I've been thinking a while about the case of Google Books massive scanning project. It reminds me of the Harvester machines from Terminator Salvation. Google was hell-bent on acquiring books and it eventually became a battle between publishers and the Google Harvester. Publishers at least had the funds to hire attorneys and the ramifications of what Google Books will become haven't even begun to take hold.

The UK Government wants to introduce a law to allow anyone to use your photographs commercially, or in ways you might not like, without asking you first.

In reading more about the UK Digital Economy Bill, I realize something bigger than any individual has been put into motion: the world-wide culture of content harvesting.

Without exaggeration, Google's business model dictates it must own all the world's content. Right now everybody is okay with that because we all use Google's Web, image, news, blog, map, book, and scholar search services. Every day we are telling Google they are doing what we want.

So why should it surprise anyone when companies use the Internet in the same way individuals do (see image above)? Companies are made of people. Governments are run by people. When it became a cultural norm to pirate books, movies, music, and photographs, why wouldn't company employees do what they do at home?

Enter Clause 43 of the UK Digital Economy Bill. The language legitimizes unauthorized use of intellectual property by lumping all work on the Internet into a "collective". The philosophy seems to be this: creators who put any content on the Internet divorce themselves of control of that content. Side note: I'm seeing more questioning of the hive mentality (recommended reading You are Not a Gaget by Jaron Lanier).

My internal question machine kicks into gear:

• Does accidental publishing of content put it into the collective to be used?
• Can content be retracted?
• Is there any direct recourse for individuals who retract published work?
• Can a web-based service's failure to hide private content provide any recourse for individuals whose works became part of the collective?
• Will I see my daughter's face on a can of soup one day?
• What are the international ramifications? Specifically, does that mean if I know a photographer in the UK, for example, can I use his work without telling him?
• Can people in the UK use my stuff without my permission?
• Who decides what is and isn't in the collective?
• Most importantly: what does this mean for people who make a living as artists and writers? Will the "licensing body" feed their children and pay their rent?

I could come up with questions along those lines all day. Many content creators could.

I agree with the opponents of this legislation. But this is a basic problem with society in general. When things are left up to a government to decide, they will screw it up. Just because technology poses hard questions to answer, we shouldn't leave it up to government bodies to decide. Culturally the world is saying they want everything for free. A large part of the solution is to work on public campaigns, education, and real solutions as to how to handle intellectual property.  The war between people and companies will get nastier, especially when governments feel compelled to get involved and have such a history of siding where the money is.

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Fair warning: the following is a rant. No, I'm not flying a plane into a building. At worst I may kill this mosquito buzzing around my desk or break a pencil or two. However, there is a churning in my gut that feels different than most afternoons after lunch. I've been ignoring politics as of late and I think I need a release. I'll tackle health care and demonstrate to you why normal people like you and I don't belong anywhere near Washington DC. See these demonstrators to the right in that photo from a health care rally? There's a day they'll never get back.

Who Made What Arguments?

First, I know the President said every argument about health care reform has been made. Really? Really? I'm not sure either side has formed anything more coherent than "death panels" and "unregulated this or that". It appears that the only way to debate in DC is to run to the cluster of cameras on the Capitol steps and spew a bunch of soundbites.  The level of debate is so infantile it could be sponsored by Pampers.

There is a business discipline called Process Improvement. Process Improvement experts look at existing systems and figure out where to cut costs and improve productivity. Seems to me if you were to apply Process Improvement principles to health care, your first stop would be the source of most problems, congress.

While I'm at it, I have to ask: why have businesses been dragged into health care reform? That's another tumor you can lob off health care's ass. Why does the quality of your health care depend on your HR department cutting a good deal with Blue Cross? Insurance companies virtually dress like NASCAR drivers with logos everywhere. Your employer is more of a sponsor for your health insurance company than a customer.

Wouldn't be more fair to have free market health insurance with FDIC-like protection where you are in groups based on your local hospitals?

Image via Wikipedia

Today's Lesson in Self-Indulgence

The only law on the floor of either side of the Capitol right now should be to make it illegal for any lawyer to be a lawmaker. I can't think of any other profession that has somebody looking out for them like the legal profession. How would you like it if the people who ran the country kept coming up with new ways for you to be infinitely employed? For every law written, a new legal niche opens and one more ambulance chaser has his rabbit hole.

Nothing about proposed health care is about making things simpler and more affordable for people directly affected: patients, doctors, and insurance companies. In reality this is an exercise in complicating everything so more consultants can over-bill. It's like our tax code. Hey, you remember Sarbanes Oxley? You know how that was supposed to prevent future financial meltdowns? Yeah, health care will be like that: nothing solved but everybody involved will have to work harder to get what they have today.

How About Prerequisites?

If you could actually get any professional politician in touch with their constituents, you would solve all sorts of quantum physics problems, including time travel and tunneling to Bizarro World. I propose before any of the  morons in Washington even breath "health care reform" from their intern-licking mouths, they go on sabbatical. During said sabbatical, they must complete the following:

• Work for three years in the corporate world, during which time they don't get a raise, have benefits cut, get laid off several times, pay for COBRA, collect unemployment until it runs out, and get rehired. After getting rehired, they have to spend a year paying a $12,000 deductible before the next open enrollment so they can pick a better insurance plan.

• 

  Image via Wikipedia

  Run a small business with fewer than say, 50 employees. And it should be in an industry where the majority of employees are minimum wage but accidents are likely, something employing truck drivers or dock workers. They should also have to do this in states where they pay quarterly taxes, just to make it interesting. Then have them try and figure out how to get all employees to sign up for coverage so the few that want it can have it and those that don't can complain constantly about their withholdings. In addition, every quarter, the insurance company gets to jack up rates or drop the company altogether because one of the employees has cancer.

