The sheer number of patents in the U.S. is fueling frivolous litigation and drastic action is needed to make patents more difficult to obtain and easier to invalidate, U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit said Tuesday. > more ... (0 comments)
Congress passed a hasty law recently that was intended to strip funding away from that hotbed of black-on-black community action, ACORN.
But it looks as if the law was worded so broadly that it may strip government funding from a huge swathe of the military-industrial complex.
Awesome. Wake me up when we have a functioning government again.The congressional legislation intended to defund ACORN, passed with broad bipartisan support, is written so broadly that it applies to “any organization” that has been charged with breaking federal or state election laws, lobbying disclosure laws, campaign finance laws or filing fraudulent paperwork with any federal or state agency. It also applies to any of the employees, contractors or other folks affiliated with a group charged with any of those things.
In other words, the bill could plausibly defund the entire military-industrial complex. Whoops.
Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) picked up on the legislative overreach and asked the Project on Government Oversight (POGO) to sift through its database to find which contractors might be caught in the ACORN net.
Lockheed Martin and Northrop Gumman both popped up quickly, with 20 fraud cases between them, and the longer list is a Who’s Who of weapons manufacturers and defense contractors.
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Hors D’oeuvres
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We Paid For the Shadow Demon, We're Gonna Use the Shadow Demon
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THE GRAPEVINE
While trying to pin Acorn with voter fraud they have opened the door on one of the biggest lobbyist problem in government. I really have to wonder if the Democrats did this on purpose, we will give you Acorn but we will take on the military contractors.
i doubt highly that they're that crafty. the hamhandedness of this just boggles the mind, although i'm sure the military contractors will just flout whatever the law is like they always do because politicians will give them a wink and a nod and pocket millions in campaign contributions. it's much easier to demonize an organization devoted to giving minorities a voice than $multi-billion military contractors.