crime

Airport Security Experiencing Complete Turbulance!

No doubt that just about everyone in the world has heard about The Grinch who tried to blow himself up on an airplaine as it was landing in Detroit on Christmas.

Well, since then world wide airport security has taken steps…backward.

Whether it be passenger incompetence about things you can’t bring on board (NO EXCEPTIONS!), turning the plane around for one passenger whose name is similar to another person on the No-Fly List and doubling travel time and expenses, freaking out because some guy left LaGuardia Airport wasn’t on any of the aircraft but was on the No-Fly List so the airport had to be shut dhow for six hours, cancelling everyone’s flight over a jar of honey, or illegally seizing someone’s computer for being critical about current and new, rediculous security measures. If this is what you call an effective system, even if nothing is found (because it still costs way too much money to conduct any search), the system is in panic. And what happens when a person has anxiety attack, they become paranoid.

Even with terrorist threats picking up again, the TSA’s level of effectiveness is SLIPPING!

Terrorists are smart. We assume that these guys are people who live in caves and shout things in Arabic wearing scarves and toating AK-47s and C4 vests to blow themselves up. But this is wrong. To quote Keanu Reeves from the movie Speed, terrorists are “crazy, not stupid.”

The guy who stuck up the flight in Detroit this Christmas was the son of a wealthy Nigerian lawyer. Osama bin Ladin and much of his family and next of kin are wealth. Bin Ladin is the heir of a wealthy construction company. We thought that locking up his bank account would stop a guy who has enough money that he can pay for everything with cash.

Then their are all the other terrorists we have forgotten about. People who were part of the Irish Republican Army, Hezbollah, November 14th, E.T.A., Animal Liberation Front, and of course the domestic terrorists in our own country, some who may have been at the Town Hall Outbursts last year mearly to observe rather than engage in the madness.

We’ve spent the past eight years chasing ghosts, and locking up the wrong people, while suicide bombings and IEDs still go off on a daily basis, but the news media shugs it off like it is mearly a bug hitting a windshield.

Yet, you can’t enter or leave London anymore whout getting a full body high-power X-ray which is unsafe and illegal. You don’t go to the Airport anymore to travel, you go there to be herded, profiled, and treated like cattle only to have the airport shut down, flights cancelled, and planes turning around after nearly reaching their destination because of one passenger whose name matches some retired terrorists in Ireland.

People forget that terrorists are smart. They don’t need to fly commercially if they have their own private jet. They don’t even need to be at the airport to enter this country. They can hop a cargo ship, a train, or just WALK IN to the country from some port of entry no one thinks about. And what about the Domestic terrorists? Clearly, they have the ablity to drive to their destination, catch a train, or simply WALK where they want.

We are looking in the wrong direction. We have all this high technology to check someone at the airport, yet the terrorist don’t even need to use the Internet. They can be low tech and on the downlow. Look at Ted Kazenski, the Unibomber. The FBI was on a nation wide manhunt for him, yet their he was living in his little cabin in the woods, self susstaining, and off the grid.

This is why after nearly a decade, we still haven’t apprehended Osama Bin Ladin. Why shoes are taken off at the airport and strip searches are kicking in. Why an X-ray machines are being installed in airports.

Frequent exposure to X-rays in a place that really isn’t a hospital is VERY dangerous! Why in the world would when you go to the dentist, you have to wear a lead apron? So that your entire body isn’t exposed to X-Ray radiation. If you are a frequent flyer, you are about to have cancer, because the Airport is not the Hospital or the Dentist.

We worry that terrorists will set off a radiologically device, when the airport has several of them going off all the time, exposing everyone to radiation hazards daily. The guy at the TSA at the security gate is not the X-Ray Technician at the hospital.

We’ve lost at this point. The TSA is beating a dead horse hoping that it will live and still work and is lashing out at everyone who doesn’t believe that they have the ability to resurenct that horse to back to life and become Optimus Prime of the Transformers.

We need a new plan. We know what to look for. Adding security measure after security measure has been ineffective, expensive, a health hazard, and a hassle.

