Friday, February 11, 2011
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Slash and Post Operative Axl at the Super Bowl
Great to see Slash and post operative Asl at the greatest entertainment event in history of mankind, the Super Bowl.
It gladdened my heart to see the 2 play "Sweet Child of Mine," like back in the Citrus Bowl Use Your Illusion day, putting aside their differences and anger and regrets and sexual tension between them, realizing no matter how far apart they go musically or in time and space or gender roles, life for a time inextricably linked their disparate geniuses.
Having just read a list of "10 bands that shook the world," the performance cemented my faith in G 'N' R' as 1 of top 10 rock bands of all time even though realizing lists are like souls; every human has 1, and the premise of this list basically absurd as music shook the world before the invention of the electric amplifier.
Surely some people saw Beethoven as the musical bad boy of his time. God himself invented the blues and planted it in the racism and soil of the Mississippi Delta, maybe helped by the Devil at the crossroads like in the book of Job and Robert Johnson lore, with Satan striding through cotton fields instead of down heavenly roads.
Also, don't confine my choice of the word gender above to male/female stereotypes because, as Vonnegut wrote in Slaughter House 5, it takes 7 of 12 human genders for 2 human beings to mate in any way
So let us celebrate Axl's surgery choice and Slash's ridiculous caricature of himself with that tacky toff top hat, for their performance did "take me away to that special place," and made me long for the late 80's.
As for the rest of the performers, maybe my nieces will identify them for me.
Also, the surgery helped Axl's voice, making it sound more masculine.
Peace!
The things I do for my blog, watching the halftime circus again so my to friends who failed to see it could get my jokes above, (Slash starts at about 2:31 into clip)
Please, will somebody identify Will I Am allegedly head pea of the Black Eyed variety? Where did Sam I AM go? "Boom, Boom, Pow," yes, that will rank among greatest ballads of all time.
It gladdened my heart to see the 2 play "Sweet Child of Mine," like back in the Citrus Bowl Use Your Illusion day, putting aside their differences and anger and regrets and sexual tension between them, realizing no matter how far apart they go musically or in time and space or gender roles, life for a time inextricably linked their disparate geniuses.
Having just read a list of "10 bands that shook the world," the performance cemented my faith in G 'N' R' as 1 of top 10 rock bands of all time even though realizing lists are like souls; every human has 1, and the premise of this list basically absurd as music shook the world before the invention of the electric amplifier.
Surely some people saw Beethoven as the musical bad boy of his time. God himself invented the blues and planted it in the racism and soil of the Mississippi Delta, maybe helped by the Devil at the crossroads like in the book of Job and Robert Johnson lore, with Satan striding through cotton fields instead of down heavenly roads.
Also, don't confine my choice of the word gender above to male/female stereotypes because, as Vonnegut wrote in Slaughter House 5, it takes 7 of 12 human genders for 2 human beings to mate in any way
So let us celebrate Axl's surgery choice and Slash's ridiculous caricature of himself with that tacky toff top hat, for their performance did "take me away to that special place," and made me long for the late 80's.
As for the rest of the performers, maybe my nieces will identify them for me.
Also, the surgery helped Axl's voice, making it sound more masculine.
Peace!
The things I do for my blog, watching the halftime circus again so my to friends who failed to see it could get my jokes above, (Slash starts at about 2:31 into clip)
Please, will somebody identify Will I Am allegedly head pea of the Black Eyed variety? Where did Sam I AM go? "Boom, Boom, Pow," yes, that will rank among greatest ballads of all time.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Isaiah 58: "loose the chains of injustice"
My college career resumed in the early 1980's at THE University of Central Florida. Resuming my politcal science studies led to the American politics class of Mark Stern
His comments in some lectures taught me tons about Judaism and the Old Testament, mainly the Jewish tradition came first in espousing the worth of the individual, even the poor, widows and orphans.
By forgiving debts every seven years, allowing widows to glean in the fields, promoting kindness to foreigners in Jewish lands, and other examples, the Jewish nation showed a sense of social justice for the first historical time on earth.
So thus did a lad raised in a Lutheran household by christian parents going to church in his matching shorts, coat, clip-on tie, and hat learn later the Bible part 1 had more than the angry old white dude with a beard in the sky and Psalms.
So Sunday past when my friend read the Old Testament lesson from Isaiah 58, memories came back on how my life led make back to church, to the Gospels and minor prophets like Amos.
So for family, friends, naysayers and nabobs who think me too liberal, you may have rightly judged. Nevetheless, the bible supports social justice with words like these:
[5 Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the LORD?
6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;]
Socialism, because the Bible told me so.
God bless you, Mark Stern.
