The jailing of Iraqi journalist Muntazer al Zaidi for throwing his shoes at former US President George W Bush is a crime against journalism.

A hero of Iraq

A poll released today, commissioned by ABC News and the BBC, suggests 62% of Iraqis regard the shoe-thrower as a hero. Twenty-four percent of respondents saw him as a criminal who had assaulted a visiting head of state.

Outside the court, Mohammed Ali, a childhood friend of Zaidi, said: “His act was not a crime but one of defiance. When he is eventually released I expect Muntazer could change his career and become a politician.” The Guardian’s story today.

There’s also a longer profile piece about the reporter, who has become a hero to many Iraqis.

There is an online petition at the Petition Site which is aiming for 1000 signatures. When I signed there were 57 so get on over there and do your bit.

The International Federation of Journalists has condemned the three year sentece as “disproportional”:

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has protested over the disproportionate decision of an Iraqi court which sentenced television journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi to three years in jail for throwing his shoes at former American president George W. Bush in December last year.

“This sentence is hugely out of proportion,” said Aidan White, IFJ General Secretary. “The journalist made a serious mistake, but it was something that should have been properly dealt with internally and not brought before the courts at all. The Iraqi response is regrettable and we urge that there is clemency and his sentence is reduced on appeal.” [IFEX Update 12 March]

However, I disagree that Muntazer made a “serious mistake”. He was doing something that millions of us have fantasized about – expressing our hatred of the despotic Bush regime and its war criminal leadership.

Reporters Without Borders has also issued a statement condemning the sentence as harsh:

“We obviously regret that Zaidi chose this way to protest against the President Bush’s policies but there is no justification for this prison sentence,” Reporters Without Borders said. “The sentence is cynical in a country where so many of the people who kill journalists are never brought to justice. We call for his release.”  [Reporters Without Borders]

Sorry, but I don’t share this regret. My regret is that Muntazer is in jail.

There’s a nice post on this at Woolly Days.

For those who don’t know Boy, it’s a Ready-to-Wear line by Scott Sternberg who is also the designer for Band of Outsiders.  The whole concept of Boy is devoted to the ways and styles of Scotland. The spring collection for Boy is very sophisticated and playful at the same time which is a big change from its Fall and Winter lines. With great blazers off all styles, high waisted skirts, nicely tailored pants and a plaid blazer to die for Sternberg has really revamped boy from its tom Boy look. Last but not least Sternberg even casted on of our favorite American beauties to do the look book for his spring collection. KRISTEN DUNST!!!!

~ Aaron M…

Photos courtesy of Boy by Band of Outsiders

Sitting in traffic yesterday, the words “Buck Fush,” managed to make themselves visible through the heavy coating of salt on the car in front of me.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.

A farmer considers the changing sky; A teacher says, “Take out your pencils. Begin.”

What will they do with their anger, the Buck Fushers???

We encounter each other in words, words spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed; words to consider, reconsider.

What will they do with their disdain for the human rights violator when Barack is slow to close Gitmo?

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark the will of someone and then others who said, “I need to see what’s on the other side; I know there’s something better down the road.”

What will they do with their contempt for domestic spying when Barack continues it?

We need to find a place where we are safe; We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Where will their anger over the Iraq war go – the immoral, illegal war must end the moment he becomes President - when Barack takes his time?

What if the mightiest word is love, love beyond marital, filial, national. Love that casts a widening pool of light. Love with no need to preempt grievance.

Yeah, I know. I haven’t exactly gotten the New Year off on the good foot. I’ve been off the ball for a while. Now I know the tens of you who actually read this thing must be absolutely – Aww, fuck it.

 Look, the Pats are out of the playoffs, we’re one weekend from Mikey’s Super Bowl pick from becoming a reality, and I had to go to the hospital for a 70 year old doctor with kielbasas for fingers tell me I have the prostate of a homeless geezer. (His words, not mine.) So i was out of commission, and didn’t do a post in a while. I wasn’t up for it, and Mikey’s been holding it down quite well. I’ve got about of month left of living like a Mormon with an oxygen allergy (no alcohol, no caffeine, no spicy foods, AKA all the fun stuff) and then things can get back to normal, also known as “drunk and belligerent.”

 A lot of stuff went down this past month, so here’s a quick one-blurb donkey punch on topics I wanted to talk about, but instead, spent the better part of the holidays pissing blood. Not that I’m bitter.

TERRELL OWENS

Fuck you, you fucking fuck. Way to single-handedly crush my Super Bowl pick, asshole, by destroying your team with your whining, again.  Die in a fire.

24 & JACK BAUER

Welcome back, you magnificent son of a bitch. God, I missed you. Like the deserts miss the rain. I’d sing Milli Vanilli’s entire catalog at a Ku Klux Klan rally if it meant I got to bang his new female compatriot, Agent Walker (Annie Wersching). She’s like a slightly older, hotter Lindsay Lohan without the crotch rot. Tell you what, fuck it. She needs her own blurb so I can post the picture I’ve been giving the 5 knuckle shuffle to.

ANNIE WERSCHING

GRR STAMPA STAMPA! Seriously, she’s a fucking BABE.  Even though it’s early (and this thing could go south in a hurry faster than a certain mountain lion in Season 2), Season 7 is pretty kickass, and she’s the best thing about it by fuckin’ far.   

JIM RICE

Mikey did a fine job on this already, but I wanted to say congratulations, too. The man’s one of the nicest Young & The Restless fans I’ve ever met. (They tend to be bitches on wheels.)

