The New York Times has a slideshow of color photos taken during the 1930′s and 1940′s–called Poverty’s Palette–that are just awesome. Kodak was holding out on us!
I’m awestruck at how differently things appear when color is added, it’s adds a whole new level of vibrance and reality to these snapshots of daily life.
An interesting movie came out today called “A Day Without a Mexican.”
It looks interesting, from what I in the movie trailer (5MB on a T1 took 20+ minutes). The storyline is simple, all of the Mexicans disappear. Not in the quasi-metaphorical sense that no one can see them, but they literally vanish in thin air. The result is a world where people have to cut their own grass, wash their own dishes, park their own cars and other daily chores that are taken for granted as being done by Mexicans.
From the movie sypopsis page:
As time goes by, the State continues to deteriorate: Garbage has taken over the streets and tears are permanently painted on the faces of most citizens as the 5th largest economy in the world tumbles. The realization that what has disappeared is the very thing that keeps the “California Dream” running — cooks, gardeners, policemen, nannies, doctors, farm and construction workers, entertainers, athletes, as well as the largest growing market of consumers — has turned Latinos and their return into the number one priority in the State.
I wish this were playing in more places than just Southern California and a few venues in Texas. See the theater listing to see if one is near you.
DailyKos has finally hit on something that I’ve been saying for a while:
“[...] [T]he libertarian contingent on the web is huge. In fact, many of the blogs on the Right are actually more libertarian-leaning than movement conservative.”
That’s just a great line from the article on his response to the NRA’s supposedly wavering support of Bush in the face of the “assault weapon” ban that is set to expire a few months before the November elections:
“If he renews the ban, it won’t endorse Bush, if he doesn’t, then he’s got it. Which is a huge political problem for Bush, as the assault weapons ban is popular amongst the suburban set the Republicans are trying mightily to hold.”
He goes on to talk about one of the possible Libertarian candidates, Aaron Russo. However I am refraining from the primaries debate for the Libertarians seeing how it appears to be a close race between Russo and Gary Nolan, both of whom have been vocal critics of Bush administration policies. The Libertarian Convention is being held next weekend here in Atlanta, I will be covering it as an independent for WatchBlog.
I have been of the opinion that there will definitely be a large groundswell in Libertarian support in the run-up to the election, primarily because conservative voters who are becoming jaded with Bush policies will be unwilling to vote for Kerry because they don’t see him as a viable solution. Bush’s falling poplularity has only strengthened this hypothesis.
Bush’s libertarian challenge [DailyKos]
NRA endorsement of Bush is on hold [TheHill]
Russo for President
Gary Nolan for President
2004 Libertarian Convention
This is great, someone edited Beetle Bailey cartoons to create humorous cartoon editorials on the Abu Ghraib prison scandal called Beetle Ghraib:
[via BoingBoing]
The $41.22-per-barrel price is at its highest in the 21 years since the New York Mercantile Exchange launched the contract. The last major spike occurred during the Iranian revolution in which the adjusted-for-inflation price was $78-per-barrel. In explaining what has caused the prices to continue to climb, Dennis Kongsiri, vice president at Mitsui & Co Energy Risk Management in Sydney said:
“If you look at the way this market is rallying, it’s been broad-based and gradual, relentlessly going higher supported by a strong products market and solid refining margins,
[...]
As long as the world economy does not go into recession, it could be the case that the days of cheap oil are over,”
Translation:
“Yeah, we could probably hit $78 in another couple of years.”
The OPEC cartel is expected to increase quotas to at least 1.5 million bpd in their June meeting, but that would do little more than justify the overages in exports that are already occurring.
Just drill ANWR already. We’re acting like junkies trying to get our fix of crack from an abusive dealer, not that it helps that quite a few of us are using crack pipes the size of a ditch drainage line.
–
Also, seen today: A Hummer H2 towing a 100-gallon gas tank, replete with gas nozzle. I wish I’d had my camera.
