Do we need another reason to be concerned about the US Government?
Well if we do then I think I have it here.
So basically The President said he was waiting until the Supreme Court came to a decision. When the decision came out he said that it upheld his position on Camp X-ray. It didn’t. It didn’t take a position either way. He was advised on the issued by the Department of Justice.
When asked if the President was right about that conclusion, the Acting Deputy Attorney General said ton Congress [and I quote] “The President is always right”
How can there be any meaningful inquiry into things like the War in Iraq and the Rove saga, when the Department of Justice adheres to this type of dogma. and to think I’m going to live next door to this country someday.
mm……a little scary.
Buccaneers
If there was ever a reason to worry about the bullying tactics of the current government of the USA it was the recent story that broke about ‘The Pirate Bay’.
The Pirate Bay is a site (the servers being based in Sweden) which hosted torrents for a range of materials including Movies, Music, Games, TV and Books (to name but few categories) It is one of the world’s most popular websites for file-sharing.
On May 31st Swedish Police entered the premises of Pirate Bay and seized a number of file servers. The servers not only hosted the torrent information but also the files and pages for a number of perfectly legitimate sites. It behoves me to say that Pirate Bay is operating legally under Swedish Law. The sites were back up and running within a couple of days from the Netherlands and are now back up and running in Sweden.
The RIAA in America obviously have a big problem with this information being hosted and materials being made available with royalties being paid to artists. They have a sent lots of legal request for cease and desist and warning letters which Pirate Bay promptly ignored because they were operating perfectly legally.
Now it turns out the White House was behind the raids. Swedish Television says it has documents that show the U.S. threatened to go to the World Trade Organization to impose economic sanctions against Sweden if the site was not stopped. The message reportedly came through the American Embassy in Stockholm.
According to the documents, a chief prosecutor was called to the Justice Ministry and ordered to take action. Dan Eliasson, state secretary to the Minister of Justice, has admitted that the American government suggested there was a risk of sanctions against countries that don’t respect international copyright protections. He also says the ministry provided information on the issue to the chief prosecutor including what are described as “instructions and priorities”. But, Eliasson says, no improper pressure was put on the public prosecutors.
What on earth are the American Government doing trying to bully another government into taking actions against it’s OWN citizens when they are obeying that country’s OWN laws? Does anyone think for ONE SECOND that America would do that if it were asked told to do that by another government?
My Thanks to Radio Sweden
A Drip too far?
So Thames Water failed to meet Ofwat’s (the Water Authority Watchdog) leakage targets in 2005-2006. Not only that but it was the third year in a row. It admitted last month that it was leaking 894 million litres of water per day.
Then they post pre-tax profits of £346.5 million in its financial year ending March 31, 2006. That’s right they are leaking water at an astonishing rate and still making huge profits for their shareholders.
Sounds bad for them, eh? They’re going to be in trouble from the Watchdog aren’t they?
Well no, actually. Ofwat decided that “a fine it wouldn’t have gone to protect customers, but to the Exchequer. This is the right answer for Thames’ customers and for London.”
Where is the sense in this ? A company fails to meet government set targets which results in essential services being reduced [you can’t get much more essential than Water] and a drought in the South East of England. Despite this the company makes £340 million profits for it’s shareholders (who may not even be in England as it’s a German owned company.) and NOTHING is done about it by the Industry Watchdog. Why am I still living here?
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