Wednesday, July 23, 2003

gated information and the role of libraries Recently I got access to digital cable – it’s not something that I pay for, but is a nice perk provided by my generous landlady. It made me realize that I am on the über-privileged side of the digital divide: hundreds of TV channels, broadband internet connection. I also have access to non-public material sites such as on Salon and AOL Then through my work I have Westlaw and Lexis passwords, and free interlibrary loans – within reason. My point isn’t to brag, but I can say that I have access to a lot of stuff which is out of reach of less privileged people. Before I had access, I had no idea of the type of things that I was missing. I’m disturbed to see how effective technology has been in separating information from the haves and have-nots. Ten years ago in Australia, there was no pay-TV and barely a world-wide web (and what there was limited to educational and scientific purposes). The main sources of information were printed publications and the free broadcast media of radio and TV. I know printed magazines and journals have never been exactly cheap, but many of these were freely usable in public and academic libraries. Is there any way of categorizing information as essential or non-essential information? I wonder if there are some types of information – particularly legal and governmental - which all people have a right to access and use in a free society. Especially when society says that ignorance is no excuse for not obeying the law and everyone has equal rights & duties in the political process, irrespective of their income. So does mean that everything else would be non-essential information – entertainment for which it is entirely fair that people pay for. I’m not sure if there’s a clear dividing line between what’s essential and what’s entertaining. For example, national (and especially local) news provide information without which it would be very difficult to participate in the political process, but they also contain entertainment sections. And if news is essential, then what about magazines or lifestyle programmes aimed at particular groups – women, men, different ethnic groups – these may contain more entertainment than news, but what news they cover might be the only way that their particular constituents access any news. Another quandry is with the arts, sciences and other academic disciplines. If it’s in society’s interests that all people are able to make advances in the arts, sciences and other fields of learning, how is this possible if only elites have access to this material? Are we saying that only the elites – those with the means to pay for this material – have anything to contribute in these areas and that the poor deserve to shut out? Or do we think that great art can happen in a vacuum and that it is not necessary to know of what’s been tried before? The point of all these unanswerable questions is that libraries are the buffer zones – or safety net, if you want a different metaphor – of the digital information divide. Fund public libraries adequately, and you won’t need to answer these questions about who is worthy enough to receive which information. Most importantly, libraries are no longer about books. They are just not about books, microfiche, videos, audio tapes, CDs, DVDs or online databases – important as all these things are. Libraries are repositories of information, in whatever form. In an ideal world (and I am allowed to be idealistic and naive sometimes), libraries would collect all useful information which has been broadcast (via TV, radio or the web) and is not otherwise available in fixed formats, such as tapes or discs produced by the broadcaster. </idealism>: Of course, this is not going to happen because of two big reasons. Firstly, libraries are currently too understaffed and underfunded to imagine adding this to their workload. Secondly, this would be against existing copyright laws. 9:22:53 AM

wondering about big media biases (with a postscript about left & right tactics) I wrote earlier about the unlikely story of how I first experimented with AOL. I’m surprised to say that I still use it from time to time – on a plan which gives me a very small number of dialup access hours. The reason is that now my iBook doesn’t seem to work well with any other dialup ISP. I would be tempted to think that this is something that AOL did to my computer, except that I remember that this problem predated the first time that I used AOL. It’s probably a hardware problem – but because most of the time I use a broadband connection without any problems on my iBook – I’m reluctant to send it in if it’s not really urgent. My first use of AOL coincided with the beginning of the Iraq war. At the time I noticed a real pro-war bias in the way the war news was reported. It’s interesting to see how this has changed lately. Last week, they reprinted Salon’s article about John Mellencamp and patriotism. Am I paranoid to wonder if AOL Time Warner decided to pander to the government’s dogs of war in the lead up to the execrable FCC decision about media ownership, to show the Republicans in power that big media could be supportive of their interests? And that now the FCC rules have been released, AOL Time Warner can be a little more centrist (definitely not left-wing). Postscript: Along with the Salon article, AOL had one of their ubiquitous polls. The question was along the lines of “Who is more patriotic? – a) the Left, b) the Right, c) Neither – each side is patriotic but they have different opinions.” My recollection of the result was that almost 50% answered “C” for neither, 40% answered “B” for the Right and a measly 10% chose “A” for the Left. I chose the Neither answer – because I do think that many of the Right-wingers genuinely care for their country, even if their methods or goals are misguided. My reading of this poll – and be assured that I don’t put too much stock in its results – is that people on the left are more reasonable and are mature enough to admit that the other side might sometimes have a point, or at least a legitimate concern. Whereas people on the right (I choose not to call them Conservatives because they a radical agenda of tearing up long-standing social supports and threatening civil liberties) are more fanatical – and refuse to see any good in their opponents or flaws in themselves. I know, it’s kind of petty to be fighting over the high moral ground but it’s still legitimate point. What do you do against an opponent who refuses to play fairly? Do you to stick to your principles and lose (praying that someday the wrongs will be righted) – or adopt their rough-handed tactics in the hope of beating them at their own game? 9:18:41 AM

