RON REEDER: MASTER OF FINE ARTS

Friday, I formally become a MASTER of Fine Arts. Heh. "Now I am the master." I suppose that makes me even more qualified to author a blog called Real Art, but whatever; anyone can be an artist. Anyway, it's time to re-run the commencement address I wrote for a mask assignment during my first year up here at LSU. Details on how the speech came to be here. I'm also embedding the Beatles video for "All You Need Is Love," which needs to play during the speech. Ideally, you should simply push play, and then read the text below.

Here goes:

SMITH'S COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS



President Griswold, members of the faculty, graduates and their families, ladies and gentlemen:

Let me begin by expressing my appreciation for the very deep honor which you have conferred upon me. As General de Gaulle occasionally acknowledges America to be the daughter of Europe, so I am pleased to come to Yale, the daughter of Harvard. It might be said now that I have the best of both worlds, a Harvard education and a Yale degree.

To be popular one must be a mediocrity.

It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.

There's nothing you can do that can't be done. Nothing you can sing that can't be sung. Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game. It's easy. There's nothing you can make that can't be made. No one you can save that can't be saved. Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be in time. It's easy. There's nothing you can know that isn't known. Nothing you can see that isn't shown. Nowhere you can be that isn't where you're meant to be. It would be very glamorous to be reincarnated as a great big ring on Liz Taylor's finger.

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.

Congratulations! Today is your day. You’re off to Great Places! You’re off and away! You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And you are the ones who'll decide where to go. Life is too important to be taken seriously.

All you need is love.

From the book of Matthew:

"Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

But question authority. Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion. Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious. Take, say, the core of the established religions today: the Bible. It is basically polytheistic, with the warrior God demanding of his chosen people that they not worship the other Gods and destroy those who do -- in an extremely brutal way, in fact. It would be hard to find a more genocidal text in the literary canon, or a more violent and destructive character than the God who was to be worshipped.

Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear. It is partly the terror of the unknown and partly, as I have said, the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand by you in all your troubles and disputes. Fear is the basis of the whole thing -- fear of the mysterious, fear of defeat, fear of death. Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand in hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those two things.

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible. And so I am a deeply superficial person.

From the book of Ecclesiastes:

"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? It hath been already of old time, which was before us. There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after. I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit."

I have known them all already, known them all, have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons; I have measured out my life with coffee spoons. I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, and I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, and in short, I was afraid. I have dared disturb the universe. I have prayed to God, but God is dead. I should have been a pair of ragged claws scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

This is the end. My only friend, the end, of our elaborate plans, the end, of everything that stands, the end, no safety or surprise, the end. I'll never look into your eyes...again. The end of laughter and soft lies. The end of nights we tried to die.

This is the end.

Hooray! I'm a Master of Fine Arts!

Time to re-start my life...

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DOBSON WON'T VOTE IF GIULIANI GETS GOP NOMINATION

From CNN courtesy of AlterNet:

Dobson, 71, is the founder and chairman of Colorado-based Focus on the Family, but said he was writing as "a private citizen and not on behalf of any organization or party."

He endorsed President Bush in 2004, the first time he endorsed a presidential candidate.

Dobson's organization says his daily radio program is heard by as many as 220 million listeners over 3,500 stations in the United States. He's also seen on 80 television stations, and 10 Focus on the Family magazines have 2.3 million subscribers, the group says.

Dobson attacked Giuliani for publicly saying he hates abortion but supports a woman's right to have one. Giuliani had been criticized for being ambiguous on his abortion views, but firmly stated last week that he supports abortion rights.

More here.

James Dobson is as big of a psychopath as Jerry Falwell was. This possible flirtation with pulling out of politics is extraordinarily good news. The Republican marriage with fundamentalist Christians has been politically powerful, but always unstable. The true GOP power brokers never really took the religious right seriously, throwing them a bone every now and then, but never really willing to descend into the theocratic lunacy that leaders like Falwell wanted. Now that Republicans, as a party, are running scared, fundamentalist lunatics are something of a liability, and smart guys like Giuliani know it.

I really hope he gets the nomination. It could drive the religious nuts out of politics completely for years to come.

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Hitchens slams Falwell’s life

From CNN via Crooks and Liars:

HITCHENS: The whole consideration of this — of this horrible little person is offensive to very, very many of us who have some regard for truth and for morality, and who think that ethics do not require that lies be told to children by evil old men, that we're — we're not told that people who believe like Falwell will be snatched up into heaven, where I'm glad to see he skipped the rapture, was found on the floor of his office, while the rest of us go to hell.

How dare they talk to children like this? How dare they raise money from credulous people on their huckster-like "Elmer Gantry" radio stations, and fly around in private jets, as he did, giggling and sniggering all the time at what he was getting away with?

Do you get an idea now of what I mean to say?

COOPER: Yes, no, I think — I think you're making yourself very clear.

I mean, I…

(CROSSTALK)

HITCHENS: How dare he say, for example, that the Antichrist is already present amongst us and is an adult male Jew, while all the time, fawning on the worst elements in Israel, with his other hand pumping anti-Semitic innuendoes into American politics, along with his friends Robertson and Graham?

COOPER: And, yet, there are…

(CROSSTALK)

HITCHENS: … encouraging — encouraging — encouraging the most extreme theocratic fanatics and maniacs on the West Bank and in Gaza not to give an inch of what he thought of as holy land to the people who already live there, undercutting and ruining every Democrat and secularist in the Jewish state in the name of God?

Click here for the video.

Hitchens, a Trotskyite writer, went nuts after 9/11 and abandoned the left in order to support the neocon wars of aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan. That made him not a very popular guy in liberal online circles. Of course, what pushed him in this baffling direction was his utter hatred of religion--apparently, he was extraordinarily rattled by the fatwa declared by Iranian clerics against his pal author Salman Rushdie back in 1989. Once the WTC was hit in 2001, I'm sure he was totally freaked out. So now he's a hawk without any real ideological allies.

But man, he's still stellar when bashing religion. Actually, his anti-religious zeal is probably what drives him more than anything these days. And man, he really lets Falwell have it. This video is well worth checking out, if only for its bile and venom.

He's also got a really kickass English accent. Go check it out.

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ATRIOS ON ECONOMIST BIAS

From Eschaton:

The second is that early on it becomes hardwired in our young economist brains that it makes sense that if the pie is bigger there are more slices to pass around. You can have gains from a policy such as "free trade" and then redistribute the goodies later. But the redistribution doesn't happen.

All this leaves aside other issues, such as the fact that people, especially French people, don't just like goodies but also this mysterious thing called "leisure" which doesn't get counted in that GDP figure...