HOW MUCH I LOOK LIKE VOLTRON IN THIS PICTURE

 I know, right? Maybe a bit more like a transformer. That was from my tryout today for the Boston Blazers, the local professional lacrosse team. Basically, I had their all-star forward come down to the station and whip 100 mph lacrosse balls at me. What? It’s not like I just had a health scare or anything.

SHE & HIM: VOLUME ONE

Best album in a long time. I got the LP for Christmas. Zooey Deschanel is a new addition to my top 5, (along with Annie Wersching up there) but Zooey should be known for this excellent music, and not how hot she is. Zooey & M. Ward kill it on this record, and it sounds like the perfect little folk record that’s been sitting in a box in your grandparent’s attic, just waiting for you to stumble upon it while you’re looking for old forgotten bottles of scotch. It’s fucking great. Best “Sunday morning, making pancakes” music ever. Buy it.  

This is the best song of 2008, by anyone, hands down.

download: She & Him – Sentimental Heart

STEPHON MARBURY

Yeah, what the fuck, why not? The Celtics need scoring on the second unit. Cut him if he fucks up. Do it, Danny!

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA

I mean, can we do this thing already? In a perfect world, we’d have elected Jack Bauer, but this is almost as good. I’m pumped. Let’s go. Which reminds me…

BUSH

SHUT THE FUCK UP AND GET THE FUCK OUT, YOU INSUFFERABLE ASSHOLE.

I am loving the way that throwing shoes at things you don’t like has taken off like a cool piece of countercultural viral marketing.

In Ashland, Oregon, on the crazy northwest fringe of the USA, a city councillor and local shit-stirrer has set up an installation in an art gallery with an 8ft caricature of Dubya and has been hurling shoes at it. Members of the public were encouraged to have a go. It looks like fun.

I’m all in favour of modern art with a purpose. It seems Eric Navickas is a bit of a maverick, even in these maverick parts of the US.

Meanwhile, the trial of Muntadhar al-Zeidi, the Iraqi journalist who started the shoe-throwing craze by actually throwing his shoes at George W Bush in Baghdad a few weeks ago, has been postponed.

Não cometa o mesmo erro que o jornalista iraquiano. Acerte na fuça do fulano.

http://bushbash.flashgressive.de/

O jogo é tosco, mas foi criado em menos de 24 horas após o ocorrido, estilo Jack Bauer.

So how bad is it in America right now?  How royally did the Bush administration fuck the American Public?

Let the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) count the ways.  Please check out their absolutely amazing “Broken Government Project” and download a comprehensive PDF showing what they call their “assessment of executive branch failures since 2000.” 

It is astounding and overwhelming. Here are the highlights (each with a clickable link containing additional data):

• 45 million Americans without health care
• 60 percent of EPA scientists report political interference with their work
• 1,273 whistleblower complaints filed from 2002-2008; 1,256 were dismissed
• 190,000 U.S.-supplied weapons missing in Iraq
• $212.3 million in overcharges by Halliburton for Iraq oil reconstruction work
• $455 billion deficit for fiscal year 2008; estimated to reach up to $1 trillion in 2009
• $9.91 billion for government secrecy in 2007 — a record
• 809 government laptops with sensitive information lost by FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
• 30 million pounds of beef recalled in 2007
• $300 billion over budget for Department of Defense weapons acquisitions
• Less than 3 percent of U.S. electricity needs met by alternative energy
• 2,145 troops killed and 21,000 injured in Iraq from March 2003 through November 1, 2008, by IEDs (improvised explosive devices) and other explosives — many while awaiting body armor. Additionally, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed in the conflict
• 34.8 percent of oil used in America imported during Nixon administration; 42.2 percent during first Gulf War; 59.9 percent in 2006
• $100 million for failed FBI computer network
• $100 billion in federal tax revenues lost annually to corporations using off-shore tax shelters
• 163 million airline passengers delayed 320 million hours; cost to U.S. economy: more than $41 billion in 2007
• $60 billion stolen in Medicare fraud each year
• 2.5 million toxic toys recalled in summer of 2007
• $12.5 billion for defective National Polar-Orbiting Environmental Satellite System
• $4 billion to upgrade National Security Agency computers that often crash, have trouble talking to each other, and lose key intelligence
• 60,000 flights made by 46 Southwest Airline jets in violation of FAA safety directives due to lax FAA enforcement
• 12.8 percent job turnover at Department of Homeland Security in 2006 — double that of any other cabinet-level agency
• 730,000 backlogged patent applications
• 148,000 troops not enough to secure Iraq, enabling insurgency to take root
• $1 billion, six-year “Reading First” program called ineffective by Department of Education Inspector General
• 20,000 U.S. deaths annually from lack of pollution controls on diesel vehicles and power plants
• 60,000 newborns a year at risk for neurological problems due to mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants
• Two-thirds fewer clean ups of EPA Superfund toxic waste sites during 2001-2006 than in previous six years
• 935 demonstrably false statements in lead-up to Iraq war by President Bush and seven members of his administration
• At least $500 million for FEMA trailers contaminated by formaldehyde occupied by thousands displaced after Hurricane Katrina
• 558 detainees at Guantanamo detention facility reduced to 255 after court-ordered case reviews
• 26 percent of corporations holding at least $250 million in assets audited in 2006; percent audited in 1990: more than 70 percent. IRS audit staff slashed by 30 percent
• $431.5 billion spent on Medicare in 2007, double amount in 2001
• 47 dead in mining accidents in 2006 blamed on lax oversight
• $9 billion in federal oil and gas royalties mismanaged by agency linked to drug-and-sex scandal
• 275 largest U.S. corporations pay, on average, about 17 percent in taxes in 2007, half the standard corporate tax rate
• $45 trillion in credit-default swaps, without federal oversight, in 2007
• 760,800 disability claims backlogged, awaiting hearings at Social Security Administration as of October 2008
• 806,000 Veterans Affairs disability claims in 2006, up 39 percent since 2000; backlog reached 400,000 claims by February 2007
• 2,640 days Osama bin Laden at large since September 11, 2001 (as of December 10, 2008)

FUCK AND YES, people. Thank god.

