-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.aci.net/kalliste/ <A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin Grabbe</A> ----- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Today's Lesson from Viet Nam, Part 9: Epilogue--Beyond Incompetence by Robert L. Kocher Neither is American government to be used as an amusement park and playground for pampered, pompous, alienated academics and pseudo-intellectuals. Kennedy's best and brightest turned out to be immature self-impressed, spoiled children who were the most hopeless and incompetent. They had a genius for destroying everything they touched while claiming the disastrous consequences were the result of a complexity of situation that only people of their highly developed mentality could understand, and that somehow made not destroying everything impossible from the beginning. Destruction somehow became a demonstration of superior intellect. This half-assed self-certified brilliance gave us in rapid intellectually exhilarating succession, the betrayal at the Bay of Pigs, weakening of the NATO alliance, strengthening of Castro, demoralization of the American military, assassination of a foreign ally, international mistrust of American policy, buildup of the political left in America nearly to the point of internal revolution, and continuing slow loss of what should have been an easily won war�to the point of near-unsalvageability and eventual catastrophe. This is only a partial list. That group was followed by a forceless, dismally brilliant Doctor Henry Kissinger who rode the inertia of what had been done without properly challenging any of it or presenting alternatives, and who went on to permanently validate and solidify the mess in a destructive agreement with the North Vietnamese that immobilized and isolated the South�while assuring the North eventual absolute military license with unlimited Soviet and Chinese aid. Lesser uncultivated minds couldn't have accomplished all this. This required advanced education and the title of "intellectual" There is something about graduating from the upper levels, or holding positions in, liberal universities that, with few exceptions, confers a twisted mentality that becomes the kiss of death to anyone who contacts it. ===== Russian Follies Mafia May Control Russian Arms Firm So what's the problem? Is that worse than the Russian government? SUSPECTED links between the Russian mafia and the company that builds Sukhoi jet fighters are being pursued by officials investigating money laundering at the Bank of New York, according to a report yesterday. Sukhoi sets a world standard in aircraft performance and has sold billions of dollars worth of its Su27 family of fighters to international air forces. The company accounts for almost half Russia's arms export revenues. There have already been suggestions in the Moscow press that Sukhoi is one of the sources of hard currency that the "cabal" around President Yeltsin would like to control, although the Russian leader denied to President Clinton on Wednesday that he or his family were involved in any moneylaundering or corruption. But American intelligence officials have been questioning those involved with the Bank of New York about the failure of two Russian banks that between them owned 39 per cent of Sukhoi, according to the New York Post. It added that the officials are worried that Sukhoi could be under the control of Russian organised crime bosses. "If the manufacturer of arguably the world's deadliest military aircraft is controlled by Russian organised crime, it makes the world a little more dangerous place to live," one source said. The two banks, Inkombank and Unexim, were said to own 25 and 14 per cent of Sukhoi respectively. Both banks ran into financial difficulties amid allegations that underworld figures had looted accounts and used others to launder money. The licences of both banks were withdrawn by the Russian Central Bank three months ago. The Sukhoi shares were reportedly never found. Those belonging to Inkombank were said to have been transferred to a subsidiary in Cyprus and then to three off-shore firms which remained under the control of former officers of the bank. What happened to Unexim Bank's Sukhoi shares is not known. Officials from Russia's Federal Security Service, the Interior Ministry and the Tax Police are expected in America on Monday to meet their US counterparts investigating the Bank of New York scandal. The London Times, Sept. 10, 1999 Digital Society MP3 for Britney Spears The definition of aural sex. Move over, porn. There is an even more lusty entity subsisting in the online cosmos these days. MP3. Don't let the innocuous acronym, which packs about as much eroticism as a Star Wars robot moniker, fool you. MP3 is the reigning king of topics searched on the Internet, according to Searchterms.com, a Web site that keeps tabs on such things. "Hotmail" is the second most queried topic. And boring old "sex" has been demoted to third place ("Britney Spears" is No. 5, if you were wondering). MP3 stands for -- yawn -- Moving Pictures Experts Group, Audio Layer 3. That might come in handy sometime during final Jeopardy, but most people just need to know that MP3 is a burgeoning technological phenomenon that lets people listen to music files and store them on their computers. So what? Haven't people been doing that for a long time? Yes, but not easily and not without frustration. MP3, a tight format that shrinks music into tiny digital bundles (about 1/10 the normal size) of near-CD quality puts an end to the long waits, large files and low caliber sound, says Andy Rathbone, author of the soon-to-be-released guide MP3 for Dummies. This means after downloading MP3s, technophiles can easily burn that material onto new CDs