Click here for the rest.

Duncan Black, a.k.a. Atrios, is a trained economist who actually taught the subject at the university level before his blog became popular enough to support him. In my opinion, he's at his best as a blogger when taking on economic issues, explaining abstract concepts in concrete terms that average Americans can understand.

The above linked post is a good example. Of course, I totally agree with Atrios on this.

Back in the late 90s when the economy was booming, it was achingly obvious to me that vast segments of the population were being left behind. I often told my public speaking students that the economy was doing great...if you're rich. And after multiple Bush recessions, the now "recovering" economy appears to be doing the same thing. Indeed, it's become pretty obvious that the old ways of determining national economic health are no longer useful. A growing economy means nothing if you're not in the loop, and not in the loop is where more and more Americans are now finding themselves. Unemployment is down? Well, that would be really nice if all these new jobs weren't in the shitty service sector for low wages and no benefits. Consumer spending is up? That's just great for all the credit card companies holding the usurious levels of debt that more and more people find themselves servicing. The corporate sector has finally perfected the art of expanding the economy and pocketing the profits--part of that is owning politicians from both parties who've legalized the whole scam.

Things are fucked, and economists are oblivious.

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Falwell shepherded Christian right into the polls

From the Chicago Tribune courtesy of the Houston Chronicle:

Founder and pastor at Lynchburg's Thomas Road Baptist Church for more than 50 years, Falwell played a major role in taking evangelism from the revival tent to the television screen to a prominent seat at the table of national politics.

He achieved national stature — including the covers of Time and Newsweek — for spurring conservative Christians into political action beginning with his founding of the Moral Majority in 1979, a development that helped propel Ronald Reagan into the White House.

Engaging issues such as abortion, gay rights, pornography and bans on school prayer, Falwell told Christians it was their duty to jump into the political fray. And they did, millions of them registering and voting for the first time in 1980. At one point the Moral Majority claimed 6.5 million members.

"Jerry Falwell, more than anyone else, was responsible for galvanizing and spearheading the most important mass political movement of the last 30 years. His Moral Majority really catapulted the Republican Party to power," said Matthew Wilson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.

And

He apologized, for example, after televised remarks suggesting that the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks reflected God's judgment on a nation spiritually weakened by the American Civil Liberties Union, providers of abortion and supporters of gay rights, and after he called Muhammad a terrorist.

Click here for more.

I was working in the Swine Palace theater office today when I saw the news of Falwell's death online. I immediately announced it to all within earshot. Several of my fellow students, all raging liberals like me, immediately started cheering, clapping, and jumping up and down. Me too. I was really happy that the old asshole is gone. After a moment or two of this, our marketing director, who is a rightward moderate, a decent fellow who loves a good political argument, admonished us for our celebration, saying something to the effect of "a man is dead." I couldn't help but laugh and laugh, but my suddenly silent classmates made me think of the time my dad told me how businessmen at Standard Oil of Texas, where my mother worked in 1963, had done essentially the same thing when JFK was murdered.

Was I wrong to celebrate Falwell's end?

I thought about it for a bit. Falwell, more than any other individual, merged the Republican Party with fundamentalist Christianity, and almost singlehandedly started the so-called Culture War. There is no doubt in my mind that his actions caused the Reagan White House to drag its feet for over four years on the AIDS crisis simply because the victims were mostly gay--in the meantime people were dropping dead like flies. Indeed, Falwell's horrible legacy is all over the place. Stem cell research funding is in limbo while people degenerate and die from Parkinson's and other ailments. Anti-abortion propaganda has put countless young girls into a hell of self-doubt and self-hatred while dealing with unwanted pregnancies. Rhetorical gay-bashing has given encouragement and moral certitude to physical gay-bashers. Falwell's celebration of blind faith was fully in play as an overwhelming majority of Americans supported the White House lies that got us into Iraq.

Yeah, that's right, Falwell's rhetoric descends directly into the post 9/11 demagoguery that has killed hundreds of thousands in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He had blood on his hands. Lots of it. He was not a decent man. He was not a man of God; he was the exact opposite, pushing this great country toward evil. Certainly, he was no ruler like Stalin or Hitler or Pol Pot. He didn't have blood on his hands that way. But it is appropriate to compare him to, say, Goebbels or Eichmann, men who didn't personally order death, but facilitated it all the same.

Falwell was scum. It's right to be happy about his passing. I make no apologies for my celebration.

Fuck him.

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VICE PRESIDENT CAUGHT UP IN PROSTITUTION SCANDAL

From CounterPunch:

Cheney and the DC Madam's Cookie Jar

"WMR has confirmed with extremely knowledgeable CIA and Pentagon sources that the former CEO who is on Deborah Jeane Palfrey's list is Vice President Dick Cheney. Cheney was CEO of Halliburton during the time of his liaisons with the Pamela Martin & Associates escort firm. Palfrey's phone invoices extend back to 1996 and include calls to and from Cheney...while he was the CEO and maintained a residence off Chain Bridge Road in the Ballantrae neighborhood in McLean, Virginia, a few blocks from the headquarters of the CIA...."

More here.

"WMR" refers to the usually extremely accurate website run by investigative journalist Wayne Madsen. He gets good dirt and I'd be linking to him all the time except for the fact that his site doesn't link individual posts, which is damned frustrating. Anyway, this is totally believable. Cheney is a hard drinking, hard-core motherfucker. OF COURSE he was using hookers when he was in the private sector.

Now I have to admit that I've never really made up my mind about the ethics and morals of prostitution. I know that as the business is currently constructed, that is, as an illegal enterprise, it's really awful for the women involved; on the other hand, prostitutes working in the legal and regulated environment of Nevada appear to be less oppressed. Tough call, so I'm not scolding the Veep here simply for using prostitutes. What I am doing is calling him out for the standard GOP variety of hypocrisy that allows prominent right wing figures to rhetorically blast, say, drug users or freaky sex people, while doing the same thing themselves on the side. Think Rush Limbaugh or Ted Haggard.

And, oh yeah, using prostitutes is also breaking the law.

The real question here is if the corporate media picks up the story. ABC News has already declared that these phone records contain nothing of any real political interest, so it sounds like the whitewash is already underway. Lemme tell ya, the Dems would be fools not to ram this down the Republican elephant's throat.

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News site outsources local journalism

From CNN courtesy of Crooks and Liars:

Outsourcing first claimed manufacturing jobs, then hit services such as technical support, airline reservations and tax preparation. Now comes the next frontier: local journalism.