• Also they need spouses to have have at least one major accident, something like falling out of a tree while pruning it or getting hit by a neighbor's car while checking the mail. Here's the stipulation: they must have an HMO during these incidents and forget to call their primary doctors before dialing 911. They  must also try to hold on to a full-time job while the spouse is incapacitated. They have to remain in this situation until all medical bills are taken care of.
• Finally, they must have aging parents on fixed incomes who need medicine for serious conditions like Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, or MS. They cannot afford to pay somebody else to care for them, so they have to figure out long-term care while physically bathing and changing their parents' adult diapers.

Maybe, just maybe, by going through these things, they might be qualified to work on health care reform.

You're not really expecting anything significant from this current legislation I hope. If so, then I hate to break it to you, Dwayne Johnson is not the real tooth fairy.

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Why Government Sucks

Since I have a real job, I can't spend all of my time reading documents from other professions in a lame attempt to know everything. For example, as much as I search WebMD, I don't feel comfortable writing my friends' Hydrocodone prescriptions anymore. I didn't go to school for eight years and then suffer more years of an abusive residency under tyrannical, self-important, already-established doctors so I could become one myself.

When I read in Bloomberg today about idiotic senators apparently thinking elections are shortcuts around medical school, I had to rant (see Ruin Your Health With the Obama Stimulus Plan: Betsy McCaughey). I read the bill for myself.

I am not going to quote since it's long-winded, vague, full of passive voice, and wrist-slittingly boring. So if you want, have at it here.

The brainiacs pushing this stimulus down our throats have also decided to shove some health care regulations into our tax holes too. There are so many things wrong with the health care section alone the bill should be exploded. It is going to create some kind of information technology standard by which health care providers (i.e. your doctors) will have to conform. This standard is not defined, but membership is required. That's all my doctor needs is yet another cost to pass on to the insurance companies so they can pass it on to me. All health care needs in general is one more layer of bureaucracy to second guess and frustrate doctors right out of business.

Have any of these so-called leaders ever had to fight an insurance company over asthma meds? Have any of them spend 10 or more hours a week for months trying to justify why they didn't call their doctor for permission to go to an emergency room after an accident? Has one of them even tried to figure out why people hate HMOs?

Imagine a future where not only you must fight insurance companies over your doctor's treatments but you also fight government agencies, all because these soulless hacks just had to stick this on the stimulus bill. This all feels like a prostate exam.

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I predicted it would happen and then it did (see Congressman Twitters Security Breach).

"Just landed in Baghdad," messaged Hoekstra, a former chairman of the Intelligence panel and now the ranking member, who is routinely entrusted to keep some of the nation's most closely guarded secrets.

Before the delegation left Washington, they were advised to keep the trip to themselves for security reasons. A few media outlets, including Congressional Quarterly, learned about it, but agreed not to disclose anything until the delegation had left Iraq.

Nobody expected, though, that a lawmaker with such an extensive national security background would be the first to break the silence. And in such a big way.

Not only did Hoekstra reveal the existence of the lawmakers' trip, but included details about their itinerary in updates posted every few hours on his Twitter page, until he suddenly stopped, for some reason, on Friday morning.

Just a reminder, these are the people who "lead" us. Their hands were all over the bailouts, too. Idiots.

A Quiet Flame

I finished A Quiet Flame by Philip Kerr the other day. I can't get enough of Bernie Gunther and his hard boiled cynicism. In this fifth book of the series, he winds up in Argentina in 1950. It was a fascinating read as Kerr knows his history well and expertly mixes it into his narrative.

So after I finished, I got on the Web to look up some of the events mentioned in the book. Curiously absent from Wikipedia is any mention of Nazi war criminals at all. None. Not even in the Argentina talk page. I can't even begin to speculate why.

But the lack of anything about Nazis escaping to Argentina on Wikipedia is part of the scary side of crowd-sourcing. Crowd-sourcing's design-by-committee ways are effective at keeping things unpublished.

Maybe nobody brought it up. Maybe it was suppressed. Maybe nobody cares.

In his author's note at the end of A Quite Flame, Kerr recommends Uki Goni's The Real Odessa as a resource on Nazis in Argentina. I certainly can't recommend any place online to get the same information.

Why is everyone surprised when the banking bailout turns into a catastrophic failure? The AP is shocked, shocked I tell you that executives are still holding on to their jobs after the bailout (see AP: 9 in 10 execs at bailout banks remain on job). What did the AP think was going to happen to these guys? They took the handout directly themselves. It's not like they were going to fire each other.

My children interact with other kids who have a hand out with a harsh sense of entitlement. We call those kids assholes spoiled and avoid them and their parents.  These kids are our apparent future banking leaders.

Banking executives were rewarded for bad decisions, just like the people who handed over the bailout money keep getting elected in spite of their own dysfunctional legacies. There is no greater irony I've witnessed than that of congress lecturing car companies on fiscal responsibility. The only thing worse than that was the pathetic car execs with their fake remorseful faces holding their hands out. Where is John Galt to tell them to get the hell out of his way?

There is apparently some ignorance in human behavior in the media. Fire, hot, burn. No more wood. Put it out.

So the new Obama administration comes in and is bewildered by the lack of modern computers in the White House . Their reaction was naive at best. Many of the staffers who were complaining probably never heard of TEMPEST. And what's the deal with whining to the press that they don't have Macintoshes? (see Staff Finds White House in the Technological Dark Ages).

