Month: September 2008

The Big Bailout – et godt tilbud til dig

Apropos big shit pile – se, hvad der (ikke) lå i min mailbox i morges:

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

Tror I, det er for real? Det minder meget om alle de andre venlige forretningstilbud, jeg altid reagerer på.

Læs også:

The big bailout – moderne tids største tyveri?

Det kan godt være, der er nogen, der er glade for amerikanernes store økonomiske “redningsaktion“, og det kan også godt være, den er nødvendig, men… er det virkelig godt at lade finansverdenen køre friløb i årevis, ophobe hidtil usete profitter, pumpe penge ud til dårlige lån baseret på en “boble” i form af boligprisernes himmelflugt, og så simpelt hen friholde dem, der har forårsaget miseren – på alle andres bekostning?

Glenn Greenwald er ikke tilfreds:

Whatever else is true, the events of the last week are the most momentous events of the Bush era in terms of defining what kind of country we are and how we function — and before this week, the last eight years have been quite momentous, so that is saying a lot. Again, regardless of whether this nationalization/bailout scheme is “necessary” or makes utilitarian sense, it is a crime of the highest order — not a “crime” in the legal sense but in a more meaningful sense.

What is more intrinsically corrupt than allowing people to engage in high-reward/no-risk capitalism — where they reap tens of millions of dollars and more every year while their reckless gambles are paying off only to then have the Government shift their losses to the citizenry at large once their schemes collapse? We’ve retroactively created a win-only system where the wealthiest corporations and their shareholders are free to gamble for as long as they win and then force others who have no upside to pay for their losses. Watching Wall St. erupt with an orgy of celebration on Friday after it became clear the Government (i.e., you) would pay for their disaster was literally nauseating, as the very people who wreaked this havoc are now being rewarded.

Måske det simpelt hen er Bush-regeringens grande finale: Efter en inkompetent ført krig i Irak, baseret på en løgn, efter at have gjort USA til krigsforbrydelsernes og torturens internationale bannerfører, efter skamløst at have gennemførst ulovlige aflytninger af tusinder af amerikanere, efter Guantanamo og Abu Ghraib, skulle der jo ligesom noget til, som de for alvor kan huskes for.

Mange havde frygtet, at det ville blive en krig mod Iran – en ulykke, som Bush-regeringen dog ikke har fundet for godt at påføre verden, og som den amerikanske hær næppe er klædt på til heller. Men … verdenshistoriens største tyveri, 700 milliarder dollars (ca. 4 trillioner kroner) hældt direkte fra skatteydernes lommer over til Bushs venner på Wall Street – det er vel et lige så godt bud?

Camre: “Islam ud af Europa”

Mogens Camre holdt søndag middag en tale til Dansk Folkepartis årsmøde, hvor han kræver “islam ud af Europa”, skriver Berlingske Tidende:

“Islam kan ikke integreres. Islam vil dominere Europa. Og islam er uforenelig med vores værdier. Derfor skal islam sendes ud af Europa,” tordnede Mogens Camre og modtog efterfølgende et stort bifald fra salen.

Berlingske Tidende påpeger, at forhenværende medlem af Dansk Folkeparti Merethe Egeberg Holm sidste år sagde næsten det samme fra samme talerstol, da hun udbrød “Ud med alle muslimer i Europa og ind med jøderne i stedet!”

Holm blev efterfølgende ekskluderet fra Dansk Folkeparti. Det vil næppe overgå Camre, men man må unægtelig indrømme, at hans krav rejser nogle praktiske problemer. Hvordan vil man smide “islam” ud af Europa? Islam er et abstrakt begreb, der er til stede, overalt hvor der er muslimer.

Der bor en del muslimer i Europa. Hvad vil Camre gøre ved det? Smide alle muslimer ud – men hvor skulle de i givet fald tage hen? Tvangskonvertere dem, der ønsker at blive?  Og hvad med konvertitter og andre europæiske statsborgere, som trods alt har 100% lige så meget ret til at være her som alle andre, ja, som Camre selv?

Og hvad så med det, der bliver tilbage af samfundet? I Storbritannien ville sundheds- og skolevæsnet nærmest forsvinde, hvis det ikke var for indvandrere fra nær og fjern. Og hvad så i øvrigt med muslimer i Bosnien og Albanien, som også er en slags Europa?

Og hvad med religionsfriheden?

Enhver journalist med respekt for sig selv burde fra nu af gå ud fra, at hvis Mogens Camre ikke bliver smidt ud af Dansk Folkeparti for dette her, så er det Dansk Folkepartis officielle politik, at alle muslimer skal smides ud af Europa, og indrette deres spørgsmål til partiets talsmænd efter det.

