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Suite101 Articles

2009-09-07T17:49:00.001-07:00

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News From Asheville Global Report

2009-09-07T17:48:00.000-07:00

Aug. 30- Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has the swine flu and officials are contacting other South American governments whose leaders attended a summit last week with the Colombian leader, authorities said Sunday.

The 57-year-old Uribe began feeling symptoms Friday, the same day as a meeting of South American presidents in Bariloche, Argentina, and he was confirmed to have swine flu after returning home, Social Protection Minister Diego Palacio said.

"This isn't something that has us scared," Palacio said at a news conference. Uribe, a key U.S. ally in Latin America, is not considered a high-risk patient and will continue working from his computer, officials said.

Public health director Gilberto Alvarez said in a telephone interview that there was no need to put the president in isolation and that his condition would be monitored for three days to a week.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-09-07T17:44:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs.....

2009-09-07T17:43:00.001-07:00

Visit them...often....

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

North Decoder

Prairie Fire

From The Barricades

The Teacher (1974)-A Prurient Delight

2009-09-07T17:38:00.000-07:00

Oh, the joys of Cinemax, or as we called it back in the day, "Skinemax." Pornography was not neary as accessible at one time as it was today. Nope, we had to beg a magazine from our roommate, or better yet, watch one of the delectable films that we coudl get away with watching in our dorm room TV lounges, 'cause it wasn't really porn, 'cause it was on cable. Besides, you coul actually get away with watching these films when girls were in the room.

I was thinking of this, the other day while watching the 1974 delight, The Teacher. The film featured Jay North (yep! Dennis The Menace hisownself!!) and the star of many of these types of features, Angel Tompkins.

These movies had to have enough plot so that they would not be dubbed pornogrpahy, so, here it is. By the way, I love 1970s low budget movies. These were predominantly shot on location anywhere they could get away with shooting them, and let's face it, just about everything looked like crap in the that decade. Particularly in southern California.

We quickly find out that public school teachers in southern California in the 1970s were some of the most financially-remunerated people in this decade, as Tompkins' character owns a boat,with her name on it, a Camaro, and a ranch-style house, Either that, or she really took her ex-husband to the cleaners, in which case, putting her name on the boat, was a pretty vindictive move. We never quite learn what subject she teaches, but she does like to sun herself a lot.

Okay, so Jay North and his friend go to the warehouse digs of this friends' creepy older Vietnam vet brother. We find out that the older brother's fave hobby is scoping out Tompkins with a telescope from a veranda at the warehouse. A couple of mildly absurd plot points later,and North's friend falls from the warehouse veranda and is killed.

The creepy older brother stalks Tompkins, and North and Tompkins end us seeing each other, a lot, and we see Tompkins in various states of undress throughout the pic. Much later,the creepy older brother gets his. It turns out that North recently graduated from high school, so that makes his scenes with Tompkins considerably less statutory.

I don't thin this is out on DVD, nor would I expect to see it anytime soon. It is an interesting relic from a more innocent, if crappier age.

Newsvine Articles

2009-07-26T09:45:00.001-07:00

News From Infoshop

2009-07-26T09:44:00.001-07:00

July 23-Manila, PHILIPPINES — The rejection of nuclear power in Indonesia is another nail in the coffin of the nuclear industry, Greenpeace said today as it demanded the Philippine government to follow suit and abandon its dangerous nuclear power plans which it criticized as "backward and unproductive," and seemingly "reeking of less-than-noble intentions."
The environment organization had recently welcomed the decision of Indonesia's largest Muslim organization, Nahdlatul Ulama, (NU), that nuclear power is haram (forbidden) on the island of Madura, East Java. The announcement in Madura, close to Indonesia's second largest city of Surabaya, follows a similar decision by the Jepara, Central Java chapter of NU on 1 September 2007, when scholars and clerics concluded that the threat to the local communities from potential radioactive leaks and radioactive waste handling far outweighed any potential benefits.

"In Indonesia and in any part of the world including the Philippines, communities clearly do not want nuclear power as they will be the most at risk from its operations. This latest case of rejection of nuclear power is another nail in the coffin for the obsolete nuclear power industry. Our government must see this as a signal to stop wasting time and money on expensive and dangerous technology that no one wants nor needs, and keep the focus on developing investments in clean, safe renewable energy under a strong Renewable Energy Law," said Greenpeace Southeast Asia Campaigner Francis dela Cruz.

Worldwide, the nuclear industry is failing and still struggles with the same problems as it did forty years ago. Very few of the 435 operational nuclear power plants, as well as waste storage sites around the globe have been built within budget and on schedule. While there were reactors being built in 2008, many of these were delayed and no new reactors came online--compared to 27,000 megawatts of wind energy which came online in the same year. Indonesian President Yudhoyono had already announced that he was opposed to building a nuclear reactor as long as there are better alternatives. In June Indonesia's state energy utility, PLN, stated that it didn’t see nuclear power being part of Indonesia's future energy mix.

In the Philippines, however, the government seems bent on pursuing the costly and hazardous nuclear path with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and the Department of Energy expressing support for nuclear power as an "alternative" energy source. This is despite strong opposition particularly on plans to revive the mothballed and obsolete Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP).

"There is no real benefit from nuclear power--only real economic losses and obvious danger. To pursue nuclear power when the country is ready to harness clean, safe and abundant renewable energy goes against all common sense. Greenpeace asserts that the government should focus on massively expanding our renewable energy capacity and promoting energy efficiency standards and technologies. Renewable energy is the safest and cheapest source of power available, aside from being a key solution to climate change and energy security," concluded dela Cruz.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-07-26T09:42:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs....

2009-07-26T09:40:00.000-07:00

Visit them...often....

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

North Decoder

Prairie Fire

From The Barricades

Abortion and North Dakota: The Latest Battle

2009-07-26T09:39:00.000-07:00

North Dakota is once again ground zero in the abortion wars. Last spring the state briefly considered what is known as a "human life" definition bill, which would have defined a fetus as a human being.

North Dakota is an odd place for such a battle, because so few abortions are performed in the state. There is but one facility that provides abortion, The Red River Women's Health Clinic in Fargo. It would be a three-hour trek from western parts of the state, unless a woman would go to Billing, Montana for the procedure. There were a grand total of about 1,200 abortions in North Dakota. According to 2005 figures, all of New York State had the most that year at about 125,000. Abortion appears to be a big issue in this state. You can't go on the interstate without seeing anti-abortion billboards.

A new law, set to take effect in August requires that a woman considering an abortion be required to view an ultrasound and be exposed to an audible heartbeat of the fetus. This is to be done 24 hours before the procedure. Ultimately, it's an insulting law. It's predicated on the idea that no woman considering an abortion has thought it through sufficiently. It is premised on the idea, that if only women knew what they were doing, they would forswear consideration of this fact and fall down in a heap on the floor and beg forgiveness.

Here's the wording of the law from the bill's main sponsor, Robert Erbele of Lehr

It gives a person considering the abortion just a little bit more time to think about it and maybe by viewing the ultrasound it would make them aware of the reality of what they're doing… There is a real life there and a real person that they're dealing with.

The meaning is clear. Women seeking an abortion cannot possible know what they are doing.

The clinic is filing suit to stop the law. It is based around the clinic performing the procedure has to provide the ultrasound and the heartbeat. There are criminal charges attached to not performing the procedure highlighted in the bill.

The clinic is being backed by the New York based Center For Reproductive Rights. Right now, the clinic and the center are asking for an injunction. This would mean a temporary halt to the enforcement of the law, while the lawsuit is being evaluated.

Attorney General Wayne Stenhjem says he is planning to fight the lawsuit.

The clinic says that law is vague and confusing and if the clinic would have to provide the device to hear the heartbeats, would pose a financial hardship on the clinic.

There is an issue as to whether this law interferes with patient client relationships.

The center believes that this is first time the heartbeat test has been mandated by state law.

So, once again, North Dakota is in the center of abortion politics.

Suite101 Articles

2009-07-02T17:01:00.001-07:00

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News From Indymedia

2009-07-02T17:00:00.001-07:00

June 13-- Thousands of people around Australia rallied for emergency action on Climate Change on June 13, calling for 100% renewable energy by 2020 and demanding that Australia must make the shift from fossil fuels to wind, solar and other available renewable technologies. The National Climate Emergency Rally was held in capital cities around Australia, with people siting down outside Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's city office in Sydney and a sitdown protest in front of the Melbourne Town Hall where the ruling Australian Labor Party were holding their State conference.

This comes as progress on climate negotiations in Bonn, Germany, were blocked by the US Administration, with the US still talking about zero per cent reductions by 2020 on 1990 levels. "Industrialised countries need to assume their historical responsibility and pay back their climate debt. Developing countries must stay strong in calling for climate justice. By ignoring calls to repay their climate debt and hindering progress in these talks, rich countries are jeopardising the lives and livelihoods of millions of people." said Meena Raman, Honorary Secretary of Friends of the Earth Malaysia in a media release.

Climate IMC | Perth Indymedia | Melbourne: Report, Photos: 1, 2, Videos: 1, 2 | Sydney Report, Youtube Videos: 1, 2, 3 | Brisbane Report

The co-ordinated rallies ocurred in all capital cities around Australia and some regional towns and the demands included:

* 100% renewable energy by 2020. Australia must make the shift from fossil fuels to 100% renewable energy from wind, solar and other available technologies.
* Green collar jobs not job cuts. We can renew our economy by creating hundreds of thousands of 'green jobs' and supporting workers to make a fair and just transition to sustainable industries.
* Don't pass the Carbon Pollution law. We need climate policies that make the big polluters pay and not allow big companies to go on polluting. The CPRS won't reduce Australia's greenhouse pollution.
* Logging and clearing vegetation are major contributors to climate change as forests and woodlands are important carbon stores.

This follows a break in the environment movement over carbon trading where several environmental groups such as Greenpeace Australia, Friends of the Earth Australia and the Wilderness Society have refused to follow the Australian Conservation Foundation qualified endorsement of the Federal Government proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS), and have put forward a Plan "B", an agenda for immediate climate action.

Many activists criticised the proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) as giving too many free concessions to the fossil fuel industry, with minimal direction of capital to renewable energy projects. In other words, Business As Usual.

In December 2009, governments of the world will meet in Copenhagen to forge a critical new global climate change agreement. The Climate Emergency Rally sought to motivate people at the grassroots to pressure politicians to secure strong global action to cut emissions in time to avoid catastrophic climate change.

At the Melbourne protest a woman from Tuvalu, Emeretta Cross, spoke on the rising seas threat to her country and other low lying nations and spoke of the need of acting for the children and their future. (Watch Video)

Damien Lawson, National Climate Justice Co-ordinator for Friends of the Earth Australia, spoke on the need for a campaign of popular civil disobedience if politicians continue taking no action or ineffectual action to rapidly decrease carbon emissions. (Watch video - Climate Emergency: Damien Lawson calls for Civil Disobedience Campaign for action on Climate Change)

Read more on the Climate Action Centre website which organised the protest in Melbourne.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-07-02T16:56:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs.....

2009-07-02T16:52:00.000-07:00

Visit them....often...

Visit them...often....

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

North Decoder

Prairie Fire

From The Barricades

Side Trips From The Monkees

2009-07-02T16:51:00.000-07:00

In my mind, the Monkees were always unfairly bagged, for not playing their own instruments; or not writing their own songs, which is a peculiar lament in the world of pop music. It really was not a relevant concern until the Beatles and Dylan. No one bagged on Doris Day for not having written Sentimental Journey.

What counts is what is in the grooves ,and for my money the Monkees delivered very good pop/rock from a distinctive era.

The Monkees remain fertile ground for pop exploration. Both pre-and post Monkees careers can be investigated and these grounds. We could talk about the aborted New Monkees, that songwriters Boyce and Hart, along with Dolenz and Jones, tried to forge as Dolenz, Jones, Boyce and Hart, but we will confine ourselves to the Billboard Top 100 singles charts.

Davey Jones was a star and would have continued to have been so without the Monkees. He had a stage career because of Oliver! And was being molded into a safe, teen-boy idol. In his pre-Monkees career, he had a lower reaches of the charts hit with a jaunty vaudevillian number called, What Are We Going To Do? and was featured on some of the teeny-bopper TV shows of the day. Its not bad and gives a measure of what his career might have been without the Monkees. Post-Monkees, he tried to forge a bubble-gum career and only had one-charter with a nifty little bubble-gummer called Rainy Jane.

Perhaps the biggest Musician of the Monkees was Mike Nesmith. I will not discuss his pre-Monkees, rare-as-the-teeth-of-hens singles as Michael Blessing, but rather his post-Monkees chart action. With the First National Band, Mike put forth some credible country rock and got on the charts a few times with songs like, Joanne.

Mickey Dolenz is the oddest of this bunch. He did some recording pre-Monkees with a group, called the One-Nighters. During the end of the Monkees the label that had the rights to it, released it. Were there no Monkees, or had Mickey not made it in, it could have been a "lost" garage band single by a former child actor. The song, Don't Do It dented the Top 100.

The other Musician of the group, Peter Tork had a career that brushed by the Top 100 and deserves some mention. He hung out with the musicians that constituted most of the Lovin Spoonful. I have heard rumors that he dated Cass Elliot. Mickey Dolenz always said that Peter was his entrée into the bohemian counter-culture of the 60s. He was very much a Musician, and a very smart man. He was relegated to a role he hated, the dumb guy of the group, whereas, the others got to play extensions of themselves. Mickey was wacky, Mike was dry, and Davey was cute. Peter had to completely play against what he was. Alas, no Top 100 love for our Peter.

The Monkees are a gift that keeps on giving for the pop music fan. The hits and albums were good enough by any pop measure. The side trips are worthy excursions.

