Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the a-lobbyist-by-any-other-name dept

We've got a double winner this week, with John Fenderson taking both first and second place for insightful with two comments from our post pointing out that, regardless of what you think about Kim Dotcom's guilt, you should be concerned about the government stealing his assets. First, John expressed a thought I've had several times myself:

Here's the funny thing: I originally believed that DotCom was probably guilty as hell, but everything the US government has said and done about this case has changed my mind and convinced me that he's probably innocent.

Next, he added another underline to the general absurdity of asset forfeiture court cases:

That it is even possible to file a court case against inanimate objects is a strong indication that the legal system is not just broken, but fundamentally corrupt and insane and is not worthy of any amount of respect.

For editor's choice on the insightful side, we start out on the eye-opening revelations about the MPAA's conspiracy to run an anti-google smear campaign. One anonymous commenter made a connection to something else we talk about here:

It sounds like this is an actual case of a felony interference with a business model, except the charges would properly be called collusion, conspiracy, fraud, bribery, and corruption.

Next, we've got a response to General Wesley Clark's evocation of WW2 internment camps in a discussion about domestic radicalism. Even setting aside the obvious awfulness of that suggestion, there's another issue which is that Clark, like most people born after the war, seems to be forgetting or ignoring that the emergence of Naziism and its impact on America was a lot messier than we like to believe in hindsight, as Coyne Tibbets thoroughly points out:

General Wesley Clark: "They do have an ideology. In World War II if someone supported Nazi Germany at the expense of the United States, we didn't say that was freedom of speech, we put him in a camp, they were prisoners of war."

Actually, no, there were quite a few you didn't. Cases in point: William Randolph Hearst, Andrew Mellon, Standard Oil of New Jersy, Ford Motor and Henry Ford, International Telephone and Telegraph, Allen Dulles, Prescott Bush, and IBM.

Today, we have HSBC, caught laundering money for drug lords and terrorists; you didn't put any of them in camps, either.

Given those examples, I have to say, General Clark, that your ideas are pretty radical. Maybe we should lock you up in one of those camps.

Over on the funny side, it appears we have a winner to Karl's request for a new title to grant Comcast's David Cohen, since he seems to object to the accurate label of "lobbyist". Mike's suggestion wasn't just the top-voted comment on that post, it won funniest comment of the week overall:

Why not a spoonerism?
Lob Toppyist

In second place for funny, we've got a response to a story everyone was talking about this week: the demonstration of how easily (and intensely) hackable modern cars can be. Chris ODonnell felt an entrepreneurial urge:

Note to self: Start used car business, market them as "secure."

For editor's choice on the funny side, we'll start by highlighting one of the anonymous runners-up for David Cohen's new title:

Schrödinger's Lobbyist

And finally, on that same post, Jeff Green decided to forego the title-game and provide Cohen with what I think is best described as an anthem:

It isn't that I lobby
I just acquired the hobby
Of working hard to influence them all
It's not because they paid me
And no, nobody made me,
It's just that I'm at Comcast's beck and call
A lobbyist I'm not
That's simply Tommy rot

Your writing isn't funny
I hand out LOADS of money
To anyone who'll scream that they agree
It's not influence I'm buying
(Although I'm really trying!)
It's the only way that they'll be friends with me
A lobbyist NO WAY
I simply preach for pay!

That's all for this week, folks!

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