anti-[everything]

Under Capitalism, everything is for sale.

When US-made 'censorware' ends up in iron fists | csmonitor.com:
OAKLAND, CALIF. - During Burma's short-lived uprising late last month, young dissidents risked their lives to smuggle news of their peaceful protest to the outside world. They may have been up against Internet censorship software designed in America, if a connection found to exist in 2005 still holds.

Moreover, if a US firm wanted to sell Internet filters to Burma (Myanmar) today, despite several layers of economic sanctions against the government there, it would probably be legal to do so, say export lawyers.

Absence of federal regulation has allowed so-called censorware of at least four California companies to end up in the hands of foreign governments shown to block citizens' access to political, religious, and other websites.

The Capitalists' greatest value is profit. All other values are secondary and dispensable as long as the first value is obtained. Any social reality is acceptable as long that first value is materialized.

That is why they will sell the undertakers of capitalism the rope, and be too busy counting their profits to see the noose tied.

Technorati Tags: censorship

Here's why we won't have real health care reform:

As Democrats Criticize, Health Care Industry Donates - New York Times:
WASHINGTON, Oct.28 — In a reversal from past election cycles, Democratic candidates for president are outpacing Republicans in donations from the health care industry, even as the leading Democrats in the field offer proposals that have caused deep anxiety in some sectors of the industry, according to campaign finance records.

Hospitals, drug makers, doctors and insurers gave candidates in both parties more than $11 million in the first nine months of this year, according to an analysis done for The New York Times by the Center for Responsive Politics, an independent group that tracks campaign finance.

In all, the Democratic presidential candidates have raised about $6.5 million from the industry, compared with nearly $4.8 million for the Republican candidates. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York has amassed the most of any candidate, despite her calls for broad changes to the health care system that could pose serious financial challenges to private insurers, drug companies and other sectors.

Is it any surprise that Clinton has received the most healthcare industry dollars? Remember Clinton's mandatory insurance plan?

Which half of the ruling class are you voting for in 2008?

Technorati Tags: 2008 elections, healthcare, insurance, corporate goverment

You have to wonder how something this retarded could get published.

Marx's erupting skin may have influenced writings
LONDON (Reuters) - Karl Marx, who complained of excruciating boils, actually suffered from a chronic skin disease with known psychological effects that may well have influenced his writings, a British expert said on Tuesday.

Sam Shuster, professor of dermatology at the University of East Anglia, believes the revolutionary thinker had hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) in which the apocrine sweat glands -- found mainly in the armpits and groin -- become blocked and inflamed.

"In addition to reducing his ability to work, which contributed to his depressing poverty, hidradenitis greatly reduced his self-esteem," said Shuster, who published his findings in the British Journal of Dermatology.

"This explains his self-loathing and alienation, a response reflected by the alienation Marx developed in his writing."(emphasis added)

While I wouldn't label myself a Marxist, Marx's works do have many valuable contributions. Supposing Shuster properly diagnosed Marx's condition based on letters, it's a rather large jump to move from dermatological ailment to specific philosophic positions.

Technorati Tags: dermatology, Karl Marx, Marxism, medicine, Sam Shuster

From Media Matters:

Citing new G.I. Joe movie, Glenn Beck warned of a possible "one-world-government nightmare"

But first, there's something else. We're being attacked someplace else in the cover of night, and if we lose this battle, we lose it all. Here's "The Point" tonight. G.I. Joe is the latest casualty in the war against the American way, and I know, I know, Glenn, it's just a toy, a little hunk of plastic, a cartoon. I know. And that makes it easy to dismiss this. But I believe that would be a huge mistake.

We cannot lose sight of the fact that G.I. Joe was a real guy and he is something more, as well. He's -- he is a symbol, and when you attack a symbol, you strike a blow against everything it represents.

I know. Glenn Beck proves he's an utter moron 365 days a year. This is no exception.

It's sad so many people can't differentiate between marketing and meaning.

See also: GI Joe: Just a Toy

Technorati Tags: capitalism, GI Joe, GI Joe movie, Glenn Beck

...and it turns out, they don't like it either!

Conservative Authors Sue Publisher

Five authors have sued the parent company of Regnery Publishing, a Washington imprint of conservative books, charging that the company deprives its writers of royalties by selling their books at a steep discount to book clubs and other organizations owned by the same parent company.

...

“It suddenly occurred to us that Regnery is making collectively jillions of dollars off of us and paying us a pittance.” He added: “Why is Regnery acting like a Marxist cartoon of a capitalist company?”

Priceless.