James Macpherson, editor and publisher of the two-year-old Web site pasadenanow.com, acknowledged it sounds strange to have journalists in India cover news in this wealthy city just outside Los Angeles.

But he said it can be done from afar now that weekly Pasadena City Council meetings can be watched over the Internet. And he said the idea makes business sense because of India's lower labor costs.

"I think it could be a significant way to increase the quality of journalism on the local level without the expense that is a major problem for local publications," said the 51-year-old Pasadena native. "Whether you're at a desk in Pasadena or a desk in Mumbai, you're still just a phone call or e-mail away from the interview."

More here.

Okay, so this is really just a California entrepreneur and his wife trying to make some money out of their basement, but, conceptually, it pretty much captures the essence of how the corporate news media is so fucked up. From a business perspective, it makes perfect sense to try to cut costs by chasing lower wages in the third world. But when you go after the bottom line in this way, there are always hidden losses. In the same way that farming out pet food manufacturing to China has meant a drastic loss of health and safety oversight resulting in countless pet deaths and illness here in the US, farming out the city council beat to Indian reporters means reducing the job to stenography. That is, it's not really reporting anymore. Sure, it provides information, but that's all it is, and such information is already available on the internet, which is how these "reporters" are able to report it. Real reporters, ideally, look for real stories, and by being in personal contact with the officials they're covering, and by being in the actual city that they're covering, they're able to get leads, hunt down good dirt, and generally serve their communities in ways that journalists have traditionally done.

In short, treating news as though it were some interchangeable, standardized product means it's not really the news anymore. I mean, it looks like news, but it ultimately lacks the depth necessary for citizens to make important decisions about the course of their city, state, or country.

More on how business practices shape and skew the news here.

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DRUNK MONKEYS

From YouTube courtesy of AlterNet:



Okay, this isn't usually the kind of post I make here at Real Art, but, as regular readers probably already know, I troll AlterNet pretty heavily for stuff to comment on, and they ran this drunk monkey clip from Animal Planet, and, well, I love monkeys, and these are drunk monkeys. I'm also fascinated by anthropologists who study primates in order to better understand human behavior: apparently, these particular monkeys, in terms of percentage of population, tend to drink just like humans; that is, some get trashed all the time, some are responsible, and some just stay on the wagon.

But when you get right down to it, I'm posting this video because they're monkeys. And they're drunk monkeys.

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Suit: Sub showed 'Brokeback' in class

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

The lawsuit claims that Jessica Turner, 12, suffered psychological distress after viewing the movie in her eighth-grade class at Ashburn Community Elementary School last year.

The film, which won three Oscars, depicts two cowboys who conceal their homosexual affair.

Turner and her grandparents, Kenneth and LaVerne Richardson, are seeking around $500,000 in damages.

"It is very important to me that my children not be exposed to this," said Kenneth Richardson, Turner's guardian. "The teacher knew she was not supposed to do this."

More here.

Okay, so I haven't actually seen the movie, but if I understand correctly, it's not supposed to be gay porn or anything along those lines. Never mind, for a moment, whether the sub broke the rules, which I'm sure he did; instead, ask yourself why it's so god-awful bad for eighth graders to see a romance film about gay cowboys. Why is it "very important" that Richardson's "children not be exposed to this"? Is he afraid that his kids will turn gay? Well, that's obviously not going to happen, but even if it did, so what? I'd also like to know the exact nature of this girl's "psychological distress." Is she anxiety-ridden? Depressed? What is it about gay cowboys that's got these people so freaked out?

Obviously, there's a deep strain of homophobia running smack dab down the middle of this suit. That, and the Richardsons probably could really use the 500 grand.

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Push to oust Gonzales loses momentum

From the Financial Times courtesy of TomPaine.com:

Republican members of Congress on Thursday leapt to the defence of Alberto Gonzales, the embattled US attorney-general, as Democratic efforts to oust him appeared to lose momentum.

Mr Gonzales faced a fresh barrage of question from Democrats over the controversial firing of several US attorneys when he appeared before the House judiciary committee.

But Republican committee members largely supported Mr Gonzales and called for an end to the investigation, easing pressure on one of President George W. Bush’s closest political allies.

Democrats have sought to prove that the firings of at least eight US attorneys last year were politically motivated, citing an e-mail by a Gonzales aide that judged federal prosecutors according to whether they were “loyal Bushies”.

“The list of accusations has mushroomed, but the evidence has not,” said Lamar Smith, the senior Republican committee member. “If there are no fish in this lake, we should reel in our lines of questions, dock our empty boat and turn to more pressing issues.”

More here.

WTF?!?

This investigation has uncovered a massive sidestepping of laws mandating the preservation of all White House records, caused an important DOJ aid to take the Fifth, and revealed that Gonzales himself is either fucking stupid or was lying while under oath--how many times did he say "I don't recall"? How could the investigation possibly be losing momentum? I would say this is amazing, but I've seen it happen too many times before to be surprised; the Democrats are rolling over even though they're the majority now. That is, if the investigation really is losing momentum. It would make sense if the press was simply getting bored with the story, and deciding that it's over, you know, because it's not sexy enough now.

Either way, it's fucked up.

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HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!



Your Mother should Know

Let's all get up and dance to a song
That was a hit before your mother was born.
Though she was born a long, long time ago
Your mother should know
Your mother should know
Sing it again.
Let's all get up and dance to a song
That was a hit before your mother was born.
Though she was born a long, long time ago
Your mother should know
Your mother should know
Lift up your hearts and sing me a song
That was a hit before your mother was born.
Though she was born a long, long time ago
Your mother should know

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Top Teacher Shown the Door After Showing “Baghdad ER”

From the Progressive:

Michael Baker worked for the Lincoln, Nebraska, public schools since 1981.

But after he showed the documentary “Baghdad ER” to his geography class on April 18, his career there was over.

This, despite the fact that in 2006, Baker was one of only 47 teachers in the state to win National Board Certification, according to the Lincoln Journal Star, which broke the story.

And

“What’s obvious is that the showing of ‘Baghdad ER’ was only an excuse to remove a progressive educator from the classroom,” Anderson charges.

Baker has clashed with administrators before. In 2005, they objected to his innovative approach to teaching history, which was to start at the present and work backwards, an approach he’d been using for four years.

But then, the school district forbade him from teaching that way any longer. The school’s consultant said it was “not logical, does not contribute to effective teaching or monitoring of progress, and puts students at a disadvantage” with newly instituted statewide tests, according to a paper on the subject by Professor Nancy Patterson of Bowling Green. Baker appealed but lost, and was eventually “prohibited from teaching U.S. history,” Patterson writes.