Suite101 Articles

2009-06-24T14:20:00.001-07:00

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News From Asheville Global Report

2009-06-24T14:19:00.000-07:00

Jun. 18- At 5:00AM this morning 14 concerned citizens entered onto Massey Energy's mountaintop removal mine site near Twilight WV. Four of them scaled a 150-foot dragline and unfurled a 15×150 foot banner that said, "Stop Mountaintop Removal Mining". The climbers were on the enormous dragline, a massive piece of equipment that removes house-sized chunks of blasted rock and earth to expose coal, and remained there for over three hours. Meanwhile nine others deployed a 20×40 foot banner on the ground at the site which read, "Stop Mountaintop Removal: Clean Energy Now".

Police arrested David Hollister, Melissa O'Neil, Chelsea Ritter Soronen, Lynn Stone, Charles Suggs, Rodney Webb, Jeanne Kirshon, John Johnson Greg Yost, Jessica Sue Eley, Lisa Ramsden, David Pike, Paul Brown, and Kurt Delano Mann. The group is expected to be arraigned early this afternoon at Boone County Jail in Madison, West VA.

This act of peaceful protest comes just days after the Obama Administration announced a plan to reform, but not abolish, the aggressive strip mining practice.

"I've written letters, attended hearings and called my congressman, so far they have done nothing to stop the disastrous and unnecessary practice of mountaintop removal," said Charles Suggs, a 25-year old of Rock Creek, WV who was one of those climbing today. "It has come to the point when we must take direct action to abolish this practice that is immorally robbing Appalachian communities of their culture, their health and their future."

This is the first time a dragline has been scaled on a mountaintop removal site, and marks the latest in a string of protests in West Virginia by residents and allies from across the country. Another protest is set for June 23rd in the Coal River Valley area with local coalfield residents, NASA climate scientist James Hansen, actress Daryl Hannah, and 94-year-old former US Representative Ken Hechler, and Rainforest Action Network Executive Director Michael Brune, among many others.

"It's way past time for civil disobedience to stop mountaintop removal and move quickly toward clean, renewable energy sources," said Judy Bonds, Goldman Environmental Prize winner and co-director of Coal River Mountain Watch of West Virginia. "For over a century, Appalachian communities have been crushed, flooded, and poisoned as a result of the country's dangerous and outdated reliance on coal. How could the country care so little about our American mountains, our culture and our lives?"

An increasing number of concerned Appalachians and environmentalists are calling for the end to mountaintop removal, a practice that harms the people and places of Appalachia, destroys the economic potential of the Appalachian Mountains for long term clean energy opportunities and jobs, and furthers the burning of climate-killing coal.

Every day, mountaintop removal mines use more explosive power than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Mining companies are clear-cutting thousands of acres of some of the world's most biologically diverse forests. They're burying biologically crucial headwaters streams with blasting debris, releasing toxic levels of heavy metals into the remaining streams and groundwater and poisoning essential drinking water. According to the EPA, this destructive practice has damaged or destroyed nearly 2,000 miles of streams and threatens to destroy 1.4 million acres of forest by 2020.

Just days before this action, the Obama Administration announced steps to end the fast-tracking of certain mountaintop removal coal mine permits and to add tougher enforcement in Appalachia. However, it remains unclear what, if any, improvements this will have on-the-ground in Appalachia or elsewhere. Without a significant change in policy, mining companies will continue to destroy historic mountain ranges and bury community's drinking water in toxic waste.

Source: Mountain Action

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-06-24T14:15:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs....

2009-06-24T14:13:00.000-07:00

Visit them...often....

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

North Decoder

Detour (1945): A Poverty Row Must See

2009-06-24T14:12:00.000-07:00

I may have a new favorite in the film noir genre. Double Indemnity has pretty much been replaced in my heart with Detour, released in 1945.

Some good reasons to like this include: No major character you can really root for, and feel good about yourself afterwards; actors you have never of; the budget.

How low was the budget of this movie? Well, it was shot largely on two sets. A hotel room set and a car shot in front of a screen. Oh, the car belonged to the director. It was made for about 20 grand. I love this movie.

Here is the basic plot-man hitchhikes from NY to Cali to be with the woman he loves. Man gets ride with cad who dumped a woman along the way. Cad dies and leaves a bankroll and car with hitchhiker who decides that cops will not believe that the guy up and died. Man picks up bimbo who was dumped by cad. The two conspire to swindle an inheritance using the identity of said cad. Man accidentally kills floozy and goes on run. Hollywood production code demands that man get nabbed by cops at last minute. Can you beat that with a stick!?

This is the only poverty row studio film to be on the national film registry. So, what gives it that distinction. It cannot be for cinematography, or set design. These are pretty basic in the film. It really can't be for the acting. The acting is pretty ham-fisted and the narration is about as subtle as a flying mallet.

It would have to be because this movie is such a profound example of noir. The hero kind of wants to do the right thing, but seems plagued by an epic flaw to never do the right thing. He constantly makes the choice he should not have.

To tell you the truth, I am almost willing to say that this film should be on the national registry, just because the female lead is played by an actress named Ann Savage. That almost does it for me, right there. It is kind of a road picture, so it is a good example of that also.

I really think that one of the major reasons this film is in the national registry, is because, once you see it, you really cannot get enough. The plot of the movie is a train wreck that you hate yourself for watching.

We also need movies like this for the national registry, because a lot of people in Hollywood, and other places made movies. Not everything was a gritty Warner Brothers drama, or a flashy MGM musical. There were a lot of people who got up every day and made motion pictures. Not everyone was, or should have been This movie is a shot-and-a-beer of American filmmaking at a rundown bar. This movie is not champagne at a fancy night club. If people were lucky, they stumbled into this film at a rundown theater in the 1940. They probably came away with a pretty good yarn. Do see this movie,

Suite101 Articles

2009-06-16T08:54:00.000-07:00

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News From Infoshop

2009-06-16T08:53:00.000-07:00

June 15-2009-June 3, 2009 was a day of anger and sadness for people in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas—a region known for its vast rural landscapes and primarily immigrant community. At around 6:15 a.m., Southwest Workers’ Union (SWU) member Nadezhda Garza received a phone call from a detainee inside the Port Isabel Detention Center (PIDC). The worried voice on the other end of the phone line informed Garza that fellow detainee Rama Carty had been assaulted by four private guards and one federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent at around 5:45 a.m. The ICE agent allegedly involved was identified as Lieutenant Sandoval. When Carty demanded to speak with representatives of Amnesty International, USA, the guards proceeded to drag him away. Policy Director of Refugee and Migrant Rights for Amnesty International, USA, Sarnata Reynolds, and a representative named Daryl Grisgraber, were at PIDC since June 2. They were writing up a report on conditions inside the facility, and met with Carty on the day before the assault.

At around 8:00 a.m. after the assault, Carty called Garza to corroborate his friend’s phone call, but also to inform her of his situation: “He said they were transferring him to a detention center in Louisiana, and from there he will be deported to Haiti,” Carty said. Carty then requested to speak with Amnesty International in order to stop the transfer. Carty then told Garza that his friend needed to remain in the PIDC in order to show his documentation regarding the abuses. According to Garza, Carty wanted to assert that he was a U.S. citizen and had the documentation to prove it. He wanted to make it clear that justice was being obstructed. He was sent to Texas, and did not have the legal resources to fight his way out of detention.
No Time Wasted

As soon as the initial phone call came from Carty’s fellow detainee, organizers on the outside took action. “We began to make phone calls to our community activists and friends. We sent out a press release to both local and international media in order to make this as public as possible.” said Hector Guzman, a student organizer in McAllen, Texas. Garza also called the ICE office, which oversees the PIDC, and spoke to Assistant Field Director James Bentsen. When she informed him of the incident, he simply said “I don’t believe you” and shrugged it off.

The SWU staged a zero hour protest circa 1:30 p.m., outside the PIDC, denouncing what happened and demanding a freeze on Carty’s deportation. Still, protesters felt that their biggest chance of stopping the illegal removal of Carty was for Amnesty International to take action. They were, after all, on the inside.

Organizers made several phone calls to Reynolds, informing her of what was happening with Carty and requesting they meet with him and stop the transfer. Amnesty International was notified, yet refused to move on the situation. Instead, they implied that they had a schedule to meet and that Carty would not be deported right away. Garza said “(Amnesty International) proved themselves impotent … they let it happen. That is why we want community organizations in the (PIDC)—people who have a connection with the people in there, not out-of-towners who are just here to compile a report, and too worried about their schedule to pay attention to a crisis that went on right under their nose.”

Towards the end of the demonstration, Amnesty representatives drove out of the facility and admitted to protesters that Carty had been rushed out of PIDC. They did not bother to join the community action or step out of their vehicle. Since April 2009, local organizers with the SWU and members of Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) have been working for justice at PIDC. They have had weekly visits with the detainees, but have not been allowed to monitor conditions on the inside or the state of those still fasting.

The hunger strikers are spearheading a movement to put an end to the inhumane detention of immigrant workers, and we should view this struggle as part of the broader class war. The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) actions against Carty are viewed as retaliation and have had a definite effect on all the immigrants at PIDC.
Hunger Strike Organizer

Who is Rama Carty? Rama Carty is a known leader and participant in a hunger strike that has been going on at the PIDC since late April. He was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo to Haitian parents, but has lived in the United States for more than 38 years. After he and other detainees read a report documenting the deplorable conditions that exist throughout the entire immigrant detention system, they felt compelled to do something about it, and decided to stage a hunger strike. Soon after, the hunger strike spread to include up to 200 detainees at the PIDC.They demanded (and continue to demand) the right to due process, medical attention for all detainees, access to legal resources, and an end to physical and verbal abuses by guards at the facility.

At the time of his transfer, Carty had been detained by DHS/ICE for over 13 months, after serving a two-year sentence for a drug conviction he had already served time for. He also said that his drug conviction was wrongful. Carty has been interviewed by several news sources, including a recorded telephone interview with the Texas Observer which was aired on the popular independent radio/television news program Democracy Now.

At the writing of this story, it was known that Carty was at the LaSalle Detention Facility in Jena, Louisiana. The Consulate General of Haiti is refusing to issue DHS a travel permit in the name of Rama Carty because they have no Haitian birth record for him. Rama Carty has the strong language of a revolutionary, with such calm and concentrated delivery comparable to that of Mumia Abu Jamal. Our hearts and solidarity are with him.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-06-16T08:50:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here.

These Are Good Blogs...

2009-06-16T08:49:00.001-07:00

Visit them...often....

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

FIRE Is Not In Favor Of Student Rights

2009-06-16T08:47:00.000-07:00

FIRE, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, has either forgotten and strayed from its original mission, or it was lying about that original mission to begin with. This is the inescapable conclusion that can be drawn from the tortured defense of the scuttling of the College Democrats club from Liberty University, from the chief of FIRE, David French. The first conclusion to be drawn from French's defense of Liberty University is excusable but must be redressed. The second is inexcusable.

As a matter of quick background, the evangelical private university, Liberty University, which was founded by Jerry Falwell, decided that the College Democrats could no longer be a recognized campus organization, because of its affiliation with the Democratic Party, which supports abortion and equal marriage rights. These positions were held to be at variance with the official positions of the university. Now, to be perfectly honest, there is not much of a First Amendment issue here. Liberty is a private organization. The question becomes, not was this legal, but was it right?

Here is part of FIRE's mission statement, from their website: The mission of FIRE is to defend and sustain individual rights at America's colleges and universities. These rights include freedom of speech, legal equality, due process, religious liberty, and sanctity of conscienceâthe essential qualities of individual liberty and dignity.

Well, Yay! I Cannot disagree with anything there. Which makes defenses of Liberty by French, all the more: weird.

Let us try to follow it: In my experience, private colleges â especially religious private colleges â run into problems when they try to be all things to all people, when they promise freedom but impose speech codes, when they try to advance a religious mission but crave approval from an overwhelmingly (and aggressively) secular academic culture, and when they try to "broaden their appeal" while still telling donors that they have retained their "religious roots."

So, as this applies to the case at hand: Liberty is different. The school could not be more explicit about its mission; from its doctrinal statement to its purpose, to its "Distinctives," Liberty positions itself as not just religiously conservative but politically conservative as well (heck, one of its "Distinctives" is an "absolute repudiation of 'political correctness'").

So, I guess expecting it to encourage viewpoints different than its doctrinal statements would be like asking a a wifebeater, to stop beating his wife. After all, is it not a distinctive trait of wife beaters to beat their wives?

So here then is why FIRE, though it has taken other private universities to task for what it perceives to be threats to student liberties: When a private university, however, acts in a manner that is consistent with its stated mission and purpose, it is exercising its own civil liberties, not violating student rights.

Uhhhhâ¦.Yeah, except as noted above it is not the stated mission of FIRE to defend corporate rights, but Individual rights. The right of Liberty to do what it did is roughly equivalent to the right of French to bop me in the nose. It ends where my nose begins.

Here is what it comes down to: Censorship by conservatives-good. Censorship by liberals-bad.

I hate speech codes at college campuses as much as French does. However, once could argue that it would be against the mission of a secular university to recognize student religious organizations. Here is the difference between me and FIRE. I would never make an argument like that. FIRE has made such
an argument, and that is all the difference.

Suite101 Articles

2009-06-09T14:12:00.000-07:00

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News From Green Left Weekly

2009-06-09T14:11:00.001-07:00

May 31 2009-Imagine a government trying to sell to the public a new proposal to reduce murder rates by selling right to murder. The government brazenly names it the Murder Reduction Scheme.

Here is how it works. The money raised by selling murder rights could be used to subsidise terrified potential victims to arm themselves for self-protection, thus hopefully reducing their chances of being murdered.

But that’s not all!

Some of the money raised from selling the murder permits would also be used to compensate professional killers and other commercial organisations that might be adversely affected.

It is hoped that over time, subtle “market signals” will force these murderous commercial enterprises to invest in non-murderous activities.

Sorry, that’s just not good enough, responds the opposition that prides itself on being even more committed than the government to protect business interests.

The Murder Reduction Scheme will wreck the economy, it says. It demands the biggest killing companies be “compensated” with even more free murder permits.

Feeling the pressure, the government announces more free permits will be given out.

