TMR: More Students “Stealing” Textbooks, L.A. Cops Kill One Per Week, Coulter Wants To Drown Libertarian Voters
Happy Friday! Take a load off, kick up your feet, and enjoy another edition of The Morning Roar!More Students “Stealing” TextbooksCollege students today have been afforded a choice: pay thousands of dollars for text books, or find the same text books available for illegal download on the internet for a fraction of the price. With the financial burden that is experienced by so many college students, it should not be the least bit surprising that students have been picking the latter choice more frequently.When I was in college a decade ago it was common practice for friends to take the same classes in order to split the cost of books and ease the financial burden inflicted by a semesters worth of them. With advancements in technology this practice has been replaced by students illegally obtaining the copyright protected material at very low costs.From the Washington Post:
The cost to students of college textbooks skyrocketed 82 percent between 2002 and 2012, according to a 2013 report by the U.S. General Accountability Office, the research arm of Congress. As a result, students have been looking for less expensive options, such as renting books — and, now, finding them on the Internet, uploaded by other students.In August, an organization called the Book Industry Study Group, which represents publishers, retailers, manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, librarians and others in the industry, released a survey of some 1,600 students and found, according to a release on the data, that “students continue to become more sophisticated in acquiring their course materials at the lowest cost as illicit and alternative acquisition behaviors, from scanned copies to illegal downloads to the use of pirated websites, continue to increase in frequency.”
I would never promote or recommend that someone break the law, but it is not hard to understand why so many young people are choosing to challenge copyright laws in order to save some cash. Technology has advanced to levels that allow for books to be converted to a variety of easily consumable formats very quickly once a published book hits the market. Essentially there is no cost to make digital copies of books and distribute to consumers. The only thing standing in the way of free flowing information is copyright laws. Increasing amounts of college students and individuals throughout the country value saving money more than they care about following the law.In order to make money on books in the future, authors will need to be creative in marketing and in developing new devices or methods for books to be made available in the marketplace. If authors reduce their prices to near black market levels, students may pay a small amount for a book in order to obey the law and save money.With how absurdly expensive college course books have become, compared with the risk of obtaining them illegally, it is easy for students to choose low cost over the risk associated with breaking the law.Check out Marc Clair's interview with actor Aaron Calafato on the student debt crisis for more on how the high costs associated with college are harming an entire generation.L.A. Cops Kill One Per WeekCops in the City of Angels have some explaining to do.The Huffington Post reports on the staggering amount of citizens killed by Los Angeles cops in the last ten plus years:
Since 2000, nearly 600 people, many of them young black and Latino men, have been killed by Los Angeles law enforcement officers. That's according to a sobering new report from the Los Angeles Youth Justice Coalition, a youth advocacy organization, that looks into the use of lethal force among police.The report, titled "Don't Shoot to Kill," examines homicide data from the Los Angeles County coroner's department and incorporates details from numerous media reports on specific incidents. Between Jan. 1, 2000 and August 31, 2014, the report found, law enforcement officers in Los Angeles County used lethal force resulting in the deaths of at least 589 people. That's almost one death a week, for nearly 14 years.
The police are tasked with serving and protecting, but in L.A. it looks like the police have instead become more proficient in shooting and killing the people they serve.Can you imagine in today’s social media frenzied world if a corporation had a safety record of allowing one worker to die per week? They would be bombarded with negative media attention and sued for every penny possible. And rightfully so.Why aren’t the “authorities” trusted with protecting the populace held to the same standards as everyone else?Coulter Wants To Drown Libertarian VotersAre you thinking of voting for a libertarian in the upcoming mid-term elections?Ann Coulter had something to say in a recent blog post that she hopes will persuade you to cast your vote for the GOP candidate on the ballot, regardless of their principles or policies.
The biggest current danger for Republicans is that idiots will vote for Libertarian candidates in do-or-die Senate elections, including Kentucky, Kansas, North Carolina and Colorado. (That's in addition to the "Independent" in Kansas who's a Democrat.) Democratic candidates don't have to put up with this crap -- they're even trying to dump the official Democrat in Kansas to give the stealth Democrat a better shot.When we're all dying from lack of health care across the United States of Mexico, we'll be deeply impressed with your integrity, libertarians.Which brings me to my final assignment this week: If you are considering voting for the Libertarian candidate in any Senate election, please send me your name and address so I can track you down and drown you.
How on earth does this woman have an audience? She makes Sarah Palin look like a reasonable person.There is something that Ann needs to learn about libertarians. We think for ourselves and we could care less what a career GOP water carrier recommends. A libertarian values freedom and liberty. They certainly aren’t going to respond to a threat of violence or allow it to dissuade them from voting a certain and compromise their principles. Maybe those tactics work with mainstream GOP goons, but they are not gonna fly with lovers of liberty!Read The Morning Roar every weekday Monday-Friday!The Lions of Liberty are on Twitter, Facebook & Google+Receive access to ALL of our EXCLUSIVE bonus audio content – including “Conspiracy Corner”, “Degenerate Gamblers” and the “League of Liberty Podcast” by joining the Lions of Liberty Pride and supporting us on Patreon!
