What do those "who only think of the Children" fail to tell us?

See the Written Declaration currently going through the EU Parliament

http://smile29.eu/doc/DS29_EN.pdf

Download now or preview on posterous

DS29_EN.pdf (101 KB)

On the Surface it looks all sweetness and light, but take a look at what the Swedish Pirate Party Say

http://christianengstrom.wordpress.com/2010/05/31/written-declaration-29-for-data-retention-of-internet-searches/

If you follow the reference to Directive 2006/24/EC, an old acquaintance rears its ugly head: the Data Retention Directive.

According to the Data Retention Directive, which is currently in various stages of implementation in the different member states, Internet service providers and mobile network operators are required to collect and save data about who we are in contact with and where we are located. With Written declaration 29, search engines like Google and others will have to collect and save data about our searches, and make the data available to the police on demand.

This is the same bullshit which our Attorney -General is proposing to introduce here.

http://www.zdnet.com.au/govt-wants-isps-to-record-browsing-history-339303785.htm

I suggest you contact your local MP if you have any concerns around this.

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Philippe Cousteau: Reflections From the Gulf

Once we made it to the southern part of Louisiana about an hour into the trip we started to see signs advertising small shops shut down due to no fish being available to sell and others pleading with the gov and BP to help them feed their children. By the time we got to Grand Isle and met the team there was a sense of frustration and anger that was palpable amongst the people milling about the marina.

via huffingtonpost.com

Follow Phillipe @pcousteau

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Last Century Music Industry wants to ream LimeWire, avoids responsibility for own failings

The record labels have told a federal judge LimeWire is liable for possibly “over a billion dollars” — the latest sign that the industry is seeking to annihilate the New York-based file sharing company.

via wired.com

Hi,
I've got a Business who's model is being destroyed.
Look there is someone who is destroying my business model.
Work with them, you say?
Hark! Let us, with prejudice, destroy them with Lawsuits!

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Cowen seeks to hide policies from bank probe

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Cowen seeks to hide policies from bank probe

By Paul O’Brien and Mary Regan

Thursday, June 10, 2010

BRIAN COWEN is seeking to prevent the banking inquiry from examining the policies he implemented as Finance Minister which added "fuel to the fire" and helped stoke the crisis in the sector.

Two devastating preliminary reports published yesterday found that policies adopted by the Government during the boom helped cause the overheating of the economy and the subsequent banking crisis.

They laid bare Mr Cowen’s culpability as Finance Minister from 2004 to 2008, when the Government failed to apply the brakes and rein in spending.

But despite the reports’ indictment of fiscal policy, the Government does not intend to allow the commission to examine the decisions it took during the boom.

The Cabinet has agreed draft terms of reference for the commission which exclude any mention of Government policy during the period under investigation – January 2003 to September 28, 2008. The timeframe also means Government actions taken to solve the crisis from September 29, 2008, onwards are set to be off limits to the commission.

Instead, if the draft terms are passed, the commission will look at the failures by the banks themselves, the Central Bank and the Financial Regulator. These failures were outlined in yesterday’s preliminary reports, but the documents also extensively criticised Government policy during the boom.

The second report, conducted by Central Bank governor Patrick Honohan, who was appointed last year as part of the clean-up of the regulatory system, blamed the banks in the first instance.

But he was no less damning of the Government, saying budgetary policies "contributed significantly to the economic overheating". The Government had helped foster a climate that led the public to believe the "party could last forever".

via irishexaminer.com

As Fintan O'Toole writes in his book ship of fools, as long as there is no accountability, everyone thinks they can get away with anything.

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Wired: U.S. Intelligence Analyst Arrested in Wikileaks Video Probe

Federal officials have arrested an Army intelligence analyst who boasted of giving classified U.S. combat video and hundreds of thousands of classified State Department records to whistleblower site Wikileaks, Wired.com has learned.

via wired.com

Pretty Amazed that Photos can be published with such impunity. Let the witch hunt begin!

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Robert Fisk on Journalism and 'the words of power'

...the flotilla - the convoy of boats setting off for Gaza. I don't think they are a bunch of anti-Israelis. I think the international convoy is on its way because people aboard these ships - from all over the world - are trying to do what our supposedly humanitarian leaders have failed to do. They are bringing food and fuel and hospital equipment to those who suffer. In any other context, the Obamas and the Sarkozys and the Camerons would be competing to land US Marines and the Royal Navy and French forces with humanitarian aid - as Clinton did in Somalia. Didn't the God-like Blair believe in humanitarian 'intervention' in Kosovo and Sierra Leone?

In normal circumstances, Blair might even have put a foot over the border.

But no. We dare not offend the Israelis. And so ordinary people are trying to do what their leaders have culpably failed to do. Their leaders have failed them.

Have the media? Are we showing documentary footage of the Berlin airlift today? Or of Clinton's attempt to rescue the starving people of Somalia, of Blair's humanitarian 'intervention' in the Balkans, just to remind our viewers and readers - and the people on those boats - that this is about hypocrisy on a massive scale?

The hell we are! We prefer 'competing narratives'. Few politicians want the Gaza voyage to reach its destination - be its end successful, farcical or tragic. We believe in the 'peace process', the 'road map'. Keep the 'fence' around the Palestinians. Let the 'key players' sort it out.

via english.aljazeera.net

"Competing Narratives" Yeah, weasel words FTL!

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John Abraham's reply to Christopher Monckton - pls RT #climate #deniers

via stthomas.edu

Friday night viewing. Can we please RT this!

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