Pope Urges New World Economic Order
By RACHEL DONADIO


VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday called for a radical rethinking of the global economy, criticizing a growing divide between rich and poor and urging the establishment of a “world political authority” to oversee the economy and work for the “common good.”

He criticized the current economic system, “where the pernicious effects of sin are evident,” and urged financiers in particular to “rediscover the genuinely ethical foundation of their activity.”

He also called for “greater social responsibility” on the part of business. “Once profit becomes the exclusive goal, if it is produced by improper means and without the common good as its ultimate end, it risks destroying wealth and creating poverty,” Benedict wrote in his new encyclica, which the Vatican released on Tuesday.

More than two years in the making, “Caritas et Veritate,” or “Charity in Truth,” is Benedict’s third encyclical since he became pope in 2005. Filled with terms like “globalization,” “market economy,” “outsourcing,” “labor unions” and “alternative energy,” it is not surprising that the Italian media reported that the Vatican was having difficulty translating the 144-page document into Latin.

Reportedly delayed to take into consideration the financial crisis, it was released by the Vatican on the eve of the Group of Eight Summit of industrialized nations, which opens in Italy on Wednesday, and before Benedict is expected to receive President Obama at the Vatican on Friday.

“It’s not an encyclical done for the crisis,” Cardinal Renato Martino, the president of the Vatican’s Council for Justice and Peace, said at a news conference on Tuesday. Still, he added, “if the encyclical had come out before the crisis, you would have said it was prophetic.”

In the encyclical, Benedict writes that “financiers must rediscover the genuinely ethical foundation of their activity, so as not to abuse the sophisticated instruments which can serve to betray the interests of savers.”

In many ways, the document is a somewhat puzzling cross between an anti-globalization tract and a government white paper, another indication that the Vatican does not comfortably fit into traditional political categories of right and left.

“There are paragraphs that sound like Ayn Rand, next to paragraphs that sound like ‘The Grapes of Wrath.’ That’s quite intentional,” Vincent J. Miller, a theologian at the University of Dayton, a Catholic institution in Ohio, said in a telephone interview.

“He’ll wax poetically about the virtuous capitalist, but then he’ll give you this very clear analysis of the ways in which global capital and the shareholder system cause managers to focus on short term good at the expense of the community, of workers, of the environment.”

Indeed, sometimes Benedict sounds like an old-school European socialist, lamenting the decline of the social welfare state and praising the “importance” of labor unions to protect workers. Without stable work, he notes, people lose hope and tend not to get married and have children.

But he also writes that “The so-called outsourcing of production can weaken the company’s sense of responsibility towards the stakeholders — namely the workers, the suppliers, the consumers, the natural environment and broader society — in favor of the shareholders.”

And he argues that it is “erroneous to hold that the market economy has an inbuilt need for a quota of poverty and underdevelopment in order to function at its best.”

Benedict also calls for a reform of the United Nations so that there can be a unified “global political body” that allows the less powerful of the earth to have a voice, and calls on rich nations to help less fortunate ones.

“In the search for solutions to the current economic crisis, development aid for poor countries must be considered a valid means of creating wealth for all,” he writes.

John Sniegocki, a professor of Christian ethics at Xavier University in Cincinnati, said that one of the most controversial elements of the encyclical, at least for some Americans, will be Benedict’s call for international institutions to play a role in regulating the economy.

“One of the things he’s saying is that the global economy is escaping the power of individual states to regulate it,” Mr. Miller said. He said the encyclical also contained elements “very critical” of how the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank “have required cuts in social spending in the third world.”

Arguably the most environmentally-conscious pope in history, Benedict writes that, “One of the greatest challenges facing the economy is to achieve the most efficient use — not abuse — of natural resources, based on a realization that the notion of ‘efficiency’ is not value-free.”

In line with what he calls “respecting the intrinsic value of creation,” he also decries stem cell research, abortion and euthanasia.

2005 Gun of the Year
Kimber Eclipse II .45 ACP

Frame: full size, stainless, series II, black oxide and brushed polished sides (after black oxide). Slide: 5”, stainless, fixed sights, black oxide, brushed polished sides (after black oxide), engraved with “NRA Eclipse II” on ejection port side and “2005 FNRA GUN OF THE YEAR” on the Kimber logo side. Seven round blue Kimber magazine. Fixed white dot sights, premium aluminum trigger with 4-5 lb. trigger pull, standard thumb safety, wood grips with round NRA letter logo, 5” carbon barrel, black small parts and serial number range from K05NRA0001 - K05NRA1025. There will be a total of 1025 guns in this limited edition.

