Friday, December 30, 2005

Just to Reiterate about the Day Before 9/11

When there is political or corporate bad news it's invariably released late on a friday.
Why, someone might ask?
Most people in the country have their noses to the grindstone on weekdays and look forward to putting that aside to attend to personal matters on the weekend. Hence the news organizations place their emphasis on frivolities and sports and matters of substance take the back burner. Forget about the TV talking heads on sunday - their job is to complete the obfuscation process through propaganda and trivialization.
So by monday that ugly news, whether it's scandal, political chicanery or corporate crimes, is old news. Outpaced by other stuff, it'll stay on the back burner of public consciousness and voila! Nothing to see here, we've got to move on.

Now go back to the day before 9/11. Von Rumsfeld said at a news conference that, umm, the pentagon couldn't locate 2.3 trillion dollars. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml
That's $2,300,000,000,000.
How convenient that bad news was buried by subsequent events.

-------

Also leading up to 9/11:

From http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/fbishut.html

THE FBI SHUT DOWN OF ARAB MUSLIM WEB SITES IN THE DAYS LEADING UP TO 9/11.
FBI accused of anti-Muslim bias
Among the sites the FBI shut down just days before 9-11 was the web site for the Arab World's leading independent TV news channel.
FBI Agents Raid Muslim-Owned Internet Company
Five days before 9-11.
FBI executes "unspecified search warrant" to shut down Arab Muslim web sites, denies racial bias
Four days before 9-11.
US pulls the plug on Muslim websites
The day before 9-11, the FBI moved to make sure that Arab Muslims could not defend themselves on the internet from accusations that would be made after the WTC attacks.
Guess who "persuaded" the FBI to shut down the Arab web sites just before 9-11
If you are going to frame someone, you have to make certain they cannot speak in their own defense.

Thursday, December 29, 2005

Clowntime is Over: The Last Stand of the American Republic

This essay is so important I thought I'd crosspost it.

By Chris Floyd

So now, at last, the crisis is upon us. Now the cards are finally on the table, laid out so starkly that even the Big Media sycophants and Beltway bootlickers can no longer ignore them. Now the choice for the American Establishment is clear, and inescapable: do you hold for the Republic, or for autocracy?

There is no third way here, no other option, no wiggle room, no ambiguity. The much-belated exposure of George W. Bush's warrantless spy program has forced the Bush-Cheney Regime to openly declare what they have long implied -- and enacted -- in secret: that the president is above the law, a military autocrat with unlimited powers, beyond the restraint or supervision of any other institution or branch of government. Outed as rank deceivers, perverters of the law and rapists of the Constitution, the Bush gang has decided that their best defense -- their only defense, really -- is a belligerent offense. "Yeah, we broke the law," they now say; "so what? We'll break it again whenever we want to, because law don't stick to our Big Boss Man. What are you going to do about it, chump?"

That is the essence, the substance and pretty much the style of the entire Bushist response to the domestic spying scandal. They are scarcely bothering to gussy it up with the usual rhetorical circumlocutions. The attack is being led by the fat, sneering coward, Dick Cheney, who has crawled out of his luxurious hidey-holes to re-animate the rotting husk of Richard Nixon and send it tottering back onto the national stage. Through the facade of Cheney's pig-squint and peevish snarl, we can see the long-dead Nixonian visage, his grave-green, worm-filled jowls muttering once more the lunatic mantra he brought to the Oval Office: "If the president does it, it can't be illegal." This is what we've come to, this is American leadership today: ugly, stupid men mouthing the witless drivel of failed, dead, discredited, would-be petty tyrants.

But not even Nixon was as foul as this crew. When he was caught, he folded; some faint spark of republican conscience restrained him from pushing the crisis to the end. He was a vain, stupid, greedy, grasping, dirty man with blood on his hands, but in the end, he did not identify himself with the government as a whole. He did not say, "l'etat, c'est moi," he had no messianic belief that the life of the nation was somehow bound up with his personal fate, or that he and his clique and his cronies had a God-given right to rule. They just wanted power and loot -- as much of it as they could get -- and they pushed and pushed until the Establishment pushed back.

