Infinite reading list

The ever expanding reading list of someone who wants to see it coming.

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Assange trying hard not to notice Ecuadorian state secrets

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Mitt Romney undergoes emergency surgery to remove feet from mouth

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Seb Coe’s little brother won’t stop making fun of Olympics

[infinitereadinglist-blog]

By 1996, it became clear to everyone in the halls of power that there was something important about to happen. We were about to have an information economy, whatever the Hell that was. They assumed it meant an economy where we bought and sold information. Information technology improves efficiency, so imagine the markets that an information economy would have! You could buy a book for a day, you could sell the right to watch the movie for a Euro, and then you could rent out the pause button for a penny per second. You could sell movies for one price in one country, at another price in another, and so on. The fantasies of those days were like a boring science fiction adaptation of the Old Testament Book of Numbers, a tedious enumeration of every permutation of things people do with information—and what might be charged for each. Unfortunately for them, none of this would be possible unless they could control how people use their computers and the files we transfer to them. After all, it was easy to talk about selling someone a tune to download to their MP3 player, but not so easy to talk about the the right to move music from the player to another device. But how the Hell could you stop that once you'd given them the file? In order to do so, you needed to figure out how to stop computers from running certain programs and inspecting certain files and processes. For example, you could encrypt the file, and then require the user to run a program that only unlocked the file under certain circumstances. But, as they say on the Internet, now you have two problems. You must now also stop the user from saving the file while it's unencrypted—which must happen eventually— and you must stop the user from figuring out where the unlocking program stores its keys, enabling them to permanently decrypt the media and ditch the stupid player app entirely. Now you have three problems: you must stop the users who figure out how to decrypt from sharing it with other users. Now you've got four problems, because you must stop the users who figure out how to extract secrets from unlocking programs from telling other users how to do it too. And now you've got five problems, because you must stop users who figure out how to extract these secrets from telling other users what the secrets were!

Lockdown: The coming war on general-purpose computing - Boing Boing

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Mr. ZAKARIA: Yeah, I know several of them in Egypt, not really so many in Tunisia. But I know many of the people in Egypt. They call themselves student revolutionaries, but the thing to understand is almost none of them are actually students. They were students in 2004, 2005, when they began their efforts, but at this point, they’re all mostly - I think what one would call them, honestly, is yuppies. They’re all sort of young urban professionals for the most part. GROSS: So what’s it been like for you to watch them become activists? Mr. ZAKARIA: You know, I just - I have to say you are - I’ve been just struck with awe, because these are people who are just like us. They’re just ordinary people. They’re young, educated people who want - wanted a good job, decent living. They’re not highly political but found themselves in a situation where they had to become political for the sake of their country.

Fareed Zakaria: What Does A 'Post-American World' Look Like? : NPR

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When your arguments start from an extreme minority position, how do you effectively market your idea and form coalitions? The key number to get to in a Democracy is 51%. Their answer was to change the target markets. You’re probably familiar with a few ways the monied interests have re-targeted the market: Republicans vs. Democrats: In this target segmenting, the segments are roughly 50/50. White vs. minority: The most frequent segmenting here is black vs. white. By crafting a message that appeals to whites, you shift the target markets in your favor by roughly 88 / 12 % Straight vs. gay: Don't know exact numbers, but it's clear who's in the minority. Religious vs. non-religious: According to a 2008 survey, only 15% claim no religious affiliation. Target the religious.

Daily Kos: 99%: A Warning to #OWS and the Rest of Us

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If you were to raise your hand to ask 99% of the financial intelligentsia whether we might be on the verge of a failure of the dollar-based world monetary system, the response would be thinly veiled derision. Because, as we all know, such a thing is unimaginable! Think again.

[infinitereadinglist-blog]

I asked another question. Something about Francis Maude, and his tone of conciliation. Not very good, I know, but the best I could manage. Get him to say something about Francis Maude, I was thinking… his hairstyle, his glasses, the way he peers over the top of them as he drones on, anything, just stop already with the strikes are wrong while negotiations are underway, and the rhetoric has got out of hand… I’m not sure what I asked next. Frankly I was in danger of losing it. On my own, with the eyes of Ed Miliband and his three handlers boring into me but apparently oblivious of my presence, I was getting twinges of what I can only describe as existential doubt. So I said some words. And Ed told me that the strikes were wrong, and the rhetoric was out of hand, and both sides needed to sit down… That was the worst one, I think. If news reporters and cameras are only there to be used by politicians as recording devices for their scripted soundbites, at best that is a professional discourtesy. At worst, if we are not allowed to explore and examine a politician’s views, then politicians cease to be accountable in the most obvious way.

