http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/…

The bureaucrats at the European Commission are still upset that Irish voters had the gall to reject the statist EU Constitution (even though it was repackaged as the Lisbon Treaty in an attempt to deceive voters). A private European Commission memo circulating in Brussels was obtained by the Irish Times, which notes that the bureaucrats are particularly upset with private media outlets, which refused to act as lapdogs for the Commission’s propoganda campaign:

In a private briefing document circulated by the [European] commission in Brussels, it warned that Ireland’s “changing media landscape” between 2002 and 2008 has implications for public opinion about the European Union. …”There is a shift away from the State news radio and TV stations. This means that the quality of debate has suffered. Commercial radio and local radio are increasingly important to reach - and their style is different from the old State broadcasters,” it said. …The development of a conservative religious press since the second Nice Treaty is particularly noted by the commission… Though the circulation of ALIVE!, which targets conservative, older readers, is unknown, the paper claims that 365,000 copies a month are handed out, the commission briefing went on.

Not surprising. We know they wish to subvert the people.

http://arstechnica.com/…

If there’s a sense of déjà vu permeating a rather massive corporate campus in Redmond, Washington right now, it wouldn’t be surprising. The European Commission, which regulates competition for the European Union, today announced a brand new antitrust investigation against Microsoft.

Like the investigation that resulted in a €497 million fine in 2004, the new investigation will look at whether Microsoft abused its dominant market position to give some of its own products an unfair advantage. This time around, the EC will be proceeding on two separate fronts.

The first area of investigation will concern the interoperability of some of Microsoft’s products, including Office 2007, the .NET Framework, and some of Microsoft’s server products. The investigation stems from a complaint filed by the European Committee for Interoperable Systems, which alleges that the new Office Open XML does not play nice with competing products.

The EC will also fully investigate a complaint filed late last year by Norwegian browser maker Opera. In it, Opera accused Microsoft of illegally tying Internet Explorer to Windows operating systems and not following “fundamental and open” standards for how web browsers render pages. Opera wants the EC to force Microsoft to begin offering versions of Windows without IE installed and to make the browser more standards-compliant.

Sad. Opera can’t compete with Microsoft so they try to use the government to hurt their competitors. I give them props as a software development firm but their legal department appears to be filled with sore losers.

Microsoft is not a monopoly. They have a huge market share because they where in the right places at the right times with the right software. You want to out do them you’re going to need to do more than provide a decent browser for free. There’s a decent amount of competition in that game. Why not focus on the mobile market and stop whining.

As for Office… if you don’t like its interoperability or lack thereof than don’t use it. Problem solved. Latex, RTF, etc are supported by plenty of apps.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/…

How cute. Socialized National Health Service telling people who pay taxes to provide the service they can’t get service.

Further down in the article it talks about the European Commission considering a proposal to extend the upcoming ban on smoking in enclosed public places to cover doorways.

Officials have been studying the Canadian province of Quebec, where smoking is banned within nine metres of the doorway into any healthcare-related building, school or social services building.

The experiment is thought to have shown positive health benefits.

What the hell does that mean?!