Technorati Tags: capitalism, Regnery

I'm not a businessman, so maybe that's why I don't understand this site's business scheme.

The founders of Abunga.com¹ believe that it is time for a wholesome marketplace where illicit materials are restricted and new product offerings are constantly monitored by both the company and its growing community of users that care about decency, hence empowering decency.

Abunga provides three levels of content filtering:

Internal Filter – We remove broad classifications of illicit materials by the information classifications set by the publisher. Currently, over 65,000 books are eliminated from our available inventory to protect your family.

Individual Customer Block - On any search, any Abunga customer member can click the block button and that particular book will never show up as an offering on their account.

Community Block – Abunga records your blocks and if a number of customers block the same product, Abunga will remove it from their offering. (About Abunga.com)

Their plan is generate profits by letting everyone permanently filter out books? In essence, they plan to specialize in not selling you stuff? So really, they're saying:

Internal Filter - There's tons of stuff we can't selll to you! Currently, over 65,000 books are for sale somewhere else! Try Amazon!

Individual Customer Block - Doubtful that our other users are doing a good enough job filtering your search results? Block it just for you! Find even less stuff with every search!

Community Block - If a undefined number of anonymous potential shoppers find a book particularly bothersome, we won't' sell you that either. Just sit back and watch your purchase choices dwindle.

Is it just me, or is this phenomenally retarded?

The result is, basically, a store that mostly sells Christian nonsense (redundant, I know). Why not just ignore the titles you don't want to see? Why are "families" so damn sensitive? What's the chance a search for a "family friendly" title is going to return an illicit suggestion? I buy a lot of books online and not once have I ever been presented with an illicit item on my searches. For example, I've searched for and purchased osteology books online and have never found results for books about "the wrong kind of bones" (i.e, hard dicks, we're not family friendly here). Maybe their software people just can't write a decent search engine?

Finally, is it really empowering to hide the title and tiny pictures of book covers from yourself?

I think someone is overstating the importance of their business.

To test this theory, I searched for some religious titles (e.g., the Bible, Purpose Driven Life) and then blocked them. It was pretty boring. In addition, it took much more work to find things that I might hate and block them than it did to not search for them at all. But wait! I can also view all of the books I've blocked, in case I've forgotten what's been offensive to me. But I thought I didn't want to see these titles again? Apparently they can't even protect me from the stuff I hate when I make an effort to tell them. What's the point of this endeavor then?

It's Dumb. Very dumb. I hope this business fails and everyone involved starves to death in an alley.

So they're not just dumb. They're also annoying. Thanks, Abunga.

[Update]: Here's link to a recent post at abunga's blog. They pat themselves on the back for not selling the Golden Compass²

[posted with ecto]³

Technorati Tags: Abunga, family friendly

It's May 1, which means it's International Workers' Day. Well, except in the US where workers' struggles are ignored in favor of Loyalty Day. Loyalty Day was specifically created to counter May Day. Combined with the US's anti-labor Labor Day celebrated in September, Loyalty Day allows good Americans the opportunity to avoid any untoward display of anarchist, communist, or socialist sentiment. It's an easy way to let the boss know you're one of the good workers and not the uppity, trouble-making kind that might need to be hung or beaten to death by security guards.

I suppose Loyalty Day isn't overly popular. Does anyone actually celebrate it? It was created in the same nationalist, anti-revolutionary spirit as the "under God" addition to the Pledge of Allegiance, and the transformation of the national motto to "In God We Trust" as opposed to E Pluribus Unum. Questioning the value of Loyalty Days and of pledges to god and country isn't terribly popular in the US. Americans, it seems, are content to celebrate their allegiance to State, God and Capital rather than their own liberty, or their own historic struggles for it.

Sometimes it's hard to believe there was ever a revolutionary spirit in the US.

We have not come to do the work of political parties, but we have come here in the cause of labour, in its own defence, to demand its own rights. -Eleanor Marx, Speech on the First May Day

The Marxists Internet Archive has a page of May Day links worth reading.

[Update: 5.1.2008 @ 1:23 PM]

Dockworkers Protest Iraq War - New York Times:


Thousands of dockworkers at West Coast ports stayed off the job on Thursday in what their union said was a call for an end to the war in Iraq.

The International Longshore and Warehouse Union said more than 25,000 members in 29 ports stayed off the job. The action came despite an order issued Wednesday by an arbitrator directing the union to tell its members to report for work as usual in response to a request from employers.

Cool.

Technorati Tags: anarchism, International Workers' Day, Marxism, May Day, work