First a Cute Kitty, Then the Rape

Purrbarella takes life gracefully

From The Rude Pundit:

Everything Means Less Than Zero:
(Updated below)
In Brett Easton Ellis's 1985 book Less Than Zero, after we've read about the narrator, Clay, snortin' coke 'til his brain bleeds, fuckin' meaninglessly left and right, watchin' his boyhood friend - now a male prostitute - gettin' fucked by a john, and simply allowing the entire world to decay, all of a sudden Clay walks into a bedroom where all the L.A. posers and rich boys have gathered around a nude, drugged-out 12-year old girl tied to a bed, and they're getting ready to run a train on her. Clay confronts Rip, in whose apartment the rape's about to occur. Haltingly, Clay says, "I don't think it's right."

Rip responds, "What's right? If you want something, you have the right to take it. If you want to do something, you have the right to do it."

Clay answers, "But you don't need anything. You have everything."

To which Rip says, "No, I don't."

Clay asks, "Oh, shit, Rip, what don't you have?"

"I don't have anything to lose," Rip says, before he heads into the bedroom to join in the rape. Clay walks out of the apartment. He doesn't call the cops, he doesn't rescue the girl, he doesn't even try to stop anyone. He just leaves. And in the pathetic realm in which the characters exist, it can be seen as some kind of mighty gesture of strength and character. If one wants to be blindly optimistic, it can be seen as a moment of change for Clay, a moment when he will become a different, better person. But, after Clay leaves, even if he's washed his hands of it, that little girl's stranded in a nightmare.

Rude Pundit than talks about how by refusing to vote for the filibuster, certain Senators that then voted "No" don't get to walk away and feel better about themselves, because they just left that 12 year old girl tied to the bed to deal with the nightmare continuing.

So a big FUCK YOU to the Alito confirmation. Which means a big FUCK YOU to all of us minorities, disabled, women, miners, medicare needers, etc. Because this is the stealing of America from those of us who have become without voice.

Tied to the bed about to get raped by those who have everything and nothing to lose.

From Jesus' General:

The petition:

Dear Yahoo!, I am joining with others in boycotting your organization for the part you’ve played in recent human rights abuses. I have been a previous user of your services, but as of today I will be taking immediate action to discontinue my e-mail accounts, as well as the use of your search tools. I will also discontinue use of all Yahoo! affiliates such as HotJobs and MusicMatch. It's Yahoo!’s policy to abide by the laws of those countries wherein it does business. While this sounds innocuous, this policy recently in an example of why this policy is unacceptable in today’s global marketplace. By turning over Shi Tau’s identity to the Chinese government, and their subsequent imprisonment of him, you have shown the world in the worst way how business compliance with an oppressive government can result in catastrophic injustice. Shi Tau committed no crime other than exercising his freedom of speech—-a freedom that is severely curtailed in China. By revealing his identity, you committed a shameful act, and you have clearly shown that you value profits over human rights. As a response, I will do my small part in negatively affecting Yahoo! profits to show my disapproval of this policy. My hope is that enough people will do the same in order to get Yahoo! to modify its policies so they will not allow any government, foreign or otherwise, to interfere with certain inalienable human rights, such as the freedom of speech. If Yahoo! were to reverse this policy, they would be, once again prove themselves a leader in their field, and will regain my respect and my patronage.

I added this:

I've gone back and forth with your company for years. My husband almost worked for your new product 360. And I have to say that I'm appalled at your behavior. This will make the second time I've had to stop using your site. Considering I belong to several groups that I enjoy taking part in and will have to desist makes me sad. But it's nothing compared to having to go to jail for something I wrote.

I expect Yahoo! to be a leader in freedom of expression. Especially on the Internet. Your behavior has shown just how little respect you have for the customers whom have helped create your profits.

It's a petition with few signatories and some misspellings, however I believe that it's a sound issue to promote.

Part of why I hate BIG BUSINESS

The drugs don't work

· The global spend on pharmaceuticals has risen 25-fold over the past three decades, from $20bn in 1972 to more than $500bn in 2004. '[In 2002] the combined profits for the 10 drug companies in the Fortune 500 ($35.9bn) were more than the profits for the other 490 businesses put together ($33.7bn),' Dr Marcia Angell writes in her book The Truth About The Drug Companies. The breakdown of pharma finances for 2003 is: 14% on research and development, 17% on profits, 31% on marketing and admin, the rest on manufacturing and distribution.

More gets spent on Marketing and Admin combined than on Research. Any time I read somebody saying that the sick and obscene costs of my medications are due to Research I plan on slapping them with those numbers.

That's sick and twisted and making money out of other people's miseries.

Read the whole article. It's worth it. And I plan on buying the book when it comes out. It looks like a doozy.

Phone records to the person with a credit card

Any person with a credit card

You believe in conservative values? Do you? Than why are Americans being spied on and our phone records for sale to anybody with a credit card? Big government has to go the platform for the Republicans? When the spending of the party has gone up while cutting the taxes of the richest Americans?

I know who believes in my rights as an American to privacy and [it] sure is NOT my representative. And I'm just going to get one more form letter telling me politely to piss off in not so many words.

Other than missing the [it] I just sent that via Moveon.org to my representative. I'm so fed up with the political state of the nation.

On the plus side AMERICAblog has done some fine reporting for "just a blog." And has started an excellent grass roots movement (again) to get people to realize just how much our liberties are being encroached.

Go here to sign the petition Moveon.org has to try and get our phone records protected from any back-stabbing bastard with a credit card and our numbers.

Sign the anti-DRM pledge to boycott Sony

Pledge to Boycott DRM!

You can bet I signed this sucker and fast!

DRM severely restricts our rights as users, creators, and members of the global community. We will not stand by and let fair use grow extinct as a consequence of poorly thought out technology and the laws that support it.

I've been keeping up with the ongoing saga through boingboing.net

Monday, December 5, 2005
Sony rootkit ripped off anti-DRM code to break into iTunes
Sony's DRM supplier XCP ripped off a free software project so that it could defeat Apple iTunes.

Remember when Sony got nailed for including code an open-source crack for iTunes in its rootkit DRM? Princeton researcher Alex Halderman has been patiently teasing apart the rootkit, looking for an explanation. Why would Sony's arms-merchant rip off an anti-DRM program for its DRM?

Halderman concludes that the XCP -- the Sony rootkit -- was intended to be used to crack open iTunes and insert Sony's music into it, without allowing Sony customers to convert their music into MP3s along the way.

This exposes one of the things about DRM that most people miss: it doesn't really matter what permissions a given DRM grants or prohibits (as fun as it might be to point out the absurdity of a DRM that keeps you from listening to your own music). The important thing about DRM is that it gives the company or consortium that controls the DRM control over who can use the DRM.

So Apple can make an iPod and shut Real and Microsoft and Sony out of it. Napster can make a subscription music service and shut Apple out of it. And so on.

Reverse-engineering Apple's DRM is hard, but not overwhelmingly so. Jon Johansen and his pals generally went through each new release like a hot knife through butter (Jon's got a new job and says he's putting his Apple-coring hobby on hold for a while, so the iTunes 6 version of DRM has stood for longer than its predecessors).

So when Sony's arms-dealer was making its munitions, it added an attractive new feature for Sony and others: the ability to break DRM to sneak music into iTunes.

So yeah, definitely sign this Pledge because it's useful as a movement to get people more aware of our rights as consumers.

Damn the Man!