	Wednesday, July 16, 2003

patriotism corrupted I did take one little vacation to Iowa, south eastern Iowa to be exact. I attended my first ever Fourth of July parade in the small town of Morningsun. I enjoyed the experience, although it made me feel very much like the foreigner (or resident alien, as the INS prefers to call me). I was struck by the sense of community that I saw. I have never seen so many John Deere tractors in a single day, or beautifully restored old cars, beauty queens of all ages or American flags. Almost every single car or person in the parade bore an American flag, usually with a slogan such as “Support Our Troops!” Sometimes there was a variation, such as “Support our troops, they support you!” Other slogans mentioned the words Freedom and Liberty in connection with the supporting the troops. At this moment, I felt very bad for my American friends who went to the parade with me. They had no Real Freedom or Liberty to say anything like, “Support Our Troops, Bring Them Home!” without being shunned and excoriated by their community. Of course, they could think such thoughts, but that would be setting themselves against the clear message that their community was saying in this parade. The message was that patriotism means wholeheartedly supporting President George W. Bush’s decision to liberate (i.e., invade and occupy) Iraq. It must be hard to love one’s country when patriotism has been hijacked and defined to be jingoistic warmongering. So when did being a true American become reduced to loyally supporting the nation’s secretive and deceitful leaders? I may be an idealistic foreigner, but wouldn’t the true spirit of the Fourth of July involve demonstrating independence of thought from one’s leaders, as did the signatories of the declaration of independence? This travesty made me feel glad that I’m Australian, where there is a long-celebrated tradition of taking the piss out of our leaders, whether in good times or bad. (“taking the piss” might be described as irreverently putting people back in their place) Music: Liz Phair, Liz Phair, Insanity 12:28:05 AM

	Tuesday, June 24, 2003

my thoughts on government-mandated web filtering in public libraries It almost goes without saying that I think that this decision is wrong. Another example of the US Supreme Court being split down the middle with Justice O’Connor being the swing vote that gave the conservatives another thin majority. I hope that history judges the Rehnquist Supreme Court as harshly as it judges Dredd Scott. That said, I do think that this is a difficult issue. I don’t want weird people viewing porn and wanking over the keyboards where I work! It horrifies me how the most innocuous search term in a search engine -- or mistyped URL can lead to some very nasty results. This may sound like heresy to some librarians, but I don’t think the status quo was working well. Something needed to be done, but I think CIPA went way too far. It’s wrong to make everybody (meaning the less privileged teens & adults on the other side of the digital divide who can’t afford their own internet access) view the internet through the filter of what’s appropriate for a child. Even the Supreme Court admits this, but says that it’s sufficient that an adult can request to have the filters temporarily turned off. A commentator on today’s FutureTense (I must give a link to this Minnesota production) was correct when he mentioned how people will be very reluctant to ask library staff to have the “porn filters” turned off. So I call on all adult library patrons to thwart this paternalistic Supreme Court decision to demand that filters be turned off when they visit their public library. Not so you can look at porn, but just so that you can use the internet that hasn’t been filtered or dumbed-down or bowdlerized (now that’s a word that’s due for a revival!). Any librarian worth her or his salt would be happy to turn off the filters for this reason. Don’t expect such a positive reaction if you actually are planning on looking at porn in a public library. Whenever I get a minute, I should reread some jurisprudence. The law is only one means (the very official and blunt tool) for governing people’s behaviour. There are also personal ethics and social mores. I would hazard to guess that although most librarians would fight for your legal right to read anything you want, they would not be thrilled about somebody viewing porn in a their library or any other public place. Generally, social restraints are more pervasive but less enforceable than legal rules. That is why there is a danger when conservatives want all their social mores embodied in the law. There is a place for socially disapproved but legal behaviour. It is a murky area which is both a nasty cesspool and a helpful compost heap – which is fertile for humour, self-analysis and new ideas. Furthermore, there is something about the smell of this cesspool/compost heap which keeps the Borg of Conformity & Tyranny at bay. Because as soon as you want the law to mirror social mores – the first issue is who’s mores get chosen. Because that’s the thing, although a lot of social mores are held in common, they are not uniform. And although in a democracy, the majority has the right to do what it wants according to its constitutional powers, it would be very dangerous for a majority to use the its power to impose all of its social mores on everyone else – whether that majority happens to been in Parliament / Congress or the Supreme court. 9:05:34 PM