Problemet er ikke, at jeg tror, det ikke kunne lade sig gøre at smide “islam ud af Europa”. Det 20. århundredes historie viser uhyggeligt og smerteligt, at det kan lade sig gøre. Men … ønsker Dansk Folkeparti med Camre i spidsen virkelig at lade præcis den samme retorik føre os ud over den samme kant én gang til?

Det virker helt utroligt.

Kvinder i Alaska siger nej til Sarah Palin

Jeg har modtaget nedenstående i en mail fra en bekendt i USA:

Alaska Women Reject Palin

Alaska Women Reject Palin rally was to be held outside on the lawn in front of the Loussac Library in midtown Anchorage. Home made signs were encouraged, and the idea was to make a statement that Sarah Palin does not speak for all Alaska women, or men. I had no idea what to expect.

The rally was organized by a small group of women, talking over coffee. It made me wonder what other things have started with small groups of women talking over coffee. It’s probably an impressive list. These women hatched the plan, printed up flyers, posted them around town, and sent notices to local media outlets. One of those media outlets was KBYR radio, home of Eddie Burke, a long-time uber-conservative Anchorage talk show host. Turns out that Eddie Burke not only announced the rally, but called the people who planned to attend the rally “a bunch of socialist baby-killing maggots,” and read the home phone numbers of the organizers aloud over the air, urging listeners to call and tell them what they thought. The women, of course, received some nasty, harassing and threatening messages.

I felt a bit apprehensive. I’d been disappointed before by the turnout at other rallies. Basically, in Anchorage, if you can get 25 people to show up at an event, it’s a success. So, I thought to myself, if we can actually get 100 people there that aren’t sent by Eddie Burke, we’ll be doing good. A real statement will have been made. I confess, I still had a mental image of 15 demonstrators surrounded by hundreds of menacing “socialist baby-killing maggot” haters.

It’s a good thing I wasn’t tailgating when I saw the crowd in front of the library or I would have ended up in somebody’s trunk. When I got there, about 20 minutes early, the line of sign wavers stretched the full length of the library grounds, along the edge of the road, 6 or 7 people deep! I could hardly find a place to park. I nabbed one of the last spots in the library lot, and as I got out of the car and started walking, people seemed to join in from every direction, carrying signs.

Never, have I seen anything like it in my 17 and a half years living in Anchorage. The organizers had someone walk the rally with a counter, and they clicked off well over 1400 people (not including the 90 counter-demonstrators). This was the biggest political rally ever, in the history of the state. I was
absolutely stunned. The second most amazing thing is how many people honked and gave the thumbs up as they drove by. And even those that didn’t honk looked wide-eyed and awe-struck at the huge crowd that was growing by the minute. This just doesn’t happen here.

Then, the infamous Eddie Burke showed up. He tried to talk to the media, and was instantly surrounded by a group of 20 people who started shouting O-BA-MA so loud he couldn’t be heard. Then passing cars started honking in a rhythmic pattern of 3, like the Obama chant, while the crowd cheered, hooted and waved their signs high.

So, if you’ve been doing the math Yes. The Alaska Women Reject Palin rally was significantly bigger than Palin’s rally that got all the national media coverage! So take heart, sit back, and enjoy the photo gallery. Feel free to spread the pictures around to anyone who needs to know that Sarah Palin most definitely does not speak for all Alaskans. The citizens of Alaska, who know her best, have things to say.

Boykot Red Barnet

Godt interview i Computerworld med formand for IT-politisk forening, Niels Elgaard Larsen om foreningens opfordring til boykot af Red Barnet:

Hvorfor vil I egentlig fjerne børnepornofilteret?

“Fordi det er censur. Man skal gå efter at opklare forbrydelserne i stedet, og det er usundt at have en gateway-funktion, hvor politiet bare kan lukke de sider, de har lyst til.”

Er I ikke bange for, at der bliver åbnet for, at pædofile så uhindret kan se børneporno?

“Det kan de i forvejen. Alle og enhver kan omgå det filter. Og efter de er begyndt at bruge det samme filter til Allofmp3 og sider med ulovlig musikkopiering, kan man være sikker på, at alle kan omgå det.”

Hvad håber I på at få ud af jeres kampagne?

“Vi håber at komme i dialog med Red Barnet og gøre opmærksom på problemerne med filteret.”

Hvad er det for sider, I mener bliver censureret?

“Det ved vi jo ikke. Vi har søgt om aktindsigt i hvilke sider, der bliver blokeret. Og det er jo et af problemerne, at politiet siger, at det har blokeret omkring 6.000 sider, og vi må ikke vide, hvad det er for nogle.”

Hvorfor mener I, at censuren breder sig?

“Det begyndte med børnepornofilteret, og så blev det brugt i Allofmp3-dommen, og så blev det brugt imod PirateBay. Og det er nævnt i forarbejderne til loven, at det også skal bruges i forbindelse med racisme og trusler, så det har bredt sig allerede. En kommisær i EU har også foreslået, at man skal til at censurere bombeopskrifter, opfordringer til hellig krig og den slags ting.”