Jimmie Mac of AngryFinger.org has put together a good timeline on the events leading up to Nick Berg’s death:
He thinks there is something shady about the US denying holding Nick Berg in military custody (which does seem incredibly suspect):
Why was the US Military so adamant about denying having Nick Berg in custody? When even the US consulate in Iraq says he was in US Military custody.
He says he’ll keep updating the timeline as new information comes to light.
Nick Berg’s Iraq Timeline [AngryFinger.org]
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Related:
Questions Surround Berg Video
Nick Berg’s Murderer Given 3 Passes by Bush
Militants Behead in Retaliation for Prisoner Abuse
Jayson Blair, of New York Times’ make-shit-up-and-hope-no-one-will-notice infamy, has officially dropped off the radar screen of the latest trend of cashing in on bad deeds by writing books about it. His book, “Burning Down My Master’s House”, sold a whopping 1,386 copies through March 18th. New Millenium, the publishing house which undersigned Blair’s book, has changed from Chapter-11 bankruptcy to Chapter-7, in which it will have to liquidate it’s holdings in order to pay off debts.
Blair’s book has suffered from denigrating reviews and low sales. Here’s one Amazon.com review of the book:
“Unlike the pieces Jayson Blair ‘reported’ for the New York Times, this laborious account of the aftermath of his infamous crash ‘n’ burn is way too boring to be anything but the real deal. (Okay, he does try to commit suicide in a coffee shop restroom–but, conveniently, he changes his mind and there are no witnesses.)”
You know things are pretty bad you’re trying to slit your wrists with the plastic lid of a latté in a Starbucks. I have to empathize a little, because hey, I’d kill myself too if I had just paid $3 for a shitty latté.
The (Publishing) House That Blair Helped Close [MetaFilter]
Publisher’s story ends: Liquidation for Jayson Blair house New Millennium [New York Daily Post]
Wow, this is a surprise; I guess those of us who write a letter to our congress-critter to tell them that PATRIOT sucks is finally paying off. The Hill reports that a group of Republicans in Congress is blocking President Bush’s effort to strengthen domestic counter-terrorism laws and reauthorize the USA Patriot Act:
Fifty-eight lawmakers, including six Republicans, have co-sponsored legislation sponsored by Rep. Butch Otter (R-Idaho) in the House that would rein in aspects of the Patriot Act.
Maybe the tide is turning and we are going to see some further rational legislation concerning terrorism enforcement. You know, like making sure we’re not locking people up for years without trials and other unconstitutional things.
Presidential push fails to quell GOP fear of Patriot Act [The Hill]
In a somewhat humorous editorial snafu, three editors of the Boston Globe overlooked or approved pornography photos which simulated rape acts. The photos–vetted by the Arab propaganda site Albasrah.net and a Tunisian website produced in France by Committee for the Defense of Saddam Hussein [Comit de D'fonce de Saddam Hussein En Tunisie]–were debunked as frauds last week by WorldNetDaily:
A WND investigation has revealed that most of the photos are taken from the American pornographic website “Iraq Babes,” and the Hungarian site, “Sex in War,” which is linked to by the American site. Both websites are linked to by violent pornography sites and both describe Iraqi women — played by “actresses” — in vulgar terms.
The Boston Herald has jumped on the story enthusiastically in what appears to be a chance to sling a little well deserved mud at it’s local competing newspaper.
Globe caught with pants down: Paper duped into running porn photos [Boston Herald]
Bogus GI rape photos used as Arab propaganda [WorldNetDaily]
Globe publishes apology for fake ‘GI rape’ photos [WorldNetDaily]
[via Fark]
–
UPDATE: NewsDesigner has more info and uh, context or something. Okay, really I was just suckered by the great headline: The Boston (Boom-Chicka-Wow-Wow) Globe.
UPDATE **EXCLUSIVE**: The fake porn images fobbed as torture photos have been found. At first glance you will probably see that the uniforms are not the same as those worn by soldiers in Iraq, these appear to be surplus.