It has long been evident, however, that Bush and Cheney do believe their clique should by all rights rule the country -- and that anyone who opposes their unrestrained dominion is automatically "anti-American," an enemy of the state. For them, there is no "loyal opposition," or even political opponents in any traditional understanding of the term; there are only enemies to be destroyed, and herd-like masses to be manipulated. They believe that their dominion is more important than democracy, which they despise as a brake and hindrance to the arbitrary leadership of an all-wise elite -- i.e., them. They are the state; a police state.

Elections are just necessary evils, a way to manufacture the illusion of consent, shake down corporations for big bucks and calibrate the loyalty of courtiers. Democracy is simply another system to be gamed, subverted, turned to factional advantage -- in precisely the same way that Enron gamed the California electric grid. This accounts for the strange, omnipresent tang of unreality that permeated the last three national elections, in 2000, 2002, and 2004. It's because they were unreal: the results were gamed, sometimes in secret, sometimes in plain sight; the "issues" and rhetoric were divorced from the reality that we all actually lived and felt -- and the outcomes were as phony as an Enron balance sheet.

Dominion seized on such sinister and cynical terms will almost certainly be defended -- and extended -- by any means necessary. That is the great danger. The Bushists have already pushed on further than Nixon ever dared; will they "bear it out even to the edge of doom"? This is the crux of the matter; this is the crossroads where we now stand. Will the American Establishment push back at last? Will they say, This far we will go, but no further; this much we will swallow, but no more?

Some of us have been writing for years about Bush's piecemeal assumption of dictatorial powers. We have watched in rage and amazement as the Establishment meekly accepted Bush's repeated, brutal insults to democracy. Time and again, I've quoted the words of the Emperor Tiberius, after the lackeys of the Senate grovelled to do his bidding: "Men fit to be slaves." In one sense, then, the Rubicon was crossed long ago. Yet "we live in hope and die in despair," as my father always says. In the back of the minds of many an embittered dissident, there has been a spark of hope that somewhere down the line, one of the many, many Bush outrages would somehow take hold, gain critical mass, and force the Establishment to act, to rein in the renegade, break him, box him in if not remove him from office.

For let's be clear about this: only the Establishment -- the institutional powers-that-be -- can break an outlaw president. Millions marched in the street against Nixon and the system; whole city quadrants went up in flames in those days; but none of this was decisive in the corridors of power. (Nor to much of the American public, to be frank; after Kent State, after My Lai, after Cambodia, Nixon was still re-elected in a landslide.) It was his insult to the institutions -- the Watergate break-in of Democratic headquarters, the subsequent cover-up and subversion of the legal system, the defiance of Congress -- that led to his downfall. He pushed too far, tried to grab too much -- and the Establishment pulled him short.

And it will have to be the Establishment that breaks Bush -- or he won't be broken. All the blogs in the world won't bring him down, no matter how much truth they tell, how much bloodsoaked Bushist dirt they expose. Yes, perhaps if we had millions of outraged citizens marching in the street day after day across America, a sustained mass movement and popular uprising for liberty and democracy, this might obviate the need for Establishment action. But we all know that such marches are not going to happen. If there was sufficient fire for liberty and democracy in America, there would have already been a popular uprising -- and Bush would never have garnered enough public support to keep the election results close enough to be fudged. No, it will be the Establishment -- or no one.

That's why the spy scandal is so pivotal. Because it is a direct, open and unignorable challenge to the institutional life of the American Establishment. In it, the Bush Regime is saying to the various powers-that-be, especially in Congress and the courts, but also to centers of power and influence outside government: you no longer have any power. All real power is now in our gift. Your laws, your institutions, your traditions, the whole complex infrastructure of checks and balances that have sustained society are now essentially meaningless. As in ancient Rome, we will keep the old forms, but the life of the state has now passed into the hands of the autocrat and his court. His arbitrary will can override any law -- although of course, strong law will still be applied to his enemies, and to the riff-raff in the lower orders.

