The worm in the bottle

you can always blame a scientist The people who inivented the feed that was made from animals, who put together the machines that milled it the developers of the binding agents that bound it into pellets. They are to blame for BSE. The people who created protien feeds to supercharge the cows that produce 200 litres of milk instead of the normal 14. They are the ones we blame. We cannot shift the blame away from the people who create the problems, and we must not conflate two separate problems for convenience. Animal husbandry in the form of factory farming has nothing to do with creating monster feeds to distort the way a cow produces milk. Farmers don't need scientists to build factory farms. Farmers cannot produce supercharged cows pumped up with specially designed feeds without scientists however. There is the difference. We blame the scientists only for what they are responsible for and nothing else. That is rational.

Decloaked Thatcher!

First, I would like to say that I hope the people protesting against animal experimentation (1) are strictly vegan, (2) don't use any animal-derived clothing or animal-derived products and (3) are denied any medicinal intervention, surgical or otherwise, which have been generated through the exploitation of humanity's place at the top of the intellectual pile. People agreeing to these conditions can protest to their heart's content and their moral strength will win them many friends. ??!! There is also an argument that worrying about animals being used under strict laws with the aim of improving human knowledge is pitiful when factory farmed pigs, chickens, cows and the like are slaughtered in their millions every day, wastefully and scornfully treated in both life and death simply to feed an obese population of ingrates with no idea of where the food on their plate comes from. This is a straw man argument. You present something tangentially related to what you are trolling about and then knock it down to discredit the first argument. Honestly, you have to do MUCH better than that! While ID could be taught as an "idea" I think Dawkins is fundamentally right in demanding a separation of religious dogma from scientific theory in teaching. I think "disastrous consequences" is about right if children are taught in such a slipshod manner as to allow religious beliefs to define classroom policy and teaching schedules. One may as well include other 'theories' of the nature of the universe into physics classes such that children have no idea whether it's waves, particles or "turtles all the way down". A mix of straw man, separation of church and state. Oh dear. I'll bite. "Turtles all the way down" is comprable to feathers on dinosaurs. For generations 'science' classes taught that dinosaurs were giant lizards with scaly skin. This was the view handed down by the religiious elite, and all schoolchildren were examined on it, and made to believe it like it was the absolute truth. Now of course, feathers are the vogue, all the books are being re-written the religion has had an update, and if you want to pass the exams, you have to put on the feathers. That is "turtles all the way down"; a set of beliefs that are internally consistent but completely wrong. Why should any student be forced to recite the verses of this religion or face academic failure? It is wrong for scientists to claim that they are the only ones who know what the truth is at any one time, and then to insist that everyone follow them or face ruin. What people teach in a school is the responsibility of the school and the parents that send their children to that school. The policy for all should not be set by scientist atheists, any more than it should be set by Muslims or Catholics. Scientists fail every time because they believe that they are the only ones that have the correct view. They are precisely like the fundamentalist Muslims, only they don't want to kill you, they just want to kill your way of thinking and they use these skeptic tactics, like the straw man argument, to equate religious belief with illogical nonsense like "turtles all the way down". Ideas.... See above. When you invite me round to your hovel for a bowl of gruel cooked in your hand-thrown clay pot and show me your lovely new dog-skin trousers and the fabulous new cesspit out back, then I'll let you get away with suggesting a world without scientists. And we will both be HUMAN when we eat that gruel, which will be real gruel and not GM frankenstien gruel. There is no dogma! Show me the scientific dogma and I'll run it over with my scientific karma. Richard Dawkins may have dogma, but that's his problem. There is no dogma? There is no "Mafia". There are no UFOs, There was only one shooter. This is precisely the poor attitude that people are talking about; scientists believe that they are right in all things, and that their method of divining the world is the only correct and trustworthy one, and that they are not suffering under any sort of delusion or misunderstanding or error. This is false. Scientists have been wrong again and again and again; there is nothing bad in this per se, but what is totally wrong is their stubborn and arrogant belief that they are absoutely correct at any one time. I am not against arrogance or stubbornness. BUT when the arrogant and the stubborn try and force people to believe what they believe, they are no better than the female mutilating, child beheading, stoning to death for adultery 'nutcases' that pollute this world. It is they are truely living inside a "turtles all the way down" delusion, because they fundamentally believe that they are correct, above all others. This belief they adhere to is crafted to near perfection; it allows for self correction ad infinitum through writing experimentation and re-writing. The dogma is flexible, handed down as it is 'improved'. The only thing that it cannot absorb is anything that is outside of the scientific method, otherwise, anything is game. This is modern sciences fatal flaw. "We"? Who we? We the people that guzzle fuel and eat mass-produced shit without a thought? We the populace that demands progress, whether it's a new Playstation or better botox? We are the people who want to be sure that when someone deveolps a new feed for a cow, that they remember their school lessons whilst they are doing it: 'COWS ARE HERBIVORS - THEY DON'T EAT MEAT, ESPECIALLY NOT OTHER COWS' Do not conflate the science that produces the playstation (maths, material science) with the science that produces hybrid humans and gm crops. The latter two are BAD and the former are GOOD. The internal combustion engine falls under the former, and is GOOD. Just because it has been over used doesn't make it bad, it means that we all have to change our behaviour, and the people who invented it are not responsible for its misuse. GM damage cannot be withdrawn from the environment, this is why it is different to the damage caused by burning oil (note how I do not call it fossil fuel :P ). The same goes for hybrid humans. Once hybrid human genes are mixed into the gene pool, they cannot be removed; future generations will be contaminated, and that is that. No amount of "sorry" will fix either of those two pollutants. No one wants to throw away all science. We only want to destroy the bad, the poisoinous, the stuff that kills our childrens rightful inheritance to a clean world. 'Not tested on animals' came about as a result of LAW not science. It was LAW which required products to have been tested for toxicity to animals... And that makes it right? If they pass a law that all products must be tested on unwilling humans, will the people carrying out the tests comply with it simply because it is the law? "I was only following orders". We all know where THAT road leads don't we. Starve or take the devil's shilling? Turtles all the way down....to hell! The "arrogant and cavalier treatment of our shared environment" is carried out not by scientists, but by businesses and politics. The "evil" is a result of business and politics. We cannot shift the blame off of the people who carry out the work. The people who carry out the making of exotic poisons are responsible for the existance of the poisons, which would not be there had they not made them. Scientists must decide not to do work that will have disasterous consequences or which will cause untold suffering. If they don't have the backbone to do it, they will be made to do it. And yet, every time one speaks in an attempt to help people understand science, he is derided as a charlatan. Richard Dawkins is not trying to help anyone "understand science". He is trying to manipulate public policy to exclude ideas that he finds offensive as a humanist atheist. Helping people understand science by speaking, teaching, and demonstrating scientific principles is good - trying to kill other peoples ideas with hysterical language like "disasterous consequences" is BAD, and he is immediately discredited when he puts himself in opposition to ideas he personally loathes just because he loathes them. When you need it, and it is your only hope, think of these invisible men. An emotional paragraph. Emotion is good. No one is agiainst good work. No one is against the men and women who truely want to help their fellow man. Do not confuse peoples disgust with the GM meddlers and human cloners and mix it in with an imaginary hatred of the good biologists who make the world better in a humble and moral way. No one bats an eyelid when Bush talks anti-science nowadays because.... religious fervour and a McCarthyist attitude to dissent makes it unwise to do so. NO, People don't bat an eyelid precisely for the reasons that I gave, which aparently went in one eye and out the other. Exactly why people of integrity and intellectual rigour such as Richard Dawkins should be encouraged to put the true face of science to the people, and to expose business and politics (and religion) as the EVIL manipulating forces behind the problemswith which science has been stigmatised. ALL HAIL HIGH PRIEST DAWKINS HOLY DISSEMINATOR AND REGENERATOR. ALL BOW TO HIS WISDOM, THE WISDOM OF THE GREAT GOD OF SCIENCE! ahem...once again, no matter who says it, you cannot excuse the immoral acts of scientists out for a buck and shift the blame onto the paymasters or legislators. Everyone is responsible for their own actions, and scientists are not part of a super human subset of people for whom the rules governing responsibility do not magically apply. First, (if one agrees in a state-sponsored education system) the argument of what is taught to children should be taken by educated people able to understand a debate. It is these people who should be beating Bush with intellectual sticks and pointing out his lack of objectivity and lack of ability to understand the debate. Second, people like Richard Dawkins are exactly the type of people to tell a school what should be taught. Firstly there is more than one way to organize state schools. There is no reason why the curriculum should be centrally dictated. Secondly if it is to be centrally dictated, then ELECTED OFFICIALS should set the curriculum, not UNELECTED ATHEISTS. The public pays taxes for these schools and elects representatives to get the job done (ideally) and so lone voice third parties with an agenda, from whatever camp, should not be able to exert undue influence on the shape of the curriculum. But their poor standard of education has made them too STUPID to see past their TV set and into the real world. This is the world according to HIGH PRIEST Dawkins. If you do not understand the scientific view of the world, and do not accept its tenets, then you are, by definition, 'uneducated'. After all, no other type of knowledge is valuable, no other belief is correct save that sanctioned by the high priests of science, you are therefore by definition, incapable of making good decisions. If you do not support THEE KNOWLEDGABLE 1 by definition you are outside of the faith, irredeemable, and to be surgically excised. ALL BOW! would you be able to live with yourself if all you did as the books got burnt was stand by and watch your beliefs go up in smoke? Funny you should put it in those terms; Dawkins is the book burner here, as he tries to incenerate the idea of God the creator and replace it with his own ideas to be rammed into the minds of children. Funny that "I was only doing my job" is the excuse used by the vivisectionists who maim, kill and torture "because its the law" borth of these...from the same era of book burning. The fact that the high priest thinks the people setting the curriculum are "fools" is worth noting. He is the same type that thinks, for example, that "Homeopathy is no better than placebo", and of course now that these holy verses have again been published in The Lancet that printer of pages from the ever increasing multi bible of science, he will believe it even more. No matter that everyone (the MILLIONS of people) who use it say that it works, that it brings them relief from hayfever for example. No matter that this medicine has been used sucessfully for over a century; this doesn't matter because it has not been published in a peer reviewed journal. Dawkins is the fool. And he is free to be a fool until the end of time as long as he does not foist his diabolical will and evil plans for intellectual domination on anyone. Should he persist, he will be smacked down and all will benefit. Real science will increase; the science of humans for humans, science that is open and not closed will gain ground. Bad science, the bad 'modern science' of religious dogma, rigidity and closed mindedness will loose ground. And that would be a good thing.

