industrial dairy ltd.

America, Fuck Yeah

2005-10-23T02:31:00.000-03:00

This Plame thing has partly degenerated into porn. But it is articles like this one that sully the distinction between porn and geniune political enjoyment, that can be justified and made productive within a variety of ideological frameworks. I'm a happy penis.

New 'Whistleblower' blows

2005-10-20T00:39:00.000-03:00

Colin Powell's former Chief of Staff, Lawrence Wilkerson, releases a hurricane, or will it be a tropical storm? Or just a depression.

There is no doubt, that I have
reconstituted a hard-on.

Galloway - Hitchens MUST SEE TV

2005-10-19T18:10:00.000-03:00

This is old news folks, however, I listened to this in it's entirety for the first time last night and was very impressed with the degree of viscera, blood was spilled ladies and gentleman, please avert your eyes if you are weak stomached ...this is beyond freddy vs jason: BATTLE OF THE BEHEMOTHS

Neoliberalism Still Sucks

2005-10-19T17:48:00.000-03:00

Finally Democrats Attack!!! Could it be? :pray: to my civic gods of democratic socialism that, yes, it can be! IT can BE! - Graeme

An ode to Dick

2005-10-19T10:18:00.000-03:00

``Don't you think when people tell you you're allowed to do
whatever you want as long as it's not sexually X-rated
that they should stand behind their word and show your
cow?''

Cheney Watch ep. 1

2005-10-18T16:32:00.000-03:00

This is the beginning of the end, my friends! Rumours aboud that Cheney will step down as VP and Condi be elevated. WOW.

It had to have been Cheney!

2005-10-17T13:56:00.000-03:00

This just keeps getting better and better, I am livid that CNN, MSNBC and the networks aren't on this 24/7. My question is; Why would Libby leak Plame's name (not conclusive) to Miller autonomously. He is the Vice Presidents' Chief of Staff, it's his job to carry out the directives of the VP's office, therefore, it make very little sense that he would independantly decide to smear Wilson? From the WSJ Mr. Fitzgerald asked Ms. Miller if Mr. Libby "ever indicated whether Mr. Cheney had approved of his interviews with me or was aware of them," Ms. Miller wrote. "The answer was no." A spokesman for Mr. Fitzgerald couldn't be reached to comment."
LIAR!

Just How Good Would This Be?

2005-10-17T13:48:00.000-03:00

At the tail end an incredibly comprehensive Bloomberg peice on the Plamegate dragon, I found this tasty morsel:

"In an interview yesterday, Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and others seeking damages for the alleged harm done to Plame's career. If they do so, the current state of the law makes it likely that the suit will be allowed to proceed -- and Bush and Cheney will face questioning under oath -- while they are in office. The reason for that is a unanimous 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that Paula Jones' sexual harassment suit against then-President Bill Clinton could go forward immediately, a decision that was hailed by conservatives at the time."
The article focusses on how Fitzpatrick is gunning for Cheney.

New York Times Falling Apart?

2005-10-14T16:22:00.000-03:00

According to Ms. Huffington the NYT is having a crisis of conscience and at stake is their credibility. She asserts that's it's imperative that the paper's next Plame/Miller article not be a "mushy bowl of Judy-shielding pablum" but rather must be something at least resembling the truth. What allegience do they owe to Judy Miller? Why won't the paper just come clean? Is it editorial vanity? She's been corrupted and if they stubbornly cling to their editorial line they'll become infected and lose their brightest stars. She clearly had extensive ties to the whitehouse in the run up to the war and spat propaganda under the NYTimes banner. fuck her. sorry miller, your days of martyrdom are through! hack! CHECK IT

Pauvre Bush, Pauvre Monde

2005-10-14T15:22:00.000-03:00

This op-ed piece by Zbigniew Brzezinski, former United States National Security Advisor to President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1981 is the single best assessment of Bush and company's slipshod neocon philosophy and misaction have increased terrorism and caused unnecessary suffering. A must read.

Why help never arrived.

2005-10-14T14:10:00.000-03:00

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the President of the United States...

Frazzle McDazzle!

The Real Katrina

2005-10-14T13:47:00.000-03:00

We've all been barraged by images on CNN and elsewhere of the human devastation that the abject response to Hurricane Katrina caused. However, most of those images were sanitized at the behest of the Louisiana state government and FEMA officials. I found an incredible set of images that, at least in my mind, convey something that seems a little closer to reality than those recycled images and footage of black folk standing outside the convention centre. These stills are infinitely more powerful.

Is the White House in Deep Shit?

2005-10-14T10:11:00.000-03:00

In case you haven't been following, Plamegate is exploding with possible indictments for Karl 'the brain' Rove and Cheney's chief of staff Lewis Libby and potentially the entire conspiracy (not a bad word!) responsible for manipulating the public, the UN, allied nations and the media in the run up to war may be completely exposed. This is extremely significant! With scandals erupting in thecongress and the senate it looks as though the Republicans are in trouble come 2006. The weight of these scandals, Plamegate, the war in Iraq and the poor response to Katrina may ultimately lead to the premature ruin of this administration, something many of us have dreamt about since Bush took office in 2000. Bush's approval rating is at a solid 40%-38% depending on which poll you trust and a Washington Post NBC poll found that only 2% of African Americans supported the president, the lowest number ever reported since the question has been asked on polls. Uber-pundit Howard Fineman speculated on the October 10th Hardball w/ Chris Mathews that the white house was bifurcated(ing) into two camps: chief of staff Andy Card (the anti-Iraq camp) and Rove and the Hawks (Iraqi civilian killers).
FINEMAN: "Right now, my sense, in reporting this, Chris, is that the Bush family, political family, is at war with itself inside the White House. My sense is, it's Andy Card, the chief of staff, and his people against Karl Rove, the brain."
My sense from Fineman is that the Card camp is a fetal administration within the administration that will survive the indictments resignations and possible impeachment that the current admin might face in the next year or so and thereby become the new government.

RESURRECTION

2005-10-14T10:00:00.000-03:00

After being shot, poisoned, stabbed in the thigh, neck and eye industrial dairy scratches it's way through six feet of worm-filled soil only to discover that the world has become an even more insanely apocolyptic political nightmare. Standing upright maggots fall from this blog's face and puss oozes from it's forehead. Rove, Bush, McClelland, Libby, Miller, Martin, Gibson, Cruise and many more will now pay the price at the hands of this resurrected puss fuelled zombified blog....beware we's a coming home.

Workers First

2005-08-11T23:57:00.000-03:00

An interesting bill is being put forward in the House of Commons, to little fanfare from the press.

The lack of notice is surprising, too, since most press agencies, daily papers, television channels, etc are multimedia conglomerates, owned by large commercial entities and maintaining a great distance from the journalist image of yesteryear.

Jack Layton and his rouge band of middle class lefties are pushing a bill through parliament that would mean greater protection of the working class in this country. Bill C-281 would "move workers to the front of the creditor line in a bankruptcy" thus squeezing out taxes, lenders and suppliers in the shuffle for compensation when a big corporation tanks.

And tank they will. WorldCom, anyone?

The "Workers First Bill" is on parliaments agenda now and it seems important that you, each and every one of you, if you do support this bill, contact you MP via fax/phone/email and let them know that this is (if in fact it is - and it should be) an important issue to you.

Urge your MP to vote for the Workers First Bill!
For more info see The Workers First Bill website

Interesting

2005-08-09T01:01:00.000-03:00

Publicist to the neo-conservatives.
It really is amazing how huge the Iraq PR campaign was.
Pretty weird site. Look through the list of 'Members'.

Oh damn

2005-08-07T14:49:00.000-03:00

Judy Miller

Graffiti by Banksy

2005-08-05T18:34:00.000-03:00

"Imagine a city where graffiti wasn't illegal, a city where everybody could draw whereever they liked. Where every street was awash with a million colours and little phrase. Where standing at a bus stop was never boring. A city that felt like a living breathing thing which belonged to everybody, not just the estate agetns and barons of big business. Imagine a city like that and stop leaning against the wall - its wet."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4748063.stm

http://www.banksy.co.uk/

Loving his brilliant skills and diverse styles. Most of all, loving the social messages, the humanity, the satire.

Incredible new documentary about... UTAH??

2005-08-02T23:35:00.000-03:00

Conservatives are such weirdos!!! Watch an insane millionare spend 25G to not allow Michael Moore speak at a university. Watch as conservative white men and women foam at the mouth as the evils of liberalism slink into their backyards stealing away their kin and exposing them to HOMOSEXUALTIY and LATINO PASSION...sorry...I've read a few positive advance reviews on this film which was the brainchild of first time filmaker steve greenstreet. Check out the Hannity clip! Okay here's the trailer and some clips.

Congotronics

2005-08-02T20:52:00.000-03:00

CONGOTRONICS CHECK IT

I want a new music! This desire was inaugerated by a personal research project I embarked on trying to discover the roots of industrial noise music, it's political orientation in particular (this was a genre I reveled in for years but had abandoned only a few years ago). I discovered that one of the bands I really used to like, Death in June, quite early in their career (1983) used to parade around on stage wearing brown shirts. Actually fairly recently there was a bit of a controversy when they were booked to play a show in Chicago. I found out that groundbreaking bands such as; NON, Throbbing Gristle, Foetus, and Nurse with Wound flirted with fascist imagery and symbolism. I got really turned off and began to explore other music. I have been adrift musically for quite some time...that is until recently. One of my discoveries was a band from the DRC called Konono No. 1, the album Congotronics. Now this IS NOT namby pamby world music it's an exploration of sound and texture that is vibrant and challenging.
Description From the website:
KONONO N°1 was founded over 25 years ago by Mingiedi, a virtuoso of the likembé (a traditional instrument sometimes called "sanza" or "thumb piano", consisting of metal rods attached to a resonator). The band's line-up includes three electric likembés (bass, medium and treble), equipped with hand-made microphones built from magnets salvaged from old car parts, and plugged into amplifiers. There's also a rhythm section which uses traditional as well as makeshift percussion (pans, pots and car parts), three singers, three dancers and a sound system featuring these famous megaphones. It's truly a beautiful beautiful album. So fresh!

