statism watch

Flashback: More ACTA Details Leak: It’s An Entertainment Industry Wishlist | Six Days Left: Canadian Net Users Caught As Copyright Consultation Nears Conclusion | MP Charlie Angus on copyright: industry lobby pulling for ‘dead business model’ | Ottawa denies altering public’s ECopyright Consultation submissions | Security guards stop MPs, students from distributing fair use flyers at Toronto copyright townhall | Can The Public Be Heard On Copyright Issues? | Copyright Consultation Launches: Time For Canadians To Speak Out | Third stab at copyright law ‘reform’ to kick off with consultations | Time to slay Canadian file-sharing myths | Canadian copyright lobbyists leaned on “independent” researchers to change report on file-sharing | Think tank plagiarizes, pulls report on Canadian piracy | Obama Administration Claims Copyright Treaty Involves State Secrets | Latest Round of Closed-Door ACTA Copyright Negotiations Wrap Up | Digital rights groups sue for access to secret ACTA treaty | Critics waging a cyber offensive to fight copyright changes | Canadian Industry Minister lies about Canadian DMCA on national radio, then hangs up | The Canadian DMCA: Check the Fine Print | Government ready to drop copyright bomb | Transparency needed on ACTA | Revamped copyright law targets electronic devices | New Attempt to Align Canada’s Copyright Act with USA Coming Soon | Canadian DMCA To Be Introduced Tomorrow Morning?

Michael Geist, MichaelGeist.ca
November 10, 2009

Last week Canadian officials travelled to Seoul for the latest round of closed-door negotiations on an international treaty called the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). Battling commercial counterfeiting would seem like a good idea, but leaks have revealed that ACTA – which has been conducted with unprecedented secrecy – is really about copyright, rather than counterfeiting.

My weekly technology law column (Toronto Star version, homepage version) notes that from the moment the talks began last year, observers noted the approach was far different from virtually any other international treaty negotiation. Rather than negotiating in an international venue such as the United Nations and opening the door to any interested countries, ACTA partners consisted of a small group of countries (Canada, United States, European Union, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Morocco, and Singapore) meeting in secret and opposed broadening the process. The substance of the treaty was also accorded the highest level of secrecy. Draft documents were not released to the public and even the locations of negotiations were often kept under wraps. In fact, the U.S. government refused to disclose information about the treaty on national security grounds.

Despite the efforts to keep the public in the dark, there has been a steady stream of leaks. Earlier this year, it was revealed criminal provisions would target both commercial and non-commercial infringement, creating the prospect of jail time even in cases where there was no intent to profit. Further, border guards would be given new powers to search people and seize products as they enter a country.

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Canadians are sure to fully appreciate this use of the Olympics as a test bed for the militarization of their peace officers once they figure out what’s going on. For now, you can watch the Vancouver police demonstrating their new toy.

Flashback: G20 protesters blasted by sonic cannon | American Citizens Attacked With Military Sound Cannons & Tear Gas At G20 | Sonic weapons used in Iraq positioned at congressional townhall meetings in San Diego county

CBC News
November 10, 2009

Vancouver police have a new crowd control device capable of emitting painfully loud blasts of sound, just in time for the 2010 Winter Olympics, CBC News has learned.

The medium-range acoustic device (MRAD) can use sound as a weapon, emitting piercing sounds at frequency levels that cross the human threshold of pain and are potentially damaging to hearing, say audio experts.

But it is primarily designed as a communications device that’s clearly audible up to a kilometre away, say police.

Const. Lindsay Houghton said the device was first tested this summer as a public address system during the Celebration of Light fireworks events in Vancouver.

Houghton said police don’t plan to use the device for anything more than communication. [Ed. Note: Lies.]

The primary function we’re using the device for is its ability to communicate with very large groups with respect to crowd control, evacuations, tactical situations where we may need the loudspeaker portion of it,” he said.