His comments in some lectures taught me tons about Judaism and the Old Testament, mainly the Jewish tradition came first in espousing the worth of the individual, even the poor, widows and orphans.
By forgiving debts every seven years, allowing widows to glean in the fields, promoting kindness to foreigners in Jewish lands, and other examples, the Jewish nation showed a sense of social justice for the first historical time on earth.
So thus did a lad raised in a Lutheran household by christian parents going to church in his matching shorts, coat, clip-on tie, and hat learn later the Bible part 1 had more than the angry old white dude with a beard in the sky and Psalms.
So Sunday past when my friend read the Old Testament lesson from Isaiah 58, memories came back on how my life led make back to church, to the Gospels and minor prophets like Amos.
So for family, friends, naysayers and nabobs who think me too liberal, you may have rightly judged. Nevetheless, the bible supports social justice with words like these:
[5 Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the LORD?
6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;]
Socialism, because the Bible told me so.
God bless you, Mark Stern.
Reagan: Killer, Coward, Con-man
Could not write it better myself.
[You're not going to like this. You shouldn't speak ill of the dead. But in this case, someone's got to.
On the 100th Anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth, as we suffer a week of Reagan-kitcheria and pukey paeans, let us remember:
Reagan was a con-man. Reagan was a coward. Reagan was a killer.
In 1987, I found myself stuck in a crappy little town in Nicaragua named Chaguitillo. The people were kind enough, though hungry, except for one surly young man. His wife had just died of tuberculosis.
People don't die of TB if they get some antibiotics. But Ronald Reagan, big-hearted guy that he was, had put a lock-down embargo on medicine to Nicaragua because he didn't like the government that the people there had elected.
Ronnie grinned and cracked jokes while the young woman's lungs filled up and she stopped breathing. Reagan flashed that B-movie grin while they buried the mother of three.
And when Hezbollah terrorists struck and murdered hundreds of American marines in their sleep in Lebanon, the TV warrior ran away like a whipped dog — then turned around and invaded Grenada. That little Club Med war was a murderous PR stunt so Ronnie could hold parades for gunning down Cubans building an airport.
I remember Nancy, a skull and crossbones prancing around in designer dresses, some of the "gifts" that flowed to the Reagans — from hats to million-dollar homes — from cronies well compensated with government loot. It used to be called bribery.
And all the while, Grandpa grinned, the grandfather who bleated on about "family values" but didn't bother to see his own grandchildren.
The New York Times, in its canned obit, wrote that Reagan projected, "faith in small town America" and "old-time values."
"Values" my ass. It was union-busting and a declaration of war on the poor and anyone who couldn't buy designer dresses. It was the New Meanness, bringing starvation back to America so that every millionaire could get another million.
"Small town" values? From the movie star of the Pacific Palisades, the Malibu mogul? I want to throw up.
And all the while, in the White House basement, as his brain boiled away, Reagan's last conscious act was to condone a coup d'état against our elected Congress. Reagan's Defense Secretary Casper the Ghost Weinberger with the crazed Colonel, Ollie North, plotted to give guns to the Monster of the Mideast, Ayatolla Khomeini.
Reagan's boys called Jimmy Carter a weanie and a wuss although Carter wouldn't give an inch to the Ayatollah. Reagan, with that film-fantasy tough-guy con in front of cameras, went begging like a coward cockroach to Khomeini, pleading on bended knee for the release of our hostages.
Ollie North flew into Iran with a birthday cake for the maniac mullah — no kidding — in the shape of a key. The key to Ronnie's heart.
Then the Reagan roaches mixed their cowardice with crime: taking cash from the hostage-takers to buy guns for the "contras" — the drug-runners of Nicaragua posing as freedom fighters.
I remember as a student in Berkeley the words screeching out of the bullhorn, "The Governor of the State of California, Ronald Reagan, hereby orders this demonstration to disperse" — and then came the teargas and the truncheons. And all the while, that fang-hiding grin from the Gipper.
In Chaguitillo, all night long, the farmers stayed awake to guard their kids from attack from Reagan's Contra terrorists. The farmers weren't even Sandinistas, those 'Commies' that our cracked-brained President told us were 'only a 48-hour drive from Texas.' What the hell would they want with Texas, anyway?
Nevertheless, the farmers, and their families, were Ronnie's targets.
In the deserted darkness of Chaguitillo, a TV blared. Weirdly, it was that third-rate gangster movie, "Brother Rat." Starring Ronald Reagan.
Well, mis amigos, your kids can sleep easy tonight. The Rat is dead.
All week you're going to hear about how Reagan restored America's sense of patriotism - as if heartless slaughter, Club Med wars and making racism respectable are patriotic . (When they said "small town values" you know the color of the town, don't you?).