21 and life retarded

2005-08-01T17:48:00.000-03:00

A University of King's College Alumni, and former aquaintance of mine, writes on a fascinating well written 'literati' blogspot blog. There he experiments with tone, emotional phrasing and expounds on his shattered and tortured life by dropping small literary bombs leaving psychological shrapnel the readers soulder, left breast and occasionally in the eye. In person, he justifies his utterance of racial slurs and deep feelings of hatred by hiding behind some slipshod theory of freedom of speech and the rejection of the totalitarianism he sees in political correctness (not a dirty word). I was not without sympathy and was empathetic to his plight for quite some time, giving him distance and keeping my comments (as a person of colour) to myself. That is until I read this post on his blog. Am i to understand that because these views are couched in prose gifted by years of reading and guided by the academy, written by an individual I know to be intelligent, well educated, and obviously quite talented! that they are somehow not horribly venemous, dreafully terrifying (to "queers, Jews and niggers" and yes even visible minorities? In my estimation these are the attitudes of rapists and murderers, of the rapists and child murderers at Auchwitz and those Southern evil bastards who chased 'coons' for sport.I re-print this with a great deal of hesitation and a heavy heart: "Am I racist? Yes. Do I wish I wasn't? Yes. Violence materializes in many forms: pistol whippings are one blatantly obvious one. But can't a "lynching" happen with something so subtle as a sideways glance? Yes. The violence is so widespread. I hate queers, niggers, jews, and Roman Catholics. I HATE them. And so do you. You can't help it.Those of you who don't believe that you are as guilty of hatred as I am are the fullest of hate. You mask your hate. You cover up your true identity. Embrace it instead." Embrace it? I loathe my repression of the beast but I'll die before I 'embrace' him.
btw, my dear peer signs his name using the psuedonym of Paul Blood (an obscure American poet from the 19th c).

Please comment, am I crazy or is this unacceptable.

Bolton Through to UN by way of Recess Appointment

2005-08-01T12:32:00.000-03:00

Un-fucking-believable...Controversial rage-oholic diplomat (?) John Bolton has been given a recess appointment by President Bush to the UN. Now Bolton did NOT get a recommendation from the senate and during the confirmation hearings alot of damming info came out about this guy. John Bolton is incompetant; let's review: he is in charge of America's policy on nuclear poliferation in both Iran and North Korea (and we all know how well that's going), also, he almost singlehandedly bungled the deal with Libya in 2004. He's been implicated in some grossly unproffesional behaviour, including chasing a woman down a hotel hallway screeaming! And where are the democratic talking points!! where's the 'liberal' media on this one! With a few exceptions = Go Harry Reid!! TODAY Iran has announced that it wants to expand it's yellow cake enrichement program, great work Bolton, great work.

Pop Quiz!!

2005-07-30T11:06:00.000-03:00

One of these things is not like the others
One of these things does not belong

You tell me which:

Republican congressman Connie Mack has proposed a three-point plan regarding Venezuela. It involves ”the creation of institutions that will foster a free press, the freedom of speech and religion, and free and fair elections for Venezuela; a Venezuelan Security Zone that will isolate Chavez and limit his ability to destabilize Latin America; and promotion of economic development in Venezuela through free markets, privatization, and other means that will create lasting prosperity and opportunity for all Venezuelans.”

A) free press
B) freedom of speech and religion
C) free and fair elections
D) free markets and privatisation

Three guesses, kiddies!

Apparently all this new hubbub regarding Venezuela comes in response to Hugo Chavez launching (what has been called in the mainstream media) HIS OWN television station, TeleSur.
In reality, the station is a joint effort between Venezuela, Argentina, Uruguay and Cuba and works to promote Latin American and Caribbean culture, producing and featuring locally made documentaries, news casts, arts broadcasting, etc.

TeleSur website claims that its purpose as a Pan-Latino station is to, for the people of the South, "difundir sus propios valores, divulgar su propia imagen, debatir sus propias ideas y transmitir sus propios contenidos, libre y equitativamente."

(Broadcast or spread our own values, create our own images of ourselves, debate our own ideas and transmit our own content, freely and equitably)

This is done, of course, in response to the fact that most Latin American television stations are saturated with largely American programming. More CSI, anyone?

This sounds harmless, in a sense. Things get problematic for the rebel station a little further down on their website's opening page, where they claim that as a station they will "Frente al discurso único sostenido por las grandes corporaciones, que deliberadamente niegan, coartan o ignoran el derecho a la información, se hace imprescindible una alternativa capaz de representar los principios fundamentales de un auténtico medio de comunicación: veracidad, justicia, respeto y solidaridad."

("Confront the discourse maintained and offered by the large corporations, which deliberatly deny, limit or ignore the peoples right to information, and become and alternative [broadcaster] capable of representing the fundamental principles of authentic media communication: truth, justice, respect and solidarity")

Why, thats practically terrorist talk!

In closing, Chavez's little media empire states that, for the people of Latin America, possibly the profit motive is not the bottom line (gasp!). In the poetic language of the conquistadors, TeleSur states that "Vernos es conocernos, reconocernos es respetarnos, respetarnos es aprender a querernos, querernos es el primer paso para integrarnos."

(To see ourselves is to know ourselves, to know ourselves is to respect ourselves, to respect ourselves is to learn to love ourselves and to love ourselves is the first step in the creation of community.)

"Si la integración es el propósito, teleSUR es el medio."
(
If community [or, unity] is the intention, TeleSUR is the means)

Uh-Oh! I think I see why the U.S. House has earmarked nine million dollars for 2006 and another nine million for 2007 to support opposition political parties, media and civil society organizations in Venezuela. (I mean, there's no one hungry in america or anything...)

All translations my own, so apologies if there are any discrepancies...

Gratuitous Bush Jokes

2005-07-29T14:27:00.000-03:00

At McSweeney's.

Poking fun at the humourlessness [sic?] of the American left.

A doctor, a lawyer, and an accountant all die and go to heaven on the same day. When they get to the Pearly Gates, they are greeted by St. Peter. St. Peter says, "Scott McClellan is a lying sack of shit and I'd tell him so myself if he weren't going straight to hell when he dies."

Priceless

2005-07-28T16:42:00.000-03:00

The Cone of Instability.

Hahahahahah.

Shanghai Suicide Map

2005-07-28T12:47:00.000-03:00

Here is a translation:

Find a place to die! Is it you or the judges who should go to hell? After seeing the 4As exhibition, you’ll have your answer.
Huichunji pharmacy sells sleeping pills.
Suzhou Creek is uncovered.
The #57 bus goes directly to the zoo. You can jump into a tiger’s mouth and die.
The Kerry Center is 32 stories tall. Jumping off is 100% successful.
A manhole cover has been stolen — jump into the sewer and drown.
Cars under the Yan’an Road viaduct drive very fast. Accidents happen often.
Changshu Road subway station — lie on the tracks.
Fuxing Park — hanging yourself is simple among the tall, close trees.
Barber stand at 1324 alley — steal a razor and cut your throat.
High-voltage power lines — with 20,000 volts, electrocution is convenient.
Wang’s Tofu Stand — crush yourself with a piece of tofu.
Dafa Gardens construction site — there’s always something falling.
Filling station — death by self-immolation.
Free and Easy Sauna — death by suffocation.
This was adapted from the location map of the Creative Awards Show 4A.

They were warned (anger part III)

2005-07-28T10:40:00.000-03:00

So we know who was responsible for the mess.

The US Officer Corps and the CIA have been made to seem like apparently moderate and reasonable institutions in comparison with this radical administration. Yay! Go CIA!

Stonewalling par excellence

2005-07-27T20:38:00.000-03:00

Perhaps I've been under undue stress, but as of late I've made it a daily habit to watch the daily whitehouse press briefings with Scott McLellan who repeatedly refuses to answer any question regarding what bloggers have dubbed "treasongate" (the rove/plane scandal)...well it's getting absolutely absurd. It's an odd thing to watch I gain no new information and am only half interested in the other questions the press core asks of ol' Scottie. Well today for some reason I just laughed my ass off!!

Q Has Karl Rove offered to resign, in view of his problems?

MR. McCLELLAN: Again, you keep asking these questions that are related to an ongoing investigation <--add tone of fatigue

Q Does he still have his security clearance?

MR. McCLELLAN: -- and those are questions that have already been addressed.

Q No, they -- I've never heard this before. Have you? <---add tone of sarcasm and frustration

MR. McCLELLAN: The question has been asked before.

Q We haven't heard an answer.

Q What was your answer?

Q There hasn't been an answer.

I hope the mainstream catches onto shit like this, I mean anyone who grew up watching Matlock knows that this evasive behaviour is a classic tell of guilt.

TWOT

2005-07-27T00:22:00.000-03:00

'War on Terror' now called 'Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism'.

