"Survival of the Squeebiest"

By Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone, courtesy of Alternet:

The word "squeeb" is a crude mix of squid and dweeb, and by inventing it I mean no disrespect to the squid...

[A squid] has no heart, and its first instinct when trouble comes is to hide in a cloud of its own excretions. This is why a squiddy word like squeeb seems to me to be a good way to describe the American voter during a presidential election season.

That's especially true now, during a "controversy" like this latest flap over Barack Obama pastor Jeremiah Wright. This Wright business is a perfect example of the American electorate at its squeeby worst -- panicky, gutless, acting more on reflex than thought, incapable of retaining information for more than a few minutes at a time. It's also a great example of how the presidential election process has become more about enforcing the attitudes of a cultural orthodoxy than a system for choosing leaders.

Through scandal after idiotic scandal, the election process has become a painfully prolonged, deeply irritating exercise in policing conventional wisdom, through a variety of means keeping the public in a state of heightened, dumb animal panic, and ultimately turning the election itself into a Darwinian contest -- survival of the Squeebiest.

click here for the whole thing

I highly encourage reading more of this article, it's jam-packed with very funny comments about this so-called scandal and the dolts who created it.

Actually, I've got nothing to ad, I just wanted to share this with all the people who stumble upon this blog after googling "eminem backmasking," (there really are a lot of them...)

Is lead overhyped? Doesn't matter.

I tuned in to some down-home Fox News talk radio this evening, as I do from time to time for laughs.

This particular pundit was ranting in typical Faux fashion about the "lead scare," and about how "lots of parents are freaking out" because of lead presence in children's toys. The pundit said that his generation, as parents, worry too much about their kids. He said something like "many" parents are opting not to buy plastic toys for their kids this Easter, because a Chinese company was found to have Easter eggs with more than the legal amount of lead in the coloring. His argument was that the hype about lead in kid's toys (made in China, of course) is overkill, because lead levels were much higher in the past and everyone turned out relatively well. "Where are th heaps of dead?" he asked.

To scare a Fox pundit you have to have PILES of dead people, not just a few poisoned children throughout the years and scores of mentally disabled people, linked directly to things like lead paint and other pollution...

Anyway, this particular rant really got my bullshit detector humming, and I wanted to document all my thoughts about it right here:

1) ARE "a lot of parents" really freaking out about this, or is Fox hoping that after hearing someone mention the latest "lead scare," that more of them WILL freak out? So, a few articles come out documenting a violation from a Chinese toymaker, some parents post some shit on the Fox Forum, and all of a sudden scores of parents are needlessly freaking out and not buying Easter eggs for their kids. Right, I'm sure Wal-Mart is bogged down with unsold Easter shit (bunnies and candy to commemorate the crucification of your savior? FUCK YOU!).

2) This pundit pointed out that the EPA's standard for lead levels in products was less than .6%, and asked "What IS .6%? I can't see that!" Something like "the average Joe doesn't know what .6% is!" just a bunch of useless whining. At the end of his bitch fit, he was careful not to sound like he was advocating laziness, or carelessness, saying that "they" (the EPA) keep "lowering the standard" of what is too much lead. Yes, the actual percentage of what is legal has been lowered over the years, but most sane people recognize that as raising the standard, not lowering it. This wording, of course, was a lousy attempt at sounding like he wasn't advocating regression in consumer safety.

Country of Laws - Ralph Nader on Spitzer/Bush hypocrisy

From nader.org:

Eliot Spitzer violated certain laws regarding prostitution and transferring of money through banks—though the latter was disputed by some legal experts—and for such moral turpitude emotionally harmed himself, his family and his friends.

George W. Bush violated federal laws against torture, against spying on Americans without judicial approval, against due process of law and habeas corpus in arresting Americans without charges, imprisoning them and limited their access to attorneys. He committed a massive war of aggression, under false [pretenses], violating again and again treaties such as the Geneva Conventions, the UN Charter, federal statutes and the Constitution.

click here for the whole thing

Yeah, Nader is really smart. I'd kick myself for not thinking of this legal conundrum myself, but Ralph is really, really smart.

Bottom line: Spitzer broke the law, he resigned; Bush has broken the law many times, he claims he will leave office with his "head held high."

Free Tibet! (and the rest of China too, damnit!)

From the AP via Yahoo:

BEIJING - Soldiers on foot and in armored carriers swarmed Tibet's capital Saturday, enforcing a strict curfew a day after protesters burned shops and cars to vent their anger against Chinese rule. In another western city, police clashed with hundreds of Buddhist monks leading a sympathy demonstration.

the whole thing

I had to click this headline when I saw it because I saw a "Free Tibet" table outside the UNO library not but three days ago. When I saw them, I thought about their cause and realized that it's kinda short-sighted. While Tibet probably deserves freedom, so does ALL of China! In other words, don't just free Tibet, free the rest of China as well, it's still a one party state and this is the 21st century.

Read "The China Fantasy" by James Mann.

Happy 400th Post!

Wow this is my 400th post.

I've been doing this since the '04 election, and now the next election is at our doorsteps.

Let's recap the last Bush term:

• still in Iraq
• still have disproportional taxes
• Supreme Court is basically Margaret Thatcher's wet dream
• still aid terrorist states
• still have NAFTA
• the gears of war are shifting towards Iran
• and a whole lot more

Guess I better keep blogging.

An excersize in bullshit detection

I was looking through some British news sites, ones I don't usually read like The Independent and The Times, and I found this article about Hamas/Iran at the latter 'news' paper. The article is really short and to the "point," and to the average reader, this article would probably present a reasonable excuse for starting a war with, or at least placing sanctions on, Iran. Is it possible that that's what the article is designed to do, make the average Joe who happens to read it feel like the authorities are doing the right thing at that time? Just consult your bullshit detector, here's how:

THE Palestinian group Hamas, blamed for last week’s massacre of eight students at a Jewish seminary in Jerusalem, has revealed that hundreds of its fighters have been trained in Iran.

So Hamas was "blamed," but were they actually responsible for it? Did they admit to committing the "massacre"? While the subject of the article is aside from that detail, the addition of "blamed for killing school girls," makes sure the reader knows these are the bad guys, regardless of who actually trained them (that's the subject of the article). Let's continue:

A senior commander interviewed by The Sunday Times said 300 of the group’s “best brains” had been secretly sent to Tehran.