Can’t you imagine Obama walking in to the White House Staff meeting and doing this? God, I hope he does this verbatim. Or something like it.

That wasn’t so hard, now was it? Way to go, America. there’s hope for you yet.  

(by the way, was anybody else sweating bullets when McCain had that tiny lead (like 11-4) absurdly early in the results stage yesterday? I was about to head out and stock up on bottled water to settle in for the riots. Thank god Obama won. Now comes the hard part, undoing the unholy level of fuck-up Bush has spackled the country with.)

A História às vezes é tão macabra que, às tantas, daqui a 8 anos, a primeira mulher presidente dos EUA vai-se chamar Jenna Bush.

(noc, noc noc. Lagarto, lagarto, lagarto. Vai de retro Satanás!)  

 foto:  danny.hammontree

I just saw one of the dumbest sites ever: a car with its back window covered with a picture of the Twin Towers in NYC and outlined with “Support Our Troops…Never Forget”. What a fucking dumbass.

I support our troops…by wanting them the fuck out of Iraq and Afghanistan. They shouldn’t have been there in the first place and now they are stuck in an endless war.

And i will never forget what a fucked up job Bush has done. If Gore had been elected like he was, this quagmire in the Middle East wouldn’t have happened. At least Shrub will go down as the worst. president. ever.

And i am voting Libertarian in two weeks. Go Bob Barr!

 Lo so, ho già scritto un post su Adam Green e i Moldy Peaches, ma due parole su Kimya Dawson, stasera che l’ho vista suonare alla Union Chapel di Islington, le vorrei sprecare. Kimya è l’artista più timida di questa terra, con la voce tremante tratteneva il respiro prima di ogni pezzo senza mai guardare il pubblico, se non tra una canzone e l’altra. Dopotutto, quale altra cantante, che si esibisce solo con chitarra e voce, parte per il tour senza nemmeno il suo strumento? Ha usato la chitarra del gruppo spalla, che però le sembrava troppo grande e scomoda. Lei vive nel suo mondo fatto di parole pronunciate a una velocità inverosimile, un mondo popolato da molti animali, orsi, conigli e soprattutto panda. Come quello che ha tatuato sulla mano destra (vedi foto) e come il nome che ha dato a sua figlia, la quale ogni tanto si sente canticchiare in lontananza durante lo show. Poi ci sono tutte le varie grevezze, volgarità, le mille farts e shit che compaiono ogni due per tre nei suoi testi. Riempire una chiesa con quelle parole dissacratorie ci ha paradossalmente avvicinato a una dimensione spirituale, perché pura, sincera. Come lo è Kimya i quali occhi parlano molto prima della sua turbolingua. Mentre le facevo foto mi ha guardata, ha smesso di parlare e ha sorriso implorandomi con lo sguardo di smetterla. Poco importa se ero autorizzata e se stavo lì da un solo minuto… Come avrei potuto continuare!? Lei non è a suo agio coi riflettori puntati contro, non è solo la regina dell’anti-folk ma anche la teorizzatrice dell’anti-fashion e dell’anti-cool, solo che in questo modo finisce con l’essere ancora più cool. 

La sua voce da eterna bambina, nonostante i trentasei anni, e le divertenti canzoni-scioglilingua l’hanno portata ad essere la colonna sonora di Juno. Kimya è stata scelta proprio per dare un’impronta “indie” al film anche se poi il risultato della pellicola mi è parso ben diverso ma questo è un altro discorso. Stasera però li ha fatti tutti i brani della soundtrack: Beer, My Roller Coaster, So Nice So Smart e Loose Lips. In quest’ultima il pubblico  è intervenuto con un boato di approvazione dopo le parole contro Bush:

So I’ll curate some situations, make my job a big vacation/ And I’ll say FUCK BUSH AND FUCK THIS WAR/ My war paint is sharpie ink and I’ll show you how much my shit stinks/ And ask you what you think because your thoughts and words are powerful. 

Ma penso ci sia stata più retorica nell’applauso del pubblico che nel testo della canzone. Il nuovo album Alphabutt è uscito proprio in questi giorni e le nuove canzoni sono del tutto in linea con quello che ha fatto finora. Racconta nuove storie da ascoltare tra una risata e l’altra.

I picked up the New York Times yesterday, it’s a thinsheet too, like the LA Times.I ripped out four pages from the newspaper, only one of them was a piece of journalism.

Columnist Bob Herbert wrote a great piece about the proud achievements of what Americans coyly call “liberals”. That is US citizens with a modicum of intelligence and a social conscience.  I put that last bit in there to distinguish them from intelligent conservatives-they’re the ones who know they’re f&8k9nG the rest of us over and get sadistic pleasure from it. They’re the ones who know it’s torture, think it’s OK and actually enjoy it being done to “terrrrists”.

