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Category Archives: Creeping Totalitarianism

Book report

Sunday, July 6, 2008

I marked a birthday recently (too old to celebrate) and my son gave me a copy of Takeover, The Return of the Imperial Presidency and the Subversion of American Democracy, by Charlie Savage. I just finished reading it. I found this book to be a bit of a tough slog. It’s a little bit like […]

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When corporations battle, we lose.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Verizon is currently suing Google/youtube, claiming that youtube has committed sundry acts of copyright infringement. Recently, a judge ruled that youtube’s source code was a trade secret, and youtube did not have to hand it over to Verizon in connection with the lawsuit. But the same judge ruled that youtube had to hand over 12 […]

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Dodd speaks out on FISA

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Chris Dodd’s website has the text of his FISA speech in Congress today, but the audio won’t play, at least on Safari. I tried to embed it in a post, but it was silent. Parts of the speech are on youtube however, and here’s one: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4o_3bphT3dg[/youtube] Harry Reid is clearing the way for this bill. […]

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Dodd to filibuster, Harry Reid to subvert

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

You can see the endgame from a mile away. To his credit, Dodd has announced that he will filibuster the FISA legislation. Harry Reid has announced that he will co-sponsor Dodd’s amendment to strip immunity out of this legislation. Nonetheless, it’s clear that Reid stands ready to put the knife into Dodd, and to deliver […]

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More on FISA

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Glenn Greenwald has an excellent piece on the FISA bill, as well as the mainstream media reaction to it, which is to hail it as a compromise rather than the sell-out that it is. At times like this, mega corporations must stick together. Via that article, an honorable exception, from, who else? Keith Olbermann. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2MpyODTLnY[/youtube] […]

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Joe Courtney does us proud, Congress sells us out

Friday, June 20, 2008

We can be justly proud that our Congressman voted against Iraq war funding and against the outrageous FISA bill, as did all our Connecticut Democrats. It is unlikely that the Congress has ever surrendered so much power to a president in this nation’s history. They have made the most unpopular and no doubt worst president […]

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Put pressure on Steny Hoyer and his gang

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Consider giving money to put pressure on Steny Hoyer to stop trashing the constitution. You can donate here. Glenn Greenwald explains: It is now definitively clear that House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is the driving force behind a bill — written by GOP Sen. Kit Bond — to vest the President with vast new warrantless […]

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Open letter to Joe Courtney

Monday, June 16, 2008

Dear Joe: A few months ago you and most of the other freshmen Democrats took a courageous stand. You were among the most courageous, because it was not so clear then that the Democrat with the narrowest 2006 margin of victory would have such an easy time winning re-election. You voted to preserve the Constitution […]

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Time of War

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Recently the Supreme Court ruled, by the slimmest of margins, that prisoners at Guantanamo have the right to file habeas corpus actions challenging their incarcerations. In today’s Times, Jonathan Mahler, writes that in doing so the Supreme Court has bucked precedent: “The most important thing we do is not doing,” Justice Louis D. Brandeis once […]

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Unlawful free speech

Saturday, May 31, 2008

You have the right to free Speech as long as you’re not Dumb enough to actually try it. The Clash This ( Jailed for Protesting Gitmo: 34 Convicted for Demonstrations Outside Supreme Court) was passed on to me by a friend this morning. According to the article the 34 were convicted of “unlawful free speech”. […]

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