You can't tell from just this quote, but the senior commander they're referring to is supposedly a commander from Hamas. This may seem like a weightless argument, but why would a senior commander of Hamas reveal a "secret" to a reporter from The London Times, much less agree to an interview in the first place? Is this a credible testimony? The article doesn't name who the commander was, so if what "he said" was actually true (considering the interview really happened), he must be sabotaging Hamas from the inside. That would make sense, except that the article also says this:

“Iran is our mother,” the commander said. “She gives us information, military supplies and financial support.”

Forgive me again, for sounding like a conspiracy theorist, but isn't that statement kind of.... exactly what certain people want to hear from groups like Hamas, so they can continue to label Iran a "terrorist threat" and therefore legitimize sanctions or even war? and once again, why would a senior commander of Hamas, who says things like "Iran is our mother," expose all of this to a Times reporter if the training was supposed to be a secret?

Enough with my pointed questions, I'll just say this: I think it's highly likely that this article is complete bullshit. There's no way to confirm that this interview even took place, that's the beauty of the story: the guy was giving away a secret about his big bad terrorist organization, he'd be killed if he were identified. But therein lies another contradiction: if this guy is a commander of a big ol' bad schoolgirl killing organization, why hide his identity and protect him? What does The Times owe to this guy, who's part of an organization who supposedly kills innocent people? It is physically impossible that everything in this article is accurate, there's at least one fabrication here.

The Ritter lecture I saw

This is the actual lecture I attended with Scott Ritter, former UN Weapons Inspector/Intelligence Officer/US Marine.

Austin domestic abuse officers more efficient than Houston's

In this really short article from the Texas Observer, Houston is compared with Austin in terms of how its law enforcement deals with domestic abuse. There's also information about the Bush administration's undoing of legislation that protected undocumented women from the "catch-22" of calling the police after being abused by husbands with legal US citizenship.

It's a good, important read for everyone, check it out.

Gaza Under Siege

Gaza Under Siege is the latest article from Ralph Nader. Here's the most interesting quote:

Hamas, which was created with the support of Israel and the U.S. government years ago to counter the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), has repeatedly offered cease-fire proposals.

Just another example of how spot-on and direct Ralph is on the issues. Here's an idea: vote for him.

Friday Face Time: Instant Runoff Voting

Definitely Not Safe for Work

Sitting here in a simultaneously liberal and conservative city, I'm reminded of how equally crazy my home state is.

If you're in a place where you can read a story and watch a video about dildos/sodomy and the legality of owning one/participating in it in the Lone Star State, click here now. The article, courtesy of Alternet, is called "The Great Texas Dildo Wars of 2008."

Bottom line: sexual discrimination is still a problem in this country, depending on where you go.

Commanding Heights

Go check it out, it's a PBS feature.

I haven't finished watching it so you may see an update on this later.

The US, UN Security Council, and EU are BREAKING THE LAW

From the AP via Yahoo!:

The U.N. Security Council approved a third round of sanctions against Iran on Monday with near unanimous support, sending a strong signal to Tehran that its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment is unacceptable and becoming increasingly costly.

For the first time, the resolution bans trade with Iran in goods which have both civilian and military uses and authorizes inspections of shipments to and from Iran by sea and air that are suspected of carrying banned items.

Iran signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty circa 1976 (when our puppet leader, The Shah, was in power), and has every legal right to enrich uranium. The UN Security Council is punishing Iran for NOT breaking the law.

Imagine if a police officer gave you a ticket for going the speed limit. That would be illegal. This is the EXACT same thing.

Iran was under the control of the Shah when they signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were there, probably grinning like idiots. Now that Iran is under leadership who don't answer to the United States or United Nations or European Union, all of a sudden it's "unacceptable" for them to enrich ANY uranium AT ALL.

The Shah did studies back in the 70s and concluded that, despite Iran's oil capacity, the country would hit an energy crisis within 30 years if they did not begin to find an alternative way to generate energy. Eager to help, Rumsfeld and Cheney oversaw and approved Iran's signing on to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

IT'S A FISH CONSPIRACY

You know there's a conspiracy afoot when something smells fishy, and this time it's actually fish.

Have you noticed how every single fast food chain (including Subway) has starting featuring their fish sandwiches in more ads lately? McDonald's has the double Fillet O Fish, Jack in the Box has a new fish sandwich, Wendy's has a new fish fillet sandwich, and I just saw a Subway commercial that featured their tuna sandwich.

Is this a result of the beef recall? Seems like it. Probably is. I dunno, it's kinda stupid seeing as most of the recalled supply of beef has already been eaten, and there wasn't necessarily anything wrong with it in the first place.

So maybe it's not because of the recall, maybe there's something else wrong with the beef..... more than the big corporate farms, the fast food chains, and the media tare elling us.......IT'S A CONSPIRACY! That's the only explanation.

(yes this was a joke......) But really, is fish any better right now than it's been before? Could there be something wrong with the current beef supply? I guess it's always better to opt for fish if you're gonna have meat, maybe this is an overall good thing. But that just wouldn't be blog worthy, would it?

The Senate "appologizes to Native Americans"

It's an election year, and a Republican decides to act as the spokesperson of a heart-warming, feel-good...piece of paper. A piece of paper that says something to the effect of: "The US government apologizes for any misdeeds it committed against the Native American community over the coarse of this nation's history."

Hundreds of years of exploitation, humiliation, subjugation, genocide....."Sorry."

'Yeah, sorry about destroying your way of life and everything, man our great great grandfathers were NUTS! Well, here's a piece of paper that says we acknowledge that people like us did horrible things to people like you, happy now?'

Okay, to be fair, the Senate is putting more money into "health care for Native Americans" or something like that, but I still get this weird vibe from this story. Seems kinda like....a diversion or something.

Happy March - I just found some vodka in the freezer

I'm feelin' pretty good right now.

I just opened the freezer and saw a bottle of "spring water." I picked it up and realized the stuff inside was not frozen. I took a whiff and concluded that it was some sort of clear liquor.

So I took some sips.