	Wednesday, June 11, 2003

Lost opportunities for Australian progressives Why aren't Australians more outraged about non-existent Iraqi WMDs? As this Sydney Morning Herald article points out, compared to what's going on in Washington and London, there's been basically no fall-out in Canberra over this issue. This is surprising considered how strong the opposition to this war was in Australia. Before the war, opinion polls showed a large majority of Australians opposed the miltary action in Iraq. The many public demonstrations against the war indicated the level of opposition - and that this was a very broad-based mainstream opposition. There was a strong view that John Howard, Australia's sycophantic Prime Minister was vulnerable on this issue - for dragging the country into this crusade, and misleading the country about this commitment. I was in Australia in January and heard him say that he hadn't yet decided on Australia's commitment, even as Australian troops were being sent to the Persian Gulf. One explanation is that the Australian Labor Party (ALP) has been just as timid and ineffectual an opposition party as the Democrats in the US. In fact, during the past month, they have been even worse than their American counterparts, because they have been preoccupied with the Simon Crean / Kim Beazley struggle over the party leadership. It is really sad that at a time when they could really be punishing the John Howard over dragging the country into war under false pretences, as well as the whole Governor-General debacle, they are in the midst of this pointless leadership spill. It would be different if I knew that real policy differences were at stake in this contest. But the internal debate is primarily about form ("that Kim Beazley has a better rapport with the Australian people than Simon Crean") rather than substance. I know that Kim Beazley is at the very Right of the ALP (think Joe Lieberman, except that Beazley has already lost 2 elections to John Howard) and so generally I would prefer Simon Crean, but if Crean is gutless, it doesn't really matter what he thinks, does it? Oh well, at least Australia has a viable and growing green party, and an electoral system which minimizes the "wasted vote" syndrome. 9:57:48 PM

	Wednesday, June 4, 2003

contact your Representatives and Senators about the Public Domain Enhancement Act reclaiming the public domain. We have launched a petition to build support for the Public Domain Enhancement Act. That act would require American copyright holders to pay $1 fifty years after a work was published. If they pay the $1, the copyright continues. If they don't, the work passes into the public domain. Historical estimates would suggest 98% of works would pass into the pubilc domain after 50 years. The Act would do a great deal to reclaim a public domain. This proposal has received a great deal of support. It is now facing some important lobbyists' opposition. We need a public way to begin to demonstrate who the lobbyists don't speak for. This is the first step. If you are an ally in at least this cause, please sign the petition. Please blog it, please email it, please spam it, please buy billboards about it -- please do whatever you can. And most importantly, please help us explain its importance. There is a chance to do something significant here. But it will take a clearer, simpler voice than mine. [Lessig Blog] 7:54:29 AM