We assume that the enemy is stupid. So we treat everyone with indignation hoping that the terrorist will jump out and say “hey I’m over here!” We’ve been going at this all wrong!

We think that we won’t be treated terribly at the airport, but when you get there, “Surprise!”

If we want to catch people on the No-Fly List before they even enter the airport, why not put security guards at the front door of the airport rather than scattered throughout the terminals? This has been very effective at sports stadiums. They don’t inspect you when you are on the floor where your seats are at the stadium. They do it at the entrance. You can’t even get into the base ball stadium to buy anything unless you pass security. Why is this not the case at the airport?

Why are we find out about terrorists getting on plains seconds after the plane doors are closed, when people’s names are printed on the tickets? Why aren’t we identifying people who buy thier tickets when they are being printed off? We can tell somone their credit card has been declined instantly, but we can’t tell some “sorry sir, you can’t fly on the plane, you are on the No-Fly List.” To which just like the credit card declination, you can go to someone and dispute that information to possibly clear your self, especially if it involves Identity fraud.

What are the chances that a terrorist with your name, has a credit card similar to your own? We are able to identify an identity theif all the time with the credit card, but why not with airline tickets?

And what about the guys who pay with cash? I mean, you need proof of identity to buy the ticket in the first place. If you are flying internationally, you need your passport. SO WHY ISN’T THE TSA LOOKING UP THIS INFORMATION BEFORE PEOPLE GET ON THE PLANE?!

It only makes the terrorists look so much smarter, and the TSA look so much more stupid. Sure the TSA can take the credit when they find someone, but when they fail, they want to blame something else.

Don’t we have a unified system to identify international terrorists? Clearly there isn’t or else that one guy would have been stopped in Amsterdam where he was chaning his underwear to Fruit of a Booms!

No improvements have been made at the airport. If there were, people wouldn’t be critical of the TSA, London wouldn’t be turing into an Orwellian nightmare, and terrorists wouldn’t even be able to get into the airport.

Preparations is more than just guarding the airport, but making sure that terrorists can’t even buy tickets to get on the plane in the first place!

Use your heads, for crying out loud, TSA!

Tags: , , ,

Tuesday, January 5th, 2010 Safety, censorship, crime, media, security, tourism No Comments

Compainies firing workers to boost their corporate profits, executive bonuses

It is as if the executives in corporate America think we have “stupid” tatooed on our foreheads.

About a year ago, InBev bought Anheuser Busch to form AB InBev. InBev stated they woud save jobs, which they didn’t. InBev laid off workers while at the same time sheding Busch Theme Parks. And while beer sales are slumping and jobs are being cut, AB InBev reported they made a better profit this year.

But it is not just the world wide distributor of beer that has reported that they’ve made a better profit this year and that the guys on top get to keep their jobs and get a larger than average bonus this year while sacking workers. Citigroup, Bank of America, AIG, GM and Crystler, all reporting an increase in profit, while service, products, and employees all get cut out.

In other words, the guys on top save their own ass, and tell everyone else “your on your own”.

As unemployment spills over 10.2%, the rich get richer, the middle class is being pushed into the lower class, and the lower class have no where to go.

Chances are if you have graduated college in the past couple of years, you are unemployed or working in a low paying job. Although it may seem like the military looks like a way to make money, if you have no interest in fighting in combat or are not physically able to give the military 20 years of your time to serve your country, then DON’T! You can serve your country in other ways, but at this time thouse government agencies are not hiring anyone with a short resume.

It is quite clear that the country is run by a very small, wealthy minority. The private sector continues to show that at this current time, their only interest is to look out for themselves.

We see this when the best military in the world can’t get the manpower or functioning equipment they need to complete a war that has lasted for far too long. The president can send as may troops the generals need, but as long as the private sector sells the same weapons to our enemies as they do with our allies, the war continues at the expense of the people and the families that suffer. But it is no problem for the executives at the top that are double dealing. To them, War is money. The longer the war goes on, the more money they can take from the government.