Two more examples of the 'Dawkins Disease'

"Australian scientists have created mice which can regenerate absolutely any tissue except for the tissues of the brain. Heart, lungs, entire limbs, you name it. This is the first time this has been seen in mammals. The potential implications are positively mammoth." ???!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!? and:

BSE Also on the programme, our Science Editor Susan Watts has gained early access to an astonishing report being published tonight in the Lancet. It advances an extraordinary and horrific theory about the origins of mad cow disease BSE.

The latest programme available in broadband http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/4204180.stm ...the BSE part of this programme is the most sickening thing ever; a new report to be published in a 'Scientific Journal' claims that the true origin of BSE is human corpses harvested by peasants on the banks of the Ganges river, sold to western farmers as feed for cattle. Now. who was the genius that came up with the idea giving cows cows to eat? Who prepared the formulae, who thought it all up (and most incredibly what the feed was made of was a trade secret so the farmers didnt' know what they were feeding to their livestock). I guarantee you that no farmer came up with the idea of feeding cows 'protien' made from cows to increase milk yield. YOU SEE?!

the dead are in nature

Situated near the intersection of Liberty and Perrilliat Streets, the Girod Street Cemetery stood near the site of the present-day Louisiana Superdome. Shrouded in strangling vines for much of its history and hidden in a disreputable neighborhood, the cemetery that once existed in the heart of the city is now largely forgotten. Actress Jane Placide, financer Glendy Burke, and Episcopal cleric Rev. William T. Leacock were only a few of the cemetery’s illustrious dead. One of the most notable monuments honored Lieutenant Colonel William Wallace Smith Bliss, General Zachary Taylor’s Chief of Staff who had perished in the 1853 yellow fever epidemic. Hundreds of that disaster’s less fortunate victims were buried beneath a large earthen mound. Such mass burials occurred several times during the cemetery’s history. The worldwide Asiatic cholera pandemic of 1832-1833 hit New Orleans especially hard; many of its victims were buried in shallow trenches in the Girod Street Cemetery. The Girod Street Cemetery was located in a flood-prone area, near what would become “the Swamp.” By the 1950s, the cemetery was badly overrun by vegetation and criminal activity. Grave robbers routinely looted the burial ground. Derelicts set up house in vacant crypts while prostitutes conducted business among the crumbling memorials. The site where the city’s first exclusively Protestant graveyard stood has no commemorative marker. Although a legend asserts the New Orleans Saints’s end zone rests atop old graves, the burial ground’s exact location was closer to the New Orleans Centre shopping mall and a corner of the Superdome’s parking garage. [...] A 2-year-old girl slept in a pool of urine. Crack vials littered a restroom. Blood stained the walls next to vending machines smashed by teenagers. Inside, a man coughed up blood and his shoulders quaked as he was wheeled through the halls. Thousands clutched their meager belongings, sitting in seats normally used for football games or lying on the artificial turf, its end zones painted with the word "Saints." "There is feces on the walls," said Bryan Hebert, 43, who arrived at the Superdome on Monday. "There is feces all over the place." At least two people, including a child, have been raped. At least three people have died, including one man who jumped 50 feet to his death, saying he had nothing left to live for. [...] An old man in a chaise lounge lay dead in a grassy median as hungry babies wailed around him. Around the corner, an elderly woman lay dead in her wheelchair, covered up by a blanket, and another body lay beside her wrapped in a sheet At least seven bodies were scattered outside, and hungry, desperate people who were tired of waiting broke through the steel doors to a food service entrance and began pushing out pallets of water and juice and whatever else they could find. The crowd got angry when journalists tried to photograph one of the bodies, and covered it over with a blanket. A woman, screaming, went on the front steps of the convention center and led the crowd in reciting the 23rd Psalm. John Murray, 52, said: "It's like they're punishing us." [...]