The government then rolls out a Clark Kent lookalike, who allegedly was once a hard-fighting union chief, to threaten the opposition: “I’m warning you Silvertails, if you force the Murder Reduction Scheme back to the drawing board, Murders Inc could end up paying more. You’ll never get a better deal than this,” he growls.

Meanwhile, a group of crime researchers release a new study that shows a “90% probability” that already sharply rising murder rates had been underestimated by half.

* * *

Thank goodness the real political world is not as bad as this … or is it?

Green Left Weekly is loud and clear in opposing the Rudd Labor
governments Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) — which should be called what it really is: the Carbon Pollution Trading Scheme.

It won’t do anything to address the climate emergency — in fact it will make things worse.

The CPRS should be blocked in the Senate. Federal and state governments should stop playing games with our future and invest in a massive, publicly-owned and controlled, shift to renewable energy.

The total phasing-out of the coal industry and other heavy carbon polluting industries needs to begin now. The workers in these industries need to be retrained and re-employed in building up the new renewable energy systems and other projects to improve ecological sustainability.

We have the technology and the resources and it can be done. All it needs is the political will.

Green Left Weekly takes this message to the streets, week after week. And we do so on a shoestring. But we need the help of our readers and supporters to stay afloat.

So far this year our supporters have raised $96,099.08 for our Fighting Fund. This is 38% of our annual target of $250,000. If our supporters bring in another $8,000 before the end of May we will be right on target.

Please make a donation to our fighting fund at: Greenleft,
Commonwealth Bank of Australia, BSB 062-006, Account No. 00901992. Or, send a cheque or money order to PO Box 515, Broadway NSW 2007 or phone it through on the toll-free line at 1800 634 206 (within Australia).

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-06-09T14:08:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs...

2009-06-09T14:07:00.001-07:00

Visit them...often....

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

Lou Adler And Dunhill Records

2009-06-09T14:06:00.001-07:00

When sixties music is usually discussed, the name of Lou Adler rarely surfaces. It is a shame really. Lou is largely responsible for signing a lot of the major acts of the era, helping to merchandise one of the seminal films, and helping to launch a major songwriting team.

Adler and Dunhill records is an interesting story. Adler was a music promoter and one of his major acts was Johnny Rivers. Dunhill Productions helped bring to fruition, a record deal between Rivers and Imperial his first label.

Dunhill actually became a record label, and oh, the acts that became a part of the Dunhill Family. Let us just start with The Mamas and The Papas. Surely one of the most accomplished vocal acts of the era. Of course, the hit spin offs of Cass Elliott were also Dunhill releases. One of the hardest rocking acts of the era, Steppenwolf was also a Dunhill act. The Grass Roots were morphed from a San Francisco folk-punk group into one of the biggest hit machines of the era on Dunhill. One of the finest bands of the 1970s, Three Dog Night are also a Dunhill find.

In what was a bit of licensing genius, one of the seminal movies of the 1960s, Easy Rider, got its soundtrack release on Dunhill, when only two of the artists, Steppenwolf and Smith were Dunhill acts. In an era when record labels were jealously guarding the next big thing, this was pretty big news.

The songwriting combo of Sloan and Barri, who penned multiple hits for the Grass Roots was also launched on Dunhill.

There are lots of delightful odds and sods that can be considered Dunhill releases. The solo work of Phil Sloan, which is fairly rogh-edged folk-rock can also be found on Dunhill. The early solo work of John Phillips of The Mamas and The Papas were Dunhill releases. The previously mentioned one-hit wonders, Smith and the solo work of their lead vocalist Gayle McCormick. An engaging garage nugget from the Woolies, a rave up of Who Do You Love? that made it all the way to #97 on the pop charts was a Dunhill release. A nifty little pop-psych gem by the Lamp of Childhood that placed on the Bubbling Under chart was also released. A compilation of some of these gems would be a nifty boxed set.

Adler was also responsible, to a large degree for the Monterey Pop Festival, at which his client , Johnny Rivers performed.

Labels often get swallowed by the bigger fish and eventually Dunhill became ABC-Dunhill, and then just ABC. Ever the Maverick, Lou struck out on his own again and founded Ode records, which gave the world Carole King, Spirit, and others. A giant in sixties music, who needs to be better remembered.

Suite101 Articles

2009-05-03T13:31:00.001-07:00

Latest Articles

News From Indymedia

2009-05-03T13:29:00.000-07:00

May 1, 2007-On April 27th, without prior warning, the indigenous land owners of the villages surrounding Barrick Gold’s Porgera open pit mine were violently evicted by a police and military operation with 200 troops. “Operation Ipili” was launched during the middle of the day to allegedly make way for the expansion of a Barrick gold mine. This effective State of Emergency in Porgera was motivated by situation reports presented by Barrick (PNG) Limited, according to Laigap Porgera Member of Parliament Phillip Kikala.

Households of third generation landowners were purposefully razed to the ground, causing residents to flee for fear of their lives. According to eyewitnesses, eighty houses in Ungima, two houses in Yokolama and four houses in Kulapi had been torched within the first 2 days of the operation. By April 30, community reports put that number at close to 600.

According to the Akali Tange Association, a human rights organization in Porgera, none of the residents were given time to gather any of their possessions. Anyone who spoke up was reportedly physically attacked by the security forces and some were arrested.

Increasing numbers of people are reporting injuries, as are those who are being detained. Although the landowners received no formal warning that they were to see their houses destroyed – according to the ATA – Barrick Gold had demanded that the land be cleared of local villagers, some of whom are small scale artisanal miners eking out a living beside the mine.

Barrick Gold’s personnel claim the land owners are ‘illegal’ and last week, issued a memorandum calling on them to stop their subsistence activities and leave their homelands. The chief landowner, Nixon Mangape, recently alerted their local Member of Parliament as well as media outlets about the impending threats from the mining company. To date, there has been no acknowledgement that villagers have been demanding compensation from Barrick if the confiscation of their land was to move forward, given their resulting loss of livelihood, possessions and ancestral territory. Now, these communities are suffering from brutal attacks by security agents and faced with the situation that their homes – with all their possessions – have been burned to the ground, in clear violation of national and international legal precedents.

Jethro Tulin, Executive Officer of ATA traveled to Canada this week – along with other international affected communities – to tell shareholders at Barrick Gold's annual general meeting about the on-going human rights crisis in Porgera. As Mr. Tulin traveled to Canada to attend Barrick's AGM, the Papua New Guinea government sent 200 heavily armed troops to the Porgera area. He has since been receiving regular updates about landowner's houses being searched for incriminating materials and burnt to the ground.

"Barrick Gold and the Government of Papua New Guinea must immediately start to address the catastrophic problem in Porgera pro-actively rather than over reacting with high level security installations and branding it as a law and order problem. Calling a State of Emergency is not the right method to fix these extensive and irreversible damages, the ordinary people are already victims of what as gone wrong."

Last year the Norwegian Pension Fund divested $230 million CAD from Barrick Gold for ethical concerns related to the Porgera Mine.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-05-03T13:28:00.000-07:00

Here

Here.

These Are Good Blogs...

2009-05-03T13:26:00.004-07:00

Visit them....often..

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

Schlock Cinema's Last Hurrah: Hobgoblins

2009-05-03T13:26:00.001-07:00

I have come to think of the 1980s as the last hurrah of exploitation cinema. Those of us born in the early 1960s had no idea that when we trundled off to the local movie house we were seeing the last round of cheaply-produced cinematic garbage. Nowadays, because we are firmly ensconced in the era of the cinematic block-buster, we can only see crap movies on home DVD, or god-forbid, the Internet. We no longer have the communal experience of chucking candy and popcorn at the screen while hooting out loud at the big screen.

One of the hallmarks of exploitation cinema is the cheap knock-off designed to cash in on a big trend or popular movie. As a young science fiction and fantasy fan, I cannot tell you how many on-location-in-the-Hollywood-Hills-quickies I dutifully attended in movie houses, just because somebody was feeding my jones. I am talking about movies that make Beastmaster into high cinema. Of course, horror, and the re-vamped monster movie were big draws in the 1980s and had their share of low-budget imitators.

I draw your attention to the 1988 schlock-fest: Hobgoblins. Gremlins was a big cinematic hit earlier in the decade and spawned a couple of sequels. So, what is a schlock cinema producer to do except rip it off? The titular critters in this masterpiece of rip-off cinema look so much like the Gremlins of the parent feature that the makers of this film are so lucky their feature flew so far under the radar that it avoided a lawsuit. Also, like the Gremlins of the previous hit, the creatures are not to be put into direct light, or maybe they are not to be put in darkness. This movie has a wonderfully-muddled script that no one can really keep straight, much less the characters.

Speaking of the characters, the casts largely consists of a bunch of younguns probably trying to get their SAG cards. The plot, which largely revolves around a house in Rancho Cucamunga that was not being used for the weekend it took to shoot this mess, wherein, it is discovered, that the titular creatures, have the ability to grant fantasies, which somewhat explains the bizarre behavior we see for a lot of the film. During a severe crisis, one of the characters, for some reason, calls a fantasy-phone line, so that in the next scene, we can see the director's girlfriend standing outside the house ready to sate the fantasy of the young man. Next, the female lead, or what passes for same in this flick, gets into her head to go to a punk /strip club to perform the least erotic striptease in cinematic history. Eventually, the movie ambles to a close, but not until we see one of the least talented of the New Wave Bands of the Sunset Strip, The Fontanelles, perform for us.

The real value to this film, is that I can remember getting all liquored up, stumbling into a feature, like this, and then stumbling on over to an all-night eatery to commiserate about how bad a film like this is. It is an empty experience watching it over the intertubes, and I lament that the kids of today do not have bad cinema of their own to kill a couple of hours on weekend night.

Suite101 Articles

2009-04-26T13:54:00.001-07:00

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News From Asheville Global Report

2009-04-26T13:53:00.001-07:00

Israel stands ready to bomb Iran's nuclear sites
By Sheera Frenkel

Apr. 18- The Israeli military is preparing itself to launch a massive aerial assault on Iran's nuclear facilities within days of being given the go-ahead by its new government.

Among the steps taken to ready Israeli forces for what would be a risky raid requiring pinpoint aerial strikes are the acquisition of three Airborne Warning and Control (AWAC) aircraft and regional missions to simulate the attack.

Two nationwide civil defence drills will help to prepare the public for the retaliation that Israel could face.

"Israel wants to know that if its forces were given the green light they could strike at Iran in a matter of days, even hours. They are making preparations on every level for this eventuality. The message to Iran is that the threat is not just words," one senior defence official told The Times.

Officials believe that Israel could be required to hit more than a dozen targets, including moving convoys. The sites include Natanz, where thousands of centrifuges produce enriched uranium; Esfahan, where 250 tonnes of gas is stored in tunnels; and Arak, where a heavy water reactor produces plutonium.

The distance from Israel to at least one of the sites is more than 870 miles, a distance that the Israeli force practised covering in a training exercise last year that involved F15 and F16 jets, helicopters and refuelling tankers.

The possible Israeli strike on Iran has drawn comparisons to its attack on the Osirak nuclear facility near Baghdad in 1981. That strike, which destroyed the facility in under 100 seconds, was completed without Israeli losses and checked Iraqi ambitions for a nuclear weapons programme.

"We would not make the threat [against Iran] without the force to back it. There has been a recent move, a number of on-the-ground preparations, that indicate Israel's willingness to act," said another official from Israel's intelligence community.

He added that it was unlikely that Israel would carry out the attack without receiving at least tacit approval from America, which has struck a more reconciliatory tone in dealing with Iran under its new administration.

An Israeli attack on Iran would entail flying over Jordanian and Iraqi airspace, where US forces have a strong presence.

Ephraim Kam, the deputy director of the Institute for National Security Studies, said it was unlikely that the Americans would approve an attack.

"The American defence establishment is unsure that the operation will be successful. And the results of the operation would only delay Iran's programme by two to four years," he said.

A visit by President Obama to Israel in June is expected to coincide with the national elections in Iran — timing that would allow the US Administration to re-evaluate diplomatic resolutions with Iran before hearing the Israeli position.

"Many of the leaks or statements made by Israeli leaders and military commanders are meant for deterrence. The message is that if [the international community] is unable to solve the problem they need to take into account that we will solve it our way," Mr Kam said.

Among recent preparations by the airforce was the Israeli attack of a weapons convoy in Sudan bound for militants in the Gaza Strip.

"Sudan was practice for the Israeli forces on a long-range attack," Ronen Bergman, the author of The Secret War with Iran, said. "They wanted to see how they handled the transfer of information, hitting a moving target ... In that sense it was a rehearsal."

Israel has made public its intention to hold the largest-ever nationwide drill next month.

Colonel Hilik Sofer told Haaretz, a daily Israeli newspaper, that the drill would "train for a reality in which during war missiles can fall on any part of the country without warning ... We want the citizens to understand that war can happen tomorrow morning".

Israel will conduct an exercise with US forces to test the ability of Arrow, its US-funded missile defence system. The exercise would test whether the system could intercept missiles launched at Israel.

"Israel has made it clear that it will not tolerate the threat of a nuclear Iran. According to Israeli Intelligence they will have the bomb within two years ... Once they have a bomb it will be too late, and Israel will have no choice to strike — with or without America," an official from the Israeli Defence Ministry said.

Source: Times (UK)

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-04-26T13:51:00.000-07:00

Here

Here

These Are Good Blogs...

2009-04-26T13:49:00.000-07:00

Visit them....often..

Chavezian Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Ken Jennings

Time To Divorce Sports And Education

2009-04-26T13:48:00.001-07:00

Recently Washington County, Utah got concerned over its school budget, because there was a threat to cut sports.

To me, this is just another reason, among many, to divorce sports and education, and so permanently. It sounds like I am just another anti-sports fanatic, when nothing could be further from the truth. I have enjoyed sports at all levels most of my life. I have cheered for teams at all levels of competition. But, I have come more and more to the conclusion, that the odd hybrid that we have in America, which exists nowhere else in the world, of grafting sports onto education is bad, archaic, and just plain unworkable.

