Visa my arsa

Obama makes a first, civilized step toward nailing the credit card companies - admirable sense and restraint - I'd have turned Cheney loose on them. The thing, though, is the asymmetry between credit corporations and individuals is merely a special case of a more general asymmetry between the large institutional corporation and the alleged human being in USia.

We have all been fucked for so long we do not know we are being fucked. Now that the corporations have generally, royally, providentially fucked themselves, perhaps we can, by a sort of vicarious osmosis of recirculation, dimly recall how fuckity fucked we are, have been, etc.

bloodlines of legitimation

AKMA notes the curious fact that the "legitimate" online offerings from music companies typically offer no added value, no lyrics, no liner notes, nuthin', in other words, that would differentiate the "legitimate" from the pirated file.

I'll add this one to the pile of examples of USian Grifterism (a pile which includes, among other things, certain forms of mortgages, FEMA, several major corporations and the entire Bush Administration).

For the record co's, the thing that makes their pay-for-it files "legitimate" has nothing to do with the listener, or with the music, or with the quality of the file. It has to do with the contractual relationship of the corporation to the property.

This is the working definition of legitimacy in USia. It's also the reason we have no culture, no community, and no public forums for consensual intelligence. Legitimacy by contract is not love. It is the blood of USia, and it's poison.

imhfo, of course.