"So one money sucking leech has attached itself to another money sucking leech?"

Pretty much. And a pox on 'em both too in IMO. I'm sticking with a "stupid" phone myself (i.e., telephone and text messages only; no camera, no Internet, etc.). As for the smart phone taking over from the notebook computer as the principle Internet access device? I don't think so. Not for me anyhow. [The iPhone Is a Nightmare For Carriers]

Weblog

Food Not Bombs activists arrested for feeding homeless in Orlando, FL city park (Mark Schlueb, Orlando Sentinel)
Hard to figure.

Bad news for the neo-cons, globalists and new-world-order crowd (Pat Buchanan, American Conservative)
Even Republicans are turning against foreign entanglements and military interventions.

Companies and individuals continue to try and copyright the name SEAL Team 6 (SusanAnne Hiller, BigGovernment blog)

Sign of the times...cont'd.

Hey we're just making the market more efficient!

How to make money from a dying city: Speculators complicate Detroit's efforts to reconfigure its increasing empty neighborhoods. As Bob Dylan noted once "...money doesn't speak, it swears...".

weblog

Further proof that the University of Michigan benefited greatly by having Lee Bollinger leave to be president of Columbia - NYP
Why is Chicago so corrupt? - Chicago (via NewGeography)
A fascinating read.
Corporations okayed to make artificial life forms without regulation - PopSci
Isn't this how all those zombie apocalypse movies seem to start out?
Economics based haiku - ST
Corporate welfare queens
Make out: we get something, too:
Debt with the Chinese
Intel's new processors have a remote kill switch to protect your data if your device is ever stolen- TechSpot (via Slashdot)
Of course once this chip is able to be hacked by vandals, hackers, crackers, paparazzi, mafiosi, law enforcers, intelligence agencies et al then they'll all be able to remotely kill your device too, so there's that.
The disposable academic: Why going for a Ph.D. is a a waste of time - Economist
Grad students and post-docs are smart, inexpensive and thoroughly disposable. Even better in the eyes of the colleges, they pay them for the privilege of obtaining an expensive but largely useless advanced degree. Go figure?

weblog

60 Year-old bottle of Glenfiddich whiskey goes for $37,000 + @ auction - Bloomberg

LA crowds riot in "celebration" of Lakers NBA championship win - LA Times

Bailouts for the banksters debtors prison and foreclosures for the serfs - Pro Libertate

From the post:
"As a result, it's increasingly common for people who owe small amounts to find themselves being confronted by police -- in the streets, at home or work, while driving, or even while recovering from surgery -- and hauled away in handcuffs. Warrants have been issued over outstanding debts as small as $85, which is "less than half the cost of housing an inmate overnight."

After a brief but robustly unpleasant interlude behind bars, debtors are brought before a judge and compelled to sign documents permitting the collection firms to garnish their wages or extract money from their bank accounts. Refusal can lead to a "indefinite incarceration," a sentence recently imposed, without trial, on a debtor from Kenney, Illinois. "Bail" consists of paying the amount demanded by the collection firm, which is the amount of the purchased debt plus whatever enhancements the firm can devise."