How Sergey Aleynikov Learned Never to Talk to the Police – The embedded video is worth taking the time to watch if you’ve not seen it. Although the advice may sound counter-intuitive or even impious on first blush (respect for authority and all that), there is a good case to be made for not speaking to the police as a matter of increasing the chances of justice. Remaining silent is a right offered you, not stubborn disobedience.<>
Out of the mouth of babes should come praise to the true God. But this type of theological monstrosity is what we are to expect of a people who make politicians the last hope of civilization. The parents here are largely to blame. Their indoctrination is now becoming a generational curse. We are not to put out trust in princes nor in messiah-like politicians, Republican or Democrat. A nation that has lost confidence in the true God is a nation that turns to anyone as a their new god. This may be an insignificant reflection of the broader culture, but the fact that it is present at all is indicative of a larger problem.<>
Putin is supporting a new “stimulus” program for the Russian economy: free imprisoned entrepreneurs and businessmen. It is horrifying to learn why some of these people were imprisoned in the first place:
One of those Mr. Titov championed was Ruslan V. Tyelkov, whose short arc from businessman to inmate illustrates both the entrepreneurial spirit that still simmers in Russia and the risks. Mr. Tyelkov, a strapping 32-year-old from Moscow, invested nearly his last ruble to open a wholesale upholstery business that could hardly have gone wrong in Russia: selling leopard-print fabrics.
In 2010, Mr. Tyelkov spent the equivalent of $31,000 for 25,000 yards of Chinese-made leopard-print fabric suitable for chairs and sofas. “It’s very popular here, not only for furniture but cloths, wallpaper, sheets, shoes, bags, everything.”
With no warning, the police arrived at his warehouses and removed every roll on six flatbed trucks, handing it over to a competitor, ostensibly for storage, though it was later sold. Then they arrested Mr. Tyelkov, who spent a year in pretrial detention.
The crime? The police said they suspected copyright infringement of the leopard design. “It was funny at first,” recalled Mr. Tyelkov of his initial meeting with the police. “I asked, ‘Who owns the copyright, a leopard?’ ”
Mr. Titov’s later investigation confirmed the police had colluded with a competitor to seize the merchandise under the pretext of a criminal case, so it could be sold for a profit.
While his business was ruined, Mr. Tyelkov said he did manage to apply his skills to the small challenges of life in jail. He rose to become the informal leader of the cell he shared with a killer, a militant and several drug addicts.
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Snowden’s Email Shut Down – Kuyperian Commentary.
Steven, this brings up (to my mind) the problem with corporations. They rarely do this kind of thing.
Publicly owned companies especially are naturally state-compliant entities. The phone companies, remember, when ordered to do illegal wire-tapping, only cared about their legal liability to their customers. Once that was taken care of (or promised), they fully cooperated.
What else could we expect? Why would a person hired to an office be willing to resist the government to the possible harm of the company he worked for. The stockholders would fire and replace him.
As stray thought: this would give us one reason why governments would appreciate large corporations and be suspicious of small business.<>
I have to say this defense of nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki convinces me of exactly the opposite of what the writer claims to be arguing for. (Though it does bother me that the atomic bombs get so emphasized when the same crimes were first committed with conventional bombs).
Not only was there a time when Americans had a sanctified conscience about such war crimes, but there was a time during Wold War II when such war crimes were even repudiated in war propaganda. I refer of course to the classic “Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo.”
Here’s a clip. Notice the words spoken to the bombers and pilots starting at 6:55
So:
In my opinion, a “civilian” working at a legitimate military target is a justifiable homicide. Apparently, all the crew agreed. But my point is that they asked.
Obviously, by the time this movie was released, a very different mindset had been inculcated in some number of people. General LeMay certainly never was burdened with any of the moral principles that James Doolittle is portrayed as holding in this scene.
I suspect you will see some more commentary on this issue on this website in the near future.<>
An encrypted email service used by political refugee Edward Snowden has been forced out of existence by the heavy hand of the U.S. Government.
Ladar Levison of Lavabit said the following:
“This experience has taught me one very important lesson: without congressional action or a strong judicial precedent, I would strongly recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States.”
Can we convince Kim Dotcom of Mega (https://mega.co.nz) to get us an out of the country encrypted email service?
Read the whole article: here
Kuyperian Commentary Podcast