I think I started coming to my conclusion last fall. I was a witness to a football game, in which a young man, who was a student of mine, was very seriously injured. He is a smart young man, and not at all what I would conclude to be a dumb jock. He missed several weeks of school because of his injuries, and for the remainder of the term, he hobbled into class, and had to be excused for several medical procedures. The school he attends is Division II, and so, there is scholarship money made available to him, but his health care costs are not attended to. It seems to me barbaric that we hold out the promise of education to young people while they risk injury for our amusement. The same could be said about most sports at the professional level. But, those are adults, and we can expect independent judgment from them of risks and benefits.

Another reason for the divorce is that the desire to win and flout the rules that govern education and athletics is omnipresent. For instance, in March, 60 Florida state students, who participate in athletics were cheating in online courses. Athletics in the educational realm requires constant policing to keep it above board.
I am not impugning students who participate in athletics. I have known many fine, upstanding students who do so. But, at most levels, athletic competition requires more effort and time than does their education. The eventual reward of athletics for most of them is elusive. The number of people who can make any sort of career of sports is miniscule, and yet, we dangle this is front of students constantly.
Let us not forget the students who would never be admitted to college without athletics. I knew of a young man who took a class from me twice, and still failed to earn the required grade for his major. He was cashiered from this major and steered into an independent-degree major from which he could graduate. I do not think he did. He went the free-agency route into an NFL team, was cut and continued into NFL Europe before it suspended operations. Where he is now, and what he is doing I cannot say, but the cruel carrot of pro sports, a fickle mistress at best, was probably dangled in front of him, all of his life.

Let us do what nearly every country does. For those who want to participate in sports, let us have training programs sponsored by professionals and competitive league for youngsters. Let us end the charade of education and sports, and the student-athlete. It is bad for education, bad for sports, and bad for the competitors.

Suite101 Articles

2009-04-13T14:02:00.001-07:00

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News From Infoshop

2009-04-13T13:59:00.001-07:00

April 13- Halla targeted as Ontario Common Front members meet

They’re part of the Ontario Common Front (OCF), a group holding a series of workshops and protest planning sessions this weekend.

A variety of delegates were expected Saturday at Belleville’s Organic Underground coffee shop to discuss future protests against the G8 meeting of world leaders, the 2010 Olympic Games, and the Security and Prosperity Partnership. But also on the agenda was an information picket outside one of three local buildings owned by Halla Climate Control Canada Inc.

“We’ve been asked to do an action against the local plant,” said Belleville activist Samuel Kuhn.

Halla’s parent company, Visteon Inc., has laid off hundreds of workers in Europe.

Workers at several sites have responded by occupying those buildings to protest the layoffs and demand better severance packages.

Kuhn said OCF members would hand out information on Visteon’s labour situation and the protests to Halla workers. Though the protest was slated for Sunday, Kuhn and Picton OCF member Terry Douglas said the date, time and location would be finalized in a closed planning session Saturday afternoon.

“We want to make sure the workers know what’s happening to their brothers and sisters in Europe,” said Kuhn.

Read more about the OCF gathering in Monday’s Intelligencer.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-04-13T13:55:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs

2009-04-13T13:54:00.001-07:00

Visit them...often....

American Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Uncool Singer-Song Writers

2009-04-13T13:53:00.001-07:00

When people talk about singer-songwriters they usually mean something in the weepy confessional mode like James Taylor, or, in a more contemporary mode, Sufjan Stevens. Not that both Mr. Taylor, and Mr. Stevens have not done estimable work, they have. But the singer-songwriter tag is never applied to people who put together AM radio pop fare. Singer-songwriter to me can be equally applied to Gene Pitney, Tommy Roe, and the subjects of this essay, Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart.

Boyce and Hart made substantial contributions to the pop sound of the 1960s. Tommy Boyce started his career as a boy-singer in a teeny-bop mode and posted a couple of minor chart entries. But, when he teamed up with Bobby Hart, they had the magic touch. They started penning songs for Jay and The Americans, Paul Revere and the Raiders, and of course, their most famous contributions to the catalog of the pre-fab four, the Monkees. They may have just about written the toughest pop song of the 1960s. (I'm Not Your) Stepping Stone is one of the great kiss-off songs in the vein of the bad boy kissing off the rich girl in the history of that sub-genre of 1960s songs. But, it was as a singing duo that Boyce and Hart should be remembered. They were singer-songwriters in every sense of the word and do not credit for being as such. They had a few hits, but really should have had more and should have been a major act. They produced what I consider to be one of the great AM nuggets of all time. One of these days I will put together a list of these and this will be on the top (as a side note: I'm A Believer, It's a Cryin' Shame, and It's Only Make Believe would also be on the list, but that is another essay). The song is, I Wonder What She's Doing Tonite. This song has it all, heavily-strummed guitars, punchy horn charts, and stellarly belted harmonies from Tommy and Bobby. The duo was pimped on network TV programs, but it only added marginally to their status. Elizabeth Montgomery dancing with Elizabeth Montgomery (in her dual roles as cousins Samantha and Serena) while a record album is spinning in mid-air and playing their non-hit, I'll Blow You A Kiss In The Wind, is one of the great moments of 1960 TV.

Did you know that Tommy and Bobby even got political? Yep, they penned a song that promoted the 18-year old vote called L.U.V. (Let Us Vote), even though the duo themselves had been eligible to vote for about a good ten years when this record came out.

Why are they not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? It is hard to imagine the 1960s without them.

The duo teamed up with a couple of Monkees in the mid-1970s with a group called Dolenz, Jones, Boyce, and Hart. The attempt was to pass the quartet off as a reconstituted Monkees, but the band name was tied up in litigation at the time. An album under the name of this quartet which largely went nowhere had some more Boyce and Hart originals on it. Bobby Hart had a solo bubbling under hit in the 1980s. It was really an ignonymous end, and these two, who helped craft the sound of that decade really deserve better

Suite 101 Articles

2009-04-05T12:37:00.001-07:00

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News From Indymedia

2009-04-05T12:36:00.001-07:00

On the 3rd and 4th of April - right after the G20-meeting in London - in Strasbourg, France, and Baden-Baden, Germany, a summit meeting of the NATO members is taking place for NATO's 60th anniversary. No less than the very continuance of this military alliance is at stake. Expect broad resistance from all section of the left from labor unions through to extra-parlimentary radical leftists – as well as heavy state repression.

In Strasbourg a resistance camp is under construction, while the Convergence Center (CC) in Freiburg is already in use by activists getting ready for the summit protests. Another CC will open in Strasbourg on the 31st of March. The Infopoints have published an infosheet to support the campaign.

Some 30,000 police are expected to secure this militarist gathering, while German intelligence services are aggressively aiming to recruit activists (1 | 2 | analysis). The CC Legal Team will provide legal advice and aid to protesters from across the border.

The protests will kick-off on Monday, 30th of March, with an unregistered demonstration in Freiburg. Prior to this demonstration the cops attempted to intimidate activists by harassing the alleged organizers of the latest major leftwing demonstration in December, 2008. Their only achievement was to convince activists and the general public that they have no intention of enforcing the law.

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-04-05T12:33:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These are good blogs...

2009-04-05T12:31:00.001-07:00

Visit them...often....

American Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

Documentary Spotlights Salt Lake Top 40 Radio

2009-04-05T12:27:00.000-07:00

I guess it's about time I wrote about a documentary and I might as well right about a documentary that people have about exactly zero chance of ever seeing unless they go over to the Mountainland Applied Technical College website and order it.

The doc is a labor of love by Mountainland instructor Greg Carlisle who started doing an all vinyl radio show on the college's radio station to help recreate the sound of Salt Lake City Top 40 radio from the 1960s and 1970s when KNAK and KCPX duked it out over listeners in this market.

I know what people are thinking, the city's LDS fathers sitting in the ivory temple towers of this city put the kibosh on the evil rock and/or roll from the era. But, nothing could be farther from the truth. I've seen playlists from the era and these stations rocked!! Little known fact: the Beach Boys found Salt Lake City and the outdoor venue, Lagoon amusement park to be such a receptive venue that they included a composition named after the town on one of their early albums. Need further evidence of the rock credentials of Salt Lake? In the late 1960s, such hard and heavy stalwarts as Jefferson Airplane, CCR and Jimi Hendrix all played Salt Lake. Jimi Hendrix! I know someone who is working on a documentary about the rock years of Lagoon. I cannot wait to see it.

A side note: A certain Communication Department chair of a small southwestern Utah college was a drummer for a band called the InMates that had a hit on Salt Lake radio with a song called London Town. Anyone who has serious lead on this record should get a hold of me via this column.

The production on this doc is iffy and low budget, but the makers of the film employed a brilliant strategy: they invited jocks from the era to a couple of dinners and then put them in front of mikes in roundtables to spin their tales. Need I tell you what happens when you put a bunch of ex-rock jocks in front of a bunch of microphones? The stories come hard and fast. Some of them are even true!

There is genuine drama in some of the stories as the jocks spin tales such tales as: How ex-KNAK jock Wooly Waldron left for cross-town competitor KCPX and immediately went on a talent raid of KNAK and made his station the one to work for and listen to; How a Salt Lake radio station broke the world-wide rock news story that Doors front-man Jim Morrison had died in Paris; How Salt Lake radio became the focus of the story when LDS prophet Spencer Kimball made the call to admit blacks to the LDS priesthood.

Top 40 radio really mattered at one time and the doc entitled: AM to FM shows us how this was the case.

Suite101 Articles

2009-03-29T12:30:00.001-07:00

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News From Asheville Global Report

2009-03-29T12:28:00.000-07:00

Mar. 16- The senior diplomat who withdrew as one of Barack Obama's top intelligence officials in a row over Israel has stepped up his attack on those he says are stifling debate in the United States, adding that he was "deeply insulted" to be accused of antisemitism for criticising what he described as "the Israel lobby".

Chas Freeman, a former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia, told CNN that organisations representing the right wing of Israeli politics had "a hammer lock on both public discussion and policy", and that their campaign to force his withdrawal as the chair of Obama's national intelligence council had been intended to "reinforce the taboo against any critical discussion of Israeli policies".

Freeman also reiterated his view that American policy on Israel had contributed to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, part of a litany that prompted several members of Congress to speak out against his appointment. The US was "paying a price" for its Middle Eastern policies, he said, "because our actions have catalysed - perhaps not caused, but catalysed - a radicalisation of Arab and Muslim politics that facilitates the activities of terrorists with global reach, like those who struck us on 9/11."

His opponents "should probably be called the Likud lobby" rather than the Israel lobby, he added. "The atmosphere is such in this country now that, whereas Israelis in Israel routinely criticise Israeli policies that they think may prove to be suicidal for their country, those who criticise the same policies here, for the same reasons, are subject to political reprisal."

Freeman's Washington critics, including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and the Zionist Organisation of America, have pointed to the fact that he served as president of a thinktank part-funded by the Saudi government, and on the advisory board of a Chinese-owned oil firm.

"If you're going to be an intelligence man, you can't have a financial conflict of interest with countries that are critical to your evaluation of intelligence data," Morton Klein, president of the ZOA, said.

Klein rejected the notion that American debate on Arab-Israeli policy was artificially narrow. "Many people are talking about the establishment of a Palestinian state, and Obama just increased aid to the Palestinian Authority from $700m under Bush to $900m now. What's narrow is that nobody talks about how the PA obligated themselves at Oslo to get rid of incitement to hatred and murder."

Freeman has also been attacked for his alleged support of China in the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. In his CNN interview, he insisted that a much-quoted email list posting had been edited to obscure the fact that he was characterising "the dominant view of the Chinese leadership", not his own.

Answering charges of antisemitism, Freeman said: "There's a very large number of American Jews who have written to me to express their gratitude for me raising the issues I have... The last thing on earth I am is antisemitic."

Other Places To Go On The Web

2009-03-29T12:26:00.000-07:00

Here

and Here

These Are Good Blogs....

2009-03-29T12:25:00.001-07:00

Visit them...often....

American Airspace

Pharyngula

World O'Crap

For College Journalists, Direct Action Can Get The Goods

2009-03-29T12:23:00.000-07:00

There is a natural tension between college administrations and campus newspapers. The students who write and edit the sheets believe they are journalists who have First Amendment rights. The college administrators believe the newspapers are part of the university, and being such, are subject to the decisions of the administrators. Being as close to a First Amendment activist as I can be, I have to side with the student journalists. They are closest to what is happening on the campuses, and are often the only ones reporting about what is happening with what are major institutions in their own communities.

There are too many incidents happening in which college journalists have to fight for their rights, and they need a program of activism. The activism has to be on several fronts, but it should never stray far from the dictum of the I-W-W: Direct Action Gets The Goods!

Here are the steps I believe student journalists should take when confronting college administrators.

First: Lobby for state laws that protect student newspapers. Following the case of Hosty v. Carter, student journalists are lobbying for, and in some cases, getting protective laws passed. The laws have to extend the doctrine of bonafide news organization to the papers. This is effective for state college campuses.

Second: If you feel your rights are being infringed, file a lawsuit. Yes, it takes time, effort, and money to do this. But, at the very least, the presence of a lawsuit is news and may embarrass the administrators in question.

Third: Strike, Sit-In, and Protest. This is one part of the direct action program. This is what students at the University of Oregon did when the administration attempted to put another layer of oversight onto an independent student newspaper. Again, it is newsworthy and will get coverage in some venue. It may embarrass the administration.

Fourth: This is the final part of the direct action program. I simply cannot believe it is not being done in cases that I hear about. Publish the offending material anyway. Usually administration actions are brought on by stories that have the potentiality to embarrass the administration and school. The students of today are supposed to be technology savvy. Find some way to publish the offending material online. This is direct action at its finest. It takes the power completely away from the authorities. The material gets out there and there is nothing they can do about it.

The fight has to be on many fronts, but remember: Direct Action Gets the Goods!!

