http://news.slashdot.org/…

AdamWeeden writes “According to research done by the Boston Globe, HP has been secretly using a third-party company to sell printers to Iran. This is illegal under a ban instituted in 1995 by then US President Bill Clinton. The third-party company, Redington Gulf, operates out of Dubai and previously stated on their web site that the company began in 1997 with ‘a team of five people and the HP supplies as our first product, we started operations as the distributor for Iran,’ though now the site has been changed to remove the mention of Iran. Has HP unknowingly been supplying Iran with technology or have they been trying to secretly get by the US government’s export restrictions?”

I sure hope it’s the latter. In what way is it legitimate for the government to infringe on HP’s private property rights like this? Besides does anyone actually believe these types of restrictions actually do anything constructive? The government will still be able to smuggle in whatever they want and the rest of the residents will be forced into the black market to obtain the products and services they desire. Those who aren’t willing to go that far will be artificially kept back in the rat race leading to less productivity and bigger disparities between those within and without the country. Worse case they pick up lesser brands from China, India or Russia who have likely fewer if any trade restrictions.

Free and open trade makes for more peace and prosperity. Trade restrictions just aren’t bad foreign policy they are bad economics.

When goods don’t cross borders, soldiers will. -Fredric Bastiat

http://timesofindia/indiatimes.com/

MUMBAI: The state constabulary was grossly unprepared to deal with the worst-ever terror attacks on the metropolis because of an acute shortage of weapons and ammunition.

Official records show that for a force of well over 1.8 lakh, the home department procured a meagre 2,221 weapons — 577 for Mumbai, and 1,644 for the rest of Maharashtra.

‘‘Under the centrally sponsored modernisation programme, we purchased almost all types of weapons, but for a state like Maharashtra, the number of weapons was grossly inadequate ,’’ a senior official told TOI on Monday.

In the absence of a firing range and of ammunition for practice, members of the law enforcement agencies have not opened fire in the last ten years. ‘‘I’ve been in the police force for a long time, but I had no occasion to open fire for practice,’’ a senior inspector of police said.

As per the police manual, officials ranking from constable to assistant inspector get rifles with 30 rounds each, and those with the rank of police sub-inspector and above get revolvers, also with 30 rounds each.

Jawans with the State Reserve Police Force are given SLRs or self-loading rifles. In addition, AK-47 rifles have been given to officials posted in areas where there is Naxal activity, while officials on VIP security duty are armed with either revolvers or carbines.

The manual also prescribes mandatory training for all officials, especially shooting practice at the firing range. According to a senior IPS official, the norms prescribed in the manual now exist only on paper because of the acute shortage of ammunition for practice and the non-availability of a firing range.

As per the rules, every district should have a firing range exclusively for the police. But official records indicate that more than half the state’s districts have no independent firing range.

‘‘We have constables who have not opened fire even for practice ever since their recruitment,’’ the official said.

For your consideration: http://www.abhijeetsingh.com/. Abhijeet Singh is one of the exceptions to the norm in India–he is a proud gun owner. Singh provides a comprehensive history surrounding the Indian Arms Act of 1959 and Arms Rules of 1962. Also included are the various forms and documents involved in applying for and owning a firearm in India.

http://www.marketwatch.com/…

Japan’s Nikkei 225 Average sank 9.6% to end at 7,649.08, a closing level it hasn’t seen since April 29, 2003. The benchmark is now valued at less than a fifth of its all-time high of 38,915.87, which it touched in December 1989.

“There is a complete loss of confidence and it was brought on by the decline in Japan,” said Francis Lun, general manager at Fulbright Securities in Hong Kong. “We are going back to the stone ages.”
South Korea’s Kospi index dropped even more, plunging 10.6% to close at 938.75, registering its first fall below the 1,000-point level since June 30, 2005.

India’s Sensitive Index hit the day’s bottom at 8,566.82, a level it hasn’t seen since November 2005, before ending down 11% at 8,701.07.

During the tumultuous week, the Nikkei lost 12% and the Sensex shed nearly 13%, while the Kospi sank more than 20%.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index, which ended below the 14,000-point level a day earlier, fell past even the 13,000 milestone during the session for the first time since October 2004. The index ended down 8.3% at 12,618.38.

“I don’t think the turmoil will be finished any time soon. I think it’ll continue this quarter and the next. It’s very difficult to see the bottom in the near-term,” said Hirokazu Yuihama, head of regional strategy at Daiwa Institute of Research in Shanghai.

http://money.cnn.com/…

U.S. stock futures tanked early Friday as fears of recession deepened a global market rout.

Dow Jones industrial average futures were down more than 500 points at 5:30 a.m. ET. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures were also down sharply.

Oil. Also, the Organization of Petroleum Producing Countries, which controls 40% of the world’s oil supply, announced on Friday that it would cut production by 1.5 million barrels a day, from its current level of 29 million.

OPEC had intended to raise prices by reducing production. But after the announcement, oil prices dropped $3.24 a barrel to $64.60 in electronic trading.

And the likely next president wants to increase spending, increase taxes, create makework projects and his party is talking about getting rid of 401k’s. Not that the other asshat is much better… but…

Just read America’s Great Depression [PDF]… I say it a lot but it is really important information to know.