	Wednesday, May 21, 2003

dissecting arguments for investigating library patron information under the Patriot act ALA Aiding And Abetting Terrorists. Gerry writes "David Horowitz's FrontPageMag, dedicated to rooting out the fifth columns, left-liberals and hate-American conspirators among us, turns its withering gaze to LIBRARIANS..... Please have some fun baiting true believers in the comments forum. " At least they admit ALA librarians are not the quiet, unassuming stereotypes you see on TV and in the movies, but they go on to say while the ALA ostensibly wants to protect the First Amendment rights of all people to read what they want, they themselves seem to have not read the USA PATRIOT Act and its guarantees to protect First Amendment Rights. [LISNews.com] Maybe it's my legal background, but I'm always interested in dissecting a controversy into the exact areas of disagreement. Although I heartily disagree with almost everything written in this article (authored by Paul Walfield), I find that it illuminates very clearly the differences in the two viewpoints. "The idea is simple; terrorists use things like airliners against us. Now, we make it harder for them to do that by federalizing airline checkers, and putting marshals on planes and beefing up airline security in general. The Feds want to do the same for terrorists that use our libraries." Let's develop this argument a little further. The terrorists didn't just use airlines and libraries (allegedly) against the US - they exploited weaknesses inherent in an open, democratic society - freedom of association and movement, freedom of thought, and freedom to read. Let's cut to the chase - 9/11 wouldn't have happened in a police state without those freedoms. Does this mean that these fundamental human rights are to blame for the tragedy and must be curtailed? Of course, even John Ashcroft is not going to admit to that, but we live in an age of doublespeak. So instead of abrogating these freedoms, they attack the tangible institutions and professionals which protect these abstract ideas - in the name of patriotism and preserving the American way of life. The danger is that human rights expressed in the constitution become meaningless because there are no ways of protecting infringements of those rights by the executive branch of government. "The librarians say they will not break the "sacred" trust between a patron and a librarian. The American Library Association seems to view this bond as literally sacred." This has to be the most offensive part of Walfield's article, the way that he scoffs at the idea of librarian's ethics in general, and librarian-patron confidentiality in particular. Without this confidentiality, we librarians could report all patron borrowing, reading and web surfing habits to the government - or sell this information to marketers. Everything you read will be on the record somewhere (but not accessible to you), and people will make inferences about your beliefs and security risks from this - without any input from you or any ways of fixing errors or erroneous assumptions. "She didn't explain that when you take a book out of the library, you are giving up any right to privacy. The employees at Santa Cruz know what their people check out but will not allow our government to know the same ..." Does Walfield really think that because library employees might know what a patron is reading or borrowing, that patrons have given up all their rights to privacy? And that the government might as well know everything too? That's like saying that there's no such thing as medical privacy because doctors and nurses might know your medical information. Well, I'm glad that I can clarify that this is another reason why we emphasize librarian-patron confidentiality in our professional ethics. We know that this information is potentially very sensitive - not unlike medical records - and we take pains to be very careful with it. Library-patron confidentiality is not something which we invented after 9/11 so we could be a thorn in the side of the Bush administration and advance our left-wing agenda. My mother was an academic librarian in the 1970s and this was as central to librarianship then as it is now. "[The Patriot Act] prohibits the government from doing anything that would infringe on an individual's First Amendment right." Yes, that's how the law is written on its face. But in effect, this protection is meaningless. It's up to the FBI to decide if they may be infringing on your first amendment rights. The only restraint on the over-zealous investigator is at a secret summary hearing where you will not be represented. Even if the secret judges do care whether an investigatee's first amendment rights are protected, it is very difficult for them to do so, because they are only told the would-be prosecutor's side of the story. "Unlike our Founding Fathers, the ALA gives First Amendment Rights to "all individuals," presumably including non-citizen terrorists." LISNews.com commentor Daniel Cornwall pointed out that in fact Jefferson believed that the first amendment should apply to all indviduals "against every government on earth" and that he thought that the constitution was flawed for not stating this more clearly. 12 The Papers of Thomas Jefferson 438, 440 (J. Boyd ed. 1958). Also, while I don't like the idea that terrorists have human rights and may use these rights to cause destruction, it is dangerous to say that terrorists can never have any legal rights. What if you are mistakenly found to be a terrorist, and thereby lose all your legal rights? Including the right to appeal the mistaken terrorist designation? Mistakes happen all the time in any legal system, which is why there need to be procedures - natural justice at the trial level, procedures for appeals and accountability against abuses. After discussing the ALA's resistance to the Patriot Act, Walfield gives a brief chronicle of the ALA's "left-wing agenda." Included in the ALA's list of sins is campaigning for more openess in government records. Towards the end, there is a mention of the ALA being upset at the destruction and looting of the National Library and Archives of Iraq. Of course this was interpreted that the ALA did not care about the safety of American troops. Forget the fact that the Ministry of Oil had been protected, or that the US Government had been warned of the dangers to Iraqi cultural institutions and chose to ignore them - and their international legal obligations as an occupying force. I can't ignore Walfield's mention that the ALA's left-wing activism happens despite the organization's tax-exempt 501(c) 3 status. This struck me as a veiled threat which is so typical of these times. Yes, you still have freedom of speech, but if you express unpatriot/lefty views, we will try to punish you until you shut up! 1:56:16 AM