Suite 101 Articles

2009-03-08T11:51:00.001-07:00

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2009-03-08T11:48:00.000-07:00

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News From Green Left Weekly

2009-03-08T11:47:00.001-07:00

6 March 2009

Thousands of civilians have been killed or injured and hundreds of thousands are in danger from hunger and disease, as the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) continues its brutal offensive against the Tamil people in the island’s north-east.

The Sri Lankan government is declaring an imminent victory in its 26-year war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), an armed group fighting for the independence for the Tamil Eelam homeland in Sri Lanka’s north and east.

“The Sri Lankan government has pursued a brutal military campaign in which it has shelled its own people, including in government-designated ‘safe zones’, displacing, injuring and killing many thousands of innocent civilians”, according to a letter signed by 11 British members of parliament.

The letter, published in the March 4 British Guardian, stated: “In the past two months alone 2,000 lives have been lost and as many as 5,000 have been injured. In the areas it has secured there have been reports of unlawful killings, enforced disappearances and other human rights violations.

“Dissent is treated as treason, criticism is violently suppressed and Sri Lanka is one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists.”

The MPs called for a ceasefire and peace negotiations, and for the army to allow access for aid agencies to the areas under attack.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has warned of “an impending humanitarian catastrophe”, according to a March 4 BBC report. Doctors Without Borders (MSF) reported on March 3 that 200,000 civilians were “living under desperate conditions”.

“Patients tell MSF how people are being shelled for days on end, with the dead and wounded surrounding them. There is a severe lack of medical care and not enough food and drinking water”, the NGO stated.

Sri Lankan defence affairs minister Keheliya Rambukwella dismissed calls for a ceasefire by the LTTE as “hilarious” as “the LTTE is on the verge of defeat militarily”, according to the March 3 Hindustan Times.

During a Norwegian-brokered ceasefire between 2002 and 2008, much of Tamil Eelam was under the de facto administration of the LTTE. In January 2008, the army unilaterally ended the ceasefire and embarked on the reconquest of the LTTE-held areas.

Since December, government and military spokespeople have announced the final defeat of the Tamil rebels several times.

While attacks by the LTTE against police and military targets have continued, it is clear that the army has succeeded in bringing most of the island under its territorial control. This has been achieved at the cost of the displacement of hundreds of thousands of civilians.

The civilian death toll from army’s assault is greater even than that during Israel’s recent assault on Gaza. According to Tamil sources, 2018 civilians were killed by the army in January and February, including 728 children. US-based Human Rights Watch has corroborated these figures.

Like their Israeli counterparts, Sri Lankan military authorities have kept media and aid agencies away from the conflict.

A high proportion of the civilian casualties have been in the areas which the military itself designated as “safe zones”. Hospitals have been targeted and columns of fleeing civilians have been carpet bombed by Israeli-supplied Kfir jets.

Illegal weapons such as cluster munitions and white phosphorus have been used.

The latest “safe zone” is a narrow 12-kilometre strip between a lagoon and the sea north of the town of Mullaiththeevu. More than 200,000 civilians have been herded into this barren land that lacks potable water and shade.

Food and medicine cannot be brought in. Health workers have reported deaths from starvation and from people eating poisonous Adampan leaves — one of the few plants that grow in the area.

According to S. Kanagratnam, member of parliament for Vanni (which covers the “safe zone”): “Scores of Tamil civilians are being killed every day. But the civilian victims are not on or near the frontline, as some international media is reporting.

“These people, inside safety zone, away from the frontline and they are being deliberately targeted by the Sri Lankan military … International actors and media who suggest that the civilians are somehow caught between the combatants or caught in crossfire and so on are deliberately misrepresenting the situation.

“This misrepresentation serves to absolve the Sri Lankan state of any blame for the killing and maiming of hundreds of Tamil people every week.

“It also serves to conceal, deliberately or unintentionally, the genocidal logic of firing thousands of shells at civilian areas — especially after arbitrarily designating these places as a so-called safe area so as to draw civilians into it.”

Western politicians and media have called for the LTTE to allow civilians to be evacuated to government-controlled areas, echoing Sri Lankan propaganda claiming that the LTTE are keeping civilians as human shields. This ignores the routine abuse of Tamil civilians in government-controlled areas.

According to a March 4 report on the TamilSydney website, the abandoned Kilinochchi hospital is being used by the army to hold young men, who are subjected to forced labour, and young women, who are held as sex slaves.

The March 2 Hindustan Times reported that the US Pacific Command (Pacom) was planning to evacuate 200,000 Tamil civilians from the conflict zone to government-controlled areas, where the government “would then imprison them in concentration-style internment camps”.

“PACOM evacuating these Tamil civilians is equivalent to signing their death warrants. These people have been bombed for months by this genocidal government; evacuating them from Vanni and delivering them to the Sri Lankan government is equivalent to being an accomplice to genocide”, Rosha Hebsur from the NGO People for Equality and Relief in Sri Lanka told the Hindustan Times.

The anti-Tamil war has been accompanied by a crackdown against the media that has resulted in journalists being arrested, assaulted, kidnapped and assassinated. During the past five years, 23 journalists have been killed by government-linked death squads and the BBC has suspended operations in the country.

The past-quarter century of civil war in Sri Lanka was preceded by a quarter-century of discrimination and escalating anti-Tamil violence. Backed by the Buddhist clergy, the major Sri Lankan political parties have promoted a chauvinistic nationalism that promotes the Singhalese people (who comprise 74% of the population) as the only true Sri Lankans.

In fact Singhalese and Tamils have coexisted on the island for millenia.

Despite discrimination in education and employment, when the LTTE was founded in the 1970s, the majority of Tamils did not support their program of independence to be won through armed struggle.

However, the success of the Singhalese elite in diverting discontent amongst the Singhalese poor into regular outbreaks of anti-Tamil violence convinced Tamils that there was no place for them in the Singhalese-dominated Sri Lankan state.

Following the 1983 “Black July” anti-Tamil pogrom, in which 3000 people were killed, a majority of Tamils switched their allegiance to the LTTE.

Attracted by the prize of the strategically important deep-water port of Trincomolee, global and regional powers have competed with each other to provide military assistance to Sri Lanka.

The US, Israel, China, India and Pakistan have all equipped the Sri Lankan army with high technology weapons, including illegal chemical weapons and cluster munitions.

The Sri Lankan army has only been used against internal enemies — the Tamils and uprisings by Singhalese rural poor youth in the ’70s and ’80s.

Since 2001, Western support for Sri Lanka has been justified by viewing the conflict through Washington’s “war on terror” prism, with the LTTE being listed by the US and the European Union as a terrorist organisation.

The LTTE are not listed as a prohibited terrorist organisation in Australia. This did not stop the Australian Federal Police from attempting to assist the Sri Lankan state by using anti-terror laws to prosecute three Tamil men in Melbourne for allegedly providing assistance to the LTTE.

However, nine terrorism-related charges were dropped on March 6 against the men. In 2007, Supreme Court judge Bernard Bongiorno had raised doubts as to whether the prosecution could succeed in convincing a jury the LTTE were a terrorist organisation, according the March 6 Australian.

The men still face charges of assisting an organisation prohibited by the United Nations, which carries a five-year maximum sentence, down from the 25 years attached to the dropped charges.

History repeatedly shows that oppression creates resistance. Even if the SLA’s current offensive succeeds in militarily destroying the LTTE, as long as the Tamil people are denied justice and the right to self-determination, there will be no lasting peace.

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2009-03-08T11:44:00.001-07:00

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My Kind Of Town

2009-03-08T11:42:00.000-07:00

I have had the opportunity recently to reflect on the incredible music scene that was the city of Chicago in the mid-to-late 1960s. On the rock and pop front, you had a stunning array of bands that included: The Buckinghams, The New Colony Six, The American Breed, The Ides of March, The Cryan Shames, The Shadows of Knight, just to name a few. These are just the ones who notched mentions on the Billboard Hot 100 and Bubbling Under charts. I am not even mentioning the ones who were just a local phenomenon and only scored local plays and sales, like the Yardbirdsy Del-Vetts.
Certainly one of the reasons the above-mentioned groups went beyond the purely local scene and into some national recognition was because of a fairly locally-oriented playlist philosophy from former Top-40 monster, WLS. This station could get the above-named bands, and others recognition in about 38 states with its night-time signal. A lot of these bands got followed throughout their entire careers. WLS was playing new records by the New Colony Six in the twilight of their career around 1972. You will probably find old-timers in Chicago who would swear that I Confess, circa 1965, was a major hit record.
Leave us not forget that, of course, Chicago was home city to the electric blues and the sounds of Koko Taylor, Muddy Waters, and Willie Dixon wafted mightily out of the Chess studio on Michigan Avenue, hung briefly over Lake Michigan and then hopped the pond where hundreds of young limey lads were inspired to take up the guitar.
But, Chess was always an eclectic outfit, and its many subsidiary labels spun out slick rockabilly, R N B, and soul sides.
Let us linger a bit on the Chicago soul scene. The names of Gene Chandler, Major Lance, and Curtis Mayfield and the Impressions cause the hearts of many latter-day soul men to flutter. I am not even mentioning such marginal, sales-and-play-wise outfits like the Accents, who were probably a major force on the local Chicago nightclub circuit and local airwaves.
An Interesting compilation project would be a two-CD set of Chicago Rock and Soul from the mid-to-late 60s. Many of the marginal singles and acts would be a good presentation of the Second City from this era. An Armload of WLS Silver-Dollar Surveys from the era would provide the raw data.
I am sure many teen-dance venues were stocked with locals only talent.
So, a toast to you, City of the Broad Shoulders and the local talent you gave us in the first full decade of the Rock and Roll Era.

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2009-03-01T12:28:00.001-08:00

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2009-03-01T12:26:00.000-08:00

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New From Indymedia

2009-03-01T12:25:00.000-08:00

February 11-2009--This Monday, Kent Police arrested a man in Sheffield under the Serious Crime Act 2007 in relation to the recent Indymedia server seizure. His home was raided, all computer equipment and related papers taken. He was released after eight hours. The person had neither technical, administrative nor editorial access to the Indymedia UK website. He was only associated to the project by hosting its server.

The arrest took place under Section 44-46 of the Serious Crime Act, which was passed into law on 1st October 2008 to combat serious international crime like drug trafficking, prostitution, money laundering and armed robbery. Sections 44-46 refer to “encouraging or assisting offences”.

Kent police claim that they are after the IP address of the poster of two anonymous comments to a report about a recent animal liberation court case, which included personal details of the Judge. The IP address of the poster is not stored as Indymedia does not log IP addresses. This was acknowledged by British Transport Police in 2005, after the Bristol IMC server seizure.

For the police to arrest the person who happened to sign the contract for server hosting, is sheer intimidation, in light of Indymedia’s openly stated policy of no IP logging.

With the implementation of the EU Data Retention Directive in March 2009, the UK government attempts to turn every internet service provider in the country into part of the law enforcement apparatus. This legislation will provide a legal basis to track, intimidate, harass, and arrest people who are doing valuable and necessary work for social change, for example as peace activists, campaigners for economic and social justice or against police brutality.

The present intimidation of the open publishing alternative news platform Indymedia will have serious implications for anyone running a server in the UK which allows user contributions – blogs, social networking sites, wikis. This is an attempt to close down sites that respect the privacy of their contributors, pure and simple.

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2009-03-01T12:24:00.001-08:00

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The Real Gangs York-Can You Dig It!?

2009-03-01T12:21:00.000-08:00

I have had the opportunity to recently to re-visit two movies which subjects are Gangs and New York. Two things struck me from my re-visit to these two movies. The first is that it is possible to make amazing movies these days on large budgets. The second is that I was rather lucky to have grown up when I did, as it was still possible to see low-budget trash in theaters. The exploitation era of cinema ran roughly from the beginning of the 1960s to the death of the drive-in in the early 1980s.
The first movie I am talking about is of course, the magnum opus of Scorsese, which is undeniably capital A Art. But for my money, the great Gang and New York movie is from 1979, and entitled the Warriors. This film is firmly in the canon of cult film and has even had a video game made from it. I do not play video games, so I cannot attest to its value. But, I saw this movie before it was a cult film and can attest to its grandeur.
I remember seeing it by myself at Rogers Cinema in the town of Stevens Point, Wisconsin. My parents gave me a fairly long leash and let me see pretty much any movie I wanted to. My dad even drove me to the film in question.
Let me tell you why this movie is so great, and was even more so from the perspective of an adolescent:
It may feature the greatest cinematic speech in history from the gang leader Cyrus: Can You Dig It!?
The scene with clown-make-upped and bat-wielding Baseball Furies scared the bejesus out of me.
The sex and violence inherent in the fight scene between the Lizzies and the Warriors about made my adolescent head explode.
The plot prominently featured radio.
Something I know now: only one scene, the bathroom fight with The Punks was filmed on a set, meaning this movie was shot on location in the mean streets of New York.
It extols the virtues of public transportation.
It features a future sit-com star: Deborah Van Valkeburgh, soon to be featured on Too Close For Comfort.
You really cannot say that anybody in this movie is well-intentioned. Of course, you want to root for the Warriors, but they are criminals. The character, Ajax, has a marked propensity for rape.
From the perspective of the now-adult me, the close to penultimate scene in which Swan picks up a discarded corsage and bestows it upon Mercy, is surprisingly tender.
There are a lot of vests in this movie.
Shortly after seeing this movie for the first time, I saw the paperback novel by Sol Yurick in K-Mart. Why I never bought it is still a mystery to me.
It has a classical source: The Anabasis, by Xenophon, so um….that is cool.
Hollywood has been remaking a lot of cult favorites lately. The remakes of good-ol-fashioned slasher pics are just torture-porn. The remakes of Rollerball and Death Race 2000 were largely crap. I am hoping they leave this one alone. The kids need to see good low-budget crap cinema.

News From Asheville Global Report

2009-02-22T10:48:00.000-08:00

Feb. 11- US defence officials are preventing Barack Obama from seeing evidence that a former British resident held in Guantánamo Bay has been tortured, the prisoner's lawyer said last night, as campaigners and the Foreign Office prepared for the man's release in as little as a week.