More here.

So this Progressive article has to speculate because of some compensation deal Baker cut with his district, but, having taught high school for six years myself, I think it's pretty safe to say that their guess is probably dead on. I've been writing here at Real Art lately about how teachers are just as subject to the severe and harsh authoritarian culture of public schools as students are--even slight challenges to the traditional order of things are dealt with harshly; teachers, then, serve as huge examples to their students of both authority and obedience.

It's pretty obvious that the film showing was only a pretense. Baker, who seemed to believe that the institution could actually be used to facilitate real learning, defied the rather arbitrary standards for his department's curriculum. It doesn't matter that learning history backward, by providing some context and real world applicability in order to create some true understanding and appreciation, might actually be a better way to teach history. All that matters is that Baker broke the rules. That is, he stood in direct defiance of the public schools' true mission, indoctrinating children into the culture of obedience and authority. For that he had to be punished.

Learning, you see, is a crime.

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Boston Legal’s Alan Shore on Gitmo

From Crooks and Liars:

James Spader's character named Alan Shore can definitely give one hell of a closing argument. I've posted him before and on Tuesday night the topic was Gitmo. Boston Legal often tackles the incompetence of this administration and whole bunch of issues that are smart and funny…"Guantanamo by the Bay": Alan Shore sues the United States on behalf of a client who was tortured for two years at a detention camp.

Click here for the video.

Okay, so I don't even really watch the show, but I probably would if I knew when it comes on. I only seem to catch it when I happen to be in front of the TV, which doesn't happen often these days, surfing around. I first checked it out because of a review I read praising the wonderfully honest relationship between the character played by William Shatner, a.k.a. Captain Kirk, and Spader's character, Shore, something about their end-of-episode chats on a downtown penthouse terrace. The review was dead on. Shatner's a tricky actor, tending towards melodrama, but clearly possessing great talent when in the right role, guided by the right director, or playing opposite the right actor. Boston Legal has clearly found the right combination to get Shatner's brilliance into a realm of consistency. Somehow he and Spader approach the television sublime when together, and that's what seems to be the glue that holds the show together.

Anyway, the show also deals with politics and general weirdness, well worth watching. I was fortunate enough to see this particular clip a few nights ago: Spader makes a fantastic argument against post 9/11 civil liberties violations by way of sarcastic overstatement. Go check it out--in addition to a silent William Shatner, you'll also see fellow Texas Ex Mitch Pileggi of X-Files fame.

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FRIDAY CAT BLOGGING

Phil



Sammy



Frankie



Be sure to check out Modulator's Friday Ark for more cat blogging!

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Former 'LA Times' Baghdad Chief Says Iraqis Are 'Humiliated'

From Editor and Publisher courtesy of AlterNet:

"Iraqis are rather hostile and feel humiliated. And that's the key thing that maybe some of our policymakers don't understand. The presence of the U.S. soldiers is very humiliating to the Iraqis. Even those who, in their minds know that it's necessary to have the soldiers there, at least some kind of force there preventing an all-out civil war from getting even worse...I don't think they appreciate American culture."

And

"Because there is not - even according to General Petraeus' own guidebook for fighting counterinsurgencies, they're not using soldiers, they're not using enough troops to accomplish their goals...But also, more fundamentally, I don't think that they can do this militarily. I don't think the fundamental problems in Iraq right now are military problems."

More here.

Okay, this has been obvious for quite some time now, but it's nice to hear it from somebody who was on the ground over there for an extended period of time. The US military presence does nothing but aggravate an already bad situation. Sure, if we just pulled out without any planning, the civil war would probably get worse, but why the hell would we leave without any planning? No less than Henry Kissinger has asserted that the only way out is to use a regional approach: bring Iran, Syria, Pakistan, the Saudis, the UN, and others to the table, and hash out something, anything, as long as it doesn't include US troops. It'll be messy, to be sure, but what's going on now is unsustainable.

I mean, the money we're spending should be incentive enough. Not to mention the ever increasing death toll.

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11 GOP Congressmen to Bush: You’ve Lost Credibility

From Crooks and Liars:

On tonight's "Countdown," Keith Olbermann replays an exchange between Brian Williams and Tim Russert from NBC Nightly News this evening about a stunning, closed door meeting that Keith described as a "watershed moment" between President Bush and eleven Republican members of Congress regarding Iraq. In this private meeting, the group, led by Reps. Mark Kirk (R-IL) and Charlie Dent (R-PA), hammered the President on Iraq and the impact the war is having on the future of the Republican Party.

Russert: The Republican Congressmen then went on to say: "The word about the war and its progress cannot come from the White House or even you, Mr. President. There's no longer any credibility. It has to come from General Petraeus."

Click here for the video.

I was wondering if something like this was ever going to happen. Quite the ass-licking. And I don't mean that in the good way. I'm kind of surprised, actually. The cult of Bush, or Reagan's First Law "thou shalt not criticize another Republican," or the kool-aid, whatever you want to call it, has been so amazingly binding to rank and file GOP members that I had kind of been taking for granted that most of them were going to play lemmings and run off the proverbial cliff behind their doofus alpha male. Apparently that's not the case. It's obviously too late to save the Republican Party, so an extra round of applause goes out for these eleven Congressmen: they've done this for their country instead of for political advantage.

I guess some Republicans really do love America.

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Kansas Board of Ed. repeals conservative sex ed policies

From CNN courtesy of AlterNet:

The Kansas Board of Education on Tuesday repealed sex education policies enacted last year, the latest move by the moderate majority to undo efforts by conservatives when they dominated the board.

One rescinded policy recommended that schools stress abstinence until marriage, while the other urged school districts to get parental permission before students could attend human sexuality classes.

On a 6-3 vote, the board replaced the policies with one that recommends "abstinence plus" sex education programs and leaves it up to the state's 296 school districts to decide whether to get parental permission.

The "abstinence plus" program stresses abstinence before marriage, while also urging schools to give students information about birth control and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases.

More here.

Well, it's nice to see that the moderates are trying to clean up the mess left behind by their nutty predecessors. Man, I'll never understand what makes those fundamentalists think this way about sex education. The thought that the whispered implication of sexual encouragement by teachers who talk about condoms somehow makes teens want to have sex is just plain laughable. As if the endless media stream of sexuality that pounds teens every minute of every day, or even hormones and human nature, have nothing to do with it. Obviously, "abstinence based" sex ed is just wishful thinking, but fundies honestly believe they've got a good argument here.

That, in itself, is good reason to totally bar right-wing Christians from ever having anything at all to do with education. Ever. They're fucking crazy.

