Growing Up With Racist Double-Standards

Growing up I had trouble understanding all of these social nuances. Often I found myself very frustrated at the double-standards of our society that let the black kids in my school call any white kid a cracker, but heaven forbid a white kid use the N-word in any context because that would make him/her a racist and a bigot. The truth of the matter is the social nuances were the problem and using such words in frustration to these rules did not make one a racist, but merely misunderstanding of how society dictates that the game should be played.

Now over the years I grown tremendously as a person. I have relaxed, I have become more confident, and I have come to learn more about these unspoken rules and how they will affect my life. I have also come to detest not only the N-word, but also any racially charged derogatory words such as cracker (I would say the c-word but that could mean a lot of things in the English language). I find that anyone treating others or even themselves differently based on race or ethnicity to be detestable. Everyone has there differences, many of which they cannot control.

Dr. Laura And The Huffington Post

I was recently reading an article in the Huffington Post about Dr. Laura’s recent spewing of the N-word on her talk show in which she repeatedly used the N-word when speaking to a black caller. In this article the writer, Keli Goff, a black man, goes into great detail on this problem that our society is facing. He talks with great wisdom and eloquence about how many in mainstream media and entertainment keep reinforcing the idea that the color of your skin dictates what you are allowed to say and do. Mr. Goff points out the many rappers that drop the N-word left and right in their songs, but then complain opening about racism in America.

Ending Racism In America Starts With You

I agree with Mr. Goff that this only contributes to and perpetuates racism in America. Its creating more of a problem, more frustration and anger, and is not at all helpful to the situation. These double-standards only serve to create tension when they come up. Either none of us can use these words or all of us can. This is one subject that we simply won’t be able to find a happy middle ground on. I vote that no one can use these words.

Until everyone understand this and treats others truly equally we will not be able to stop racism. We will only create more.

In this article, which I will paste in a block at the end of this post, we hear an endless string of lies and propaganda used to feed on the fears of the unemployed and the disenfranchised. This target audience, already shaken by presence of a black man holding the highest office in our land, is still reeling from the recession and is terrified about there future and thus highly suspicious of anyone in power let alone a well spoken black man. The author of this WSJ “article” is to be preying on the worst fears and paranoia of the populace, just to push his own political and professional agenda. This kind of fear mongering and blind, thoughtless rage must stop.

Now I responded to this email in kind and would like to share my response with you now. So without further adu:

Ok, do not ever send me disgusting trite like this again. First of all this trash is filled full of lies, misrepresentations, and delusional interpretations of events. It gives no real specific examples of any accusations and relies completely on here-say and paranoia. If you honestly believe all of this garbage then you have forgotten how to think for yourself and really examine each line in what is said here.

While I do not support everything Obama has done I also hold no pretenses both for the mess he was left by his predecessor and for the level of difficultly in both conquering our nations many problems and concerns and balancing the solutions with public opinion and GOP backlash. If you want to determine the cause of and slowness to respond to our nations problems then look no further than Congress itself. Filled with infighting, squabbling, and back-room deal making by BOTH parties we have been left with few solutions and little recourse. This while major media outlets want to point fingers this way and that when the problem lies mostly with corrupt politicians, stupid decisions, immoral lobbyists, and outspoken hypochondriacs from both sides of the fence.

If ever there has been a time of need for great upheaval in government and a disbanding of the medieval party system this is by far the most needing in the history of this nation.

Think before blindly forwarding trash written by the talking heads on TV and their ilk, otherwise known as sheeple.

Sincerely,
Patrick Thurmond

The next bit I must share with you is the article which my writing above is in response to.

“I have this theory about Barack Obama. I think he’s led a kind of make-believe life in which money was provided and doors were opened because at some point early on somebody or some group took a look at this tall, good looking, half-white, half-black, young man with an exotic African/Muslim name and concluded he could be guided toward a life in politics where his facile speaking skills could even put him in the White House.