How will the Establishment deal with this direct challenge? The past few years give little grounds for hope: the Democrats spineless, conflicted, co-opted and corrupt; the Republicans slavish, bellicose, cruel and criminal; the media timorous, witless, corporate-controlled; big business absolutely rolling in gravy from the autocrat's larder; academia cowed, silenced, ignored, demonized; the military acquiescent in criminal aggression, top-heavy with time-servers currying autocratic favor. Only the courts provide some stray sparks of hope, although they too are now loaded with political sycophants, corporate bagmen and knuckle-dragging throwbacks produced by the Right's decades-long devolution of American jurisprudence. Prosecutors like Patrick Fitzgerald and Elliot Spitzer "keep hope alive," but their efforts will mean little in a system where lawlessness at the top has been countenanced by the rest of the Establishment. And in any case, the outcome of their work lies ultimately with the Supreme Court -- the same court that shredded the Constitution in awarding power to Bush in the first place, and which is now led by a Bushist apparatchik.

Still, you don't go through a constitutional crisis with the Establishment you want; you go through a constitutional crisis with the Establishment you have. And this sad, sick crew, ladies and gentlemen, is all we have. If they swallow the spy scandal, if they don't push back now -- and I mean really push back, not just make a lot of harrumphing noise or hold a few toothless hearings or get a couple of underlings offered up as ritual sacrifices to save the Leader -- then we will have well and truly and finally lost the Republic that Franklin, Jefferson and Madison gave us so long ago.

The next few weeks will show us if there is still some hope of restoring the Republic through the old institutions, or if we will have to follow the course laid out by Bob Dylan some 40 years ago: "Strike another match, go start anew." Who knows? Maybe we can make a better republic next time: one not born of blood, greed and fury -- those all-too-common elements of human organization -- but made from a new compound of mercy, justice, communion and liberty. Still imperfect, of course, still corrupt -- because that's our intractable human nature -- but with our worst instincts restrained by enlightened, ever-evolving law, and the predatory ambitions of the rich and powerful reined by elaborate checks and balances.

It's just a dream, of course; probably a vain one. But we will need some vision to guide us if, as seems likely, we must soon set forth into the unknown territory of an openly declared American autocracy. .

Wednesday, December 28, 2005

Christmas thief steals 'Nun Bun'


The horror. A thief stole the famous cinnamon pastry from a coffeeshop in Nashville, TN. A customer found the bun, which some claimed looked a lot like Mother Theresa, in 1996.

I think it looks like this guy:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Why do people suddenly go into religious swoons over random patterns?
Such as the nacho pan jeebus from a couple posts back, or this jeebus on a tortilla that was put into a freaking shrine in Lake Arthur, NM:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

or this grilled cheese mary:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Of course people can believe whatever they want. Venerating some slime mold or paint drips doesn't hurt anybody. But is this an indication of how gullibly stupid we are as a society?
What's next, voting to put an incompetent dimwit into the white house?

Update - Bob Geiger at Yellow Dog Blog has much the same post as this, highlighting a Rold Gold, honey-mustard-flavored pretzel that was the spittin image of the virgin mary cradling the baby jeebus. The white house resident's notorious snack was sold on ebay for $10,600.

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Tuesday, December 27, 2005

Before and after pictures of a town in Mississippi. Thanks to Katrina.

Monday, December 26, 2005

Two Views about Iran

“This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous...Having said that, all options are on the table.”– Resident Dimwit, February 2005

One thing that has struck me while reading news reports and essays across the electronic universe is Israel's (and by implication the US) talk of attacking Iran. There's been a constant media background noise about Iran's supposed nuclear program, which no one says actually exists, but may someday. Sound familiar? There's just been a lot of finger pointing, accusations, denials and planted stories to keep Iran and Attack in the news.

