(Image is in the Public Domain)

Yesterday the House passed a FISA amendment act which includes a provision shielding telecommunications companies from any liability. In the coverage of the situation by Ars Technica, they were able to quote Nacy Pelosi as being an idiot:

The most extended apologia came from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who urged that the compromise be judged by comparison with the Senate bill, which she characterized as the only realistic alternative (So we can't ask for a good law, only a less bad one? That's a great standard to live to). She outlined several ways in which the current legislation is preferable to the Senate's version. First, the compromise bill reasserts that FISA is the "exclusive means" for conducting electronic surveillance, which would require the president to ignore such language twice in order to launch an extralegal surveillance program, rather than only once, as under traditional FISA rules (So if the President breaks the law, now it would violate two laws instead of just one. The next time someone breaks a law, I wonder if it will result in jail time if it only breaks the law "once"). Second, it preserves prior judicial review of surveillance authorizations, except in "very, very rare" circumstances, such as when the attorney general asserts that waiting for a judge would entail delay (I think that recent history has shown how much we can trust to the "rarity" of the Attorney General approving anything a president might ask. Has she even been awake in the last decade?). Third, it contains specific provisions barring the use of authorizations targeting parties abroad as a pretext for targeting U.S. persons, presumably to be enforced by a board of psychics. Finally, it provides for an internal investigation of the extent of past surveillance, which Congress will act upon with the same legendary zeal for civil liberties it has displayed over the past seven years (Brilliantly summarized. Ars has some great writers.).

So in one day, the House voted to expand powers of the Judicial branch that they didn't need and shield their conspirators from liability against justice.

Don't get me wrong, if I got a letter from the Attorney General of the United states that required my company to do something and my lawyers said to do it, I would have and maybe that's what happened to the telcos. But if there is no accountability for the Attorney General, the President, and the involved Agencies, then the whole things tastes like Congress cooked us up some chili made of poo.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation

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In a recent case, the judge has asked for public comment which the Electronic Frontier Foundation was happy to do.

In brief, the EFF is trying to show the judge that the RIAA can't win judgments against people only by showing that someone had a copyrighted song in a share folder. In other words, just because it was "available" for download, doesn't mean a crime occurred. Second, just because MediaSentry (the company paid by the RIAA to find copyrighted material online) downloads the song from someone doesn't suddenly make the providing person a criminal.

Hear, hear.

It wasn't me!

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Is this a joke? I sure hope so.

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Apparently all the focus and attention that schools are now providing to "low-achieving" students is resulting in less attention and care to the high-achievers.

“This is like sports, ? said Chester E. Finn Jr., the institute’s president, who served in the Education Department under President Ronald Reagan. “If the only goal of a sports program is to get people over a three-foot hurdle, why would anybody be coached to get over a four-foot hurdle? They wouldn’t. So those who can already sail over a three-foot hurdle have no incentive to do anything except to sleep late. ?

Every single person I knew related to the education field knew that the No Child Left Behind act was going to be trouble.

Don't call me

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Before when you put your name on the list, you'd have to renew every now and then. This was, in my opinion, a move that was designed to make more work for average people and give telemarketers a chance to get at you again when you forgot and let the block lapse. Well they've FINALLY made it permanent. Opt-out once and it lasts forever.

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Five years after CAN-SPAM did nothing to prevent Internet spam, Congress is ready to consider a similarly useful anti-spyware act.

the CSA states that it's illegal to steal someone's personal identification information off of their computer either via direct physical access or through a third-party program. It should be noted, however, that all of these things are already illegal under federal and state law

I just quoted since I couldn't have said this better myself. Original article here. In the end, this ACT seems that it will only legalize spyware just as it's predecessor legalized SPAM. Thanks congress!

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Granted the information about what each of them makes per year is not that important, but the fact that Obama has no credit card debt is a really good sign of someone with some money skills.

RIAA

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The RIAA likes to send people settlement letters whether they've done anything wrong or not which leads many people to pay up just to end the issue (much like traffic tickets which, even if you're right, it's often cheaper to just pay). Now, if someone tries to defend themselves in court, the fee will more than double thus providing stiff motivation to avoid using our own justice system.

George W. Bush

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89% out of 650000 votes so far says yes. Make sure to get over there and vote yourself.

Mine now, sucka!

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Any computer with at least one file "coming from 'dubious origins,' e.g. downloaded from P2P". I don't know about you, but everyone I know has downloaded something at one point or another. As I've said before, there are many situations where downloading even copyrighted material is completely ethical(even if it may not be clearly legal or illegal).

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