Decius wrote:
I dunno. But one thing is for sure, although I generally support the right to bear arms, I can't support a political group who endorsed somebody who claims that my website promotes credit card theft, illegal surveillance, and murder. I can't wait for the next fool who asks me what I think of the NRA!

Actually, I can relate to that. There was a time when I was a member of the N.R.A., as well as the Libertarian Party. I won't get into the details, but both organizations have rubbed me the wrong way over the years, to the point where I decided they would no longer receive my financial support (small though it was), and they could no longer count me as an official member... and I more than "generally" support the citizens' right to keep and bear arms.

One could argue that we shouldn't blame an individual or organization for all of the actions and policies of their associates, but when you decide to use whatever public influence you have in order to support other organizations by means of public endorsements, or when you accept such endorsements from others, you're taking on your associates' sins (real or perceived), at least to some extent. That's why some companies have recently pulled their prime-time ads, following Tiger Woods' recent "transgressions." In this case, I doubt that the A.M.A., Joe Gibbs, or the N.R.A. are remotely aware of such mischaracterizations on bsecure's part. Even if they were, they probably wouldn't be bothered by it enough to react, unless it caused a high-profile scandal, or as you point out, "a public company with a 14 billion dollar market capitalization" were involved. Still, I can't blame you or anyone else for holding their associations with bsecure against them.

Decius wrote:
Bsecure claims that sometimes they make "mistakes" when categorizing websites. Perhaps these are "mistakes?" I don't think so. It turns out that lots of prominent security sites such as seclists.org and NT Bug Traq are placed in the exact same categories (promoting murder and the like). However, Security Focus, a website which distributes every known exploit for every known computer security vulnerability, has a clean bill of health and two thumbs up from Bsecure.

As for bsecure itself, I'm not sure whether you could make a case for bsecure's listing of Memstreams as being intentionally defamatory, as opposed to simply being careless and/or incompetent; but either way, I would think a case could be made (at least theoretically) that damage to an entity's reputation has been done, and continues to be done. Maybe that's enough.

Stefanie wrote:
I won't get into the details, both organizations have rubbed me the wrong way over the years, to the point where I decided they would no longer receive my financial support (small though it was), and they could no longer count me as an official member... and I more than "generally" support the citizens' right to keep and bear arms.

You're right, there isn't any organization you're going to agree with on everything (if you're a thinking person and you make up your own opinions). But the system doesn't really enable us to make a difference as individuals - if you team up with a group your chances of changing things are much greater. This is part of whats frustrating about our two party politics. You end up signing up for stuff you don't support and you have to decide if its worth it.

I was being a bit over-the-top with my outrage at the NRA as there are too many layers of indirection there - but on the other hand, what is the NRA doing putting their seal of approval on net filtering software? Conservatives like the NRA, Conservatives like net filtering software - I guess they figure its an opportunity to raise awareness with Conservatives. But in embracing that relationship they narrow themselves.

Second paragraph... I agree.

Decius wrote:
But the system doesn't really enable us to make a difference as individuals - if you team up with a group your chances of changing things are much greater. This is part of whats frustrating about our two party politics. You end up signing up for stuff you don't support and you have to decide if its worth it.

I think we actually can make differences as individuals, but citizens rarely choose to do so in any significant numbers. We have a two party culture and mentality, but not a two party system, per se. Our situation says more about our voters than it does about our system. Sadly, we tend to continue doing exactly what you described.

In a sense, the system is perfect, because it gives the people exactly what they want: the same old BS year after year, decade after decade. Things swing a bit to the right and left every so often, but not enough to change our course. In the end, the majority is satisfied, even though I'm not.

It constantly amazes me that our Constitution (not to mention The Bill Of Rights) was ever ratified in the first place.