News and other stupid stuff
Jan. 9th, 2004 03:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsFirst, the scary news: A man in Texas has been arrested for possession of 65 pipe bombs and remotely detonated explosives, along with 800 grams of pure sodium cyanide and dispersal agents, and 500,000 rounds of ammunition. The tipster who turned him in claimed he was only "collecting" these things.
If the man had had a name like Jamal or Mohammed, you can bet this would have been front page news. But no, he's a bigoted white-supremacist who doesn't fit the BushCo script for "what is a terrorist," so he's being quietly swept under the rug.
Well, here's a fun one. A court in Nashville, TN, has ordered a man that, in order to comply with his child visitation agreement, he may not be gay in front of his child. I'm not sure how one does that. Reading among the lines, the court is definitely relying on the canard that being gay is a choice, that the dad chose to be gay, that this was an inherently immoral decision, and that immoral acts should not be visited upon children.
A part time judge in the small town of Hunter Village, NY, has resigned after telling a woman that domestic violence cases are a waste of the court's time and that women asked to get "smacked around" now and then.
Timothy Durmouchel is an unhappy man. His wife has gained 50 pounds in the past four years, and he's no lean and mean machine himself anymore. Even his kids are pudgy. So what does he do?
He sues the cable company. That's right. He claims that television is so compellingly addictive that he couldn't stop watching it, and neither could his family.
Back in March, the U.S. Treasury Department solicited comments from the public regarding whether or not the federal tax on malt liquors should be raised. They did so declaring that the comments would be made public, but personal information such as e-mail addresses, home addresses, and phone numbers would be cleared before they did so.
They lied. The volume of letters was so great, they claim, that they could not hold to their promise and "keep the public informed in a timely manner" regarding the content of the letters.
Aren't there automated scripts to handle 99.9% of this crap?
And now one near and dear to my heart: The International Network for Cultural Policy is soon going to put forth a treaty stating that "cultural goods and services" are distinct from ordinary goods and services and should be exempt from free trade agreements. This is nothing more than protectionism. The list of things that can be made "cultural good and services" is endless: Italian wines, French cheese, Swiss chocolate.
But what this really amounts to is protection for local entertainment markets. American movies and music will be subject to outrageous taxation to defend "local cultural expression," and if the treaty goes through there won't be a damned thing we can do about it.
If the man had had a name like Jamal or Mohammed, you can bet this would have been front page news. But no, he's a bigoted white-supremacist who doesn't fit the BushCo script for "what is a terrorist," so he's being quietly swept under the rug.
Well, here's a fun one. A court in Nashville, TN, has ordered a man that, in order to comply with his child visitation agreement, he may not be gay in front of his child. I'm not sure how one does that. Reading among the lines, the court is definitely relying on the canard that being gay is a choice, that the dad chose to be gay, that this was an inherently immoral decision, and that immoral acts should not be visited upon children.
A part time judge in the small town of Hunter Village, NY, has resigned after telling a woman that domestic violence cases are a waste of the court's time and that women asked to get "smacked around" now and then.
Timothy Durmouchel is an unhappy man. His wife has gained 50 pounds in the past four years, and he's no lean and mean machine himself anymore. Even his kids are pudgy. So what does he do?
He sues the cable company. That's right. He claims that television is so compellingly addictive that he couldn't stop watching it, and neither could his family.
Back in March, the U.S. Treasury Department solicited comments from the public regarding whether or not the federal tax on malt liquors should be raised. They did so declaring that the comments would be made public, but personal information such as e-mail addresses, home addresses, and phone numbers would be cleared before they did so.
They lied. The volume of letters was so great, they claim, that they could not hold to their promise and "keep the public informed in a timely manner" regarding the content of the letters.
Aren't there automated scripts to handle 99.9% of this crap?
And now one near and dear to my heart: The International Network for Cultural Policy is soon going to put forth a treaty stating that "cultural goods and services" are distinct from ordinary goods and services and should be exempt from free trade agreements. This is nothing more than protectionism. The list of things that can be made "cultural good and services" is endless: Italian wines, French cheese, Swiss chocolate.
But what this really amounts to is protection for local entertainment markets. American movies and music will be subject to outrageous taxation to defend "local cultural expression," and if the treaty goes through there won't be a damned thing we can do about it.