Ebay Mom beyond pack rat

2005-07-26T14:37:00.000-03:00

Hilarious insane mother keeps everything, it takes a bit of time but this is well worth a gander. Cleverly written and ultimately disturbing. Step into ebay materialist madness here.

This is Funny

2005-07-26T11:09:00.000-03:00

Spam Czar Killed.

Pentagon Lawyers defy Judge (anger pt. ii)

2005-07-26T10:51:00.000-03:00

What the fuck! An order by a federal judge ordering the Pentagon to release dozens of photographs and videos of horrific abuse perpetrated on Iraqi citizens was denied. The ruling was on a suite brought by the ACLU under the Freedom of Information ACT. The material apparently includes video of innocent children being sodomized among a score of other abuses. The only reason given in the article I read, and presumabley the only reason given by Pentagon lawyers was that, check this...they wanted to avoid further humiliating the victims! give me a break! Hopefully, these images will eventually come out and sink the leaky ship that is the current Bush administration.

Anger

2005-07-23T04:08:00.000-03:00

Horrible. Next Door.

What the fUCKING fUCK is this fucking world coming to. Or has it always been like this.

In 15 years, are we going to be living in some unrecognizable fascist blood-cult hedoni group or not? What are we doing?

Oh, and by the way, that's a pretty fucking nice brown suit Bush is wearing. Less military than most of his outfits. Letting loose for the summer, i suppose.

Fallujah

More pictures

2005-07-22T13:08:00.000-03:00

I worry about the brown people in Europe.

happy birthday graeme (!)

2005-07-22T03:40:00.000-03:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRAEME!!!! Although I'm sure you have been visited by those stringy children of age, welcome into the 'greying' years. I just came from a very strange party~~ugh awkwardness... so ... I guess I just wanted to make it public: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

all my love, James

Nicely Made Flash Animation: Safety at work

2005-07-22T00:35:00.000-03:00

Eye-candy with the same old chain-reaction concept.

Safety at work by =NCH85

@ deviantart

Rove Ass Stench Still There

2005-07-22T00:30:00.000-03:00

There was concern that the SCOTUS nomination would give the WH a significant break from incessant lying. I'm sure it was hoped the the Rove story would go the way of the Downing Street Memo 'scandal'.

(which i think did actually affect public opinion).

But it is definitively not so.....There are some huge stories tonight, chek em out! It seems like each news organization has developed their own sources, whereas earlier, last week, most articles were depending on some pretty similar statements and facts for the news-meat of the story.

First of all, the most vanilla, in that the source for this article seems, yet again, to be an entity friendly to the WH.

NY Times, For Two Aides in Leak Case, 2nd Issue Rises.

The work done by Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby on the Tenet statement, during this intense period, had not been previously disclosed. People who have been briefed on the case discussed the critical time period and the events surrounding it to demonstrate that Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby were not involved in an orchestrated scheme to discredit Mr. Wilson or disclose his the undercover status of his wife, Valerie Wilson, but were intent on clarifying the use of intelligence in the president's address. Those people who have been briefed requested anonymity because prosecutors have asked them not to discuss matters under investigation.

This is an entirely new defense of Rove, and Libby. It also seems more plausible than the, "don't get too far out on Wilson" defense.

However, it is shat on by two other articles... Via Daily Kos

One is in the Wall Street Journal tomorrow, which Olberman scooped, apparently.

The Mysterious State Department Memo, which if ever leaked could be 20 times more damning than the DSM, as it describes how the CIA and State already knew the Niger claim, amongst others, was false before Wilson went on his trip, was marked Top Secret next to the paragraph that discussed Wilson's trip to Niger and his wife's possible role in arranging it. This is important because Rove's lawyer and the RNC minions have been claiming that Rove did not know of Valerie's covert status.

But by far the greatest article is in Bloomberg. Perjury, Conspiracy, Obstruction of Justice.

It seems as if they have the best source. read it via Think Progress.

PARTY INVITATION

2005-07-20T17:13:00.000-03:00

Rove might really be in a bit of trouble.

2005-07-19T22:34:00.000-03:00

Apparently, he forget to tell the grand jury about his conversation with Matt Cooper.

Read here.

2005-07-19T15:13:00.000-03:00

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Wicked Cool Grandma

2005-07-19T03:46:00.000-03:00

"Pick me up a strategy guide tomorrow, I need a map."
(on Prince of Persia)
"Fucking bitch, get out of the way when I'm shooting!"
(on Resident Evil 4)

Old Grandma Hardcore features a 69-year-old grandmother
of twelve who plays PS2, XBox, GameCube, SNES, and
Genesis. She is a foul-mouthed, proficient gamer and doesn't
believe that "violence in video games and movies has shit to
do with anything."

Be sure to check out the three videos on the right menu,
especially #3:Grandma Goes Nasty. I promise you will be
thoroughly entertained.

Grandma is beyond awesome.

rubbers

2005-07-18T23:26:00.000-03:00

Chris Cunningham and Aphex Twin collaborated on a new short called 'Rubber Johnny'.

New Seymour Hersh Article

2005-07-18T11:18:00.000-03:00

After a long hiatus, America's pre-eminent journalistic 'terrorist', according to Richard Perle, returns with a scorching article full of revelations damaging to the Bush Administration, but too 'nuanced' to get any play in the 500 $ ugly haircut that is the American Media.

Just got posted this morning, here.

Juan Cole Responds:

The important point in this whole story is that it reveals the Realpolitik reason for which the Neoconservatives (including Bush and Cheney) really want "democratization." They are convinced that multiparty elections can be covertly manipulated by the United States in countries where Washington has an interest in the outcome.

This story is an old one in the Middle East. The Young Ottoman movement for democratization in the 1860s and 1870s argued that absolute monarchy should be replaced by an elected parliament, because a single all-powerful sultan could too easily be subjugated by the British or other imperial powers. They just had to get influence over one man, and then they could set policy for the whole Ottoman public. Similar arguments were made by Iranian democrats in the 1890s and early 1900s.

But then when there was an Ottoman and an Iranian parliament, it turned out that Members of Parliament could be bribed by foreign powers. The Iranians made a Constitutional Revolution in 1905-1911. But it became clear to them in 1912 that the British and the Russians had bribed members of parliament and that democracy just wasn't a barrier against foreign imperial penetration. Then Iran fell into chaos because of its weak government and people turned to a new dictator, Reza Khan Pahlavi. Likewise, in the Ottoman Empire, a military coup soon put an end to democracy after the 1908-1909 revolution had led to parliamentary elections. Then fears of Russian designs led the military to ally with Germany in WW I, sealing the doom of the empire. After WW I, the Turks faced French, Italian, Greek and British occupation, with the threat of Anatolia being carved up into small countries. This threat was fought by Mustafa Kemal Attaturk and the remnants of the Ottoman army, who rallied to him. He emerged as more or less president for life of a united, modern Turkey.

"Democracy" can never be viewed in isolation in Middle East politics. Because there are always several questions. How much power in our country are foreigners going to have? Can our national independence be better preserved through authoritarianism or elections?

Americans who are in a tizzy about the possibility that a Chinese company might buy the American petroleum company Unocal should stop and think how they would feel if China were actively throwing covert support to one or another American political party and buying up US congressional representatives, causing them to make policy helpful to China but harmful to, say, US workers. That is the kind of world in which Middle Easterners have been living for two centuries.

Cover-up being investigated

2005-07-15T19:05:00.000-03:00

The American Prospect.

A federal criminal investigation into the leak of CIA officer Valerie Plame's name has in large part focused on the truthfulness of statements made to investigators by White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove, and whether he worked with others to devise a cover story to conceal his role, according to government officials familiar with the probe.

....

...the few leaks that constitute public knowledge of the investigation's progress have largely come from one side: the defense attorneys'. And what they have to say is oftentimes self-serving, misleading, and in some cases untrue. Their all-too-willing collaborators have been the nation's leading newspapers.

Another Success in the War on Terra

2005-07-14T23:26:00.000-03:00

Read.

And More.

Un-fucking-believable.

Its bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S !!!!!!

Big Developments in London Bombings

2005-07-12T12:47:00.000-03:00

I love the new blogger images function. no more stupid typing. Above is a CCTV image of the bus bomber captured at Luton Station.

Also, it seems as if the fourth bomber was not Asian:

Police sources also unofficially named the fourth bomber this afternoon as
Lindsey Germaine, a Jamaican-born Briton. He is believed to be linked to a house
in Aylesbury which police have been searching since last night.
Interesting.

4 Bombers Died in Attacks

Arrests Made in Attacks

Update:

James Wolcott has a really excellent post.

...al Qaeda is not a cohesive organization anymore. Their network has given way to an even looser but more potent form of development: open source warfare. In this model, autonomous groups arise, innovate, plan, and act locally without central direction. Al Qaeda merely serves as the final arbiter of the attack's efficacy to the articulated war plan -- endorsement of the action and the group, comes after the operation is accomplished...

[snip]

But if Cliff May and Limbaugh and all of the fine minds in the Fighting Keyboarders' Strategic High Command are correct, terrorists will soon be reduced to setting off firecrackers in mailboxes like Robert DeNiro's Johnny in Mean Streets....

Pitchfork Has a Good, no, Interesting Article

2005-07-11T10:49:00.000-03:00

here, on the influence of the shoegaze on the rest of 'indie', or 'post-rock' music in the 90's. I know everyone goes to this site, but maybe you might miss this one, a 'feature'.

