposition of that issue -- will often be determined by his or her position on other issues. People will look at a politician's full program as a way of judging good faith."
http://www.fee.org/in_brief/default.asp?id=1524
"Remember the 'cakewalk war'? Well, this time the neocons think that an attack on the Revolutionary Guards will free Iran from Islamic influence and cause Iranians to back the US against their own government. Lies, unprovoked aggression, and delusional expectations -- the same ingredients that produced the Iraq catastrophe -- all over again. The entire Bush regime and both political parties are complicit, along with the media and US allies."
http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts08242007.html
"The striking animus that the leaders of the Bush Faction exhibit toward America's soldiery grows more pronounced all the time. Indeed, their pathological hatred of the actual human beings in the armed forces seems to increase in proportion to their increasingly frenzied rhetoric about supporting the abstract entity known as 'the troops'."
http://www.chris-floyd.com/content/view/1264/135/
"Turning open source into a political issue is worse than turning science into one, although I know people do it. People do lots of stupid things. Open source is an economic phenomenon, rearranging relations between buyers and sellers, users and makers. It’s based on licenses, agreements designed to fit inside any political, legal or economic system. ... No matter what your other beliefs you can be part of the open source movement, agree to an open source license, and contribute to an open source project." [Perhaps anti-political would describe FOSS even better.]
http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/?p=1358
"Evolution may have driven women's preference for pink, according to the study published today. 'The explanation might date back to humans' hunter-gatherer days, when women were the primary gatherers and would have benefited from an ability to home in on ripe, red fruits. Culture may exploit and compound this natural female preference', says Professor Anya Hurlbert, Professor of Visual Neuroscience at Newcastle University. "
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/press.office/press.release/content.phtml?ref=1187625608
"One of the great freedoms of open source is the ability to take just the bits we need and recombine them into new applications, accelerating innovation and time to market. … Open source allows startups to take the bits of Linux and other open source projects they need and combine them in new ways that deliver new capabilities."
http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/08/20/34FEnextbigthing_dargo_1.html
"'If worse comes to worst,' a friend asked me a few weeks ago while discussing climate change, 'could we build some kind of machine that pulls carbon dioxide out of the air?' 'Um, yes,' I said. 'It's called a tree!' Because trees store CO2, preserving forests is a good way to keep greenhouse gasses out of the atmosphere."
http://www.abetterearth.org/blog/id.4234/news_detail.asp
"I stress our current debt-based monetary system because other types of monetary systems are possible. Most people never stop to think about this (usually because they're too worried about paying their bills), but our current system (which is controlled by the Federal Reserve) is just one of many possible money systems."
http://bullnotbull.com/bull/node/39
"None of Leutze’s enthusiasms would matter to me if it weren’t for his proposed way of satisfying them. He wants the government to increase taxes to accumulate funds so the state can purchase and conserve property. As I see it, that is simply using the coercive power of the government to force everyone to give up some money so that conservationists can get what they want at little expense to themselves."
http://www.fee.org/in_brief/default.asp?id=1521
"[W]ould a new injection of federal dollars inflame the problems that already exist in the world of higher education? Steadily increasing federal grants and loans to college students are one major cause of the exponential rise in tuition, student debt, and institutionalized dependency on government aid."
http://www.acton.org/ppolicy/comment/article.php?article=399
"The water monopoly — which loses some 40% of its water through leaky pipes or in ways otherwise unaccounted for — is only one of Peru's monuments to government incompetence. Peruvians were reminded of another last month when the communist-led teacher's union went on strike, paralyzing schools and triggering violence across the country."
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=8648
"All joking aside, this is simply despicable. The Bushists launch an illegal war to aggrandize the power and wealth of the rapacious elite they represent -- then they toss aside their soldiers (who didn't know they were signing up for a criminal enterprise) like so many broken toys they don't want to play with anymore. They created a hell, and now they abandon the tormented -- even those they used as tools to stoke the flames. "
http://www.chris-floyd.com/content/view/1263/135/
"Almost all of our public debate is conducted on the first level of analysis: what various political leaders say their goals and objectives are. In terms of those stated goals, their decisions in foreign policy are uniformly calamitous, and they lead to results that are the opposite of what they claim they hope to achieve. No public figure will admit the truth of the second kind of analysis and, I regret to note, most Americans are not the least bit interested in hearing such unpleasant truths. Nonetheless, they are truths: a huge swath of our economy is now devoted to preparing for war, making war, and cleaning up after war. To one degree or another, most members of Congress are beholden to the economic powers that drive the obsessive concern with war, and its cornucopia of economic opportunity. Both parties are enmeshed in the War State, and the current corporatist warmaking apparatus devours almost all those who go into public service. Until this intricate and complex system is altered, nothing else will change, except in comparatively superficial ways."