We see this when not just manufacturing, but white collar work, is outsourced overseas. The free trade model has moved our jobs to China. America is not the only country where jobs are moving to China. Japan, Austraila, Europe, Canada, even Mexico have seen jobs move to China.

Ah, but now China wants total control over foreign patents. Foreign companies now must decide if they still want stay in China, where there is abundant cheap labor and laxed environmental regulations, or go back home an restart manufacturing here. If you are an coporate executive, you don’t care about ideas, labor issues, or the environment. Your interest is to sell whatever you can and build them as cheap as possible and still make a profit even if the product or service sucks.

The Chinese will soon be showing us the hubris of these executives.

Finally, to futher the madness of corporate America’s irrational behavior, there is the issue of healthcare. If your job can provide you with adequate private insurance, and the insurance company is not in the business of finding some way to prove that whatever is ailing you is benign, then more power to you.

However, for the rest of us, especially the unemployed, recently unempolyed, and those in poverty, we don’t have such good fortune to have a doctor on call who will actually look at what is wrong and not pretend there is nothing wrong because you have no medical coverage or the insurance company tells the doctor to ignore it.

It would be great to have a job. It would be great to have insurance. It would be great to let the capitalist system of government leave the private sector alone so that the private sector could do whatever it likes. However, we can’t. Not when people can’t tell the difference between consumerism and capitalism. Not when people can’t tell the difference between socialism and communism. Not when corporations distort the defintions of these words during a time when unemployment is high, wars seem everlasting, and a pandemic is infecting the world but the sick can’t see a doctor because they can’t afford it. And especially when corporations free themselves of being responble for any bad behavior they do.

When the capitalist system fails because it has perverted the idea that consumerism (in which people buy things) not capitalism (in which people save up for things) jumpstarts the economy, then defends this faux capitalism that only serve the people on the top by excluding everyone not just at the bottom but all people that are not at the top, then tells the people who have lost their jobs and benefits “don’t go to the big bad government” and “government run programs are bad and are socialism” (where they use socialism not as the intended word of a system serving the people, but as a synonym for communism), then continue to operate this system for a very long time, people will ultimately become stressed. They will comit crimes, unaware that it is OK to ask for assitance until it is too late. That if several people in the same predicimate can’t convince the government to help them because some corporate lobbyist made an exception to the rules or put in something to kill the bill to provide relief during a time of suffering and recession, they can do this instead of hurt other people.

The corporate system is based on greed and jealousy. Why should you suffer because you were fired so your employer could get a raise especially if you did a good job and didn’t have a poor performance record? Why should the next genereation of the workforce be paid less than there parents if they’ve recieved a better education and have worked to live a better life than their folks have?

We’ve been told that “hey, you shouldn’t pay you taxes” while at the same time accept the cost of rising fuel prices, the loss of alternatives when it comes to shopping, cheap breakable goods from big box stores, diminishing water, food, and environment quality, failing schools, high health cost, and small government, all so that small minority can preserve their way of life.

To call these feeling “raging against the machine” or to say “there is nothing you can do about it” and to actually do nothing about it endorses the continuity of the status quo, no mater who you vote for.

We have a great, intellegent leader as president right now. And everyone who has stalled or shotdown any of his plans to do something or to save jobs, lives, and property has done this because they have everything they need and people to provide it for them until suddenly they are themselves inconvienced either by their own family or someone they know needs something done. Suddenly, autism is a big deal because some senator or corporate excutive has a child with autism. Military spending becomes a big deal because someone’s best friend is joining the military. Automobile safe becomes a big issue because they were in a car accident recently. The environment becomes an issue because they suck at hunting or fishing and wonder where are all the wild critters they saw as a child.

Things shouldn’t be done because the lawmakers are affected by them. They should be done because at some point everyone is going to need something they want that the government can help them with, no strings attatched.