Clive Stafford Smith, the director of the legal charity Reprieve, which represents Ethiopian-born Binyam Mohamed, sent Obama evidence of what he called "truly mediaeval" abuse but substantial parts were blanked out so the president could not read it.

In the letter to the president , Stafford Smith urges him to order the disclosure of the evidence.

Stafford Smith tells Obama he should be aware of the "bizarre reality" of the situation. "You, as commander in chief, are being denied access to material that would help prove that crimes have been committed by US personnel. This decision is being made by the very people who you command."

It is understood US defence officials might have censored the evidence to protect the president from criminal liability or political embarrassment.

The letter and its blanked-out attachment were disclosed as two high court judges yesterday agreed to reopen the court case in which Mohamed's lawyers, the Guardian and other media are seeking disclosure of evidence of alleged torture against him. Mohamed's lawyers are challenging the judges' gagging order, claiming that David Miliband, the foreign secretary, changed his evidence.

In a judgment last week, Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Lloyd Jones stated repeatedly that Miliband claimed the US had threatened to stop sharing intelligence with the UK if information relating to Mohamed's alleged torture was disclosed. Miliband subsequently denied the US had applied such pressure. The case will be reopened next month.

After a meeting with Mohamed's US-appointed military lawyer, Lieutenant Colonel Yvonne Bradley, Miliband said yesterday that the US had granted permission for Foreign Office officials to visit Mohamed. The Foreign Office said the officials would be joined by a Metropolitan police doctor, who would accompany Mohamed back to the UK if he is released.

Stafford Smith said he believed this trip was to check Mohamed was fit to fly after the hunger strike that he has maintained for over a month. He stressed that no date for his client's release had been fixed, but "I think we're talking about a week, I sincerely hope so".

Millband said the US administration had agreed to treat Mohamed's case as "a priority", adding that Britain was working with Washington for "a swift resolution". Bradley said later: "We haven't been given any specific date about Mr Mohamed's release."

Earlier, she told a press conference that Mohamed's treatment "would make waterboarding seem like child's play".

Bradley and Stafford Smith yesterday met in private with members of the intelligence and security committee, the group of MPs and peers facing mounting criticism in Westminster over claims it failed to effectively scrutinise the activities of MI5. Stafford Smith said he told the committee it would have been "absolutely impossible" for it to have cleared MI5 of involvement in the torture of Mohamed had it seen 42 key documents in the case – as he has – that Miliband says cannot be released for reasons of national security.

Bill Delahunt, a senior Democrat congressman and chairman of the House of Representatives subcommittee on human rights and oversight, said: "We cannot let our governments stonewall ... I take offence at the idea that secrecy is being maintained in order to preserve national security." He told the all-party committee on rendition: "The treatment of detainees has done great harm to the security of both our nations."

Lieutenant Colonel Nigel Wylde, who worked in intelligence in Northern Ireland, told the committee: "The use of torture is utterly counterproductive because it breeds hatred against us and encourages people to become extremists."

David Davis, a former shadow home secretary, said torture was wrong morally and legally, ineffective and undermined the safety of British people. "Was the government involved, was it a matter of policy or a matter of freelancing – failure of policy or a failure of control?"

The Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, Edward Davey, said: "Miliband's bad judgment in blocking the courts from publishing this evidence of torture is being compounded by his refusal to press the new Obama administration to disclose this evidence freely."

Source: Guardian (UK)

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2009-02-22T10:45:00.001-08:00

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2009-02-22T10:40:00.000-08:00

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2009-02-22T10:39:00.000-08:00

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Legislating Biology

2009-02-22T10:38:00.000-08:00

Creationists, sorry, Intelligent Design proponents are attempting to do with law what their ideas could not do by themselves. Their ideas could not stand the glare of scrutiny, and experimentation, so they are legislating their views into existence.
When Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana runs for president in 2012, I want leftists to hammer home the fact every day of his campaign that he signed the very inappropriately named Louisiana Science Education Act into law. I want this done so often that the phrases Bobby Jindal and Intelligent Design become forever linked in Yahoo! Concepts searches. This classic wolf-in-sheep clothing law allows Intelligent Design to be taught in Louisiana Schools. Intelligent Design no more belongs in a biology class than the Turtle Island story belongs in a geology class. Intelligent Design is clearly religion masquerading as science.
Iowa and Alabama are trying to get Intelligent Design into the back door of higher education under the guise of academic freedom as well. In similar bills the law is being used to protect students and teachers because:

current law does not expressly protect the right of instructors to objectively present scientific information relevant to the full range of scientific views regarding
chemical and biological evolution.

And
existing law does not expressly protect students from discrimination due to their positions or views regarding biological or chemical evolution.

Which of course is completely false. You can express any fool thing you want, just do not expect to get tenure, because you obviously have not kept current in a field whose current body of knowledge was established about 150 years ago. Also do not expect an A on a biology exam because you are willfully disregarding the content of the class. Other than that, believe what you will, write it all up and get a regular stint writing for Townhall.com, because you are the latest victim of leftist intolerance.

The idea that scientists do not critique their own science is patently false. The latest cover of New Scientist magazine proclaims in no uncertain terms that Darwin Was Wrong! It does so while stating in equally uncertain terms that evolution, like plate tectonics, like the atomic theory is still pretty much sound. Science can stand the gaze of scrutiny, which is why no legislation was ever introduced to allow the theory of the germ to take hold. It became evident over time.

I know why evolution bothers the religious. It is because God is no longer necessary to explain the origin of life, any more than Thor is required to explain meteorology. God is merely conjecture at this point. I am not even sure that God is required to explain ethics. For my money, social contract theories developed during the Enlightenment, provide a perfectly valid, god-less
basis for ethics. Read the Age of Reason by Paine sometime.

Secularists of all stripes need to get together to defeat these bills. Iowa and Alabama, get out there and make sure they remain bottled up. Louisianans can use the Dover decision to fight the constitutionality of their new law. Better yet, start a new bill that overturns that one and get it right under the nose of Jindal in time for 2012.

Intelligent Design is not science. Let us not have the laws treat it as such.

News From Indymedia

2009-02-15T13:14:00.000-08:00

Feb. 12-2009-The flagship of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, the M/Y Steve Irwin, is heading back from the Antarctic Whale Sanctuary where it has been on patrol to enforce international conservation regulations in protection of the area's great whales. Since its departure from Brisbane, Australia on December 4th, the ship and its crew have been involved in various confrontations with a Japanese Whaling Fleet, which continues to operate a commercial whale hunt in the area illegally.

On December 26th, the Steve Irwin confronted the Japanese vessel Kaiko Maru. The ships collided and Sea Shepherd crew deployed butyric acid on its decks. From 1st February the whaling operation was shut down for 8 days straight with both sides of the conflict accusing each other of dangerous manoeuvres and tactics. On February 6th, the Steve Irwin had collisions with the harpoon ships Yushin Maru No 2 and Yushin Maru No 3, when it tried to block the ships from offloading dead whales onto the factory ship Nisshin Maru. As an international crew of 40, activists from Australia, America, Canada, United Kingdom, South Africa, Sweden, Bermuda, Germany, the Netherlands, Hungary, New Zealand and Japan manned the Sea Shepherd vessel during the campaign which was dubbed operation Musashi.

On December 19th, only 9 days after the Steve Irwin had left Hobart, Tasmania it was able to locate one of the ships of the Japanese Whaling Fleet. The Yushin Maru No.2, one of the Japanese harpoon ships, suffered ice damage to its propeller while being pursued by the Steve Irwin that day. In dense fog the harpoon ship was forced to flee into icy waters. The incident and the damage which resulted from it took the harpoon vessel out of operation between December 20th and February 5th, for a total of 46 days.

On December 26th, the Steve Irwin confronted the Japanese spotter vessel Kaiko Maru. The ships collided and Sea Shepherd crew deployed butyric acid on its decks. During manoeuvres by both ships a collision occurred causing minor damage to both ships, and no injuries, in Antarctic waters within the Australian Economic Exclusion Zone and Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, north of the Mawson Peninsula. Australian citizen Jeff Hansen from Perth, Western Australia, delivered a message over the radio in Japanese calling on the Japanese whaling ship to cease whaling operations and leave Australian territorial waters.

The Kaiko Maru had been undertaking a detour in the ice pack area after completing the day’s research activities, according to the Institute Of Cetacean Research (ICA). The Steve Irwin pursued and came alongside the Kaiko Maru for anti-whaling activists to throw 10 bottles of butyric acid (rotten butter) and 15 bottles of a methyl cellulose and indelible dye mixture.

Methyl cellulose makes the decks of the whaling ships unbearably slippery, as the whalers now know after a few of these confrontations, while butyric acid produces a very bad smell making work intolerable. Both substances are biodegradable and cause no harm when it comes in contact with a person. The main target is the large deck of the Nisshin Maru, the factory ship which processes the whale meat. Once the substances have been thrown on deck, they can’t use it for a while as it would contaminate the whale meat, delaying any killing of whales.

From 1st February the whaling operation was shut down for 8 days straight as Sea Shepherd persued the factory ship Nisshin Maru. On February 4th, Sea Shepherd reported that the three harpoon vessels of the fleet attacked the Steve Irwin. All three harpoon ships moved in to flank the Steve Irwin as the Sea Shepherd ship continued to chase the factory ship Nisshin Maru. "The Yushin Maru #2 initiated the attack by cutting dangerously close across the bow of the Steve Irwin from port to starboard in seas that were far from calm. The other two harpoon vessels Yushin Maru #1 and Yushin Maru #3 made the same dangerous maneuvers." stated a press release by Sea Shepherd. "It has given us some very dramatic footage for the next season of Whale Wars," said Captain Paul Watson.

"If their intention was to intimidate us, it did not work. When it comes to playing chicken on the high seas, we have much more experience than the whalers."

On February 6th, the Steve Irwin had collisions with the harpoon ships Yushin Maru No 2 and Yushin Maru No 3, when it tried to block the ships from offloading dead whales onto the factory ship Nisshin Maru. No injuries occurred during the collisions. The Japanese Whaling fleet decided to stop running from Sea Shepherd and recommenced whale slaughtering which has provoked confrontations between the whalers and Sea Shepherd activists.

According to Captain Paul Watson: "We told them to not continue their illegal whaling operations and that we would be blocking the stern slipway of the factory ship. They decided to test our resolve and apparently expected us to retreat when they charged in ahead of us to make the transfer."

With the Japanese Whaling Fleet using three harpoon boats, Sea Shepherd does not have the resources to prevent the harpooning of whales. Once harpooned, the whales need to be transferred to the rear slipway of the factory ship, the Nisshin Maru. Sea Shepherd have endeavoured to block the transferring of dead whales by placing their boat, the Steve Irwin, right behind the Nisshin Maru. Both collisions ocurred in this situation with the Japanese attempting to force Sea Shepherd from blocking access to the Nisshin Maru slipway, while pounding the activists with hire pressure water jets, Longe Range acoustic Devices (LRD) which can daze or confuse people within its range, and metal objects.

Sea Shepherd says they pursued the Japanese whaling fleet for over 2000 miles between December 18th and January 7th disrupting their whaling operations for 19 days. "The Steve Irwin returned and relocated the whaling fleet shutting down operations of the fleet for an additional 8 days. We can claim 27 days that we physically prevented the whalers from killing whales.

"Many less whales have been killed and more whaling profits lost. The whaling fleet will not meet its quota for the fourth year in a row."

The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society was founded in 1977 by Paul Watson who is one of the three founding members of Greenpeace. Watson had come to feel that the tactics employed by that organisation were inadequate. While Greenpeace have a policy of avoiding harm to whaling vessels, Sea Shepherd have a deliberate policy of sinking or sabotaging vessels engaged in illegal whaling.

This confrontational approach has been controversial. Greenpeace refuse to work with them and the FBI dub them 'eco-terrorists'. Nevertheless, their uncompromising position has found them many supporters, including several high-profile figures. In 2007 the MV Robert Hunter (named after Canadian Robert Hunter, co-founder of the Greenpeace Foundation) was renamed Steve Irwin after the TV naturalist. Irwin had considered joining the vessel on an upcoming voyage to Antarctica shortly before his untimely death, and the decision to rename the vessel was endorsed by his widow Terri Irwin.

Although it is most famous for its work defending whales, Sea Shepherd's remit is much broader, incorporating campaigns against poaching, longline fishing, shark finning, seal hunting, unlawful habitat destruction and climate change. Their confrontation with shark poachers in Guatemala is a key element of the film Sharkwater, recently released in cinemas across the world.

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2009-02-15T13:13:00.001-08:00

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2009-02-15T13:09:00.000-08:00

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The Marvelous Marvelletes

2009-02-15T13:07:00.001-08:00

Motown had three excellent girl groups. The Supremes had the sweetness and sophistication. The Vandellas had the amazing pipes of Martha Reeves, which could really clean the lint off of bricks at 50 yards. But pound for pound, I would have to say the Marvellettes had an amazing collective grit that really makes them my favorite Motown girl act.
People know their songs but they never really had a collective face in the way that the Supremes had Diana Ross and the Vandellas had Martha. They were somewhat faceless, but had an amazing record of 23 Top 100 hits. They can also be found as backing vocalists on numerous Motown sessions. They were also briefly known as the Darnells. I have long ago given up figuring out how vocal groups got their names, so let us just be thankful that they got known as the Marvellettes. Perhaps also leading to their lack of recognition is the fact that both Gladys Horton and Wanda Young alternated leads for their songs. They had a total of five members, in what was supposed to be a three-person, or four—person group, depending on the time of the recording. Juanita Cowart left early on. Georgeanna Gordon left about mid-stream, and lead vocalist Horton was replaced Anne Brogan late in the career of the group. So, they had somewhat of a rotating cast of characters.
Yet, their songs, though written by men, delivered a very believable female-centric view of the universe of love. My fave rave of theirs, Too Many Fish In The Sea, really tells women that they do not have to wait around for a particular man. Their uber-sexy, My Baby Must Be A Magician, has a great basso spoken-word introduction by Temptation Melvin Franklin. The otherwise sappy, Please Mr. Postman, really comes off like an urgent plea. And, who has not wanted to dial Beechwood4-5789 and ask for a date any old time.
Motown really was, at times, a family, and the Marvellettes showed that. Georgeanna Gordon was married to a Contour and Wanda Young married a Miracle.
They lasted eight years, which is really a lengthy run. When Motown shed its Detroit-roots and left for California, the Marvellettes were one of the groups left in the dust. Most of the Motown groups have Utlimate Collection CDs and the Marvellettes are no exception

News From Green Left Weekly

2009-02-08T12:42:00.002-08:00

Stuart Munckton
6 February 2009

More than 120,000 people marched in London on January 31 against the genocidal war being carried out by the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) that has conquered Tamil-controlled areas in Sri Lanka’s north and east at massive cost to the civilian population, according to Tamilforum.com.