NOTE – GRAPHIC CONTENT (NOT ACTUAL IRAQ ABUSE PHOTOS)
image 1 image 2 image 3 image 4 image 5 image 6 image 7 image 8 image 9
The New York Post has a story that casts doubt on the 288,000 newly created jobs that were flaunted in April:
Without those extra 117,000 make-believe jobs, the total growth for April would have been just 171,000 – sub-par for an economy that’s supposed to be growing at more than 4 percent a year, but right on the pros’ targets.
Take away all 270,000 make-believe jobs and, well, you have the sort of pessimism that the political pollsters are seeing.
If I was the suspicious type (and if I thought Washington was smart enough), I’d suspect a nasty motive behind the sudden surge in these mystery jobs. But for now, let’s just acknowledge their existence.
The ramifications of this are not good at all, large jumps in job growth can trigger the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates when a recovery is not properly in place. Rising interest rates and a lackluster employment rate is a causic mixture, especially leading up to a presidential election.
WHAT ARE THEY SMOKING AT THE LABOR DEPT.? [NY POST]
The Libertarian Party has issued a statement saying Rumsfeld is not the only person who should be held accountable:
“As a direct result of [Congress'] actions, more than 700 U.S. soldiers are dead and thousands of American families are grieving. Iraqi prisoners are being tortured and abused in clear violation of international law, and our enemies are retaliating with televised executions of American civilians.”
Under those circumstances, no one should be surprised that politicians are looking for a scapegoat, Libertarians point out.
[...]
“Either Rumsfeld knew how prisoners were being treated and did nothing, or he didn’t know about it — and in either case he’s not qualified to be defense secretary,” Seehusen said. “Nevertheless, Rumsfeld is but one bureaucratic cog in a massive war machine, and swapping him out for another cog answerable to the same commander-in-chief won’t affect the course of the war.”
[emphasis added]
If Rumsfeld goes, Bush should go, too [lp.org]
Nick Berg’s murderer, Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian militant with ties to al-Qaida was not the only person culpable for his death. The Bush administration had the chance to assassinate Zarqawi on 3 seperate occations between June 2002 and January 2003. It was seen as an unacceptable idea to take out either Zarqawi–now blamed for more than 700 terrorist killings in Iraq–or the terrorist camp he operated in Kirma, in Northern Iraq, because the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.
To this I respond: “George Bush, you and your administration, through your clemency for a known terrorist who you allowed to operate with impunity due to dirty politicking, are just as guilty of Nick Berg’s murder as Zarqawi himself. I have unmasked the other four terrorists in the video, and it is you.”
Avoiding attacking suspected terrorist mastermind [MSNBC]
But he got his war! [WatchBlog]
–
Related:
Questions Surround Berg Video
Nick Berg Timeline
Militants Behead in Retaliation for Prisoner Abuse
Drudge Report has one of his special pages up with two pictures of different soldiers posing with Iraqi children. One even has flowers in his helmet and flak jacket. I’ll reproduce them here (to show that at least I’m not biased against good news):
He had this to say about the images:
Here’s images you will not see in the NEW YORKER or on 60 MINUTES:
American soldiers welcomed as heros in Iraq!
Well, lo’ and behold, The New Yorker actually has posted positive news on Iraq, witness from this picture from the New Yorker website (sorry, I couldn’t locate the original article):
Behold the power of the Internet (thanks to You_mean_Im_gonna_stay_this_color from TotalFark).
–
UPDATE: Mike Hindes responds:
Hello, great site :)
I got it from this article,The New Yorker actually does not post too many pictures online, but behold, some of those few are positive. If people like Drudge are going to go out of their way to make a point like this over 1 or 2 ‘posed’ pictures some troops sent them, then I will try to make sure they have the facts straight.( In addition, the picture I providied is not posed like his pictures.) Another note, I was watching MSNBC last night, and they did a whole segment on actor Gary Sinise, and how he is helping the children of Iraq, along with the troops. They had MANY wonderful shots of troops helping children and happy childeren greeting troops and Gary himself. And this was on ‘liberal’ MSNBC. We all know the bad stuff sells, and all networks are going to show it for that reason, but good is shown and I do see it all the time.
Take care!