Please reject the elitist canonization of rock music along with me..., and Unfortunately, this article is as guilty of that as you would expect from writing that is published by Pitchfork.They must grow too-earnest rock critics indoors, hydroponically. The critical antennae are over active here as usual. There is no geneology in music, for christ. Music does not 'arise' and is not 'birthed'. But it is nice to see Disco Inferno and Seefeel getting some love.

I just can't get over the self-importance of this kind of music criticism. 'The Lost Generation' that is now found. Sorry. NO.

New Uk Memo

2005-07-11T10:41:00.000-03:00

Secret Plan to Quit Iraq

Nina

2005-07-08T18:42:00.000-03:00

There's been quite a bit of buzz floating around the interweb on a Brazillian film called Nina that was descirbed as part Dostoevsky and part David Lynch. Check out the offical website and trailer here.

Peak Oil

2005-07-08T16:44:00.000-03:00

One of my newest obsessions.

Life after the oil crash.

Something Stupid

2005-07-07T20:28:00.000-03:00

check out my new movie

bye

London Explosion

2005-07-07T10:04:00.000-03:00

Update: 3:55 Friday

London Bombs Likely Simple and Homemade

I lived for a brief time right around the corner from edgware road station.
These attacks could have been 10 times worse, it seems.

Update: 7:45

No suicide bomber, unexploded devices found.

The terrorists finally got their act together.
Cobra Command in Pakistan must be buzzing...

Check out this for good updates.

And look here for a collection of images from the attacks and its aftermath.

Terrorism is pretty fucking gross.

Update: More articles....

London explosions 'mirror Madrid bombings' :

Michael Clarke, director of the Centre for Defence Studies at King's College London, said six bombs would mean at least 24 people involved in planting them in a targeted operation. The fact that London had been hit when the resources of the security forces were focused on the G8 summit at Gleneagles indicated some clever thinking by terrorists.

Statement claiming London attacks

We have repeatedly warned the British Government and people. We have fulfilled our promise and carried out our blessed military raid in Britain after our mujahideen exerted strenuous efforts over a long period of time to ensure the success of the raid.

----Terrorists really have a funny way with language.----'blessed military raid'

the waiting game is over...

2005-07-02T14:48:00.000-03:00

Today, July 1st 2005, the United States Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor officially resigned from her seat on the Supreme Court.

Justice O'Connor was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1981 by President Reagan and officially became the 102nd justice and the first female member of the Supreme Court in US History. She was never a radical, never what the right likes to call an "activist judge", but she did make often surprising decisions and displayed her political independence, blazing new trails for women during her time on the Court.

Justice O'Connor was the 5th vote which saved the Roe v Wade decision during its threatened period - the Webster v Reproductive Health Services case in 1989. It was through her efforts that the pro-choice message of Roe v Wade was kept alive. She did, though, side with the majority and vote for blocking a hand recount in Florida and the much ballyhooed 2000 presidential election and was commonly decried by the left as being a poltical conservatice soft on feminist issues.

Unfortunately, it is likely that Roe v. Wade is likely to be the pivotal issue in the choosing of a new Justice by his high holiness, George W. Bush. Right-wing forces which align behind his Bushiness have already raised millions of dollars in preparation for this moment, to support whomever Bush chooses to appoint to take Justice O'Connor's place.

For instance, right-wing advocacy organisation Progress for America has raised $18 million to fight for Bush's nominees, and the Judicial Confirmation Network has raised $3 million to fight any attempts to filibuster a Supreme Court nominee. Said Dr. James Dobson, founder and chairman of the conservative Focus on the Family, O"Cnnor's resignation marks "the resignation of a swing-vote justice on the Supreme Court and the opportunity to change the court's direction" and Richard Land of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, declared, "For President Bush, social conservatives and the senators they helped elect, the moment of truth has arrived".

Rumour has it that on the top of Bush's list of potential nominees is Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzalez. Gonzalez was Bush's counsel when he was Governor of Texas and together the two of them executed more people during their term and had/have mre people on death row than in any other state in history ever. Gonzales' name has been linked to the "torture memos" coming out of Iraq, but apparently is pro-choice and pro-affirmative action.

According to reliable sources, these last two qualities make him a top, yet unlikely candidate. Apparently, the pro-life base of the party would never allow a pro-choice Republican to be appointed to the Supreme Court.

With that news, and last spring's roll in the proverbial hay with Terri Schiavo, the fight for women's reproductive rights in the United States is heating up again. While O'Connor's resignation does not necessarily make Roe v Wade history, it does open up the potential for further shirfts to the right and the eventual attack on women's rights to again occur. The "partial birth abortion" ban (a term which is both invented and fallacious) was recently deemed unconstitutional by a narrow margin of 5 to 4.

While O'Connor's resignation may not lead to the immediate withdrawl of abortion rights for American women, it could easily and quickly lead to greater impediments to abortion access and more restrictions.

The Feminist Majority Foundation is looking for donations to build a Save Roe Campaign and raise awareness about the seriousness of the appointment of a Supreme Court Judge and what is at stake should Bush be able to stack the Court with right -wing anti-choice justices.

For more information or to donate, click HERE

C-38 passes

2005-06-28T22:08:00.000-03:00

to no ones surprise bill C-38 has passed! Canada is the third country on the planet to have gay marriage, not just civil unions but MARRIAGE! What a night of transcontinetal division.

meanwhile...

2005-06-28T21:07:00.000-03:00

Bush's speech contorted his mess in Iraq explaining away the haven for extremists (cough..ugh.. terrorists) HE CREATED! overall he was both upbeat and optimistic about Iraq's prospects asking his television audience to not pay to much heed to the images on your television but he was also rather sober and somber. He reminded me of a tepid or castrated hitler. One of the most brilliant spins was that Iraq was now the battleground for the 'war on terror' thereby he's, in effect, recasting how that war is waged. Instead of being a loose network of cells etc. as al-queda is often understood, Bush describes them here as a homogeneous enemy one composed of 'foreign fighters' from virtually every major muslim nation, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and, of course, the more familiar villains, to be fought as a conventional war in Iraq. His two visions of Iraq are deeply contradictory, on the one hand, Iraqi's are rebuilding schools and on the other the country is soaked in bloody spartan epic warfare. Yet the last line of his speech was surely the most disturbing, he said 'the terrorists are brutal, but they are no match for our men and women in the armed forces', now he WAS at Fort Bragg speaking to a room of servicepeople but the implication was very very clear: We are brutal because we have to be in order to fight such awesome evil and prevail...In my opinion it is of no small coincidence that a batch of new abu ghraib photos depicting horrendous torture are set to be released either today or tommorow. Please post your impressions.

Gay Times Ahead

2005-06-28T20:46:00.000-03:00

7:46pm... Ottawa time, the five hours of debate have just terminated and the 'speeches' have begun. Each speech is ten minutes a peice with five minutes of questions per speech. I, for one, am ready to jump for joy as the vote goes down, as soon as it does I'm going right down the Vortex (my local gay bar) and raising my glass to one positive moment in this sea of blood soaked news and white liberal grandstanding (Live 8). There are some who see gay marriage as an elimination of homo-difference, streamlining the distinctiveness of homosexuality and lesbianism and mashing gay love into the banalities of status-quo consumer pair bondings. Although I see the logic of this concern, let us not forget that as people gays and lesbians are not all trangressive margin dwelling artists, many are conservative, boring, dress poorly and have bad hygene. The passage of this bill is an old school victory for the civl rights style liberal leftism that I for one have great affection for. As J.S. Mill might say "Fuck any which way you please, just don't be knockin in the street"

The Choose Your Own Adventure of our times

2005-06-28T14:05:00.000-03:00

Is today the day?

Do they do it?

Do they pass it?

While Stephan Harper sits pretty with radically right wing mullahs, opposing those evil doing ho-mo-saxualles from getting married or even celebrating their sin in downtown Toronto parades, the rest of the Canada prepares to be remembered proudly and become a smile on the face of history as opposed to a shitstain on history's pimpled ass.

Today, the government of Canada is supposed to pass legislation making same sex marriage legal. Making it enshrined in our sacredest of sacred places - the law.

Will they do it? Will they manage to stand strong? Will they lead Canada to become one of only 3 nations in the WORLD to legalise same sex marriage (behind Belgium and the Netherlands)??

Or will they fall prey to the heterosexist charms of the big of nose and double of chin that is Stephan Harper?

Only time will tell.

Stay turned for further bulletins as events warrant.

Reuters,9AM
CBC, 9:30AM

the fetus and jesus

2005-06-28T13:37:00.000-03:00

Sorry for being a neglectful blogger, I don't want to see this project slide into obscurity as so many of my endeavours have in the past, but summer's been fantabulous and I just finished a nine month streak of school. I hope anyone reading is enjoying their summer and NOT working too hard. Just thought I'd start back with a link to a hilarious post by my favorite self effacing asshole comedian, Larry David whose insomnia feuled neurotic paranoid political ramblings and machinations are well worth a read.

Italian Judge Orders Arrest of 13 C.I.A. Agents

2005-06-24T14:22:00.000-03:00

I hadn't heard about the missing imam before today, but check out this story.
Surely the Italian clandestine services were also invloved.
Just more netherworldly shit.

Land of the Dead, Circuses and Bread.

2005-06-23T10:31:00.000-03:00

I saw an advance screening of George A. Romero's Land of the Dead last night, and i thought i'd put down a few of my thoughts, if not offer a formal review about what was an entertaining but vaguely dissapointing cultural moment for me. I'll try not to give anything away.

