Let's summarize what we've learned this week.

Item one: Your private property can be taken from you, for the benefit of corporations or private individuals, and all they have to do is prove is that more tax revenue will result.

Item two: You can be held accountable for what third parties do with software that you write, or presumably with hardware you build. Expect massive lawsuits against Xerox.

Item three: The police are not obliged to enforce the law if it is inconvenient for them to do so. You could be raped to death in front of a crowd of yawning police officers, and your family could not then sue them for letting your assailants get away.

Gee, thanks Supreme Court. Every time I start to think I'm too cynical, you forcably remind me that I'm not.

Miscellaneous Stuff

-Behold the Glory that is the Kook Museum.

http://home.pacifier.com/~dkossy/kooksmus.html#lobby

-Highbrow Atheism.

http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/forward.html

-The way things might have been

http://www.ahtg.net/aboutahtg.html

-What if LoTR were written by...

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=138905&page=1&pp=50

THIS is what Religious Persecution really looks like.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4476121.stm

"Protests rise against Muslim sect


By Roland Buerk
BBC News, Bogra, northern Bangladesh

The protesters had gathered to hear their neighbours denounced as heretics and infidels.

Protesters in Bogra, Bangladesh
Ahmadiyyas must be declared non-Muslim, protesters say

"Kaffir, kaffir," the mullah shouted into his microphone again and again, looking over the crowd from the makeshift stage set up on the back of a truck. "Infidel, infidel."

And he led the demonstrators in a chant: "Ahmadiyyas are not Muslims."

For four hours, the leaders of the International Khatme Nabuwat Andolon exhorted their followers in the main square of Bangladesh's northern town of Bogra.

The crowd swelled to far more than 5,000, most wearing skull caps.

At times the voices of the speakers cracked with emotion and they sobbed into the microphone.

There were tears among their audience too, and shouts of rage.

Scattered

The target of this passionate hatred was the Ahmadiyya community, sometimes called Ahmadis or Qadianis.


We believe in Allah and we pray for Allah... why do these people come to crush us?
Khandker Azmal Haq,
Ahmadiyya leader

"They don't obey our prophet as the last prophet," shouted one supporter.

"We'll force the government to ban them," added the protester next to him.

Another vowed: "We'll continue our jihad against them, we'll continue our marches."

Isn't it cool that we live in a world where this is even an issue?

U.S.: No billboards in space

Friday, May 20, 2005 Posted: 10:36 AM EDT (1436 GMT)


WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- The U.S. government does not want billboards in space.

The Federal Aviation Administration proposed Thursday to amend its regulations to ensure that it can enforce a law that prohibits "obtrusive" advertising in zero gravity.

"Objects placed in orbit, if large enough, could be seen by people around the world for long periods of time," the FAA said in a regulatory filing.

Currently, the FAA lacks the authority to enforce the existing law.

For instance, outsized billboards deployed by a space company into low Earth orbit could appear as large as the moon and be seen without a telescope, the FAA said. Big and bright advertisements might hinder astronomers.

"Large advertisements could destroy the darkness of the night sky," regulators said.