In a very real way, he has been a young man in a very big hurry. Who else do you know has written two memoirs before the age of 45? “Dreams of My Father” was published in 1995 when he was only 34 years old. The “Audacity of Hope” followed in 2006. If, indeed, he did write them himself. There are some who think that his mentor and friend, Bill Ayers, a man who calls himself a “communist with a small ‘c’” was the real author.

His political skills consisted of rarely voting on anything that might be deemed controversial. He went from a legislator in the Illinois legislature to the Senator from that state because he had the good fortune of having Mayor Daley’s formidable political machine at his disposal.

He was in the U.S. Senate so briefly that his bid for the presidency was either an act of astonishing self-confidence or part of some greater game plan that had been determined before he first stepped foot in the Capital. How, many must wonder, was he selected to be a 2004 keynote speaker at the Democrat convention that nominated John Kerry when virtually no one had ever even heard of him before?

He outmaneuvered Hillary Clinton in primaries. He took Iowa by storm. A charming young man, an anomaly in the state with a very small black population, he oozed “cool” in a place where agriculture was the antithesis of cool. He dazzled the locals. And he had an army of volunteers drawn to a charisma that hid any real substance.

And then he had the great good fortune of having the Republicans select one of the most inept candidates for the presidency since Bob Dole. And then John McCain did something crazy. He picked Sarah Palin, an unknown female governor from the very distant state of Alaska . It was a ticket that was reminiscent of 1984’s Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro and they went down to defeat.

The mainstream political media fell in love with him. It was a schoolgirl crush with febrile commentators like Chris Mathews swooning then and now over the man. The venom directed against McCain and, in particular, Palin, was extraordinary.

Now, nearly a full year into his first term, all of those gilded years leading up to the White House have left him unprepared to be President. Left to his own instincts, he has a talent for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. It swiftly became a joke that he could not deliver even the briefest of statements without the ever-present Tele-Prompters.

Far worse, however, is his capacity to want to “wish away” some terrible realities, not the least of which is the Islamist intention to destroy America and enslave the West. Any student of history knows how swiftly Islam initially spread. It knocked on the doors of Europe, having gained a foothold in Spain .

The great crowds that greeted him at home or on his campaign “world tour” were no substitute for having even the slightest grasp of history and the reality of a world filled with really bad people with really bad intentions.

Oddly and perhaps even inevitably, his political experience, a cakewalk, has positioned him to destroy the Democrat Party’s hold on power in Congress because in the end it was never about the Party. It was always about his communist ideology, learned at an early age from family, mentors, college professors, and extreme leftist friends and colleagues.

Obama is a man who could deliver a snap judgment about a Boston police officer who arrested an “obstreperous” Harvard professor-friend, but would warn Americans against “jumping to conclusions” about a mass murderer at Fort Hood who shouted “Allahu Akbar.” The absurdity of that was lost on no one. He has since compounded this by calling the Christmas bomber “an isolated extremist” only to have to admit a day or two later that he was part of an al Qaeda plot.

He is a man who could strive to close down our detention facility at Guantanamo even though those released were known to have returned to the battlefield against America . He could even instruct his Attorney General to afford the perpetrator of 9/11 a civil trial when no one else would ever even consider such an obscenity. And he is a man who could wait three days before having anything to say about the perpetrator of yet another terrorist attack on Americans and then have to elaborate on his remarks the following day because his first statement was so lame.

The pattern repeats itself. He either blames any problem on the Bush administration or he naively seeks to wish away the truth.

Knock, knock. Anyone home? Anyone there? Barack Obama exists only as the sock puppet of his handlers, of the people who have maneuvered and manufactured this pathetic individual’s life.

When anyone else would quickly and easily produce a birth certificate, this man has spent over a million dollars to deny access to his. Most other documents, the paper trail we all leave in our wake, have been sequestered from review. He has lived a make-believe life whose true facts remain hidden.

We laugh at the ventriloquist’s dummy, but what do you do when the dummy is President of the United States of America.