First of all, the problematic mutant zombies. The dead movies have all been structured around rather ill-defined but still obvious political allegories, and the all-purpose idea of the zombie has always been rather easily formed into a signifying role within those allegories. I'm not sure if this means that any striking alteration of the zombie in this new film would risk toying with the meaning and importance of Romero's previous films - i just prefer the stumbly zombies to the ones that can run around and stuff. For whatever reason, Romero avoids any contrived major update of zombie physical capability- instead it is in their mental capacity that the zombies have become less zombie. They still shuffle, sort of, but they are less shuffly, which reduces their comic effect, definitely. I found that this was the least funny of any of the dead films. These are much more determined zombies. These zombies communicate with hand gestures and grunts.

But where do these zombies fit in this movie's political allegory?, which takes has as its nexus, in future-zombie time, the degraded relations between a BCE Place-living elite (Dennis Hopper, who is great as Dennis Hopper) and the vice-distracted but vaguely politically active huddled masses who survive at the base of the skyscraper. It is a decadent anad all-too human, post-zombie world. It is a rather bleak allegory for the current state of western relations.

Interestingly enough, as far as i can remember, there are no black people within this refuge, save for Dennis Hopper's Butler. However, the "zombie-leader", the most sentient zombie, just happens to be black... thereby continuing Romero;s constant prominent foregrounding of racial politics.

This guy's first major tactical move is to wake-up his fellow zombies of Unionville from the stupour that they fall into when they see fireworks. This not so subtlety equates the stupefied fireworks-watching zombie with the human revellers within the skyscraper compound. It sounds trite, but the zombies of Unionville 'wake-up' and move on the fortress, no longer distracted by the pretty explosions in the sky, possibly liberating the humans they don't eat from their current economic predicament.

But this is also where The War on Terrorism (T.W.A.T.) allegory breaks down, or something. This all too easy equivalence between the zombies and the poor humans doesn't really make sense to me. It is either really smart, or not. Perhaps someone can explain it to me later.

Anyway, the gore is amazing, it really is quite gross. The motorcycle-jacket zombie makes an appearance. The movie maintains a B-movie level of acting and dialogue throughout, which is great. But the ending...

I have to get back to work.

Go see Howl's Moving Castle!

2005-06-19T13:32:00.000-03:00

In a sense the films of Hayoa Miyazaki, Japan's internationally acclaimed auteur, are the most sophistocated ruminations on spirituality, mortality and the condition of the human subject caught in the torrential winds of rapid industrialization, consumption, greed and war. His films are as profoundly philosophical as they are excessively sentimental. Howl's Moving Castle is no exception, for fans of Miyazaki it's especially a treat because he doesn't bother developing certain plot points that have been articulated in his other films thereby freeing him to explore some simple psychoanalytic themes (repression, war trauma) and engage in a profound rumination on mortality and the beauty and horror of aging. Forget the tragedies of the world, let this film fill you up.

Will the 'Fat-Ass Street' care?

2005-06-18T12:47:00.000-03:00

Via common dreams -

This is the kind of article that has been missing from the professional american media's coverage of the issue. I don't know how may local newspapers pick up Knight-Ridder, but it is articles like this one that may attract the interest of the Americans.

Downing Street Minutes -> Impeachment

2005-06-17T23:32:00.000-03:00

The Downing Street Memo/Minutes have gotten quite a bit of blogerage and finally most major media outlets are either defensivley covering it (having been out-journalized by the blogosphere) or fully admiting that they dropped the ball on this one. Yesterday Senator John Coyners held a forum with four panelists that was broadcast on CSPAN. The panel included, ex Iraqi ambassador Joe Wilson (whose CIA agent wife was outed by robert novak), Cindy Sheehan mother of dead soldier, a flamboyant exCIA analyst and John Bonifaz a constitutional lawyer. John Bonifaz was very clear that the executive by decieving the congress by presenting to them 'fixed' intelligence, which the memos suggest (prove?), has broken the law and therefore the entire executive itself (under a specified law); the president and his cheifs of staff can be empeached. I am asking is why aren't the calls for impeachment pouring forth from the Democrats and the Democratic grassroots, listening to Bonifaz's testimony and reading his website this seems plausible. At least the independent press is on this.

A Personal Opinion on Assata Shakur

2005-06-16T01:13:00.000-03:00

That I was lucky enough to meet and converse with the intelligent, powerful, fierce and admirable Assata Shakur still sometimes blows my mind. I hope to spend time with her again in the future. In the meantime, in case you don't know who Assata is or what the eff is the big deal, here is a personal recollection by Mos Def.

No Altruism in Debt Relief to Africa

2005-06-15T13:04:00.000-03:00

New details coming out of the G8 summit in Scotland reveal that the planned debt relief scheme is not entirely about 'liberating Africa from poverty'. It is also about ensuring that Africa will "develop" in the exact way that the IMF, the World Bank and the multi-nationals dictate. To me this does not seem all that different from when India was rescued from its debt problems in the 1990's. In that country the economy has skyrocketed but the poor remain poor, and just like in other "developing" nations the gap is widening. This relief, cheered on by neo-liberal capitalist cheerleader Bono, policymakers, the public and politicians around the world is bad for the Africa's poorest PEOPLE. "For debt relief to work, let the conditions be set by civil society in our countries, not by big world institutions using it as a political tool," argued Kennedy Tumutegyereize of the Uganda Debt Network(1) International financials seeks to shape the African politico-economic future so as to benefit Western capitalist interests, obviously! The debt relief came with conditions that were designed to increase foreign investment by removing all manner of obstacles and boost private sector investment in the region. In effect, privitazation hung over African debt relief potentially curbing or limiting the possibility of social spending and increasing the likelihood of further exploitation of African resources including oil. The ministers at the conference used Nigeria as an example of economic reform. "We welcomed Nigeria's progress in economic reform as assessed in the IMF's intensified surveillance framework... and encouraged them to continue to reform." they said (that was on June 14th). Naomi Klein's June 10th article, A Noose, Not a Bracelet was remarkably prescient and disturbing (great even), she makes the rather salient point that Nigeria doesn't see the bulk of the profits generated by its own resources. In fact, according to the article, Nigeria only sees 12% of it's own oil revenues, a percentage that Klien claims is unacceptable by colonial standards. The problem is not debt relief, it is according African nations the same economic status as Canada, for example, whose pathetic dribble of oil in the East scared up hundreds of millions for the country before it was even sucked out of the ocean floor. What is going on in Africa seems to me, like a form of colonial exploitation but instead of nations doing the plundering it's 'the market'. "This is what keeps Africa poor: not a lack of political will but the tremendous profitability of the current arrangement." Klein argues. Ken Saro-Wiwa was a Nigerian scholar, writer and political activist who was hung on November 10th 1995 for organizing a political campaign against Shell and Chevron from destroying the Niger Delta. He claimed that Nigeria was rich and that multinationals had an undue amount of influence on the Nigerian government. Naomi Klein gets it right: "how about if Africa's oil wealth was used to save Africa--along with its gas, diamond, gold, platinum, chromium, ferroalloy and coal wealth?" William Easterly is a senior advisor at the World Bank and he makes the case better than I or any half ass blogger could: "By transferring scarce resources to corrupt governments with proven track records of misusing aid, debt forgiveness might only aggravate poverty among the world's most vulnerable populations...Insincere governments can simply blame their woes on the World Bank and IMF's "harsh" adjustment programs while not doing anything to fundamentally change economic incentives and ignite economic growth. It would be better for the international financial institutions to simply offer advice to governments that ask for it and wait for individual countries to come forward with home-grown reform programs, financing only the most promising ones and disengaging from the rest. Rushing through debt forgiveness and imposing complex reforms from the outside is as doomed to failure as earlier rounds of debt relief and adjustment loans." (2)

2005-06-15T09:52:00.000-03:00

Fatal Meningitis, II

Thought I'd had some other Serrano pictures. Curious about what you think of these James.

2005-06-15T09:51:00.000-03:00

Jane Doe Killed by Police

Micro soft on censorship?

2005-06-14T18:42:00.000-03:00

In case you weren't already sick of the technology giant Microsoft and its King Grand Poobah-for-life Bill Gates, now you have an even better reason to banish the corporation to the depths of capitalist hell. Seems Microsoft corporation, in a joint partnership with a Chinese government agency, has made inroads into the communist fortress of production, launching a new Chinese language web portal. The portal will allow Chinese citizens to create their own web pages and even, gasp! blogs.

But Microsoft has decided, in signing the contract with the government funded Shanghai Alliance Investment, to cave to censorship pressures on the part of the Chinese government.

Now all blogs and websites which function through MSN Spaces, a programme offering free blog space and operating through the MSN China portal, will not appear online or publish if the messages therein contain certain prohibited words.

A sampling of those words being "democracy", "human rights", "demonstration" "democratic movement", "freedom" and "Taiwan Independence" as well as some profane or sexually explicit references. Should one attempt to use these or any other prohibited words on their blog post, a message will be generated telling the user, if she already didn't know, that such language is prohibited.

Microsoft's portal launched on May 26th and already 5 million new blogs have been created, albeit without reference to certain words which will go unmentioned, nudge nudge, wink wink.

Seems a share of the profits from an estimated 87 million Chinese web users was too much for philanthropist Bill Gates to pass up on.

Left turn ahead?

2005-06-14T16:03:00.000-03:00

It seems very interesting that while we in the North (Canada, the US, a lot of Europe) make increasing moves towards the right, infusing (in the case of Canada) greater doses of capitalism into our psuedo-Socialist system, our cohorts to the South seem to push further and further left in their political ideals.