What does that mean in 21st-century terms? No Facebook to communicate with supporters. No outside e-mail log-ins. No instant messaging. Hard adjustments for a staff that helped sweep Obama to power through, among other things, relentless online social networking.

...

One member of the White House new-media team came to work on Tuesday, right after the swearing-in ceremony, only to discover that it was impossible to know which programs could be updated, or even which computers could be used for which purposes. The team members, accustomed to working on Macintoshes, found computers outfitted with six-year-old versions of Microsoft software. Laptops were scarce, assigned to only a few people in the West Wing. The team was left struggling to put closed captions on online videos.

You're in the White House, dudes! That's the highest of high levels. It doesn't get any higher than that. Besides complying with the Presidential Records Act, try not tweeting (click graphic to see more) about how the President is sending missiles into Sudan or is going to travel using the backroads to Camp David.  While it's refreshing to see an administration attempting to operate in a more modern way, I think ignorance of security is inexcusable. I hope these aren't the same guys who are also tasked with national infrastructure security (see Hackers Lurking in Obama's Web Site):

Hackers have registered bogus accounts on Obama's online community, my.barackobama.com, where they are posting images designed to set off a chain of events that lead to malicious Trojan horse programs. These programs are stepping stones used by hackers to download more and more malware onto a victim's computer.

The problem on Obama's Web site is not unique. Hackers and the operators of popular Web sites are often caught in a cat and mouse game, with the bad guys constantly finding a new way of uploading malicious programs just as soon as one avenue of attack is closed. Social-networking sites want to give their users as many cool ways of enhancing their own Web pages as possible -- my.barackobama.com lets users create their own blogs -- while at the same time reining in any misuse.

"The U.S. Presidential campaign has shown the world how governments can leverage Web 2.0," Websense wrote on a company blog outlining the issue Monday. "However, this ... is yet another opportunity to spread more malicious code."

What's good for Silicon Valley is not necessarily good for national security. I hope the administration starts to show some interest in keeping information locked down and malicious code away from government tech.

What's up with the President becoming the "president"? I had this sneaky feeling that something had changed since second grade, when they wheeled a TV into my classroom and had to let it warm up for 30 minutes so I could see Carter's inauguration. I was told then if it's the President of the United States, it was capitalized. Gotcha. Capitalized. It was of those things that stuck with me from school along with kiss chase and getting paddled in the office regularly.

Out of habit, I've been capitalizing "president" in that context since then. Today it struck me that nobody is anymore. A few Google searches later, I saw where the style for many news organizations is to only capitalize a political title if it's Speaker of the House. Okay, that seems kind of random.

Fortunately, there's an entire book on this topic; see "President of the United States" or "president of the United States"?: An Historical Analysis of the Evolution of the Presidency (or presidency).  The authors are Richard J. Hardy, Ph.D., Department of Political Science, Western Illinois University and David J. Webber, Ph.D., Department of Political Science, University of Missouri-Columbia, so the focus of the paper is on the political reasons for the change. It's almost as good as the angry debate I had with other tech writers at the 1997 STC conference in Anaheim regarding if there should be one or two spaces after a period (one space naturally--you're not using a Selectric anymore).

Anyway read the whole thing. It's fascinating. From the Abstract:

The data clearly reveal that before the Nixon Administration, the vast majority of publications employed the uppercase referent to the "President." However, beginning with the Nixon Administration and accelerating in the late-1970s, this near universal standard changed dramatically. Moreover, our study suggests that, contrary to popular belief, it was neither journalists, grammarians, publishers nor politicians, but prominent presidential scholars (viz., Thomas E. Cronin and George E. Reedy) who led the nation's intellectual charge to make the lowercase "president" the rule rather than the exception. We believe this grammatical relegation represents, to a large extent, both a desire by leading political scientists to make the office appear less "imperial " and a significant symbolic reaction to presidential transgressions concerning the Viet Nam War and, most importantly, the Watergate Scandal. These alterations, we contend, thus redound more from the desire by prominent political scientists to "de-imperialize" or "de-glamorize" the office than any concerted effort to establish "grammatical correctness."

If you've been following me for any length of time, you know I have conservative leanings, especially when it comes to national defense issues. Call me crazy, but when somebody says they want to kill you, they might mean it.

Another thing is that I come from a family who owns a small business. Over the years, I've never been able to figure out why businesses are our country's tax collectors. That's pretty much the basis for my conservatism.

Well, that and a belief that whatever government touches gets screwed up. You name it, and the government has demonstrated absolute ineptness when it comes to spending money responsibly. There was nothing stranger than congress lecturing car companies on fiscal responsibility.

So I was doing some thinking. After the election, there was so much Obama worship going on that people seemed to have forgotten that government sucks. I had people I know express disgust that I didn't vote for Obama. To them I say that I gravitate toward conservative values and I ate a big shit sandwich this election. Can I not respect Obama but hate his politics? We have a two-party system and I had to make a choice. I wasn't going to not vote. I guess I have a 50/50 chance of being a dumbass, considering the political affiliation of who's judging.

Today, as I watched the inauguration ceremony, I had mixed feelings.  I thought, cool, a black man is president. I always believed the right guy could pull it off. However, I also thought the PR campaign he successfully used to get elected had a huge bearing on how he was perceived today. Obama may be the 44th President, but he's still human and he will still play political games. So I came up with this reminder to everybody who thinks just because we have a new President things will be different this time (click the graphic for the full size).

I'm watching the Obama acceptance speech. I'm am convinced beyond any doubt that anybody will accept anything as long as it's in a nice package.