with no generational loss, making bootlegging a whole lot more leggy. "MP3 in and of itself is pretty boring actually -- it's just a compression mechanism," Rathbone says. "What is interesting is what people are doing with it." And whether they could go to prison for what they are doing with it. And how, thanks to MP3, almost anybody (modicum of talent or marketing savvy helpful) could be a music star without David Geffen's blessing. And how the format enables people to listen to different kinds of music from all over the globe. And how MP3 is infuriating the record industry. And, most importantly, how MP3 -- something most high school and college students know intimately, even if their parents have never heard of it -- has already begun changing the music world as we know it. YOU WANT A REVOLUTION? Turn on the radio at any time of the day. Flip around. Lots of Ricky Martin and ilk. Packs of pubescent boy bands. Maybe some Lilith Fair ladies. A country-fried Pop-Tart group or two. But that's pretty much it. That's not the case on the Web. In the mood for some Malaysian pop? Want to hear what's new in the Zydeco realm? Up for dabbling in the world of trip-hop? It's all there for your perusal through MP3 files. The unofficial nucleus of the current MP3 movement is http://MP3.com a site that boasts thousands of authorized files that people can listen to and download. Say you found one of those Malaysian pop groups particularly stimulating, you could buy a DAM (digital audio music file) of their music that you can play on your computer or on your traditional home stereo. "It's like getting a sample of Tide detergent in the mail," Rathbone says. "You try it, and if you like it, you'll buy a box. Same thing with MP3. You listen to a song. If you like what you hear, you buy it. If you don't, you don't." Musicians and music scholars like Harry Panion III, chairman of the music department at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, find the technology very exciting. "There is a whole new subculture that is being birthed here," Panion says. "It reminds me of the phenomenon of rap music. Back when rap began in larger urban areas, you had kids mixing and recording their music, selling lots of CDs out of the trunks of the car." Ron Simpson, co-author of The Official MP3.com Guide to MP3 with the site's Chief Executive Officer Michael Robertson, calls MP3 a revolution. "Every musician now has the opportunity to have a potential listening base of millions of people -- that's incredible," Simpson says. "If you can market a little bit, you can sell an infinite amount of music if it's good. Let the listeners decide who is good and who isn't. Don't let the bean-counters decide." One guess who isn't exactly happy with this development. Yep, the bean-counters, or in this case, the Recording Industry Association of America. That's because MP3 threatens to eliminate them from the entire process. The industry's business is based on controlling music distribution, so when artists are able to produce and sell records without them, it can't make money. That is one prong of the record industry's problem. There is another, and it's even sharper: the reality that most of the MP3 files on the Web are not authorized (as they are on MP3.com). They are created illegally without permission. Let's go back to Ricky Martin, for example. If you type "MP3 Ricky Martin" into your browser, you'll certainly pull up several thousand fan sites that include MP3s of singles, and even his entire album. You could download his music. You could play it on your computer and listen on wireless speakers in your living room. You could transfer it into a lightweight, portable MP3 player -- similar to a Walkman -- like Rio by Diamond Multimedia and listen to "Livin' La Vida Loca" wherever you go (and unlike portable CD players, these won't skip with every little bump). You could even make your own Ricky Martin CDs and give them to friends or sell them on the street. You couldn't do it legally, but you could do it. For free, you could own his CD and even make money off it. That's money Ricky Martin and his label won't get. (And Metallica won't get. And even Yanni won't get. There is no known musician who hasn't been MP3-ed.) Those people get enough money already, you say? Whine to your lawyer during your one phone call from jail. REVENGE OF THE SUITS The RIAA has been devoting a lot of time and money to crack down on Internet piracy. Record companies have hired employees to spend their 40-hour work week finding illegal MP3s of their artists on the Web. When they discover unauthorized MP3s, attorneys will fire off warning letters to the site managers. If they refuse to comply and do not remove the MP3, the record companies will file suit. The recording industry's problem is, it gets expensive to sue people. And the pace is against them. They can knock down one site, but a dozen more can grow back in its place overnight. While they are continuing this fight, the association has started a Secure Digital Music Initiative -- a coalition of companies working to create a system that will prevent illegal distribution of copyrighted music on the Net. There is another coalition who wants to watermark every MP3 that is downloaded legally, beginning next year. Chances are, the bootleggers will find another way around the system. And chances are, once everybody learns how to successfully work MP3 and has spent their allowance on portable players, the techies will have introduced the Next Big Thing in music technology (MP3, version 2.0? MP3001?). And chances are, porn will still be around. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, September 10, 1999 ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. 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