Yet, people feel threatened when the president gives a speech to school children. They feel threatened by his endorsement of public healthcare. They feel threatened that he might not provide more than enough or less than enough (in that they want the exact number, nothing more or less) troops to end our wars, apprehend terrorists, and secure our country. They feel threatened by fair trade, efficent cars, workers with benefits and insurance. They feel threatend because some uberliberal California law maker created a federal madate to preserve some turtles living in farmland that needs water for irrigation. (A more moderate liberal would have provided an alternative to support the farmers and the turtles…like rerouting where the water comes from.) And they feel threaten that they have to pay more on taxes which mathematics–which is NOT partisan–says they have to anyway.

And these people have hired voices to tell those without “don’t seek out, stay where you are!” And they are concerned that the country is falling apart.

If the healthcare bill fails in the Senate–or is thwarted by some partisan action to preserve the status quo–expect a new group of individuals to come out of the wood work to take down the fearmongers that preserve the stats quo. Because after a while, people will realizes that yes they have had enough and it is not the fault of the guy in the Oval Office. It is the guys in the high rise office buildings who right now are worried for their lives that some angry mob will try to harm them because they now have more than anybody else because they have take more than they deserve.

The TEA Party is misguided or they are misguiding. They are standing up for the rich minority either because they are the rich minority or they are to ignorant to realize they are supporting their oppressors. You will find that many of the TEA Party supporters still are employed, still are better off than the majority of this country that is suffering, and rarely–if in any case–part of or wish to identify themselves as part of the 10.2% that is unemployed.

You will not go to jail for not buying health insurance or using public healthcare. The country is not headed towards communism, it is headed toward oligarchy, to which to stave off the oligarchs, social programs need to be reinstated or installed.

America is hungry for the change that they asked for, and the president wants to deliver, but it is the status quo that continues to deny the things that we have worked hard for.

Friday, November 13th, 2009 Activism, Business, capitalism, consumerism, crime, economy, employment, energy, environment, healthcare, socialism No Comments

Rupert Murdoch should get a free ride home from the airport complements of the FBI

Telephone hacking, or phreaking, is a common subject in hacker magazines like 2600: The Hacker Quarterly. Because most forms are illegal, they are discussed in hypothetical situations.

Unfortunately, there is nothing hypothetical about paying over $1 million in hush money to quiet victims of telephone hacking. Especially when you are a controvertial billionaire broadcasting magnate who own various media outlets around the world.

Rupert Murdoch, the man who runs the New York Post, Fox News, and MySpace, is in hot water in the UK for hiring hackers to break in to cellular telephones (which are now like mini-computers) to steal personal information. (Hireing hackers is not as rare as you think. The FBI has a page about such people who hire hackers to break the law for them.) Murdoch’s UK company News Group then tried to use hush money to cover up the hackings of THOUSANDS of cellphones.

This is a controversy that not only concerns the UK, but also the United States, where his US company News Corp may have persuaded a judge into making MySpace the victium in the US v. Drew case, where locally, a depressed teenager was bullied into killing herself due to the actions of Lori Drew of Dardenne Prairie, Missouri.

More over, how does the paparazzi manage to get into the cellphonese of celebrities? Why was Barack Obama’s cellular records being looked over by workers at Verizon last year?

Murdoch’s involvement with telephone hacking in the UK will open up alot of questions that involve privacy when the Federal Bureau of Investigation meets up with him upon his return to the United States.

A major computer crime has been committed. Not by some guy with alot of time on his hands, but by a very rich and very powerful person who does not have authorized access to pry into the personal information of people around the world.

This man does not hold any leadership in government! There is no George W. Bush to pardon his actions or to make an excuse for him to break the law.

Gordon Brown is not at all pleased that the News Group is hacking telephones. So why should we permit him to break the law here with the News Corp?

I really urge anyone to contact their telephone provider and tell them that Mr. Murdoch does not have permission to break into their cellphone.

It is probably a good idea to shoot off a complaint to the FBI’s Interent Crime Center, especially if you susspect that your phone is being hacked.

It’s time to send Mr. Murdoch where he belongs: IN PRISON!