Herbert’s column’s called “Hold your heads up” and it argues well that American liberals should be proud of who they are and not ashamed to be identified as liberals, even though it’s a swear word in the red states.

The other stuff I pulled was a series of interesting display ads.

[dribblejaws alert-you should go here]

I think you should read Bob Herbert’s piece, particularly if you’re American and are doubting your liberal politics; it starts like this

Ignorance must really be bliss. How else, over so many years, could the G.O.P. get away with ridiculing all things liberal?

Troglodytes on the right are no respecters of reality. They say the most absurd things and hardly anyone calls them on it. Evolution? Don’t you believe it. Global warming? A figment of the liberal imagination. [Hold your head up]

The other items I ripped were three display ads that offer a nice reinforcement and counterpoint to Herbert’s column.They each highlight why the American liberals and broad left cannot rest on their laurels, despite their proud history.

Defend Science!

A Berkeley-based organisation called Defend Science placed a quarter-page ad. Why does science need defending in the United States today, one of the most technologically advanced nations on the planet?

Basically, science is under attack from religious fundamentalists and hard-right conservatives. A group of over 2300 scientists, including 14 Nobel Prize winners have signed the Defend Science Statement. The statement is a call to action:

“The signs of this are everywhere. The attacks are coming at an accelerating pace, and include frequent interventions by powerful forces, in and out of the Bush Administration, who seem all too willing to deny scientific truths, disrupt scientific investigations, block scientific progress, undermine scientific education, and sacrifice the very integrity of the scientific process itself — all in the pursuit of implementing their particular political agenda. And today this dominant political agenda is profoundly allied and intertwined with an extremist (and extremely anti-science) ideological agenda put forward by powerful fundamentalist religious forces commonly known as the Religious Right. These fundamentalists now have extensive influence and representatives in major institutions of the U.S. government, including Congress and the White House. This itself goes a long way towards explaining why science itself is under such unprecedented attack.” [Defend Science Statement]

The group points to the nomination of fundamentalist Alaska Governor, Sarah Palin, as an example of how the Religious Right is organising to maintain the ethos of the Bush White House for another four years.

Palin called in the past for teaching creationism in science classes in public schools (though more recently has been cautious in stating what she thinks.)  She is an abortion opponent,  an advocate of the view that life begins at conception, and an opponent of most birth control.  As small town mayor in Alaska, she raised whether it would be possible to ban books from the town library, and tried to fire the town librarian who refused to go along.

Freedom from Religion

On the same day as the Defend Science group took out a quarter-page ad in the NYT, a coalition called the Madison (Wiscosin)-based Freedom From Religion Foundation placed a full-page ad directed at the 9/11 seventh anniversary which is today (US time).

Photo of twin towers used in FFRF NYT ad campaign

The key message is that American freedoms are menaced by religious terrorism. The flip? This terrorism is both external and internal. he group also believes in the real separation of church and state. The ad points out that freedom depends on freethinkers:

The history of Western civilization shows that most social and moral progress has been brought about by persons free from religion. In modern times, the first to speak out for the abolition of capital punishment, for women’s right to vote, for death with dignity for the terminally ill, and for the right to choose contraception, sterilization and abortion have been freethinkers, just as they were the first to cal for an end to slavery. Today the fasted growing religious affiliation in America is “no religion”–as many as 50 million American adults dissent from organized religion, yet our rational viewpoint continues to be marginalized. [FFRF.org]

How true, the national conversation here is dominated by religion and quasi-religious sentiment that oozes from every pore of the Bush administration. Notice how he ends every speech with “God bless America”. Bush’s political views cannot be separated from his religious ideology. The USA today is run by a tight coterie of clerical fanatics.

It’s no coincidence that Defend Science is in Berkeley (San Francisco) and that the FFRF is based in Madison, these are two of the most liberal cities in the US today and they buck the dominant trend.

The War Within

The final ad was for Bob Woodward’s latest book, The War Within: A secret White House history 2006-2008.

Woodward is famous, along with Ed Bernstein, for cracking open the Watergate scandal that brought down the Nixon administration. I’ve no idea if Bob Woodward would call himself a liberal, but he’s a campaigning journalist who continues to get amazing sources and inside information. Whatever his politics, Woodward is an important critic of the Bush administration and a champion of free-thinking.

The War Within chronicles, among other thing, the secret campaign of assassinations being conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan by US special forces on the direct orders of the White House. Not only do we have extraordinary rendition (a polite way of saying state-sanctioned kidnapping and torture), we now have explicity-endorsed black ops and extra-judicial killings. These are the techniques of a police state.

This full-page ad was on the reverse of Bob Herbert’s column in which he asks why liberals continue to be deferential and cowed by the attacks of the American right. Part of the answer is, despite the protests of the right, the American media is not dominated by liberals. In fact, like the media in most places, it’s dominated by conservatives and by the next best thing, an ideology of professionalism that masks a series of unchallenged ideological assumptions. This is particularly evident in the reporting of crime, business and politics, where challenges to the status quo are ridiculed and marginalised.

Liberals need to be proud of their heritage and defend it. More than that, as the fight against the dominance of religion in American political life shows, liberals need to be more offensive.

“Fuck off, dribblejaws, we’re coming to get you!”

Warning: this post contains some AO language and is not really about taxi drivers at all.

I have a lot of respect for cab drivers. Most of the time they’re really well-educated and they’re all very, very  street-smart. Last night I got a ride home with Ahmad. He’s from Afghanistan and he was listening to the BBC World Service.