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Poe blasted for quoting KKK leader during war speech

From Hearst via the Houston Chronicle:

U.S. Rep. Ted Poe, R-Humble, has ignited ire from bloggers nationwide and inspired TV personality Keith Olbermann to label him one of the "worst in the world."

It's because Poe, a Texas history enthusiast from his days as a Harris County prosecutor and judge, quoted Ku Klux Klan leader and Civil War Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest during a House floor speech about the war in Iraq.

Poe stated that Bedford Forrest's military strategy was "Get there firstest with the mostest" — a variation on the "Git thar fustest with the mostest" quote attributed to Forrest.

Historians disagree about whether the general ever said those exact words. Regardless, Poe's words rippled across the Capitol and online, where bloggers accused the congressman of racism for offering Forrest as a font of wisdom.

More here.

Poe was the local judge in the area where I grew up. While on the bench he made sure that people knew he had a reputation for being "tough on crime" and and for creative sentencing, like making DWI convicts wear sandwich board signs publicizing their crime, that sort of thing. In short, he's a big fucking right-wing idiot, and his ill-considered quotation probably has more to do with his mental retardation than with any sort of conscious racism. I mean, he may very well be a racist for all I know, but I don't think quoting the KKK's founder makes him one. After all, Hitler had some interesting things to say: would quoting him make me a racist? Hell no.

At this point the GOP is running scared. I don't think it's wise to bash them for piddling bullshit.

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Kansas Tornado Renews Debate on Guard at War

From the New York Times courtesy of AlterNet:

Ms. Sebelius’s comments about the slow response prompted a debate with the White House on Tuesday, which initially said the fault rested with her. Tony Snow, the White House press secretary, said the governor should have followed procedure by finding gaps after the storm hit and asking the federal government to fill them — but did not.

“If you don’t request it, you’re not going to get it,” Mr. Snow told reporters on Tuesday morning.

The debate was reminiscent of the Bush administration’s skirmishes with Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco of Louisiana, also a Democrat, after Hurricane Katrina. But after an angry flurry of words, both sides seemed to back down a bit later Tuesday.

Ms. Sibelius said she now had enough equipment and personnel to deal with the problems in Greensburg, and the White House acknowledged that the governor had requested several items that the federal government supplied, including a mobile command center, a mobile office building, an urban search and rescue team, and coordination of extra Black Hawk helicopters.

Nonetheless, the governor and officials in other states again expressed concern that the problem could occur again as the stretched National Guard system struggled to respond to disasters at home while also fighting overseas.

Click here for more.

When progressives raised this point during the reign of chaos in New Orleans after Katrina hit, I mostly kept my mouth shut about it. After all, there was no way of really knowing if the Louisiana National Guard response was late in coming due to the Iraq war or if it was just plain incompetence on the part of Louisiana's governor--I mean, obviously, Bush doesn't have a monopoly on incompetence, and there was plenty else to write about in regards to Katrina. For me, this new story about Kansas National Guard equipment shortages nails the coffin shut. In addition to the now infamous incompetence demonstrated by Bush's FEMA, the Federal and state response after Hurricane Katrina was so bad because important resources were tied up in the Iraq occupation.

I think it's safe to say that we're now, and have been, experiencing domestic casualties in this damned war, and it's from friendly fire. Fucking bastards.

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QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES
Means "Who Polices the Police?"

From the BBC courtesy of AlterNet:

LA police reassigned over clashes

News footage showed a police officer pushing a TV camerawoman to the ground and shoving people who were walking away from the officers.

Officials have denied the police deliberately targeted immigrants or civil rights activists.

But police chief William Bratton has acknowledged that an order for protesters to disperse may not have been understood because it was issued in English when most of those attending the rally spoke only Spanish.

Nonetheless, the highest-ranking officer at the scene of the rally has been demoted and placed on house leave pending the outcome of an internal inquiry.

His second-in-charge, a veteran of almost 40 years on the force, has been demoted and about 60 highly-trained riot control officers who were involved in the clashes have been reassigned.
Click here for more.

When I talk about police culture being out of control, this is exactly what I mean. It's not a question of whether demonstrators could speak English or not. It's that the concept didn't even occur to the cops on the scene. They were much more concerned with asserting their authority, so much so that they had to go after people who were obviously on their way out. And that's the problem: cops operate in an insular, hypermasculine, violent, and authoritarian culture. That means taking control, regardless of whether that's the right or strategic thing to do.

Clearly, this needs to change. We live in an ever more complicated world. Hitting people over the head isn't always a smart move.

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TWO FROM THE HOUSTON CHRONICLE

So it's finals week and I have no finals. Strangely, I'm extraordinarily busy. Go figure. Soon. Soon I'll graduate. Anyway, here's a couple of noteworthy stories via the Houston Chronicle.

Senate blocks bid to allow prescription drug imports

From the AP

In a triumph for the pharmaceutical industry, the Senate on Monday killed a drive to allow consumers to buy prescription drugs from abroad at a significant savings over domestic prices.

On a 49-40 vote, the Senate required the administration to certify the safety and effectiveness of imported drugs before they can be imported, a requirement that officials have said they cannot meet.

"Well, once again the big drug companies have proved that they are the most powerful and best financed lobby in Washington," said Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican.

The vote neutralized a second amendment, later passed on a voice vote, that would legalize the importation of prescription drugs manufactured in Canada, Australia, Europe, Japan and New Zealand.

More here.

Fight against adult businesses costly for city

It's a big bill for so few clothes.

The city has spent nearly $1.3 million since 1997 on outside lawyers to defend a sweeping sexually oriented business ordinance against legal challenges from topless bars, adult book stores and "modeling" studios, officials say.

That figure doesn't include the likely equal amount of time city lawyers have spent over the years supporting and advising the outside legal team.

City Attorney Arturo Michel said defending the ordinance has been an unusually costly and time-consuming process.

"It involved more legal work, and clearly more work with people looking at the data and preparing for trial," he said. "With most other litigation, we typically don't appropriate anything that's even close to that."

Not surprisingly, the city's policymakers and the adult industry diverge on the necessity of fighting over the ordinance, which, among many regulations, prohibits the businesses from opening within 1,500 of feet of schools, churches, parks and day care centers.

More here.

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Gasoline prices hit record average of $3.07

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

Gasoline prices have surged to a record nationwide average of $3.07 per gallon, nearly 20 cents higher than two weeks earlier, oil industry analyst Trilby Lundberg said Sunday.

The previous record was $3.03 per gallon on Aug. 11, 2006.