Now I spent a little bit of time trying to trace down the original article and had no luck on the WSJ website. However I did find some of it here: http://myrightwingdad.blogspot.com/2010/04/fw-wall-street-journal-sizes-up-obama.html

It goes without saying that the true origins of this piece are questionable and the blind coercion it tries to provoke is undeniable. I hope those that find this and the many other trash pieces floating around, both on TV and the internet, will take time to truly think about what is being said and whether or not it represents truth and reality. Don’t be a sheeple, become a thinking people.

Thanks,

Pjerky

First of all research isn’t just about solving one particular problem. While there is always a primary goal, often research into one thing yields discoveries in other, often related areas. These discoveries often give us ways to improve the condition and reduce the suffering of those inflicted with the malady that is being researched. So while a “cure” may not yet have been found for, lets say AIDs, the research done into the subject has yielded drugs and methods to reduce symptoms, extend the lives of the infected, and significantly reduce the risk of spreading the disease. This could not have been done without this research, yet we still have no cure.

The next problem with this article is that ES is a very broad field with research into everything from diabetes and heart disease to spinal cord injuries and Multiple Sclerosis. To say it isn’t done yet or results are decades away is lunacy. There are too many areas of study for ES to be “done” yet. We will probably even be studying the field for thousands of years to come and still gain results. Granted at some point the results will become less and less frequent as we unlock more and more secrets, but that does not mean the information that we gain is useless. So far the study of ES has yielded much information into how the human body develops, how cancers work, how cells gain their position in the body, etc. This information has already led us to solutions and treatments for many different diseases.

Finally, I have a problem with someone whom knows little to nothing about research, save what he Googled in one afternoon, telling a wide audience of public (most of whom are probably just as ignorant on the subject) that Embryonic Stem Cell research is not worth the time, money, and effort put into it. Mr. Fumento, stick to subjects you know and stop spreading discourse about that which you are so ignorant, such as anything to do with science.

More and more over the next couple weeks you will hear about the brief, but powerful story of a young woman named Neda. According to reports coming from Iran she was attending a peaceful demonstration when a member of the Basij forces shot her as she stood next to her father. In the video you can see the young woman falling over and been caught by two men then slowly lowered to the ground. The older of the two men, presumably her father, starts saying her name “Neda” over and over again. As she lies on the ground you can see her eyes jumping about, confusion, suprise, and terror etched across her face. Then the worst starts to happen, blood starts running out of her mouth and nose, she loses conciousness. Within seconds her father realizes that there is nothing that can be done for her. Panic fills his voice as he starts crying and screaming her name.

This horrifying scene is difficult to take in, but it symbolizes the struggle and danger now facing any Iranians that are openly offended by the way the election was conducted and the results found. As the violence continues to escalate, the President Ahmadinejad and the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei are losing more and more control of the citizens of Iran. Protesters are chanting “death to the dictator”. Many forms of comunication are being blocked in Iran including most social networking websites, cell phones, and text messaging. Foreign reporters are barred from reporting on any news of the protests in Iran. But messages are still getting out. The world is listening.

I don’t know how much longer this can continue before the world reacts. We must put more pressure on the Iranian government to conduct themselves peacefully and actually listen to the concerns of its people. If they want another election and a real chance at a fair election then give it to them. Unfortunately events like this cannot be handled by outside forces using military action. This must be solved by the people of Iran, for now. We can only directly intercede at the behest of the Iranian citizens. This could quickly unfold into a new revolution or coup or possibly even a full-blown civil war.

The video has appeared on YouTube and several other websites, but it has been taken down from there. But it can still be viewed. To see it please follow the link below. I warn you it is VERY graphic and I would not recommend small children seeing it.

http://www.javno.com/en-world/video–young-iran-woman-shot-in-the-heart_266818

Our society has more and more become a nanny society with everyone but parents being blamed for the actions, morals, and attitudes of our children. Parents demand that schools teach their children about sex because they are afraid to, but then turn around and complain about how and what they are taught in sex education. Parents blame violent video games and movies and music for teenagers committing more acts of violence.

