United States Marines lip synch Britney Spears song – Hold It Against Me.
This video has gone viral and what would viral mean if I were to ignore it?
James Pilant
I did not nominate Bhushans: Anna Hazare
This is the next round. It’s going to be exciting. My general impression is that to discredit someone with a strong reputation you attack his colleagues. And those colleagues in this kind of struggle are likely to be politicians. Unfortunately, if you have been in politics any length of time, you have usually left some questionable decisions not wholly dealt with. What’s more, India seems to have some very creative ways for a politician to make money. In the United States, corruption is more institutionalized, so to see who owns a politician we just go online and look at the campaign contributions or we look to see what Political Action Committees their wives or relatives use to suck up money from the gullible.
My admiration for the Indian press is growing rapidly. I found the reporting informative and challenging. I got the impression that being a press favorite was not as common there as it is here.
The struggle goes on, from my distant perch in the center of the North American continent, I watch.
James Pilant
時間の止まった警戒区域付近 南相馬市 CNNニュース2011年4月21日 (A trip into the “no-go” zone.)
This is heartbreaking. How many times do you see this before you wonder why this kind of damage doesn’t seem important to the proponents of nuclear energy? I keep reading these guys. They keep talking about the low death toll of nuclear incidents. First, I doubt that the death toll at Chernobyl is anywhere close to the real number. Second, I find land being reduced to a dead zone closed to humans more than a little unsatisfactory.
But I have faith in the nuclear industry. They will come back with tons of PR, promises of safety and the hope of an economic miracle in some small hamlet desperate for jobs. They always come back.
James Pilant
Wife of Fukushima nuclear plant worker: Waiting and worried (CBS News)
You have to watch a commercial before you can see the video.
I’m not entirely happy with the news story. Somehow we found an American angle to give drama to the story. We Don’t Need an American Angle. The Japanese are people and though they don’t appear to look like many American, I find the stories of the Japanese to be just as compelling. What is it with Americans? Can’t we look at other people and recognize their commonalites, their souls, minds, spirits, hopes, dreams, emotions,.. Don’t we get it. We are all the same in the importance of our stories.
James Pilant
The Malcontent (via A Lonely Philosopher)
This is angry. This is a non-conformist, a deviant, doesn’t play well with others, etc. etc.
Fantastic, I loved every syllable. In a world where the obscenity of “emotional intelligence” is taken seriously, it’s wonderful to hear some intelligent resistance!
To the gallant author, “Write your book. I’ll buy a copy, maybe three or four and you are a philosopher in my book, any day.”
Keep up the struggle, You are not alone.
James Pilant
Discarded (via marcelgomessweden)
Art and mood. A story in a picture.
(There is a lot of amazing pictures on this site!)
JP
Who will stand up for the public interest, not just the major telecommunications companies? (via Ritajasper’s Blog)
I ask that question every day. Who stands for the public? Who stands for the middle class? Does anybody care?
This is a post directed at Canadian issues in terms of the details but once past the details the problems are world wide. Are we going to allow the new powers of technology to be cash cows for a rapacious corporate mind set? Are we going to be a bunch of proles, peons and sheep, managed like cattle being fed while these huge organizations decide whether or not our material is seen?
I read all the time that these companies have a right to make these charges, to regulate bandwidth – – corporate freedom? That’s a comedy concept. People are what’s important. The right of an organization to make a profit is overborne by the possibilities of human happiness, human welfare and political rights. Whatever our wacky supreme court decides, corporations should have no more rights than any other political concept, that is, none. Corporations are already well protected because the people who run and own them have human and political rights which they are in no way shy about exerting.
It’s time to organize and fight. It time to stop this nonsense of corporate sentience.
Humans are important, not giant collections of cash.
James Pilant
Another Successful Foreclosure Fraud Happy Hour (via Foreclosure Fraud – Fighting Foreclosure Fraud by Sharing the Knowledge)
These are some great people. They took up a public fight on a major issue before the media or the government recognized the problem. In fact, the government and the press denied there was a problem. These people are heroes, using the power of the internet as visionaries have hoped.
I wish them well!!
James Pilant
via Foreclosure Fraud – Fighting Foreclosure Fraud by Sharing the Knowledge
Organisations as Corporate Citizens (via Johan’s Lean Leadership Blog)
Mini-governments, privately run and profit motivated, may not be the best way to organize a society. There are too many competing motives for the public good to be first. In fact, for a profit seeking organization public good may mean a diminishment of profit.
After all, isn’t the modern idea of salesmanship the creation of needs followed by the necessity of purchase to solve the created problem?
I like the ideas here.
James Pilant
The Undead: Life Sciences and Pulp Fiction (via Science. Technology. Ethics. Art. Media. Culture)
The idea that humankind could take control of evolution at this point in history is one I find compelling. The idea of the transhuman, a composite human of flesh and technology is soon to be a reality although the idea of cybernetic Koch Brothers reminds me of Dawn of the Dead without the comedy.
In the future, the mad billionaire will have incredible power to physically self manipulate while the proles will live brief painful lives of servitude to the technological demi-gods. I would hope for better but our society is a road map for the wealthy to manipulate and cheat their way out of social responsibility.
The world of the transhuman self proclaimed John Gaults may be our future, –
Ayn Rand’s cult of selfishness enshrined is a technological hell of demi-gods and worshipers.
James Pilant
Pilant's Business Ethics Blog 
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