Posted 8:00 pm

Well, that was quick. My posting probably scared the crap out of them:

Google Updates Chrome's Terms of Service
"In response to the reaction to Chrome's terms of service, Google has truncated the offending Section 11, apologizing for the oversight. The new Section 11 contains only the first sentence included in their Universal Terms of Service, now stating: 'You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services.'"

Source: Slashdot

...fear my juice...

Posted 5:58 pm

Have no doubt about this, the GOP has morphed into the Christian Cracka Party:

Westmoreland calls Obama 'uppity'
Georgia Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland used the racially-tinged term "uppity" to describe Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama Thursday.

Westmoreland was discussing vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's speech with reporters outside the House chamber and was asked to compare her with Michelle Obama.

"Just from what little I've seen of her and Mr. Obama, Sen. Obama, they're a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they're uppity," Westmoreland said.

Asked to clarify that he used the word "uppity," Westmoreland said, "Uppity, yeah."

Other Democrats have charged that the Republican campaign to paint the Illinois senator as an "elitist" is racially charged, and accused them of using code words for "uppity" without using the word itself...

Source: The Hill

...the outfit Mrs. McCain wore last night cost more than $300,000, but the dimbulbs who will vote for these pirates are being played for fools...

Posted 3:55 pm

Well, at least he's being honest. He wants you to eat the loss. You can't expect rich people to:

U.S. Must Buy Assets to Prevent `Tsunami,' Gross Says
Sept. 4 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. government needs to start using more of its money to support markets to stem a burgeoning ``financial tsunami,'' according to Bill Gross, manager of the world's biggest bond fund.

Banks, securities firms and hedge funds are dumping assets, driving down prices of bonds, real estate, stocks and commodities, Gross, co-chief investment officer of Newport Beach, California-based Pacific Investment Management Co., said in commentary posted on the firm's Web site today.

``Unchecked, it can turn a campfire into a forest fire, a mild asset bear market into a destructive financial tsunami,'' Gross said. ``If we are to prevent a continuing asset and debt liquidation of near historic proportions, we will require policies that open up the balance sheet of the U.S. Treasury.''...

Source: Bloomberg

...crikey, what balls. Capitalism for the profits, socialism for the losses, it's all good...

Posted 3:48 pm

There's yet another half-trillion dollars in mortgage-backed losses to pass through the python. You'll end up with the tab, for sure:

Lehman May Shift $32 Billion of Mortgage Assets to `Bad Bank'
Sept. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. may shift about $32 billion of commercial mortgages and real estate to a new company that will be spun off in a move similar to the good-bank-bad-bank model used in the 1980s banking crisis, two people briefed on the discussions said.

The bad bank, nicknamed Spinco for now, would have about $8 billion of equity coming from Lehman, the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the plan is one of several under consideration. Spinco would borrow the remaining $24 billion from Lehman or outside investors. The New York-based bank would replace capital put into Spinco, whose shares would be owned by current Lehman shareholders.

Lehman Chief Executive Officer Richard Fuld, 62, is under pressure to strip the firm's balance sheet of hard-to-sell assets...

Source: Bloomberg

...this is accounting hokus-pokus of the most egregious sort, the kind that would make even an Enron CPA blush. But here's what should really concern you—notice how no bank or investment house has yet said, "That's it, we've gotten rid of all of it."? That's because they can't unload all they have, it would bankrupt them...

Posted 6:52 am

Honesty is the best policy. The meek shall inherit the earth. Yadda-yadda:

Judge rules Oracle withheld Ellison e-mails
Oracle deliberately destroyed or withheld CEO Larry Ellison's e-mails and failed to preserve audio recordings sought as evidence in a class-action lawsuit filed against the software maker, a federal judge has ruled.

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco said Tuesday that Oracle willfully withheld tapes and transcripts of interviews that a journalist conducted with Ellison in 2001 and 2002 while researching a book about the Oracle founder called Softwar. The recordings and transcripts were stored on laptop by the author, Matthew Symonds, who directed a computer repair shop to destroy the laptop in late 2006 or early 2007, Illston said.

The lawsuit alleges the software giant made false statements about the company's financial condition in the second quarter of 2001 and made false statements about its Suite 11i business management software. The suit, filed by shareholders who held the stock when its price fell after the company reported disappointing results, also claims Ellison knew about the problems and sold about $900 million in stock before investors were told of the problems.

Ellison and Oracle knew the material was potentially relevant to claims that they made false statements about the company's 2001 second-quarter financial results and problems with the software suite, Illston said...

Source: CNET News

..."Behind every great fortune is a great crime." Honoré de Balzac (1799 - 1850)...

Posted 6:22 am

Damn. I wish this research hadn't been published. Most of the anti-vax zealots (generally X-ian Nutters and Yuppie scum) who willingly remove their DNA from the gene pool are not the sort who would be missed:

Study Finds No Autism Link in Vaccine
A common vaccine given to children to protect them against measles, mumps and rubella is not linked to autism, a study published yesterday concludes.

The findings contradict earlier research that had fueled fears of a possible link between childhood vaccinations and a steep increase in autism diagnoses. In February 1998, the Lancet journal published a study by British researcher Andrew Wakefield of 12 children with autism and other behavioral problems that suggested the onset of their behavioral abnormalities was linked to receiving the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine.

The new study comes as the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington is in the midst of evaluating evidence on whether children's vaccines are implicated in causing autism. A special master is evaluating three different kinds of claims -- two of which specifically link the MMR vaccine with autism.

Like Wakefield's study, the new study looked for evidence of potential links between MMR vaccinations, autism and the digestive (gastrointestinal, or GI) problems sometimes seen in autistic children...

..."There was no evidence . . . MMR preceded either autism or GI problems" in the children studied, he said...

Source: Washington Post

...it's not right to mess with natural selection...