Monkey House, the nets ugliest p2p news site, is back!

Monkey House, my p2p news blog is back up. It's new url is: http://monkey.byethost17.com
I was only able to save a few of the old posts, but at least it is up and running again.

Religious Fanaticism - SUCKS

A relative posted this on Facebook. I have a pretty thick skin but I found it offensive.

A college professor stood up on his chair and said "If GOD really exists then GOD knock me off this chair." Nothing happened. The class silently watched as an Army Veteran stood up and punched him in the face knocking him out and off the chair, then sat back down. As the Professor came to he looked at his student and said "WHY DID YOU DO THAT?" He said "GOD was busy protecting my buddies still fighting for your right to say and do stupid shit like that, so HE SENT ME. Amen.

I was the only one who objected, everyone else thought it was wonderful. Here are my two responses to this crud below.

Guess it's just me, but I REALLY don't trust people who hear voices in their heads, claiming to be god telling them what to do

I could rewrite that as the professor being a christian talking about Jesus and guy who punched him being a Muslim, who felt that HIS god was being insulted/denied. Exactly the same mentality, but I bet no one would be cheering for Abdul.

I so despise religious fanaticism, no matter WHAT flavor it comes in. The funny thing is, the professor in the story's argument isn't really all that good. I can beat it down and I'm an agnostic-atheist.
Essentially the professor is trying to force god to prove his existence by saying nah nah, look at me, prove you are out there by knocking me off this chair. Well if you read the bible or even just watched Charlton Heston as Moses you will know that god as portrayed in the bible doesn't operate like that. While all knowing of everything, god operates on HIS time and does what HE wants.
According to the bible the Jews were tortured for thousands for YEARS before god decided to send out Moses to rescue them in his name. Sodom and Gomorrah's citizens sinned for years before god got sick of it and sent his angels to destroy the cities. So one professor standing up in a chair NOT being knocked out of it by god is in no way contradictory to the bibles teachings.

I guess you can't make an argument like that if your mind is all fogged up and confused with fanatic religious rage, at that point all you can do is face fist someone for expressing a viewpoint that conflicts with your theology.
Mr. Army douche has it wrong. Nazis, KGB thugs, Islamic fanatics and other people from dystopian police states smash people to the ground for disagreeing with their philosophy. By punching the professor THAT's what he is defending

The Government's undeclared war

I've been thinking about 20th century history, from the 50's till now, and have come to a conclusion. The U.S. government has been engaged in a war. The war it has been engaged in is against its own people. The government never admits this, but it is so.

It started with the "war on communism", in the 50's. Sure you had the cold war conflicts in Korea and Vietnam, but there was also a conflict going on at home. By flag waving and fear mongering the government was able to frighten people about "communist" infiltrators, who were trying to destroy the American way. Who were these people? Anyone the government said they were. Belong to a group the government didn't like. Guess what, you were a communist! Push forward a viewpoint the government didn't like? COMMIE! Hollywood got hit particularly hard, with actors and directors careers ruined over the governments accusing them of communism.

People started getting wise to this bullshit in the 60's, you could see it in the activism and protests about Vietnam and other government stupidity. The people weren't buying the old commie bs anymore, so the government had to come up with a new excuse in order to continue to conduct it's war against it's own people. Enter the war on drugs!!! Ushered in by that scion of virtue, Richard Millhouse Nixon the war on drugs has been longtime and still ongoing justification for the government to wage war against its citizens.

Part of any war is the acquisition of territory and with the RICO laws the government has seized millions, if not billions of dollars worth of peoples property under the auspice it was bought with "drug money". In wartime the loser doesn't get a trial first, and neither do RICO victims. If an asset forfeiture victim wishes to get their stuff back, they have to take the GOVERNMENT to court. It is the complete opposite of the way U.S. justice is supposed to be, where the government needs to collect evidence them prove you guilty under a presumption of innocence. Instead, you are PRESUMED guilty and have to attempt to prove innocence in order to have your seized property returned. Mimsey were the Borogroves!!!

