SOX sucks

Quite some time ago, Mr. Steven Den Beste had an article that quite rightly backed up a US judge's declaration that courts outside of the US had no juristiction over what US companies and/or people put on their web sites. The case was about Yahoo and the ability of French people to access auction sites where Nazi memorabilia was for sale - against the law in France to sell things like Nazi memorabilia. The shoe has swapped feet.

I'm in IT. And in IT there is one thing on EVERYBODY'S lips at the moment : SOX (aka The Sarbanes-Oxley Act). In a nutshell :

Due to executive greed at several highly rated companies (mostly American companies but an Italian also snuck in) who then folded, Dubya decided that the whole world should suffer and got two politicians to come up with some heavy hitting bureaucracy that will only help to line the pockets of accountancy and auditing firms.

And don't think that companies could just de-list from the NASDAQ or the Dow Jones, oh no. If you've got over 300 shareholders in the US, you have to be SOX compliant (since you cannot de-list if you have over 300 shareholders - and all listed companies have to be compliant).

Twats.

Land of the Free and home of non-sexually suggestive cheerleaders

I remember a while ago, Perry de Havilland of Samizdata wrote this article. He has decided, after a lot of contemplation I would think, that the United States of America is :

a place in which the battle can be fought within the last bastion of the Anglosphere's culture of liberty.

Well Perry, I'm not sure about New Hampshire (except that its bloody cold in winter) but in the one state that everybody associates with liberty, freedom and the RKBA, we have politicians proposing measures such as this.

I'm sticking with Europe. The revolution will start sooner here. Those that want to work, enjoy freedoms and look after themselves will be able to before the USA gets back on track.

I have been known to be wrong before though.

A Reminder

Had an argument with a colleague the other day about the Nazi Party. He didn't believe me that it had socialist in its title. So just in case there are some that don't know the meaning of Nazi :

Nationalsozialistische deutsche Arbeiter-Partei - in German, and translated for those that are still not convinced : National Socialist German Workers' Party.

So, next time someone starts an argument about how bad capitalism is for the world and they state that they are a socialist, you can retort with :

"What a socialist ? You mean just like the Nazis ?"

Perfect, I can't wait until the opportunity comes up.

A bona fide hero

Balls. Gigantic, steel balls. The full citation is here.

Watch and see some politicians try and make capital out of it.

Well done Private Beharry, I hope we can all live up to your standards.

Shooting demon

Last night I got 421 points out of a possible 500 at 25m.

Chuffed.

Second Quote of the Day

Speaking of ScaryDuck earlier :

Useless Workshy Cunt Of A Builder

Priceless.

Quote of the Day

From Fred :

A Volvo is a beautifully engineered, well-built statement that the owner has the soul of a dung beetle.

I'll get fired if I elaborate but he is spot on.

Chirac urges full review of EU 'open services' plan

Well he would wouldn't he ? Lets see what Jacqui Chiraci is so afraid of shall we ? Europa (The Gateway to the European Union) has a nice document here. And just so we know what services are, let us use Europa's definition :

This definition covers a very wide range of activities including, for example, management consultancy, certification and testing, maintenance, facilities management and security, advertising services, recruitment services, including the services of temporary employment agencies, services provided by commercial agents, legal or tax consultancy, property services, such as those provided by estate agencies, construction services, architectural services, distributive trades, organisation of trade fairs and exhibitions, car-hire, security services, tourist services, including travel agencies and tourist guides, audiovisual services, sports centres and amusement parks, leisure services, health services and personal domestic services, such as assistance for old people.

OK, basically besides selling tourists dodgy postcards under the Eiffel Tower, or serving drinks at the beach in summer or on the pistes in the winter, this is everything that France could do after its large manufacturers move to Eastern Europe due to French union strength. Now do you see why Jacques is so worried ? He's got a VERY important vote coming up. Remember which one children ? Yes that's right - the one that could just decide if the European Union survives in its present form - The European Constipation.

