So now corporations have even more control thanks to the court whose majority was created by Republican presidents. These corporations will make it more likely for more Republicans to win which will secure even more rights for corporation and less rights for people.

In this country, corporations have the same rights as citizens. This “corporate personhood” is ridiculous and causes corporations to run this country instead of its people.

Corporate personhood needs to end now.

Time figure out how to stop these corporations from being evil. Legislators are as useful as penis pimples in doing this since they rely on corporate money to get elected.

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It should be pretty obvious to anyone with sense, that political party has little effect on the impact that corporations have on America’s government. So why not use that to our advantage, and stop blaming politicans, and focus blame on the CEO’s instead?

Before we even try to fix healthcare we need to fix the corporate influence problem. I don’t think many citizens, whether Republican or Democrat, would disagree with the notion that corporations have way too much power on Government.

So forget about social issues for a while- and all those things we differ on and just focus on this. Then, when corporate influence is where it should be, we will have a level playing field and can then make our society run the way WE THE PEOPLE want it to run, and not the way non human profit-driven corporations would have it.

I know you may be thinking that iPhone OS is already a scaled down version of OSX but that’s not all it is. iPhone OS makes the UI much simpler and from what I understand the API’s are under much stricter control than in standard OSX. As any iPhone developer knows, these controls mean that no application can be installed on an iphone without Apple’s explicit blessing in the form of being available on the iTunes App Store.

So now that there is wide speculation that the Apple’s mystery tablet will be essentially a much larger iPod Touch, it implies that the same iPhone OS will run on it. So is it not possible or even likely that Apple is slowly moving towards all of it’s computers being giant iPod touches?

I hope this isn’t so because I for one would bail from the platform. Apple in its technical achievements seems to be expressing more and more hubris. Apple, as a single entity, is quite possibly becoming more egotistical. Egotism often twists ones perception.

Apple’s design decisions are based on what’s best for the user (except for certain Jobsian hangups such as built-in batteries), but its business decisions are based solely on what’s best for Apple. I believe that is why Apple expresses so much control over the platform, iTunes, and the app store.

It would be a mistake to stretch the iPhone OS past the realm of lightweight consumer devices. Perhaps it will not go past this point, but who knows. Apple, while being technologically more innovative that pretty much anyone, tends to be fairly predictable in its corporate strategy.

I use a Mac because I enjoy the OSX experience which makes the work I do about the work and not about the computer. But, it would be easy for me to switch to Windows at any time: The only application I use which is not available on Windows is Final Cut Pro, one which I would gladly replace with Avid Media Composer if my clients would agree to it.

By buying all this crap you will be fulfilling your patriot duty as a consumer. (You are not a citizen, just a consumer). As a result of all this new production in China, we will be dumb enough to buy the new devices with money we don’t have (credit) since we are dumb and unemployed here. This will increase the consumer credit bubble and eventually make it burst, making the “downturn’ even worse. But by then it will have a new name that sounds even nicer than a downturn.

Also, while all this excessive production damages the economy, it will also help to destroy the environment by reinventing technology (Television) which does not need reinvention, thus causing more toxic garbage and toxic waste, not to mention pollution from the factories.

Not to worry, though. You will soon be able to watch greenwashing commercials from BP and Shell in 3D describing how great they are doing talking about words that end in -ility.

Love it. Keep eating.

The level of disrespect by the Chinese paid to Britain and humanity in general is profound on so many levels. Britain does not allow the death penalty under any circumstances. For that matter neither does the EU as a whole. It’s a slap in the face of diplomacy to punish a citizen of another country for a crime which would not be punishable by death in the other country.

But to really understand the sadistic nature of China, just read the following quote from a BBC story about the murder:

The Shaikh family also said it was “particularly distasteful” that judges at an appeal hearing laughed openly at Akmal’s rambling speech as he pleaded for his life.

-source

It is worth noting that the trial lasted only half an hour and the patient was not even given psychiatric evaluation.

Over a year ago you may recall that I researched the organ trade in China. It is well documented that they (legally) use executed prisoners’ organs for transplant without permission. What is not well documented is the suspicion that prisoners of conscience, Falun Gong members, in particular are being executed solely for their organs which are then being sold to foreigners and others. But there is only circumstantial evidence of this, albeit a ton of it.

What I can’t seem to find out is if the family was able to verify that Akmal was killed by lethal injection. The family did not receive the body. China took the liberty of disposing of the body as well. Another profound disrespect.

China is getting too powerful and they must be stopped before they get even more power. China is testing the international community. We have to punish them before it gets even worse.

UPDATE (from the UK’s Daily Mail):

A British official said yesterday that the Chinese authorities had also denied relatives’ requests to inspect Mr Shaikh’s body.
His family had asked for a Muslim burial, which demands that the body be buried intact.
But China has a notorious record of harvesting executed prisoners’ organs and selling them for the domestic transplant trade.

So I still support it because I think if they kill it now it will die a certain death come January and the election year bullshit.

And this still wouldn’t be the final bill. From what I understand it still has to go back to the house and then back to the senate again if this vote passes.

I think we have to learn the lesson from what happened in the clinton administration when they tried to reform healthcare. It died. People who were born during the clinton administration are now acting in porn movies to give you an idea of how long we might have to wait for another go at this.

Also- there’s the rarely discussed public health issue. If your neighbor has an infectious disease and doesn’t get treated for it, then you are more likely to get it. Diseases are social and they generally don’t discriminate based on wealth. Having everyone covered by health insurance benefits the health of everyone, not just the poor in this country who are often vilified.

I pay $550/month for insurance. I can’t afford it and pay the premiums using credit. Sure I could work for Starbucks and become an indentured servant to pay for it but I seem to remember from grade school that America is supposed to be a free country.

Although, yeah, being forced to pay for insurance isn’t exactly freedom, but then again neither is taxes. I think that angle is being overplayed. Everyone needs healthcare for the physical and fiscal health of this nation. Call it what you want and repackage it, but in the end, it is a tax and is not voluntary. But, it’s more fair than forcing sick people to die because they can’t get coverage and forcing healthy people to get sick because their community is sick and poor.

I could go on and on. Yeah, the bill sucks, but in it’s current form, I still support it.

If we blame the politicians, it gets us nowhere. Just about all of them are corporate sell-outs. It seems to me that the corporations (lobbyists) are strong arming these politicians pretty hard to get them to obey them over their constituents. Who knows what’s really going on? Are the corps. threatening politicians with something other than campaign funding? It certainly seems to be within the realm of possibility.

But then the American people are just as to blame as the pols- at least many millions of them are.

So yeah it’s easy and perhaps fair to blame the politicians and the American people, but Is there a common denominator?

Yes, The corporations are to blame. They’re behind all of the influencing of the politicians and the brainwashing of the American public through advertising, PR, bad TV shows, and fake news.

Corporations are to blame. Their influence is too powerful. Expecting the pols to loose this influence is like expecting inner city youth to get straight A’s and get 1200 SAT scores without changing their schools, parents, or environment.

The corporations- and I mean the ones being evil, which is not all of them- need to be stopped.

That’s the problem. (I think). So how can these huge things be stopped legally and ethically? There’s something to ponder.

I could be way off here- so feel free to disagree or say whatever you want in the comments. LIke I wrote up there. I’m just trying to figure it all out.

and…

There is a straight couple in New York that is trying to get their marriage annulled because gay marriage is not legal:

Cupcakes are the new cute nonofensive thing to blog about.

evidence: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/the-periodic-table-of-cup_n_373079.html