For once can our society get to the root of the problem, bad parenting? Stop blaming everyone else for not paying enough attention to your children and taking the time to educate them about right and wrong. To teach them about smoking and drinking and sex. To explain to them the cautions they should take, including moderation. Instead of attacking everyone in sight, how about we send a better message. The message about being a better parent and taking responsibility for your mistakes as a parent.

When did parenting in America become litigating and lawmaking? Grow up and place the blame where it belongs, on poor parenting.

The first story that leads me to believe this is one that has been around for a few months now. Apparently some teenagers in Italy filmed themselves attacking and abusing a mentally handicapped person. Then those kids posted the video on YouTube. Authorities in Italy found the video and used it to find and prosecute the teenagers. This would have been a great example of how the internet could be used to stop criminal behavior. However, the story doesn’t end there. Within a few hours of being made aware of the offensive content of the video, Google (owns YouTube) promptly took it down. But instead of praising Google for their swift action and cooperation with authorities, Italy has now charged several Google executives with criminal offenses for allowing this content to be posted on the internet on a Google-owned site.

This is insane. Not only did the team at Google comply quickly and professionally, but the video itself helped catch the perps. There is no reason for them to arrest the execs.

That was just the beginning. The authorities have been trying to implement a three-strikes law like France recently passed recently. This law basicaly says that if you are accused of even attempting to pirate media more than 3 times will automatically be banned from the internet. Then they added to that law by requiring all blogs to register with the government. Thus, making it easier for the government to monitor citizens. This is of course scary not only because it attacks anonymity on the internet, but it also sounds like the first steps to stamping out free speech online and arresting dissidents. Italy is considered a parliamentary republic, which is a type of democracy that doesn’t have a clear separation of the executive and legislative branches.

Then the owners of an online music site in Italy were thrown in jail because the Italian music industry body, SIAE, has accused them of copyright infringement. This is in spite of the fact that they did obtain a license to sell the music. Though apparently, according to SIAE and the IFPI site, not the correct licenses. Note plural, meaning they have to have multiple licenses in Italy to sell music. In fact one man even claimed that you need as many as 33 different licenses to sell music in Europe. Though some have disputed that number. Why is it that this is not simplified, seeing as how the countries of Europe have been slowly building one unified governing body known as the European Union. Doesn’t sound very united on this front. Another question, why is it that criminal charges are being filed for copyright infringement. This is not larceny, burglary, murder, or any number of other heinous crimes. It is simply a business dispute. It is barely even that because the owners thought that they had obtained all the correct licenses. If you keep changing the rules, how can you expect anyone to follow them?

It gets even better. The Italian government has decided that they want to be able to listen in on the calls made with the popular service, Skype. They want a back door installed so that they can listen into whichever calls they like. It seems the wiretapping issue has reached a whole new level. In Europe, Skype is a very popular tool. While it can be used for evil, such as coordinating terrorist attacks, it is generally used for private conversation to save money (over the cost of local phone services, which are generally high). There are a number of issues with this. The first that comes to mind is that the internet has no borders. What if they use this to listen in on conversations people in other countries are having with people in countries that are not Italy? The privacy warning radar is going nuts on this one.

Then finally, last but not least, the Italian government is also looking to entirely ban anonymity online. Opening up the prosecution flood gates. Everyone from annoyed citizens complaining about products, services, and politicians to everyday social network chatters and forum posters will become targets. This would become a lawsuit free-for-all. Plus, being that government does not give you the right to control the thoughts of your countrymen. This will definitely create problems for dissidents.

After reading all these stories I am starting to believe that the ghost of Mussolini has risen and started to regain control of the Italian government. These are certainly scary markers. Especially because the politicians are taking most of their queues from corporations that are trying to serve their own interests and to hell with everyone else. Europe is becoming colder and darker. Science and reason are sounding more and more scarce. Along with morality.