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2007/08/you-too-can-and-should-be-intelligence.html
"How is it done? How do you screw the taxpayer for millions, get away with it and then ride off into the sunset with one middle finger extended, the other wrapped around a chilled martini? … You start off as a well-connected bureaucrat…."
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/16076312/the_great_iraq_swindle
"Every totalitarian movement -- and by now it is clear to any honest and rational person that Bush-era 'conservatism' deserves that description -- depends on the eager and energetic participation of the willfully ignorant; as the doxology of Orwell's dystopia recognized, 'Ignorance is strength.' The invincibly ignorant people who compose Bush's core constituency will have no difficulty swallowing and regurgitating the refrain 'They attacked us' as a rationale for continuing the war on a country that had no connection whatsoever with 9-11."
http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2007/08/last-full-measure-of-murderous.html
"Real populism is angry, dangerous, and déclassé. When its tribunes take the stage, mainstream pundits titter and shake their heads, dropping words like 'paranoid,' 'demagogue,' and 'not serious.' Hillary Clinton can recite a few lines about the 'invisible' masses, but that isn't enough to make her a populist, no more than an all-strings Muzak cover of 'White Riot' is punk rock. "
http://www.reason.com/news/show/122082.html
"The cruelty and brutality that for so long marked poor relief in this country was thus not the result of just sadistic management. In the relief of poverty harshness was deemed a virtue. In Tudor and colonial times poor relief was mixed up not only with the suppression of vagrancy (a crime) but ... with the compulsory labor that typified the era. A humane tradition could hardly begin there."
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0705b.asp
"Easy money and fools are a volatile mix. As the real estate market began to pick up steam, more and more folks began to jump in, eventually creating a frenzy that fed strictly off emotion. The real estate market became flooded by human lemmings who never stopped to analyze CAP rates, affordability, geographic location, absorption rates or cash on cash returns; they bought simply because they feared they would miss out on (unsustainable) future gains. "
http://www.strike-the-root.com/72/antunez/antunez2.html
"At the height of its power, even the mighty Roman Empire could not stare down a collapsing economy and a burgeoning military. In fact, it was largely prolonged periods of war and false economic prosperity that led to its demise. And it is feared that America, by repeating Rome’s mistakes, is headed toward collapse."
http://www.rutherford.org/articles_db/commentary.asp?record_id=492
"The desire to get rid of the foreign military occupier is a universal feature of political history. To recognize the failure of force is to admit that the state cannot accomplish all that it claims it can accomplish. It is to admit the big lie. Doing so requires humility, a willingness to own up to mistakes, a desire to face reality and to think about the long term. These are traits that the state and its managers do not possess in large supply. Witness: George Bush."
http://www.mises.org/story/2690
"Today, as the inhumane and monstrous occupation of Iraq continues on its horrific, bloody daily course, we pursue the same overall policy in pursuit of further war, and to ensure America's global hegemony."
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2007/08/american-way-of-doing-business.html
"He and his speech writers will go to any lengths, however, to create the impression that keeping U.S. forces in Iraq will be good for the Iraqi people, not simply for Halliburton, Blackwater, Alliant Techsystems (the military cartridge manufacturer), and the rest of the military-industrial complex. "
http://www.lewrockwell.com/higgs/higgs65.html
"In a disgusting display of mendacity not seen since the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, a pro-war advertising campaign spearheaded by former White House spokesman Ari Fleischer is buying $15 million worth of 30-second television spots that repeat the lies linking 9/11 to Iraq – and explicitly threatening another terrorist attack in the US if we 'surrender.' It's the first storm in a season of fear."
http://antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=11498
"Cauchy pioneered the study of analysis, both real and complex, and the theory of permutation groups. He also researched in convergence and divergence of infinite series, differential equations, determinants, probability and mathematical physics."
http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/history/Mathematicians/Cauchy.html
"An American critic, satirical poet, and short-story writer, Dorothy Rothschild Parker ... is remembered as much for her flashing verbal exchanges and malicious wit as for the disenchanted stories and sketches in which she revealed her underlying pessimism."
http://www.levity.com/corduroy/parker.htm
"Isadore 'Friz' Freleng was one of the pioneers of modern animation and the creator of more than 300 cartoons featuring Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Speedy Gonzales, Tweety Pie and most notably Yosemite Sam among other classic Looney Tunes characters for Warner Bros. "
http://www.chuckjones.com/artists/friz_freleng.php
"[K]nown for both his conducting of the New York Philharmonic, including the acclaimed Young People's Concerts series, and his multiple compositions, including West Side Story, Candide and On the Town ... He is known to baby boomers primarily as the first classical music conductor to make many television appearances, all between 1954 and 1989."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Bernstein
Dystopian science fiction thriller stars Charlize Theron, Marton Csokas, Frances McDormand, Amelia Warner; directed by Karyn Kusama. “In addition to special effects and stunts, interesting costumes may often grab the viewer’s focus in this striking film. Fans of Charlize Theron will find much to enjoy, as will the devotee of dystopian science fiction. However, the screenplay adds more....”