Tags: , , , ,

Thursday, July 9th, 2009 Activism, cellphones, crime, hackers, media, news, security, telecom No Comments

The Tale of the Robber Baron Businesses

It doesn’t seem like it was so long ago that the St. Louis was the headquarters of many companies. McDonnell Douglas, Anheuser-Busch, May Company, A.G. Edwards, Trans World Airlines, Ralston-Purina. Major corporations that were headquartered here in St. Louis, Missouri, that were swallowed up by large out of town corporations who snatched up the assets of these companies only to be exported, outsourced, sold off, and eventually shut down.

The majority shareholders of these companies did not care about the importance of these businesses were to the area, so as long as they were being paid for letting the outsiders take over.

Now we have Boeing owning McDonnell Douglas, Macy’s owning May, American Airlines owning TWA, Nestle owning Purina, Wells Fargo owning Wachovia owned A.G. Edwards. And the biggest, most disasterous aquesition to our area, InBev owning Anheuser-Busch.

We are no longer the headquarters of various major corporations but the home of very expendable branches of corporations who do not understand, nor want to understand, the true value of the actual worth of the native companies.

The most recent of acquesition by out of town conglomorates was made by a company called InBev, who last year purchased a very profitable and successful Anheuser-Busch. AB was a financially sound corporation during this troubling time. Yet despite the fact that the InBev company from Europe had amassed a large amount of debt by taking out loans to purchase AB, the shareholders approved of the merger.

Imagine if you took out several credit cards or large loans from the bank and then showed off the money you took out to show that you were wealthy when in fact you are in so much debt that you put other people in a financial pinch. It would be alot like this commercial.

So now InBev is shedding off all of the many assest that AB had in St. Louis. The Bevo Mill, owned by AB, was sold by InBev for $1 to the City of St. Louis. To which the people the City put in charge of keeping the Mill open, defaulted on Payments, and now the Mill is closed indefinitely. Grant’s Farm, formerly owned by United States President Ulysses S. Grant and home of the Budweiser Clydesdales, has it’s hours reduced and there is no more free beer in the beer garden. Busch Entertainment Corporation, parent company of Sea World and Busch Gardens, is being auctioned off by InBev, but BEC may just break off before that happens.

Another takeover company, Macy’s, has yet to close the Macy’s (nee Famous-Barr) location at Jamestown Mall in North St. Louis County. The mall, like so many others has fallen from grace. Yet, when Macy’s finds out they are losing money, and didn’t bother to take the advice of closing down the Jamestown Macy’s, they will shut down the Downtown Macy’s which was the headquarters of May Department Stores, and is doing moderately well in these tough times.

Then there is this outrageous incident where steel used to build an oil pipeline from Canada to Wood River, Illinois is being imported from India. The pipeline that is being constructed runs along the Granite City Steel mill, where workers are being laid off. There are things in the “global free trade” system that do not make sense. And this is just one of them.

The other is the Pentagon buying Chinese-made computer parts for their computers then wondering why the Chinese are breaking into the Pentagon. It is because the Pentagon buy’s the same parts that we buy them from. Places like Best Buy, who sell many electronic items that are made in China. The logic behind items that are shipped from overseas are cheaper is flawed.

Yet when the United States Govermment as well as several state governments are sending jobs for various agencies overseas and permitting foreign access to American data systems, then wonder why service is poor and there is virtually no security from the outside, it just makes you want to find the person who decided to permit all of these terrible and irresponsible ideas and kick some sense into his head.

Another example of broken systems is the St. Louis Metro Bus system. When the Obama Adminstration gave money to mass transit authorities, Metro had recieved money. Just not the Metro we though was getting the money. Through some weaselly business practice where a slight name change can break a company into separate entities, Metro’s adminstration (which had been slashing routes due to the fact that their route planning skills are medicore and non-aggressive) got money, but Metro’s transit system recieved NOTHING. This is a perfect example of what is wrong.

We entrusted the transit system to take people to work, to take people to companies and events, in an affordable and efficent system. Instead, everything that could go wong has gone wrong.