While our nine wise red-robed sages make the dangerous decision to strike down the ban on public healthcare and Stephan Harper practically ejaculates with glee, Latin American politics and populations appear to be realising the deadly effects privatisation can have on cities and citizens. In Bolivia (named, incidentally, after great liberation leader Simon Boilvar and location of the murder of Ernesto "Che" Guevara) president Carlos Mesa was forced to resign last week after 3 weeks of protests paralysed the capital city of La Paz and even resulted in the shut down of the cities airport.

Why all the fuss?

The protesters are demanding that the Bolivian government nationalise the energy sector, keeping the vast natural gas reserves in the hands of the people, as opposed to the clutches of the greedy multinats that already populate large parts of the country. In October if 1999 the Bolivian government passed a law allowing the privatisation of water reserves in the country, which saw prices of residential water supply rise 400%. Massive protests against the French owned company Suez Lyonnaise des Eaux and the resignation of then president Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada saw the mostly indigenous protesters in Bolivia achieve some measure of success. Now the radical indigenous residents of El Alto, a mountainous town just outside the captial city of La Paz are at it again, demanding nationalisation in another important sector.

No surprise, then, that US State department statements place the blame squarely on leftist Latino leader Hugo Chavez, climing that his involvment spells doom for Bolivia and "democracy" (read: capitalism) in the region. Reports have stated that the State department is willing to intervene should they see any attempts to dismantle "democracy" (read: free market capitalism) in Bolivia. Interesting to note on that point that as well as being Latin America;s poorest country, Bolivia is also the areas most corrupt. Governments have successively passed legislation and signed contracts (including present ones with foreign oil companies) without the support of Congress, let alone the Bolivian population. The question ought to be, how can one dismantle democracy where none exists?

While racism is rampant, to the point of many hotels and swimming pools not admitting entry to Indigenous persons, the US State department has stated that the problem in Bolivia is not a matter of foreign multinational corporations getting rich off of Bolivian natural resources, or of the massive racial divide and discrimination against the Indigenous majority in the colonised country, nor even the continued meddling of the International Monetary Fund (Bolivia was the testing ground for the IMF's new liberalisation "shock therapy" project in te mid eighties).

No.

The problem, according to US State Department reports, is a matter of poor policy surrounding private property rights.

Have you ever had one of those moments where you realise that the person you are talking to is just not on the same wavelength as you at all? Like you are both talking about two totally different things.

At any rate, this movement by Bolivias Inidgenous majority seems indicative of recent moves in Latin America - many nations in the region seem to be moving (back?) to some sort of socialist or leftist political standpoint. While we in the wealthy and consumer driven north make moves towards ever greater privatisation and erosion of the public system, Latin America drives forward into the leftist future on an almost yearly basis.

The story of the Bolivian Indigenous movement ought to be a motivating force for Canada's First Nations population as well.

In other news of interesting happenings to the South... The first Retiremoent home for elderly prostitutes is slated to open in a few short months in Mexico City.

Pakistan to rid Afghanistan of "al-Qaeda" in 10 years?!

2005-06-14T12:36:00.000-03:00

To continue along the critical vein we tapped in regards to al-Qaeda, I came accross this Reuters 'story', which seems more like a press release from the white house or Karachi than journalism. "All this is do-able in 10 years and I am very sure that the way we are going we will be able to dismantle the al Qaeda organisation totally (within Afghanistan in 10 years)," Musharraf is quoted. It further describes the conflict in Afghanistan in terms that seem very favorable to the war on terror. Recapping who the enemy is: al-Qaeda, who it's leader is: Bin Laden, and of course how we will prevail, the standard Bush narrative. In the article, the longtime Bush lackey and Pakistani Dictator Pervez Musharaff is also quoted saying, "We have broken (al Qaeda's) cohesion, their lateral and vertical cohesion (in Pakistan). That's a great achievement because they cease to exist as a homogenous body able to execute operations in a command and control environment,". All this, is of course quite ironic given that Pakistan was instrumental in creating the Taliban. A further irony is that Musharraf was once quoted as saying that "The Country (Pakistan) is more important than democracy." Furthermore, Pakistan sheltered Abdul Qadeer Khan who sold nuclear technology to North Korea. I guess criticality, irony, nuance and detail elude those at Reuters! Perhaps the al-Qaeda fiction is entering into it's third act and this is our prelude. And the fictional triumphant defeat of the 'organization' in Afghanistan in ten years will be propped up as a completion of one book or chapter of the al-Qaeda mythic narrative. One that is heralded by a figure whose own relation to international security (a dictator with nuclear capability) is totally fucking sketchy.

2005-06-14T11:12:00.001-03:00

Cooling down.

2005-06-14T11:12:00.000-03:00

Photos by Andres Serrano

Turkey

2005-06-12T08:45:00.000-03:00

Oh, for those who haven't noticed, the odds of Turkey entering the EU have gone from long-shot to a snowball's hope in hell.

James: In response to your request for some reference material, I've added the following.

EU politicians insist that the referrendum results will not affect Turkey - that the possible rise of right-wing national parties in Europe is the real danger (think the ascendant German Christian Democrats). Assencion talks between Brussels and Ankara will begin, as scheduled, October 3.
Turkish Press

Greek Cyprus, moreover, has endorsed Turkey's bid - perhaps an anticipation that a US-aligned Turkey might be able to secure greater concessions, since Cyprus is a) aligned with the EU bloc and b) not a big country bordering Iraq and Iran.
Washington Post

The Turks have a clear sense that the referendum calls into question the whole project of EU expansion.
Zaman (Turkey)

This is also the understanding of most international commentators I have encountered.
CS Monitor
International Herald Tribune

Note that US relations with Turkey, historically very close, have been weakened since the Iraq war. It is possible that the US, and conservatives in Turkey, could capatialize on the present confusion to draw Turkey back into the US sphere.
International Herald Tribune

If you are really interested (as I am) the Center for European Policy Studies has a collection of papers downloadable free at:
CEPS Online Store
I'm looking forward to browsing this.

al-Qaeda? pt.II

2005-06-11T13:46:00.000-03:00

Graeme says:
"I had a great prof in uni. who was an expert in pakistani/afghani/india history, who specualted that the origin of the 'al-quaeda' term in the media and in intelligence circles had its origins with intelligence intercepts in which the word 'network' was heard repeatedly. Apparently, Bin Laden is/was something of a tech nerd. He set-up a intranet network with which his various sympathizers could communicate. This network was then misinterpreted as a formal political entity rather than just a decentralized system of communication."

Site News

2005-06-11T01:22:00.000-03:00

We have been added as a link to a popular, if not totally crass blog. Thank you very much destroyallcelebs for linking us the fuck up! Graeme we need your posts. And a defintite shout out and thanks to Elise for giving us a plug on her insightful blog.

al-Qaeda?

2005-06-11T00:47:00.000-03:00

Thank you Adam for bringing up a very compelling topic. If anybody is interested this is a great resource for alternative news. I am very disturbed how the press at large and the international public have embraced al-Qaeda. Like I mentioned in a comment before, although it may indeed be the case that certain islamic fundamentalist organizations have adopted the moniker and the myth of this organization; in the minds of Americans and the media, al-Qaeda has become the placeholder that was previosly held by the so-called 'red threat'. The Islamic critique of Western liberal capitalism has become the new enemy. It is no mere coincidence that the critique of crass materialism in liberal democratic capitalism that is found in radical socialism is mirrored in radical Islam. The right will try and obsfuacte their argument by promoting facile versions of gender equality and an empty vision of "freedom" and "liberty" but most thinking peopl realize that the conflict is between those that promote the capitalist agenda and those that defy it, even if their means are murderous and absurd (as indiscriminant bombing is!) Perhaps we should listen to their intial reasoning (not the more extreme dogma). The Washington Post reports that US intelligence has recently discovered al-Qaeda training camps in Pakistan, andthis article seems to paint al-Qaeda as a monetary resource which having only an economic tie to the Al-Zarqawi "second front" al-Qaeda". Do you guys have any further thoughts on the actual composition/reality of al-Qaeda?

Al Qaeda my ass (rant)

2005-06-10T08:52:00.000-03:00

James: I don't know about you, but ever since I watched the BBC documentary The Power of Nightmares I've had a new sensitivity to the phrase "Al-Qaeda affiliated". It is absolutely everywhere - every terror attack, assasination or robbery in the Middle East or Asia has the shadow of al-Qaeda cast over it. There are even suggestions that Hamas and Hizballa are somehow connected (I'll try to substantiate this, I'm sure I've seen it recently). It seems like "al-Qaeda affiliated" is accepted uncritically by the news media. What is there to differentiate the Uzbekistani government's claim that their political opponents are al-Qaeda, from the Russians' claims that al-Qaeda is working with the Chechens, from the USA's claims that al-Qaeda is involved with the Iraqi insurgency? Oh sorry, it's "al-Qaeda and Bath loyalists" just like in Afganistan it's "al-Qaeda and Taliban remnants."

Patriot Act Webstie

2005-06-09T22:09:00.000-03:00

From Daily Kos: Did you guys know that the USA Patriot Act is an acronym: Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism and that it has it's own website? And the big news: "The FBI would get expanded powers to subpoena records without the approval of a judge or grand jury in terrorism investigations under Patriot Act revisions approved Tuesday by the Senate Intelligence Committee."

Not "Shmomery" at all.