No knock raids, "stop and search"(a PC new name for an old cop tactic formerly known as "rousting the niggers"), a massive escalation in the size and armament of SWAT teams, the war on drugs has definitely allowed the government to escalate the war on its own people to the next level.

When you are conducting a war, sometimes attacking from just one front isn't enough. You want to catch the enemy in a pincher movement, flank him, wrap him up, finish him.

Enter post 9-11 and the war on terrorism. I'm not saying retaliation wasn't necessary, but the government has peddled fear and used it to convince people it's OK for it to make an end run against the constitution. The Patriot act, TSA gate rape, treating photographers like terrorists.

All wars end; its been LONG overdue for the government to end its war against it's own people. When John Lennon sang give peace a chance he was talking about the governments idiotic war in Vietnam. It was good advice then, its still good advice now.

Taxes, who should pay?

  Why when it comes to tax increases is it ALWAYS the working guy who has to bend over and take it? I can recall years ago BEGGING my employer, who had a wage freeze, to just give me enough of a raise to compensate for the state tax increase so that I could at LEAST be making the same money and not be handed a pay cut. The answer of course, was no.
  Democrats LOVE to talk about taxing the rich, but there is a problem with this. Corporations and rich people lobby politicians. They make large scale political contributions. Joe six pack doesn't have have the money to lobby the politicians and his contribution, if any, is a joke in comparison to what the rich give. So when all the bloviating is done, guess who winds up with the tax increase?
  There is a HUGE vein of untapped tax revenue out there. It is NOT the rich, as even if they don't pay enough, they are at least paying something. I'm talking about so called "non profits". You know, churches, universities, hospitals, and charities all squatting on acres of land and not paying a dime in property or income tax.
  Lets start with the churches. Does the Catholic church seem poor to you? The Vatican is literally dripping with gold, yet pays no taxes in the U.S. There may be some small churches not making any profit, but the large ones rolling in money need to start paying taxes.
  Now we come to the Universities. Rah rah go team go! Love that college football! If a school can afford a multi-million dollar football team AND raises tuition well above the inflation rate year after year they need to stop crying non profit poormouth and pay taxes.
  Feeling sick? Uninsured? So sad, if you need any surgery you'll be paying that hospital bill for the rest of your life. I'm not quite as down on the hospitals as I am on the churches and universities, but I do think there are some hospitals with administrative bloat and overpaid management. Hospitals like this need to be given the option of shaping up or paying the tax man.
  Last but so very not least are the so called "charities". So sorry chums, but any charity paying out a six figure salary to its CEO should not only lose non profit status and have to pay taxes, it should have to pay them RETROACTIVELY.
  These moochers have been getting a free ride for far too long; it's time for them to shoulder the same tax burden everyone else has to.

Why the right to bear arms is important

  If you live in a decent neighborhood, odds are you will never need a gun for self defense. Limousine liberals whose most dangerous experiences were a few fist fights in prep school don't have a clue what it's like if you DON'T live in a nice neighborhood. They, and unfortunately some misguided community leaders as well, seem to think strict gun control is some kind of magic that will make a bad neighborhood less dangerous.
  I never understood that. Are the hoods still there? The drug dealers and the pimps still there? Gangs still there? Poverty still there? With all other conditions the same, the only thing gun control does is make life easier for the hoods, many who can still get guns from the same people they get illegal drugs from.
Liberals argue: "need help, just call the police, it's their job".
Is it? Really? Actually, it isn't. Putting aside the axiom "when seconds count, police are only minutes away",it has been ruled that police have no duty to protect you.
  The state of Massachusetts has some of the strictest gun control laws in the nation, yet it is codified in Mass state law that police are NOT obligated to protect you. A Massachusetts statute spells out the rule there: the government has no legal duty “to provide adequate police protection, prevent the commission of crimes, investigate, detect or solve crimes, identify or apprehend criminals or suspects, arrest or detain suspects, or enforce any law.” Mass. Gen. Laws Ann. Ch. 258 § 10(h).
  More recently, the supreme court in Castle Rock v. Gonzales has upheld the precedent that authorities are under no obligation to protect you, even in the case of a restraining order.
So when you call the police if they show up it is because they chose to, not because they had to. By restricting gun ownership via tough gun laws, the state is replacing the right to self defense with a police force which has no obligation to protect you. Sorry to sound like a redneck, but personally I'd trust the functionality of a shotgun over the benevolence of the police.