Look for unexplained disappearances and mysterious arrests in the future. Sounds an awful lot like the kind of things the Nazi’s did. I would recommend that anyone tread lightly in Italy.

This article is based off the one found at: http://techdirt.com/articles/20090504/0148494730.shtml

Ashton has been accused of making multiple bomb threats from internet-based phone calls (using Voice-Over-IP). The FBI then did an IP address trace that led to Ashton’s personal computer. With this information they gathered a search and arrest warrant for him and barged into his house in the middle of the night, guns out, to arrest him. There is a huge problem with their evidence that lead to the arrest, but more on that later. This boy’s basic rights as granted by the Bill Of Rights has been violated. The most obvious right being violated here is sixth amendment which states:

“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.”

He has been denied a speedy and public trial for sure, especially the public part. His family has not been given much access to him, a gag order has been put on the case, there is no information for public record, and details about the charges are being hidden behind the Patriot Act. Without such details it is difficult to build a case to defend him. It would also seem that his 4th amendment rights may also have been violated, though without more details it is hard to discern if this was an unreasonable seizure of property.

Unfortunately the details on this case are sketchy, so that even if the FBI was fully justified in their actions they have also made sure that it is difficult to trust anything they say. Making people even more concerned that we are heading towards becoming a police state. However, even if the threats made did justify their actions, the evidence (from what I have read so far) seems to be pretty disputable. The evidence as far as I can tell that they have is an IP address.

IP addresses help identify a computer or other internet device or server on the internet and act almost like a mailing address. The problem with IP address tracking is that not only do most internet providers use dynamic IPs, which are regularly updated and replaced with a new one users log in/out or as their computers just automatically refresh its IP address. So these floating addresses make it difficult to pin down who had which IP address at what time. To make matters worse these addresses can be spoofed or faked to make a computer look like a different computer on the internet. Which means just about anyone could have highjacked his IP address and used it for nefarious purposes (though I doubt they knew who it would be associated with).

It is frightening to think that our government can get away with whisking away citizens, especially children, to undisclosed locations for no particular reason at all and hold them indefinitely. To read more on this case please view the links at the bottom of this post.

References:

• The Original YouTube Video
• Teen homeschooler jailed under Patriot Act
• US Patriot Act

Today we received news about a small town in North Carolina called Wilson. This town of about 47,000 residents had long complained about the price of cable TV, phone, and internet offered by Time Warner and Embarq. The only service providers in the little town. At first the town approached the providers about working with them on cutting the costs for residents. But the companies refused, unwilling to cut into their profit margins. So the resourceful city of Wilson took it upon themselves to find other solutions to their problem. In the end they found it cheaper to build their own provider network for the town and provide the services near cost to residents. This left residents paying about $99 a month for basic cable (81 channels), 10mbps broadband internet, and unlimited long distance to anywhere in the US and Canada. The city of Wilson also offered higher levels of service for considerably less than what either Time Warner or Embarq offered the same services at. They even offered a 20mbps premium service and a higher tier of 100mbps. Both of which are much higher than the top end 15mbps service offered by both companies.

After losing their business to the city, Time Warner and Embarq have now set themselves on a mission to prevent this from ever happening again. To accomplish this they have decided to lobby the state legislature of North Carolina to make it illegal for municipalities to setup their own telecommunications and content services.  Not only that but they are also trying to make it impossible for such services to get funding from the broadband portion of the national Stimulus Act that was passed recently. Looks like companies and lobbyists are trying to write laws to help line their pockets.