Link: Hvorfor i alverden vil I boykotte Red Barnet?

Krakkede investeringsfirmaer blev fritaget for kontrol

Firma: Jeg fylder lommen uden din intervention - Staten: Men hvis du taber, giver jeg

SEC svarer vel nærmest til det danske Børstilsyn, og SEC har altså bevidst vendt øjnene væk fra de største firmaers excesser:

As we learn this morning via Julie Satow of the NY Sun, special exemptions from the SEC are in large part responsible for the huge build up in financial sector leverage over the past 4 years — as well as the massive current unwind

Satow interviews the above quoted former SEC director, and he spits out the blunt truth: The current excess leverage now unwinding was the result of a purposeful SEC exemption given to five firms.

You read that right — the events of the past year are not a mere accident, but are the results of a conscious and willful SEC decision to allow these firms to legally violate existing net capital rules that, in the past 30 years, had limited broker dealers debt-to-net capital ratio to 12-to-1.

Instead, the 2004 exemption — given only to 5 firms — allowed them to lever up 30 and even 40 to 1.

Who were the five that received this special exemption? You won’t be surprised to learn that they were Goldman, Merrill, Lehman, Bear Stearns, and Morgan Stanley.

As Mr. Pickard points out that “The proof is in the pudding — three of the five broker-dealers have blown up.”

So while the SEC runs around reinstating short selling rules, and clueless pension fund managers mindlessly point to the wrong issue, we learn that it was the SEC who was in large part responsible for the reckless leverage that led to the current crisis.

You couldn’t make this stuff up if you tried.

Lad de store komme til fadet – skatteyderne tager skraldet, og fanden tager de bagerste. Sand risikovilje: Hvis jeg vinder, rydder jeg bordet, hvis jeg taber, kan vi dele i porten. Heads I win, tails the taxpayers lose, som Paul Krugman siger.

En passende mindesten over Bush-æraen. (Via Boing Boing)

Fri software som politisk bevægelse

James Love har en glimrende artikel på Huffington Post, hvor han forklarer, hvorfor han selv er glad for at bruge fri software på sin computer, og hvorfor andre “progressive” burde gøre det samme:

Like nearly everyone else these days, I use computers to write, read email, browse the web, store music and photos, and generally organize my life. Unlike most people, I’m using a free operating system, rather than Microsoft’s Windows/Vista, or Apple’s Mac OS. Specifically, I’m using Ubuntu, a popular distribution of GNU/Linux.

It’s hard to explain the experience without trying it. Using any Debian type Linux distribution (such as Ubuntu), it is very easy to find, install and update software. Pretty much everything I use is available at a zero price. Linux isn’t a program, but rather a collection of thousands of programs that work together, each maintained by different communities. Most share the source code they develop, allowing others to copy, modify and incorporate code into new and even competing programs.

Linux is a possible future, one that isn’t controlled by Microsoft or Apple, and one that responds to a different set of values. Ubuntu is so good that it now seems plausible to anticipate a significant shift from Apple and Microsoft to Linux. This would be no small thing, increasing the odds that the Internet will continue to develop in ways that empowers users. Linux provides a powerful counterweight to companies or governments that undermine innovation, privacy and freedom, benefits that should not be taken for granted or undervalued.

Med andre ord: Fri software sikrer, at brugeren har og beholder kontrollen over, hvad der foregår på hans computer, og gør det muligt at sikre sig mod regeringsstøttede og andre trusler mod ens privatliv.

Hele fri software-bevægelsen er en vigtig modvægt mod hele den tendens til overvågning og central kontrol, vi ser i de senere år, en bevægelse, der tager handsken op ved selv at skabe programmer, der kan fungere som modvægt til monopolernes kontrol over brugerne og regeringernes indgreb. Og så er det ved at være oppe i et stabilt teknisk leje, hvor man sagtens kunne installere det på sin bedstemors computer. Men læs endelig bare hele Loves artikel.

Hvor er racismen?

Læserbrev sakset fra Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

How racism works

What if John McCain were a former president of the Harvard Law Review?
What if Barack Obama finished fifth from the bottom of his graduating class?

What if McCain were still married to the first woman he said “I do” to? What if Obama were the candidate who left his first wife after she no longer measured up to his standards?

What if Michelle Obama were a wife who not only became addicted to pain killers, but acquired them illegally through her charitable organization?
What if Cindy McCain graduated from Harvard?

What if Obama were a member of the “Keating 5“?
What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker?

If these questions reflected reality, do you really believe the election
numbers would be as close as they are?

Punditokraterne: Legaliser narkotika

STOP PRESS! Et fornuftigt og velovervejet indlæg hos Punditokraterne.  Will wonders never cease?

