Category — Uncategorized

Is there anyone who thinks that the College of Cardinals would elect an avowed atheist Pope?

That would appear to be an absurd question with an obvious answer, but let’s shift the context. Why would people give the reins of the US government to people who don’t believe in government?

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The Australian reports that Xinhua moves to tighten censorship:

XINHUA, Beijing’s official news agency, has issued rules demanding international counterparts censor news and information distributed in China and barring them from dealing directly with local clients.

…

Sunday’s ban on the distribution of any agency content that “harms China’s national security or honour” or “disturbs the Chinese economy or social order” matches other recent moves by Beijing to tighten media censorship.

Let’s be absolutely clear that this story has nothing, nada, zip to do with the fact that MSNBC just axed Altercation, its blog by Eric Alterman.

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September 11^th, 2001

On September 11^th, 2001 approximately 3,000 people died and the individual most responsible is still at large – why?

In the intervening five years we have spent hundreds of billions of dollars, trampled on peoples rights, created huge new government bureaucracies, and can’t respond as well as the third world to a natural disaster.

Your government failed you. Those entrusted with protecting you failed you. And I failed you. We tried hard. But that doesn’t matter, because we failed. And for that failure, I would ask, once all the facts are out, for your understanding and for your forgiveness. – Richard Clarke.

You can blame John McKay at archy for this.

Why do you blog?
The authorities frown on violent street protests and the computer requires air conditioning.

How long have you been blogging?
A year and 9 months.

Self Portrait?
See the top of the blog, that isn’t Brad Pitt up there.

Why do readers read your blog?
Because it’s presented in text format? Possibly because they think what I write strikes a chord.

What was the last search phrase someone used to get to your site?
Google sent someone looking for a picture of a rooster and CNN sent someone looking for the mayor who banned snowballs.

Which of your entries unjustly gets too little attention?
There is no realistic way of knowing. You can make assumptions based on which get comments, but that isn’t very accurate. A powerful post doesn’t necessarily invite comments, while the lighter posts generally do.

Your current favorite blog?
It doesn’t work that way. Blog for what? I have a blogroll for a reason.

What blog did you read most recently?
Yellow Doggerel Democrat

Which feeds do you subscribe to?
Usually I make my own with a cup and a half of rice, garlic powder, brewer’s yeast, multivitamins, vegetable oil, and then I add protein [ground beef, chicken livers, mackeral, etc.]. The feral cats seem to like it.

Oh, I read blogs, not feeds.

What four blogs are you tagging with this meme and why?
I am the Death of Memes. I don’t promulgate them.

In addition to his tribute to Donald Robson, Jams at The Poor Mouth provides a link to The 2996 Project, links to tributes to all 2996 victims of September 11^th.

Kevin Hayden at American Street has been hard at work providing a major backgrounder on the information the Mouse is supposedly covering in its 5 hour Republican campaign commercial.

He also covers our part-time Congress, that just gave itself a raise. In rough figures they are making more than $2,000 per hour worked, not counting the cost of staff and expenses.

Terry at Nitpicker has found a a nifty little study on the Global War on Terrorism™. I’m sure that the Shrubbery has a reason why the median sentence in terrorism cases went from 41 months prior to 9/11/01, down to less than one month since.

Via Lurch’s post, Why We Lost, at Main and Central, through James Wolcott’s piece, Irrationalizations, you arrive at John Robb’s original analysis, Rationalizations And Warfare at Global Guerrillas.

John speculates on all the excuses that people are going to invent when we finally have to admit that the Iraq War is a lost cause and we need to get out.

It isn’t enough to say it was the wrong war at the wrong time with the wrong opponent, and we went in based on a string of lies required to pay homage to an ideological fantasy called neoconservatism. The military and pundits are going to want to “learn lessons” from the disaster that will support book deals and speaking engagements.

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I hate to break to the guys at Blogger Status, but Internal Server Error 500 when I attempt to load Echidne of the Snakes would tend to indicate that your problems are not resolved yet.

One would think that a corporation like Disney would be ready for a little quiet time after all of the turmoil of the end of the Eisner era, and would be looking to reassure investors rather than spending 30 to 40 million dollars on a project for their ABC television unit with no opportunity of a profit.

A good, solid piece of historical film making wouldn’t have been a smash hit, but it would have been in keeping with the corporation’s philosophy of long term profits, like those received from its classic animated films, the primary reason they keep fighting to extend copyright protections.

With so many of the principle players still available, now would be an excellent time to record their memories of the events and create a film based on first person experiences.

If they run their five-hour Republican campaign commercial people need to be aware that Disney includes everything labeled Disney, ABC, ESPN, Miramax, Buena Vista, Touchstone, Fox Kids, Baby Einstein, Hyperion Books, SOAPnet, Lyric Street Records, Hollywood Records, and it has an interest in the Lifetime, A&E, and E! cable channels.

Stockholders might want to ask management why this is being done.

Professor Cole caught the Shrubbery again lying about Abu Zubayda.

Abu Zubayda was another al Qaeda #2 captured early on by the Pakistanis, except it turns out he has multiple personality disorder, and acted as a travel agent for low-level people.

He was shot up when captured and the US personnel denied him pain medication until he told them all than he knew, none of which was especially helpful. He was the source of the information that resulted in Jose Padilla being arrested for a plot to destroy Chicago with a “dirty bomb” has been downgraded to something in the range of loitering with intent to jaywalk, if the judge doesn’t toss that charge too.

You can’t trust anything these people say or write.

Well, it was about Muslims and it was in Europe, but you have to read the BBC article, Belgium police hold 17 in ‘plot’, to find out that the Belgians uncovered a right-wing, anti-immigrant plot that involved members of their military.

It’s a good thing that the US doesn’t allow racist right-wingers into our Army…Oh, yeah, ummm, never mind.

Litany Against Truth

I must not speak truth.
Truth is the election-loser.
Truth is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will avoid the truth.
I will force it to pass by me or through my distortion.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the truth has gone there will be nothing.
Only my lie will remain.

[with apologies to Frank Herbert]

If The Path to 9/11 is a docudrama, then so is Gone with the Wind.

From Wikipedia’s entry on Docudrama:

Docudramas tend to follow a set of following guidelines…

* A strict focus on the facts of the event being treated, as they are known
* A tendency to avoid overt commentary or authorial editorializing
* The use of literary and narrative techniques to flesh out or render story-like the bare facts of an event in history.
* A tendency to eschew such literary techniques as regards the overt assertion of the creator’s own point of view or beliefs.

Docu-fiction, then, is distinct both from the main line of historical fiction, in which the historical setting is a mere backdrop for a plot that could be set in many periods, and from straight documentary or journalistic writing in its creation of a coherent narrative out of the materials of history.

Notice that first item, “A strict focus on the facts”, that means you can’t make it up as you go along.

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Cat Daddy & Dr. Squeeky has a very fitting tribute to Steve Irwin.