Disastrous Consequences

Trolling Alun? I'll bite! I love the way talking head scientists rubbish on about "disastrous consequences" when it comes to ideas being taught, but when it comes to discussing GM crops being spread throughout the land, this inflammatory phrase is off the table. Lets apply some logic to both of these troll articles. Life without scientists, means life without the atom bomb, GM crops, hybrid humans. Life with or without teaching evolution in classrooms? No effect on anything at all. Life without scientists also means no pointless and horrifyingly cruel experiments on animals. Result - lots of people may or may not die from all sorts of diseases BUT everyone gets to live in a clean world without GM crops, hybrid humans, atom bombs and cruelty on an unimaginable scale. Anyone that wants humans to live on this planet for another ten thousand years doesn't want anything to do with scientists and their insane world destroying dogma. We want a world without these egomaniacs who look at every living thing as just another tool or object to experiment on. The rise of products that are guaranteed 'not tested on animals' is a testament to this sentiment. Are the scientists listening? Of course not, after all, the public are at best, children to be guided, and in all other cases, chattel to be experimented on. Scientists are falling out of favour now more than ever due not only to their arrogant and cavalier treatment of our shared environment, but also because they are trying to control what people think, instead of just getting on with their work quietly and dilligently. They are not content with improving the quality of life for everyone, they insist also on controlling the minds of the population, poisoning the environment with their diabolical experiments and making sure that no one anywhere will be able to even live without their permission. By that I am talking about the scientist created crops that don't produce seeds (for example). That, by any measure, is pure evil, a perversion of nature, and totally inexcusable and unjustifiable. If I were a scientist, (which I am by the way, a TRUE scientist in the way that men were in the past) I would cease trying to force my religion down the throats of the masses, because the masses are going to turn around and shut down every interesting lab and experiment once and for all, since clearly the people behind them have no sense of responsibility, no common sense, no connection with their fellow man, no morality, no empathy with living creatures or the planet...in other words, they are not human. No one bats an eyelid when Bush talks anti-science nowadays because everyone and thier dog can see that it is scientists that are pushing us into a nightmare future where the world (and the very nature of human beings) is being transformed into something that we do not want it to be. These inhuman tinkerers are already being harmed and killed (vivisectionists) because they won't listen; next they will all be shut down, and this means the good as well as the bad. Remember when the Cassini probe was being launched? People protested that a nuclear reactor was being used to power it. Those people would rather not have Cassini in orbit around Saturn, simply because they dont like the power source of the mission. These are the types, that if they win, will shut down the beneficial, non destructive science because they cannot distingush between something that doesn't change the environment or humanity and something that is pure exploration / research. Blathering on about how religion is simply wrong because it has not appeared in a peer reviewd journal is just the kind of insulting, unfeeling, stupid and threatening behaviour that is going to cause this nightmare to come true. And it is threating precisely the wrong groups in society; people with children in schools. Richard Dawkins has no business telling a school what they should or should not be teaching to a mans children, and when you threaten peoples children, as we all know, people go absolutely WILD with rage. My advice to all the imbecile talking heads like Richard Dawkins; S.T.F.U. and accept that people will believe whatever they want to believe, they have the absolute right to believe whatver they want to believe, and that this is none of your business. If you do not shut up and get back to decent honest work, your worst nightmare may come to pass and you may find that you get the answer to wether or not there is a God demonstrated to you first hand. Then your nightmare will REALLY begin!

No fish & Chips for John Young!

Welcome to the league of men who have the right to bear the letters BSL after their name: John Young (BSL) Where 'BSL' stands for ' British Shit List'. Cryptome has once again, published a list of M|6 officers, this time, Paddy 'perpetual looser' 'pants down' Ashdown (Jeremy John Durham Ashdown) is on the list. No Fish & Chips for you sunshine!

oops

Streaming aerial video with narration by some annoying people who claim know the landmarks....(porn for those who long to witness nature destroy hideous urban centers, malls and concrete subdivisions) http://nebe-b.org/wgno26flyover.asx

Something must break

It won't be long before the masses demand the invasion/annexation of Saudi Arabia so that gas prices can return to lower levels. Of course, these same masses will never demand that all fuel taxes are scrapped, because, well, they simply have not got the brains to do that....or maybe not.....For every £50 you put in your tank, you're giving the government £37 in tax.

Overseas UK Fuel Prices

Country	Local Currency per litre		UK pence per litre
	Unleaded	Diesel	Unleaded	Diesel
Austria (Euro)	0.98	0.86	67.61	59.33
Belgium (Euro)	1.20	0.83	82.79	57.26
Czech Rep (Koruna)	27.70	25.70	62.25	60.54
Denmark (Krone)	9.05	8.22	86.69	78.74
Finland (Euro)	1.18	0.90	81.41	62.09
France (Euro)	1.11	0.96	76.58	66.23
Germany (Euro)	1.19	1.03	82.10	71.06
Greece (Euro)	0.87	0.94	60.02	64.85
Netherlands (Euro)	1.31	0.99	90.38	68.30
Hungary (Forint)	252.50	237.00	77.80	73.02
Ireland (Euro)	1.00	0.94	68.99	64.85
Italy (Euro)	1.17	0.99	80.72	68.30
Luxembourg (Euro)	0.97	0.78	66.92	53.82
Estonia (Kroons)	11.95	10.50	54.44	47.84
Norway (Norwegian Krone)	9.90	8.55	85.42	73.77
Latvia	0.49	0.47	52.73	50.58
Lithuania	2.73	2.61	56.64	54.15
Poland (Zloty)	3.86	3.40	69.65	61.35
Slovakia	36.90	36.60	66.33	65.79
Slovenia	207.40	199.90	62.92	60.65
Portugal (Euro)	1.06	0.83	73.13	57.26
Spain (Euro)	0.93	0.84	64.16	57.95
Sweden (Swedish Krona)	10.55	9.63	82.55	75.35
Switzerland (Swiss Francs)	1.50	1.59	69.37	73.54
USA (US Dollars)	0.53	0.58	30.07	32.91

"The government spend approximately £6 billion on roads and local transport, but a staggering £36 billion is collected in road taxation" [...] http://www.lesstaxonfuel.co.uk/index.htm

Handy Felt Tips

Passport factory redunancies caused by ISLAND

Met seek 'fake' passports accused

British police have one month to make a case for extradition

British police will seek the extradition of an Algerian man arrested in Thailand on suspicion of forging European passports.

Atamnia Yacine, 33, was detained in the Thai capital Bangkok on Wednesday, after he was found with at least 180 French and Spanish passports.

Britain has a warrant for his extradition on charges of forging passports and money laundering.

Thailand is widely reputed to be a major source of fake travel documents.

Yacine was arrested during a raid on his house in Bangkok.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "We understand the individual has been detained in Bangkok."

"We will be working with the Crown Prosecution Service, the Foreign Office and the Thai authorities to seek his extradition."

British police will have one month to present their case to authorities in Bangkok.

'Forgery hub'

Thai police said the seized passports had been sent to the French and Spanish embassies for examination.

Western governments view Thailand as a hub for fake passport production and proliferation, the BBC's Jonathan Head said from Bangkok.