He said something about those who didn't vote for him: "I hear your voices." I'm not sure I can articulate my disappointment in our culture. The only voices he's heard are those of his handlers. He doesn't give a damn about America or for anyone outside of his immediate family. For the record, I don't think McCain does either. But as I'm watching this, the cameras are focusing in on the crowd. Each shot is a mix of black and white with tears in their eyes or a look of awe on their faces as if they were extras in Close Encounters during the landing scene. It feels contrived as if a producer is making sure to frame each shot in such a way they have looped footage for days.

I don't see hope or change. I see a savvy politician who was a better fund raiser than George Bush run a campaign that tugged on heartstrings like John Edwards in front of a jury. His entire speech is filled with sugar-pill sound bites. I will admit that lofty rhetoric is what is expected at a speech like this, but to me his speech is just another stop on the same road. The prospect of his inexperience ignored because he's so dreamy has ushered in the era of the manufactured candidate.

Obama represents the generation of celebrity, similar to Paris Hilton or Julia Allison: he's famous because he's famous. He is now President because he is famous for being famous. How very meta. His handlers took a guy with a far left ideology, but no experience and very few skeletons, and reinvented him to be the perfect candidate.

I guess this has been coming for a while in bits. Marketing and advertising and public relations have saturated our culture into thinking each person is a brand. Now we have an election that was based entirely on minute-by-minute spin. Will Obama lead our country based on the latest polling data? Of course. His job for the next four years is to keep his job for another four years.

The worst part about this election is lack of control or input I feel. I never would have picked either candidate. In fact, both parties suck and if they aren't force-feeding the public pre-determined, over-analyzed, over-think, they are punishing nonconformists who somehow made it into office. I'm pretty sure it's just me since tens-of-thousands of people in Chicago are welcoming our new manufactured overlord, but I feel like a real outsider. I think I'd feel the same way with McCain, but less because at least he has some sort of record. Maybe I realized this year how pointless this stuff really is. The reality is so far removed from the discourse it's actually making French philosophers appear to be onto something.

This is the year the electoral process has jumped the shark. Starting in the summer of the year before the election year transformed the Presidential election into retail Christmas; Christmas used to be special until stores tried to beat each other with early displays. The time between election cycles will grow shorter and will concurrently drain optimism from the electorate. All this election has done is reinforce what we all know but don't dare say lest we bash the candidate we support: quality people do not go into politics.

Neither McCain nor Obama are quality people. I believe the closer someone is to the White House the further removed that person is from what is presented for the cameras. Obama, for example, is a young Chicago politician who will do whatever it takes and say whatever he can to move forward, but he's managed and is presented as the ideal candidate who is beyond ugly politics. Everything he does is orchestrated by committee and everything he says is scripted by consensus.

McCain fell into the same trappings upon the receipt of the Republican nomination. His message changed because he was being handled. His handlers knew he had to appeal to the conservative base and he severed his bipartisan history without batting an eye. I don't agree with his bipartisan ways, but he is certainly not honest with who he is.

When a person submits to being managed in order to get elected, that person is not genuine by default. The presentation becomes the message. I think this is one reason people easily spot gaffes and inconsistencies with nearly every speech. The candidate is uttering things he would never have said on his own because he doesn't believe in them. Barak Obama no more believes in a wealth-generating free market economy than McCain believes in border security. However, the news cycle has forced their campaigns to publish fluid opinions that become "re-framed" repeatedly based on polls and consultants' research.

Obama claims he is not a socialist, but continues to say things here and there to indicate he is. In his first book he admitted to being drawn to socialists in college. But the script says he must deny it, so he does. McCain is not a maverick. If he was, he would not stay on script and he would not have to say he was a maverick to everyone. If Michelle and Barak were just like average Americans, they wouldn't have to tell us. It would be obvious. Don't get me started on Palin's joe-six-pack schtick.

This persona manufacturing is getting old. PR is helpful to present an official voice, but there is a point when PR moves from being a consistent message into a world of fantasy. In the fantasy world, the candidates don't offend anybody at any time and can be everything to everyone. Who do you know is like that? As unrealistic as the fantasy candidate is, people seem hungry for it. It's scary how people gulp down every ounce of their chosen candidates as the truth when, as I just pointed out, there is no truth from either candidate.

The other part of this is how the campaigns have taken advantage of the country's hunger for leadership. There has been a leadership deficit in American government for a while now. There is a leadership crisis and I think that's why people seem to care which celebrity endorses which candidate. It's desperation for any kind of leadership when Matt Damon, Alec Baldwin, and Ted Nugent help people form political opinions. The campaigns seem to know this and play along with campaign stops on Letterman, The Daily Show, and Saturday Night Live. How much of Obama is celebrity versus genuine leadership? Based on what I've seen, his celebrity far exceeds his actual experience as a leader, but since he is projected as a leader, his emotional appeal trumps the logical question of his experience. I have actually read forums on various political Web sites where people say things like "and I've written to Obama about this" as if their email messages were prayers.

As many have said about this year's election, it is historic. However, I think it is historic not because Obama could be the first black president or because McCain could bring the first woman VP with him to the White House. It's not because record numbers will vote or because it will be as close as the election of 2000. I think it is historic because millions of Americans have accepted the PR releases, talking points, and staged image as perfectly acceptable in lieu of a real person. I think this is the year expectations are so low that crafted, calculated personas are just the way things are.

World leaders who went to Olympics endorsed the current regime. No, not directly, but it's already being spun that way in China and naturally the punditry echoes that in various forms (see Olympic success may empower China's leaders: Government quick to take credit for country's impressive medal haul):

Indeed, the 2008 Games seemed likely to go down as a political as well as an athletic victory for China, reinforcing the image of party leaders as adroit managers of the world's largest nation on a double-step march toward greater prosperity. In the view of the Chinese, the appearance of dozens of foreign leaders during the Games, including President Bush, meant the world had effectively endorsed the Communist Party's rule, despite its continued political repression.