What makes this peculiar is that if it's going to happen it's the most telegraphed upcoming preemptive military strike in history. Yeah, everybody knew Iraq was going to be invaded aside from what little boots and his lying cabal were saying. But Iraq couldn't do much about it after crippling sanctions and isolation, leaving it weak and vulnerable. Iran, on the other hand, is militarily strong and most certainly has WMDs, and can readily acqire the latest warfare technology with an abundance of oil revenue. What's also peculiar is that Israel certainly knows the value of surprise. So why all this heavy breathing about war?

Maybe this provides an answer - http://www.aljazeera.com/cgi-bin/news_service/middle_east_full_story.asp?service_id=10401
"U.S. Congress approves $600 million aid for Israel"

So extortion and fearmongering are nothing new. Hell, that's near the top of the bushista playbook here in this country. And AIPAC has ensured that our congress is the best that money can buy.

Shi'a Iran is no real threat to Israel, the only nuclear power in the middle east. Syria would be a far more likely target for the zionist monsters as it's within a potential Greater Israel. Iran isn't Arabic, it's Persian. Iran is three times the size of Iraq with three times the population. It has a formidable military and has strategic partnerships with Russia and China. As far as the US military is concerned, the treasonous scum in Washington have insured that it is stretched thin and weak and bogged down in a quagmire in Iraqnam. So an attack on Iran wouldn't seem likely.

However there's one more situation in the mix - Iran's upcoming oil bourse. (bourse -stock exchange for securities trading) Beginning in 3 months, the Tehran government has plans to begin competing with New York's NYMEX and London's IPE in international oil trades. They're going to trade in petroeuros. This is seriously bad news for the dollar.

According to James Petras "An Israeli air and commando attack on Iran will have catastrophic military consequences for US forces and severe loss of human life in Iraq, most likely ignite political and military violence against pro-US Arab-Muslim regimes, such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, perhaps leading to their overthrow."
You won't hear much about this in our country with it's controlled media. What you will hear is a new onslaught of lies ala Iraq. If the money and power obsessed psychos aren't stopped, the middle east could burn this spring.

Sunday, December 25, 2005

Workers See Jesus Image In Nacho Pan

Workers at a Florida restaurant say they found an image of jeebus in a warming pan used for nachos.

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Minerals in the water formed the image as the water slowly evaporated. It's now confirmed that due to the War On Christmas, jeebus has had to go undercover like this to spread his message of peace and random slop patterns.
Rock solid proof of intelligent design.

Story at http://www.nbc5.com/irresistible/5617686/detail.html?z=dp&dpswid=1260382&dppid=65193

Looks more like Stephen King.

Thursday, December 22, 2005

Help! Al Qaeda is Everywhere!

Monitor them all, let the NSA sort them out - http://rense.com/general69/alq.htm

Impeach our terrorists. Now.

Dick Cheney has put it on the table as bluntly and thuggishly as a mobster setting down a crowbar.

"It may be the Holiday Season, but for the United States of America we're back to Lexington and Concord."

From Buzzflash - http://www.buzzflash.com/analysis/05/12/ana05056.html

-------

From MSNBC:
Image hosted by Photobucket.com

From Ben Conover:

"They must be impeached now, before they turn the US military's guns on Syria, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia -- or whichever country is deemed the enemy du jour -- before completely destroy what is left of the US and declaring themselves dictators. Our lives, our children's lives and the lives of innocent people throughout the world depend on their impeachment, conviction, removal from office and handing them over to civil authorities to be tried for their crimes. And all Bush's cabinet officers must be impeached, convicted and removed from office as well."

Monday, December 19, 2005

Fly Fishing in Wyoming


Brokeback Mountain seems to be doing very good in theaters, even with a limited number of screens. It also picked up 7 Golden Globe nominations.