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Flashback: Obama wins Nobel peace prize | Obama rules out Afghanistan troop cuts | Barack Obama to cement new US-UN relationship, chair UN Security Council | Obama’s effort in Afghanistan ‘just beginning’: U.S. defence secretary | Guantanamo’s closure window dressing – overseas CIA ‘black sites’ to stay | Obama adds another brigade to Afghanistan troop surge | Obama administration: Guantanamo detainees have ‘no constitutional rights’ | Dismay at Obama plan to leave 50,000 US troops in Iraq after 2010 | Obama backs Bush: No rights for Bagram prisoners | After Obama praises torture ruling, civil liberties group appalled | Obama eyes 3 more brigades for Afghanistan | Obama’s planned troop surge in Afghanistan could lead to more violence: ISAF | Obama requests Guantánamo Bay tribunals suspension || Obama promises 10,000 more troops for Afghanistan

Steve Watson, Infowars.net
November 10, 2009

Pointless “will he, won’t he” debates ignore the fact that Obama has already deployed 34,000 additional troops to Afghanistan

Nobel Peace Prize winner Barack Obama has decided to send close to 40,000 more troops into Afghanistan over the course of 2010, according to insiders.

“Informed sources tell CBS news he intends to give General McCrystal most, if not all, the additional troops he is asking for,” the network reported Monday night.

According to the report, Obama has decided to send four combat brigades plus thousands more support troops, bringing the total of new troops to be deployed close to 40,000.

The first troops will arrive in early 2010, and it would take until the end of 2010 before all the additional troops were in position.

The build up is expected to last four years, meaning there would be 100,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan by the end of 2012 when Obama has completed his first term.

According to CBS, Obama will announce the decision the week before Thanksgiving, just in time to fly over to Oslo, Norway in December to pick up his Nobel Peace Prize.

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Considering this report was purchased by Toronto, we’ll probably get right on that. Nice trick, though – an appeal to authority to justify taxing you, paid for on your dime, to what it’s becoming increasingly apparent is a new international standard. Of course, your firewalled national media won’t tell you that.

Flashback: UK: Rothschild bank pitches motorway privatisation plan | Vancouver kicks off quest for ways to fund transportation system | Road tolls called ‘inevitable’ | Federal government stages another retreat on road tolls | Federal Road Toll Meeting Sponsorship Kept Quiet Until After Election | Metrolinx considering road tolls after all | GTA Transport Plan Defers Road Tolls, Focuses on Centralization, Intensification | Federal road-toll study announced, immediately cancelled on eve of election call | Cities Debate Giving Away Public Infrastructure to Bankers | Bush Calls for New Highway Tolls, More Private Funding of Roads | Regional transit requires ‘good governance’ | Road tolls, a bitter pill that works | Is it time for toll roads? | Metrolinx Proposes Satellite Vehicle Tracking for Road Tolls | Vancouver to import road tolls from UK | UK proposes national road tolls to cut congestion | Motorists to pay London toll

Natalie Alcoba, The National Post
November 10, 2009

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development says the greater Toronto area could tackle gridlock by creating incentives to get people out of cars, such as congestion tolls, parking and fuel taxes and high occupancy toll lanes.

In a report commissioned by the City of Toronto, the OECD says local and higher levels of government need to hammer out long-term transit infrastructure funding to improve the area’s competitiveness and consider other revenue sources for Metrolinx, the regional transportation authority. Other metropolitan transit agencies use money from advertisements, rents, taxi licence and parking, a transport tax on employers and fuel taxes to help provide transit, it noted.

“A congestion charge in the Toronto region could cover the major highways (the 400 series) and other major arterial roads, and HOT [High Occupancy Toll] lanes could also be introduced,” the report states.

The city could also levy a tax on parking spaces, “based on a fixed charge per square meter or adjusted according to area or zone.”

Mayor David Miller said the city commissioned the OECD Territorial Review (it was co-funded by the provincial and federal governments) because it “wanted outside impartial advice about whether we’re on the right path.” He believes the report says that, even though it is clear there is work to be done by all levels of government and the business community, he said.

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If Soros is calling the US’s controlled, mixed-state economy ‘capitalism’ – then we need a new word for capitalism. He’s blaming ‘capitalism’ for the failure of a market that is both over-regulated where it ought to be free, and under-enforced in terms of actual fraudulent activities. His solution? More regulation and control by economic mandarins (such as himself), of course. But on a heretofore unseen scale in world history. Call it what you will – communism, socialism, fascism, economic totalitarianism – it’s all essentially the same. It is the international revolution, carried out not by the molotov-throwing youth of the early twentieth century, but their ideological inheritors. There’s a certain Hegelian irony here – the revolution has become the establishment, and these old men in suits, attending elite conferences throughout the globe, are accomplishing the institution of rule by council in a way that their predecessors in The International could scarce have hoped for in their most fevered dreams.

