(NEW COMMENTS SYSTEM – SEE YESTERDAY)
FRIDAY? GOOD? THANK GOD IT’S SATURDAY
Good Friday, and first I read a note from kaymo –
Been down in Virginia for a bit. They're mad down there, completely taken over by the right wing looniness. It's a wee bit frightening, mate.
And then I turn to the NY Times and find two Op Ed pieces, one by Bob Herbert and the other by some Princeton oil academic who’s name I don’t recognize. All a bit depressing, what with all the fucking crosses on TV.
First Bob Herbert
While the press and the public are distracted by one sensational news story after another - Terri Schiavo, Michael Jackson, steroids in baseball, etc. - the president and his party have continued their extraordinary campaign to undermine the programs that were designed to fend off destitution and provide a reasonable foundation of economic security for those not blessed with great wealth. Figures in the budget show that child-care assistance would be ended for 300,000 low-income children by 2009. The food stamp cut would terminate food stamp aid for approximately 300,000 low-income people, most of whom are low-income working families with children. Reduced Medicaid funding most certainly would cause many states to cut their Medicaid programs, increasing the ranks of the uninsured. Education funding would be cut beginning next year, and the cuts would grow larger in succeeding years. Food assistance for pregnant women, infants and children would be cut. Funding for H.I.V. and AIDS treatment would be cut by more than half a billion dollars over five years. Support for environmental protection programs would be sharply curtailed. And so on. Conservatives insist the cuts are necessary to get the roaring federal budget deficit under control. But they have trouble keeping a straight face when they tell that story. Laden with tax cuts, the president's proposal will result in an increase, not a decrease, in the deficit. Shared sacrifice is anathema to the big-money crowd.
Now the oil prof...
I used to work with Mr. Hubbert at Shell Oil, and my own independent research places the peak of world oil production late this year or early in 2006. Even a prompt and successful drilling operation in the Arctic refuge would not start pumping oil into the pipeline before 2008 or 2009.A permanent drop in world oil production will have serious consequences. In addition to the economic blow, there will be the psychological effect of accepting that there are limits to an important energy resource.
Which I guess brings me to my own...
EASTER MESSAGE
I’ve never been a great supporter of B.F. Skinner and behaviorism, but I feel a rat-cage instinct taking over. Even without figures and projections, humanity starts senses that it’s overcrowded and stuff will shortly be in very short supply. The neo-con response is to put a wall around the remaining stuff and hold it for themselves at any price. The real problem is who gets to be inside the wall and who is locked out. It’s the Capitalist Rapture. Those with stuff with are in an uneasy material paradise, those without get a John Shirley/Soylent Green, increasing-scarcity dystopia. No shit, shamus. Unfortunately too many Bush-supporting Americans believe that the simple act of voting in the current gang of fools, psychotics and grifters guarantees them a divine laminate that reads Access All Areas. They think, when the wall turns overt, and the gates quickly close, they will be safe on the inside with their SUV, their Bible, and their riding-mower. Bad fucking error, neighbours. Compounded by the fact that, in your fear, you are turning on all of those who should be your logical allies in the only concerted action that will save us – the concerted tearing down of these walls before they are fully built and manned with armed guards.
Fascism, my dears, has never been, and never will be, the friend of human beings. So why not take this weird ass spring weekend, while you’re celebrating executions, eggs, and rabbits, to wise up and join the human race? It is damned nearly too late.
The secret word is Joshua
QUOTE – "I have had my fun if I never get well no more." – Howling Wolf
Friday, March 25, 2005
IT WOULD SEEM THAT, TO POST A COMMENT, CLICK THE TINY "COMMENT" AT THE BOTTOM OF EACH POST, AND THEN "POST A COMMENT" ON THE NEW SCREEN THAT COMES UP. TO READ COMMENTS, YOU ALSO HAVE TO CLOCK "POST A COMMENT". SEEMS UNWEILDY, BUT MAYBE I WILL TINKER.
ANY COMMENTS?
(AND NO, I DIDN'T TAKE DOWN THE OLD BOARD. IT JUST MYSTERIOUSLY VANISHED. I WAS FOND OF THE OLD BOARD. IT HAD A LIFE OF IT'S OWN. WHY DO I FEEL LIKE I'M LIVING IN A VERY OLD USED SPACESHIP.)
ANY COMMENTS?
(AND NO, I DIDN'T TAKE DOWN THE OLD BOARD. IT JUST MYSTERIOUSLY VANISHED. I WAS FOND OF THE OLD BOARD. IT HAD A LIFE OF IT'S OWN. WHY DO I FEEL LIKE I'M LIVING IN A VERY OLD USED SPACESHIP.)
DID I MENTION ALREADY THAT THE WORD SEEMS TO BE GOING INSANE?
Over on the comments board Billy Oblivion has clued us in on how the Brits are cleaving to the Bush madness and now TPGLA sends this piece from The Guardian that indicates the Greeks, despite two and a half years of civilization are going just as nuts...