I haven't seen it yet but I know a little about it's story. It appears to be a well made, beautifully shot movie by a well respected director using a universal theme. What is so audacious to me about the project is that it's set in an area of the country where the traditional apperance of manhood is taken very, very seriously. I know, I worked there for a couple of years.

Maybe that dichotomy is integral to the plot, I won't understand that until it's released on DVD. But the cowboys-in-love theme is resonating with a substantial number of movie goers which is a surprising and interesting thing in and of itself. You would think that a tale of hard humpin' hombres of the purple sage would be avoided like the plague in these days of super manliness and war and codpieces on the flight deck. I'm sure the bible thumpers are panning it with crazed rightousness. But there's no denying the popularity of the first gay cowboy love story starring A list actors.

Sunday, December 18, 2005

Much More Than Domestic Spying

"This administration is attempting to establish totalitarian control, and has proved that it is not to be trusted with the Constitution. Impeachable offenses are being committed."

Read the rest at http://rense.com/general69/more.htm

Saturday, December 17, 2005

Impeachment, Now

How much more of this illegal cabal of warmongering criminals are we going to take? Every word out of their pieholes is a lie, they're addicted to lying, they can't stop lying.
Stolen elections with vote fraud.
Inside job on Black Tuesday, killing thousands of American citizens and traumatizing the nation. Lying the country into the most fraudulent wars in history, killing tens of thousands of innocent people.
Using banned weapons and irradiating the environment and the people.
Treating the constitution like toilet paper.
Flagrant violations of civil rights.
Defeated in Iraq. Bankrupt at home. Despised around the globe.
And all the while, lying through their fucking teeth.

We the people have become monsters by allowing these scumbags to do what they have done. The rest of the world sees us as a murderous, rogue nation.
We must stop the psychopaths in Washington before they continue their rampage.
Impeach. Now.

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

Just Some Suggestions

I was monitoring the Limbecile show today while I was washing the dishes and heard that the Vermont Teddy Bear Company is one of the sponsors. A quick peek at their site shows that one can buy a stuffed bear-like animal that theyll dress up in an assortment of semi humorous guises, such as the dead-from-the-neck-up cracker bear:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

the used-and-discarded-cannon fodder bear:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

and the coked-up-frat-boy bear:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

This seems to be an innovative company that has a viable product that serves to assuage whatever guilt you may feel about gift giving. However, being a sponsor of the Limbecile "excrement in broadcasting" radio program is a splendid opportunity to cash in on the core values of his listening audience. So I suggest to the Vermont Teddy Bear company that they include these items:

the fabulously-successful-war hero doll:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

and the shock and awe-collateral damage-raghead doll:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

I'm sure the good folks at Vermont, by appealing to Limbecile's war obsessed audience, would rake in a bundle with these items. In the spirit of christmas, possibly they'd share some of their profits with the people of Iraq.

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

When search engines collide:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com

(swiped from heraldblog)

-------

And the worst record album covers of all time - http://www.cenedella.com/stone/archives/2003/10/worst_album_cov.html

sample:


Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Saturday, December 10, 2005

Tookie Williams Execution Date - Dec 13

This is by Les Visible at Quo Vadis, Tookie Williams? I reprint it here in full for obvious reasons.

All through the course of American history political leaders have made decisions based on factors other than vox populi. Presently, the only vox populi getting any kind of a hearing is vox Midas. Many a leader has swept into office on promises and many a promise has died on the vine for want of water. One can’t know what the message of vox populi is any more because that message is fashioned by vox media without any actual reference to vox populi. In any rare instance where vox populi is resourced, the words are imbedded beforehand and then shaped to fit in the way the questions are fashioned. Anyone unaware of this is watching too much vox news.