"The party state was clearly a winner in the eyes of the people," said David Shambaugh, a George Washington University China specialist who was in Beijing for the Games and who wrote a recently published book on the Chinese Communist Party.

The emphasis on China's national achievements was intense, responding to guidance from the Central Propaganda Department as well as spontaneous pride. The U.S. lead in the overall medal count was nearly ignored, for instance, in favor of China's winning tally of gold. In another example of the tone, the headline over a story on the success of Australia's Matthew Mitcham in a diving competition Thursday read: "Mitcham Ruins China's Clean Sweep in Diving."

Oh they are going to break their own arms patting themselves on their collective communist backs. This was the very reason I had a problem with the media types tiptoeing around the Olympics, trying not to upset their host for fear of getting their plugs pulled. NBC is just another oppressive-government-butt-kissing corporation, similar to Google who has Chinese government censoring enabled just for the privileged of being there.

Many people have already compared this years' Olympics to the 1936 Olympics in Germany (take a long stroll through that site for a good history of the '36 games in Germany). There are many parallels that apply, especially the way both countries used the Olympics as a vehicle for legitimacy. Right now there is a lot of chatter about how modern China is and how great it is that they pulled off the Olympics with such perfection. Germany was praised for the same thing right up until WWII.

Okay, I'll kick off the end of my long absence with a local story (see Commissioner Defends Position That 'Black Hole' is Racist Term).

Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price is sticking to his comments that the term "black hole," which a colleague used, is racist.Price also says language such as "angel food cake" and "devil's food cake" are also racially insensitive.

Other racially insensitive terms I want in on the ground floor to objecting:

• white out
• red eye
• greenhouse effect (definitely offended at that one)
• little red wagon
• white liberal guilt
• brown bear
• black bear
• blond headed
• redhead
• brown rice
• white rice
• fried rice
• head lice
• old spice
• green thumb
• green tea
• dog poop brown (the color of a car I drove in high school)
• any color associated with crayons, curtains, carpets, tiles, grout, cars, paint, wallpaper, and sheets like "rogue red", "peaceful pink", and "yummy yellow"

Come to think of it, let's just ban English altogether.

Earlier this week, a most excellent opinion piece was published by the Christian Science Monitor on the constitutionality of nationalized health-care: Must You Buy Health Insurance.

In making the case for her plan to mandate private health insurance, Clinton said in a recent Democratic debate that not doing so "would be as though Franklin Roosevelt said, 'Let's make Social Security voluntary,' or if President [Lyndon] Johnson said, 'Let's make Medicare voluntary.'"

In fact, under the law, there's a big difference between participation in a government health program funded by taxes and privatizing such a program, with individuals forced to purchase private health insurance.

Taxation involves representation, as when Congress appropriates money and controls a government program for the general welfare. This describes Social Security and Medicare. But government cannot simply delegate its taxing powers to private business.

What representation do we have in the insurance firms whose products we would be required to buy, at prices and terms they set? Can we vote out an insurer's board of directors for denying claims or paying its CEO a multimillion-dollar salary? Here, too, the Supreme Court has drawn a distinction between taxes imposed by government and mandatory fees set by entities with private interests.

A health insurance mandate is essentially a forced contract, in which one party (the insurer) gets to set the terms. You must buy their policies, even if you prefer to self-insure, rely on alternative medicine, or obtain treatment outside the system. In constitutional terms, such mandates may constitute a violation of due process or a "taking of property."

So I took more time off. It's one of those things I can't control. Actually two of those things. Okay, there are three. Three things I can't control. Seeing how my number one priority is to my day job and my family, I had to make some sacrifices. But as it all got too much for me and I wanted attention, I threw myself down a flight of stairs quite accidentally and broke my knee cap. Fortunately, I don't need surgery and I'm in physical therapy (read: sadism) with a guy who only knows how to increase weights on weak joints arbitrarily and then laughs at each attempt to perform his exercises.

The one thing that is overwhelming to me is the saturation of cynicism I feel as the final three blowhards duke it out for the Presidential Race. None are quality people and I had no idea what I was expecting, really. Maybe I want somebody to show a little character or backbone. How about somebody who would say, "Yes, my staffer called Hillary a 'monster'. So f-ing what? She is a monster and my staffer doesn't like her. Get over it." I pull a lever over that kind of honesty.

But alas, you can only count on the dishonesty and spin. Also there are the daily verbal snipes at each other. McCain can try to avoid it, but he can't stay at the kids table much longer. He will be eventually pulled into doing what he has to do to survive, like a high school wannabe trying to fit in with the mean girls.

The point is that the talent in the United States, all the captains of industry, all of people who know how to get shit done, and all of the visionaries who can see us in a better place have seemed to disappear in a weird Atlas Shrugged sort of way. The only people left in politics are two-dimensional sleazebags who would rather grin on TV than do real work, requiring planning and thinking. The adults left politics a long time ago and left the bullies and losers.

I didn't vote in the primaries and I think I will end up voting recklessly in the general election since it's important and there are times I like to spit into the wind just to see if really will hit me on the way back.

Both Republicans and Democrats should be mourning their parties right now. The Republicans have effectively demonstrated their complete inability to do anything meaningful after 8 years of control. No tax reform. No tort reform. No serious national security reform. The Democrats have done nothing but bitch and complain for 8 years and have proven themselves to be nothing better than indulged children fighting over plastic trucks while the rest of the playground is on fire. I find it particularly amusing that Hillary and Obama are competing to see who can tell the biggest whopper.