I wonder if the Reaganauts can recognize any of the weapons they sold the mullahs when they see students gunned down in Teheran.
I do plan a memorial, for the victims, not the victimizer.
Please join me in commemorating the ill star that brought us a celluloid cowboy on his movie-set horsey by lighting a candle for a mom from Chaguitillo.
******
This obituary was originally published in The London Observer on Reagan's death in 2004.
The author received close to 150 death threats and suggestions for acrobatic acts of intercourse with beasts and relatives.
Therefore, we have reserved a special email, deaththreat@gregpalast.com just for your next threats.
Sign up for Greg Palast's investigative reports at www.GregPalast.com.]
http://www.gregpalast.com/reagan-killer-coward-con-man/
emphasis addded
[You're not going to like this. You shouldn't speak ill of the dead. But in this case, someone's got to.
On the 100th Anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth, as we suffer a week of Reagan-kitcheria and pukey paeans, let us remember:
Reagan was a con-man. Reagan was a coward. Reagan was a killer.
In 1987, I found myself stuck in a crappy little town in Nicaragua named Chaguitillo. The people were kind enough, though hungry, except for one surly young man. His wife had just died of tuberculosis.
People don't die of TB if they get some antibiotics. But Ronald Reagan, big-hearted guy that he was, had put a lock-down embargo on medicine to Nicaragua because he didn't like the government that the people there had elected.
Ronnie grinned and cracked jokes while the young woman's lungs filled up and she stopped breathing. Reagan flashed that B-movie grin while they buried the mother of three.
And when Hezbollah terrorists struck and murdered hundreds of American marines in their sleep in Lebanon, the TV warrior ran away like a whipped dog — then turned around and invaded Grenada. That little Club Med war was a murderous PR stunt so Ronnie could hold parades for gunning down Cubans building an airport.
I remember Nancy, a skull and crossbones prancing around in designer dresses, some of the "gifts" that flowed to the Reagans — from hats to million-dollar homes — from cronies well compensated with government loot. It used to be called bribery.
And all the while, Grandpa grinned, the grandfather who bleated on about "family values" but didn't bother to see his own grandchildren.
The New York Times, in its canned obit, wrote that Reagan projected, "faith in small town America" and "old-time values."
"Values" my ass. It was union-busting and a declaration of war on the poor and anyone who couldn't buy designer dresses. It was the New Meanness, bringing starvation back to America so that every millionaire could get another million.
"Small town" values? From the movie star of the Pacific Palisades, the Malibu mogul? I want to throw up.
And all the while, in the White House basement, as his brain boiled away, Reagan's last conscious act was to condone a coup d'état against our elected Congress. Reagan's Defense Secretary Casper the Ghost Weinberger with the crazed Colonel, Ollie North, plotted to give guns to the Monster of the Mideast, Ayatolla Khomeini.
Reagan's boys called Jimmy Carter a weanie and a wuss although Carter wouldn't give an inch to the Ayatollah. Reagan, with that film-fantasy tough-guy con in front of cameras, went begging like a coward cockroach to Khomeini, pleading on bended knee for the release of our hostages.
Ollie North flew into Iran with a birthday cake for the maniac mullah — no kidding — in the shape of a key. The key to Ronnie's heart.
Then the Reagan roaches mixed their cowardice with crime: taking cash from the hostage-takers to buy guns for the "contras" — the drug-runners of Nicaragua posing as freedom fighters.
I remember as a student in Berkeley the words screeching out of the bullhorn, "The Governor of the State of California, Ronald Reagan, hereby orders this demonstration to disperse" — and then came the teargas and the truncheons. And all the while, that fang-hiding grin from the Gipper.
In Chaguitillo, all night long, the farmers stayed awake to guard their kids from attack from Reagan's Contra terrorists. The farmers weren't even Sandinistas, those 'Commies' that our cracked-brained President told us were 'only a 48-hour drive from Texas.' What the hell would they want with Texas, anyway?
Nevertheless, the farmers, and their families, were Ronnie's targets.
In the deserted darkness of Chaguitillo, a TV blared. Weirdly, it was that third-rate gangster movie, "Brother Rat." Starring Ronald Reagan.
Well, mis amigos, your kids can sleep easy tonight. The Rat is dead.
All week you're going to hear about how Reagan restored America's sense of patriotism - as if heartless slaughter, Club Med wars and making racism respectable are patriotic . (When they said "small town values" you know the color of the town, don't you?).
I wonder if the Reaganauts can recognize any of the weapons they sold the mullahs when they see students gunned down in Teheran.
I do plan a memorial, for the victims, not the victimizer.
Please join me in commemorating the ill star that brought us a celluloid cowboy on his movie-set horsey by lighting a candle for a mom from Chaguitillo.