But despite inventory fears that have sent prices higher, there are signs that the rising prices at the pump may be peaking.

And

The recent increases are due mostly to refinery problems, Lundberg said, noting there have been at least a dozen additional partial shutdowns in the U.S. and internationally that cut refining capacity.

Click here for the rest.

So rising prices may be peaking, eh? I'm sure they'll bounce back. And since it's become clear that the California energy crisis a few years back was completely constructed by the energy industry timing its "maintenance" operations to happen all at the same time, which shut down electricity generating capacity, thereby greatly decreasing supply, and consequently raising prices astronomically, I have a major hunch that some of these refinery "problems" may be by design. That is, I don't think Big Oil is above market manipulation.

Anyway, there is one way to deal with the situation: tax the fuck out of Big Oil's windfall profits, and regulate pump prices so they can't pass it on to consumers. And don't give me none of that "free market" bullshit. I'm referring to an economic model that worked for decades with regulated power companies. You can write the law such that Big Oil is assured a fair profit, with money for maintenance, exploration, and expansion, while taking all those billions and putting them to good use for average Americans.

Screw economic orthodoxy; these gas prices are bullshit.

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Army general predicts rise in U.S. casualties in Iraq

From the Los Angeles Times via the Houston Chronicle:

A U.S. Army general on Sunday forecast a rise in deaths among American forces in the coming months, a prediction underscored by the announcement that a roadside bomb had killed six U.S. soldiers and a foreign journalist north of Baghdad. Five other American troops died elsewhere over the weekend.

Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, said casualties will climb as American troops dig into enemy territory as part of a stepped-up military operation ordered by President Bush in January.

Lynch, who oversees a swath of territory to the south and east of Baghdad, gave his bleak prediction on the heels of the deadliest month so far this year for American forces in Iraq.

Click here for more.

So no surprise here. Hawks predicted a rise in casualties as part of Bush's dumb-fuck "surge" plan; doves predicted the same thing. Heck, I predicted it too: putting meat into a meat grinder results in hamburger--it's common sense on which we can all agree. Where the disagreement lies is in whether or not the "surge" will accomplish anything. The White House has asserted repeatedly that the idea is to create a stable situation such that the Iraqi government and military can rise to the challenge, or stand up, or whatever the catch-phrase of the day is. Meanwhile, the Pentagon has announced that training Iraqi soldiers has been downgraded as a priority, and the sham Iraqi government we created doesn't appear to be getting its shit together.

Obviously, the "surge" can only result in loss of American life, and nothing else.

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NEWSWEEK Poll: Bush Hits All-Time Low

From MSNBC courtesy of AlterNet:

It’s hard to say which is worse news for Republicans: that George W. Bush now has the worst approval rating of an American president in a generation, or that he seems to be dragging every ’08 Republican presidential candidate down with him. But According to the new NEWSWEEK Poll, the public’s approval of Bush has sunk to 28 percent, an all-time low for this president in our poll, and a point lower than Gallup recorded for his father at Bush Sr.’s nadir. The last president to be this unpopular was Jimmy Carter who also scored a 28 percent approval in 1979. This remarkably low rating seems to be casting a dark shadow over the GOP’s chances for victory in ’08. The NEWSWEEK Poll finds each of the leading Democratic contenders beating the Republican frontrunners in head-to-head matchups.

Perhaps that explains why Republican candidates, participating in their first major debate this week, mentioned Bush’s name only once, but Ronald Reagan’s 19 times. (The debate was held at Reagan’s presidential library.)

Click here for more.

Holy shit, that's pathetic! My oh my, how the mighty have fallen. I think it's safe to say now that Bush is utterly despised. I mean, he's below 30%; you can just trash him in casual conversation these days, and anybody who challenges you is the one who looks like a nut. If you think back to early 2003, when the White House had whipped the country into bloodlust, it was exactly the opposite: opposing Bush made you the nut. Of course, the ten or twenty percent of the country who had the balls to think for themselves in those days were actually the level-headed folk, but there's no need to dwell on that at the moment, although this ought to be discussed ad infinitum in the future for obvious reasons.

For now, I'm basking in all this wonderful Bush hatred.

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Fort Bend principal resigns in Bachelor backlash

From the Houston Chronicle:

The principal disciplined after one of her teachers appeared on the television show The Bachelor has resigned her position.

Tammie Carpenter sent a letter of resignation to Fort Bend Independent School District officials saying she was stepping down effective June 29.

Carpenter, the principal of Colony Bend Elementary, was disciplined by the district after she allowed teacher Amber Alchalabi to miss 22 class days earlier this year to tape episodes of The Bachelor.

Previous plans called for Carpenter to be reassigned to another campus and demoted.

And

The flap around Alchalabi's appearance on the show started two weeks ago. Lesley White and Raquel Flores, both parents who have children in Alchalabi's class, were upset that the teacher was gone for such an extended period.

White also said the nature of the show was not appropriate for a teacher and took issue with the show's producers taping at the school.

"It does not promote family values, moral values or appreciation of the normal 'dating' process. To exploit the children during the filming of this show is unacceptable," White said in a letter to district officials.

Flores also was concerned, saying class routine was interrupted while children were preparing to take the TAKS tests.

More here.

So what this means is that teachers are not supposed to have personal lives. That is, even on their own time, they are expected to adhere to the arbitrary and authoritarian standards of the workplace. Even indirectly aiding such a challenge to the indoctrinational system known as education can result in dismissal, even though in this case they're calling it a "resignation." It's like I said last week: teachers must necessarily be the most indoctrinated individuals participating in the educational system, serving as examples of both authority and obedience, and even slight challenges are dealt with harshly.

As usual, this extreme example proves the rule: public education's mission is to indoctrinate children into the culture of obedience and authority.

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THE NEW SPIDER-MAN MOVIE

Things I liked:

1. The appearance of NYPD Capt. Stacy, a favorite character from the 60s.
2. Casting favorite character actor James Cromwell to play Capt. Stacy.
3. The appearance of the Sandman, another 60s favorite.
4. Casting favorite character actor and Texan Thomas Hayden Church to play the Sandman.
5. The appearance of Venom.
6. Casting the goofy That 70s Show actor, and Bizarro Tobey Maguire, Topher Grace to play Venom.
7. The appearance of Peter Parker's 60s pre-MJ girlfriend, Gwen Stacy.
8. Harry Osborne.
9. Mary Jane Watson.
10. Bruce Campbell's silly French maitre d'.
11. Doctor Conners.
12. The black symbiote suit.
13. Peter Parker's self-doubt and crying.
14. The obligatory cameo appearance by Stan Lee.
15. Theresa Russell's brief scene as the Sandman's wife.
16. Jolly Jonah Jameson.
17. Betty Brant.
18. Robbie Robertson.

