Amidst 5,000+ pages of COVID Stimulus bill, a 10 year prison sentence for streaming piracy

The 1:24:13 mark in Airplane II: The Sequel features a fitting sign to this post

When people talk about long novels, War and Peace often comes up. War and Peace is 1,225 pages long.

Ha, that’s nothing compared to what follows. If’s not even 1/4 the size.

One of the biggest problems with the United States government is that nothing is ever simple like it should be. The second COVID Stimulus package can’t be simply about getting checks out to people in need, it must be — seriously — 5,000+ pages long and include completely unrelated legislation just to garner votes.

Everything in a bill is about pork. More pork = more votes. They can find all the ways to insult the American people by giving them less than they did in the last stimulus bill ($600 instead of $1,200) but they can find some way to give more to others, including legislation for streaming piracy.

For the record, we don’t care about the money for us personally. We are doing fine without any money from other American taxpayers. That is, after all, where any money from the government ultimately comes from.

Get Marty McFly’s Delorean, because this is robbery from the future to pay the present. When the trillions of debt blow up the value of the U.S dollar, well, that’s when the bill comes home to everybody living in America.

I doubt this will happen in our lifetime, but the debt clock continues to horrify (see: No, Taxpayers Should NOT Bail Out Cinemas, Sorry Patty Jenkins and Other Millionaire Hollywood Directors).

Don’t even want to update the debt clock two months later, but, sadly, here it is …

In October 2020 debt was at just over 27 trillion. We’ve added another 500 million in the last two months and this new stimulus bill will add another trillion.

Rand Paul is getting slayed for his comments on the Senate floor. It’s gone viral.

Rand Paul lampoons the “deficits don’t matter disaster”

He was one of a small few who voted against the mammoth stimulus bill, loaded with garbage and a $600 kicker for the American people just, well, because.

Yes, streaming piracy simply must be a major priority in America right now (major eyeroll).

The “Protecting Lawful Streaming Act,” which was introduced earlier this month by Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from North Carolina, doesn’t target casual internet users. The law specifies that it doesn’t apply to people who use illegal streaming services or “individuals who access pirated streams or unwittingly stream unauthorized copies of copyrighted works.” Rather, it’s focused on “commercial, for-profit streaming piracy services” that make money from illegally streaming copyrighted material.

10 years in prison for illegal streaming? It’s in the Covid-19 relief bill – CNN

We’re not condoning streaming piracy. We pay for all the streaming channels we have, but this issue is a very small priority right now. How it squirrels its way into a stimulus bill is disturbing at best.

No, the image at the top of this post is what it was. A sign from a comedy movie nearly 40 years ago is screaming “logic, people!” at us in 2020.

It’s no wonder many people despise politicians and the job they’re doing.

They should have had a stimulus bill passed months ago following the last one that addressed the people who truly needed the help. I liked the one that gave $2,000/month to people until the pandemic was over, because that seemed like actual, meaningful help directly to the American people. It would have been nice to see the American people for once be the recipients of help since debt is just fine to pile on for businesses galore. If we’re going to pile on the debt, then give the money to the people directly, not to more businesses and industries.

But no, the American people are worth half what we were six months ago. Sigh.