And I'm diggin' some Weezer, I can't wait until their new cd comes out, here's a link to a vid I made about Weezer fans:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=wSp5Ov_6Zho

Friday Face Time: Clinton and Obama are Conservative

I dunno, weird

There's transition going on in my environment. I feel strange.

But here's an article from the Guardian about the Army. Seems pretty cool.

Also, I've been reading about one of my favorite bands, Weezer. It makes me really, really, really really, really, really, really, really want to play music for a living.

Yet, I still just sit and read.

Spring Break Shark Attack [video]

I reviewed them the other day and here's the vid from the show I saw:

Clinton and Obama are conservative

In the true sense of the word, Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama are running conservative campaigns.

This quote is in large letters at the top of Obama's "Economy" page:

“I believe that America's free market has been the engine of America's great progress. It's created a prosperity that is the envy of the world. It's led to a standard of living unmatched in history. And it has provided great rewards to the innovators and risk-takers who have made America a beacon for science, and technology, and discovery…We are all in this together. From CEOs to shareholders, from financiers to factory workers, we all have a stake in each other's success because the more Americans prosper, the more America prospers.”

— Barack Obama, New York, NY, September 17, 2007

If you read down the page and look at his actual plans, it says he wants to promote fair trade by "fixing" NAFTA so that it benefits American workers. Sounds great, but how is it possible? I think to "fix NAFTA" to help workers, you just have to outright scrap it, and I don't think that's an unreasonable change to make in trade policy. Therefore I consider Obama's economic plan pretty conservative.

According to both candidates' websites, they want to lower the taxes of middle class families. Super. Neither of them plan to get rid of the breaks Bush gave to the wealthiest Americans, though Obama's site says the tax cuts for the rich are a problem.

It's one thing to criticize Bush's tax cuts, it's another to actually undo what he did. They're scared of saying they're going to raise taxes, so they don't. They just do half the job that needs to be done. That's literally a conservative approach, doing less because it's convenient, conserving time and effort.

Spring Break Shark Attack (a review)

Today I went to this big block party at the Big Top.

There were like 15 bands, most of them fantastic, but the one who stuck out the most to me was the one who played the second slot on the bill: Spring Break Shark Attack of Baton Rouge, LA.

This band transcends all expectations of what a local band can sound like, but first I'll just explain that they're an instrumental surf rock band. Right off the bat, that's something you don't often see, but something more rare is their ability to take an old style and modify it for a modern audience. This isn't a carbon copy of the Ventures we're talking about, this is a truly unique band who doesn't deserve my pigeon-holing them into the surf rock genre.

Most of their song titles have to do with shark attacks (like "Red Tide" and my personal favorite, "Army of Sharkness"), but these comical touches are just icing on top of the rich cake of pure talent that these guys possess. At times their songs transitioned to fast-beat punk sections, but without actually playing power chords (an impressive feat all it's own). At other times they had more metal sounding riffs, which made sense later when I saw one of SBSA's guitarists, Andy, playing with a down-tempo and severely down-tuned (drop F# to be exact) hardcore band called Thou (I tried to hate them but I just couldn't, I sincerely dug that band in spite of my general disgust with modern "hardcore").

SB Shark Attack also had something of a progressive quality. As a trained guitarist, I can say that both their guitarists rival and possibly excel the picking technique of their well known predecessor, Dick Dale. Their songs are well thought-out as well, and I suspect that these guys are former band nerds (takes one to know one, I guess).

Being a surf rock band, they could have easily written a bunch of songs that all sounded alike, but once again they impress in that area as well: each song really holds it's own, while sticking to the surf rock vibe. Not a task easily accomplished, hell the Ventures themselves could barely do it.

I truly cannot express how much this band's mere existence makes me hopeful of rock 'n roll's future in America.

Maybe we don't have to grow jet black bangs that cover one eye; maybe we can wear jeans that fit properly; maybe bands can actually not suck! Check out Spring Break Shark Attack today and see for yourself (myspace.com/sharkattacksurf).

A news story that doesn't focus on the sex side of McCain's trouble

Of course, it's from Democracy Now! A legitimate source of legitimate news.

I heard a little bit of it in my car earlier, I've heard NPR many times on many different stations but I was surprised to hear Democracy Now!, I think it was on WWNO, my school's station.

Anyway, here's a link.

Friday Face Time: My immediate response after the Scott Ritter lecture

Scott Ritter was right: Turkey invades Iraq

The other night I went to a lecture with Scott Ritter, a former Marine/intelligence officer/weapons inspector. He spoke about Kurdish Iraqis in the north of Iraq and how the PKK (essentially a terrorist group who the U.S. essentially supports) goes into Turkey and kills people (for whatever reasons, because they're terrorists). They use U.S. built weapons and U.S. training.

He said Turkey was about to retaliate. Well, check out this headline from the Associated Press:

Turkish Troops Enter Iraq Seeking Rebels

Holy moly perhaps this guy knows what he's talking about, unlike every pundit you'll find on TV and probably talk radio.

Find out if Scott Ritter is coming near you.

Castro

Wow, Castro finally had to take himself out of power, since no one else could.

I guess it's best to quit while you're ahead, or while you're old as fucking dirt, either way.

Hey remember when he fell down? Good times.

Holes in the Wall

From the Texas Observer:

"...a 1.63-mile proposed fence will cut through the backyard of several modest homes and stop at the edge of a resort and golf course."

click here for the article

Fucked up.

Another day, another recall

Schools and fast food chains were supplied beef from cattle that were "unable to stand at the time of slaughter."

The beef isn't necessarily contaminated but it's being recalled because the beef supplier broke the rules by slaughtering those sickly cows. But the meat has probably all been eaten already anyway.

Oh well, free trade still kicks ass, right?!

NIU Shooting: what's wrong with White culture?

Please excuse the title if it's a tad disrespectful.

The NIU shooting is definately as strange as it is tragic. If you read a little bit about the gunman, you'll find that those who knew him didn't find anything troubling about him. He studied criminal justice and according to the Associated Press he was interested in political violence and even social justice. There was also no suicide note.

So all we can really do is ask, "Why did he do it?" Because white people aren't violent, are they? Nice, hard working white guys don't do bad things. If Kazmierczak (the NIU gunman) were black, how many headlines would read "What's Wrong with Black Culture?" How many pundits would be asking the same thing?