Pictured: The company director arrested for attempted murder after rescuing son being beaten by yobs
By Tom Harper and Steve Farrell
Last updated at 8:39 PM on 26th July 2009
Add to My Stories
A company director has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after confronting a gang of yobs who were attacking his stepson.
Colin Philpott, 58, allegedly stabbed a 16-year-old in the chest during the incident in the front garden of his £500,000 Tudor-style house.
He had awoken late on Friday night to discover stepson Alex Lee being beaten by the group of teenagers.

  Arrest: Colin Philpott (left) went to the aid of his stepson Alex Lee (right)

Mr Lee, 25, had gone outside to stop the gang from vandalising Mr Philpott’s Jaguar car. Mr Lee was said to have then been punched and kicked in the head, suffering a broken nose and concussion for which he needed hospital treatment.
Speaking after his release on bail, his stepfather Mr Philpott, who owns an escalator cleaning company, described how he had gone downstairs to find the gang on the doorstep.
'I was asleep and I awoke to hear a noise outside. When I appeared at the door I was set upon by them, as a result of which one of the youths received several stab wounds,' he said
'My wife appeared and I asked her to call the police and the ambulance service. They arrived shortly afterwards and I was arrested.
'It was traumatic but I was very well treated by the police. I have to return to the police station in September.

'At the moment I am not too worried about it but has been difficult, particularly for my wife, I must say.'

He went on to claim his Jaguar had been vandalised on a number of occasions and youths often congregated in the area.

Mr Philpott's wife Susanne, 51, had earlier described how her husband had rushed out to defend her son with a letter-opener he had grabbed from a shelf. It was then that the teenager was allegedly stabbed five times. He was taken to hospital and was last night said to be stable.
When police arrived at the five-bedroom house in Crowthorne, Berkshire, Mr Philpott was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. Five youths, aged 16 and 17, were arrested on suspicion of assault and criminal damage.
Mrs Philpott said: ‘My son and I came out at about 11pm after hearing a bang and we saw two young guys outside our house.
‘They returned 15 minutes later – with three others – and all were visibly drunk. I took a digital camera and told them that if they vandalised anything else I’d take pictures as evidence.
‘One said that he would kill me and burn down my house. I was terrified and when Alex tried to calm him down, the other four got worked up and they all attacked him. Alex ended up on the ground with all five of them on him, kicking him in the head and stomach. I was so frightened for him that I screamed for Colin, who was in bed.
‘He came running out – still barefoot and half asleep – and saw the mess Alex was in so ran back into the house. He grabbed the first thing he saw, which was a letter-opener, and confronted the boys.
‘They attacked Colin and I saw one stumble into the road as Colin screamed for me to call the police. When the police arrived and then arrested Colin, I was gob-smacked.
‘It was heartbreaking to see him handcuffed and carted off like a common criminal. He is a hardworking, honest family man and was only trying to protect us.’

The mother of two, who works as a training consultant, said the quiet neighbourhood had been blighted by teenagers attacking cars and defacing gardens for several months.
Terror: Colin Philpott and stepson Alex grappled with thugs outside their luxury home
She claimed that just days earlier, Mr Philpott’s £30,000 S-Type Jaguar had been smothered with hair gel while it was parked on the driveway.
‘We have had lots of trouble with vandals and they have targeted us twice within a week. The worst thing is that I am now terrified in my own home.
‘The police have installed a panic button but I still don’t feel safe. My husband and I had a holiday planned but now I wouldn’t feel safe leaving my 22-year-old daughter on her own.
‘I just can’t get over how one minute you’re happy and everything is fine and the next your  life has been turned upside down by some mindless yobs.’
Terry Brenner, a 55-year-old pipe fitter, described how he was walking past the scene of the stabbing at about 11.30pm. Mr Brenner said: ‘The son was sitting on the doorstep and had facial injuries. The ambulance had already taken away the injured boy and the police had taken away Colin.
‘Susanne was with her son and the policeman came over and said the father could be prosecuted for attempted murder. The poor lady just collapsed.
‘That’s when the policeman realised that someone else had been injured and he called an ambulance for her son.’
One neighbour said that Mr Philpott’s green Jaguar had been discovered the day before the incident covered in a white substance.