There were items about the conflict in Georgia and so we got to talking. It was quite funny to realise that my chat with Ahmad was the perfect dessert to my main course argument with my colleague Wayne at the Brooklyn.

Wayne and I had been talking about Russia, Georgia, gangster capitalism, transnationals and failed or failing states. Ahmad segued straight into that line of thinking off the back of the World Service reports from Georgia. Ahmad has been all over the world. He thinks the Russians are crazy and hates the American presence in his homeland. There’s a nice, balanced logic to his position and I’m instantly drawn to a stranger who’s making my journey smooth on a soggy Auckland night.

My conversations with Wayne and Ahmad  led to this little tome: gangster capitalism, the looming resource wars and ‘regime change’.

What happens when you give gangsters access to new-killer weapons of mass distraction?

One big mother of all explosions and a shitrain of trouble for everyone from South Ossetia to the Bird’s Nest. As one seemingly well-connected journo/blogger, Steve LeVine of Business Week,  puts it: The Oil and the Glory. Neat.

it all centres on what is actually happening in Beijingand Tbilisi (and other points in time and space) – the materiality, as I kept arguing with Wayne, although we’d moved on to the Cosmos and Flux by that point. It wasn’t until I jumped into Ahmad’s cab that I could draw the strands of a dialectic together and make a picture of the near and now.

Beijing and South Ossetia typify what’s wrong with the capitalist world.
Blood, sweat, tears, oil and napalm. Gangsgter capitalism seems to be the global norm; hidden under a veneer of national pride; competition and consumerism.

I’m not making up this idea about gangster capitalism – it basically refers to a system of capitalism built on a foundation of massive corruption.

This little insight from today in the Georgian city of Gori, which is currently under Russian occupation, makes the whole thing seem like a fantastic warped Gonzo dream; only it’s real:

We got a picture of what that occupation could look like, at least for now, in the Georgian city of Gori today. Under the watchful eyes of Russian soldiers sitting on tanks, a paramilitary soldier stole two new SUVs belonging to United Nations officials, then dispersed them and journalists by firing into the air. As described by Yaroslav Trofimov, my former Wall Street Journal colleague, three of the U.N. officials escaped by jumping into his car, which then sped away. [Steve LeVine - The Genocide in South Ossetia, 15 August 2008]

Remember, this is from Business Week, hardly a lefty haven. It’s a crazy fucken’ mess, but there is some truth to it…first a little digression.

Russia today is the headline example of gangster capitalism, but many also believe it applies to China. I think you could argue that Afghanistan and to some degree Iraq are also now in this league, thanks mainly to the generous “rebuilding” being funded by oil revenues and American tax-payers.

Russia began moving towards gangster capitalism in the early 1990s:

Russia’s descent into gangster capitalism began in the early 1990s when Russian market reformers attempted to introduce capitalism in one fell swoop—on the advice of Western advisors, particularly Harvard University “shock therapist,” Professor Jeffrey Sachs and his capitalist provocateurs at the Harvard Institute for International Development (HIID).
(Holmstrom & Smith, 2000)

[Sachs with Bono]

How did this injection of shock therapy create a systemic and endemic gangster culture in the Russian economy? [look here] The rapid and forced privatization of every key activity in the Russian economy under ‘fire sale’ conditions meant that party bosses were able to scoop up assets for little or no down payment. They instantly became the economic czars and…

Instead of plowing their stolen wealth into productivity-enhancing investments, as Sachs’ reformers had hoped, they have, for the most part, just socked their loot away in secret western bank accounts or squandered it on yachts and villas on the French Riviera. By the mid-nineties, Russia’s red bourgeoisie had stashed more than 150 billion dollars in foreign bank accounts, investments, and properties. At home, they’ve “invested” in furs, limousines, and high living. And they’ve hired private armies of gun thugs to defend their stolen wealth and possessions (from each other). But this is only until, as the Thatcherite Economist frankly acknowledged, the “legitimacy” of these stolen properties can be ratified by compliant governments—as were the enclosures in England or the vast land grabs in the nineteenth-century United States. (Holmstrom & Smith, 2000)

So, Russia is the paradigm case of gangster capitalism, but the shock therapy of Jeffrey Sachs and others is well-documented by Naomi Klein in her excellent book Shock Doctrine (see my review). There’s also the well-reviewed 2005 book by Micheal Widiwiss, Gangster capitalism: the United States and the global rise organized crime.

For the better part of the 20th century the mass media has done an excellent job of selling the biggest lie of all, that we in the West live in democratic societies ruled by a political class that allegedly represents us and our interests, and the country where this lie has been sold to the greatest effect is undoubtedly the United States of America.‘Gangster Capitalism’ documents the lie in all its sordid details from the days of the ‘Robber Barons’ through to the ‘War on Terror’ and all the stops in-between, the ‘War on Communism’, the ‘War on Drugs’. Between them, they are responsible for an assault of unparalleled brutality that is global in scope and a lie that has been so successfully sold, it has dragged much of the planet into going along with it. (Bowles, Investigating Imperialism, 2005)

Tong=State

The Chinese case is also interesting, as we’ve seen throughout the build up to the Beijing Olympics.  China’s record on human rights at home (not to mention Tibet) and the unbridled expansion of its economy at any cost to the environment and to people are clear signs of the nation’s emergence as a new capitalist superpower. As Holmstrom and Smith argue, this too shows signs of an emerging criminal elite:

In the ongoing collapse of China’s social order into a pell-mell capitalist free-for-all, it is no longer clear who owns what. As in Russia, the transition to a market economy in the absence of a bourgeois legal framework is fast producing a descent into corruption, criminality, gangster capitalism, and violence in a society-wide struggle over property. (Holmstrom & Smith, 2000)

The Olympics are one big gangster scam. The whole facade is a three-card monte, it’s all about taking your money and the whole system’s in on it – everyone from CBS and TVNZ to the BBC, Nabisco, dairy producers and Nike. The Chinese have faked up the Olympics to hide their ugly, rotten corpse of an economy from the rest of the world, but not from their gangster mates.