Obama seems to be really growing into his arrogance and it is beginning to fit like a tailored suite. He is what Bill Clinton was in 1992, but without all of trailer trash stuck in his pants.

Why so cynical? Because our country has devolved into a place where words have a shelf life of a few hours after the spin and over-management of each soundbite. The Presidential candidates are nothing more than micromanaged props and they lead the news every day.

I already have election apathy. I stopped watching broadcast news regularly about a year or so after I realized all it consisted of was videos of whiny senators and representatives complaining about each other. That's not news; it's torture. It's nearly impossible to watch any news without some in depth story on the Presidential campaign, but not real coverage of the issues. The news is all about the horse race and I couldn't care less.

We've had around two dozen debates collectively between the two parties and we are just now a year away from the actual, real election. States are competing to be the first to hold primaries like children fighting for the "good" seats on a school bus--they will all still end up riding together. The mud-slinging has started and political operatives are digging up everything they can on the candidates. I doubt we'll have an October surprise in 2008 since everybody is already spilling what they have in near real time. I feel like I'm in a department store that has Christmas decorations out before Easter.

The media has catered to all of the candidates and their gun-jumping press conferences, fund raisers, whistle stops, and idiotic YouTube debates. It's incredible the amount of glowing coverage these people get for trying to outdo each other. Then I think about who these candidates actually are. Only a handful of them are officially working as a candidate as a full time job. The rest are senators, representatives, and a governor. Shouldn't they be working? I guess it's good they may be too busy to work on stupid legislation, but at the same time I don't like idea of these guys getting congressional pay to campaign.

This precedent of campaigning so early could mean the next President will have to spend more than half of the first term campaigning for re-election. At that time, what's the point? Who cares who you vote for? It's not like the President will do much since the job description involves never-ending campaigning. You can add that to the relatively new job of spending a large chunk of time fighting with Congress and the Senate over their soundbites of the day.

My election apathy has taken hold. It's hard not to be cynical when the politics trump everything else.

The city of Philadelphia has decided that the Boy Scouts aren't trendy enough. Since every prime time TV show has a token gay character, the Boy Scouts must really be out of step (see: Boy Scouts' Rent Hiked Over Gay Ban). That's really the only motivation I can think of where a city with such a sordid history of corruption and racial preferences would take on this issue.

For a while now, the British government's tentacles seem to creep into every facet of its citizens lives. I've been following reports of everything from a family expelled from their neighborhood to government intervention to remove an obese boy from his mother. While noble on the surface, the continuing loss of UK citizen rights is disturbing to watch.

Yesterday, I found an article on proposed changes by the Tories to NHS policies that would deny medical benefits to people with "unhealthy" lifestyles (see 'NHS should not treat those with unhealthy lifestyles' say Tories):

Patients would be handed "NHS Health Miles Cards" allowing them to earn reward points for losing weight, giving up smoking, receiving immunisations or attending regular health screenings.

Like a supermarket loyalty card, the points could be redeemed as discounts on gym membership and fresh fruit and vegetables, or even give priority for other public services - such as jumping the queue for council housing.

. . . . .

The report calls for a greater emphasis on the "citizen's responsibility" to be healthy and says no one should expect taxpayers to fund their unhealthy lifestyles.

Yet while the Health Miles Card would award points for giving up smoking and losing weight, it could penalise those who are already fit and well because they would receive no benefits under the scheme.

It's funny the article compares the proposed card to grocery store discount cards, used to track individual purchasing habits in exchange for discounts and rewards. These cards are enticement for individuals to be profiled and scrutinized. I have often wondered how far in the future health insurance companies will go to find out what individuals are buying. If you buy red meat or candy bars, could that cause you to pay higher premiums? In the case of this proposed "NHS Health Miles Card", I wonder if the governing policies will be as broad and, at the same time, nebulous as the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003. How subjective will "unhealthy" be? Does somebody with a broken leg become unhealthy because they stop going to gym while healing? As studies come out (almost published daily these days), does the standard for "unhealthy" change depending on the study? If a person chooses not to take medicines in lieu of alternative treatment, is that individual cut off?

If such a plan comes to pass, the NHS would face a whole new set of problems aside from trying to define unhealthy. Those cut off from the program are still tax payers, paying for the NHS. Also it's worth noting that the philosophy of socialized medicine is everybody gets equal access to the same resources. The proposal may not happen, but it is a clear indication of the control mentality of Tory officials.

Yesterday, I read about how Lord Justice Sedley is advocating a national DNA database to track everybody in the UK, not just convicted criminals. Naturally this is under the guise of law enforcement. He referred to unsolved crimes. As we have learned from many past events, good intentions can lead to the most dire of situations. I can't imagine what a government that wants to cut off health care for unhealthy people would do with a library of DNA. The potential for abuse and misuse is limitless. See Judge wants everyone in UK on DNA database.

Today, Shami Chakrabarti, the director of the human rights organisation Liberty, warned against potential changes to how and when British authorities collected DNA data.

"The DNA debate reveals just how casual some people have become about the value of personal privacy," she said.

"A database of those convicted of sexual and violent crime is a perfectly sensible crimefighting measure.

"A database of every man, woman and child in the country is a chilling proposal, ripe for indignity, error and abuse."

The emphasis is mine. Chakrabarti is exactly right. Personal liberties and privacy erode as the culture accepts the constant, piece-by-piece dismantling of rights. There is no conspiracy. Instead there is a general cultural acceptance that the government knows best and people shouldn't take care of themselves. I can't speak with much knowledge of European culture, but this micro-management of UK citizens reminds me of the detail in the European Union's constitution. Instead of securing basic liberties and relying on law, the nearly 500 pages of the constitution tries to address nearly everything the authors could think up (see A Constitution for Europe). Why is so much regulation and control acceptable? The U.S. government is bad enough and I feel smothered as it is.