http://endervidualism.com/agora/aeon_flux_2005.htm
"She didn’t know where she was going or what she was looking for, and was only certain of that basic fact of forward motion. That, for the moment, seemed good enough." [Main link below goes to Part I, links here for Parts 2, 3, 4, 5.]
http://markettheocracy.blogsome.com/2007/08/20/the-woman-who-hitch-hiked-with-cats-i/
"The timer buzzed. Jennifer Carolina whipped her arms down from surrender position, spun on the ball of her left foot, drew, and confronted three targets. She had done this 50 times, over days. Every time, she stumbled or fumbled or flinched or forgot to do some part of the exercise. But this time was different."
http://www.backwoodshome.com/columns/wolfe070820.html
"Does all this so-called social networking crap make you wish people would stop being so fucking friendly? Do you long to disconnect? "
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/08/22/the-noso-project-no-social-networking/
"Although some members of the crowd initially incited a metaphorical impeachment of the president, a majority felt that would be far too harsh a symbolic action to take. After agreeing on the censure, the decorous riffraff whipped themselves into a relative frenzy and clamored single file to the National Mall with the meticulously crafted Bush effigy. ... Democratic leaders were quick to distance themselves from the subdued riot out of fear that condoning even a meta-symbolic political rebuke would alienate some of their more mild-mannered constituents."
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/65581
"Aasif Mandvi surmises what would've happened if the Vietnam War lasted longer."
http://www.comedycentral.com/motherload/?lnk=v&ml_video=92044
"Stephen debates the only man he's sure is not in Al Qaeda: Stephen Colbert. "
http://www.comedycentral.com/motherload/?lnk=v&ml_video=91917
"Nothing can stop Carl Wainwright from doing what he loves best -- performing surgery on the human brain."
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/65412
"[I]f the interplay of circumstances and intelligence is thus conceived, the fact that the leading edge of human civilization has thrust forward now in one area among one people, now in another region embodied by some other nation, is far less mysterious than it should appear to Lynn and Vanhanen. How, using their theory, can they explain that three of the four "cradles" of civilization appear as low-IQ locales in their data, and, therefore, as improbable torchbearers in mankind's advance?"
http://www.mises.org/story/2677
"When should you trust the experts? That question has been the focus of much debate lately, especially given the poor track record of various 'experts' regarding issues such as whether to invade Iraq."
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/opinion_columnists/article/0,2777,DRMN_23972_5678158,00.html
"Yes, there are many realpolitik reasons for the Bush Regime's war crime in Iraq and its planned war crime for Iran. And there is much knowing cynicism, knowing lies, knowing hypocrisy, in the tactics that the Bushists use to advance their criminal agenda. But it is almost certain that when these wretched specimens look in the mirror, they see nothing but good people working hard to protect our national security (which they identify with their own narrow, elite interests) against evildoers bent on our destruction."
http://www.chris-floyd.com/content/view/1261/135/
"[T]he next version of Flash video will support H.264, AAC audio, most HD frame sizes, and -- here's the most important part of all -- will work with your graphics card to make it all run faster and with less CPU load."
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007/pulpit_20070824_002787.html
"My take is that modern painkillers are an unalloyed good to which we should be happy to have access--even if some people choose to use them recreationally. Hell, recreational use doesn't necessarily strike me as a bad thing either, so long as people don't over-do it. But a lot of people in this country seem to have trouble coming to terms with the idea that it can be morally acceptable to take and dispense substances that make people feel good."
http://www.tuccille.com/blog/2007/08/and-so.html
"So I guess once you're elected to Congress, you're immune from drunk driving laws; you can stash the evidence that you've committed a crime in your office, because investigators aren't allowed to search it; if you kill someone because you've got a lead foot and blew a stop sign, the taxpayers will cover your financial liability; and, we learn today, you can commit whatever Internet-related crimes you please, because the police aren't allowed to search your computer."
http://www.theagitator.com/archives/028078.php#028078
"On May 11, 2007, Mort Sahl turned eighty. He was a pioneer in stand-up comedy. He broke through the tradition of jokes about airplane food, Asian drivers, booze and frigid wives, instead sharing his wit and insights about political hypocrisy, racism, marijuana laws and monogamy."
http://www.counterpunch.org/krassner08252007.html
"McCausland says that he is neither a coder nor a Linux guru, and that he does not want to go back to jail. He also reiterated that he does not want to circumvent the terms of his probation. He just isn't sure why the government is allowed to force him to switch operating systems. He also says that his lawyer agrees with his point of view. In the mean time, he has added a donation link to his blog to help pay for the cost of a Windows license."
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070824-court-orders-movie-pirate-to-switch-to-windows.html
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