All language is but a poor translation.
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House guarantees continuing million$ to recruit Bubba, Jr →
Just like planes not worth flying, personnel carriers more dangerous than walking through a minefield – and toilet seats fit for a general’s soft tush – Congress is perfectly willing to throw good money after bad to stay in the good graces of their favorite fundraising pimps.
If National Guard recruiters want to keep sponsoring Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s racing team, the U.S. House is willing to keep providing millions of dollars for the right to back No. 88.
An effort to ban the military from spending $72.3 million on sponsorships was defeated on a bipartisan vote of 216-202 — a victory for Nascar, the National Football League and the National Basketball Association, which lobbied against the proposal.
“I say let the military run the recruiting as they have done successfully for all these years,” said Representative Bill Young of Florida, chairman of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee…
NASCAR’s advertising productivity is plummeting as fast their income, attendance and viewership.
It would be “irresponsible and outrageous” for Congress to continue allowing the Pentagon to sponsor sports while cutting funding for services that aid struggling families and communities, said Minnesota Democrat Betty McCollum.
“We can spend this money a lot better than we are today,” said Georgia Republican Jack Kingston, who offered the defeated amendment.
The Army has said that it doesn’t intend to sponsor a NASCAR team after this year, saying the spending can’t be justified.
you have got to be kidding me
Source: prosveshcheniye
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DailyTech - Congress Plugs Anti-Piracy Legislation By Day, Pirates Porn by Night →
Now a particularly ironic fact has come to light — it appears that IP addresses belonging to the offices of members of Congress have been downloading content illegally via BitTorrent.
TorrentFreak used Hurricane Electric’s handy list of assigned IP blocks (found here) to track down which IP addresses belong to the offices of members of Congress. And lo and behold, when those addresses were compared to results on YouHaveDownloaded, a torrent tracking site, they yielded over 800 hits.
Now to put this in context YouHaveDownloaded tracks only a tiny portion of torrent traffic, so it appears that Congress — even as they look to punish lesser mortals for file sharing — are themselves gleefully committing a “smash and grab” as Vice President Joe Biden (D) once put it.
Much of the pirated materials appeared to be adult self-help or education books such as “Crucial Conversations- Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High” and “How to Answer Hard Interview Questions And Everything Else You Need to Know to Get the Job You Want”.
Argh, Congress knows how to pirate, apparently! [Image Source: Reuters]
A fair amount of useful software — like Microsoft Corp.’s (MSFT) Windows 7 Ultimate Edition — was also pirated.
But other pirated works appeared to be purely stolen for pleasure. For example one individual within the halls of Congress downloaded a season of Sons of Anarchy, a TV show on News Corp.’s (NWS) FX channel. Another download appeared to be more “adult” in nature — “Gangland Cream Pie 21” (we’re guessing that’s not an educational baking special).
Some Members of Congress or staffers appear to like the cream pie. No, not this kind of cream pie. [Image Source: Food Network]
II. Editorial/Analysis: Should we be Surprised that Politicians are Hypocrites?
Is it surprising that the office of Congress are pirating even as they plot to chop the legs off of online business, further crippling the struggling U.S. economy, and raise taxes to further punitive punishments for filesharing that are already grossly disproportionate with offline offenses? Is it surprising that federal politicians or bureaucrats are pirating even as they plan to imprison Americans for streaming sports events, injecting even more Americans into the crowded penal system at a time when America imprisons more of its citizens than any nation in the world?
If Americans wants unbiased political representation — human beings who truly wish the best for their well being — why would they allow special interests to pay federal politicians’ way into office? Clearly you’re the boss of who pays you, and when it comes to politicians, their boss isn’t the American people.
Why question are glorious industry installed leaders? [Image Source: Shepard Fairey]
TorrentFreak should be congratulated though, for their excellent armchair gumshoe work. They’ve previously exposed busted torrent traffic coming from IPs at the Department of Homeland Security and the RIAA; at Hollywood studios; and at the French President’s Palace. (Has nobody ever heard of Tor?)
Is intellectual property protection important? Of course. These government pirates are just as much in the wrong as the members of the public, as they’re ultimately stealing work, denying hard working software engineers, actors, musicians, etc. funds.
But at the end of the day that SOPA and its propents aren’t engaging in some lofty moral stand, they’re just looking to smack down the little guy with punitive punishments, even as the nation’s economy lurches and as they or their aids merrily pirate away.