******
This obituary was originally published in The London Observer on Reagan's death in 2004.
The author received close to 150 death threats and suggestions for acrobatic acts of intercourse with beasts and relatives.
Therefore, we have reserved a special email, deaththreat@gregpalast.com just for your next threats.
Sign up for Greg Palast's investigative reports at www.GregPalast.com.]
http://www.gregpalast.com/reagan-killer-coward-con-man/
emphasis addded
Monday, February 7, 2011
Packers Win!!! Let the Lockout Begin!
To even type that when NFL has gotten more profitable than ever, during Super Bowl week, with the owners causing it by tearing up the CBA amounts to absolute insanity.
Lest any stray reader think this just a sports matter, consider it as perfect example of union busting, perfect because this leads to early deaths of union members in a "game" they collectively bargained to play professionally.
Yes, blessed by birth in Milwaukee circa 1958, I revel in victory of the Green Bay Packers in the greatest marketing event in the world, a small market team owned by community members.
Insert inchoate howl of rage here.
Links to follow when my fury subsides, but leave aside professional football players and consider the roll call of college kids murdered by competetiveness, macho egos institutionalized in so called institutions of higher learning: Eric Plancher at THE University of Central Florida, casualties at FSU and UF in pre seson workouts, 13 University of Iowa fgootball players ending up in the emergency room this year facing possible organ failure after sadistic workouts designed to make boys into men and "win the fourth quarter.".
So the impending lockout by billionaire owners of NFL teams of their employees provides a perfect pitch for we fans to tell the morally deficient we do not want our heroes sacrificed for our bread and circuses.
Roger Goodell, hold an open vote for the owners on the 18 game season. Let those who favor it wash the metaphorical blood off their hands in public, damn youse!!!
Check the links in dailyKos piece: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2011/2/6/940677/-NFL-lockout:-No-more-football-in-2011.
Let me quote from a quoted passage: [According to Kurt Badenhausen of Forbes SportsMoney, "The NFL has never been more profitable by our count with the average team earning $33 million in 2009 in operating profit (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) thanks to huge incomes for teams like the Cowboys, Patriots and Redskins."] http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2011/2/6/940677/-NFL-lockout:-No-more-football-in-2011
Note depreciation above because that involves depreciating monies paid as salary on players' contracts just like capital depreciation of a factory built by a company.
Owners get their cake, eat it too, get public $ for venues, and still want bigger damn slices of the cake.
Scumbags.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Webster#Post-football_life
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronic_traumatic_encephalopathy
Lest any stray reader think this just a sports matter, consider it as perfect example of union busting, perfect because this leads to early deaths of union members in a "game" they collectively bargained to play professionally.
Yes, blessed by birth in Milwaukee circa 1958, I revel in victory of the Green Bay Packers in the greatest marketing event in the world, a small market team owned by community members.
Insert inchoate howl of rage here.
Links to follow when my fury subsides, but leave aside professional football players and consider the roll call of college kids murdered by competetiveness, macho egos institutionalized in so called institutions of higher learning: Eric Plancher at THE University of Central Florida, casualties at FSU and UF in pre seson workouts, 13 University of Iowa fgootball players ending up in the emergency room this year facing possible organ failure after sadistic workouts designed to make boys into men and "win the fourth quarter.".
So the impending lockout by billionaire owners of NFL teams of their employees provides a perfect pitch for we fans to tell the morally deficient we do not want our heroes sacrificed for our bread and circuses.
Roger Goodell, hold an open vote for the owners on the 18 game season. Let those who favor it wash the metaphorical blood off their hands in public, damn youse!!!
Check the links in dailyKos piece: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2011/2/6/940677/-NFL-lockout:-No-more-football-in-2011.
Let me quote from a quoted passage: [According to Kurt Badenhausen of Forbes SportsMoney, "The NFL has never been more profitable by our count with the average team earning $33 million in 2009 in operating profit (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) thanks to huge incomes for teams like the Cowboys, Patriots and Redskins."] http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2011/2/6/940677/-NFL-lockout:-No-more-football-in-2011
Note depreciation above because that involves depreciating monies paid as salary on players' contracts just like capital depreciation of a factory built by a company.
Owners get their cake, eat it too, get public $ for venues, and still want bigger damn slices of the cake.
Scumbags.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Webster#Post-football_life
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronic_traumatic_encephalopathy
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Just Went to Virtual Versailles
And I like it. Google has done something actually worthwhile. From Reina Sofia Madrid to Versailles to the Smithsonian, the most precious art of the world lives on the intertubes.