Not only were the fireworks created in Photoshop, but the disgusting charade of national unity is a sick, fucked up joke too. Even the Chinese Olympics Vice President (there’s a lovely, corrupt title to give gangsters a chillthrill) couldn’t escape the stink. Fifty-six ‘ethnic’ faces in national costume at the opening ceremony were not who they were made out to be. Mr Wang Wei explains:

Games Vice President Wang Wei was rapidly into damage control mode, downplaying the latest incident.

“It is typical for Chinese performers to wear different apparel from different ethnic groups. There is nothing special about it,” Wang told reporters.

“They will wear different apparel to signify people are friendly and happy together.”

[Ethnic children faked]

“Friendly and happy together”? Signifies bullshit Mr Wang; signifies attempts by the gangster state to pretend to the world that all is hunky-dory. For those of you who think the opening ceremony was “awesome”; wake up and smell the scam. You have  been fooled. Don’t let it happen next time.

The exploitation of children from the gangster-state sanctioned Galaxy Children’s Art Troupe was meant to hide the Chinese government’s ethnic cleansing and cultural genocide policies.According to the People’s Daily, the Galaxy Troupe is part of the state-run television service, CCTV; it ain’t pretty; at best it’s the kids of the gangster-elite getting a leg-up; at worst, it’s slave labour.

Don’t worry, the sponsors lapped it up.

Sponsorship contributes more than 40% of Olympic marketing revenue. Each level of sponsorship entitles companies to different marketing rights in various regions, category exclusivity and the use of designated Olympic images and marks.

The Olympic Movement works continually to protect the rights of sponsors.

[It's official IOC propaganda]

Fuck them too; every last dollar-grabbing, baby-fucking bastard on the list.

Geez, I am fucken’angry tonight. I don’t care, this shit is important.

So, to the oil trail

who’s at fault in the current Russia-Georgia conflict? It’s not easy to work this out. According to some commentators, Georgian president Sasskashvili is a civilised, pro-Western, “smart, young president”, who “speaks perfect English”. But, he’s also part of the gangster class of nationalist wardogs who’ve taken over the former Soviet states. Don’t forget the conflict started because Georgian troops attacked nationalist “rebels” in South Ossetia. And don’t forget that the “rebels” were fighitng a national liberation struggle, but to the Georgians they were “terrorists”. On the other hand there’s an almost appeasement-style argument from those who think Russian shit don’t stink.

The story of this war, it seems, will be that the US faced down a snarling, expansionist Russia, and forced it to limp back to its lair.

This is a travesty. But it is only the latest and most glaring in a series of Western misrepresentations and misreadings of Russian intentions throughout this sorry episode. They began with the repeated references to Russian “aggression” and “invasion”, continued through charges of intended “regime change”, and culminated in alarmist reports about Russian efforts to bomb the east-west energy pipeline. None of this, not one bit of it, is true.

[Mary Dejevsky, The Independent]

Oh the irony. George W Bush accuses the Russians of seeking “regime change” in Georgia, while the Georgians argue they’re fighting the “war against terror” in South Ossetia and the Russians appeal to nationalist pride and gore to “defend” the poor South Ossetians against Georgian “expansionism”. No wonder we’re left wondering “What the fuck!”

Well,how about this: Mary Dejevsky is not an independent journalist; she’s actually an “author” associated with some weirdarse think tank called openDemocracy. I’m not sure what this is, but I am a tiny bit suspicious. All i can say is this needs further investigation. Open source journalism is interesting, but like most things, it can be misconstrued and hijacked by dribblejaws.

I’m stopping now; dinner’s ready, it’s nearly 8pm on Saturday. The sabbath is unnholy in this house, we honour it with a visit to the markets and then a nice dinner. Plus today we had the added stress of a sick Josie. She’s OK, but the vet  visit was stressful for Moac and me.

Before I go, it’s all about oil – again. Are we heading towards the first global war of the 21st century? Maybe, but Wayne reckons a series of small, dirty wars; I argued that if you look at history, ten years of small dirty wars can plunge into global conflict pretty damn quickly.

Oil: this is it

“Recent escalation in military engagement between Russia and Georgia poses a threat to certain key oil and gas pipelines which transit Georgia,” the International Energy Agency said.

Two hours after the report was published, Georgia said that Russian aircraft had attacked the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline, the second such attack since Sunday, but said it did not know if the pipe had been damaged.

Russia denied it had made any deliberate attack.

Georgia conflict a threat to strategic oil supplies

Whatever the situation for 60,000 refugees, BP and it’s gangster corporate henchdogs will keep the oil flowing. Good news?

Georgia has said that Russian bombers badly damaged the port of Poti, which the shipping agent said was out of action. “Poti is not operating at all. Technically it is OK to start but the stevedores don’t feel safe enough.”

BP, a BTC shareholder, said Azeri crude was being transferred y pipeline to Supsa and by rail to Batumi, but did not comment on whether tanker shipments from the ports had been affected.