Stanley ‘Tookie’ Williams stands accused of shot-gunning a convenience store clerk for the princely sum of $120.00 and then a series of 3 Asian motel owners for a grand total of $100.00. Tookie was at the same time one of the founders, along with Raymond Washington and (according to vox media) head of The Crips; a blue headscarf wearing gang who was the counterpoint to The Bloods; a red headscarf wearing gang. The Crips were formed to combat random neighborhood violence. So far as I know, shot-gunning convenience store workers and motel owners wasn’t in the charter.

The question you have to ask yourself is, “Would the head of what came to be the largest, most organized gang in the United States really go out and small time murder for chump change?” It doesn’t make sense does it? Tookie says he didn’t do it and I believe him. I believe him because my common sense tells me it’s just completely out of character for his role. Tookie isn’t a stupid man; anything but. Does this make any kind of sense? Can you say LA Confidential? I thought you could.

Was Tookie Williams a bad man? According to our imaginary yardstick, which has Charles Manson at one end and a Bambi-faced soccer mom at the other, the answer would have to be yes. Would it be fair to say that, using your logic and objective reasoning capacity; Tookie was probably responsible for murder and mayhem along his way to San Quentin? I’d have to say, “No doubt” If you asked me if he was responsible for the murders he is accused of I would have to say, “It’s unlikely.” If you asked me, "Did the LA police department set him up based on the rational that he’s guilty of it somewhere?" I would have to say; “That seems the most likely scenario.”

Our prison system was developed by Benjamin Franklin and The Quakers. The idea was to put a man in a cell with a Bible and hope that repentance and rehabilitation would be the result. Essentially this means that the idea of redemption is a basic ingredient in the process of incarceration. What is the point of parole I might ask? What is justice?

Murder is against the law right? Well Dick Cheney and George Bush and their band of neo-cons have murdered tens of thousands of people recently but they are not in jail. Why are they not in jail? We know that they murdered tens of thousands of people under false pretenses and as the result of known lies. We know this. How are they any different that Tookie Williams? They are much worse. We know that numerous business associates and political cronies of Bush and Cheney have been indicted for massive theft and fraud. How is this behavior any different than that of any gang members; they didn’t use a shot-gun? Okay.

While he has been in prison these past 20 odd years Tookie has been doing a lot of work. Tookie has worked to reform himself and the gang system he helped to bring into being. He has been nominated several times for the Nobel Peace prize. I will not here list his many accomplishments. These are things you can ‘choose’ to learn for yourself. Tookie came up on the rough streets of LA. God only knows what he went through as a kid. I’m not surprised at what happened to him. George Bush and Dick Cheney were given the finest of educations and pampered every step of their lives. They wound up murdering many thousands of times more than Tookie Williams. This is a fact and there is no getting around it. Of course you can attempt to justify it. Would you say that Bush and Cheney have since woven something as great out of their disordered past as has Tookie Williams? No you could not say this.

I’ve been to prison. I knew men like Tookie Williams. I’ve got a blue bandanna I still wear today. It doesn’t make me a Crip, even if one gave it to me. I know something about gangs and the men in them. I know how these gangs come about and the circumstances that give birth to them. Are gangs a good thing? No. Not on the streets of LA and not in the corridor of power in Washington D.C. The only difference in these two gangs is the size of the take.
A man’s life is not the sum of a few moments. The sum of a life is in the totality of the life. It is in what the life comes to. Tookie Williams is an odyssey of redemption. One might say he, “once was lost but now is found.” George Bush will never accomplish as much good as Tookie Williams.

Will Tookie get the chance to go on with his compelling efforts? It doesn’t look good. It doesn’t look good in a country where another governor once mocked an inmate on her way to execution. That governor was George Bush. He laughed and made fun of her on her way to die. Her name was Karla Faye Tucker and her story is a lot like Tookie’s. She made a big mistake when she was young and she spent the next fourteen years on death row repenting and seeking redemption. She went off to die with the governor’s laughter ringing in her ears.