My collection so far: http://goo.gl/8WEVs
My collection so far: http://goo.gl/8WEVs
This just in, Generalissimo Francisco Franco and Ronald Reagan are Still Dead
This just in, Generalissimo Francisco Franco and Ronald Reagan are Still Dead
100th birthday of Ronald Ragunz my ass.
He's dead, people! Dead and moldering in his grave, and the myth should rest, interred with him.
He raised taxes eleven times.
His wife consulted astrologers to set his schedule, and somewhere in the Old Testament God commands death for witches.
Oh, just listen to Gil Scott Heron as his words work best for me.
100th birthday of Ronald Ragunz my ass.
He's dead, people! Dead and moldering in his grave, and the myth should rest, interred with him.
He raised taxes eleven times.
His wife consulted astrologers to set his schedule, and somewhere in the Old Testament God commands death for witches.
Oh, just listen to Gil Scott Heron as his words work best for me.
Green Bay, WI, Owns the Green Bay Packers
...They are one of over 112,000 people to own stock in the most unusual franchise in the world's richest sports league.
The share, by any normal yardstick, is the lousiest investment imaginable. It does qualify you to buy an "I Own a Piece of the Pack" T-shirt, but by statute, no dividend can ever be paid on them. They are not traded on any public market, and cannot be sold except back to the Packers for a fraction of the original price. If the team were ever wound up (admittedly a prospect as unlikely as a snow storm in Tahiti), the proceeds would go to charity. And last but not least, being a shareholder gets you nowhere near a season ticket.
But sound financial judgement has never been the distinguishing hallmark of a sports fan. To the delirium of a small (and presently glacial) city in northern Wisconsin, the joy of Wisconsin exiles like the Wests and the quiet satisfaction of gridiron neutrals everywhere, the Packers are off to the Super Bowl...
But the most remarkable thing of all about the Green Bay Packers is that they are the property not of some billionaire owner, but of the fans themselves – more than 112,000 at the last count, and including my travel agent and her husband.
Such an arrangement is far from uncommon in Europe: think Real Madrid or Barcelona with their socios, the clubs of Germany's Bundesliga or a handful of lower division Football League clubs like Brentford (not to mention FC United of Manchester.)
But in all major league US sport, the Packers are unique – and community ownership has bred an extraordinary bond between fans and team. "There's an emotional attachment," says Mac West, "a sense of incredible pride that we play on the same field as Chicago, New York or Dallas."
Naturally, the Wests don't have season tickets. Few do. Every Packers home game since 1960 has been sold out, and the waiting list now exceeds the 73,000 capacity at Lambeau Field. So rarely do season tickets become available that applicants from the 1960s are only now starting to get them. Tickets are passed down the generations like family heirlooms; frequently they have been the thorniest issue in Wisconsin divorce suits...
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/others/american-football-a-smallcity-clubs-unique-affair-with-its-fans-2203619.html
The share, by any normal yardstick, is the lousiest investment imaginable. It does qualify you to buy an "I Own a Piece of the Pack" T-shirt, but by statute, no dividend can ever be paid on them. They are not traded on any public market, and cannot be sold except back to the Packers for a fraction of the original price. If the team were ever wound up (admittedly a prospect as unlikely as a snow storm in Tahiti), the proceeds would go to charity. And last but not least, being a shareholder gets you nowhere near a season ticket.
But sound financial judgement has never been the distinguishing hallmark of a sports fan. To the delirium of a small (and presently glacial) city in northern Wisconsin, the joy of Wisconsin exiles like the Wests and the quiet satisfaction of gridiron neutrals everywhere, the Packers are off to the Super Bowl...
But the most remarkable thing of all about the Green Bay Packers is that they are the property not of some billionaire owner, but of the fans themselves – more than 112,000 at the last count, and including my travel agent and her husband.
Such an arrangement is far from uncommon in Europe: think Real Madrid or Barcelona with their socios, the clubs of Germany's Bundesliga or a handful of lower division Football League clubs like Brentford (not to mention FC United of Manchester.)
But in all major league US sport, the Packers are unique – and community ownership has bred an extraordinary bond between fans and team. "There's an emotional attachment," says Mac West, "a sense of incredible pride that we play on the same field as Chicago, New York or Dallas."
Naturally, the Wests don't have season tickets. Few do. Every Packers home game since 1960 has been sold out, and the waiting list now exceeds the 73,000 capacity at Lambeau Field. So rarely do season tickets become available that applicants from the 1960s are only now starting to get them. Tickets are passed down the generations like family heirlooms; frequently they have been the thorniest issue in Wisconsin divorce suits...
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/others/american-football-a-smallcity-clubs-unique-affair-with-its-fans-2203619.html
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Fox "News" Uses King James Bible to Blame Barry 'Bama
["Those who wait on the Lord will soar on wings like eagles, and they will run and not be weary, and they will walk and not faint," the president said during a speech to several thousand people at the breakfast.