	Sunday, April 27, 2003

truth and lies in public discourse: Fox, Nike and Kamiya This week I’ve musing about truth and lies in public discourse. They are quite different issues but it is ironic that as Salon’s Gary Kamiya is being castigated for his extremely honest and courageous essay about the fall of Baghdad, we see companies such as Fox News and Nike go to court to preserve their right to mislead the public. 1. Distorting the News The courts have officially ruled that it is okay for television news to lie and distort the truth. Accepting a defense rejected by three other Florida state judges, a Florida appeals court has reversed the $425,000 jury verdict in favor of journalist Jane Akre. Here's the full scoop: Jane Akre and Steve Wilson had produced an expose for WTVT/Fox News of Tampa about how Florida supermarkets were reneging on a promise not to sell hormone-laden milk from rBGH-injected cows. In their investigations, they also found many troubling things about the artificial hormone and its maker, Monsanto Company. Fox News had already advertised the expose, but the day before it was to air, the station received a threatening letter from Monsanto's lawyers. Fox ordered Akre to retract her story and do a slanted piece in favor of Monsanto, but Akre refused, on the grounds that it would be dishonest journalism. As a result, she was fired. Akre sued, but a Florida appeals court has now ruled that it is technically not against any law, rule or regulation to deliberately lie or distort the news on a television broadcast. [Reader Weekly, Duluth Minnesota] First, for the lawyer types, the case is New World Communications of Tampa v. Akre, 2003 WL 327505, 28 Fla. L. Weekly D460. The issue before the court was not whether broadcasters are allowed to mislead the public. Rather, it involved interpreting 448.102, Fla. Stat. (Supp. 1998), Florida’s private-sector whistler-blower law. In my view, the Court made its decision in the following two quotations: Even if we agreed with Akre that the FCC's news distortion policy was a "rule" as defined by section 120.52(15), her argument overlooks the fact that the whistle-blower's statute specifically limits the definition of "rule" to an "adopted" rule. § 448.101(4). "This limitation to 'adopted' material only appears deliberate, and well serves the public by hinging civil liability upon matters of which due notice, actual or imputed, has been conveyed." Forrester v. John B. Phipps, Inc., 643 So.2d 1109 (Fla. 1st DCA 1994). We find the legislature's use of the word "adopted" in the statute to be a limitation on the scope of conduct that will subject an employer to liability under the statute. … First, federal law recognizes a dichotomy between rulemaking and adjudication; it does not equate the two. See Bowen v. Georgetown Univ. Hosp., 488 U.S. 204, 109 S.Ct. 468, 102 L.Ed.2d 493 (1988) (Scalia, J., concurring). Second, while federal agencies may have discretion to formulate policy through the adjudicative process, the same is not true under Florida law. The Florida Legislature has limited state agencies' discretion to formulate policy through the adjudicative process by requiring agencies to formally adopt each agency statement that fits the definition of a "rule" under section 120.52. See § 120.54. As noted above, the legislature's use of the word "adopted" in the whistle-blower's statute was deliberate and was intended to limit the scope of conduct that will subject an employer to liability. This limitation is consistent with the legislature's requirement that agency statements that fit the definition of a "rule" be formally adopted. You might say that the Appellants (the Fox affiliate) won on a technicality. It doesn’t matter if they violated the FCC news distortion policy, because that policy had never been adopted according to the exact requirements of the Florida statute. Because of this, the District Court of Appeal did not need to decide whether the Appellants had in fact violated the FCC news distortion policy. The Court did discuss the news distortion issue somewhat. It recognized In re CBS Program "Hunger in America", 20 F.C.C.2d 143, 150-51 (1969) as the leading authority on the issue. It also cited a journal article: Chad Raphael, The FCC's Broadcast News Distortion Rules: Regulation by Drooping Eyelid, 6 Comm. L. & Policy 485 (2001). Much of the Hunger in America opinion concerns whether a broadcaster is liable if one of its rogue employees distorts the news – unknown and unbidden by management. The FCC wrote: [U]nless our investigation reveals involvement of the licensee or its management there will be no hazard to the station's licensed status. Such improper actions by employees without the knowledge of th licensee may raise questions as to whether the licensee is adequately supervising its employees, but normally will not raise an issue as to the licensee's character qualifications. If the facts in New World Communications of Tampa v. Akre are correct, it seems pretty clear that the Fox affiliate engaged in the “top down” management-mandated distortion which the FCC was concerned about here: Rigging or slanting the news is a most heinous act against the public interest -- indeed, there is no act more harmful to the public's ability to handle its affairs Violations of this news distortion policy are only relevant when the FCC is deciding whether to renew a broadcaster’s license. There are no other legal consequences for distorting the news and misleading the public. And can anyone imagine that the current FCC, headed by Michael Powell would give a Fox affiliate even a slap on the wrist for distorting the news? The law is an ass – as indicated by the result of the New World Communications of Tampa v. Akre – but politics is worse. 