Niels Westy taler om og især imod diverse populistiske forslag om at “slå hårdt ned” på de seneste dages vold på Nørrebro (politiet lover en “offensiv og hård strategi“, som vil være lige præcis lige så nyttesløs) og foreslår i stedet at fjerne markedet ved at legalisere de stoffer, striden antages at stå om:

Det er utrolig[t], at på trods af, at bekæmpelsen af narkotihandlen og den medfølgende kriminalitet – det være sig herhjemme eller i udlandet – har været en lang perlerække af ufatteligt omkostningsfyldte fiaskoer, både økonomisk og menneskeligt, så er der åbenbart politisk konsensus om at lukke øjnene for virkeligheden, og lade s[om] om, at politiet rent faktisk kan gøre noget.

Men hvis man ønsker effektivt at bekæmpe den organiserede kriminalitet, er det noget helt andet der skal til, man skal nemlig fjerne deres indtægtsgrundlag – og her er både den billigste, effektiveste og mest humane fremgangsmåde at afkriminalisere narkotikahandlen i en eller anden form.

Desværre er der intet der tyder på at politikerne har lært noget som helst af den massive historiske data, der entydigt viser, at det ikke er muligt at vinde kampen mod narkotika.

Tværtimod: Krigen mod narkotika er strøet med ofre, men brugen af narkotika er ikke iblandt dem. Krigen mod narkotika tillader os nok at holde den “puritanske”, moralske fane højt, men prisen i form af menneskelig lidelse er høj. Jeg skrev det selv for år tilbage, i en artikel om, hvorfor narkotika bør legaliseres:

Hvis vi virkelig er i krig mod stofferne, er der ikke noget, der tyder på, at det er stofferne, der er ved at tabe. Det må være muligt at gribe det bare en smule mere intelligent an.

Læs også:

USA – torturens spydspids

Leftist scumbag Andrew Sullivan opsummerer, hvordan USA nu står i spidsen for torturens globale revival:

A new survey of global public opinion [PDF] reveals the appalling truth. Americans are now among the people on earth most supportive of government’s torturing prisoners. The United States is in the same public opinion ballpark as some of the most disgusting regimes on the planet:

Support for the unequivocal position was highest in Spain (82%), Great Britain (82%) and France (82%), followed by Mexico (73%), China (66%), the Palestinian territories (66%), Poland (62%), Indonesia (61%), and the Ukraine (59%).   In five countries either modest majorities or pluralities support a ban on all torture:  Azerbaijan (54%), Egypt (54%), the United States (53%), Russia (49%), and Iran (43%).  South Koreans are divided.

So America’s peers in the fight against torture, in terms of public opinion are Azerbaijan, Egypt, Russia, and Iran. This is what America now is: a country with the moral values of countries that routinely torture and abuse prisoners, like Egypt and Iran.

Gad vide om diverse Hollywoodfilm af den slags, hvor den heltemodige cop tæver det levende dagslys ud af skurke, som herefter straks kryber til korset, spiller ind – jeg holder selv meget af Hollywood-film, men har det ikke altid helt godt med den konstante legitimering af politivold.

Eftersom tortur stort set altid rammer folk, som senere viser sig at være uskyldige, er det i alle tilfælde knap så hensigtsmæssigt; er voldelige overgreb virkelig altid helt fjong, når bare de bliver begået af folk i uniform?

Sully runder af:

The only other countries where support for torturing terror suspects has grown are India, Nigeria, Turkey, South Korea and Egypt. In all other developed countries, support for an absolute ban on torture has actually risen in the past two years. America is now leading the way in legitimizing and celebrating torture as a legitimate tool for governments.

This is the Bush-Cheney legacy – to be continued under McCain-Palin. McCain was once a torture victim, but since 2006 has supported the torture of prisoners by the CIA. In fact, prisoners across the world who have been tortured by the CIA in the last two years can, in the terror of their cells, know that John McCain made it possible, by caving into the war criminals in the White House in 2006.

How can the country that pioneered the Geneva Conventions now be a nation more supportive of torture than any other developed nation on earth? Of course, it matters that we have had a president and vice-president actively endorsing and campaigning for the use of torture, and torturing prisoners routinely in jails where there is no escape and no due process. But the key segment of the pro-torture enthusiasts are evangelical Christians. Yes: evangelical Christians are now the greatest supporters of doing to prisoners what was once done to Christ.

Det er dem, vi følger som en hund sin herre: de torterende, krigsførende amerikanere og deres gale kristne evangelister. Men selvfølgelig holder vi dem skarpt op på vore egne standarder for menneskerettigheder! – der er endda set eksempler på, at CIA-hold er blevet nægtet kaffe, når de tanker op  i Kastrup  på vejen fra Guantanamo til Damaskus.

Se blot, hvordan vor egen standhaftige Fogh viser den frie verdens leder, hvor skabet skal stå.