Fundamentalism, Fox, and … Scientology?

I was recently chatting with a friend who has been a Scientologist for several decades. He was attacking the White House for its conspiracy with other networks to censor and muzzle Fox News. He later sent me this screed on the Campaign for Liberty blog under the Subject "Fox News is Right". The CfL is one of the political arms of Scientology. Check out their mission and board if you want. The introduction to the post is (in part, go read it yourself):

Why is America under such a vicious and prolonged [internal] attack against its basic beliefs? Why are some Americans attacking the hand that feeds them? Why tear down a working system? None of the attacks make sense. It is as though we are living in a looking glass world. I am looking backwards and it seems left is right and wrong is right and right is wrong. Politically correct speak replaced plain speak and the silent Christian majority are called domestic terrorists.

Okay, I paused at this point and replied (in part):

Lost me at "silent Christian majority". An iconic building in every neighborhood, billboards every mile, ads every hour on radio and TV channels not already owned outright by Christian networks, and their creed printed on money and embedded in children's daily oath to the flag does not fit my definition of "silent".

I didn't mention the wholesome Christian activities of blockading health clinics, continuous protests with gory signs on streets and campuses, bombing clinics and shooting doctors. But the actual point of the article is that the KGB is alive and well and still trying to take over America via a conspiracy with the Psychiatric Industrial Complex. They have (the article claims) powerful mind control methods that are being used on the public. If so, I asked in reply, how did we ever manage to get rid of CheneyBush? Today, my friend sent me (among other Scientology political pieces) a YouTube video attacking Obama's plan to sign the latest international emissions control treaty. It took a while of watching to figure this out, among the doomsayer speech of One World Government, global warming denialism, and the demise of America and such. Many of the positive comments to the video seem to be from garden variety End Days Christians, but the platform is quite visibly Scientology. The point of all this is, Why are the Scientologists aligning with Fox and Christian Fundamentalists? For recruitment? For political palatability? To hijack a powerful propaganda machine? Read and listen to what they actually say, and get back to me.

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Bond raters hiding behind First Amendment

This is insanity: The bond raters, those three big Wall Street companies that rated crappy mortgages to be great investments, thereby plunging the country into economic chaos, are hiding behind the First Amendment. They are claiming that they can't be sued for the financial equivalent of calling a mouse an elephant, because their work product is just an "opinion." We charge millions of dollars for giving you a rating, and you can't hold us accountable because it's an "opinion." I'll tell you this: I work as a lawyer. If a screw up someone's case because I give him bad advice (in return for charging her a fee), she could (rightfully) sue me for malpractice. If I raised the defense that I can't be sued for terrible advice because it was merely "an opinion," I'd be laughed out of court with an adverse judgment tattooed onto my forehead. That the courts aren't letting these ratings firms get hammered makes you wonder whether the unspoken defense is "too big to fail." If they didn't have this ridiculous "First Amendment" defense, the smug and irresponsible raters would be ripped apart by millions of justifiably irate plaintiffs. And, of course, Congress is in no hurry to beat back the ratings firms' lobbyists and hold these jokers accountable for all of the 401K's they've trashed.

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The Monsanto monster

Monsanto has been a target for many years. They have a terrible environmental and health record, they have harassed small farmers for years, they've bribed officials in Indonesia, and they've joked about performing "rural cleansing" (a play on the words "ethnic cleansing", i.e. genocide), and told small seed cleaners that rather than buy them out, "We'd rather put you out of business, it's more fun that way." All this from the company that brought Agent Orange to Vietnam, resulting in 400,000 deaths and disabilities, as well as 500,000 children born with birth defects. However, in the world of corporate PR, no sin is too big. Monsanto has sought to remake its image as the company that's helping to feed the world. Their website claims that "We apply innovation and technology to help farmers around the world produce more while conserving more. We help farmers grow yield sustainably so they can be successful, produce healthier foods, better animal feeds and more fiber, while also reducing agriculture's impact on our environment." High claims, to be sure. Too bad we don't know if they hold up to scrutiny. A new article by the editors of Scientific American explains the situation:

To purchase genetically modified seeds, a customer must sign an agreement that limits what can be done with them. (If you have installed software recently, you will recognize the concept of the end-user agreement.) Agreements are considered necessary to protect a company’s intellectual property, and they justifiably preclude the replication of the genetic enhancements that make the seeds unique. But agritech companies such as Monsanto, Pioneer and Syngenta go further. For a decade their user agreements have explicitly forbidden the use of the seeds for any independent research. Under the threat of litigation, scientists cannot test a seed to explore the different conditions under which it thrives or fails. They cannot compare seeds from one company against those from another company. And perhaps most important, they cannot examine whether the genetically modified crops lead to unintended environmental side effects.

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John McCain’s attempt to privatize the Internet

I've often written about net neutrality. See this post on the meaning of net neutrality and this post on the recently introduced "Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009." Today, Senator John McCain made it clear that he is not in favor of a free and open Internet. He believes that access to the Internet should be entrusted to the telecoms. As reported by PC World,

McCain's bill, the Internet Freedom Act, seeks to do the opposite of what its name implies by ensuring that broadband and wireless providers can discriminate and throttle certain traffic while giving preferential treatment to other traffic. Basically, those in power or those who pay more will have better access. Apparently we have different definitions of ‘freedom'.

What is McCain's rationale for this terrible bill? It's yet more free market fundamentalism:

"Today I'm pleased to introduce the Internet Freedom Act of 2009 that will keep the Internet free from government control and regulation," McCain said. "It will allow for continued innovation that will in turn create more high-paying jobs for the millions of Americans who are out of work or seeking new employment. Keeping businesses free from oppressive regulations is the best stimulus for the current economy."

Here's a bit more background on McCain's mindset, which consists of a war of misinformation (keep in mind that during the presidential campaign, McCain admitted that he didn't even know how to use a computer):

McCain was on the opposite side of the Net neutrality debate from President Barack Obama during last year's presidential campaign. During his White House campaign, President Barack Obama came out strongly in favor of Net neutrality, which is backed by companies such as Google, Amazon, Yahoo!, eBay and consumer advocacy groups, but opposed by telecommunications, wireless and cable companies.

In short, since U.S. citizens have retained such immense control over the television and radio airwaves (this is sarcasm and here's Exhibit A), we'll hand the Internet over to private corporations too. The solution to McCain's attempt to hand control of the Internet to big profit-hungry corporations is to require McCain to subject himself to cross-examination in real-time by someone like Lawrence Lessig, or any other rational person who is knowledgable about net neutrality. McCain would be one or two simple questions from being exposed as either naive or corrupt.

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