He meant it as a piece of religious satire, a playful look at the life of Jesus. But Gerhard Haderer's depiction of Christ as a binge-drinking friend of Jimi Hendrix and naked surfer high on cannabis has caused a furore that could potentially land the cartoonist in jail. Haderer did not even know that his book, The Life of Jesus, had been published in Greece until he received a summons to appear in court in Athens in January charged with blasphemy. He was given a six-month suspended sentence in absentia, but if he loses his appeal next month his sentence could be increased to two years. Haderer's book is the first to be banned in Greece for more than 20 years, and he is the first artist to fall prey of the European arrest warrant system since it was introduced in June 2002. Yesterday in Vienna, a group of prominent writers and poets called a press conference to draw attention to the plight of Haderer, an Austrian, whose case they claim is crucial to the freedom of international artists. "It is unbelievable that a person can write a book in his home country and be condemned and threatened with imprisonment by another," said Nikki Conrad, a human rights expert who organised yesterday's press conference. "But he is not going to just sit back and accept this injustice. He is prepared to take this to the European court of human rights. When Gerhard first got the summons he thought it was a joke. But now he is starting to get a bit nervous." Mr Conrad added that a 1,000-signature petition of international artists, signed by people including the Nobel prize winner Elfriede Jelinek, would be delivered to the EU within the next two weeks. "This campaign is crucial for the future freedom of international artists. Haderer is unique and situations like this will inhibit his artistic style," said the poet Gerhard Ruiss. The Austrian comedian Hubert Kramar, who is next week due to star in a new satirical play about Christ, turned up to the press conference dressed as Jesus. "We are supposed to be living in a democratic society. Greece is in Europe and the whole idea of the European Union is that everything is supposed to be more open. But what happened to Haderer is scaring artists like me," he said. Haderer's 40-page book has been already published in seven countries, including Germany, where 100,000 copies have been sold. Well known in Germany for his weekly illustrations in the news magazine Stern, he is to appeal against his six-month sentence in Athens on April 13.
AND TALKING OF CRAZY...
This week’s LA CityBeat finds me going on about the state of US jurisprudence...
http://lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=1843&IssueNum=94
SAVE OUR SCIENCE
And kaymo sends a link to 13 really fascinating things to wonder about...
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/space/mg18524911.600
The secret word is Dementia
Over on the comments board Billy Oblivion has clued us in on how the Brits are cleaving to the Bush madness and now TPGLA sends this piece from The Guardian that indicates the Greeks, despite two and a half years of civilization are going just as nuts...
He meant it as a piece of religious satire, a playful look at the life of Jesus. But Gerhard Haderer's depiction of Christ as a binge-drinking friend of Jimi Hendrix and naked surfer high on cannabis has caused a furore that could potentially land the cartoonist in jail. Haderer did not even know that his book, The Life of Jesus, had been published in Greece until he received a summons to appear in court in Athens in January charged with blasphemy. He was given a six-month suspended sentence in absentia, but if he loses his appeal next month his sentence could be increased to two years. Haderer's book is the first to be banned in Greece for more than 20 years, and he is the first artist to fall prey of the European arrest warrant system since it was introduced in June 2002. Yesterday in Vienna, a group of prominent writers and poets called a press conference to draw attention to the plight of Haderer, an Austrian, whose case they claim is crucial to the freedom of international artists. "It is unbelievable that a person can write a book in his home country and be condemned and threatened with imprisonment by another," said Nikki Conrad, a human rights expert who organised yesterday's press conference. "But he is not going to just sit back and accept this injustice. He is prepared to take this to the European court of human rights. When Gerhard first got the summons he thought it was a joke. But now he is starting to get a bit nervous." Mr Conrad added that a 1,000-signature petition of international artists, signed by people including the Nobel prize winner Elfriede Jelinek, would be delivered to the EU within the next two weeks. "This campaign is crucial for the future freedom of international artists. Haderer is unique and situations like this will inhibit his artistic style," said the poet Gerhard Ruiss. The Austrian comedian Hubert Kramar, who is next week due to star in a new satirical play about Christ, turned up to the press conference dressed as Jesus. "We are supposed to be living in a democratic society. Greece is in Europe and the whole idea of the European Union is that everything is supposed to be more open. But what happened to Haderer is scaring artists like me," he said. Haderer's 40-page book has been already published in seven countries, including Germany, where 100,000 copies have been sold. Well known in Germany for his weekly illustrations in the news magazine Stern, he is to appeal against his six-month sentence in Athens on April 13.
AND TALKING OF CRAZY...
This week’s LA CityBeat finds me going on about the state of US jurisprudence...
http://lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=1843&IssueNum=94
SAVE OUR SCIENCE
And kaymo sends a link to 13 really fascinating things to wonder about...
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/space/mg18524911.600
The secret word is Dementia
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
REPRINTS, REPRINTS, REPRINTS
I keep finding stuff of mine reprinted on the web. Lately it’s been the things I do for LA CityBeat. I know writers who throw a shitfit at things like this, whining about how they’re not getting paid (waaah, poor baby, go work for Conde Naste) but just see it as a wider audience and that maybe some good will come of it. God knows I was never in this life for the money. (Although the striven for changes in the world didn’t come about as planned, either.) And even on the days when I feel wholly and totally used up, I’m not about blame anything but my own overwhelming ego. The most fun of this reprinted stuff is that it comes with comments (like proper orderly comments not like the Doc40 free-for-all that must be getting close to some record overload.*
This week, the Smirking Chip ran my CityBeat piece on censorship and though crime.
