There is a profound pall settling over the Kingdom of El Gringo Viejo. An announcement broke though on your blog page here extremely early this morning, an "announcement" by the FBI, declaring that El Gringo Viejo's site is being closed down due movies, MP3, and other copyright infringements and violations. It directed El Gringo Viejo to go and buy a certain type of charge card and type the code of that charge card in a the space provided. It also declared that due to the copyright violations, failure to comply within 48 hours would result in El Gringo Viejo's incarceration for up to 3 years.
We have patchworked a by-pass to the screen freezure, and continue now on our merry way. If it is true that they can do this, then the Republic is truly and totally lost. Firstly, it is lost because we have downloaded nothing that was not already in the public domain. We have download numerous pictures, all of which have been widely circulated for considerable time. Secondly, every time we have a notification that "this image is protected by copyright" or if there was an offer to sell the right to use the image, we did not use that or any image so presented. Thirdly, we have no desire to sneak or resale copyrighted material. A simple notice that we have done so will result in the immediate removal of the offending material.
We have never received any advisory, never received a "cease and desist" instruction. It cannot be possible for a government entity to fine a private citizen without a demonstration of evidence, an identification of the law in question, and the presentation of some kind of a chance for defence, appeal, and conditions mitigating the circumstances. Therefore we are presuming that the penetration of our page was done by a skillful hacker of some kind...and we shall disregard the notice. If some government agency throws me in prison, or even detains me, it will signal that the finish line has been crossed.
I say this, because it is common knowledge that copyrighted stuff is duplicated by the ton by private individuals on an hourly basis. We have never heard of any such admonition or directive plaguing those individuals....who, once again...are numerous. The other thing is that there was no Treasury or Court Clerk's name, number, or anything attached to the code receiver. It looked as if it might even have been a political campaign donation destination.
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Mitt Romney loves Obama care....just not the bad parts:
It is truly a wondrous thing to wake and shuffle to the breakfast nook, and find your son there, still covered with cake-crumbs from his 72nd birthday celebration yesterday. Cake and icing crumbs are everywhere....beer bottles by the hundreds are on the floor, under the sofa cushions, under the tables, on the ceiling....the wall mounted flat screen is on the floor, still plugged in ...but showing only snow...and a recurring message crawling by that states "warranty expired....warranty expired....warranty expired". Ah! There's a few hundred beer bottles in the back yard....and the toilet is full of beer bottles. Probably better not to check the trash can.
The hulk of your son, who has turned the 1,000 dollar love seat into a big chair whose seating section is firmly touching the floor now, belches one of his famous 116 decibel "outdoor burps", wipes his nose on his forearm, and then without openning his eyes, yawns the advisory, "You have to go get a few of cases of beer. There's not any left for breakfast. Some of the guys are coming back in a minute with some bags of Hershey's kisses. We're going to have a Contesto Grandeo on BATMAN and SUPER Mario DESTROY the VOMIT MONSTER game....we haven't played that one for a week or so." He pauses, seems to go to sleep, but then speaks again..."You'd better hurry, because the guys might come back at any time, and they don't want to have to back out of the drive way while we're playing, and you'll have to walk to the store. It's not that far, but it's just a thought."
It's moments like these....those special family moments... when a Dad is really grateful that Obama and Romney agreed on requiring the mean ole' for-profit insurance companies to insure all offspring, all the time back in 2000-whatever. Now with the perpetual insurance by parents, they even have sole rights to your pension, your investments, your bank accounts, even your Lifecall necklace....just in case he or his friends run out of beer and find out you are dead and in a heap in the shower with the water still running....for the last 3 days.
El Gringo Viejo has tried to swallow the idea that a liberal Republican is better than an out-and-out marxist, but....it really is all the same. It's national socialism, bolshevik socialism, progressivism, Trotskyite socialism, Sendero Luminoso socialism, and all other forms of totalitarianism....all forms of socialist - statist control of the methods of production, distribution, and marketting of goods and services. Romney's endorsment of extending coverage of elderly children to the accounts of the parents "for free" as well as his idea of demanding that insurance cover pre-existing conditions...."for free"....means that it's over.
Romney's fuzzing out this early means that he was the Trojan Horse sent in to kill off any free-enterprise alternatives to the grey dull life that lies ahead. The Republic is probably dead. If Texas cannot retire from the Union...there are very, very, very few places left to go.
Scratch "In God We Trust" and teach the children ''Stroke of a Pen, Law of the Land".
El Gringo Viejo
