February 18, 2008 archive

Crossposted from GentillyGirl

So according to Dr. Morris, the networks in their crazed basketball frenzy keep referring to New Orleans as the “Soul of America”. Interesting considering how we have been treated post-Katrina/Rita/Federal Flood. Hell, I thought we weren’t worth the thought about the Future. (Thanks Bush Administration.)

We here in New Orleans are the Soul of America. It’s not about the French Quarter or the drinks on the streets, it’s about our belief in our Culture, our History and our Future. To live here, I mean truly LIVE here takes one to a place of acceptance and worship. What we have here cannot be imagined in most of the localities of America. We are our own.

I live this Reality day by day, and I thank the Goddess that She sent me home years ago. I had to be a part of this scenario… have to be a witness. Seattle: fucking Californication, Portland: being carved up as I type, San Francisco: god damned dot-com yuppies forced us out. I know… I was there for most of this shit.

All I have left is my hometown, and I’m not willing to let the bastards win, period. I’m like a creature backed into a corner, and it’s my turn to strike back. This is my home and my folks… I can’t back down.

For years I’ve fought for others, but this is what She wanted me to do: Fight for Her city. I see her statue on Decatur, and She tells me to fight. Therefore I fight.

New Orleans is a place that inspires. It also is a haven for those of us who no longer wish to face assimulation. We are ourselves, and what can be more realistic than that. We live… and love, and welcome  those who are searching for a safe-place.

Our world here is something that cannot be sacrificed to corporate desires or the entertainment crowd. We live as we always have. Our world is an anachronism, and yet, we are America’s hope. This is the last place to be assimulated to the corporate vision of the Borg. We are ourselves: Sinn Fein.

Betty and I are sworn to return, and soon it shall be so, but we did so because we believe in the culture here. We could have gone anywhere after the Flood, but we both agreed that we must stand for this wonderful place. Where else can a real Human Being live in our dessicated land? (Not any city I know of.) How could we look in a mirror if we just walked away?

Everything, every one here… my soul screams for. This city has been home for my folks for almost three hundred years.  Far be it from me to abandon familial ties. I must stand for New Orleans and the Coast. This is a labor of Love, not only for the Isle d’ Orleans, but for the country I gave some of my life for.

Wake up and understand: we are under attack from the elite 3%. Speak your voice and we can screw these fuckers to wall. Ya’s just gotta believe.  

1. The AP reports 140 Afghans killed in 2 days of bombings. “A suicide car bomber killed 38 Afghans at a crowded market Monday, pushing the death toll from two days of militant bombings to about 140. The marketplace blast, which targeted a Canadian army convoy, came a day after the country’s deadliest insurgent attack since a U.S. invasion defeated the Taliban regime in late 2001.

   Irony alert! U.S. Army Gen. Dan K. McNeill, NATO’s top commander in Afghanistan, back in September expressed his doubt the Taliban was ever defeated. Bush never finished his first invasion before moving on to oil-rich Iraq.

   “The toll from that bombing in a crowd watching a dog fight rose to more than 100… The previous deadliest bombing in Afghanistan killed about 70 people – mostly students – in November, part of a record year of violence in 2007 that included more than 140 suicide attacks.”

   In addition to a record number of civilian casualties in 2007, last year was also the deadliest year for American troops in Afghanistan too.

2. The Washington Post reports on Army moms in Short maternity leaves, long deployments. “Many female soldiers hoping to start families face the prospect of missing most of their child’s first year. The Army grants six weeks of maternity leave before a new mother must return to her job or training, and four months until she can be sent to a war zone. The Marine Corps and Navy allow from six months to a year before a new mother must deploy… Under that system, a woman who wishes to have a child and remain with her unit must conceive soon after returning home so she can give birth, recover and prepare for her next overseas tour. Female soldiers… say the tight schedule cuts short precious time for mother and infant to bond and breast-feed, forcing women to choose between their loyalty to their comrades — as well as their careers — and nurturing their families.”

3. The Los Angles Times reports that Student’s deportation roils New Mexico town. Until last December, Roswell had largely ignored the immigration debate. But when “a school security officer stopped Karina Acosta, an 18-year-old pregnant Roswell High School senior, and discovered she was in the country illegally. He called federal immigration authorities, who swiftly deported her. The district superintendent protested and the officer was removed from the school and transferred back to the city Police Department. About three dozen angry students and parents marched on police headquarters — a notable event in a town not accustomed to controversy — and were met by a handful of counterdemonstrators who backed the officer… Two months later, unease permeates the community.”