TwitLonger: To a TV reporter, political PRs can seem incredibly fussy, often to the point where it takes vast ta

[theinvisiblecommission-blog]

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theinvisiblecommission:

  “A worldwide shift in revolutionary tactics is underway right now that bodes well for the future. The spirit of this fresh tactic, a fusion of Tahrir with the acampadas of Spain, is captured in this quote:

“The antiglobalization movement was the first step on the road. Back then our model was to attack the system like a pack of wolves. There was an alpha male, a wolf who led the pack, and those who followed behind. Now the model has evolved. Today we are one big swarm of people.”

— Raimundo Viejo, Pompeu Fabra University Barcelona, Spain

The beauty of this new formula, and what makes this novel tactic exciting, is its pragmatic simplicity: we talk to each other in various physical gatherings and virtual people’s assemblies … we zero in on what our one demand will be, a demand that awakens the imagination and, if achieved, would propel us toward the radical democracy of the future … and then we go out and seize a square of singular symbolic significance and put our asses on the line to make it happen.

The time has come to deploy this emerging stratagem against the greatest corrupter of our democracy: Wall Street, the financial Gomorrah of America.

On the 17th of September, we want to see 20,000 people flood into lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street for a few months. Once there, we shall incessantly repeat one simple demand in a plurality of voices.

Tahrir succeeded in large part because the people of Egypt made a straightforward ultimatum – that Mubarak must go – over and over again until they won. Following this model, what is our equally uncomplicated demand?

The most exciting candidate that we’ve heard so far is one that gets at the core of why the American political establishment is currently unworthy of being called a democracy: we demand that Barack Obama ordain a Presidential Commission tasked with ending the influence money has over our representatives in Washington. It’s time for REPRESENTATION NOT CORPORATION, we’re doomed without it.

This demand seems to capture the current national mood because cleaning up corruption in Washington is something all Americans, right and left, yearn for and can stand behind. If we hang in there, 20,000-strong, week after week against every police and National Guard effort to expel us from Wall Street, it would be impossible for Obama to ignore us. Our government would be forced to choose publicly between the will of the people and the lucre of the corporations.

This could be the beginning of a whole new social dynamic in America, a step beyond the Tea Party movement, where, instead of being caught helpless by the current power structure, we the people start getting what we want whether it be the dismantling of half the 1,000 military bases America has around the world to the reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall Act or a three strikes and you’re out law for corporate criminals. Beginning from one simple demand – a presidential commission to separate money from politics – we start setting the agenda for a new America.

Post a comment and help each other zero in on what our one demand will be. And then let’s screw up our courage, pack our tents and head to Wall Street with a vengeance September 17.

for the wild, Culture Jammers HQ”

[infinitereadinglist-blog]

At first, it doesn't feel like fascism. That's why it works. At first, to people whose nerves are bleeding and torn and altogether shot from generations of bearing arms and bearing wars and bearing children who will face still more wars, and between them, chaos and trauma and fury and grief and going without, fascism can sound like quiet. It can sound like actual calm. It's an understandable mistake. What have these people had to compare it to? To people who feel vilified on reflex and demonized by rote, this new direction of ours can feel like freedom. That's why it works in a place like this. While it's getting up to speed, fascism's just another word for nothing left to lose.

A Special Place in Hell-Israel News - Haaretz Israeli News source.

[infinitereadinglist-blog]

I don't know what it's like to have shop class in high school or apprentice programs to learn a trade. I don't know what it's like to be able to simply pick a college, write them a letter, and then attend. One has to hire a consultant these days and I couldn't afford that. I don't know what it's like to have no worries about my parents mortgaging their home to finance my education. I don't know what it's like to get through college without amassing a mountain of debt and ruined credit. I don't know what it's like to have multiple job prospects upon graduation. I don't know what it's like to look forward to 30 years at one company. I don't even know what it's like to have one profession! I can't even begin to fathom what it must have been like to have an inexpensive, reliable vehicle to go from place to place. Good roads to go from place to place. Inexpensive gas to get from place to place. Public transportation that didn't take 15 percent of a paycheck. I don't know what it's like never having to choose between food and gas to get to work every day. I don't know what it's like to go to a bank and be offered one type of 30-year fixed rate mortgage. I don't know what it's like not to have to worry about bank fees that cost more than small household appliances. Usury laws. Boy, those must have been nice! There were all those heavy regulations on banks that were in place since the 1930's. John Boehner didn't have to worry about financial crashes during his first 37 years of life because there weren't any. Since deregulation began in 1982, I've had three.

