Internet pirates may have a new piece of evidence to rationalize their free downloading of movies. A study by University of Kansas Economist Koleman Strumpf shows that torrenting movies has a minimal impact on the motion picture industry.

That minimal impact: $200 million from 2003-2009.

Although a substantial amount when viewed without context, Strumpf told TorrentFreak that it amounts to "three tenths of a percent of what movies actually earned." That being said, the entertainment industry may be hard pressed to accept any loss to piracy.

The study used information from the Hollywood Stock Exchange, an online game that estimates the value of motion pictures, and data obtained from a BitTorrent tracker. Analyzing the research allowed Strumpf to reach the conclusion that pirating movies does not have a significant impact on profits during the first month of a film's release, and may also slightly raise the profits earned by the industry.

This latter point is a common argument among pirating enthusiasts, who often claim downloading movies and TV series acts as a form of promotion. The more people who torrent - the most popular way to download large files - a work, the theory goes, the more popular and buzz worthy it becomes, creating more profits than would occur otherwise.

As is typically the case with posts on Liberty Blitzkrieg, the reason for highlighting this story is to see it in the context of other cultural trends happening within society.

One of my biggest themes in 2014 has to do with the aggressive manner in which "authorities" relentlessly pursue average citizens for the most insignificant of infractions, while the most dastardly and destructive of criminals (financial oligarchs and others) receive, at worst, a slap on the wrist. Some of the more egregious examples of this behavior can be found below:

New Jersey Threatens to Take 13-Year-Old Student From His Father Due to "Non-Conforming Behavior"

Hyper-Sensitive Illinois Mayor Orders Police Raid Over Parody Twitter Account

Charleston Man Receives $525 Federal Fine for Failing to Pay for a $0.89 Refill

The "War on Street Artists" - Puppeteer Unlawfully Arrested and Harassed in NYC Subway

Video of the Day - Thuggish Militarized Police Terrorize and SWAT Team Iowa Family

Ocala - A city council has voted unanimously to impose a public dress code, enforceable by the police, and punishable by fines and up to 6 months in jail.

The 4-0 vote on July 15th officially created a new crime in the City of Ocala: wearing saggy pants. Councilwoman Mary Rich introduced it, as she did once before in 2009.

Individuals whose pants sag two (2) inches below the natural waistline may now be issued a 2nd Degree Misdemeanor. The punishment is fines of up to $500.00 or the possibility of jail time up to 180 days.

Officials lauded the new policy, citing it as "the right thing to do" and an improvement on "public decency." Others questioned how it could be enforced and what kind of confrontations it might create between police and citizens.

The dress code can be enforced on any property that is owned or leased by the city. That includes streets, sidewalks, parking lots, parks, sports & recreation facilities, swimming pools, municipal buildings, the downtown square, and public transportation.

City Attorney Patrick Gilligan could not definitively say how the law applies to bathing suits. "If that becomes a problem, we will start dealing with that," said Gilligan. "Right now, it's pants on men or women."

More than 64,000 African-American women are currently missing in the United States, according to latest statistics.

Despite representing 12.85 percent of the population, black Americans accounted for nearly 226,000 - or 34 percent - of all missing persons reported in 2012, said an article by Identities Mic, citing FBI figures.

According to the National Crime Information Center, more than 270,000 minorities have been reported missing since 2010, half of them African Americans. Black women and girls comprised more than 64,000 of the missing reports.

The Black and Missing Foundation has also documented the disappearances of these women.

However, there has not been much coverage in the mainstream media about these appearances in the US. Critics say this underlines a racial divide in news coverage of such incidents.

A veteran Connecticut state trooper faces a year and a half in prison after he pleaded guilty on Wednesday to stealing a dying motorcyclist's cash and gold crucifix at the scene of a 2012 crash.

Aaron "AJ" Huntsman, 45, was caught by his own dashboard camera stealing the items belonging to John Scalesse, who was killed on Sept. 22, 2012 after his motorcycle crashed into a construction company truck in Fairfield, Connecticut.

Huntsman, a 19-year veteran of the state police force, pleaded guilty to two felonies: third-degree larceny and tampering with evidence. Superior Court Judge Robert Devlin imposed a term in prison of 16 months and then five years of probation, opposed to the possible 10 years Huntsman could have received.

The former trooper's plea was made under the Alford Doctrine, meaning Huntsman did not admit guilt but is conceding that there is high probability he would be found guilty if the case went to trial. After the plea, the judge then found Huntsman guilty.