But the actual passage, from Isaiah 40:31, states: "But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."
Somewhat ironically, while Fox Nation appears to be positioning themselves as the arbiters of authentic Christianity, they seem unfamiliar with the fact that there is more than one version of the Bible.
Obama was quoting from the New International Version, while Fox Nation was pointing to the King James Version to "debunk" him.
This would be funny if it weren't so pathetic.]
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201102040006
But the actual passage, from Isaiah 40:31, states: "But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."
Somewhat ironically, while Fox Nation appears to be positioning themselves as the arbiters of authentic Christianity, they seem unfamiliar with the fact that there is more than one version of the Bible.
Obama was quoting from the New International Version, while Fox Nation was pointing to the King James Version to "debunk" him.
This would be funny if it weren't so pathetic.]
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201102040006
Causes of the French Revolution Resemble Current US Economy
Costly involvement in foreign wars for decades. Check.
More regressive tax structure over decades of Republican rule, cutting top tier income tax rate, raising Social Security withholding rates while keeping a $100,000 limit on the amount taxed. Check.
Almost complete disregard by elites of the commonweal of the United States. Check.
Oh, we deserve the obscene compensation and stratospheric bonuses prattle those with the most income failing to ask themselves the basic question whether they could make so much money absent the government regulations and legal framework which prevents the hoi polloifrom storming their Madison Avenue pentouses.
[Louis XVI ascended to the throne amidst a financial crisis; the nation was nearing bankruptcy and outlays outpaced income.[6] This was because of France’s financial obligations stemming from involvement in the Seven Years War and its participation in the American Revolutionary War.[7] In May 1776, finance minister Turgot was dismissed, after he failed to enact much needed reforms. The next year, Jacques Necker, a foreigner, was appointed Comptroller-General of Finance. He could not be made an official minister because he was a Protestant.[8] Necker realized that the country's tax system, which was perceived as quite regressive, subjected the lower classes to a heavy burden;[8] while numerous exemptions existed for the nobility and clergy.[9] He argued that the country could not be taxed higher, that tax exemptions for the nobility and clergy must be reduced, and proposed that borrowing more money would solve the country's fiscal shortages.]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_revolution#Financial_crisis
More regressive tax structure over decades of Republican rule, cutting top tier income tax rate, raising Social Security withholding rates while keeping a $100,000 limit on the amount taxed. Check.
Almost complete disregard by elites of the commonweal of the United States. Check.
Oh, we deserve the obscene compensation and stratospheric bonuses prattle those with the most income failing to ask themselves the basic question whether they could make so much money absent the government regulations and legal framework which prevents the hoi polloifrom storming their Madison Avenue pentouses.
[Louis XVI ascended to the throne amidst a financial crisis; the nation was nearing bankruptcy and outlays outpaced income.[6] This was because of France’s financial obligations stemming from involvement in the Seven Years War and its participation in the American Revolutionary War.[7] In May 1776, finance minister Turgot was dismissed, after he failed to enact much needed reforms. The next year, Jacques Necker, a foreigner, was appointed Comptroller-General of Finance. He could not be made an official minister because he was a Protestant.[8] Necker realized that the country's tax system, which was perceived as quite regressive, subjected the lower classes to a heavy burden;[8] while numerous exemptions existed for the nobility and clergy.[9] He argued that the country could not be taxed higher, that tax exemptions for the nobility and clergy must be reduced, and proposed that borrowing more money would solve the country's fiscal shortages.]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_revolution#Financial_crisis
World Food Prices Highest in 21 Years
Have the corporate masters of Earth forgotten the lessons of the French Revolution: Egalitie, Fraternity, and bread for the masses?
[World food prices have hit their highest level on record in January, the United Nations has said.
It said on Thursday that its Food and Agriculture Organisation Food Price Index rose for the seventh month in a row to reach 231, topping the peak of 224.1 last seen in June 2008.
It is the highest level the index has reached since records began in 1990.
"The new figures clearly show that the upward pressure on world food prices is not abating. These high prices are likely to persist in the months to come," said Abdolreza Abbassian, an economist for FAO, which is based in Rome.
Rising food prices have been cited among the driving forces behind the recent popular revolts in north Africa, including the uprising in Egypt and the toppling of Tunisia's long-time president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.] http://english.aljazeera.net/news/2011/02/20112442413591195.html
[World food prices have hit their highest level on record in January, the United Nations has said.
It said on Thursday that its Food and Agriculture Organisation Food Price Index rose for the seventh month in a row to reach 231, topping the peak of 224.1 last seen in June 2008.