The marchers were predominantly Tamils exiled due to the oppression and war carried out by the Sri Lankan state. The Tamils have been struggling for self-determination against a racist state based on the domination of the Sinhalese ethnic majority.

The SLA is seeking to completely destroy the armed resistance of the Tamil people carried out by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, as well as the structures of Tamil self-government created in LTTE-liberated territories.

Tamilnet.com reported on February 5 that the SLA had shelled that day a “safety zone in torrents not allowing people to come out of bunkers throughout the day in Chuthanthirapuram and Iruddumadu civilian refuges”.

The article reported that the previous day, more than 50 civilians were killed due to shelling within the safety zone in Puthukkudiyiruppu (PTK), forcing staff from the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross to flee.

According to Tamilnet.com: “Most of the patients at PTK hospital were moved away [February 4] as the hospital had come under artillery barrage, also deploying artillery-fired cluster shells on the hospital and its vicinity. A UN official in Colombo also told reporters that cluster bombs were used in the attack on [the] hospital.”

On February 3, the report stated, “more than 100 civilians were feared killed in artillery barrage”.

Tamilforum.com noted on the Londond march: “It was remarkable to note the high proportion of British born Tamils participating. The protest, which was arranged in less than a week by Action Committee Against Genocide of Tamils, an umbrella body made up of several Tamil organisations.”

The report noted: “With the monsoon rains in full force, the civilians’ torment is further magnified by the lack of food, shelter and medical assistance.

“The wounded are being left without medical treatment.”

The protest called for the international community to pressure Sri Lanka for an immediate permanent ceasefire and negotiations to resolve the decades-long conflict.

The marchers also called for desperately needed emergency aid to be sent to areas targeted by the SLA.

“The peace campaigners also called on the international media to expose the truth about this unfolding humanitarian catastrophe by getting around the cynical methods the Sri Lankan government has employed hitherto to suppress the truth”, Tamilnet.com reported.

“After banishing the international media, the NGOs and the UN agencies from the conflict zone and silencing the local media by assassinating leading journalists, the current hard-line Sri Lankan regime has succeeded in suppressing the truth emerging about what is widely accepted as a genocidal war against the centuries old Tamil civilisation in Sri Lanka.”

The report claimed that by spending “millions of dollars on public relations, the Sri Lankan regime has attempted to, and in many instances succeeded in hoodwinking the international media”.

According to Tamilgenocide.org, 50,000 predominantly Tamils marched in Toronto to protest the “genocide of innocents in Sri Lanka’s conflict zone” on February 6.

A protest against Sri Lanka’s war also occurred on February 4 in Durban, South Africa, and included representatives of the governing African National Congress and the South African Communist Party.

From: International News, Green Left Weekly issue #782 11 February 2009.

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Wild In The Streets

2009-02-08T12:37:00.000-08:00

really do not know why I love this picture as much as I do. But maybe I know exactly why I love it so much. Long story short, Max Frost is a rock star who manages to precipitate a youth takeover of the United States. That is really all you really need to know about it. It has a mostly rock and roll soundtrack, that was probably performed by some of the AIP rock stalwarts, such as the Chocolate Watch Band and Dave Allan and the Arrows. So, that is another reason to kind of like this movie. It has also recently been on Youtube, but I think it is down now. That is the problem with Youtube. You have to strike while the iron is hot. I really do not know what TMC has not had this movie on its TCM Underground series, it almost defines cult film. Instead of doing a big take, I thought I would just explain why this movie is cool:

You can learn really fascinating facts about the U.S. government. Such as the fact that the U.S. Congress is composed of about twenty guys, that they meet in what looks like a city council chamber, and they can change the U.S. Constitution with a 2/3 vote.

Richard Pryor does the most unconvincing drummer impersonation in any film.

The makers of this film have no idea of how LSD really works.

This film features one of the first screen appearances of Barry Williams.

Max Frost sports a tiny pony-tail on the back of his head. This may be the first screen appearance of the freshie.

At the time this movie came out, it could have catered to two different sides. If you were one of the oldsters who feared the youth of the time, it would confirm your worst fears. If you were one of the youths, of the time, you could have lived out a vicarious fantasy.

As low budget as it was, it probably provoked some serious discussions at the time.

No character in this film has any good motives. Hal Holbrook as the U.S. Senator is trying to secure power by getting young people to support him. Max Frost is trying to, well, take over the whole country. Shelley Winters, as the mom, is clearly a narcissist. Everyone in this movie is a bad guy. How can you hate that?

Please petition TMC to feature this movie on TCM Underground.

News From Infoshop

2009-02-01T11:13:00.000-08:00

February 1-Wednesday we participated in the demonstration against the separation fence in Ni'ilon and visited there the Holocaust exhibition http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3662608,00.html in the municipality building. On Friday we participated in the usual demonstrations against the separation fence in Bil'in, Ni'ilin, and Um Salmuna. In Bil'in we had a reinforcement support from the leftist Palestinian Front of struggle. Palestine-Israel, Just another week of AAtW struggle against the separation fence and occupation Wednesday we participated in the demonstration against the separation fence in Ni'ilon and visited there the Holocaust exhibition http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3662608,00.html in the municipality building. On Friday we participated in the usual demonstrations against the separation fence in Bil'in, Ni'ilin, and Um Salmuna. In Bil'in we had a reinforcement support from the leftist Palestinian Front of struggle. We also had a second wave headed by three local women that brought us up to the electronic fence. In Um Salmuna the local comity dared to lead the demonstration to the local highway - going around the unprepared state force road block. A high ranking commander detained a member of the village comity and the I.D.s of participants confiscated. However, after a 10 minute stay, the demonstration declared finished and both the detainee and I.D.s were released. On Saturday, January 31st 2009, at 15:00, we will hold a protest event in Gan Hashnaim (Yefet st. corner of Dr. Erlich), with projections of testimonies from Gaza, art installations and performances. Ja'ayus 23-1-2009 - link to video http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=nxnhDdMeQxg BIL'IN Friday 23-1-09 demonstration video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUdhNq2Na1c Friday 30-1-09 demonstration video at http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=NibvpvDgiH8 As it happen often the last few weeks, when two demonstrators hung flags on the gate to the route of the separation fence, the Israeli state force showered us with tear gas. After regrouping, three Palestinian women marched towards the gate and entered the route and even shake the electronic fence, while shouting on the state force. The state force shamed by the women refrained for few minutes from resuming shooting, and others of us joined the women. After a wile the state force started to shower us again with tear gas and gradually forcing us to retreat to the village. Following are excerpts from the report of Iyad Burnat- Head of Popular Committee in Bil'in: "Dozens suffered ["only"] from teargas inhalation during the Bil'in Weekly Demonstration Friday, 30 1 2008 "The march drew a crowd of cadres and members and supporters of the Palestinian Popular Struggle Front [from the west bank], hoisting banners and chanting slogans calling for unity and the removal of settlements and the wall and lifting the siege on Gaza." "Khamis Fathi Abu Rahma left the hospital yesterday after being injured by Israeli soldiers on Friday in the head with a new type of gas, corrected by the Israeli soldiers, causing a fracture and severe bleeding in his skull, where the Israeli soldiers deliberately pointed their guns at the heads of the demonstrators especially when firing tear gas." NI'ILIN Ni'ilin demonstration 21-1-2009 - link to video Report of Professor Uriel Prokachia on a previous Friday demonstration against the separation fence Come to Ni'ilin - Personal experience on what happens on Fridays in the village, will enable you too to decide on morally related questions Every Friday protest actions happen in the Palestinian village Ni'ilin with its 5,000 inhabitants, against the separation fence, that cut between the village and its fields. The protest activities initiate confrontations between the villagers and the security forces, that already cost a high price of life of villagers, serious injuries on both sides and destruction. Naturally, such violence rise a serious ethical question. We "consume" every week contradicted reports of the villagers and of the security forces, where each side blame the other side for the responsibility to the tragedy. Last Friday, I decided to enter the village without prejudice to witness with my own eyes what happens, without biased reports. May be what I have seen is only one piece of a more complex picture I failed to decipher its full meaning, but even this piece rise in me a serious worry. Ni'ilin is a picturesque village adjacent to the hills scene north of Modi'in. Most of its lands were expropriated after the Six Days war [1967] for "security reasons" and were built on a string of settlements, among them Modi'in Illit, Hashmonaim, Kiriat Sefer, and Nili. The security fence will bite wide area from the small remaining area - though the High Court of Justice, the less cruel for the villages from the alternatives the security forces brought before it. However, it is hard for the villagers to accept this alternative that will result the loss of means of livelihood for many families and intensify the feeling of economic and emotional strangulation forced on them from the beginning of the occupation. Friday, 10:00 in the morning, the village seems to be calm and serene. Merchant stand in front of their meager shops, people are conversing in the small alleys and small herds of sheep and goats are lead by teenagers to the near by pasture lands. Gradually, started a converging of about 200 people on a high hill facing the far away separation fence that separate between the village on one side and Modi'in Illit and Hashmonaim on the other. Most of the people are from the village including women and children. I counted about a dozen of participants from out of the village, who express support to the struggle against the separation fence. Already at that time, jeeps of the border gendarmes are seen among the olive trees, about a kilometer or two from the converging people. After a while, the people are forming a procession for the march. The soldiers and the policemen are spread out near by. Five minutes later, with no sign of violence from the side of the converging people - even before the starting of the march towards the far away fence, the state force started to spray the whole region with tear gas. The youth start to throw stones, but only for a short period, as the teargas do its job. It is impossible to stay within the cloud of tear gas. The gas blind the eyes and choke your breath. The people, and me too, escape into the houses. The people in the house that took me in shut all the doors and windows so it will not be flooded by the gas. The security forces continue their bold and ordered march into the village and invade its central square. From there, they continue to shoot tear gas into the houses. All the village houses are wrapped by the gas. The house I hide in is wrapped by gas from outside but significant amount penetrate in due to incomplete sealing of the doors and windows. Me and my courteous hosts, I was not acquainted before, shed tears like the Mississippi... but as we were healthy we got over eventually with no harm. I am less sure about the fate of babies, old folk, and people with problematic respiration system. At that stage I assumed that the Friday program was fulfilled and I may resume business as usual. However, the security forces thought otherwise. The shooting continued and continued. All the villagers were hiding at their homes. The village is covered with a disgusting cloud tear gas. The time pass, one and a half, two, two and a half, three... and the shooting continues. I know what happened afterwards only from rumors as my host that worried about me found a way to smuggle me out of the village to the near by high way using side way that bypass the shooting area. May be some readers will doubt the authenticity of the report, or that will say that it is all in the eyes of the one who look at it.... But, the ethical question presented here is important. Every one of us must equip himself with a real personal narrative that will shade light on his road. There is only one ethical way to do that: sacrifice the pleasures of one Friday and come for direct experience in the village. It worth the sacrifice. The village is friendly to its guests, the view is wonderful, at least in the minutes of grace you can look at it with tear-less eyes. ------------------------------------------ Professor Uriel Prokchia is the head of the M.A. program in law of the interdisciplinary center of Hertzelia collage

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Small And Poor May Get Out Of The Recession

2009-02-01T11:05:00.001-08:00

We like to think big and rich in this country. This is what Americans do. Our country is the country of endless possibilities, and we like to make our mark. The stimulus ideas of President Obama ideas are all big and rich. I have no real problem with funding big projects for our nation’s communities. My hometown, back in Wisconsin, has a junior high school and an athletic field that were built by the Work Projects Administration. I have no doubt that the building of these facilities kept many people fed. They have continued to be a source of community pride for about 70 years. There are, no doubt, many such projects around the country, and I would like to take the conservatives in our country who are poo-pooing these plans on a tour of all of them. They also seem to forget that the interstate system was a massive government employment project and no doubt helped keep the recession of the late 1950s from getting worse. The Internet was also a government project and it helped fuel the economic growth of the 1980s and 1990s.
I would like the president to think small and poor. I have no idea why we do not have a Grameen Bank in this country. The original Grameen Bank has helped stave off grinding poverty in one of the poorest of the poorest countries, Bangladesh. The Grameen Bank lends money to those who have no resources. I have a bad feeling that we will have many more such people before the current recession runs through the year. The bank lends money to those who have no collateral, who then use it as a means to establish their own enterprises or to assist them in getting a job. The creditors are made responsible to each other and default rates are close to zero. Let us have a portion of the stimulus package go to establishing Grameen Banks in trial areas. Let us see if the small and poor can help us, where the big and rich have failed us. I still have no doubt that some of the plans for big projects will work, they have in the past and probably will in the future. We like big and rich in this country. We also like rooting for the little guy, and gal. We need to see if they can lead us out of the recessions. Give us a chance to grow this country from the ground up.