2. Nike's Right to Mislead The Christian Science Monitor has a good summary of the facts and issues involved (thanks to Howard Bashman for that cite ): The case, to be heard Wednesday, centers on Nike's ability to participate in public debate over its foreign business operations - which critics call dangerous and immoral - without being held liable for any false or misleading statements. The question is whether Nike is engaging in commercial speech, which is subject to civil charges if found to be false, or political speech, which enjoys greater protection under the First Amendment. The US Supreme Court is reviewing Kasky v. Nike, Inc., 93 Cal. Rptr. 2d 854 (2002), which reversed Kasky v. Nike, Inc., 27 Cal. 4th 939 (2002). I will be pleasantly shocked if the Supreme Court does not rule in favour of Nike. It has been very interesting to skim through the amici briefs, most of which have been filed for Nike. I do not want Nike to win this case. Maybe it’s because I’m not American, but I do not think that free speech trumps every other right – especially the idea that companies should have the same freedom of speech as people! Freedom of speech becomes meaningless when money=speech. This means that although the poor have de jure freedom of speech, they have no de facto freedom of speech. Sorry to slip into legalese, but a legal right on paper is meaningless if there is no social or economic ability to exercise that right. So freedom of speech means the freedom to lie? Even in this country, it is not OK to use dishonesty to defame another person’s character. Corporations already have way too many rights – especially when considering their wealth and clout in media and politics. It is time to start scaling back, not expanding the legal personhood of corporations. I think that all corporate speech is advertising of some kind – whether to consumers or investors. In the company where I used to work, public relations was actually inside the marketing department. When the news about Nike’s sweatshop practices first came out, I decided to avoid Nike products. But if I heard convincing information from them that they had cleaned up their act, I’d be inclined to consider them again. In fact, I’d be more likely to trust information that did not obviously appear to be advertising. The point is that these statements do have an effect in the marketplace, therefore they should be regulated according to the rules of the marketplace. 3. Honesty will be distorted and used against you The treatment of Gary Kamiya’s article is different from the two court cases which I’ve mentioned, but it is also concerns distortion and the place of honesty or dishonesty in public discourse. O'Reilly-a-rama Here at Salon, we're used to having our arguments ripped out of context and turned into fodder for the right-wing media machine, but the feeding frenzy of distortion and lies surrounding the selective quotation from Gary Kamiya's "Liberation Day" op-ed over the past few days set a new standard for disingenuousness. You can read more about it in this Salon editorial. [Scott Rosenberg's Links & Comment] Kamiya’s main argument was that the fall of Saddam Hussein was something which everybody could feel glad about – whether they were for or against the war in Iraq. Because Saddam Hussein was a very nasty man – and whether or not the war was justified, or that it will open a Pandora’s Box of ethnic and religious hatreds in the Middle East – it is good to see him gone. In reaching this position, Gary Kamiya addressed his opposition to the war in the first place. He very honestly wrote: I have a confession: I have at times, as the war has unfolded, secretly wished for things to go wrong. Wished for the Iraqis to be more nationalistic, to resist longer. Wished for the Arab world to rise up in rage. Wished for all the things we feared would happen. I'm not alone: A number of serious, intelligent, morally sensitive people who oppose the war have told me they have had identical feelings. Of course, Bill O’Reilly and other right-wing commentators immediately jumped on these sentences, ignoring the point of Kamiya’s article – that as the war progressed, his position had evolved from that secret wish for things to go wrong. The moral of this incident is that as corporations extend their rights to lie and be misleading in public discourse, individuals will be punished for being too honest. The equivalent honesty would be if Bill O’Reilly admitted to that for a moment he really wanted to tear Jeremy Glick into “f**king pieces” for daring dispute the Right’s ownership of the 9/11 tragedy. 4:38:42 PM