It is the highest level the index has reached since records began in 1990.
"The new figures clearly show that the upward pressure on world food prices is not abating. These high prices are likely to persist in the months to come," said Abdolreza Abbassian, an economist for FAO, which is based in Rome.
Rising food prices have been cited among the driving forces behind the recent popular revolts in north Africa, including the uprising in Egypt and the toppling of Tunisia's long-time president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.] http://english.aljazeera.net/news/2011/02/20112442413591195.html
Thursday, February 3, 2011
NRA: Murder Incorporated
Why does it take Al Freakin' Jazeera to tell the truth in the good old US of A?
Absent the insane lobbying and marketing of firearms by the National Rifle Association, my country would not have the flood of firearms fomenting violence and murder, the idiots and insane armed and ready to jump up and end the life of fellow humans as Matthew Manolas.
[There is simply no understanding the prevalence of gun violence in America - as evidenced by the recent attempted assassination of a congresswoman during a mass shooting - without discussing the nefarious role played by the National Rifle Association (NRA).
Once an organisation primarily concerned with the education and training of sportsmen, in a coup that came to be known as the Cincinnati Revolt in 1977, hardliners took over the leadership and believed that any gun regulation would take us down a slippery slope to Khmer Rougism.
In the years since, unlike the US in the wake of the 1968 assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy - or for that matter Australia after the Port Arthur Massacre - the response to senseless gun violence has been to discuss everything from the rhetoric on our airwaves to the weather outside.
But any public conversations regarding restricting who has access to guns has been considered verboten (although, thankfully, this time some cracks are beginning to show).
This is largely because the NRA's duping its own members, which we'll discuss below, and coming to the realisation that the real money was in actually protecting the rights of gun manufacturers, which we'll discuss in Part II of this series.
If the NRA leadership is not radical, they certainly see the benefit in playing radicals on TV in order to enrich their financial benefactors who produce and sell the weaponry of death.
In the 1990s, in a climate of fear and paranoia that produced the Oklahoma City bombing, they were all too happy to refer to the government authority that tries to enforce gun laws, the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco & Firearms (ATF), as "jack-booted thugs". This led former president George H.W. Bush to resign his membership.
They then decided to up the ante by accusing former president Bill Clinton of murder and saying he "had blood on his hands" - all for the crime of supporting background checks at gun shows - which is among the many legislative proposals to reduce gun violence that they have repeatedly blocked.
Others include a ban on high-capacity magazines, banning sales to those on terrorist watch lists, and fully funding the aforementioned ATF (think about the latter when they say they want to "strengthen existing gun laws" after each new tragedy)...
This may be why in a piece last year for the Washington Post, columnist Dana Milbank, in referring to the NRA, titled a piece on this subject, "Terrorists who want to buy guns have friends on Capitol Hill".
Meanwhile, in the aftermath of the most recent tragedy in Arizona, a who's who of conservatives has come out in favour of at least reopening a discussion of passing some of the above measures (as well as others not mentioned here), from former vice president Dick Cheney to senior GOP senator Richard Lugar, former republican National Committee Communications Director Cliff May to ultra-conservative Oklahoma senator Tom Coburn...
Most of these gun restrictions also happen to be supported by the vast majority of those unknown anti-gun crusaders: gun owners and NRA members.
In a poll conducted by republican wordsmith Frank Luntz just over a year ago, 69% of NRA members supported closing the gun-show loophole that allows people to buy guns without the hassle of a background check, while an overwhelming 82% backed closing the terrorist gap.
In other more recent polls, a whopping 9% of Americans supported the right to carry a concealed weapon without a permit - which thankfully only exists in Arizona and two other states - and 93% of gun owners "supported requiring federal agencies to share information about suspected dangerous persons or terrorists to prevent them from buying guns."] emphasis added
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/01/20111241084358958.html
Do we have democracy in the US of A? Hell no, we have a "representative" republic.
"Democracy don't rule the world.
You better get that through your head.
This world is ruled by violence.
But I guess that's better off left unsaid."
Absent the insane lobbying and marketing of firearms by the National Rifle Association, my country would not have the flood of firearms fomenting violence and murder, the idiots and insane armed and ready to jump up and end the life of fellow humans as Matthew Manolas.
[There is simply no understanding the prevalence of gun violence in America - as evidenced by the recent attempted assassination of a congresswoman during a mass shooting - without discussing the nefarious role played by the National Rifle Association (NRA).
Once an organisation primarily concerned with the education and training of sportsmen, in a coup that came to be known as the Cincinnati Revolt in 1977, hardliners took over the leadership and believed that any gun regulation would take us down a slippery slope to Khmer Rougism.