Embarq shot back recently saying that it has the right to make money. They claim that they have to keep costs so high to ensure a better customer experience. Yet they completely ignore the fact that in the technology industry the costs of equipment keep going down while the performance, features, and quality keep going up. What this means is that while they do regular equipment replacements, the equipment they are installing is more powerful and can handle higher bandwidth needs all for less than the previous equipment cost. They are not running out of capacity, they don’t need more money to upgrade their equipment, they are just being greedy. Instead of trying to level the playing field and competing on equal ground with local service like a normal capitalistic environment would require, they have decided that they want to be the only one on the field. They want legally enforced monopolies (which, by legal definition, are illegal) where ever they setup shop.

This reminds me of the city-wide wireless internet service that Philadelphia tried to setup years ago. It too was lobbied against by cable and telecommunications companies and was just barely allowed to happen.

The news doesn’t stop with the city of Wilson today though. Another story came to light about a cable provider called RCN. RCN has decided to raise its rates AND forcefully “upgrade” all of its customers to a higher tier. Then they charge their customers a $5 downgrade fee to go back down to lower tiers of service. So either they trick you into paying more on a monthly basis or they charge you to restore your service to a lower tier. Nice, it is great to see how lack of competition is forcing cable companies across America to improve the customer experience. Now I have to ask, how terrible does your service have to be that you have to resort to trickery just to keep you profits on target? Maybe, just maybe you may want to consider offering… oh, I don’t know… BETTER service with more features that people WANT. How hard is it to keep improving with the pace of technology and the lowering costs of equipment? Is there such a thing as an altruistic for-profit cable company….

Nevermind, I shouldn’t have even asked. Back to Time Warner again… So now that the tiered and capped broadband has been shelved, for now, Time Warner has decided to rethink rolling out system upgrades in cities where it wanted to roll out bandwidth caps. Because they just couldn’t afford to install new equipment as part of a regular schedule that costs less than the previous generation but offers much better speeds unless they started charging their customers inordinate amounts for their internet service. Oh wait, they could, but instead they have decided to act like children and refuse to maintain their services while they don’t get what they want (a lot more money). Oh I am proud to be a part of a country where a software company can be fined for having an illegal monopoly (Microsoft), a telephone company (Southwestern Bell) can be halved for having an illegal monopoly, and cable companies are paid more for having an illegal monopoly. Makes perfect sense.

“Our current pricing plans require all users to pay the same amount, whether they check email once a month or download six movies a day. As the amount of usage has dramatically diverged among users, this is becoming inherently unfair and not the way most consumers want to pay for goods they consume.”

This sounds all well and good except when you look at the facts they don’t support this statement at all. With streaming media services such as YouTube, Hulu, and Pandora becoming ever more common and online gaming and social communities sprouting up everywhere the average internet usage by individuals has increased considerably over the past few years. As such, internet usage hasn’t so much as diverged but jointly skyrocketed. Now the statement above, pulled from http://a.longreply.com/101892, suggests that users don’t want to continue to have unlimited access for one common price. It, and the plans of Time Warner, suggest that people want limits on how much they can download. In the letter linked to above it suggests that people would not only want these limits, but also several options for these limits.

Now first of all I have yet to meet ANYONE who would, after years use a service for a flat rate that offered unlimited usage, WANT to move to a pricing scheme that not only stops being unlimited, but will also (more than likely) increase the monthly fees they will be paying to use that service in the same way as before. For years cable internet providers have provided unlimited access to the internet for a flat rate. Now some of them have decided that they want to squeeze more money out of us (during a world-wide recession no less) by severely limiting usage caps, charging higher rates, and charging excessive overage fees.

I understand that ISPs have to pay for the amount of bandwidth that their systems use on a daily basis and that the usage rates have increased immensely in recent years. They are now complaining that they will have to pay for equipment upgrades to maintain their network capacities. So it would seem fair that they pass those charges on to their customers right? Your first reaction may be to agree with this until you find out what they are not telling you.