Security analysts say that is a major concern, as they can be used to allow criminals and in some cases militants to move freely between countries. [...]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4190806.stm

Of course, with an ISLAND enabled passport, these Thai factories will become instantly redundant. Anyone can forge a paper and plastic passport, even a hologram protected image in a passport, but what they CANNOT forge is a PGP signature on a digital photo and its related personal information. When the ISLAND enabled passport is scanned at a port, the signature on the photo and personal info is checked. if the scan is complete, ie, the data is completely transfered to the computer checking the signature without damage, then the signature will come up as not having been made by the Passport Office or designated issuing authority. The document can instantly be determined to be fradulent. If the signature is good, then the document is good and has been properly issued. This can all be done without any smoke and mirrors or snake oil (biometrics) and can be done right now, with commodity components and zero cost Open Source software.

Dirty Teenagers In The Loop

RESEARCHERS MAP THE SEXUAL NETWORK OF AN ENTIRE HIGH SCHOOL COLUMBUS, Ohio – For the first time, sociologists have mapped the romantic and sexual relationships of an entire high school over 18 months, providing evidence that these adolescent networks may be structured differently than researchers previously thought. The results showed that, unlike many adult networks, there was no core group of very sexually active people at the high school. There were not many students who had many partners and who provided links to the rest of the community. Instead, the romantic and sexual network at the school created long chains of connections that spread out through the community, with few places where students directly shared the same partners with each other. But they were indirectly linked, partner to partner to partner. One component of the network linked 288 students – more than half of those who were romantically active at the school – in one long chain. (See figure for a representation of the network.) [...] http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/chains.htm Those filthy teenagers!

Juba ... Muadib!

Highly trained Islamic snipers on their way to the USA by Ernesto Cienfuegos La Voz de Aztlan www.aztlan.net Los Angeles, Alta California - August 23, 2005 - (ACN) The USA mainstream media is "filtering" the news coming out of Iraq. It is not reporting on certain items deemed by the Pentagon to be detrimental to the morale of US troops or their families back home. Conspicuously absent are any reports on "Juba", a sniper who has been terrorizing US soldiers in Baghdad for months. Juba is the name given by US forces to a superbly trained insurgent sniper who has already killed at least 19 GI's including four US Marine snipers in one day. No US soldier has ever seen Juba. They only hear one distinctive shot from a Tabuk sniper rifle (An Iraqi sniper rifle based on the Soviet Kalashnikov but fitted with a long barrel and a muzzle brake. It uses the 7.62mm Kalashnikov cartridge) and the next thing they see is another GI slumping down dead. The hit is usually to the head but Juba also aims at gaps in the GI's body armor. He has been known to hit his mark from 300 yards which is the length of three football fields. Juba takes only one shot and then disappears. US troops who scramble to find Juba soon after he has struck find only his trademark that consists of a single 7.62mm Kalashnikov cartridge casing with a handwritten note. The note, in Arabic, says, "What has been taken in blood cannot be regained except by blood". The note is signed, "The Baghdad Sniper". Juba is now a mythic hero to the Iraqi resistance. Word on the streets of Baghdad, from those who know Juba, is that his rifle is running out of space to add more "notches" that signify US occupation soldiers he has killed. Juba is now training an "elite" insurgent sniper squad that will target personnel coming in and out from Baghdad's Green Zone. A particular worrisome development for USA based warmongers is a CIA intelligence report that says that a superbly trained Islamic sniper squad is on its way to the USA. According to the report, the Al-Ikhwan Al-Moslemoon (Muslim Brotherhood)is preparing to send a highly trained sniper squad to the USA that will target, at first, the lower and middle level leadership of the Islamophobic organizations that cater to the Zionists. This, we presume, includes the lackeys of the Zionists on radio and television. A few weeks ago, these puppets of Israel added insult to injury when they went on a vile tirade in support of the "toilet flushers" of the Holy Koran at Guantanamo. Many of these radio talk jockeys are not Jews but they act as mouthpieces for their employers who are. One of these virulent pundits for the Zionists said over the airwaves, "US soldiers at Guantanamo should have used the pages of the Koran to wipe their asses!" La Voz de Aztlan received an e-mail from one of our subscribers in Saudi Arabia concerning the CIA report. Ali bin Ahmed bin Saleh Al-Fulani wrote that the Islamic sniper squad should include Congressman Tom Tancredo of the Colorado 6th Congressional District as one of its first targets. Tancredo recently made a public statement proposing that the USA "nuke" Mecca. "Nuke" means blasting a city with a nuclear bomb as was done to Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Mecca is Islam's holiest cities where millions of Muslims make a yearly religious pilgrimage. Ali added, "Instead of nuking the entire 6th congressional district and killing hundreds of thousands innocent civilians, a sniper should "nuke' Tancredo's ass with one 7.62mm Kalashnikov bullet hardened with depleted uranium!" Depleted uranium utilized in USA military projectiles has caused horrendous deformities in Iraqi babies. Who is Aztlan.net? Check out http://www.aztlan.net/whoweare.htm ----------------------------- This original article was found at http://www.aztlan.net/juba.htm http://www.phxnews.com/fullstory.php?article=24550 http://www.alipac.us/article-657--0-0.html [...] Who is this Muad'dib?

data retention

European Commission attempts to reduce data retention requirements

The European Commission is planning to table its own proposal in September regarding the retention of email and telecommunications for law enforcement purposes. This would pre-empt and reduce the current proposal from the EU Council of Ministers.

The EU Council of Ministers made its proposal after the Madrid train bombings, and resurrected it last month after the London bombings. It will require telcos and ISPs to retain logs of phone calls and email messages (but not the content of the messages). The Commission's proposal is more sympathetic to privacy concerns. It would cut the data retention period from four years in the Council's proposal, to between six months and a year. It also removes the requirement to log website visits and offers government money to telcos and ISPs to help them meet legislative requirements, whereas the Council wants the service providers to pay the full cost of retaining data for four years. The Commission has been boosted by research at the Erasmus University in the Netherlands, which showed that in nearly all cases where the police used "traffic data" to solve crimes, they only needed to go back three months into the records - and that telcos already hold this information for billing purposes. We could be heading for another EU political showdown over this issue, but this time the Commission will have most public and industrial opinion on its side. However, a decision needs to be implemented during 2005, so any battle over this should be short.

[...]

Megashame

July 29, 2005

Dog Poop Girl

Here's the basic story: A woman and her dog are riding the Seoul subways. The dog poops in the floor. The woman refuses to clean it up, despite being told to by other passangers. Someone takes a picture of her, posts it on the Internet, and she is publicly shamed -- and the story will live on the Internet forever. Then, the blogosphere debates the notion of the Internet as a social enforcement tool. [...]

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/07/dog_poop_girl.html I missed this one; what an astonishing story - and the Subwanker is going to get the same treatment, onle one thousand fold.