In the years since, unlike the US in the wake of the 1968 assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy - or for that matter Australia after the Port Arthur Massacre - the response to senseless gun violence has been to discuss everything from the rhetoric on our airwaves to the weather outside.
But any public conversations regarding restricting who has access to guns has been considered verboten (although, thankfully, this time some cracks are beginning to show).
This is largely because the NRA's duping its own members, which we'll discuss below, and coming to the realisation that the real money was in actually protecting the rights of gun manufacturers, which we'll discuss in Part II of this series.
If the NRA leadership is not radical, they certainly see the benefit in playing radicals on TV in order to enrich their financial benefactors who produce and sell the weaponry of death.
In the 1990s, in a climate of fear and paranoia that produced the Oklahoma City bombing, they were all too happy to refer to the government authority that tries to enforce gun laws, the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco & Firearms (ATF), as "jack-booted thugs". This led former president George H.W. Bush to resign his membership.
They then decided to up the ante by accusing former president Bill Clinton of murder and saying he "had blood on his hands" - all for the crime of supporting background checks at gun shows - which is among the many legislative proposals to reduce gun violence that they have repeatedly blocked.
Others include a ban on high-capacity magazines, banning sales to those on terrorist watch lists, and fully funding the aforementioned ATF (think about the latter when they say they want to "strengthen existing gun laws" after each new tragedy)...
This may be why in a piece last year for the Washington Post, columnist Dana Milbank, in referring to the NRA, titled a piece on this subject, "Terrorists who want to buy guns have friends on Capitol Hill".
Meanwhile, in the aftermath of the most recent tragedy in Arizona, a who's who of conservatives has come out in favour of at least reopening a discussion of passing some of the above measures (as well as others not mentioned here), from former vice president Dick Cheney to senior GOP senator Richard Lugar, former republican National Committee Communications Director Cliff May to ultra-conservative Oklahoma senator Tom Coburn...
Most of these gun restrictions also happen to be supported by the vast majority of those unknown anti-gun crusaders: gun owners and NRA members.
In a poll conducted by republican wordsmith Frank Luntz just over a year ago, 69% of NRA members supported closing the gun-show loophole that allows people to buy guns without the hassle of a background check, while an overwhelming 82% backed closing the terrorist gap.
In other more recent polls, a whopping 9% of Americans supported the right to carry a concealed weapon without a permit - which thankfully only exists in Arizona and two other states - and 93% of gun owners "supported requiring federal agencies to share information about suspected dangerous persons or terrorists to prevent them from buying guns."] emphasis added
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/01/20111241084358958.html
Do we have democracy in the US of A? Hell no, we have a "representative" republic.
"Democracy don't rule the world.
You better get that through your head.
This world is ruled by violence.
But I guess that's better off left unsaid."
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
The Coming Food Riots
[Food riots, geopolitical tensions, global inflation and increasing hunger among the planet's poorest people are the likely effects of a new surge in world food prices, which have hit an all-time high according to the United Nations.
The UN's index of food prices – an international basket comprising wheat, corn, dairy produce, meat and sugar – stands at its highest since the index started in 1990, surpassing even the peaks seen during the 2008 food crisis, which prompted civil disturbances from Mexico to Indonesia.
"We are entering danger territory," said the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's chief economist, Abdolreza Abbassian.
...Speculation, too, may be part of the crisis, as investors climb on to the rising food-price bandwagon.
...The interplay of rising fuel prices, the growing use of biofuels, bad weather and soaring futures markets drove up the price of food dramatically in 2008, prompting violent protests in Mexico, Indonesia, Egypt, Cameroon and Haiti. Last year's spike was provoked mainly by the freakish weather conditions in Russia and Ukraine, but one of the underlying trends is the growing and changing appetites of east Asia.] emphasis added
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/the-coming-hunger-record-food-prices-put-world-in-danger-says-un-2177220.html
The UN's index of food prices – an international basket comprising wheat, corn, dairy produce, meat and sugar – stands at its highest since the index started in 1990, surpassing even the peaks seen during the 2008 food crisis, which prompted civil disturbances from Mexico to Indonesia.
"We are entering danger territory," said the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's chief economist, Abdolreza Abbassian.
...Speculation, too, may be part of the crisis, as investors climb on to the rising food-price bandwagon.
...The interplay of rising fuel prices, the growing use of biofuels, bad weather and soaring futures markets drove up the price of food dramatically in 2008, prompting violent protests in Mexico, Indonesia, Egypt, Cameroon and Haiti. Last year's spike was provoked mainly by the freakish weather conditions in Russia and Ukraine, but one of the underlying trends is the growing and changing appetites of east Asia.] emphasis added
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/the-coming-hunger-record-food-prices-put-world-in-danger-says-un-2177220.html
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