“Exports are continuing via the two routes,” BP spokesman Robert Wine said. Asked if the fighting in Georgia had affected BP operations, he said: “Not currently, but we will monitor the situation.”

Some 200,000 barrels per day of oil and refined oil products has been going from and via Azerbaijan to Europe via Batumi and 100,000 bpd to Poti, according to industry sources.

In addition, since the BTC explosion industry sources have said that BP has been sending some 45,000 bpd to Supsa on the Georgian Black Sea coast with an aim to raise it to 150,000 bpd.

Oil port bombed; or not?

A little history on the Ceyhan-Tbilisi-Batumi (Baku) pipeline. I kid you not, this gushing language is real:

History may judge it as one of the capital moves of the 21st century’s New Great Game: May 25 [2005], the day high-quality Caspian light crude started flowing through the Caucasus toward the Mediterranean in Turkey. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline (BTC) – conceived by the US as the ultimate Western escape route from dependence on oil from the Persian Gulf – is finally in business.

This is what Pipelineistan is all about: a supreme law unto itself – untouchable by national sovereignty, serious environmental concerns (expressed both in the Caucasus and in Europe), labor legislation, protests against the World Bank, not to mention mountains 2,700 meters high and 1,500 small rivers. BTC took 10 years of hard work and at least US$4 billion – $3 billion of which is in bank loans. BTC is not merely a pipeline: it is a sovereign state.

Oils ain’t oils

No blood for oil. Again; when will we do something about this godawful mess?

They are all gangsters.

Ahmad understands this. We got to this point in a ten minute cab ride. Wayne’s on the money too. Capitalism, temporality and the collapsing nation state.

It has to stop.

Goodnight

Can you imagine that? No you couldn’t even Fathom the smell of Blood and guts filling your nostrils while the screams of your fellow man tear into the silence of the night. There is never a break there is never a time to just relax, every second matters, every second counts, and every breath could be your last. When I joined the Army I didn’t expect to go to war; I just wanted to get in shape and some extra money to pay for college. The army recruiter didn’t tell me about this side of the Army! “Come on Johnson Be All that you can be”. The marketing plan was Brilliant; they showed me all of the positives in joining the army. They laid down all of the benefits, signing bonuses, Army jokes, and job opportunities. I’m a Journalist, I shouldn’t be here! I don’t know the first thing about fighting, but when you join the army you become the property of Uncle Sam. “RUN FOR COVER” I hear somebody scream, seconds later there is a soul shattering thunder and from my point of positioning I can see my captains dead body being catapulted through the cold heartless sky.

Our enemy does not want us here, the citizens do not want us here, but now that bush has us here the people who’s land we have invaded will do anything to make us suffer, we came here to save the Iraqi’s and now we are just fighting to save ourselves. As I sit in the trench clutching my battle rifle like my mothers hand as an infant, I can feel my electric shock flow through my veins as the adrenaline takes over. It is time for war, so ready or not it is time to fight. I let out a battle cry as I jump from my cover and fire a round with the intent of killing every Iraqi in sight. All of the pain, Fear, and Frustration that I feel are being displayed through my gun, as the bullets shoot out with the power and accuracy of a Fastball from Roger Clemens. I am so engulfed in my murderous rage that the kickback of the rifle does not even affect me, and my eyes are a satanic red. I spot an individual target and now he must feel the wrath of my gun.

Without even thinking I fire off another round straight into this young mans chest, but something is different. Looking into this dying mans eyes I can see his soul slowly escaping his body, and a look of loneliness and fear. This man was just as scared as I was and now I have cheated him of his life. The look in his eye changes from scared and hurt to psychotic and vengeful as he lets off a round that pierces my heart like a thousand knives. The impact of the bullet causes my body to shake as it cuts through my arteries like a hot knife through butter, I can feel the spot of impact burning my insides like a live lobster being cooked. Now we are both dying but the war goes on.

Well, it seems like someone should write about the biggest music festival to hit downtown Des Moines, so here I go….

Overall: There was an overall lack of enthusiasm, in my opinion.  But it’s always good for people, myself included, to hear new stuff.  Here’s why I think people weren’t very excited for the bands (excluding PCC):  Nobody, except for about ten people total, walked over and held a spot for Black Francis; perhaps people were being polite and I hear there was excitement right in front of the stage, but a lot of the time people didn’t cheer for the FL until after he said, “Thank you;” during the FL, the people in front of me did not move once; the FL played a lot of recognizable singles, but the reception for each song was pretty much the same; the person behind me was more concerned about complaining how he didn’t have weed and how he just came to get high off of someone else’s weed.  Yeah, I like going to concerts where people are really excited and don’t stand the entire time w/ their hands folded or in their pockets…

I only saw five bands perform…

Andrew Bird: I think this was my favorite performance of the the entire festival. I have been wanting to give him a listen for awhile and his performance was a good reminder to do so. I think, with the exception of indie kids and some out-of-towners, nobody knew he existed before Friday evening.

Flaming Lips: Fuck Bush. Fuck this war. Am I the only one getting tired of hearing this everywhere from MTV to the anarchist’s hat at the bus stop? It is the general consensus that America does say, “Fuck Bush and Fuck this War,” so can’t we go beyond spreading the word that has already been spread and focus on the next election? Anyway….the Flaming Lips are known for their crazy, over-the-top, party-style performances. Is it just me or did it seem like we got a slightly abbreviated performance? With the naked painted ladies, skull costume and psychdelic colors, I was mostly reminded of a Beavis and Butt-head dream sequence, which isn’t bad, but who wants a dog when you can have a puppy? Maybe I would have enjoyed this more had a pair of giants not been standing right in front of me.