Penis Fallout

"Only in america (especially New York)"; the city of 'Dartman' 'Crazy Eddie' and the notorious James Ramseur. Tens of thousands of people are looking at the 'Subwanker' and the comments are pouring in on the flicker post. This comment thread caught my eye:

roidrage says: OH MY GOD. I live in the city as well and am SO SICK OF THIS SHIT. Earlier this week, some guy stuck two of his fingers IN MY ASS CRACK. I kicked him in the nuts and he ran away but i was insanely steamed. As a project i've been documenting the disgusting men that have tried to hit on me. Here is a link to my flickr set that i've started. I am in the process of developing a site for it. We should probably start a "PERVERTS" group! Disgusting Men. Posted 86 minutes ago. ( Permalink )

and then:

apollonia666 says: I dunno, Roidrage. The guy who grabbed you should, of *course*, be subject to ridicule, but it seems to me that there's a big difference between posting a pic of a creep masturbating on the subway and posting a pic AND THE PHONE NUMBER of a creep who called you "beautiful" on the street, as you did here. And I don't think that what may or may not be street harassment as any justification for homophobic "I like to suck dick" comments like you scrawled over this guy's face. What friendly_chic has done here seems like a way more proportionate and appropriate response to the offense than what you've done, IMHO. Posted 28 minutes ago. ( Permalink )

and the guys:

Mr. Johnie Fox	August 18, 2005
This might just be too easy. Johnie thinks i'm going to call him about being an extra in a commercial. The pay is a few hundred dollars! I hate hate hate it when 2 or more of them see me coming down the block. They part to the sides so i'm FORCED to walk inbetween them. Then, as i'm walking by them they have to say stupid shit like "PSST. PSSST. ... Beautiful." Maybe typed out it looks harmless but LOOK AT THAT MAN. IMAGINE HIM SAYING THAT TO YOU. Isn't that pleasant feeling? Posted by cassandra at August 18, 2005 11:18 PM

Say Hello to Jermaine!	August 17, 2005
I said yesterday that if one more disgusting man tried to talk to me I'd flip shit. Well, this is my way of flipping shit. Jermaine thought it would be really kind of him to tell me how beautiful I looked today as I was walking to the subway. I explained to him that I worked for a talent agency and that we are always looking for a fresh face. He glady posed for a picture and gave me his name and phone number. Wasn't that sweet? The name and phone number are real. Feel free to leave him messages. Maybe he doesn't like to suck cock but he seemed like a nice guy, so i'm sure he'll be open minded about it! I'm thinking about making photocopies and distrubuting them in gay bars across the city. Is that really wrong of me? This is the beginning of my new project. I think i''ll start collecting them and turn it into a little book. Any suggestions on what else i can do with them? I bet i can collect quite a few within the next couple of weeks. Posted by cassandra at August 17, 2005 12:21 PM

Belly laugh of the day, thanks to the newest member of BLOGDIAL, a decloaked lurker!

Yeah but no but yeah but no but

YES NO, but I was only talking specifically about these new rules that target anyone that can be deported, like those living here under 'indefinite leave to remain', who are especially vulnerable to this new attack, like Mr. Bakri, who has seven children in the UK who have the right to be here, being british, while he can be deported and separated from them at the whim of the elephant. Last word.

Not to be 'Sent Packing'

they can be imposed on anybody No, Deportation orders cannot be imposed on true born British citizens, like Alun. That is what the Anti-Babar has just 'expanded upon' with the new rules. All joking aside, this is about as stupid as the old laws forbidding the BBC from transmitting the actual voices of members of the IRA. It made Britain a laughing stock, didn't deter the IRA a single bit, and gave the BBC a ready made way to mock the government every night with the absurd out of sync fake Irish accents of actors voicing to the grave face of Gerry Adams. Stopping these people from speaking and preaching is like trying to use a water hose to put out the sun. From the ground. The cause of the heat is ..... hey wait a minute, is this speech forbidden?! Ah yes, the regulations are retroactive, so I will repeat what I have said before; the cause of this heat is the murderous lap dog foreign policy and the illigal immoral invasion of Iraq executed by this evil government, a wholley owned subsidiary of Murder Inc. And is that fat jackass so totally ignorant of how the world works that he cannot understand that websites can be run from anywhere, and that anyone who wants or needs too be 'stoked up' can find an inflamatory site in seconds, no matter who he deports. He really is like a cartoon elephant that has seen a mouse, picks up a grand piano with his trunk and franticaly thrashes it against the ground again and again trying to kill it while on his hind legs.

So many government created opportunities!

Am I getting carried away? certainly not. Maybe if I was religious, they'd lock me up. Being atheist, I'm obviously subnormal and morally corrupt and therefore my views are less contentious. Not only are you an athiest, but you are a true born british citizen which means that they can't deport you under these regulations. You, being a first class citizen, enjoy all the God given rights and 'priveledges' that are fundamental to liberty. I smell an opportunity! You and all the other first class citizens could sell your immunity (!) to the second and third class citizens in the form of being a speaking mouth or named author. You publish whatever some poor slave wants to say but cant, for a fee. The words are said, no one gets deported, you make some money.... Profit! You could even be hired to repeat words written down for you in a mosque; free speech returns to those mosques that like it, no one gets arrested or deported. Of course, should this pan out, they will simply make it illegal for people to attend these mosques. There is nothing that they will not do, except the right thing. And another thing. These new regulations were announced, and then by magic, they seemed to become part of the law. There was no review, no vote taken on it...nothing....people are now simply banned at the word of an unshaven car door eared, beady eyed, obese JACKASS. Regulation by proclamation...and they said that Saddam was a 'dictator'....

Canada is seduced by the dark side

The federal cabinet will review new legislation this fall that would give police and security agencies vast powers to begin surveillance of the Internet without court authority. The new measures would allow law enforcement agents to intercept personal e-mails, text messages and possibly even password-secure Web sites used for purchasing and financial transactions. A law professor and privacy expert involved in consultations over the bill said a draft version of the legislation circulated this year did not require court authority for police to intercept communications or demand information from Internet servers. "I think it's the kind of legislation that is literally going to shock millions of Canadians," University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist said. Justice Minister Irwin Cotler disclosed the plan during a speech to a conference of police boards from across the country. He told reporters he and Public Safety Minister Anne McLellan are preparing a memorandum to cabinet following months of discussions with police, privacy experts and the Internet industry. [...] http://www.canada.com/technology/story.html?id=360edf23-b247-4f51-af14-45ced083696a Oh, Canada......

It's going to get worse

The powers will cover statements already on record. Retroactive legislation is always a bad idea. This is going to be thrown out by the House of Lords for sure...."time to get rid of them" says Bliar. Amazing how the other place is now more representative of the British people than the lower house. Look at the comments on BBQ. This one:

Let's not forget what Livingstone calls the 'Mandela test' - would the laws when in place mean we could not have supported Nelson Mandela in the 1980s? Mandela, after all, was convicted of using violence for political ends and has never said sorry for it. I supported him then and I support it now - this probably makes me and many millions of others (including most of the Labour ministers) around the world 'terrorist supporters' and would therefore fail the new laws. Jack, Essex

is the odd one out - most of them are foaming at the mouth and baying for blood...if its true that those comments represent "what most people think" then all is lost, The Dark Lord of The Sith has won, and liberty is dead.