Rolling Stone has an article detailing how many local election boards are doing everything they can to keep college students from voting:
From New Hampshire to California, officials have designed complex questionnaires that prevent college students from registering, hired high-powered attorneys to keep them off the rolls, shut down polling places on campuses and even threatened to arrest and imprison young voters. Much as local registrars in the South once used poll taxes and literacy tests to deny the vote to black citizens, some county election officials now employ an intimidating mix of legal bullying and added paperwork to prevent civic-minded young people from casting ballots.
This also presents problems for national and state votes, since it means they would have to travel “home” in order to vote. With a system like this intended to disenfranchise a large group of voters who are usually very vocal, it flies in the face of anyone who claims that the younger generation is apathetic towards politics.
Here’s an interesting quote from Bush in 2002 [via WRH]:
“The International Criminal Court is troubling to the United States,” Bush told reporters following a tour at a Milwaukee church. “As the United States works to bring peace around the world, our diplomats and our soldiers could be drug into this court, and that’s very troubling — very troubling to me.”
With a little Google digging, I found this gem of a reason for not agreeing to the court:
“We’ll try to work out the impasse, but the one thing we’re not going to do is sign on to this International Criminal Court. President Clinton signed this treaty, but when he signed it he said it should not be submitted to the Senate. It therefore never has been, and I don’t intend to submit it either” (US Mission to the EU, July 2, 2003)
So really it’s Clinton’s fault, and Bush just wanted to make sure we don’t fix any of Clinton’s mistakes. If it’s good enough for 9/11, it’s good enough for me!
From USNews:
It was the lead item on the government’s daily threat matrix one day last April. Don Emilio Fulci described by an FBI tipster as a reclusive but evil millionaire, had formed a terrorist group that was planning chemical attacks against London and Washington, D.C. That day even FBI director Robert Mueller was briefed on the Fulci matter. But as the day went on without incident, a White House staffer had a brainstorm: He Googled Fulci. His findings: Fulci is the crime boss in the popular video game Headhunter. “Stand down,” came the order from embarrassed national security types.
Dr Claw however, still remains at large and is considered an extremely dangerous terrorist mastermind.
[via Techdirt]
A militant Islamic group with purported ties to Al Qaida had posted a video of a beheading of an American prisoner:
“After reading a statement, the men were seen pulling the man to his side and putting a large knife to his neck. A scream sounded as the men cut his head off, shouting ‘Allahu Akbar!’ ‘God is great.’ They then held the head out before the camera.”
They claim that they attempted to exchange the hostage–Nick Berg of Philadelphia–for some detainees held in Abu Ghraib:
“For the mothers and wives of American soldiers, we tell you that we offered the U.S. administration to exchange this hostage with some of the detainees in Abu Ghraib and they refused,” one of the men read from a statement.
Click Here for more Enduring Freedom Headlines“So we tell you that the dignity of the Muslim men and women in Abu Ghraib and others is not redeemed except by blood and souls. You will not receive anything from us but coffins after coffins … slaughtered in this way.”
The fact is, even though both torturing and retaliation are wrong, this is now an expected response and the military abuse has only contributed to the righteousness these militants feel when they commit these horrible murders.
Tom Tomorrow has more on the subject:
“…the Fox news anchors waste no time in exploiting this: see, the terrorists do far worse things than happened at Abu Ghraib. No one contests this, of course, but what a pathetic standard it sets: Americans–not as bad as al Qaeda!”
[emphasis added]
–
UPDATE: The video is floating around, it’s exactly what you expect it to be, a horrible act against an unsuspecting man. If you want to see it, you can watch it at Consumption Junction (warning: link is NSFW, porn banners). It’s really really really really bad, and really felt sick after seeing it, but somehow I knew that I should see it. It’s hard to explain my feelings on this, but it’s apparent that this is the people we need to be finding and locking up instead of wasting our time torturing petty looters in Abu Ghraib.