First of all they are not even close to hitting the capacity that they are capable of. The United States has the largest groupings of what is called “dark” fiber optic cable backbone cabling in the world. This cabling crosses the entire country stopping in every major city and its capacity is mostly unused, hence the “dark fiber” label. The last estimates I heard were below 10% capacity. The next thing they are not telling anyone is that the “equipment upgrades” they are complaining about are part of the standard upgrade cycle that they have kept for years. The new equipment they are installing actually costs significantly less than the older equipment and provides immense speed improvements for wide area networks (not using the backbone cabling) without any significant changes to the current infrastructure.

There is, of course, more that Time Warner and other cable companies are not telling the public. They are working on creating their own online video and audio delivery services that won’t deduct data usage from these new data caps. Which means they are trying to monopolize online video and audio services by forcing you to pay for them one way or the other.

Now most reasonable people would think that it is fine for them to change their plans, give usage limitations to prevent abuse, and offer better price schedules. The problem is most people don’t have a clue how much data they consume every month and the cable internet providers are not telling anyone who calls and asks. So people won’t know what plan would fit them. Even if they did, if they watch more than 3 or 4 videos online per month they would easily exceed the 40GB limit that they have imposed for the highest capped tier.  There goes that Netflix watch instantly subscription. That plan goes for around $55 per month my last recollections. Oh, but they are offering an “unlimited” plan… for $150 per month. That is almost triple the current monthly plans (I know because I have their Road Runner Turbo service).

What is more is that in most areas they have a monopoly on service. Many cities and counties years ago limited the number of cable TV providers in a given area to one. Due, of course, to inept politicians looking to line their pockets. So consumers don’t have much of a choice, either cable TV or satellite and the latter doesn’t work at all in bad weather and have been known for their cost prohibative internet plans. Of course you can crawl under a rock and go without an internet connection. But don’t think that many people would be willing to do that.

So to think that consumers “want” to go through the kind of hell this would create is just lunacy and a great imagination. Now I have already called and emailed Time Warner about this and expressed, in no uncertain terms, that if they roll out this scheme in my area I will take ALL of my business elsewhere. I am lucky enough to live in an area that offers one cable TV alternative. I would recommend that you do the same if you are a customer of theirs.

Oh and ignore those ads from the cable companies about Net Neutrality. Despite what Comcast says (my parents have them) it is not all “mumbo jumbo” and “big words meant to fool you”. Net Neutrality is about preventing internet providers from filtering websites that offer competitive services. It is about not allowing them to dictate to the consumer what they can and can’t browse on the internet. They are fighting Net Neutrality because without it they strong-arm you into getting all your content from them or strong-arm websites into paying them for access to that ISPs customer base.

-Pjerky

References:

http://techdirt.com/articles/20090408/2349524449.shtml

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Time-Warner-COO-Metered-Billing-Is-What-Consumers-Want-101769

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOCSIS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_Neutrality

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/04/the-price-gouging-premiums-of-time-warner-cables-data-caps.ars

This, in part, may be related to news from cable executives that say that market saturation is the real cause of recent slowdowns in subscriber growth and not the worldwide economic woes nor increased competition from telephone companies. If this is true then they should instead focus on opening markets for free-for-all style competition instead of lobbying to limit the number of cable operators that can serve an area (often forming local monopolies). They should also increase their competitiveness by offering new and creative services, especially those related to music and movies (accessible over their networks and not blocking competition). There are a finite number of consumers on this planet. Eventually you have to reach critical mass where it is simply not possible to have any more subscribers than you already have. Before that happens they should diversify their offerings and find new revenue sources (excluding using ridiculous service limitations to create overage charges for internet usage).

It is unreasonable for any business, or economy for that matter, to expect perpetual growth. There is a finite number of resources on this planet. Resources used to create products and provide necessities for consumers to survive and even thrive. This, of course, limits the number of humans this planet can support and thus the number of customers a business can have. This drive for perpetual economic growth on all scales is part of what is causing this global economic meltdown. The unreasonable expectation that money will continue to grow without end. Instead an expectation of maintaining a stable level of income seems to be a lot more practical for everyone. That or create interstellar space travel to find new life and new civilizations to turn into customers.