It's disturbing to see civil liberties destroyed by overzealous legislators, using law enforcement or public interest as an excuse.

The Telegraph is reporting that China is threatening damage to the U.S. dollar by liquidating U.S. holding: China threatens 'nuclear option' of dollar sales.

Two officials at leading Communist Party bodies have given interviews in recent days warning - for the first time - that Beijing may use its $1.33 trillion (£658bn) of foreign reserves as a political weapon to counter pressure from the US Congress. Shifts in Chinese policy are often announced through key think tanks and academies.

Described as China's "nuclear option" in the state media, such action could trigger a dollar crash at a time when the US currency is already breaking down through historic support levels.

It would also cause a spike in US bond yields, hammering the US housing market and perhaps tipping the economy into recession. It is estimated that China holds over $900bn in a mix of US bonds.

Xia Bin, finance chief at the Development Research Centre (which has cabinet rank), kicked off what now appears to be government policy with a comment last week that Beijing's foreign reserves should be used as a "bargaining chip" in talks with the US.

"Of course, China doesn't want any undesirable phenomenon in the global financial order," he added.

He Fan, an official at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, went even further today, letting it be known that Beijing had the power to set off a dollar collapse if it choose to do so.

"China has accumulated a large sum of US dollars. Such a big sum, of which a considerable portion is in US treasury bonds, contributes a great deal to maintaining the position of the dollar as a reserve currency. Russia, Switzerland, and several other countries have reduced the their dollar holdings.

Capitalism only works if its practitioners are moral and ethical. For so long, we have pursued interest in China for the economic advantage of cheap imports while turning a blind eye to China's communist totalitarianism. Because the U.S. has not held firm to its former values and policies when dealing with communist countries, our trading has done nothing but strengthened a government that should have collapsed on itself, much like the Soviet Union.

China's stance is all about control. In the same way that terrorists use violence and the media to their advantage, China hopes to control U.S. behavior with threats they are willing to carry out. China doesn't want any other country controlling or interfering in state affairs and they have put themselves in the position to execute a cyberwar, an information war, and now an economic war. Meanwhile, they continue to strengthen their military and have dealings with terrorist-sponsoring countries like Iran.

If this isn't proof enough that the U.S. State Department and our foreign policies need to be completely reevaluated, then I don't know what will do it. Hillary Clinton is cited in the article as making comments against Chinese economic control in U.S. interests, but it means little since she's been proven to be a calculated liar. I don't see much real action being generated from her camp to actually solving the China problem.

When the U.S. government and its people finally take any attempt to terrorize, blackmail, or manipulate as a threat to national security, then things will change. Until then, we will bend over backwards to keep the Chinese trading with us at the expense of our sovereignty, independence, and dignity.

Too funny (via Michelle Malkin): Friday night fun: Flush this!

Insert American politician jokes here:

Report: Man with Almost No Brain Has Led Normal Life

More imports from China are apparently tainted (see US: Chinese Seafood Detained for Safety). This is the latest in an alarmingly high number of "accidents" related to imports from China. I wonder how serious this really is. By that I mean that the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department consistently downplay terrorist threats and security issues we have with other countries. This can be because there are sources and methods that should remain secret. However, when it comes to trade relations with countries like China or Saudi Arabia, the State Department is too kind and certainly will not air the real truth. When it comes to major trading partners, the U.S. would rather avoid ruffling feathers.

To me, we have lost our moral backbone and use diplomacy to excuse bad behavior from trading partners. Carefully worded press conferences avoid calling oppression by its name. The two best examples I can think of are China and Saudi Arabia, because of their blatant oppression of their own citizens or overt actions against U.S. interests.

China is a communist country, which means by definition it suppresses dissidence and oppresses its citizens. Family homes are torn down and the occupants are left homeless to make room for Western-style development managed by the government. Medical patients are experimented on like lab rats so the government can claim medical breakthroughs. Organs are even harvested from some otherwise healthy patients. Children work as slaves in mining operations.

How does the United States respond to all of these things? By ignoring them of course. We allow American companies to do business there because we think it helps everybody. What we are doing is something we never did for the Soviet Union: we are fueling the government's ability to remain stable, perpetrating the oppression and the power-hungry tyrants running the country.

Saudi Arabia, while not communist is far from being a free society. I laugh at the comparisons of the U.S. to the government in Orwell's 1984. Jimmy Carter's insulting "apartheid" label applied to Israel is more stupid than funny. However, when you take those comparisons and apply them to Saudi Arabia, they actually fit.

Saudi Arabia may provide us oil, but they also provide many of the gears in the international human trafficking machine. This is a country that arrests people for being Christians too close to Mecca. They have religious police that make sure the country doesn't celebrate holidays like Valentine's Day. Its wealth waters the seeds of international terrorism, mostly indirectly of the government, but in a country where they somehow know if you're a Jew or Christian approaching Mecca, I find it hard to believe the government can't get a handle on terrorists like they can Valentine's Day cards.

What bothers me is how the United States claims to promote democracy while flat out ignoring the tyranny of our trading partners. I don't believe in the New World Order Illuminati conspiracy; it would be nice if it where that simple. The reality is hard to comprehend because it requires looking at cultures and how they relate.