I took the bus to an event the other day and because the busses were so spread out, the bus I was on was ahead of schedule. So I sat on a bus for five minutes as it when nowhere. The bus had also been driving far below the speed limit, much slower than it would have even if passengers were getting on or off the bus.

Yet the adminstration which had overspent money on a Metrolink route that should have followed Interstate 64, a major highway that is under construction, went south through the congressional district of one of the local politicians. Meanwhile there are still no routes to West St. Louis County or to St. Charles County where a budding technology district is forming. So now that the transit part of Metro has no money to take people to work, local businesses lose workers and revenue, and eventually close down.

The automobile industry gets what it deserves right now. As much as wishful thinking will not make S.U.V.s, crossovers, or trucks popular in an economy when the oil barrons can’t live with just one home, the automotive needs to wake up and face reality. They had well over two decades to fend off the impending bankruptcy that awaites them.

Through out the 20th Century, General Motors has been responsible for the purchase and closure of many mass transit systems. They have also purchased many technologies for vehicles that run on alternative energy, as have the coal, nuclear, and oil based energy corporations, only to lock them up or to destroy those ideas before they have the chance to catch on.

When the city of Hazelwood, Missouri along with various representatives from the Missouri and federal goverment went to Detroit to keep the Hazelwood Ford Plant operational, Ford took whatever money that was offered to them but closed down the factory anyway citing that it would be too much work to train employees to equip vehicles that run on alternative energy.

Oh yes, the complicated workings of a dynamo. Certainly not as complex as a internal combustion engine. Can’t…solder…two…small…wires…to…a…power…converter. Must…retrain…the…entire…assembly…line.

The lazy execuses to put off saving the company with cars that are efficent and affordable then got the UAW to go along with the belief that installing an electrical generator, which would really be built in another factory much like engines or any other car parts, would not only be very complex but also un-American. Which is why the Japanese are so successful selling hybrid vehicles.

Sure, the UAW got with the program and started making hybrids at various American factories, but the hybrids they were making were going to be shipped to markets outside the United States where they would be very unpopular. Again, the who illogical “cheaper to buy it imported” philosophy damed the automobile industry to bust-up the auto unions who can’t be a union if there is no car company to save. It’s like buring the house down to evict the old occupents to build a new one on top of it in hopes that the new occupants will put up with a leaking roof and no heat.

Then there is Ameren Electric, nee Union Electric, Illinois Power, and a couple of co-ops. When big storms came into the St. Louis Area in 2006, the requests to trim trees prior to the events which prompted Ameren to launch their Power On campaign fell on deaf ears. When they finally got around to trimming the trees, many trees were cut in such a way that they could now cause property damage if they fell over because all the limbs on one side of a tree would be cut off.

But that doesn’t matter. The linesmen at Ameren are heros! There is just one teeny-tiny thing they want in return for saving the day from the catastrophie they created from their prior irresponsibly. They want to build a second nuclear reactor at the Callaway Nuclear Plant near Fulton, Missouri.

If you are saying “no” to this, good.

Let us not forget that it was irresponsiblity that caused an overflow of water that caused the Taum Sauk disaster that destroyed Johnson Shut-Ins State Park in December 2005. Having former KSDK anchor Karen Foss as spokenwoman for Ameren to paint the portrait of a “benevolent corporation” does not cover up the fact that Ameren still wants to spend $6 BILLION on a nuclear power plant that is worth more than the entire company.

Then there is the promotional disinformation of former Greenpeace member Patrick Moore who has been advertising that nuclear energy is an alternative to fossil fuels, when it really is not. Even the people at Greenpeace have asked the media to disavow anything he says on behalf of Greenpeace that supports nuclear energy since Greenpeace does not, has not, and never will support the usage of nuclear energy. So when Ameren says “Relax! Greenpeace supports it”, that is totally false! Nuclear Power is NOT Green Energy!