2005-06-09T15:34:00.000-03:00

To get back into power, Harper jumped all over the sponsership scandal and tried to ride it into an election and it has so far failed. What's funny is that, while I don't support the cons, I am glad that they kept the story alive and got the public and the rest of the gov't involved in the story. While the Liberals squeaked through the first, and probably most important, no-confidence vote, they aren't clear yet. Martin will have to call an election soon. While they got Belinda to cross the floor, she is not likely to be re-elected and they have already lost an MP to the same-sex debate (can't remember his name, became an independent yesterday. A little help here?). Losing the confidence vote, Harper has lost momentum, but he has more than enough material ready to hand to whip the electorate into a deserved anti-Liberal frenzy at election time., if he doesn't fuck it up too bad before that. (for instance, it looks like they may be able to contain the wierdness of the taping affair and bury the story)

The cons are currently made up of the more urban and urbane old Tories and the more western, more Christian, more rightwing Alliance. They are internally divided andhave not yet given a clear federal policy. But they have done an excellent job in getting the Bloc onside. If they can win the election (I see a Con minority government pretty likely), we'll have an internally divided, far right swinging party aligned with the bloc against the NDP, who never do more than ok, and the Liberals, who could get hosed. Neither the cons or the Bloc want same sex marriage and they both want Quebec out of the country,

Whew! Where am I going with this? It's just not a pretty picture. It looks like the Liberal party has sustained some pretty serious corruption (a Canadian Watergate, more on that later) and may lose the election to an angry, hungry, vindictive right wing party with no clear agenda beyond bringing down the government and ditching the fags.

And that's just not cool.

Conservative Shmonservative

2005-06-09T15:28:00.000-03:00

Others here could provide better evidence of why the we must fight the right here in Canada, nevertheless: I just wrote a paper on American Evangelsim's political influence on Canadian Evangelism and I found in my research that although there is no facile equation there are definite signs of penetration and interelation between the two evangelical groups accross the continental divide. Sam Reimer conluded in his 2003 book on the subject that there was social conservative cross pollination through the consumption of American evangelical cultural products in Canada. Before the neocons bed the religious right in the 80's and Ambrams in the 90's the Republican party was nothing like it is today. You guys all know this but I think it's important to remember these guys are revolutionaries not reformists and the poltical world of those based in the 'reality community' could do well to fight the emergence of oligarchic protofascism right here at home.

Art and Politics

2005-06-09T14:18:00.000-03:00

While screening his new slavery film Manderlay at this past Cannes, Von Trier responded to journalists inquiring about his America Trilogy (Dogville 2004, Mandelay 2005 and Washington 200?) "America is a big subject because such a big part of our lives have to do with America," he said, "I must say, I feel there could just as well be American military in Denmark. We are a nation under influence and under a very bad influence…because Mr. Bush is an asshole and doing very idiotic things." Continuing, he reflected on the U.S. dominacnce over other countries and culture. "America is sitting on our world, I am making films that have to do with America (because) 60% of my life is America. So I am in fact an American, but I can't go there to vote, I cant change anything. I am an American, so that is why I make films about America." Maybe we all have a responsibility to respond to this "asshole." (like fucking blogging is doing anything)

The TV Report, episode 1.

2005-06-09T14:04:00.000-03:00

Last night saw another shining example of why the "left" is better than the "right", at least with regards to popular media. General Colin Powell appeared for his 15 minutes of fame on Jon Stewart's infamous late night "news" programme, The Daily Show.

Although Stewart's criticisms of the Bush administration (and on occasion of Powell himself) have been at times virulent (but nothing short of hilarious), Powell and Stewart were able to relate to each other with a level of respect altogether absent in Stewart's right winge contemporaries such as Ann Coulter and Bill O'Reilly.

The differences were profound, with Stewart asking difficult questions while never raising his voice. losing his temper or resorting to childish name-calling (O'Reilly's modus operandi). In turn, Powell came off as an intelligent, dignified man who (while choosing the wrong team to play ball with) was worthy of respect nonetheless. He still stood by his former administrations decision to go into Iraq, and admirably Stewart stood by his opposition to that decision all the while thanking Powell for making an appearance on his show. And the fact that Powell was appearing as a guest did not stop Stewart and Corddry from taking shots at the Bush-Blair love affair going on overseas, nor making jokes at the vast quantities of information Bush seems to have discovered regarding global warming in the last five years (uh, that'd be none).

Perhaps the most important guest Stewart has ever had, and certainly - by his own admission - probably the closest he will ever get to the Bush admin, and yet never once did we see displays of idiocy generally considered the exclusive domain of Fox.

torture marks more than scandal

2005-06-09T13:50:00.000-03:00

Back to the epic histoire of the American Empire. The kind of human rights abuses committed by the American Armed Forces cannot be seen as mere 'scandal' they are an essential feature of occuppation. To treat torture as scandal puts state sanctioned murder, rape, humilitation, psychological terror in the same camp as extortion, misuse of governent funds, blatant hypocrisy, production of sweatshop and sex workers etc, gay prostitutes leaving the white house late at night, modifying documents to conceal the reality of climate change amongst many, many other scandals. No, the moniker of scandal should not be ascribed to sexual, psychological, physical abuse and murder of sometimes innocent people (mostly all the time since the evidence for Al-Queada actually existing is rather slim) The idea of a "torture-gate" normalizes these incidents into the stream of regulated poltical discourse, therefore, any new revelation about widespread torture is dealt with by the media in a staged and scripted fashion that obsfucates the reality that the United States is illegally occupying a country to bleed it for it's resources. Naomi Klein writes in this excellent peice that "there is no nice, humanitarian way to occupy a nation against the will of its people. Those who support such an occupation don't have the right to morally separate themselves from the brutality it requires." The media has to start calling this an occupation and the issue of Torture has to remain in the headlines. Thank you Graeme for your earlier post.

Gomery Shmomery

2005-06-09T11:16:00.000-03:00

In response to David's call for a little Gomery content:

The Conservative-aligned news media seems baffled by continued Canadian support for the liberal party. This Post editorial was forwarded to me by my father. It's a ridiculous and spiteful rant, but it seems to speak to the (real) outrage experienced by many voters.

In the article, Garvey damns Canada as "A simpering quasi-nation, utterly brainwashed by [...] the CBC." He calls the Liberal government a "pack of bandits," "illegitemate," and even (gasp) "socialist." The government is further charged with having "amassed a record of utterly incompetant governance." I don't need to poke holes in this article, but I think it highlights some major issues in Canadian politics - besides that the standard for political debate in Canada is going down the same scandal-toilet as it is Stateside. First and foremost is the increasing regionalism in national party politics.

The Liberals hold the traditional power center in Ontario, the Bloc is unshakable in Quebec and Alberta - the new economic power - is committed to supporting the Conservative party. At the margins, loyalty to the Liberal party only goes so far as their support for regional priorities (eg. oil revenues). I agree that it is of the utmost importance that Alberta and Quebec be meaningfully integrated into the political establishment. The Conservative party is not the party to acheive this, however. They have shown themselves consistently out of touch with the voting public on fundamental issues, matters of social and foreign policy. I'm the first to agree that the same-sex mariage debate is little more than a distraction (after all, it is a fait-accomplis thanks to the Supreme Court), but I find the Conservative decision to take a stand against it baffling. Moreover, the Conservative attacks on our countries constitutional (and extremely well-functioning) political institutions - the Supreme Court and the Senate - are troubling and dangerous. Not only do they present unrealizable objectives, but they obscure the intended and acutal purpose of these institutions.

I don't think the Conservative party has shown potential as a unity party (returning Quebec to the fold and reconciling old money / old power in Ontario to an increased role for Alberta). It is this inadequacy, not the electorate's failure to recognize "our national decline and the bottomless corruption of our legal and political order," that has stymied the Conservatives at the polls.

Can the 'popularity' of the Liberal party be interpreted as positive support for their policies, or is due merely to a lack of better options? Or is it, as Garvey alledges, nothing more than apathy mixed with dumb brand-loyalty? To be honest, I would welcome a Conservative party - any party, for that matter - able to challenge the Liberals nation-wide. I actually wish Stronach had stuck it out with the Conservatives - for those 25% who voted against the traditional-mariage plank. I'm unable to take pleasure in Harper's humiliation. I think that Canada would be best served, in the long run, by a strong and pluralist Conservative party.

exactitudes

2005-06-08T15:38:00.000-03:00

exactitudes

Euro Setback

2005-06-05T14:50:00.000-03:00

It looks like the Euro has taken a bit of a hit lately. (Financial Times) Coming on the heels of the recent referendums, leaked news of German central bank contingency planning for the collapse of the Eurozone was a real kick in the ass. This is a sensible discussion for a central bank to hold, and no reason for alarm, but the timing was unfortunate.

A few Dutch and Spanish aquaintences were surprised when I told them that some in North America look to the EU hopefully, as a new model of inter-state cooperation - and as a bastion of progressive politics. Unfortunately, it seems that the EU has failed to effectivly promote itself in its the founding states. The politicians, for all their accomplishment, have not involved the public in their vision. (Herald Tribune)

Perhaps last week will serve as a wake up call to the treaty negotiators (though I doubt it). They seem to have forgotten the importance of a constitution in the public imagination (note America). The next draft could stand to leave aside some of the legal details - to show more poetry and inspiration.

Ecstatic Truth

2005-06-05T14:43:00.000-03:00

I've got some posting to catch up on, but here's a quicky: Werner Herzog's Minnesota Declaration.

I love this man. For best effect imagine him reading it aloud.