We all die. It has been said that we do not all die but that we are all changed. I won’t address the varieties of meaning there. I will submit that Tookie has already died and been reborn but I suspect that means nothing to those who do not understand the meaning of, “there but for fortune go you and I.” The only difference between Tookie and you and I is that Tookie knows the date. As Samuel Johnson said "Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully."

The issue here is not what Tookie did or did not do once; it is what he has done since. Either redemption is a part of our system or it is not. Special circumstance should be a two way street. Sometimes the example of a person’s life begins to live in many lives. They stand for possibilities. They remind us of the possible. Killing Tookie Williams does not kill the man accused of particular crimes. It kills the man he has become. We effectively kill the example of hope and transformation that he presently stands for.

What sort of a terrible irony is it that permits the wholesale murders of men like George Bush and Dick Cheney? These swine in human form laugh at their deeds and their victims while dining in the high tower. Their crimes against their own nation and other nations exceed the crimes of Tookie Williams to an immeasurable degree.

When and if Tookie dies he will have paid his bills. He will have done something wonderful with his life; made all the more wonderful given his background and his circumstances. When George Bush and Dick Cheney die, hard laughter will accompany and greet them and God have mercy on their souls.

Vox populi… who knows? Yet in our history many a leader has made many a decision that did not reflect vox populi. Many a leader has made a decision of conscience. Many a leader has acted upon advice and acted against advice. Sometimes a leader finds the unspoken hope in a vox populi that does not know the sound of it’s own voice until someone speaks for them. The job of a leader is not to follow it is to lead. How often have we not known what we felt until it touched our hearts? Hopefully something touches Governor Schwarzenegger’s heart.

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

Imagine, it was 25 years ago

For several decades I worked in the Xmas tree business and for a number of years brought them to Boise and sold them at a shopping mall. I hardly bothered to cook in the little trailer on the lot and ate at the fast food places down the road. On this morning it was in one of those places that I heard that someone had shot and killed John Lennon.
It shocked me that it shocked me so much.
After all, in 1980 it had been a decade since the Beatles broke up. Lots of prominent people had been killed over the years.
It felt the same as when Kennedy was assasinated. It felt like innocence was lost. A lot of us grew up with his music and it might seem quaint to younger people today, but I thought then and still think now that the Beatles were the most important musical group that ever existed. Maybe not the best or longest lasting or most prolific, but the most important. It was much more of a loss because of that.
But not to some loutish yahoo in the restaurant. He laughed and remarked he was glad Lennon was dead because he had said one time that "the Beatles were more popular than god".
Even though I knew the fuckwad was quoting him out of context, I still wanted to punch his lights out.

Not the safest of career choices in the middle east

You have to have serious moxie to be a journalist in that part of the world. Over 50 have been killed in Iraq since Operation Clusterfuck began. Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena was almost shot dead by American soldiers after being released by captors. Then there was little boots himself who wanted to bomb al jazeera in Qatar:

Image hosted by Photobucket.com
terrorist command center

Yesterday a military transport crashed into a high rise in Tehran, Iran and killed over a hundred people including 78 journalists. Considering that the war of information is the most important aspect of conflict, anything like this should be considered suspect. Especially since Iran is targetted by the zionists.

Side note - the plane had full tanks and the building caught fire, but didn't collapse into it's own footprint like the WTC.

Monday, December 05, 2005

Babs Protective of her Spawn

Gossip Corner - Barbara Bush apparently is miffed at little boots' handlers and string pullers, according to the Washington Note. http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/001129.html
Thinking that her son is being undermined by the cabal surrounding him, with his approval dropping like a brick having nothing whatsoever to do with him being a miserable failure, the Don Corleone of the dynasty vows to eat them alive.
Image hosted by Photobucket.com

Sunday, December 04, 2005

Fun With Elections (this time in Venezuela)

Hugo Chavez is the president of Venezuela.
He's an outspoken critic of the criminal fascists here in the US.
Venezuela sits on the largest supply of oil in the western hemisphere.
Our fascists really, really want that oil.