Others said some badly-behaved teenagers used the modern housing estate as a cut-through to get to a nearby park.
One said: ‘They act like yobs and are bullies. I am so upset at what has happened to my neighbour. He’s a lovely man.’
Other residents said gangs of youngsters had ripped up flower beds, thrown eggs at them and thrown objects through open windows. Neighbours have reported the anti-social behaviour to the local council and a councillor is said to have asked Thames Valley Police to take action.
Last night the force confirmed that Mr Philpott had been released on bail, pending possible charges.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1202182/Company-director-arrested-attemp...

That's England for you.  If someone attacked my family on my front doorstep, a letter opener would be the least of their worries.

Big Content: ludicrous to expect DRMed music to work forever


When Wal-Mart announced in 2008 that it was pulling down the DRM servers behind its (nearly unused) online music store, the Internet suffered a collective aneurysm of outrage, eventually forcing the retail giant to run the servers for another year. Buying DRMed content, then having that content neutered a few months later, seemed to most consumers not to be fair.

But that's not quite how Big Content sees things—just ask Steven Metalitz, the Washington DC lawyer who represents the MPAA, RIAA, and other rightsholders before the Copyright Office. Because the Copyright Office is in the thick of its triennial DMCA review process, in which it will decide to allow certain exemptions to the rules against cracking DRM, Metalitz has been doing plenty of representation of late.

He has now responded to a host of questions from the Copyright Office following up on live hearings held earlier this year, and in those comments, Metalitz (again) strongly opposes any exemption that would allow users to legally strip DRM from content if a store goes dark and takes down its authentication servers.

"We reject the view," he writes in a letter to the top legal advisor at the Copyright Office, "that copyright owners and their licensees are required to provide consumers with perpetual access to creative works. No other product or service providers are held to such lofty standards. No one expects computers or other electronics devices to work properly in perpetuity, and there is no reason that any particular mode of distributing copyrighted works should be required to do so."
metalitz.png

This is, of course, true, but that doesn't make it any less weird. The only reason that such tracks are crippled after authentication servers go down is because of a system that was demanded by content owners and imposed on companies like Wal-Mart and Apple; buyers who grudgingly bought tracks online because it was easy accepted, but never desired the DRM. To simply say that they are "out of luck" because they used a system that the rightsholders demanded is the height of callousness to one's customers. While computers and electronics devices do break down over time, these music tracks were crippled by design.

Such an attitude looks even stranger when you consider that the music labels have in fact removed DRM as a requirement at stores like iTunes and Amazon, so all tracks purchased today are open and may work in perpetuity, however much the labels would prefer people to keep repurchasing the same song.

Keep this reality in mind when you read Metalitz's next comment, which continues, "To recognize the proposed exemption would surely discourage any content provider from entering the marketplace for online distribution... unless it was committed to do so... forever. This would not be good for consumers, who would find a marketplace with less innovation and fewer choices and options."

The mind boggles. This reads like copy from a Bizarro World manifesto on DRM, since the reality of the market for downloaded music (which was the issue behind the proposed exemption) has shown quite clearly that people don't want DRM on their tunes and providers are happy to comply once the labels allowed it. The current situation, with several major stores and little or no DRM on downloads, is manifestly better for buyers.

While the issue may seem almost irrelevant now for downloaded music, DRM is still alive and well on streaming music and most video streams and downloads. Metalitz doesn't want his clients to face a situation where decryption tools can be produced under the proposed exemption, then widely distributed. How could such decryption tools be limited to those who have actually suffered from authentication servers going dark, he wonders?

But the Copyright Office indicated that it may grant the exemption, asking Metalitz and other respondents to "assume that" the case has been made. Metalitz declined to assume this, writing that "we cannot accept this invitation to assume that the Register [of Copyright] will recommend that the Librarian [of Congress] violate his statutory duty by recognizing Exemption 10B."

Metalitz suggests that the market will take care of problems that arise, pointing out that Wal-Mart and others have all kept their DRM servers running after public outcries. But Harvard Fellow Chris Soghoian, who proposed the exemption, noted that Wal-Mart will be shutting down its DRM servers for good in October 2009.

"Wal-Mart's latest actions provide ample evidence that the issue of DRM abandonware is not a hypothetical concern and that the market cannot be counted on to provide consumers with an adequate remedy," he wrote.