Cowardice and computer illiteracy

The New York Times doesn't understand the real problem. The real problem is not with Google or Microsoft, but with the computer illiterate Venture Capitalists. VCs are not geeks. The ones that I have dealt with, that claim to be interested in backing software startups were so ignorant about the world of software that they called the phrase 'client server system' "Gobbledegook". I'm not making this up. Anyone who says that Google is a threat to a startups chances of sucess doesn't understand the internet, network effects and everything to do with the intenet economy. They don't even understand the story of Google itself:

The search for a buyer

Larry and Sergey continued working to perfect their technology through the first half of 1998. Following a path that would become a key tenet of the Google way, they bought a terabyte of disks at bargain prices and built their own computer housings in Larry's dorm room, which became Google's first data center. Meanwhile Sergey set up a business office, and the two began calling on potential partners who might want to license a search technology better than any then available. Despite the dotcom fever of the day, they had little interest in building a company of their own around the technology they had developed.

Among those they called on was friend and Yahoo! founder David Filo. Filo agreed that their technology was solid, but encouraged Larry and Sergey to grow the service themselves by starting a search engine company. "When it's fully developed and scalable," he told them, "let's talk again." Others were less interested in Google, as it was now known. One portal CEO told them, "As long as we're 80 percent as good as our competitors, that's good enough. Our users don't really care about search."

Touched by an angel

Unable to interest the major portal players of the day, Larry and Sergey decided to make a go of it on their own. All they needed was a little cash to move out of the dorm — and to pay off the credit cards they had maxed out buying a terabyte of memory. So they wrote up a business plan, put their Ph.D. plans on hold, and went looking for an angel investor. Their first visit was with a friend of a faculty member.

Andy Bechtolsheim, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, was used to taking the long view. One look at their demo and he knew Google had potential — a lot of potential. But though his interest had been piqued, he was pressed for time. As Sergey tells it, "We met him very early one morning on the porch of a Stanford faculty member's home in Palo Alto. We gave him a quick demo. He had to run off somewhere, so he said, 'Instead of us discussing all the details, why don't I just write you a check?' It was made out to Google Inc. and was for $100,000." [...] http://www.google.com/intl/en/corporate/history.html

Thats the way you do a startup, put together the bare bones of your system or some kind of tangible demo, get someone that has money that they are willing to loose, and that is also a true venture capitalist ie, someone that is not 'risk averse' but who likes risk, is interested in new ideas and is willing to take a bet.

Google was initially funded with $100,000 that was simply handed over to them as you would lay down money on a poker hand. That is the true spirit of risk taking. It is also not alot of money. Most software startups don't need more than that to get a stable beta system online, in fact, most startups can be done for the cost of food money and equipment to sustain the developers. If the service starts to grow, you can then scale it up to accomodate your legion of users. The eyes of VCs glaze over when you talk about, for example, "using clients to collect people's playlists in a central server so that anyone anywhere browse them all in different ways for free". Or how about, "a service where people can upload their digital pictures for free so that everyone everywhere can browse them for free with our cool interface". Now to us, these are examples of exiting tools on many levels, and for one hundred thousand dollars and a crack team with intravenous espresso, they could be built very quickly (the second one took one year to build, and it was done in an apartment aparently). To a VC however, this is "Gobbledygook"; they will say (if you manage to get to them before their eyes glaze over) that "iTunes has this market cornered, and that is who you are up against, so we will have to pass on this one", or for the latter, "Adobe is the market leader in this space; what protection do you have if they decide to do what you are doing? If they go up against you, you are finished, so we will pass". Both of those assessments are demonstrably and horribly wrong, but this is what people have to put up with when they go into discussions with VCs. This is not a problem of Google or Microsoft its a problem of cowardice and computer illiteracy. Thanks to the new tools that are being refined and released the barrier to entry for a startup is so low that you barely have to lift up your legs to get over it. It means hunkering down, lots of reading, lots of IRC and IM sessions and writing lines of code. You release your service. When even the most illiterate of VCs smells millions of users, then you have the stink of money....and that they do understand.

Des Souvenirs

alarming, astonishing, awe-inspiring, awful, beautiful, breathtaking, daunting, exalted, far out, formidable, frantic, frightening, grand, hairy, impressive, magnificent, majestic, mind-blowing, moving, overwhelming, shocking, striking, stunning, stupefying, terrifying, wonderful, wondrous ablaze, bright, coruscating, dazzling, effulgent, gleaming, glittering, glowing, incandescent, intense, lambent, lucent, luminous, lustrous, radiant, refulgent, resplendent, scintillating, sparkling, vivid agreeable, blending, chiming, choral, consonant, dulcet, euphonious, harmonious, lilting, lyrical, mellow, melodic, melodious, orchestral, pleasing, rhythmic, silvery, songful, sweet, sweet-sounding, symphonic, symphonious, tuned, tuneful, vocal big, blaring, blatant, blustering, boisterous, booming, cacophonous, clamorous, crashing, deafening, deep, ear-piercing, ear-splitting, emphatic, forte, full, full-mouthed, fulminating, heavy, high-sounding, intense, lusty, pealing, piercing, powerful, raucous, resonant, resounding, ringing, roaring, rowdy, sonorous, stentorian, strident, strong, thundering, tumultuous, turbulent, turned up, uproarious, vehement, vociferous aphonic, indescribable, inexpressible, nameless, tacit, unexpressed, unpronounced, unspoken, unuttered, unvoiced, wordless

Independent Thinking

Police rely on 6,000 cameras across Tube network to cut crime
By Barrie Clement, Transport Editor
Independent   Published: 23 August 2005

London Underground has installed more than 6,000 CCTV cameras across the
network, some of them at stations and some on trains.

Plans are in place to double the number in use by 2010 as part of its
campaign to minimise petty crime, but also to deal with the increasing
threat of terrorism...

London Underground has been experimenting with "smart" digital cameras
which can automatically spot "abnormal" events. The equipment can be
programmed to detect suicide attempts, overcrowding, suspect packages and
trespassers. It is hoped that by automating the prediction or detection of
such events, Underground security staff, who often have to monitor as many
as 60 cameras, can take preventive action...

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/transport/article307679.ece

The thinking at the independent is not very independent, niether is it of high quality. When you run a 'report' like this (which is actually a press release that they are regurgitating verbatim), you must always run a 'slap slap...time to die' wake up section clarifying and decompiling the doubletalk. It goes like this. "The preceeding text is taken from a press release ftom TFL, submitted to this newspaper by a Public relations firm (name of firm here). CCTV cannot 'cut crime' niether can it 'deal with the increasing threat of terrorism'. CCTV can only help identify criminals after the fact, and then, as we have seen with the recent murder on the underground, if the criminals are the police, they will simply confiscate the tape so tha the crucial evidence is supressed and the criminals go free. As for suicides, CCTV might increase the number of suicides on the underground, since the suicidal will know in advance that they will live on as horror footage in some reality TV programme or the next 'Faces of Death'. " Now. If that is printed after the press release, the magic spell of double talk is broken, the reader can make a judgement about the piece, since its not a genuine news item at all but a PR insertion, and some true countering information is in there as a surficant. That is how an independent newspaper would deal with something like this. But you know this.