Gannon Hilarity

2005-06-02T20:20:00.000-03:00

I saw this at Crooks and Liars. Whether Gannon was an escort or merely a model posing as one, I will never forget the juvenile glee that the Gannon story produced in me. The link is of a segment he did for a show called 'LIE DETECTOR' on some network that seems to be called 'PAX'. What the hell is 'PAX'?

He takes a lie detector test. Don't miss it!

EVIL BOOKS

2005-06-02T00:08:00.000-03:00

Here's a list of the ten most "harmful books of all time", that is, according to Human Events magazine, whose website sells books from such itellectual giants as Fox New's Sean Hannity and the towering genius of Ann Coulter. The list includes, aomongst others , the communist manifesto, the feminine mystique and the kinsey report. The judges include Prof. Robert George from Princeton University and Prof. Stephen Presser from Northwestern University. Check out the details here. BONUS: check out some of the runner-ups they include some great books: Authoritarian Personality by Theodor Adorno (a book that attempts to discover the road from liberalism to facism!!), On Liberty by John Stuart Mill, Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin, Madness and Civilization by Michel Foucault, Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir, Prison Notebooks by Antonio Gramsci, Silent Spring by Rachel Carson Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon.

Agamben

2005-06-01T23:37:00.000-03:00

This one's for elise, this is a concise yet potent introduction to Italian political theorists Giorgio Agamben's conception of Homo Sacer. nice and brief. Read it here.

Fun with John Bolton

2005-06-01T23:19:00.000-03:00

Video of the American UN ambasadorial nominee Bolton from 1994 posted online. I've heard the audio of this before but if you haven't heard or seen his ferocity during this debate/discussion it's well worth the click.

At the end of the rainbow

2005-05-31T02:16:00.000-03:00

The TORTURE story is too dissonant for television, but it and the death-cult get some 'too-hot-for TV' attention in the NYT here, and at Slate here.

I like the Slate article because it reminded me of many things i had forgotten.

I might start updating this post with any new articles i find or see links to.

Update:

Restraining the Leviathan

A rather long (I haven't read the whole thing yet) look at Americans 'interrogating' in the aftermath of the too-many-to-count-or-even-remember revelations about US brutality (is that an appropriate word?). This article is even-handed in that cloying way that the NYT often is, acknowledging the moral reprehensibility of torture while at the same time considering the arguments of torture's "supporters" in a way that may or may not lend these Hoess jrs. some respectability within the American liberal establishment. Read it here.

A few choice passages:

An implicit understanding has been reached, or so I would argue, between the governed and those who govern: that the prime task is the prevention of future attacks on our own soil as opposed to the punishment of past attacks; that extralegal excesses, not excluding kidnappings and physical abuse, may be necessary in the effort to suppress terrorists seeking to implant sleeper cells in our midst and equip them with deathly substances and bombs; that in pursuit of this goal, much can be forgiven, including big mistakes (the abuse and indefinite detention of innocent people, the tacit annulment -- for foreigners, anyway -- of legal guarantees, not to mention a costly war of dubious relation to the larger struggle); and that the less we know as a people about our secret counterterrorism struggles and strategies, the less we contemplate the possibly ugly consequences, the easier it will be for those in authority to get on with the job of protecting us.

Viewed through an Israeli prism, the United States still has a lot to learn about the uses and consequences of coercive force, of torture lite, in interrogations. A lot to learn as practitioners: Israeli security specialists are amazed by the multiplicity of commands engaged in the American interrogation scramble, by the short tours of duty and high turnover of interrogators, by the reliance on interpreters and outsourcing to contractors and foreign governments. ''Unprofessional'' is the mildest word they use.

Interesting...

Soldiers of Christ (correction: same article as in magazine)

2005-05-31T00:33:00.000-03:00

April's Harpers had a great peice on contemporary fundamentalism called Soldiers of Christ, Harpers.org just published it online. **UPDATE*** EVIDENCE.

des ideologues du jour

2005-05-30T12:22:00.000-03:00

I was struck by the publication of an exceedingly well reasoned and well written proto marxist manifesto that Mr. David Brooks of the New York Times happened upon. What I found so facinating about the manifesto is that it identifies the locus of modern class inquity in America in the education gap. I implore you to read it. What's strange is that Mr. Brooks is a conservative op-ed comluminst...hmmm am I missing something? Also there's an excellent thread over on Huffingtonpost.com where Max Blumenthal accusses Christoper Hitchens of "enabling" Holocaust deniers such as Robert Faurisson (who denies that the gas chambers Auschwitz ever existed). The claims made by Mr. Blumenthal in the post itself are questionable and crude but for those interested in Hitchens' dark turn or in Holocaust denial whackjobs the ensuing disscussion on the comment thread is well worth a read.

speaking of vitriol...

2005-05-29T22:15:00.000-03:00

This one's for Graeme..remember the celeb hitlist, well I came across this vice style mean-spirited blog/website linked off of uh hum kevin 'what happened to my talent' smith's blog. It's really funny at times. I was offended by the crude frat boy mentality but the cult of personality deserve some serious evisceration! (note: I'm so sick of "gay" being an insult) Anyways, I know some of you will love it: check it. But the lamest of all celebs that's not actually on the webiste is Martin Short. I have a massive hateon for the embarassing and cringeworthy jimminy glick. I guess I'm not the only one who dislikes mr. short.

Belinda Bashing

2005-05-27T19:34:00.000-03:00

I've been really taken by the manner with which the Canadian television media, the Conservative Party and Maclean's have reacted to Belinda's dramatic move. Even though I might not agree with her pro business politics I applaud miss Stronach for her political savy irrespective of her "ambitious" motives. Because Belinda is a woman she has been grilled in the press and the newspapers here in Canada. What the fuck is up with that!! Alberta Conservative MLA, Tony Abbott called her a whore, Conservative MP Maurice Vellacott reffered to her action as 'political prostitution." I'm elated that the Conservative party has been revealed as the virtriol bleeting neandrothols that they are. I think both the media and the Conservative have shown that underneath all of our progressive posturing canada is seething with hate and vitriol.

Iraq slides into civil war

2005-05-23T16:48:00.000-03:00

It's with a heavy heart that I post this. Commondreams.org ran this article that argues that Iraq is most certainly slipping into civil war. Before the american invasion there were many pundits that predicted this particular outcome. Surely if the mainstream American media reported on what was actually happening in Iraq it would topple the neconservative's ideological fiction about spreading freedom and democracy. It seems as though they are spreading chaos, horror and perpetual violence.
From the article:
"Among the recent incidents of sectarian violence and apparent retaliation:
Ten clerics, both Sunnis and Shias, have been killed over the past two weeks in and around Baghdad. Several of the clerics were abducted, and their bullet-riddled bodies were discovered days later. The corpses of 14 blindfolded and bound men were found May 8 in Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood, a Shia area dominated by al-Sadr's supporters. They had been shot execution-style and were believed to be members of a Sunni tribe abducted outside Baghdad. A week later, 13 bodies were discovered in a garbage-strewn lot in the same area. Those victims, who were also bound and executed, had the type of long beards typically worn by devout Sunnis.On May 14, corpses of 10 Iraqi soldiers, all Shias, were discovered in Ramadi, a Sunni-dominated city in western Iraq that has been a center of the insurgency. On May 15, 11 more bodies were found on an abandoned chicken farm south of Baghdad. Iraqi officials said they appeared to be Shia pilgrims who were ambushed by Sunni insurgents on the road between Baghdad and the Shia holy city of Najaf."

Saddam Hidden Cam

2005-05-20T14:18:00.000-03:00

Saddam looking good, he seems pretty happy doing his own laundry.

UPDATE: Bush promises probe into Saddam underwear pictures

Scotsman Galloway Blasts Commitee

2005-05-18T14:43:00.000-03:00

While under investigation for his involvment in the Oil for Food "scandal", british MP and antiwar activist Geoge Galloway blasted Minnesota sentator Norm Coleman (R) over the war in iraq. He was very blunt! Amonst other things, he said that "Senator, in everything I said about Iraq, I turned out to be right and you turned out to be wrong and 100,000 people paid with their lives; 1600 of them American soldiers sent to their deaths on a pack of lies; 15,000 of them wounded, many of them disabled forever on a pack of lies." Full story here.

Star Wars continues to suck

2005-05-18T13:02:00.000-03:00

I have a new love affair with reading bad reviews of all things star wars. The following is an excerpt from one of my favorite negative reviews so far. Anthony Lane of the New Yorker hating yoda: "No, the one who gets me is Yoda. May I take the opportunity to enter a brief plea in favor of his extermination? Any educated moviegoer would know what to do, having watched that helpful sequence in “Gremlins” when a small, sage-colored beastie is fed into an electric blender. A fittingly frantic end, I feel, for the faux-pensive stillness on which the Yoda legend has hung. At one point in the new film, he assumes the role of cosmic shrink—squatting opposite Anakin in a noirish room, where the light bleeds sideways through slatted blinds. Anakin keeps having problems with his dark side, in the way that you or I might suffer from tennis elbow, but Yoda, whose reptilian smugness we have been encouraged to mistake for wisdom, has the answer. “Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose,” he says. Hold on, Kermit, run that past me one more time. If you ever got laid (admittedly a long shot, unless we can dig you up some undiscerning alien hottie with a name like Jar Jar Gabor), and spawned a brood of Yodettes, are you saying that you’d leave them behind at the first sniff of danger? Also, while we’re here, what’s with the screwy syntax? Deepest mind in the galaxy, apparently, and you still express yourself like a day-tripper with a dog-eared phrase book. “I hope right you are.” Break me a fucking give." Read the entire review here.