Things I didn't like:

1. Trying to tell five or six different stories, incompletely, in one movie.

Unfortunately, that one item on the latter list goes a long way towards canceling out everything on the former list. Not even all the explosions and flying debris could do anything to help.

There's a pretty darned good reason I don't watch too many movies these days.



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FRIDAY CAT BLOGGING

Sammy



Frankie



Phil



Be sure to check out Modulator's Friday Ark for more cat bloggging!

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Higher Education Conformity

From AlterNet:

But in the last three decades the percentage of jobs requiring at least some college has doubled, which means that employers are going along with the college racket. A resume without a college degree is never going to get past the computer programs that screen applications. Why? Certainly it's not because most corporate employers possess a deep affinity for the life of the mind. In fact in his book Executive Blues G. J. Meyers warned of the "academic stench" that can sink a career: That master's degree in English? Better not mention it.

My theory is that employers prefer college grads because they see a college degree chiefly as mark of one's ability to obey and conform. Whatever else you learn in college, you learn to sit still for long periods while appearing to be awake. And whatever else you do in a white collar job, most of the time you'll be sitting and feigning attention. Sitting still for hours on end -- whether in library carrels or office cubicles -- does not come naturally to humans. It must be learned -- although no college has yet been honest enough to offer a degree in seat-warming.

Click here for more.

Jeez, there are about a billion different directions I could go in commenting on this. For one, I don't think emplyers actually have a conscious intent in using college degrees as a sign of employee conformity, although such a thing may very well be happening unconsciously. But what strikes me the most about this Barbara Ehrenreich essay is how American society tends to view the concept of college.

Historically, a university education was for an elite few. Growing out of the monastic system of the Catholic Church, the idea was to create enlightened individuals who would be leaders in various fields. That concept, more or less, existed well into the twentieth century. The GI Bill after WWII changed all that. Masses of American veterans entered universities at the government's expense, which seems to have created an expectation over the years that everybody ought to go to college. By the time I was a kid in the 70s, it was understood that the only way to get ahead, the only way to live out the (mostly fictional) American dream was to have a college degree. Universities and colleges were no longer about creating enlightened individuals; they were, and continue to be, degree mills for the facilitation of social and economic advancement.

The funny thing is that college degrees these days, now that the era of the "company man" has ended, guarantee nothing in terms of job placement, but everybody seems to think that higher education is the key to the good life. Indeed, politicians and economists continually assert that more people need to go to college in order to deal with the ravages of globalization spawned job displacement. Meanwhile, white collar jobs disappear overseas.

Don't get me wrong. I, too, believe that everybody ought to get a college education, but not for the purpose of making more money. College makes enlightened human beings who are able to contribute to civil society much better; it also enriches one's personal life greatly. But this understanding that college is a meal ticket has got to end. A university education is its own reward, but the expectation that it's all about the paper you get when you're done has demonstrably diluted the higher learning experience. That is, lots of kids fuck off at school for years, get their degrees, and are still big idiots once they get out: universities, needing tuition dollars, let this happen; corporations, playing the degree weed-out game, are totally content to let it continue.

It really is a big racket when you think about it.

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Pet food recall expansion sparks FDA action

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

Government inspectors are checking food makers who use protein concentrates to make sure none of the contaminated products found in pet food have reached other products, the Food and Drug Administration said today.

There is no evidence that any of the two contaminated batches of wheat gluten and rice protein from China ended up as an ingredient in human food, "but it's prudent to look," said Dr. David Acheson, assistant FDA commissioner for food protection.

And

The announcement came as pet food manufacturer Menu Foods expanded its recall because of possible cross-contamination between melamine-tainted products and other foods made in the same period.

More here.

Christ! How much bigger is this melamine thing going to get? I'm less nervous about my cats now, if only because the recall has been going on for a month and a half and they continue to be healthy, but the way this seems to be lingering is pretty damned annoying. The contamination appears to be on a pretty massive scale, which makes utterly clear that the FDA provides very little oversight of imported food products, which makes a great deal of sense given the anti-regulation attitudes of the Republicans, who have run the FDA since Bush took office in 2001. I'd bet fifty bucks that this shit has made it into the human food supply here in the US.

And if the allegations about Chinese manufacturers spiking food exports with melamine to boost the apparent protein content are true, there's a good chance we've been ingesting this chemical for a long time. Low doses of the stuff are probably safe, but continued exposure just can't be good.

Does anybody really know what we're eating, anyway?

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TWO FROM ALTERNET

Man, it's the last week of class for the last semester of my master's program, and I'm F'ing busy!!! No blogging time tonight. Instead, here are a couple of cool essays from the always cool AlterNet.

New Studies Destroy the Last Objection to Medical Marijuana

Back in 1999, the Institute of Medicine's White House-commissioned report on medical marijuana conceded marijuana's medical benefits, saying that what is needed is "a nonsmoked rapid-onset cannabinoid drug delivery system."

The new studies -- one from the University of California, San Francisco, and the other from the University at Albany, State University of New York -- confirm that such a system is here. It's called vaporization, and has been familiar to medical marijuana patients for many years, but few outside the medical marijuana community know it exists. Unlike smoking, a vaporizer does not burn the plant material, but heats it just to the point at which the THC and the other cannabinoids vaporize. In the Volcano vaporizer tested at UCSF, the vapors are collected in a detachable plastic bag with a mouthpiece for inhalation.

Click here for more.

The End of Internet Radio?

These three judges on the recently empaneled Copyright Royalty Board decided to raise webcasting royalty rates drastically, to levels proposed by SoundExchange, a digital music collecting society presided over by record labels and musicians unions. Specifically, the board’s ruling denied webcasters’ requests for a stay and a rehearing, effectively closing the door on further deliberation over the royalty rates and requiring that webcasters begin paying the new rates by May 15 of this year, due retroactively from the beginning of 2006.

Supporters of this decision argue that these new, higher royalty rates will ensure that musicians are paid fairly for their work as the music industry shifts its focus from traditional media to the Internet. Currently, record labels and recording artists don’t receive any royalties at all from terrestrial radio, which is required to pay only composers and publishers. However, detractors argue that the new rates are ruinously high and will lead to bankruptcy for the vast majority of webcasters, eliminating a resource that entertains more than 70 million Americans and financially supports tens of thousands of recording artists.

More here.