4. CBS 60 Minutes sent Morley Safer to Denmark in The pursuit of happiness.

   Over the past 30 years, in survey after survey, [Denmark] consistently beat the rest of the world in the happiness stakes. It’s hard to figure: the weather is only so-so, they are heavy drinkers and smokers, their neighbors, the Norwegians, are richer, and their other neighbors, the Swedes, are healthier…

   After careful study, [Professor Kaare Christensen at the University of Southern Denmark] thinks he isolated the key to Danish anti-depression. “What we basically figured out that although the Danes were very happy with their life, when we looked at their expectations they were pretty modest,” he says. By having low expectations, one is rarely disappointed…

   All education is free in Denmark, right on through university. And students can take as long as they like to complete their studies…

   Denmark also provides free health care, subsidized child care and elder care, a social safety net spread the length and breadth of the country… Christensen says the average work week is 37 hours, and workers get six weeks of vacation. But in getting all of these wonderful gifts from the government, the Danes do pay a price. Christensen says a middle income person would pay about 50 percent – half – in taxes.

   But not everyone is happy in Denmark. The International Herald Tribune reports Danish police arrest almost 30 people in 8th night of youth violence. “Nearly 30 people were arrested for setting fires to buildings, cars and trash bins in an eight consecutive night of youth violence in Danish cities, mostly in immigrant neighborhoods, police said Monday… It was not clear what triggered the unrest… Some observers say the youth are frustrated over police harassment and the reprinting of a cartoon lampooning the Prophet Muhammad. Danish newspapers reproduced the drawing on Wednesday to show their commitment to free speech after police foiled an alleged plot to kill the cartoonist who created it.”

A risky and controversial plan to save coral reefs from extinction is below the fold.

cross posted from The Dream Antilles

Torture At Abu Ghraib

It depends on what you mean by “outsourcing.”  If, like me, you’ve been assuming that “interrogations” of detainees prisoners at Guantanamo and the “black sites” were all being conducted only by CIA employees or uniformed armed forces personnel or at the very least US government employees, you’re probably making a mistake.  The facts seem to be that “interrogations” have frequently been conducted by “contractors” and not by government employees.  That’s right.  Arguments about what the CIA’s employees can and cannot do don’t directly address what contractors can do any more than US law determines how prisoners are to be interrogated after they are extraordinarily renditioned illegally extradited to other countries.

Follow me behind the facade.

Hi all,

I’ve taken a long weekend, so you’ve got two Pickle-free pony parties today! Have at it.

U.S. Federal District Judge (Northern District of California, San Francisco Division) Jeffrey White, a Bush appointee, has ordered the Internet Service Provider Dynadot to shut down the important whistleblowing site, Wikileaks. In recent months, Wikileaks has published important documents related to Guantanamo’s Standard Operating Procedures, the heretofore secret Rules of Engagement of the U.S. in the Iraq War, as well as bank fraud in Kenya.

Dynadot shall immediately clear and remove all DNS hosting records for the wikileaks.org domain name and prevent the domain name from resolving to the wikileaks.org website or any other website or server other than a blank park page, until further order of this Court.

The good folks at Wikileaks have anticipated something of this sort sooner or later, and have a number of mirror sites hosted outside the U.S., so they can still be accessed here and here. But this attempt at outright censorship must be overturned. This is not China censoring government critics, or some small corrupt country trying to hide its dirty laundry. This is a U.S. judge, at an ex parte hearing (no one from Wikileaks was even present or represented), acting like a totalitarian factotum.

This is the official sappy government FCC site touting the “benefits” of digital TV.

http://www.dtv.gov/

Note all of the marketing hype. I can become a “DTV Deputy”. I can get info in spanish. Note how an entire site is geared towards the simplemindedness of a five year old. To me at least it is chock full of subliminals diverting your focus away from the Satanicness it will bring. In order to get to this let’s click on the FAQ section on the left, that stupid looking TV remote control. After that go to Why are we switching to digital TV. Here is the answer.

“An important benefit of the switch to all-digital broadcasting is that it will free up parts of the valuable broadcast spectrum for public safety communications (such as police, fire departments, and rescue squads). Also, some of the spectrum will be auctioned to companies that will be able to provide consumers with more advanced wireless services (such as wireless broadband)”.

Wireless broadband! Why is this a bad thing? Well if you have no problem with being watched 24 seven or have no problem with government knowing your every move then fine. As an engineer I could also price out very cheap solar powered mini spy cameras that only need be in range of another ugly cell phone tower. Oh, watch the proliferation of uglyness in those babies!

Financial houses are investing in corporations that will meter and control your water and electric use. Yes, you will be rationed.

I don’t see rationed energy and water use as a “benefit” of digital TV.  

Sorry but I don’t see the benefit of government partnerships with companies making all of their products outside of the United States.  And for what 300 channels of crystal clear mindnumbingly stupid “news” and or programming engineered to decimate good moral behavior.

What is does mean is the re-allocation of lower frequecy spectrum, RF energy with a farther reach potential.  They are going to reach into you life and crush it.

Hey but you’re happy, just look at the clear picture!

My Ghandi solution? Go dark Feb 17,2009 go dark. What will you miss? Mindnumbingly stupid corporate “news”? MTV and E channel shows socially engineered to degrade morals? TV evangelicals declaring I-35 in Texas the Holy Highway?

They are pulling the plug, we should too!