I’ve gotten 2 people at where I work to read The Case Against the Fed. One of them told me it was likely the most depressing book he’s ever read. Implying his agreement with the books prime argument he said that the reason for his negative feeling was due to the fact Rothbard’s solution will never be implemented or even considered. Just yesterday I traded info on books with another coworker who may now be checking out The Case Against the Fed and/or America’s Great Depression. This is the opportune time to speak about this topic to people. Take advantage of it if you can.

http://www.nytimes.com/…

The fields around this little farming enclave are among the most fertile on earth. But like tens of million of acres of land in this country, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, they literally went to seed.

Now that may be changing. A decade after capitalism transformed Russian industry, an agricultural revolution is stirring the countryside, shaking up village life and sweeping aside the collective farms that resisted earlier reform efforts and remain the dominant form of agriculture.

The change is being driven by soaring global food prices (the price of wheat alone rose 77 percent last year) and a new reform allowing foreigners to own agricultural land. Together, they have created a land rush in rural Russia.

“Where else do you have such an abundance of land?” Samir Suleymanov, the World Bank’s director for Russia, asked in an interview.

As a result, the business of buying and reforming collective farms is suddenly and improbably very profitable, attracting hedge fund managers, Russian oligarchs, Swedish portfolio investors and even a descendant of White Russian émigré nobility.

The average Russian grain yield is 1.85 tons a hectare — compared with 6.36 tons a hectare in the United States and 3.04 in Canada. (A hectare is about two and a half acres.)

Should be noted that when the USSR was the largest exporter of food years ago the United States was sending food aid to it’s people who were starving. In fact, the USSR likely wouldn’t have survived into the 1950’s if it wasn’t for western aid to the fledgling government in the 20’s.

http://www.nytimes.com/…

When Chandra Bhan Prasad visits his ancestral village in these feudal badlands of northern India, he dispenses the following advice to his fellow untouchables: Get rid of your cattle, because the care of animals demands children’s labor. Invest in your children’s education instead of in jewelry or land. Cities are good for Dalit outcastes like us, and so is India’s new capitalism.

Mr. Prasad was born into the Pasi community, once considered untouchable on the ancient Hindu caste order. Today, a chain-smoking, irrepressible didact, he is the rare outcaste columnist in the English language press and a professional provocateur. His latest crusade is to argue that India’s economic liberalization is about to do the unthinkable: destroy the caste system. The last 17 years of new capitalism have already allowed his people, or Dalits, as they call themselves, to “escape hunger and humiliation,” he says, if not residual prejudice.

If you need to login, user/pass: rationalreview/rationalreview

Companies and organizations which very likely won’t be getting my business in the future.

• Target
• TIME
• Home Depot
• Bank of America
• American Red Cross
• Big Brother Big Sister
• Boys & Girls Clubs of America
• Habitat for Humanity
• “I Have a Dream” Foundation
• National Peace Corps Association
• Special Olympics
• United Way of America

This is a subset of the list available at BeTheChangeInc.org and is organizations that stood out for me. AARP, Target, TIME, The Home Depot Foundation and Bank of America are sponsoring the 2008 Service Nation Summit in NYC on… wait for it…. September 11-12.

Mark Edge of Free Talk Live has contacted Target to get their official position but as of last night’s show had not received a response.

I noticed that Americans for a National Service Act is a member of the Service Nation coalition. Comments after the jump.
Read More…

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Campaign season is just getting warmed up, but looking back on the primaries we’ve already seen plenty of the usual fare: candidates shaking hands, hanging out at diners, and scaring voters about foreigners who are taking your jobs.

Sometimes the threat comes from China, Japan, or outsourcing to India. Today, it’s NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement—you know, all those Mexicans taking our jobs.

Senator Barack Obama joins the likes of CNN’s Lou Dobbs in decrying NAFTA. So many free trade foes fret about cheap foreign labor, yet they rarely holler about competitors who will work for far less than any foreigner. Politicians don’t pay much attention to it, but—from Terminator to Ice Pirates—Hollywood films have been warning us about humanity’s inevitable war against the machines.

“Now, think about it,” says Reason.tv host Drew Carey. “How are we supposed to compete against something that doesn’t get paid, doesn’t get health insurance, and never goes on breaks?”

Today, we don’t need human workers to book our travel, do our banking, or file our taxes. From factory workers to symphony conductors, countless workers are locked in battle with soulless job stealers known as computers, websites, and robots.

“No job is safe from the robot threat!” warns Carey. Of course, the warning is more than a little tongue-in-cheek. There’s no need to take a sledgehammer to a robot, because, although technology shakes up the labor market, it ends up giving us higher living standards as well as more and better job opportunities.

Like technology, trade gives us more good stuff than bad—yet Americans are likely to cheer technology and fear trade. No doubt TV talkers and White House wannabes will keep stoking our fears of foreigners until voters and viewers stop buying it—or until robots snag their jobs, too.

I don’t like regulated trade but if the alternative is one sided regulation the argument can be made for government treaties but they should not increase any restrictions or provide special treatment. That, however, is incredibly unlikely not to be included and therefore I think better to be safe then sorry and allow the grey/black market work around the regulations.