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THE SHOW I'M IN GETS REVIEWED
Diverse cast comes together in ‘Cocktail’

From the Baton Rouge Advocate:

The cast is good — a successful blending of professional and student actors — the choreography is fast, together and hip, and the real life story of Thai researcher Krisana Kraisintu is compelling. The play’s weakness lies in the storytelling.

The stage version of Kraisintu’s life pits her against the Thai government, which wants the scientist to lead a team in the production of headache remedies and vitamin syrups, and the world’s drug companies which are happy to rid the world of disease if there’s money in it.

LiCata’s and Chong’s play has Kraisintu, played by Mia Katigbak, overcoming obstacles by ignoring them. There’s no tension, no make-them-laugh, make-them-cry, make-them-wait.

There are some wonderful scenes, one in which a drug manufacturer’s mascot, a giant, red and white panda, does a madcap number with robot-like dancers in white shirts and black trousers.

When Kraisintu meets representatives of the company that owns patents on drugs she needs for her HIV cocktail, the scene is played more for laughs.

If the writers’ intention was to create a situation where corporate greed and insanity lose to honesty and inexpensive innovation, “Cocktail” needs fewer laughs and more drama.

More here.

Well, I'd agree with that last statement if it was, say, 1965 or so. That is, this show is definitely in the postmodern tradition, which according to Wikipedia, is characterized by, among other things, "the abandonment of strong divisions of genre, 'high' and 'low' art, and the emergence of the global village." That is, playing comedic subjects dramatically, or dramatic subjects comedically, is totally fair game in this day and age. In fact, such an approach has become so ordinary and commonplace here some twenty years into the Pomo era that TV, film, popular music, and advertising abound with such examples. It is odd, indeed, that the Advocate's reviewer didn't at least make mention of postmodernism as an artistic approach in the review.

Maybe he just doesn't understand.

Nonetheless, judging by the overall article, he found much to like about Cocktail, and I'm satisfied with that. I mean, he continues to ingnores me, but in this case, I'm in a huge cast, so I guess that's just something I'll have to deal with. At any rate, audiences seem to be downright inspired by the show, just as I am by performing in it.

We run through Sunday. Come see it if you're in the Red Stick this week.

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THE STAR TREK CALENDAR PICTURE OF THE MONTH IS...



Mr. Sulu!

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HAPPY MAY DAY, COMRADES!

From Wikipedia:

In the United States, May Day is officially observed as Loyalty Day.

"May Day" also refers to various socialist and labor movement celebrations conducted on May 1, unrelated to the traditional celebrations, to commemorate the Haymarket martyrs of 1886 and the international socialist movement generally. The latter event is an important holiday in Communist and Socialist countries.

In recent years, London based group the Space Hijackers have held events on May Day. These include Mayday Anarchists vs Members of Parliament Cricket in 2005, and a Police Victory Party in 2006. In 2007 the group plan a "Suited and Booted" party in the City of London, the financial centre of London.

In addition, May Day in the United States is commonly regarded — at least by certain groups — as a commemoration of the execution of the Haymarket martyrs who were arrested after the Haymarket Riot of 1886 in Chicago, Illinois, which occurred on May 4, but was the culmination of labor unrest which began on May 1. The date consequently became established as an anarchist and socialist holiday during the 20th century, and in these circles it is often known as International Workers' Day or Labour Day. In this form, May Day has become an international celebration of the social and economic achievements of the working class and labor movement.

More here.

Needless to say, I stand in solidarity with all movements of social liberation and justice, worldwide. Power to the people!


Karl Marx

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QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES
Documents Reveal: Cops Planted Pot on 92-Year
Old Woman They Killed in Botched Drug Raid

From AlterNet:

By 6 p.m., they had the legal document they needed to break into Kathryn Johnston's house, and within 40 minutes they were prying off the burglar bars and using a ram to burst through the elderly woman's front door. It took about two minutes to get inside, which gave Johnston time to retrieve her rusty .38 revolver.

Tesler was at the back door when Junnier, Smith and the other narcotics officers crashed through the front.

Johnston got off one shot, the bullet missing her target and hitting a porch roof. The three narcotics officers answered with 39 bullets.

Five or six bullets hit the terrified woman. Authorities never figured out who fired the fatal bullet, the one that hit Johnston in the chest. Some pieces of the other bullets -- friendly fire -- hit Junnier and two other cops.

The officers handcuffed the mortally wounded woman and searched the house.

There was no Sam.

There were no drugs.

There were no cameras that the officers had claimed was the reason for the no-knock warrant.

Just Johnston, handcuffed and bleeding on her living room floor.

That is when the officers took it to another level. Three baggies of marijuana were retrieved from the trunk of the car and planted in Johnston's basement. The rest of the pot from the trunk was dropped down a sewage drain and disappeared.

The three began getting their stories straight.

Click here for the rest.

Cops are always right. Cops are the good guys. Cops are real men, with big dicks, badges, and guns. We can trust cops. They have our best interests at heart. If you don't suck cop dick as often as possible, you're not a real American. You're not even human. Oh, please god, send a cop to break in my house and wave a gun in my face. Oh wait, you've already done that. Thank you god, for allowing me to suffer humiliation and indignity for my country. The only way it could have been better is if the cops had killed me for America.

Like with Kathryn Johnston.

Fucking pigs.

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After Moyers Iraq Documentary, DC Reporters in Damage-Control Mode

From AlterNet:

In the lead up to and wake of Bill Moyers' much-anticipated mega-dunk on the Washington press corps this week, we are seeing the ugliest side of Beltway culture -- the meltdown, damage-control freak out. Only what's new is that instead of politicians melting down, it's reporters themselves. And never underestimate the desperation that comes when Establishment Washington unifies to try to defend itself.

Click here for the rest.

The one thing I hate about bigtime journalism more than its rightward skew is the arrogance displayed by these celebrity journalists when they get called on their bullshit. A telling example of this kind of behavior is how the Washington press corp reacted to Stephen Colbert's speech to the White House Correspondents Association last year: as New York Times columnist Frank Rich observed over the weekend, they were pissed off, insisting it wasn't funny and in bad taste; meanwhile, everybody else was hootin' and hollerin' about how fucking funny it was. In short, these so-called reporters just don't get it. They're detached from reality and so totally full of themselves that there's very little chance they'll ever figure out how fucking stupid they are.

So I'm not at all surprised by the corporate news media's reaction to Moyers' devastating attack on their coverage of the Iraq invasion and occupation. Bunch of fucktards. Something tells me that we'll have to wait for them all to die off before we get some more sensible journalists. That means absurdity posing as public discourse for years to come.

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