I'm trying to balance out the universe in some way. I know that this guy was nice, had no criminal record and no history of mental illness, so the question of "Why on earth would he do this?" is certainly a valid one. It's just that I know a black man of the same reputation committing this crime would surely be villainized in the media. So, to keep everything equal, I'm just going to leave it at this: what's wrong with white people (like me) ?

"Which attack would they have hoped that we wouldn't have prevented?"

Not that we needed any further proof, but Geoge W. Bush is a raving lunatic in every sense.

In a BBC interview, he defended the use of waterboarding, and implied that everyone in Guantanamo Bay is guilty, despite the fact that many, many people there are completely innocent of every charge they have.

Friday Face Time

This is a video I made a week or so ago just to add a little something different to my YouTube content. I taped myself practicing my transcription because I knew I'd practice for a longer amount of time doing so. Recording yourself is a good way to practice music because it makes you try harder to perfect it.

Nader has a new article

He admits right off the bat that the subject is a little dry, but nonetheless important.

It's about

hundreds of billions each year of federal government contracts, grants, leaseholds and licenses given to corporations to run our government, exploit our taxpayer assets and lay waste to efficient, responsive public services.

It's from Nader.org, click here for the article.

They all support the death penalty

As if you didn't already know that.

But there's an extremely short article (if you can even call it that), over at the Houston Chronicle about how every single major presidential candidate in the '08 race supports the death penalty.

I'll concede that Obama's stance and practice with the death penalty is more reasonable but the fact remains that he supports it, and that's just ONE example of how he's actually conservative.

I think I'm going to end up making a video about how conservatives have nothing to fear from the current frontrunners.

"zero-carbon, zero-waste car-free city"

The article from the BBC is really short but it's got a few nuggets of pretty interesting information, though it glosses over supposed fears that the city will be a haven for the rich.

The city is Masdar City, and lies within Abu Dhabi of the United Arab Emerites.

We'll see how it turns out, it's supposed to take only 8 years and 22 billion dollars.

Voter Disenfranchisment

It's happened in pretty much every election ever held in the US and it could get worse before it gets better.

Check out this story from PBS NOW. The page has a link to a video on the subject of "voter restrictions," or new and up-coming laws that are likely designed to keep certain voters out of the booths. What's really interesting is that the same lawmakers who claim to be fighting "voter fraud" also try to make it easier to vote absentee, which is supposedly an easier way to commit voter fraud and just happens to be more widely used by whites.

“I didn’t volunteer to support corrupt, money grubbing contractors ...”

From the Texas Observer, Col. Ted Westhusing's supposed suicide is reconsidered.

Either way, it's pretty obvious there's something dreadfully wrong in the way we're "saving Iraq."

Shitt Bomb-ney is out

The Stormin' Mormon is out of the race.

Now all we need is both McCain, Huckabee, Obama, and Clinton to step aside and let Nader/Kucinich lead us to a better future.

Shyeah right.

Need another reason to hate the Coca Cola company?

Well, they deplete the resources of 3rd world people.

They also take municipal tap water, add salt to it and call it Dasani.

Coke sucks. I wish they didn't make Delaware Punch, one of the greatest beverages known to man.

John McCain is Dr. Strangelove

But seriously, don't let this guy be president.

A short convo about Super Bowl commercials

[my girlfriend]: i wonder what kind of commercials there will be
bebop is better: expensive ones
[gf]: indeed
bebop is better: crazy ones you'll never see again
[gf]: a lot of beer commercials im sure
bebop is better: of McCourse
bebop is better: but dont drink and drive
[gf]: haha
bebop is better: just drink
bebop is better: but buy a car

Anyways, enjoy the game you SHEEP! I'm just messin with ya.

Amnesty Day...

So I just read about Blog Amnesty Day for the first time...

Where people share blogs with others.

Well the only actual blog I read is Real Art (more so than Atrios I'm proud to say) and I highly recommend it.

That's all I got. That's my contribution. I'm sure I'll stay very, very unknown.

No Debate

By Ralph Nader:

It was billed as the great debate that, in the words of moderator Wolf Blitzer, “could change the course of this presidential race and the nation.”

Situated at the packed historic Kodak Theatre—site of the Hollywood Oscar awards, thousands of people, including anti-war protesters, were outside, where tickets were being scalped for $1,000.

The burgeoning excitement swept up Mr. Blitzer into an introduction reminiscent of a heavyweight boxing title fight. Referring to the “glamour on this stage…one of the great stages of all time,” he declared that “this will be the first time that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama will be debating face to face, just the two of them, one-on-one.” The crowd ROARED!

[...]

The two candidates were unperturbed by any questions from the reporters that they had not answered before or they were soft balls they could hit out of the ball park.

As in all debates involving presidential candidates, the reporters were unwilling or incapable of asking the unconventional questions reflecting situations and conditions widely reported or investigated by their own colleagues.

This phenomenon of invincible reluctance should be studied by anthropologists or psychologists.

clickhereforallofit

"Gee, why ask tough questions when we could simply have a black or woman president?!" seems to be the sentiment Ralph is talking about.

Everyone wants superficial change of the White House, few seem to be pushing for fundamental change of our false democracy. Having a black or woman president is not enough, the particular candidates do not own up to progressive ideas and I fear they never will. The fact of the matter is that they're corporate Democrats who just want the office. Both of them have done a minimal amount of fighting on behalf of We the People.

I'm not voting for either of them.

I'm not being pessimistic, Clinton and Obama are conservatives. They use the most vague language possible about "change," and don't take strong stances on the tough issues like getting the fuck out of Iraq. They don't want to say they're going to end the war immediately, even thougt that's what most Americans want. They don't want to push for straight up universal health care. They pretend to have their own brand new health care plans that will benefit everyone but it's really the same old junk.

Face Time Friday

I'm starting up a new feature here at SSB called Face Time Friday, where I'll post one of my videos about various topics.

This one technically doesn't have any actual face time with me but it's my voice in the background. This is just a funny late night scenario I've run in to a few times before (this video may get deleted eventually) :



This video is technically a violation of the YouTube user policy. I deleted it immediately after it finished uploading last night but it was there when I logged in today so here it is until they delete it.