Upon sentencing on October 3, Huntsman has the right to argue for a lesser term.

Huntsman left the courtroom on Wednesday "with a big smile on his face following the hearing," the Connecticut Post reported. Huntsman declined to offer comment at the time.

Huntsman was the first trooper on the scene after Scalesse, a former executive of the JAS Masonry, crashed on the Merritt Parkway in 2012. According to the arrest warrant affidavit, Huntsman approached Scalesse as he lay dying and picked up Scalesse's gold chain from a pool of blood. The trooper then took a roll of bills totaling $3,700 from Scalesse's pocket. Huntsman later told Scalesee's father that he did not find any money on the victim, according to the affidavit.

The money was later found under the front seat of Huntsman's cruiser. Connecticut state police said the trooper maintained his innocence even after he was shown the video, from his own dashboard camera, of him taking the money.

"John didn't deserve his memory to be tarnished like this and we are finally glad it's almost over," said Scalesse's mother, Marguerite Scalesse, the Post reported. "After all we have gone through we are glad that he (Huntsman) at least didn't make us go through a trial."

MOAB, Utah - A 78-year-old woman who was reported missing after she failed to show up to an event at a nearby library was found stuck in quicksand, authorities said.

Grand County sheriff's deputies said the woman had water and was in good condition when she was found the night of July 9, about 14 hours after one of her legs sank up to the knee.

Deputies said they searched a bike path at the Courthouse Wash in Arches National Park, where the woman was known to walk. Investigators found her car in a parking area first, then heard her calling out to them and discovered her about a quarter mile up the wash.

Sharon Brussell, who works at Arches, said about four people helped dig her out and struggled because the quicksand kept filling back in. The woman was tired but "extremely grateful" for rescuers, who carried her up to her car in a litter, Brussell said.

Rallies in support of the Palestinian victims of Israel's military onslaught were held across the world's major cities this week. Thousands marched in France, Germany, Argentina, the US, the UK and other countries.

The British capital saw one of the largest turnouts with thousands of protesters rallying outside the Israeli Embassy on Friday. Demonstrators flooded the streets around the building waving placards that read "Gaza: End the Siege" and "Freedom for Palestine."

A group of 17 protesters brought traffic grinding to a halt on Kensington High Street when they scaled one of the city's iconic double-decker buses. The activists suspended a banner from the vehicle, emblazoned with the slogan "Judaism rejects the Zionist state and condemns its criminal siege and occupation."

The same took place in the Norwegian capital, Oslo.

US Financial and Political Tap About To Shut Off For Israel Courtesy of BRICS.

Not everything we see is what is moving the big players.

The USA and EU are in a epic brawl for resources and to save the US dollar from being marginalized to keep the current elite in power. What we are seeing is the multi-polar world crashing on the 20th century winners. This is what the conflicts in Ukraine, Iraq, Iran, and others including Gaza are really about.

Yesterday, the BRICS countries made pacts and created a new world bank excluding USA and EU. This is NOT titillating news and does not make it to prime time but is the biggest news event in the last decade, maybe even the last 50 years, because it is earth shattering for the financial systems and will have effects in every society worldwide

International passenger flights are avoiding Eastern Ukrainian airspace, following the crash of a Malaysian Airlines plane in Donetsk. Airlines are also redirecting their flightpaths to avoid the area where flight MH17 crashed, according to Flightradar24.

NOTAM has also informed US airlines not to fly in the Ukraine area.

BREAKING: Other flights in area of Malaysia Airline flight shot down seem to be changing course pic.twitter.com/E04Ak3y7FU

- AirLiveNet (@airlivenet) July 17, 2014

A number of airlines around the world have announced they are going to reroute flights to avoid Ukrainian airspace. The list of companies includes Russian Aeroflot, UTair and Transaero, German Lufthansa and Turkish airlines.

The drastic long-term drop in Americans' trust for government since the 1950s periodically evokes pearl-clutching on the center-left. Liberal radio talk show host Leslie Marshall recently tweeted, as apparent cause for concern, a Pew Research poll finding the percentage of the public that trusts government to "do the right thing" most of the time or "pretty much always" at 19% in 2013 (by way of background, it peaked at 77% in 1965). She linked to a piece by Julian Zelizer at CNN ("Distrustful Americans still live in age of Watergate," July 7), lamenting the low level of faith in government ("which is necessary for a healthy society") as a cultural inheritance from Vietnam and Watergate and calling for political forms to root out corruption, restore public trust and render the political system once again functional.