One of the most devastating organizations to our national interests is the United Nations. It treats all countries as equal and they are obviously not. They want to remain neutral and not condemn any country too harshly (unless it's the United States) while at the same time embezzling money and supporting a good-old-boy network of diplomats who care nothing for their own people. The UN sits in New York as an ivory tower monument to elitism and cultural snobbery. When countries like Angola, Egypt, Qatar, Azerbaijan, and Cuba as well as the previously mentioned China and Saudi Arabia, everyone knows it's a sham.

One thing the United Nations is good at is PR--it's because of those diplomatic skills. The UN has become the de facto organization to solve all of Earth's problems. It chips away at its member nations' sovereignty while emboldening tyrannies to continue their paths of oppression, genocide, and military aggression. In the end, it's an organization of hypocrites and pompous arrogance. We defer to the UN when it comes to these trading partners. Iraq wasn't really a major trading partner of ours and had little influence in the UN. George Bush was more emboldened to stand up to the UN. Imagine the United States rocking the UN boat over issues with China or Saudi Arabia. I can't because of their powerful influence on the rest of the representatives there. By the way, Iraq was a major trading partner of France leading to their condemnation of an attack there; the US isn't the only one to ignore evil to continue a stream of income.

Another factor in our complacence with these trading partners is the public acceptance of multiculturalism and political correctness. Like the UN, multiculturalism dictates that all cultures are equal; it's bad form to say one culture is better than another. In the case of China, why don't we separate the long, distinguished Chinese culture from Communist culture? It is possible to respect many aspect of Chinese culture while condemning the government and those who drive the oppression of the Chinese. As for Saudi Arabia, they use money to deflect criticism. They hire U.S. PR firms to gloss over their image. Apparently this slight-of-hand is working because Bush likes to hold hands with the Princes.

Finally, American culture doesn't take security seriously. I can't think of a better example than all of the secrets given to China under Clinton's watch that received so little media attention, most Americans have no idea of the devastation caused. Recently, the CIA and Pentagon leaks to the New York Times and other media outlets have caused very little outrage regarding the actual leak. In addition, Americans don't seem to fully grasp what a nuclear Iran or North Korea means for them. China is much more of a threat, however. Communism is like Sharia law. It's proponents want it in place of free, capitalist societies. China seems to be patient and meticulous--something the USSR never was.

Just like good security in the IT world is to have backups of data in safe places, national security means to have viable alternatives to keep our country sovereign and independent. Yet our actions keep us in the stranglehold of foreign oil dependence when we could be providing our own oil. In Gerald L. Posner's Secrets of the Kingdom, Posner discusses how Saudi oil wells are rigged to explode in the case of a military invasion. Sure it's in the Saudi's self-interest to protect their only real export. However, they use this oil to make us walk this fine diplomatic line of non-judgement and acceptance of their ways. I think we spend more money, time, and energy on making nice with the stone ages than we do just getting our own oil from our own resources.

I don't like they way that America has become this lame, non-judgmental nation just for the sake of keeping good relations with trading partners. Our diplomacy philosophy is archaic and provides us with nothing as we give ourselves away to our enemies. We don't have black and white standards for acceptable behavior. We condemn small nations like Cuba for the same things the Chinese government perpetrates. We invade Afghanistan and Iraq, but ignore Iran and Syria as real terrorist beehives. I also still can't figure out why we condemn Hamas, but Fatah is okay for U.S. dollars. These inconsistencies are going to destroy us because it renders our diplomacy strategies as impotent and emboldens our enemies to continue undermining us with zero consequences.

Michelle Malkin points out the turmoil in Iran and that human rights groups are publishing reports about the execution of children. I still don't understand the continued defense of this culture by the media and liberals (see Turmoil In Tehran). The U.S. is continually demonized while these backwards countries continue to go back in time without a time machine. Isn't it about time to quit accepting all cultures as equal but different?

Update: Don't forget to read her other, more detailed posting on the chaos in Iran.

I had been formulating an article about the new Russia, which is apparently the same as the old Russia. However, guest blogger John Noonan over at Michelle Malkin site has articulated very well the real threat of the modern Russia: Borscht Fascism.

Ivan creeps me out. They're looking to boost their military to Cold War levels, bleeding off (literally) opposition to the state, and are selling sophisticated military hardware to all five Official State Sponsors of Terorrism [sic].

Russia's chief export is destablization [sic]. That and the AK-47, but I suppose the two are related. Either way, these guys are bad news bears for the War on Terrorism.

Nail on the head. Terrorism is not a cut-and-dried problem. Terrorism has its tentacles in all kinds of organized crime like drug and human trafficking. Oppressive governments provide weapons to terrorists who will cause chaos indirectly on their behalf. It's been known for a while that Russia has been dealing with nations like Iran, Iraq (during Saddam), and Syria. The weapons trickle down and the death continues.

I've read excuses for Russia that claim the government doesn't deal with terrorists, individuals do. There are some who claim the chaos in Russia is conducive to ex-military and criminals selling weapons without government consent (popularized by Hollywood and thriller fiction). However, it's obvious Putin is longing for the old days.

While I'm in the mood of posting cartoons, I thought I post this great prediction from the Simpsons (back when it was funny):

Previous posts on this topic:

• Putin is Not Our Friend
• Throw-Back Politics

Okay, after ranting a little about the crap that passes for news, I was reminded by a friend about the excellent reporting from China via Sky News. They are spotlighting the real China--you know the China the State Department and the mainstream media don't tell you about. God forbid you see the excessive cruelty perpetrated on its citizens by the Communist government. You know, Guantanamo Bay is much worse.

Where are the self-appointed human rights peeps who love the cameras and to criticize abuses?

By the way, the Sky News Web site has both Britney Spears and Anna Nicole Smith stories on their home page. Blech.