Daily Kos: John Boehner's America

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Now that formal newsflow has officially replaced the Onion's funny pages, it is only fitting that the reality of politics and finance be reduced to a board game. Enter Grant Williams, to whom the last days of the Ponzi unwind are nothing more or less than a game of KerPlunk!: "When playing KerPlunk!, the early straws are easy to pull out without causing any dislocation amongst the marbles. Consequently, there is a period when players spin the tube with abandon and yank straws from the bottom of the pile with the kind of carefree attitude one normally only sees on the face of a Fed Chairman about to be interviewed by CNBC, but as it goes on, almost imperceptibly, the game changes and tension begins to creep into the face of each and every player. The shift normally happens when one stray marble drops as a straw is pulled out without the requisite attention being paid to the ramifications of doing so. The sound of that one marble hitting the plastic floor of the tube is normally enough to concentrate the minds of the players for a minute or two, but pretty soon, as a few more straws get pulled out without further consequences, players relax again. It’s about this time that the game changes completely. Without any warning, the remaining tangle of straws suddenly looks precarious and finding a straw to pull out safely requires extreme focus...Each of the straw

zero hedge | on a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

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[infinitereadinglist-blog]

zeitgeistmovement:

The Obama admin appears to have given a green light to an Israeli attack on an unarmed flotilla carrying peace and human rights activists.

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In the face of massive public opposition, Michigan lawmakers recently reshaped democracy by giving unilateral authority to officials known as “emergency financial managers”. EMFs have independent authority to fire elected officials, close schools, void union contracts, sell public property and privatize assets. Residents and authorities of the small Michigan town of Benton Harbor say that the changes that have come to their town recently are alarming. “We believe it is illegal, immoral and unconstitutional,” said Benton Harbor Mayor Wilce Cooke. “No one person in this country has all that authority. The president of the United States did not have that authority.” Benton Harbor residents like Scott Elliot say his city could be the start of a changing landscape in American politics. “People throw around words like oligarchy and that sort of thing, but that is what it already is,” he said. “I think that the average citizen is going to have less and less to say about what is done with public assets.” The new decision-makers are appointed by the governor to oversee school districts and cities like Benton Harbor facing financial distress. In April, Benton Harbor’s EMF stripped the elected City Council of its democratic power, leaving a city of 11,000 struggling Americans under the rule of a man they did not elect. At least four other cities including Detroit have an emergency manager. In the “Motor City”, the EMF laid off some 6,000 teachers and is pioneering plans for corporations to privately run schools funded by public tax dollars

Crumbling US town on verge of democratic collapse — RT

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Keith Ellison Keith Ellison, one of two Muslim members of Congress, has drawn a Tea Party challenger who says she is running because she believes Ellison is a “radical Islamist.”

Lynne Torgerson wrote a post last week on the website of Tea Party Nation on the need to ban Shariah in the U.S., and her claim that Ellison sees Islamic law as supreme:

I, Lynne Torgerson, am running for Congress in Minnesota, against radical Islamist Keith Ellison. Keith Ellison fails to oppose banning Islamic Sharia law in the United States. He accuses people of trying to ban it as “conspiratorilists.” [sic] Keith Ellison also fails to support that the United States Constitution should be supreme over Islamic Sharia law.

Torgerson actually ran last cycle, garnering 4 percent as an independent. A Minneapolis criminal defense attorney, her campaign website was dominated by critiques of Islam:

“And, what do I know of Islam? Well, I know of 911.”

[infinitereadinglist-blog]

The PR magic, however, may be running out. Polls now consistently show that Americans are deeply suspicious of all the “free trade” triumphalism they’ve been fed — and for good reason. In creating direct unprotected competition between Americans and foreign workers who have no labor, wage or human rights protections, the most celebrated trade pacts of the last two decades have — quite predictably — resulted in widespread layoffs and the hollowing out of America’s middle class job base. At the same time, corporate-backed politicians who continue to push for new trade pacts are resorting to such twisted rhetoric that they end up undermining their own arguments. Last month, for instance, the Obama administration undercut its assertion that the proposed Korea Free Trade Agreement would be a net job-grower in America when it subsequently declared that a domestic job displacement program was a necessary part of the deal (Why would you need to expand existing job displacement programs if a trade pact was going to be a net creator of jobs??). Then this month, as Eyes on Trade shows, the administration’s International Trade Commission report openly predicted that the Korea deal will kill manufacturing jobs.

How free trade deals promote corporate power

[infinitereadinglist-blog]

It is precisely “historical practice” that argues against Koh’s Orwellian linguistics, because never in the history of the world has anyone ever argued that bombing and killing citizens of a foreign country isn’t war plain and simple – not even the Soviets, who were masters of Doublespeak. That didn’t deter our State Department’s legal eagle from defending the indefensible: after all, this administration is all about “change” – and yet they didn’t tell us they were changing the language and the clear meaning of words.