New Explosions, New Tactics, Same Demands

350 blasts in 1 hour DHAKA — About 350 small bombs exploded within an hour of each other across Bangladesh yesterday, killing two people and injuring more than 100 in an unprecedented attack initially linked to extremists. The bombs, which killed a man and a 10-year-old boy, exploded in all but a few of the south Asian country’s 64 towns and cities between 10:30am and 11:30am, the Home Ministry said in a statement. Prime Minister Khaleda Zia condemned the attacks as “cowardly”, the official BSS news agency said. Khaleda reportedly said the terrorists’ “evil design” was to create panic and destabilise the south Asian country, adding that they were enemies of democracy. Police are probing the possible involvement of an extremist group which was banned by the government in February, after leaflets calling for the implementation of strict Islamic law were found at the blast scenes. “At all the blast scenes, leaflets bearing the name of the recently banned Jamayetul Mujahideen group were found,” the Home Ministry statement said. The explosions, including 15 in Dhaka and 20 in the southeastern port of Chittagong, targeted local administrative offices, courts, and bus and railway stations. “A total of 45 suspects have been arrested, about 350 bombs exploded and the number of injured stands at more than 100,” said Foreign Ministry director Zahirul Haque. The Home Ministry appealed for calm. “After analysing all the incidents it is assumed that the main aim of the explosions was to create panic and to create a destabilised situation in the country,” the statement said. Abdul Kaiyum, Bangladesh’s Inspector-General of Police, said: “These were small, homemade bombs designed to create panic.” Home Minister Lutfuzzaman Babar said security had been stepped up across the country. Most of those hurt suffered minor injuries, police said, adding that they had no reports of any serious or life-threatening injuries. Mazeedul Haq, Chittagong’s police commissioner, said the leaflets bore the name of the Jamayetul Mujahideen and read: “It is time to implement Islamic law in Bangadesh. There is no future with man-made law.” Jamayetul Mujahideen and another hardline group, Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh, were banned in February for their alleged links to a wave of bombings of non-governmental groups, religious shrines and other targets. A police official in the large southern town of Barisal said leaflets had been found there reading: “Bush and Blair, be warned and get out of Muslim countries. Your days of ruling Muslim countries are over.” [...] http://www.timesofoman.com/newsdetails.asp?newsid=18798

Buying a property in Italy?