Being that Callaway County is in rural Missouri, where KWWR broadcasts the farm report like traffic on KMOX, I am disappointed that such a farming area hasn’t taken the opporitunity to get into alternative energy. Sure, farming doesn’t pay much, and alternative energy systems are expensive thanks to Big Oil companies snatching up them up. But I can’t believe that very few farmers are catching on to using Wind Energy products produced by John Deere. Yet it will be a challenge to fight against the nuclear supporters in Jefferson City since the state capital is powered by the Callaway plant. On the other hand, north of Jefferson City along U.S. 54, there is a small community using wind turbines. Possibly related to Missouri Renewable Energy.

St. Louis will not be using ANY power that is produced by the second Callaway reactor as it is also not using any power by the first reactor. But if a major nuclear disaster were to occur at the plant, the St. Louis Area would be affected by it.

If Ameren is permitted to build this project with funds they don’t have, that will ulitmately be part of our electric bills, what does that say about being honest and hardworking? That is means nothing? That the injuries that you’ve sustained from laboring those many hours, days, months, or even years, means nothing because your sustainiable retirement can be bought by an unsustainable buy out worth far less? You’ve done the right thing. You pay your bills. You pay your taxes. You obey the law. And yet when someone who makes more money than you or some company that makes more money than you will every seen in your life time comes along and breaks the law, is it right to procrastinate or give a slap on the wrist to someone who has everything they want and now they want your piece of pie?

We have been abiding to every rule stating what we should do to preserve ourselves, yet somehow, the rules have been rewritten so that we are weakened and that outsiders can assert there strength by breaking the rules.

I read in the news lately that an American ship that was taken over by Somali pirates. When the crew overpowered the invaders looking to hijack the ship, they were condemed more for breaking the rules when pirates commandere a ship, rather than for their bravery of overpowering the pirates who left with nothing but the ships captain as a hostage who still attempted to escape from his captors.

We are living in a world where there are business pirates. People who make up rules that say “when someone breaks into your house to take your property and to harm you and your family, crawl into a fetal position and let the criminals take what they want” rather than “when someone breaks into your house to take your property and to harm you and your family, defend yourself and attack the invaders”.

The pirates are already here. To take control of businesses they can not afford to run. To sell off the profitable assest they do not feel are of any value. To export products and outsource or layoff employment, and to import goods and services from outside companies because the rules say that it is less expensive and “supports a global economy that promotes free trade”. To purchase your competitors to shut them down within the time span of a few years, because “it’s just how business work” in their opinion.

But we are not allowed to learn their techniques. For legal reasons, many companies, and educational institutions, do not want people to learn how to blatenly break the rules for fear that teaching these techiques would cause mischief and crime. When you are trying to apprehend cat burglars, wouldn’t it be wise know how they go about picking locks and deciding whose stuff they should steal? When you are trying to stop the spread of computer viruses, wouldn’t it be wise to know how to write them so you can create an antivirus? When you are trying stop people who con people out of their life savings (like what has been going on recently), wouldn’t it be good to know what conartist look for in a person to make them a target for financial schemes?

We live in an age where criminals plan their crimes like a family plans a vacation. Some criminals do not need to break the law in order to steal things. They just take out many loans that will take forever for them to pay back, buy whatever it is that they want, sell off the stuff about the thing they don’t believe is in their best interest, take whatever resources they think is valuable, then dispose of the rest of it, leaving just a skeleton behind.

We shouldn’t allow criminals, pirates, parasites, or even robber barons to take away our strength by abiding by the laws they create and break so they permit them to steal from us while we are punished for preserving and defending what is ours. In order for us to do the right thing, we must hold those with greater influence to be accountable for their actions and expect them to do the right thing too.

Laws are written to be upheld by everyone, especially by those who have exceptional qualities.

Tags: , ,

Friday, April 10th, 2009 Activism, Business, Local, Metro, Saint Charles County, Saint Louis City, Saint Louis County, crime, economy, employment, environment, green, hackers, mass transit, politics, unions No Comments

 

September 2010
M T W T F S S
« Jul    
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
27282930