Big Brother is marching on....

[RubySlippers]

Do you trust the people running the program and those in the government?

No. But since the government de facto is in the way it is what am I supposed to do but hope those persons are wise enough to keep in proper controls, until help us other parties can counterbalance them, and end this madness at all levels.

[OldSchoolGamer]

The oil crash will sort these bureaucrats and politicians quite nicely...unfortunately, it will also sort the rest of us...

As a country, America has been in decline for quite some time now.  We peaked around 1970.  Economically, we crested the peak when a second working member in a household became a necessity rather than a luxury.  Politically, we began our decline when the words "none of your business" fell into disuse. 

But in the end, the American Empire will run out of gas...literally.  Look at oil prices...and where's the crisis?  Business as usual, and a record high...

http://www.dieoff.org/page224_files/image008.jpg

[Simon]

The Swedish IRS has demanded that if some Swedish ISPs doesn’t supply them with all information they have on their customers’ blogs and domains so they can add that information when checking peoples taxations. At least one company (Bahnhof) has refused to do this claiming that it is against the Swedish and EU law to request so general information. The Swedish IRS has threatened with fines if they don’t receive the information requested which has forced Bahnhof to go to court of the whole thing.

[Celestial Goblin]

Having the tax-men request information about *blogs* is mighty strange to me.
Unless there exist commercial blogs of some sort, which would be quite a suprise for me.

Obviously, it's nice to see that some ISP takes a matter to court if there's a law to support it.

[OldSchoolGamer]

In the old days, people fled Russia to the United States to escape incarceration and oppression.

Now that the New World Order is running things, Russians flee America and return to Russia to remain free, like the guy who decoded the DVD encryption.

When someone had to flee the U.S. to obtain asylum in Russia, I pretty much knew the America I grew up in was dead.   >:(

[Zakharra]

 It's still more the old American than what Russia is now. With Putin trying to reassemble the new USSR 1.2