My humble attempt at a viral internet image

This is a mutant offspring of the internet and twisted boredom. I found all of the pictures on Google Images, the fonts were downloaded off of some site that I can't even remember, and of course the background color and action lines are courtesy of Microsoft Paint.



Hope ya like it. If you do, spread it around, I 'accidentally' put the name of this blog on there so maybe it will get some steady traffic over here if it actually does get viral...

Greg Palast on the State of the Union

From gregpalast.com:

One Bush Left Behind

Here’s your question, class:

In his State of the Union, the President asked Congress for $300 million for poor kids in the inner city. As there are, officially, 15 million children in America living in poverty, how much is that per child? Correct! $20.

Here’s your second question. The President also demanded that Congress extend his tax cuts. The cost: $4.3 trillion over ten years. The big recipients are millionaires. And the number of millionaires happens, not coincidentally, to equal the number of poor kids, roughly 15 million of them. OK class: what is the cost of the tax cut per millionaire? That’s right, Richie, $287,000 apiece.

Mr. Bush said, “In neighborhoods across our country, there are boys and girls with dreams. And a decent education is their only hope of achieving them.”

So how much educational dreaming will $20 buy?

-George Bush’s alma mater, Phillips Andover Academy, tells us their annual tuition is $37,200. The $20 “Pell Grant for Kids,” as the White House calls it, will buy a poor kid about 35 minutes of this educational dream. So they’ll have to wake up quickly.

clickhereforallofit

Wow.

Some great plan for America, right? Does Bush not expect anyone to do the math? Maybe he wasn't thinking of all 15 million impoverished children, I'm sure that's just a "whiny liberal guestimate or something."

One more year of Bush is too long.

Untraceable: don't let it fool you (some spoilage)

I saw that movie Untraceable last week.

It was pretty good, it was entertaining and everything, and it' s a pretty awesome idea for a movie. I'd go as far to say that it's one of the most inventive original movies to come out in a while. But I've just got to say that anyone who thinks that anything in that movie could actually happen really needs to come to terms with reality.

There's this quick, totally incidental scene about a politician who supports net neutrality. The first victim in the movie gets placed in this politician's car as a sick joke from the webmaster/murderer. The main character explains the irony to her co-worker who, despite being an FBI agent, has to ask, "Net neutrality, what's that?" And, within about three seconds, the main character spits out this over-simplified, sarcastic, and false remark about net neutrality....unfortunately I can't remember what the remark was, it was so much in passing that I couldn't retain the actual quote, just the meaning.

Long story short:the movie's probably intended to scare people into opposing net neutrality.

The whole reason why there's such great hype around the movie is because "It could really happen!" But there's no way in Hell that it could. See if I'm right, here's what happens:

The FBI hits a major roadblock right off the bat: "The NSA won't let us use their technology to track the website, DANG!" For some strange reason I don't think the National Security Agency would just simply tell the FBI, "Sorry, we can't help you track this guy who's killing people with his website, we're not aloud to violate privacy, blame the craaaaazy liberal Democrats in Congress."

(This has to happen in the movie, obviously, otherwise it'd be a hell of a lot shorter and less interesting and wouldn't make piles of money for people that already have many piles of money.)

The reason why the site is so hard to track is because somehow it uses several different IP addresses from all over the world, eventually settling on Russian IP addresses that are totally out of their jurisdiction. Not once do they contact Russia and ask if they can help. "He's using Russian IP's, it's out of our jurisdiction, let's wait for the next victims to show up and look for clues in the live stream as they die! MAN this is hard!"

Now that I've spoiled much of the basic plot line for you, I think you can see why the events in Untraceable are unrealistic at best. I could go on, but I gotta ask, who reads this blog?

Exactly.

The NOSAVAGE campaign is excersizing free speech, not stifling it

From Huffington Post courtesy of Alternet.org:

Michael Savage's Hate Speech Catches up with Him

At least four major firms have pulled advertising from Michael Savage's nationally syndicated radio show following a campaign highlighting his inflammatory rhetoric.
One other company, Geico insurance, is expected to follow suit. The campaign, launched recently by Brave New Films, generated thousands of calls urging advertisers on the Savage Nation show to sever financial ties to the widely popular (and frequently offensive) talk host.

In less than a week, four agreed to pull their ads from the show, including Union Bank of California (whose representative says they were advertisers on the Savage show by mistake and were glad to be taken off), Intuit, Chattem, ITT Technical Institute.

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I emphasize "pulled advertising" and "highlighting" because I think they're the backbone of the NOSAVAGE campaign, whether they know it or not. NOSAVAGE is calling up the sponsors of Michael Savages show and telling them what he actually says on his show and asks them if they really want to support this guy's program. A handful have already said, "You know what, we don't want to be associated with such a racist motherfucker," and pulled their ads.

THAT'S NOT STIFLING FREE SPEECH, that's expressing it. Savage can be a racist, Brave New Films and their NOSAVAGE campaign can be liberal ask his sponsors if they really want to support him. They're not trying to make it illegal to spout racist and uninformed garbage, they're trying to make it unprofitable. There's nothing hypocritical about it, and I say this because I'm sure there are plenty of people saying just the opposite (or will as soon as they hear about it).

It's not like they're trying to get the government to ban fascist rhetoric from the media. THAT would be stifling free speech. If sponsors don't want to fund a show, no matter what the content, they don't have to. That's business, quite literally. If there's a "major firm" that doesn't mind being associated with Savage, they can sponsor him and he can stay on the air. All the NOSAVAGE campaign is doing is just making sure that the sponsors know it's contents.

So Savage fans, or "supporters of free speech," don't bash Brave New Films for calling attention to what Savage actually says on his show, take it up with the sponsors, they're the ones who pulled the ads. (and it ain't like he's off the air yet)

White separatists protest in Jena, La.

From the AP courtesy of mercurynews.com:

JENA, La.—About 50 white separatists protested the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday Monday in this tiny town, which was thrust into the spotlight months ago by 20,000 demonstrators who claimed prosecutors discriminated against blacks.

Police separated participants in the "pro-majority" rally organized by the Learned, Miss.-based Nationalist Movement from a racially mixed group of about 100 counter-demonstrators outside the LaSalle Parish Courthouse. There was no violence and one arrest, a counter-demonstrator.