Practical guide to buying, procedure, costs and legal aspects The purchase of a property in Italy is considerably different from the UK and some elements may seem difficult to understand, I'll try to clarify all the steps. Estate agents in Italy must have an appropriate qualification to operate their business and they offer a wider range of services to their clients than their UK counterpart, however, these come at a price that varies between 3 and 5% of the price paid for the property. Both the buyer and the seller pay the estate agent the same amount each. In this case though the sale is direct from the owner, thus you can cross that item off your list of expenses. As a rule of thumb the additional costs involved in the purchase of any property in Italy usually amount to roughly 10 to 15% of the final price paid. These costs include tax, notary, surveyor and other legal expenses. Add a translator if you need one. The Notary's fees usually correspond to 2 to 3% of the declared purchase price of the property. The owner of Vincenzini, being an architect, has all the documentation, including the cadastral (local land registry) certificates and maps indicating borders and classification of the various portions of the property. These are important elements as different classifications at the land registry mean considerably different costs and taxes. Normally you would have to ask your notary to gain access to these and obtain a copy for a fee. The steps of the purchase process: Making an Offer (Proposta d'acquisto) You need to fill a document that states the amount you are offering, an agreed date as to when the deposit will be paid and the latest date for the definition and signing of the final contract. Usually the owner will reply within two weeks, in this case it could be quicker. The form will have to be signed and a deposit paid to the legal representative of the seller, who will hold the deposit until the seller has accepted the offer, if not the deposit is returned. A private agreement between buyer and seller can vary the conditions and deadlines of this phase and is usually signed by both parties in front of their legal representative. In general every step and all documents in any transaction, however simple, require the witnessing of a notary, with corresponding fee paid; remember that there is even a small fee for each page of each document and these must be compiled on official stamped paper supplied by the government. Both buyer and seller pay a duty proportional to the value of the sale. Properties in the countryside are generally classified as rural estates. The tax and the official value that apply to rural properties is much lower than the one applied to residential dwellings and the market price; the official value of a country estate is still based on archaic concepts that relate the value of the property to the agricultural productivity of its land, whereas the actual buildings on the land have no or very little value. The tax paid on the purchase of a country estate is calculated at two different rates, one for the land and one for the buildings, we'll go into details further down this document. After the contract has been exchanged, the price agreed and the tax paid, the seller proceeds to file a request for "reclassification" of the buildings from agricultural to residential. This will enable the buyer to reside in the place and/or use it for a non-agricultural activity. Once the seller has accepted the offer the deposit is transferred from the legal representative to the seller and counts as a first instalment of the total payment agreed. So, crucially, how much to declare at completion? Property values are registered with the Comune (local council) on a Catasto (land and buildings registry). As we said there is a noticeable discrepancy between registered and the market value. You have to pay stamp duty on the price indicated in the deeds. The Italian law states that as long as you declare a little more (say 10%) than the cadastral value you will be within the limit of legal acceptability. For details regarding current registered value and other financial and procedural details please enquire directly. Obtaining a Fiscal Code (Codice Fiscale) In order to buy a property in Italy you must obtain a fiscal code. This is similar to your National Insurance Number. Any EU citizen can obtain one from the local tax office. No legal contract can be completed without a Codice Fiscale. You can apply for a Fiscal Code through the Italian Consulate, in my experience though the Italian Consulate in London is something of a shamble and local services in Tuscany are better and faster. Opening an Italian Current Account (Conto Corrente Bancario) Having a bank account in Italy will make your life easier from the beginning and you will need it eventually to complete the purchase. As a EU citizen you can open one, providing you have the codice fiscale. Some UK banks and building societies have opened branches in Italy, it is worth checking if yours is one of these. Otherwise you will have to give an address in Italy, which temporarily can be that of your legal representative until the day you move in. The preliminary contract (Compromesso) The next step is the signing of the compromesso, the preliminary purchase contract, this is usually written by the notary, and the deposit of around 20 to 30% of the purchase price is paid at this stage. After the compromesso the notary will go to the Registries to check if there are mortgages or other claims and ties on the property (in this case there are none). Often this is a phase that can become complicated by the unpleasant surprise that the property in fact belongs to several members of the family, some of whom may be living on the other side of the planet and whose signature is essential for the conclusion of the contract. Beware of this risk! In this case Vincenzini is "clear" as all the portions of the estate, which did indeed originally belong to many members of several families, were incorporated nearly 20 years go into one estate belonging to the current owner. Pulling out If for any reason you pull out at this stage you will lose your deposit. At the same time if the seller pulls out he has to pay the deposit back plus a compensation fee. (In the case of a deposit called caparra confermatoria the owner is legally bound to sell). This anyway is not a concern in this case as the owner has genuine and unchanging reasons to sell and he is the sole proprietor. The Final Contract (Atto di vendita or Rogito Notarile) This is the moment when the contract is completed, the final amount is paid and you become the legal owner of the freehold. The final signing of the contract has, again, to be completed in front of the notary and with witnesses. If you need the documents translated you will need to pay an additional fee as these must be translated and verified by an appointed official translator with legal qualifications and it can cost around £ 500, according to length and complexity (Italian documents tend to be horrendously verbose!) It is advisable to clarify all doubts, queries and details in advance as the time at the notary is very expensive and you don't want to spend a day sitting in an office, paying by the minute and possibly needing a translator with you to disentangle the intricacies of the procedure. It can all be clarified in advance, so that when you finally go to the notary it's just to sign the documents and have the notary confirm that it's all legal and cleared.. Needless to say, if you speak Italian you will feel so much more comfortable and in control, and may even find it all surreally funny. Official resident certificate (Residenza) It is important that as soon as you move in you declare the property as your permanent residence, as this reduces considerably all tax and costs (holiday homes pay higher rates) as well as giving you all the rights of access to local services, doctor's surgery etc. You will have to go to the local municipal office (Anagrafe, at the local council) to apply for a residence certificate, as a EU citizen you are entitled to it and it is merely a formality so that you can be included in the registry of local residents and effectively become a member of the community. After a few days the local Guardia Municipale (a cross between local police and local government officer) will come to visit you at home and ask a few questions, mainly to verify that you really intend to live at the property. It may take up to three months before they give you the actual documents (nothing official is fast and everything has to be done in person and at different offices). In some cases you may even receive a visit from the local Police or Carabinieri (there are two police bodies in Italy, and sometimes they compete with each other!). Don't be alarmed, they like to go around with machine guns wearing dark sunglasses and pretending they are LA cops in an American movie, they are just doing their job and showing you that you are well protected and they know you are there, and they like to poke their noses around to see what kind of person you are. To obtain most documents in Italy you need several passport-size photographs, your passport, and an official duty stamp ("marca da bollo", you buy them from tobacconists and post offices). If you are going to live in Italy get used to having to put your picture and a "marca da bollo" on any and every scrap of paper, and you will need lots of these, also get used to carrying ID all the time, it's compulsory and you can be taken to the police station if you can't produce ID and kept there for 48 hours or until someone comes to witness for you and present your documents. Stamp duty (imposte di registro) The standard stamp duty on the purchase of a house is 10% and 18% on farmland on the value declared in the deeds and contract. However, if you are going to reside there permanently, the tax is only 3% for the house and 18% for the land. In taht case the residenza (residency) has to be obtained within 18 months of purchase, otherwise you will have to pay the additional 7% plus interest and a fine. Also, you can't sell your property during the first 5 years, unless you buy another house for permanent residence, or pay the tax difference. If you are planning to run any kind of activity that is related to the land, consider that there are various funds available through local administration to help agricultural businesses, especially if these are based on ecologically friendly principles, priority is given to environmentally friendly technologies and materials both in the use of land and in the restoration of buildings. Right of pre-emption (diritto di prelazione) This is a crucial item that can cause endless problems and you should be wary of it and always check carefully. When farmland is offered for sale, the neighbouring farmers have the first right to buy it. So any neighbour who is officially farming agricultural land adjacent to a property that is for sale which also has farmland, has first right to buy the property at the value registered in the deeds. After the preliminary contract has been signed the owner (or the notary) will have to officially inform (by registered post) all those who could have this right. These have 30 days to respond. If the person has not been informed, or if the price he/she was informed of is higher than registered in the deeds, he/she has the right to buy the land (at the price declared in the deeds), this applies up to one year after the sale. In this case all the portions included for sale with Vincenzini are clear and unhindered. In fact, if you look at the plan of the property with the individual original numbered parcels you will notice parcel number 7 is not included while it belongs to the seller who is not using it and for its position should ideally be part of the property. The reason the seller hasn't included that parcel is that it is the only one that borders another property that is (on paper at least) farmland and whose owner could claim the "diritto di prelazione" – We have verified that the owner of the neighbouring land isn't interested to the purchase, however, out of precaution and to avoid any possible unexpected problem the seller has decided not to include parcel 7. As an option, it would be possible to "rent" that portion of land at a nominal fee from the seller over a period of say 100 years, which would bypass any potential problem and would give you use of the land with the exception of building on it. [...] http://www.robat.scl.net/content/Rsite/html/labirinto/Vincenzini/VinLegal.html I was going to emphasise the.....aspects of this document that surprised me, but there are so many I decided that it would be difficult to distinguish the emphasised text from the undecorated text if I went ahead and did it. Out of all the places I have visited, and I have been to countries all over the world, Italy has one of the best vibrations. Living there aparently, is a different thing entirely. Lets pull out some of the more interesting facts from this. As you, an avid reader of BLOGDIAL would imagine, the 'codice fiscale' number is one of the more alarm raising aspects of this text. It seems to the English, very wrong that a private legal contract cannot be executed without this number. A legal contract is a private agreement between two persons or a person and a corporation, who both agree to be bound by its terms and the jurisdiction of a place agreed within it. Executing it requires only the signature of both parties, and nothing else. Quite why a state issued number needs to be in there is puzzling; what if you, as an Italian want to make a contract with someone in the UK? When we licenced tracks to DFC, no mention of this requirement was made to us....hmmmm...this cant be right; if the text is right, its not right, and if its wrong, thats right. Yes. Note that you cannot open a bank account without this number. Once again, banking is a private service, and has nothing to do with anyone other than you and your banker. We can see what kind of country the UK will turn into should ID cards be introduced here. Its not very pretty; we would have all the increased beaurocrazy and none of the lifestyle advantages the Italians do! You have to go to the local municipal office to apply for a residence certificate. Actually, this is incorrect. The French 'Carte de Sejour' is a similar thing and it is a canceled requirement since the EU came into being...would you want to argue about it with the Italian authorities? That is the question. "After a few days the local Guardia Municipale (a cross between local police and local government officer) will come to visit you at home and ask a few questions"... amazing, and to the English, unthinkable that the police or the council would visit you at your new home to answer questions for no reason.

If you are going to live in Italy get used to having to put your picture and a "marca da bollo" on any and every scrap of paper, and you will need lots of these, also get used to carrying ID all the time, it's compulsory and you can be taken to the police station if you can't produce ID and kept there for 48 hours or until someone comes to witness for you and present your documents.

This to us, is the most horrifying and incomprehensible thing of all. It is alien to us, contrary to our nature, weird, far out...and if they suceed in bringing ID cards to the UK, will come to pass. I wonder if anyone in Italy ever asks why their picture "needs to be on every scrap of paper". To us, this makes so little sense, and is so offensive it makes you wonder....about alot of things. Firstly, it makes you wonder why the British, who live lives that are demonstrably more free than that of the Italians; why would they want to throw it all away? We wonder why the Italians put up with this stuff day in and day out; is there something that we have missed about all this, because frankly, it doesn't make any sense that people should willingly submit to this sort of insanity when for generations there have been countries where life is simpler, free and with the same level of legal guarantees for property and the person, creating an environment where you can simply get on with what you need to without interference from the state. Why is life (on the surface at least) so very pleasant in Italy, with all their entrenched and invasive beaurocracy making you jump through hoops like a horn honking seal? People are giving up the UK to move there despite all of this (surely not because of it)....what does the complete picture look like? Something isnt right, it doesnt add up. Reading this guide might not give you the real impression, but what is there is interesting enough, and compared to living in the UK, where you can come and go as you please, live where you like witout telling anyone, contract with people in private, never have to register with anyone for any reason, are not going to be visited by the police/council just because you have moved into a house...it looks on paper to be a nightmare. All the British should read this and the other guides to living in Europe that no doubt exist, and then reflect on how this country works, and what it is like to live here. It's something worth preserving.

Spreadable Linconlshire Poacher

I can't believe its butter!