–
Related:
Questions Surround Berg Video
Nick Berg Timeline
Nick Berg’s Murderer Given 3 Passes by Bush
Jon Stewart and The Daily Show did a few segments on the Abu Ghraib prisoner torture scandal. Thanks to Lisa Rein for hosting the videos (the archive.org links went down).
Video 1: Giant Messopotamia
Video 2: Rob Courddry On The US Torture Of Iraqi Prisoners
Quicktime format.
[via Boing Boing]
Baghdad’s art scene show US abuse, one 2-month old piece depicts a naked man in a hood that looks strikingly similar to some of the photos that have circulated from Abu Ghraib:
‘We knew what went on at Abu Ghraib,’ the artist Abdul-Kareem Khalil said on Saturday. ‘The pictures did not surprise me.’
Well that explains the whole thing now: the MPs weren’t actually abusing prisoners, they were just posing them for the local artists (in order to stimulate the Baghdad art economy). Those CIA men are so considerate of the local artists needs.
–
[via American Dynamics]
Bush spoke at a press conference today and congratulated Rumsfeld, saying: “You are doing a superb job.”
I was tempted to post one of the pictures of the MPs giving the thumbs up and congratulating Rumsfeld as well, but as cynical as I am, I can’t bring myself to use those pictures in mockery of this administration. It’s base and even I can’t stand those kinds of jokes.
The fact is, Rumsfeld and his generals tried to cover this mess up three times and it took photographic proof to surface for them to even acknowledge that oh… maybe there was a huge fucking torture problem in Iraq.
I’m not going to rush to make political hay out of this (like a certain senator whose name starts with “J” and ends with “ohn Kerry”), but it wouldn’t be overly eager of a court to subpoena memos from Rumsfeld’s office on the subject of Iraq prisoners and determine whether he should answer questions about what he knew and why it was allowed to continue. At the very least he is likely to be culpable of conspiracy to defy Geneva conventions (or whatever the official charge may be).
Speaking of Geneva conventions, why hasn’t anyone brought them up? I hear a lot of invectives being thrown around at these MPs who were complicit in following CIA and Military Intelligence orders, but I don’t hear anything about war crimes… if the shoe fits, we better not play the hypocrite in front of the world.
But then again, maybe that’s what Bush means when he says “superb job”. Rumsfeld has done a superb job of making sure that no one realizes just how war tribunal illegal this whole fiasco is.
I ran across an interesting little site called AngryFinger.org while browsing the Politics section of Open TotalFark.
Jimmy Mac dissected a quote that Rumseld made recently:
“people are running around with digital cameras and taking these unbelievable photographs and then passing them off, against the law, to the media, to our surprise, when they had not even arrived in the Pentagon.”
His response nail exactly why I have indignation at this administration even though they have apologized:
“If you were in the hotseat that Rumsfeld’s in and the thing you were talking about had such devastating worldwide implications for the US, wouldn’t you be saying along the lines of, ‘I’m just thankful that these photos made it out of Iraq and were brought to my attention, I’m sorry that it took me until the media got a hold of the story to actually do anything about it, but thankfully, now I’ll have the opportunity to punish this completely unacceptable behavior.’”
“Not Rummy, he just wants to blame the soldiers and the digital camera’s for stirring up all this shit, instead of doing what he should have done in the first place, had he actually not tried to cover it up, being grateful that the pictures came out and exposing such unacceptable behavior.”
Bravo!
Maybe it was intentional, maybe it wasn’t, but it seems that The German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung ran an editorial photo of one of the torture photos in a manner which made it look like an iPod advertisement.
I’ve included the actual photo (top) and simply added the missing elements to illustrate how close this image is to pop-culture insanity.
If this email to Pentagon staff regarding the Taguba report doesn’t epitomize the bureaucratic meltdown going on in the government, then nothing does:
“If you have accessed this document on the Internet, CALL POLICY IT SECURITY IMMEDIATELY!”
…
“THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS REPORT IS CLASSIFIED; DO NOT GO TO FOX NEWS TO READ OR OBTAIN A COPY.”
American Dynamics thinks that this is just a test run of articles before the announcement of the Onion-Time Magazine merger.
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