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50 racist protesters, twice as many counter-protesters. As horrible as it was to piss on Dr. King's grave like those supremacists did today, it's good to know that for every American racist there's two people who are willing to go out and meet them in the streets to protest their ignorance.

Last month I made a couple of videos about American whites who claim to be the new victims of racism. It's bullshit and we've got to call them on it at every instance possible. We're never going to tackle corporate crimes against humanity if blacks and whites still can't get along after all of this time.

Two From the Baytown Sun

In celebration of my upcoming holiday return to my home town (Highlands), here are two impecibly combined quotes from the Baytown Sun website's front page today:

Civic leader honored for service to Baytown

The distinguished guests – state and local elected officials and leaders of the Baytown community – rose to their feet Tuesday night to salute the 2007 Exxon Mobil Refiner of the Year, and everyone agreed no one was more deserving than Doug Huddle.

[...]

Huddle [...] said Exxon Mobil taught him what it meant to be a volunteer.

and

Nooses get noticed

[...] two nooses were found hanging from scaffolding at the Exxon Mobil refinery.

(My emphasis), with all due respect to Doug Huddle, this was just too funny of a coincidence not to point out, given Baytown's reputation as a generally bigoted city.

It's become a joke in itself to have "sensitivity training" meetings at the workplace. I've overheard sarcastic remarks about such meetings at the power plant I used to work at (and will probably work at again) in Pasadena, TX. A common phrase used is "I'm okay-you're okay PC bullshit." Political correctness has become kind of an offensive term in itself, yet it's clear that some men in the professional realm do need schooling in racial sensitivity, or maybe just an ass-kicking for being racist assholes.

I know for sure that there are plenty of white people in Baytown who just do not care about racism.

"Jena justice is Louisiana justice, which is United States justice"

From the Texas Observer:

Twenty minutes later, the officer calls James and me to her. He and I trade one last look, eyebrows up, and smile at each other. The officer hands me a ticket and tells me I am free to go. Then she grabs James and handcuffs him. “You have a parking ticket you haven’t paid, and there is a warrant for you because of it,” she tells him, and begins to recite his rights.

“No!” I tell her before I can think. “Ma’am, no, you can’t do that. He didn’t do anything. He has a 3-week-old baby in the car.”

“The judge wants to see you,” the cop tells James. “That’s all I know. So you are going to go to jail.”

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I've been thinking and talking about racism lately. I've posted some videos of myself doing so on YouTube. The titles are "White People: you're not victims of racism!" parts 1 and 2. They got immediate responses in their comment sections, and they're still snowballing.

Many white Americans truely believe minorities receive preferential treatment in this country. I can't put into words how backwards that is, it's just not true. Some call affirmative action "reverse racism," they think it only works for non-whites. They seem to think that anything done on behalf of another ethnic group is some kind of blow to their own. They don't see our government for what it is and what's it's been since our country's birth: mostly white. They can't see that white people are still in enormous positions of power.

I don't know how else to convince them, other than to talk about it, that racism is still a problem today and it still affects blacks the most.

Many naysayers remind me that white immigrants were treated poorly when they came to America, but they "worked hard," and "didn't bitch about it," and "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps," and so on. They ignore the fact that white immigrants were accepted nearly instantly compared to how long it took for blacks to gain ANYTHING in America.

Further, there are still Italian and Irish stereotypes, to be sure, but racism against whites just doesn't happen, and if it does, it doesn't come from the government or people with authority. THAT'S the difference, and it's important. It usually comes from uneducated minorities who's only experiences with whites have involved getting screwed over. Can you blame them? And how horrible is it to be called a "cracker" or a "honkey" or "white boy"? It's sure never gotten me into an "I'm a victim!" tizzy, and it never will.

Rudy spells out the hypocrasy, unknowingly

From Eschaton:

Jim Cramer is interviewing Rudy. I don't have the sound on, but the captions are funny. First one.

Giuliani: The US Should Increase Its Coal Supply Through Government Subsidies

About 4 minutes later:

Giuliani: Business And Government Are Separate - And That's Non-Negotiable

atrios.blogspot.com

Rudy inadvertently spelled out the "free trade" fallacy with these two statements.

Where would Wal-Mart or any big corporation be without subsidies? Fewer places. They'll take all the government money they can get, but anything else the government (or the People) try to give them (like regulations and taxes) is "socialist," "unAmerican," the like. I can't think of any better way to describe what is so fucked up with free trade cheerleaders than this contradiction.

All you have to do is listen to them speak for 4 minutes and they'll prove their stupidity on their own.

Want change? Restore democracy

From Alternet:

Consumer-Driven Culture Is Killing Our Democracy
Terrence McNally interviews Robert Reich

TM: I've been saying since the 2004 election that we need a Restore Democracy Trifecta: media reform for a more informed democracy -- stop (and reverse if possible) media consolidation, offer less false balance (i.e., global warming skeptics are equal to global warming scientists) and more statements of fact. Campaign reform -- public financing, free TV time. Election reform -- transparent, accurate, inclusive and verifiable.

If all progressives got together, campaigned for those three things and succeeded to a meaningful extent, only then would they have a realistic chance to get environmental, healthcare, education, civil liberties or whatever legislation passed. Is that basically in sync with what you're saying?

RR: Absolutely. I keep telling progressives who have particular issues they want to advance [that] nothing is going to happen on your issue or any other progressive issue unless you get together with everybody else who wants change and rescue democracy first.

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Every time I ponder the social changes that must be made in my lifetime, I end up at the same conclusion: we need campaign finance reform. Bottom line, no buts about it, it's the only way to get government back on the people's side. Most people would agree, yet they don't seem fired up to do anything about it. I for one will never stop talking about the need for this reform and I'll never stop endorsing independent and good Green Party candidates who take anonymous campaign donations.

A wise man once said you need social change before policy change, and that's how we have to go about it. Everyone who realizes that their representatives are putting corporate interests first needs to stop voting for corporate candidates. More people need to talk about candidates who are going to do good for the people. As Jello Biafra says, don't hate the media BECOME the media, and that's what blogs, vlogs, whatever, have made much easier. But it doesn't stop at the internet. Call your representatives and tell them what you want. Make sure they know that you know they're not really working for you. And tell them why you didn't vote for them, or why you won't vote for them and their party again. Tell them. Email, letter, phone, picket line, anything.