News From Indymedia

2009-01-25T13:12:00.000-08:00

January 12, 2009--The Zapatista inspired network "Flor da Palavra" ("blossom of words", in a free translation) invites everyone to participate in a "ajuri" (gathering) to build the first "caracol" (snail) of Brasil, in the island of Caratateua (Outeiro), in Belém, Brasil, starting in January 2009. These "snails" are the bases for the organization of autogestion in the Zapatista's regions in Chiapas (Mexico), creating unity between its autonomous municipalities and communities and facilitating the communication of the native folks with national and international civil society solidarity. The "ajuri" (gathering) is a traditional practice of the indigenous people and of the caboclos (brazilian descendants of white and indians), in which groups and individuals unite in solidarity to, for example, clean and prepare the land for cultivation. In Outeiro, the purpose of the "ajuri" is to buy a piece of land and then begin the physical and human construction of a permanent area which can be used by volunteers and inhabitants to cultivate local autonomy and communication with other struggles.

There are already initiatives for the caracol to be also a place for the gathering of autonomous groups, free radios, Indymedia groups and other collectives. The network reminds that the revolution, for the EZLN, is the result of "the struggle in many social fronts, with many methods, under different social forms, with diverse degrees of compromise and participation", and stands out the importance that the main gathering happens with the people that live and frequent the island. Caratateua (Outeiro) is administrated by Belém, and is connected to the center by an 18km bridge, inaugurated in 1986. It has a population of 16.665 (data from the Belém City Hall, 1997) distributed in the quarters of Brasilia, Itaiteua, Tucumaeira, Fama, Fidélis, Água Boa, Primavera and Água Cristalina, which combine aspects of riverain rural life (as fishing and production of açaí -- a fruit from the amazonic region) with urbanization connected to the expansion of popular turism. It suffers with infra-structure and basic sanitation problems, as well as others linked with its "poor" region profile (in the "rich" point of view) and low priority for the State.

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Bubble Gum Music Is The Naked Truth

2009-01-25T12:38:00.000-08:00

I have recently become a fan of the so-called, Bubblegum Music, of the late 1960s and early 1970s. I think of this as a lateral move from my fondness for 1960s garage and pyschedelic music, as I discovered that a lot of the music labelled as Bubblegum, sure sounds like the other two genres.

What Bubblegum exactly is, remains elusive. Every CD compilation I see labelled, Bubblegum seems to include different artists and different songs. Supposedly the term came about when teen music impressarios, Jeff Katz and Jerry Kasenetz came up with the label when talking about their studio productions they did for labels like, Buddha, and their own Super K label.

So, Bubblegum was largely put out in the form of singles by studio-session musicians
that were ready for AM radio consumption.

Except, some real bands, like the Music Explosion seem to usually fall under the category of Bubblegum.

So, here are some observations about what seems to constitute Bubblegum music:

There seems to be an Ohio connection of some sort: The Music Explonsion, Lemon Pipers, Tommy James And The Shondells, and of course, the Ohio Express, all seem to fall under Bubblegum.

The Teen Idol connection is strong: The likes of Bobby Sherman seem to usually be considered Bubblegum.

Cartoon characters as recording artists: I would put under here, The Archies, Josie and The Pussycats, and the live action cartoon that The Monkees were. The most unusual item under consideration here, is a 1969 single called, Captain Groovy And His Bubblegum Army, which was made for a never-produced cartoon show, called, Captain Groovy and His Bubblegum Army. It picked up some airplay and got all the way to #128 on the charts.

The following singers seem to be in the category of Bubblegum: Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart as recording artists, Joey Levine ( Ohio Express, Kasenetz-Katz Singing Orchestral Circus, and other productions), and Tony Burrows (Edison Lighthouse, Brotherhood Of Man and other studio productions).

Anyway, there is good stuff under this umbrella, so if you are like me and feel the need to make a lateral move from the garage and psych and tune in and turn on and like the song says:

Let me dance, dance, dance
To that bubble gum music
If you really want to turn me on.

News From Asheville Global Report

2009-01-18T11:19:00.000-08:00

Jan. 11- Palestinian children are dying at a heavy rate in the Israeli-Hamas fighting — about one of every three persons killed, according to Gaza statistics.

Medical staff on Jan. 11 estimated that over 850 Palestinians had been killed in Israel's two-week military offensive, including some 265 children, and more than 3,500 injured. During the same period, 13 Israelis have died in the fighting. On Jan. 9, the Associated Press reported that there were at least 1,080 children among the 3,100 injured up to that point earlier.

The U.N.'s top humanitarian official, John Holmes, described the numbers as "credible" and deeply disturbing. U.N officials say about half of the casualties were civilians.

Holmes and John Ging, head of Gaza operations for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, both expressed anger and regret at their decision Thursday to temporarily suspend aid shipments in the Gaza Strip because it was too risky for their aid workers.

"It's particularly distressing and horrifying that the current casualties seem to be increasingly civilian casualties, with an increasing incidence of whole families being buried in houses which have been hit," Holmes said.

Ann Veneman, executive director of the U.N. children's agency, UNICEF, warned the suspension of aid would put children even more in harm's way.

"This can only deepen an already critical humanitarian situation and put children at even greater risk of death or permanent damage. The distribution of food, water, fuel and medicine should not be impeded," she said.

The decision to suspend aid deliveries in Gaza came after Israeli strikes killed two drivers for UNRWA and injured a third in marked vehicles, U.N. officials say.

In all, four of UNRWA's Gaza staff have been killed since Israel launched a major attack on Hamas 13 days ago, according to the U.N. UNRWA said its deliveries of food have served as a "lifeline" for 750,000 Palestinian refugees in Gaza.

Holmes cited another incident in which a U.N. convoy of two armored vehicles and an ambulance were "targeted by small-arms fire during its passage" Thursday, even though its movement was "agreed in advance" by the Israeli authorities.

The World Health Organization said Gaza's health services were "on the point of collapse" — the hospitals overwhelmed, health care workers exhausted. It said the dead included 21 medical personnel, 30 more were injured and 11 ambulances have been struck by attacks.

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip received on Jan. 10 air-dropped leaflets warning them that the Israeli military was about to step up operations against militant targets there and that they should take necessary precautions.

However, it remained unclear what Palestinians could do, given that UN officials have said Gazans have no safe place to hide.

"There is nowhere safe in Gaza," Allegra Pacheco, deputy head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in the occupied Palestinian territories, said. His views were echoed by Max Gaylord, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Jerusalem.

The leaflet told Gazans that they should follow the recent example of Rafah's residents, who fled their homes in the south of the Gaza Strip after receiving similar announcements instructing them to do so just before the Israeli airforce began to pound the city, which is along the Egyptian border. Israeli officials said Palestinian militants were using tunnels to smuggle weapons under this border.

Witnesses said up to 50,000 people fled the town, and the UN reported that Israel's ongoing Operation Cast Lead, which began on December 27, has created the largest number of forcibly displaced Palestinians since the 1967 war.

Nowhere to run

While most Gazans are already refugees from previous wars, they cannot cross a border now, as the perimeter of the territory is sealed off from all sides. They can only find a relatively safer place within the Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated areas on the planet.

The latest leaflet said the Israeli military "will continue to target tunnels, weapons storage facilities and terror operatives with growing intensity throughout the Gaza Strip. For your safety and that of your families, stay away from these."

An Israeli military spokesman could not explain how a civilian in Gaza was supposed to know where a weapons storage facility was and how the person could then avoid it, particularly as the army itself has said militants were hiding in civilian areas.

Furthermore, places where Palestinians have sought refuge, including UN facilities, have been attacked, and civilians have been killed while fleeing, according to testimonies gathered by Israeli and Palestinian human rights groups.

Israel's definition of a legitimate target has been challenged by the Israeli rights group B'tselem, which, for example, rejects the military's claims that it can attack the civilian infrastructure of Hamas, including government and police facilities. International law, the group said, did not consider these military targets.

While B'tselem said Hamas was committing "war crimes" by firing rockets at Israeli civilians, it acknowledged that the Islamist group was also in charge of the enclave and provided basic services, and that these should not be targeted.

Overnight on Jan. 10, as has become the norm recently, Israel carried out more than 60 airstrikes over the Gaza Strip.

White phosphorous allegation

Meanwhile, a military analyst with New York-based NGO Human Rights Watch said Israel was using white phosphorous illegally in its offensive.

While international law allows the use of the substance as a smokescreen, it cannot be used near civilians as it has an incidental "incendiary effect that can severely burn people and set structures, fields, and other civilian objects in the vicinity on fire".

The expert saw it being used over crowded residential areas and doctors in the enclave have reported untypical burns that they are having trouble treating.

The Israeli army said it followed international law and did not use illegal weapons or employ illegal tactics.

It remains difficult to independently verify information about what is going on inside Gaza as journalists and researchers are still banned from the entering the territory.

Sources: Associated Press, Guardian (UK), UN Integrated Regional Information Networks. Compiled by The Global Report

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Ladies And Gentlemen-The Fabulous Stains!!

2009-01-18T10:43:00.001-08:00

Rhino Home Video has recently released what has got to be about my favorite punk-rock themed movie, Ladies and Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains. What has this movie got going for it? How about:

Diane Lane in her first starring role

Laura Dern in an early featured role

A couple of Tubes (about my favorite mainstream late 70's, early 80s band, The Completion Backwards Principal was required listening in my college dorm years)

A couple of Sex Pistols

A member of The Clash

Legendary LA-punksters Black Randy And The Metrosquad

So, really, what is not to to like?

An added feature is that it really is less about the redemptive power of music (although I like these kind of rock and roll fillums, also-Almost Famous, That Thing You Do, and Purple Rain would have to be required syllabus items in any Rock and Roll film class), than it is about people behaving badly.

The bad behavior starts when Diane Lane and her cohort, leave school and family behind and get themselves on a traveliing road show that includes a heavy-metal top act, a punk second bill, and a Rastafarian road manager (see? the film just keeps getting better as it goes along).

The Stains are a female rock and roll trio so unfinished, that they make the Raincoats sound like late-period Led Zeppelin. So, they obviously need a gimmick.

Diane Lane mutilates and colors her hair until she has a skunk-like hairdo. An ambitious female TV reporter pounces on this character, who inadvertently starts a bad hair and bad attitude youth movement which mantra is: I Am A Skunk, And I Do Not Put Out!!

Ummmmm....except later, she does, with Paul Simonon, in the shower.

She also steals a song from his band, The Looters, and by the end of the movie, The Stains become a polished Go-Go like act with a hit music video.

See, better living through bad behavior!!

I have seen this entire movie on Youtube on occasion, but it now is available from Rhino Home Video.

News From Green Left Weekly

2009-01-11T12:54:00.001-08:00

A December 30 statement.

The Dignity, a Free Gaza boat on a mission of mercy to besieged Gaza, is being attacked by the Israeli Navy in international waters. The Dignity has been surrounded by at least half-a-dozen Israeli warships. They are firing live ammunition around the Dignity, and one of the warships has
rammed the civilian craft causing an unknown amount of damage.

Contrary to international maritime law, the Israelis are actively preventing the Dignity from approaching Gaza or finding safe haven in either Egypt or Lebanon. Instead, the Israeli navy is demanding that the Dignity return to
Cyprus — despite the fact that the ship does not carry enough fuel to do so.

Fortunately, no one aboard the ship has yet been seriously injured.

There are 15 civilian passengers representing 11 different countries (see below for a complete list). At approximately 5am (UST) on December 30, well out in international waters, Israeli warships began surrounding the Dignity, threatening the ship. At 6:45am (UST) we were able to establish brief
contact with the crew and were told that the ship had been rammed by the Israeli Navy in international waters, and that the Israelis were preventing the ship from finding safe harbor.

We heard heavy gunfire in the background before all contact was lost with the Dignity.

It is urgent that you take immediate action.

CALL the Israeli Government and demand that it immediately STOP attacking the Dignity and endangering the lives of its passengers!

CALL Mark Regev in the Prime Minister’s office at:
+972 2670 5354 or +972 5062 3264
mark.regev@it.pmo.gov.il.

CALL Shlomo Dror in the Ministry of Defence at:
+972 33697 5339 or +972 50629 8148
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2009-01-11T12:53:00.000-08:00

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Byron Dorgan For FCC Chair

2009-01-11T12:37:00.000-08:00

President Obama has not yet selected a chair for the Federal Communications Commission. To be fair, the crises in Afghanistan, Gaza, and in the US economy have been taking most of his time.

I'm a communciation person, however, and I beleive that communication is going to be increasingly important in the near future. I nominate North Dakota Senator, Byron Dorgan.

First, a little backstory: the entire three-man North Dakota congressional delegation came out early for Obama. So, there is no political rancor to deal with here. The Obamaadministration has previously sought the services of another qualified North Dakotan, Kent Conrad, to oversee the Office of Managment of the Budget. Conrad has a rep as a numbersman in the senate, and was a tax commissioner in North Dakota. To his credit, Conrad demured, saying that he wanted to continue serving the people of North Dakota and savehis home state from a future Duane Sand run for office.

Would Dorgan be asked, I think he would say the same thing. But, there are lots of reasons to like Dorgan for this job.

Dorgan is completely right on communication issues.

Dorgan became an enemy of the rampant media consolidation we have seen in the past ten years over an incident in the city of Minot. A train car containing anhydrous oxide had spilled and emergency officials needed to get emergency information out via localmedia. Unfortunately, Minot's radio station was owned by Clear Channel and the companyhad decided that an unmanned radio station programmed with canned programming was in the best interest of that community. There was nobody home to get the information out. Dorgan became a quick study on this issue and has been telling those who would listen for years that consolidated media corporations are not serving their legally-mandated public interest. Dorgan would be a great tonic to an FCC that has given the broadcasting industry pretty much everything it has wanted.

Dorgan has also been leading the charge on net neutrality. Right now, everyone gets the same Internet. The ISP industry, emboldened by a supreme court decision that says theydo not have to treat everyone equally has been toying with the idea of tiered Internet service. Those who have more, would get more. The Internet has been a great equalizer and those days would be over if the ISP industry has its way.

Supposedly, Amazon.com CEO, Jeff Bezos, has the inside track on the nomination. Bezos
is a proponent of net neutrality, and so I couldn't complain too much about that.

But please, Mr. President, consider Byron Dorgan for this important job.