Copyright police crack down on guitar players trading chords online

This morning I tried to visit a site called OLGA (on-line guitar archive), a place where I had often gone in past years to check out chord progressions for pop/rock tunes.  Many guitarists had worked out tunes as best they could, then posted them at this site.  Over the years,…

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Unequal justice protects Iraq war criminals

The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread. Anatole France The point is that even theoretically just laws can lead to de facto injustice.  But how much more injustice can result from laws…

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Inconvenient federal prosecutors

According to a little noticed change in the Patriot Act, the Bush administration is firing (not promoting or commending) some of its star prosecutors. Why? Because they became inconvenient. Worse, the fired prosecutors have all been replaced with political hacks whose jobs will include NOT prosecuting law-breaking friends of the…

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Bill Moyers on Discovering What Democracy Means

Bill Moyers has recently written on the meaning of Democracy on TomPaine.com.  First, he presents an illustration of the problem.  As is the case with many overarching social issues today, this one starts with a media almost entirely controlled by a few large corporations: Jesus would not be crucified today. The…

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Noam Chomsky on the reason the U.S. won’t relinquish control of Iraq

Chomsky wrote that it all has to do with corporate power and oil.  Here is an excerpt from The Independent, an article entitled "The US says it is fighting for democracy - but is deaf to the cries of the Iraqis"   Sovereignty in Iraq might well lead to a loose Shia alliance controlling most…

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