“The appellate decision is terrific vindication of the First Amendment speech rights of whistleblowers, to remain anonymous,” Scott Bain, chief litigation counsel for the trade group, wrote in an e-mail. “It sets a solid First Amendment precedent that will benefit the SIIA, other associations, and publishers here in D.C., and is a persuasive roadmap for other jurisdictions.”
Showing posts with label Ayn Rand; morality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ayn Rand; morality. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Force vs. Reason
"You cannot see too clearly that force and reason—which last is the essence of the moral act—are at the two opposite poles.
When you act by reason you are not acting under the compulsion of other men; when you act under compulsion you are not acting under the guidance of reason. The one is a force within you and the other a force without. Moreover, physical force in a man's hand is an instrument of such a brutal character that its very nature destroys and excludes the kindlier or better qualities of human nature.
The man who compels his neighbor is not the man who reasons with and convinces him, who seeks to influence him by example, who rouses him to make exertions to save himself. He takes upon himself to treat him, not as a being with reason, but as an animal in whom reason is not." —Auberon Herbert
Friday, December 30, 2011
Everyone still pretending they know what they're talking about
THREE days after the exploding Euro-summit, everyone is still pretending that they know what is going to happen.
As people who are sceptical about Europe and people who want to have sex with it continued to shout, experts said there was no sign of either side conceding their 'facts' are just opinions and not particularly good ones at that.
Professor Henry Brubaker, of the Institute for Studies, said: "At some point someone with a fancy title is going to say 'I haven't the faintest fucking idea' and that will hopefully start a chain reaction of people admitting they're full of shit.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
SOPA & Preservation of Web Freedoms
""On Thursday the House of Representatives is expected to vote on the Stop Online Piracy Act...The problem is that the bills' legal and technical solutions are very similar to mechanisms that authoritarian regimes use to censor and spy on their citizens...Our organization, Global Voices Online, is an international network for citizen media. We support the protection of intellectual property; many members of our community earn all or part of their living by creating copyrighted work. We worry, though, that the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act will inflict broad unintended damage on digital activists living under repressive regimes as well as restrict speech freedoms at home." "
Sunday, December 11, 2011
On Being Disinherited....
There are so many interesting aspects to this story that I don't even know how to start.
Excerpt from article: "Why had he done it? I suspect in part I was the wrong kind of offspring for him. The only daughter, and the family outsider, I had moved away from my hometown and their idea of who I should be."
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Anonymous: Message to the American People
Uploaded by anonymous04210 on Dec 3, 2011
Dear brothers and sisters.
Now is the time to open your eyes!
In a stunning move that has civil libertarians stuttering with disbelief, the U.S. Senate has just passed a bill that effectively ends the Bill of Rights in America.
The National Defense Authorization Act is being called the most traitorous act ever witnessed in the Senate, and the language of the bill is cleverly designed to make you think it doesn't apply to Americans, but toward the end of the bill, it essentially says it can apply to Americans "if we want it to.
Bill Summary & Status, 112th Congress (2011 -- 2012) | S.1867 | Latest Title: National Defense Authorization Act for.
This bill, passed late last night in a 93-7 vote, declares the entire USA to be a "battleground" upon which U.S. military forces can operate with impunity, overriding Posse Comitatus and granting the military the unchecked power to arrest, detain, interrogate and even assassinate U.S. citizens with impunity.
Even WIRED magazine was outraged at this bill, reporting:
Senate Wants the Military to Lock You Up Without Trial
...the detention mandate to use indefinite military detention in terrorism cases isn't limited to foreigners. It's confusing, because two different sections of the bill seem to contradict each other, but in the judgment of the University of Texas' Robert Chesney — a nonpartisan authority on military detention — "U.S. citizens are included in the grant of detention authority."
The passage of this law is nothing less than an outright declaration of WAR against the American People by the military-connected power elite. If this is signed into law, it will shred the remaining tenants of the Bill of Rights and unleash upon America a total military dictatorship, complete with secret arrests, secret prisons, unlawful interrogations, indefinite detainment without ever being charged with a crime, the torture of Americans and even the "legitimate assassination" of U.S. citizens right here on American soil!
If you have not yet woken up to the reality of the police state we've been warning you about, I hope you realize we are fast running out of time. Once this becomes law, you have no rights whatsoever in America. — no due process, no First Amendment speech rights, no right to remain silent, nothing.
The US senate does not want us to speak. I suspect even now orders are being shouted into telephones and men with guns will soon be on their way. Why? Because while the truncheon may be used in lieu of conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there?
Cruelty and injustice...intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance, coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who's to blame? Well certainly there are those who are more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable. But again, truth be told...if you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror.
I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn't be? War. Terror. Disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you and in your panic, you turned to the now President in command Barack Obama. He promised you order. He promised you peace. And all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent.
More than four hundred years ago, a great citizen wished to embed the fifth of November forever in our memory. His hope was to remind the world that fairness. Justice, and freedom are more than words - they are perspectives. So if you've seen nothing, if the crimes of this government remain unknown to you, then I would suggest that you allow the fifth of November to pass unmarked. But if you see what I see, if you feel as I feel, and if you would seek as I seek...then I ask you to stand beside one another, one year from November 5th, 2011, outside the gates of every court house of every city DEMANDING our rights!!
Together we stand against the injustice of our own Government.
We are anonymous.
We are Legion.
United as ONE.
Divided by zero.
We do not forgive Censorship.
We do not forget Oppression.
US SENATE...
Expect us!!
Music by: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Requiem
Friday, December 9, 2011
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
The Beauty of Ayn Rand’s Ethics
"Productive work is the central purpose of a rational man's life,
the central value that integrates and determines the hierarchy of all his other values.
Reason is the source, the precondition of his productive work – pride is the result." ~~Any Rand
"The world you desired can be won,
it exists,
it is real,
it is possible,
it's yours.
it exists,
it is real,
it is possible,
it's yours.
But to win it requires total dedication and a total break with the world of your past,
with the doctrine that man is sacrificial animal who exists for the pleasure of others.
Fight for the value of your person.
Fight for the virtue of your pride.
Fight for the essence, which is man, for his sovereign rational mind.
Fight with the radiant certainty and the absolute rectitude of knowing that yours is the morality of life
and yours is the battle for
any achievement,
any value,
any grandeur,
any goodness,
any joy
that has ever existed on this earth."
John Galt quote that ended Ayn Rand's last public speech (New Orleans Nov 1981)
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