Today Venezuela will hold elections for its National Assembly. The opposition parties to Chavez, which are disorganized and increasingly unpopular, were projected to do kinda shitty in today's voting. Jeebus, what to do?

Well, rigging elections and political machinations have been refined in this country for some years now, and those wonderful values along with your tax dollars have been flowing to anti-democratic forces in Venezuela for quite a while. (http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1148) Rather than getting trounced at the polls, the anti-democratic opposition withdrew from the election and is sitting pouty faced on the sidelines, claiming the process is rigged.

Never mind that the Organization of American States and the Carter Center say that the system is fair (http://www.cartercenter.org/documents/2020.pdf) Never mind that the rest of the world recognizes a free and fair election down there, just pay attention to Fox news and little boots, who will claim that Chavez is the one who rigged the election.

Bonus Reason to Like Chavez - he's kicking out the preachers -
http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=46935

-------

Somewhat of a pattern here?

December 2 - Militant group kills 10 Marines (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051203/ts_nm/iraq_fallujah_dc)
December 3 - Top Al Qaeda commander killed in Pakistan (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051203/ts_nm/security_pakistan_qaeda_dc)

Nov 19th - 9 US Soldiers Killed
Nov 20th - al-Zarqawi Dead? Al Qaeda Terrorist Perhaps Killed in Firefight

Nov 16th - 8 US Soldiers Killed
Nov 16th - IRAQ: US MILITARY ANNOUNCES CAPTURE OF KEY AL-QAEDA OFFICER

Nov 2nd - 7 US Soldiers Killed
Nov 3rd - Top Al Qaeda Leader Believed Captured

Sep 28th - 7 US Soldiers Killed
Sep 28th - Al-Qaida chief killed, says Pakistan

Thanks to The Old Fashioned Patriot.

Thursday, December 01, 2005

Chariots of the Quads


I was going to write up a review and comment on Murderball, but the hell with that.
Rent this movie. Just do it.

It seems the best movies to be made in the last several years have been documentaries. In the hands of competent film makers you can get seriously poignant insights in ways you least suspect. When some hyped up big production mainstream flick comes out I feel like it's my duty to see the damned thing, but I look forward to documentaries now. And I'm very seldom disappointed.

Others:
Bush's Brain
Word Wars
Mad Hot Ballroom
March of the Penguins
Control Room
Spellbound


All the eye candy in the world couldn't save "War of the Worlds".

-------

So a light clicked on in Von Rumsfeld's head and he realized no one should say "insurgents" when speaking of those with whom we fight in Iraq. He wants us to use the clunky "enemies of the legitimate Iraqi government." I recall the 10 minutes of fame given to 'struggle against violent extremism' which was supposed to replace "the war on terror".
Maybe little boots and his blood soaked cabal think they can show up in front of captive audiences and spew their lies and believe the world approves. Maybe they think just renaming white phosphorous as an illuminating tool keeps them from being vile war criminals. Maybe they think re-branding their crimes and renaming opponents keeps the stink off them.
Just keep smearing lipstick on that pig.

Update - Blogenlust has this quick history of naming those, um, people over there:

1980-1991: “Allies
1991-September 10, 2001: “Enemies”
September 11, 2001 - March 2003: “Terrorists”
March 2003 - June 2003: “Saddam Fedayeen”, “Regime Death Squads”
June 2003 - April 2004: “Loyalists” (changed because it had too much of a postive connotation), “Former Regime Elements” (changed because the acronym FRE sounded too much like “free”), “Rebels” (changed because it was too neutral, perhaps even a bit positive)
April 2004 - November 29, 2005: “Insurgents” (changed because it lent “more legitimacy than they seem to merit.”)
November 30, 2005 - Present : “Enemies of the Legitimate Iraqi Government”
Up next: “Iraqi Cong” and “Former Enemies, Now Allies of Iran
Cost of the War in Iraq
(JavaScript Error)
To see more details, click here.