Jakob Dylan

Black Francis: I went to see Black Francis hoping for the Pixes, or even Frank Black. It still was thrilling to see a member of one of my favorite bands perform though.

Poison Control Center: This was the most fun performance. Their loyal fans love them, so the energy is great!

Food: I ordered chicken nachos and there were six-inch pieces of chicken on them, which made them impossible to eat without sitting at a table with a fork and knife. Also, they put shredded cheese on top of pump cheese, ew! I wish I could have found the regular nachos you get at ballparks or movie theaters. OH well, I had some delicious Thai Food afterwards.

Drink: The beer was cheap and the one with the one with the horse was decent. The water was cheap too, but the vendor was overly aggressive when it came to tipping!

Conclusion: I definitely have to commend the committee/people that made this happen because it was quite the feat. Good luck next year!

ninjagarden

The drum beat of war against Iran has been getting louder during the past few weeks. We’re hearing the same lies and propaganda that we heard in the lead up to the Iraq invasion. Yesterday, I was somewhat curious as to what the right wing corporate news media is saying about the subject, so I checked out foxnews.com then I went over to the Drudge report. To my surprise, on the lower left hand side of Drudge there was an advertisement for American Apparel. I’ve never had much of an opinion on American Apparel. I’ve always perceived them as phony hip. The kind of phony that you can only find in overly branded stores like Urban Outfitters. But I digress.

On a personal level, I try not to buy from corporations that are overtly Republican, or corporations that support the Bush regime. It’s not easy, but it is easy to avoid the big ones like, Walmart, Dell, (Myspace/IGN.com which are owned by Newscorp which owns Foxnews), for example. Now that I know that American Apparel supports a right wing propagandist like Matt Drudge, I will never buy any American Apparel product ever again, and I’ll do my best to tell all my friends not to as well. 

On a side note, I’d like to know what high level idiot at American Apparrel thought it was a good idea to advertise on a site like the Drudge Report. Does this fucktard think that the Drudge demographic matches the American Apparel demographic? I suspect that the idiots at American Apparel are trying to capitalize on the fact that their products are supposedly made in America, and that this fact will convince the uber nationalist right wingers to buy from them, rather than buy clothing that is made in Asia. But the problem with that assertion is that you assume that the fucking idiots who read Drudge are actually intelligent enough to realize that shopping at Walmart essentially hurts proletariat hardworking Americans.

I’m willing to bet that the overwhelming majority of American Apparel customers are not right wingers, or supporters of the Bush regime, or even readers of the Drudge Report. And make no mistake about it, when a corporation advertises on Rush Limbaugh, or the Drudge Report, that corporation is saying that they support illegal and unjust war, they support the war criminal George W. Bush, they support warrentless wiretapping, they support torture, and ultimateley they support the march to unecessary war with Iran.

Hab grad wieder n cooles Lied von vor einigen Jahren gehört und dachte ich enthalts euch mal nicht vor. Bodo Wartke ist superklasse Sollte man sich öfter anschauen… Hier mal der Liedtext und am Ende dann die Videos

Monica och –
och wärst du doch
bloß heute noch
Praktikantin im Weißen Haus.

Und hättest ab und zu
ein Rendevouz mit W,
dann säh’s im Nu, juchu
mit seiner Präsidentschaft scheiße aus.

Denn Sitte und Moral sind den Amis bitte nicht egal.
Nee, da sind die jedes Mal radikal und sehr genau.
Ihr Präsident darf mit Vergnügen
ruhig ein paar Kriege führn und lügen,
er darf die ganze Welt betrügen,
aber niemals seine Ehefrau.

Die paar Scharmützel da im Mittleren Osten
kosten viel Geld und viele Leben,
aber Bush nicht seinen Posten.
Es gibt nichts, was er nicht darf,
hauptsache er ist brav.

Die Devise lautet: Make war, not love!
Denn erst, wenn ein Präsident die Ehe bricht,
ist er in Amerika erledigt.

Denn dann rufen alle: „Wehe
dir du mieser Ehebrecher, los gestehe!
Du hast uns belogen!“

Und dann werden zum Beweis
all die heißen schmutzigen Details
bis ins letzte an das gleißende
Licht der Öffentlichkeit gezogen.

Und schon wieder wär ne widerliche
Schlammschlacht wie noch nie da
Der Irak und Al-Quaida
wären ab sofort kein Thema mehr.

Man würde Bush dazu bewegen
Sofort sein Amt niederzulegen
Und wir hätten – welch ein Segen –
Ein paar Probleme weniger.

Monica, es liegt allein in deinen Händen,
das Blatt zu wenden und seine Präsidentschaft zu beenden.
Und wenn er Dir nicht gefällt und du sagst:
„Also nee, bei dem mach ich das nur für Geld!“
Kein Problem, wir würden für Dich spenden!

„Fuck Bush!“ – solche Parolen
Sieht man unverhohlen
in Europas Metropolen
an den Wänden allörtlich

Das entspricht ganz unbestritten
sicher nicht den guten Sitten
Trotzdem möchte ich Dich bitten:
Monica, nimm es wörtlich.

Monica
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh Monica
Oh, bitte, bitte, bitte, Monica
tu es für Amerika!

unplugged gemeinsam mit den WiseGuys:

Live in seinem Programm: