"Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton left a voicemail for a lobbyist in which she brazenly begs for a 'contribution.' It's a not-so-subtle reminder of how legalized bribery is the standard operating procedure in Washington." Continue reading →
"We've been working our way through a paper released last week by the Commerce Department, concerning copyright reform, and will have a much more detailed post about it soon (there's a lot in there), but over at the Washington Post, they're highlighting the silly recommendation to bring back the plan to make unauthorized streaming a felony. This was a part of SOPA and was widely discussed. This got a fair amount of attention when Justin Bieber was asked about the law, and said that Senator Klobuchar should be locked up. It's no surprise that this is coming back. It's one of the points that's been raised a few times since the death of SOPA." Continue reading →
"Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s latest crime-fighting idea had a lot of people riled up on Friday. The mayor wants to fingerprint more than 600,000 people who live in public housing. He said it would be done to make the projects safer. 'The people that live there, most of them, want more police protection. They want more people. If you have strangers walking in the halls of your apartment building, don’t you want somebody to stop and say, ‘Who are you, why are you here?'' But residents who live within the confines of NYCHA buildings said the mayor’s fingerprinting idea goes too far." Continue reading →
"Groceries at home have not been too much of a problem, since one of the first merchants they convinced to accept bitcoins was a local community-supported agriculture operation,La Nay Ferme. They’ve even ordered fertilized chicken eggs using bitcoins, in the hopes of producing some of their own food. And they just announced a special trial run of bitcoin payment with a large grocery store. But on the road, they may have to resort to brown-bagging it between bitcoin-friendly restaurants. Buying gas will probably be the biggest challenge on the road, since it has been tough at home." Continue reading →
"The Brooklyn District Attorney will launch an investigation into a botched raid by New York City police following accusations by the Brooklyn family involved that it led to their father suffered a fatal heart attack. WABC-TV reported that 43-year-old Carlos Alcis died early Thursday morning after police entered his family’s home allegedly looking for a suspect in a street attack in the area.Alcis’ family said he collapsed and went into seizures shortly after police entered. One of the victim’s sons, Imaunel alcis, told NY1 that one officer started pumping his heart and asked him to perform CPR, which runs counter to police reports saying officers assisted him." Continue reading →
"According to legal scholar Harvey Silverglate, each day the typical American commits three acts that could be treated as felonies by a sufficiently creative federal prosecutor. On a typical day the FBI formally authorizes informants and provocateurs on its payroll to commit fifteen unambiguous crimes. The ATF and DEA also run huge networks of informants, but those agencies will not disclose any information about the number of undercover operatives they employ or the criminal activities in which they may be involved. In his book 'Our Enemy, the State,' Albert Nock observed that government doesn’t seek to abolish crime, but rather to monopolize it." Continue reading →
"Here is a sign that life is getting complicated for U.S. taxpayers with assets abroad: More of them are deciding they are better off cutting official ties with America. Daniel Kuettel, a Colorado native who lives near Zurich, says he gave up his U.S. citizenship in October because he feared he wouldn't be able to get a mortgage now that some Swiss banks are cutting ties with American clients. 'It was a really difficult decision. I had to think about what was best for me and my family, to reduce the risk,' says Mr. Kuettel, a 41-year-old software developer. He says his income was below the limit the U.S. allows overseas taxpayers to exempt and he owed no U.S. taxes." Continue reading →
"Hedge fund manager Jim Rogers, who moved to Singapore in 2007 because he thought the centre of the world is shifting to Asia, says India is set to miss out on the Asian century. The chairman of Rogers Holdings says that if there is one country an individual must visit, it has to be India for its 'spectacular sensory feast, beautiful, food, colour and religions', but it is also the worst country to do business in. Rogers also slammed the Indian government’s recent curbs on gold imports, saying Indian citizens had no choice but to buy the metal because they had very little faith in investing in other sectors of its economy." Continue reading →
"Billionaire John Paulson, who lost over $700 million after April’s gold crash, has cut his holdings by half. As one of the last major institutional holders of gold ETFs, Paulson & Co.’s exit may signal the bottom in the gold market we’ve been waiting for. Two major institutional players also give us reason to be enthusiastic. JP Morgan is advising its customers to go long on gold 'with a four-five week time horizon,' citing further supply squeezing in South Africa and seasonal pickup in India. And Goldman Sachs recently increased its position in SPDR Gold Trust to 4.4 million shares… more than six times what it held at the end of March." Continue reading →
"The biggest political protests in Peru’s capital in more than a decade have pressured President Ollanta Humala to clean up government and share the benefits of the country’s decade-long economic boom. Many of the protesters were left-leaning and middle-class youth who voted for Humala two years ago, but now they say he and other political leaders are dangerously out of touch. The street protests peaked with a rally of around 8,000 at the end of July. They were small compared to other protest movements in Latin America, but the biggest in Lima since 2000, when demonstrators took to the streets against President Alberto Fujimori." Continue reading →