Flashback: Soros: China Will Lead New World Order | Soros points out regulated markets fail to operate on market fundamentals, calls for more regulation

C. Marlon Richardson, Infowars.com
November 10, 2009

In a shocking Op-Ed piece published Thursday on project-syndicate.org, globalist financier George Soros calls for a “New World Architecture”. In his essay, he states how international capitalism, led by the United States has “broken down” and how “A new multilateral system based on sounder principals must be invented” through the use of the IMF (International Monetary Fund). Soros goes on to recommend SDR’s (Special Drawing Rights), created by the IMF, as a replacement for the declining US Dollar.

“The dollar no longer enjoys the trust and confidence that it once did… The US ought not to shy away from wider use of IMF Special Drawing Rights. Because SDRs are denominated in several national currencies, no single currency would enjoy an unfair advantage.”

The issuance of SDR’s among the world economies would place all currencies on a level playing field, whose value would be determined by the international SDR.

Soros also calls for the United Nations and its Security Council, currently led by President Barack Obama, in direct violation of the U.S, Constitution, to serve as the overseeing enforcement body for this new financial system.

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Flashback: Taliban Chief Blames Blackwater, ISI for Peshawar Blast | Ex-employees claim Blackwater pimped out young Iraqi girls | Blackwater Founder Erik Prince Implicated in Murder | Obama’s Blackwater? Chicago Mercenary Firm Gets Millions for Private “Security” in Israel and Iraq | Blackwater, mired in Iraq controversy, changes its name to ‘Xe’ | Official: Blackwater contract for Iraq not renewed | Blackwater Guards facing Charges in Case of 17 Dead Iraqi Citizens | Blackwater-linked firm to train Canadian troops | Canadian troops continue gearing up, to receive US counter-insurgency training | Blackwater Worldwide, Wal-Mart of modern war

Associated Press
November 10, 2009

NEW YORK–Former top executives at Blackwater Worldwide say the U.S. security contractor sent about $1 million to its Iraq office with the intention of paying off officials in the country who were angry about the fatal shootings of 17 civilians by Blackwater employees, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

Four former executives described the plan under the condition of anonymity, the newspaper said.

Iraqis had long complained about ground operations by the North Carolina-based company, now known as Xe Corp. Then the shooting by Blackwater guards in Baghdad’s Nisoor Square in September 2007 left 17 civilians dead, further strained relations between Baghdad and Washington and led U.S. prosecutors to bring charges against the Blackwater contractors involved.

The State Department has since turned to DynCorp and another private security firm, Triple Canopy, to handle diplomatic protective services in Iraq. But Xe continues to provide security for diplomats in other nations, most notably in Afghanistan.

The former executives told the Times that the payments were approved by the company’s then-president, Gary Jackson. They did not know if he came up with the idea.

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Flashback: IBM Building Personal DNA Reader

Mark Kinver, BBC News
November 10, 2009

Hundreds of experts from 50 nations are set to agree on a “DNA barcode” system that gives every plant on Earth a unique genetic fingerprint.

The technology will be used in a number of ways, including identifying the illegal trade in endangered species.

The data will be stored on a global database that will be available to scientists around the world.

The agreement will be signed at the third International Barcode of Life conference in Mexico City on Tuesday.

“Barcoding is a tool to identify species faster, more cheaply and more precisely than traditional methods, ” explained Patricia Escalante, head of the zoology department at Mexico’s National University (UNAM), which is hosting the gathering.

In an effort to limit the impact on the planet’s biodiversity, Dr Escalante said it was vital to establish a reliable monitoring system.

“We need an accurate inventory,” she observed, “to recognize parasites of medical, economic or ecological importance.”

Mexican researchers, she added, were involved in a network to produce barcodes in key taxonomic groups , such as trees, fungi, bees and aquatic insects.

Cracking the code

“Biodiversity scientists are using DNA technology to unravel mysteries, much like detectives use it to solve crimes,” said David Schindel, executive secretary for the Consortium for the Barcode of Life (COBL).

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