The time for change was yesterday.

Greening the Corporation

From Nader.org:

When business sees environmental management as saving it money, increasing productivity, becoming more competitive and attracting young talent, the prospect of sustainable policies taking root becomes more likely.

Obviously, it was not always viewed this way by corporate bosses who, not long ago, saw our air, water and soil as their toxic sewers.

[...]

No corporation illustrates this broad continuum better than the Atlanta-based Interface Corporation—the country’s largest commercial carpet tile manufacturer. In 1994, founder Ray Anderson started his company on its goal as a “restorative enterprise,” which he described as zero net pollution and 100% recycling by 2020. The company is 45 percent there, he estimates. (http://www.interfaceinc.com/)

[...]

“Sustainability,” Anderson told the New York Times, “pays in customer loyalty, employee spent-hard cash,” plus 336 million dollars in savings since 1995.

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If I'm not mistaken, this Anderson guy speaks in The Corporation, a Mark Achbar documentary about....corporations. Anderson (if I'm right) is a capitalist gone conservationist who is one of the few legitimate corporate voices for sustainability.

I was recently disgusted to see corporately owned NBC parading "Green Week" earlier this month, complete with an all-green peacock logo and public service announcements about conserving energy, "brought to you by WAL-MART." Something is going either incredibly right or incredibly wrong when Wal-Mart is preaching green ideals, and in this case I'm pretty sure something is going incredibly wrong. Greens have been gaining ground for a while, and the boys at the top have seen the progress. They're using the bandwagon for their own wasteful gain, and that just burns my grits.

If Wal-Mart is going to be the new spokesman for energy conservation and green living, they're gonna have to make some changes. Stop building new stores RIGHT NOW, start selling more American made products, and get rid of the Wal-Mart gas stations if you want any kind of credibility in the eyes of true greens. It's not enough to encourage us to buy "this funny looking lightbulb" from Wal-Mart. Sure, I'll buy those kinds of bulbs but I will buy them from whoever I fucking choose.

I'm glad that the whole idea of "going green" is catching on, but I think it might be getting watered down and tainted by corporate interests, we have to be really careful about who might profiteer off of whole-hearted green efforts. If we leave it to Wal-Mart to help save the planet, I get the feeling we might get the opposite of what we want.

The Texas prison system sucks, and it's going to get worse

From the Texas Observer:

Break the Chain

Voters just approved $233 million in bonding authority to build three more prisons without considering how much it will cost to operate them. Building prisons and increasing sentences is like crack cocaine for ambitious politicians. There are nearly 2,000 felonies in the Texas penal code. Between 1997 and 2002, the average amount of time served by prisoners increased 83 percent in part because of harsher sentencing laws.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Increasing parole rates for nonviolent, first-time offenders by only 4 percent would eliminate the need for any new prison beds in the short term, according to the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition. The group’s Web site (www.criminaljusticecoalition.org) has a number of commonsense solutions to prison overcrowding, including increased drug treatment and probation reform. For what we spend on each addict in a Texas prison, five could be given drug treatment at nearly the same cost.

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The editorial also notes the poor conditions of the prisons themselves and gives more statistics. It just goes to show that militant, close-minded people who vote for corporate candidates (mostly Republican in this case) are really the ones who squander tax payer money. Anything to lock up minorities for as long as possible, that's what they care about, justice and logic be damned. Some Republican (and Democrat) voters probably don't realize the consequences of building more prisons and increasing sentence terms. They think they're cleaning up the streets but they're really cleaning out the state's pockets, and making the streets and communities worse in the long run.

Why we should pull out now: Peace lies in the Iraqis' hands

Courtesy of Alternet:

The Real Story Behind the Falling Casualty Rate in Iraq
By Brandon Friedman
DailyKos

When someone tells you that the "surge" is working, you must walk them through this chain of events:

On August 7, 2007, near the end of America's bloodiest summer in Iraq, the New York Times reported the following:

Attacks on American-led forces using a lethal type of roadside bomb said to be supplied by Iran reached a new high in July, according to the American military.

[...]

Such bombs [...] are used almost exclusively by Shiite militants.

The "Shiite militants" described by the New York Times were, in fact, members of Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army.

[...]

Then, barely three weeks after the New York Times article ran, 50 Muslim pilgrims were slaughtered in sectarian fighting in Karbala. In response, Muqtada al-Sadr announced that he had

ordered his militia to suspend offensive operations for six months.

[...]

But rather than recognize this for what it was, notable Republicans and other right-wingers immediately began to spin the story as if this was the result of the "surge"[.]

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It's clear the US military presence HAS NO CONTROL over Iraq. They've got no credibility in the region either, never had it. Every government they try to set up fails, I wonder why. The best thing we can do is pull out all combat forces, give our "Green Zone" back to Iraqis, and switch the mission to "lets fix all the shit we blew up and put the Bush mob on trial." What ever government comes to power in Iraq after that, it shouldn't be too hostile towards us (at least in the long run) if we do what I just described.

Of course, the real issue at hand (that the corporate media will not touch with a ten foot pole) is that our government, our bureaucracy, Blackwater, Halliburton, the oil industry, and every leading presidential candidate, has NO PLAN TO LEAVE Iraq in this life time. There's too much money to be made, too many brown people to subjugate and kill It's gonna take a lot more opposition than the trendy, polite, "Bush sucks!" shit we've got right now, it's gonna take mass protests, EVERY DAY, for months or years, to get us out of the new Vietnam.

I think we can do it.

WELCOME to 1984

From Yahoo! News:

RFID Chips in School Uniforms Track Students

How would feel about this: Tracking chips in kids' school clothing so that school officials can know their whereabouts during the school day?

Oh, it's happening. Ten students in a secondary school in the United Kingdom are being tracked through RFID implants in their school uniforms in a pilot program.

[...]

One possible side effect: Uniform sales may pick up as kids try to procure extra non-RFID-tagged clothing. As security expert Bruce Schneier writes on his blog: "So now it's easy to cut class; just ask someone to carry your shirt around the building while you're elsewhere."