There are also others worried about the Bolestein Directive. What makes such amusing reading is stuff like this :

If adopted, this European directive would result in the merchandisation of all services within the Union. This would mean that essential sectors such as culture, education, health care and all services relating to national social welfare systems could be exposed to the same forms of economic competition as commercial goods.

Yes dear reader, dispair. There are people who see this as a bad thing. There are people who don't understand that this will in fact benefit the European population as a whole. They're probably the same people that still vote Communist. But lets get back to Jacques :

"Europe means the protection of social rights, it means fair conditions for competition, it means the development of public services and respect for cultural diversity," Chirac was quoted as saying.

For protection of social rights read : we want to impose the same handicap on you as we suffer. For development of public services read : we want to be able to skim money for political parties from road / rail / water infrastructure plans. For respect cultural diversity read : shit no we won't speak English.

Dinosaurs still roam in certain parts of Europe. Lets hope a no vote in May starts the extinction ball rolling.

Twats.

Boo hoo !!

I didn't win anything. In fact I've only ever heard of Slashdot, Policeman's Blog and ScaryDuck, the rest well ...

And nobody has written yet.

Twats.

TAX TIME !!!!!!!!!!

France and the USA have something in common. Both countries are stupid enough to have a system where you fill in a form to pay your income tax. Why they both don't tax at source for people who aren't self-employed or free-lance I'll never know. From my limited time on earth (30 odd years), it seems that wherever one has a system that asks you to fill in a form and to calculate your own tax payment, the national sport is : tax evasion.

Not that I enjoy paying taxes. I just know how I would screw the populace if I was in power.

UN panel urges France to halt racist incidents

A United Nations human rights panel called on France on Thursday to stop racist incidents involving French security forces and to do more to fight discrimination against asylum seekers or Roma gypsies.

The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination which oversees international rules against racism, said in a report that it was also concerned by a wider increase in racist, anti-Semitic and xenophobic acts.

This is the UN boys - remember how important the UN is ? You know like no country should ever think themselves above the UN since it's so well run and there's no corruption or naughty things going on, oh no never.

Trouble at mill

I have been trying for a few days now to post with no luck. Must be the French secret service attempting to deny my right to criticise them and their piss poor corrupt government. Oh well.

Only extremely large amounts of money will work on me I'm afraid - yes like all, I also have my price.

Michael Jackson trial

Thankfully I read the intelligent section of the internet (OK I visit other sections on occasion but purely for research if you must know) and the sites - being written by intelligent people - have avoided all mention of Michael Jackson and his alleged paedophilic tendencies.

That is all you will read about Jackson here. Oh, apart from this :

"Today, Michael Jackson's lawyer said that he will not play the race card - mainly because he can't figure out what race Michael is."

Trial of the century

I saw a story on the BBC site the other day, but haven't been able to find a link. This is from Yahoo France.

At the moment in France a trial has started that has more sordid details than anything I have ever heard before. Basically for several years a large group including family members raped and prostituted their children. 66 (39 men and 27 women) people are being charged. It involves 45 children. The children's ages range between 6 months and 12 years old at the time of the events.

When such a large group of people can commit such crimes for such a long period of time, I really worry about my one year old daughter.

The only solution, I think, involves a calibre of at least .44 of an inch.

Benefits of flu

No its not correct that there aren't any. I was/am a smoker. Since smoking doesn't go very well with blowing the nose every five mins, or coughing like an ex-asbestos worker, I haven't had a ciggie for a few days now. OK on the 28th I tried not just one but two fags and coughed so much I nearly vomited.

So ... the patch is on (21mg at present) and we'll see how it goes.

Twat for starting in the first place.

Surprise surprise.

Kid had flu, wife had flu, so guess what ?

I'll be out of action for a day or so.

Oh yeah, our friend Hervé Gaymard has resigned. I've not heard him say sorry though.