Massachusetts wiretapping laws, it's time for a change

Video cameras. They are everywhere. Most cell phones now come with one, and most people have cell phones. Even if you don't have a cell phone, or a camera equipped cell phone digital video cameras are small and cheap, and most point and shoot still cameras have an option to record video, with sound. With all these cameras around, is it not natural that people will well... use them? Not surprisingly, since the Rodney King incident on March 2, 1991 more and more people have used video cameras to record police. Cops don't like this and have retaliated by arresting the people filming them under a variety of charges, failure to comply with lawful order(cop illegally demands camera turned over), obstruction of investigation, basically contempt of cop charges with little or no legal grounding. Most states are one party consent, meaning that in public places there is no expectation of privacy for public officials. Hence the bullshit contempt of cop charges because police can't actually charge people for filming them. In most states. Massachusetts is a 2 party consent state. Police have interpreted this to mean anyone filming them with audio requires the officer(s) being filmed consent, which of course is never given. Arrests have been made under this statute, in Greenfield MA Pete Eyre and Ademo Freeman, and Simon Glik. The Glick case is particularly noteworthy in that Glik upon beating the case turned around and sued the police. He won in the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, part of the decision reading: "The First Amendment issue here is, as the parties frame it, fairly narrow: is there a constitutionally protected right to videotape police carrying out their duties in public? Basic First Amendment principles, along with case law from this and other circuits, answer that question unambiguously in the affirmative."
So what does this mean for Massachusetts citizens wishing to film cops? I'm not a lawyer so I could be wrong here, but from what I have read here and there if the cop SEES you filming him it is NOT considered wiretapping. From what I understand to be sure they can't charge you with wiretapping you have to inform the police you are recording them if they don't already see you. It seems like a big victory, but is it? What if a citizen witnesses a pumped up roid rage cop beating the living shit out of someone? So in this situation he's supposed to walk up to the already enraged officer and say "excuse me sir, I'm going to film you"? Oh THATs going to go over well. Over like a lead Zeppelin.
Clearly, what needs to be done is the law itself needs to be changed, so that two party consent is in NO WAY required to record public officials in public places. Ideally, the Mass legislature could get the law changed, but that is not very likely to happen. That insane clown posse is much more interested in passing seat belt laws and pushing through boondoggle multi-billion dollar projects like the big dig. There is another way, although it's a tough row to hoe. Massachusetts has a Initiative Petition process where citizens can get laws passed if they first get enough signatures on the petition and then get a majority of people to vote for it when election time comes around. As stated before, this is NOT easy, it currently requires that "the initiative petition must be signed by a minimum of 68,911 certified voters. No more than one-quarter of the certified signatures may come from any one county (until the results of the 2014 state election are certified by the Governor's Council, this figure is 17,228)."
To accomplish this requires a person or persons with both some legal knowledge to write out the law change so that the cops can't worm around it and enough connections to be able to collect the large amount of signatures needed just to get it on the ballot, THEN publicize it positively to counter the no doubt negative press that law enforcement will put out in opposition. I have neither the legal knowledge nor the influence, but I'm putting out the idea anyway in hope that someone else does.

Edit: According to this precedent, audio recording of police in secret is not legal Right to record has an interesting article on the Glik case.
"Curiously, Lisa Skehill Maki, the author of the brief for the City of Boston, wrote her student note on how the Massachusetts law was wrong."
For those who feel my post was not highbrow enough, her dissertation can be downloaded in pdf format here.

Bye Bye Monkey House (for now)

Just a short post to mourn the death of my other, and I think better blog Monkey House. It was more specialized, dealing with copyright issues and the music industry. The server I was piggy backing on got shut down, and dummy me not being used to how CMS's work, had not backed up the file the posts were on. It was more than just a blog in that it had a forum and chat room as well. Forum posts too are gone. :(