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That last statement there from Bruce Schneier says it all. It's not enough to implant the chips in the clothes, it's too easy to trick the computer if you just have your friend carry around your shirt. Eventually, to make the system really work, the chips would have to be implanted into the body. Can you say SCARY? This idea needs to be shot down before it reaches more people, like the general public. In America. Or Oceana, as it might be called by then.

Bush Is Right to Worry If Waterboarding Is Defined as Torture

By Jane Smiley, HuffingtonPost.com via Alternet:

"Jack L. Goldsmith, who served in the Justice Department in 2003 and 2004, wrote in his recent memoir, The Terror Presidency, that the possibility of future prosecution for aggressive actions against terrorism was a constant worry inside the Bush administration." Another expert points out that future prosecutors "... would ask not just who carried it out, but who specifically approved it. Theoretically, it could go all the way up to the president of the United States; that's why he'll never say it's torture."

[...]

One of the enraging things about the Bush administration is the way that they have consistently written their own rules [...] (and in fact, George W. Bush, according to Gail Sheehy, was well known among his friends for changing the rules of a game until he could engineer a win -- and isn't that how they won in 2000?).

[...]

Someone whose car hits another person in a crosswalk might have been too frightened to stick around or might not have even realized he had hit someone, but the law still prosecutes these crimes, because a responsible citizen is expected to conform to the laws no matter what his emotional state. Same with Cheney and Bush.

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This article pretty much says a lot of stuff we already know, but it's good for reiteration. The article has some pictures of a waterboard from Cambodia and a painting by an ex prisoner there showing what waterboarding looks like.

I was listening to NPR this Thursday on my way to the Houston area for a visit and on a program called "Fresh Air" they interviewed one of the main overseers from the U.S. Guantanamo Bay prison, who's name I forget. The NPR anchor was excrutiatingly polite (as I suppose they always are) to this asshole who never answered a single question asked him. When asked "Are torture tactics used at Guantanamo Bay?" he said that last year, the Army redefined their definition of torture to fit the definition commonly used in the international community (like Saudi Arabia and Turkey?). He never answered "yes" or "no," he simply went on to talk about all the nice things the prisoners have, like Subway sandwiches and 5 prayer times a day. To top it off, after listing all the "perks" the prisoners get at Guantanamo Bay, the man douchebaggedly concluded that "If that's what the UN sees as torture then..." yada yada yada, the guy was full of shit and though I'm an NPR fan, they should have called him on it.

Crappy Halloween: Haunted House Films Are Really About the Nightmares of Gentrification

From PopPolitics.com courtesy of Alertnet:

Artemio and I always end up having long discussions about horror films and politics, so he called me up after seeing the haunted house film Cold Creek Manor. "It's all about gentrification!" he said. "It's a piece of crap, but still ...

[...]

Rich city folks move out into the country and find themselves up against nasty poor locals and a ghost in another recent vengeful-spirit film, Wendigo. The more I thought about this recurrent motif, the more I realized: the modern haunted house film is fundamentally about gentrification. Again and again we see fictional families move into spaces from which others have been violently displaced, and the new arrivals suffer for that violence even if they themselves have done nothing wrong.

[...]

The spate of slow-moving zombie films that followed in the wake of "Night of the Living Dead" represent a capitalist nightmare of communist revolution: the brain-dead bloodthirsty working class, desiring nothing but our destruction, rises us up to besiege "us" in our comfortable homes, our malls, our military bases.

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This is a really good read, an insanely over-analysis of the underlying messages in monster movies. It's usually a display of classism from the perspective of the elite, where dirty poor peope or "monsters" have good reasons to hate "us" and try to kill "us" but "we're" still the "good guys." I'll never watch a zombie flick in the same light.

[Why Hillary should not be president] Weapons Industry Dumps Republicans, Backs Hillary

From Independent UK courtesty of Alternet:

The U.S. arms industry is backing Hillary Clinton for President and has all but abandoned its traditional allies in the Republican party. Mrs Clinton has also emerged as Wall Street's favourite. Investment bankers have opened their wallets in unprecedented numbers for the New York senator over the past three months

[...]

This week, she said that, if elected president, she would not rule out military strikes to destroy Tehran's nuclear weapons facilities.

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It's clear to me, and hopefully most liberals, that Hillary is not one of us. I still refuse to accept that she's got an automatic win if she's nominated for the candidacy, I think Democrats are way too scared of NOT nominating her. Kucinich may not look like a winner, but put him in the presidential debates with the Rebublican candidate and I guarantee you a landslide. It's not going to happen though. And at this point I wouldn't be satisfied with Obama either, at least not much moreso. I guess now that the defence industry has taken their eyes off him he might not be obligated to cater to them if he gets the presidency, but he probably will anyway.

Obama and Clinton are corporate Democrats who I do not want to be president. How can people like me possibly get Kucinich where he needs to be?

Voodoo Fest grocery list

Who I saw at Voodoo Fest:

FATTER THAN ALBERT!
Earl Greyhound
Vavavoom
GALACTIC (featuring Chali 2na [of Jurassic 5] and Lyrics Born)
Jose Conde y Ola Fresca
Lez Zeppelin
Donald Harrison plus the Congo Nation
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!

Bones
Rotary Downs
Circa Survive
ZYDEPUNKS!!
Fleur de Tease
BIG SAM'S FUNKY NATION
Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals
(the fake) Smashing Pumpkins

Plain White T's
(Red Jumpsuit Apparatus SUCKS)
Christian Scott
TROMBONE SHORTY & ORLEANS AVE.
The New Orleans Bingo! Show
Paolo Nutini
COMMON!
Wilco

Rumsfeld Flees France, Fearing Arrest

From IPS News courtesy of Alternet.org:

U.S. embassy officials whisked Rumsfeld away yesterday from a breakfast meeting in Paris organized by the Foreign Policy magazine after human rights groups filed a criminal complaint against the man who spearheaded President George W. Bush's "war on terror" for six years.

Under international law, authorities in France are obliged to open an investigation when a complaint is made while the alleged torturer is on French soil.

[...]

"Rumsfeld must be feeling how Saddam Hussein felt when U.S. forces were hunting him down," activist Tanguy Richard said. "He may never end up being hanged like his old friend, but he must learn that in the civilized world, war crime doesn't pay."

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BAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!