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no subject
Date: 2004-01-10 12:31 am (UTC)Also, that link requires me to give the LA Times my email address, and they say in their Privacy Policy that they will email me forever, whether I want them to or not. They will also share my info with their affiliates, who are not bound by even this very generous privacy policy. A link such as this one http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2001833051_texasterror09.html which requires no such disclosure would be better.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-10 12:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-01-10 12:51 am (UTC)While I'm skeptical about the excesses that this could lead to, I don't find anything fundamentally wrong with it. The United States, by virtue of its large domestic market and the substantial amounts of funding available to its major entertainment corporations, has a commanding advantage over other producers and exporters of mass entertainment: France, Britain, Canada, India, Japan, Egypt, you name it. This is a problem, not only because this makes a joke of free trade, but because entertainment and other cultural industries reflect non-economic cultural values that people want to preserve.
At home on PEI, for instance, I'd estimate that easily two-thirds of the channels (http://www.eastlink.ca/cable/cable/index.html) we receive are either American (A&E, ABC, CNN, CBS, Fox, MSNBC, NBC, PBS) or are Canadian affiliations of American stations (Bravo, the Comedy Network, and Showcase come to mind).
The main effect of Canadian cultural legislation is to provide funding and outlets for Canadian-made media (television, film, magazines, books) which wouldn't be otherwise available, given the tendency of the market to fuse the Canadian market with the American despite the fact of different national societies, and the fewer resources available to Canadian producers. I still watch American TV, listen to American music, visit American websites, read American books; what the subsidies do is make it possible for me to read Canadian alternatives.
From Canada (and I suspect from points elsewhere in the world), American attempts to ensure the unhindered domination of local mass media with American-produced exports looks suspiciously like cultural imperialism. This isn't how it's perceived in the US, it seems, but it should still be taken into account.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-10 01:48 am (UTC)I find your responce to Elf's original point somewhat off. The INCP treaty Elf is referring to has almost nothing to do with domestic subsidation of local 'culture'. I [b]entirely[/b] approve of local government subsidizing and promoting local culture. If the Canadian government, or the French government, or the Indian government, want to throw money at the propesition that it's important for domestically produced entertainments to be available, that's well and good.
But none of that has anything to do with the INCP's proposal. What the INCP wants is for imported 'cultural products' to be subject to heavy tarrifs. This is rediculous. This isn't making sure that local entertainments have outlets, have ways to reach people that want them even if the privately held medias are dominated by imports. This is [i]preventing imported cultural media from reaching the market at all[/i], or, if it is imported, making it more expensive. Frankly, this is another ludicrous entry in 'Protecting our citizens from that awful US culture they can't seem to get enough of'.
Governments are very bad at shutting off supplies and very good at helping marginal products continue. This treaty is badly designed policy, even if you agree with its ends.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-10 08:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-01-10 09:00 pm (UTC)I was referring as much to the CEI document (http://www.cei.org/gencon/016,03796.cfm) as the post itself, yes, particularly the below passage:
Most Americans see the billions of dollars in entertainment that the US exports each year as a benign form of free exchange. Foreign consumers can buy copies of American motion pictures, concerts, etc., and absorb American culture without having to leave home. The money they spend supports American jobs and bolsters the US balance of trade. Everybody wins.
And under the free trade regimen that the CEI would like applied to cultural industries, given precedents elsewhere subsidies as well as tariffs would be directly targeted. Which is a Bad Thing.
But none of that has anything to do with the INCP's proposal. What the INCP wants is for imported 'cultural products' to be subject to heavy tarrifs. This is rediculous. This isn't making sure that local entertainments have outlets, have ways to reach people that want them even if the privately held medias are dominated by imports. This is [i]preventing imported cultural media from reaching the market at all[/i], or, if it is imported, making it more expensive. Frankly, this is another ludicrous entry in 'Protecting our citizens from that awful US culture they can't seem to get enough of'.
This has a lot to do with weakening the strength of the American exporters, again important given the disproportion between their strength and local strength. I'm more wary of the tariffs than I am of the subsidies, but I see nothing fundamentally wrong with it all.
And yes, although I support these subsidies and tariffs, I also enjoy consuming American cultural products. I just don't want them to be the only ones available when I turn on the TV or go to the newsstand.
Governments are very bad at shutting off supplies and very good at helping marginal products continue.
That, unfortunately, is what the Canadian cultural industry is, thanks to our close relationship with the United States. We don't have global media colossi with vast resources like the United States. Increasing the strength of local cultural industries, and perhaps weakening the strength of American industries, levels the playing field.