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=20250
And something called Free Republic ran my thoughts on the cultural implications of Battlestar Gallactica, which seemed to garner over a hundred shots, mainly of right wing savagery, and only reinforced just how pig ignorant the fascist classes are when it comes to any kind of popular culture, even the kind they like.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1351052/posts
There was also, however, a cute question from Tom Galloway...
What would happen in a battle between an Enterprise security team, who always get killed soon after appearing, and a squad of Imperial Stormtroopers, who can't hit the broad side of a planet?
* An impassioned comment has recently been posted over there Billy Oblivion on how the brutality of the Bush mindset had spread to the UK. Check it out.
ELVIS MEETS BODY PIERCING
You gotta see this...
http://www.bodycandy.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?item=4484&source=froogle
RAINBOW WARRIOR
HCB sent this over as an example of just how weirdly unfettered Brit pre-school kiddie shows were in the 1970s. What he didn’t know was that, back around 1975 when I was writing the DNA Cowboys and songs for Motorhead, the Rainbow – and ultra-low budget puppet show was the only thing on TV when I rolled out of bed into a Ladbroke Grove one channel noontime, hungover from a nights drinking at Dingwalls, the Speakeasy or both. Also I seem to recall that the only overt human in the cast was a suvivor or some one-hit pop band getting what he so richly deserved.
http://rainbow.arch.scriptmania.com/rainbow_tv_episode.html
The secret word is Zippy
A GOREY GIFT
I have always love this and having found it on the web, I couldn’t resist reproducing it. Alas I don’t have the drawing to go with it...
A is for Amy who fell down the stairs, B is for Basil assaulted by bears. C is for Clair who wasted away, D is for Desmond thrown out of the sleigh. E is for Ernest who choked on a peach, F is for Fanny, sucked dry by a leech. G is for George, smothered under a rug, H is for Hector, done in by a thug. I is for Ida who drowned in the lake, J is for James who took lye, by mistake. K is for Kate who was struck with an axe, L is for Leo who swallowed some tacks. M is for Maud who was swept out to sea, N is for Nevil who died of enui. O is for Olive, run through with an awl, P is for Prue, trampled flat in a brawl Q is for Quinton who sank in a mire, R is for Rhoda, consumed by a fire. S is for Susan who parished of fits, T is for Titas who flew into bits. U is for Una who slipped down a drain, V is for Victor, squashed under a train. W is for Winie, embedded in ice, X is for Xercies, devoured by mice. Y is for Yoric whose head was bashed in, Z is for Zilla who drank too much gin. -- Edward Gorey "The Gastly Crumb Tines"
CRYPTIQUE – Elvis didn’t live long enough to feel the tongue stud.
Yup
I keep finding stuff of mine reprinted on the web. Lately it’s been the things I do for LA CityBeat. I know writers who throw a shitfit at things like this, whining about how they’re not getting paid (waaah, poor baby, go work for Conde Naste) but just see it as a wider audience and that maybe some good will come of it. God knows I was never in this life for the money. (Although the striven for changes in the world didn’t come about as planned, either.) And even on the days when I feel wholly and totally used up, I’m not about blame anything but my own overwhelming ego. The most fun of this reprinted stuff is that it comes with comments (like proper orderly comments not like the Doc40 free-for-all that must be getting close to some record overload.*
This week, the Smirking Chip ran my CityBeat piece on censorship and though crime.
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=20250
And something called Free Republic ran my thoughts on the cultural implications of Battlestar Gallactica, which seemed to garner over a hundred shots, mainly of right wing savagery, and only reinforced just how pig ignorant the fascist classes are when it comes to any kind of popular culture, even the kind they like.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1351052/posts
There was also, however, a cute question from Tom Galloway...
What would happen in a battle between an Enterprise security team, who always get killed soon after appearing, and a squad of Imperial Stormtroopers, who can't hit the broad side of a planet?
* An impassioned comment has recently been posted over there Billy Oblivion on how the brutality of the Bush mindset had spread to the UK. Check it out.
ELVIS MEETS BODY PIERCING
You gotta see this...
http://www.bodycandy.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?item=4484&source=froogle
RAINBOW WARRIOR
HCB sent this over as an example of just how weirdly unfettered Brit pre-school kiddie shows were in the 1970s. What he didn’t know was that, back around 1975 when I was writing the DNA Cowboys and songs for Motorhead, the Rainbow – and ultra-low budget puppet show was the only thing on TV when I rolled out of bed into a Ladbroke Grove one channel noontime, hungover from a nights drinking at Dingwalls, the Speakeasy or both. Also I seem to recall that the only overt human in the cast was a suvivor or some one-hit pop band getting what he so richly deserved.
http://rainbow.arch.scriptmania.com/rainbow_tv_episode.html
The secret word is Zippy
A GOREY GIFT
I have always love this and having found it on the web, I couldn’t resist reproducing it. Alas I don’t have the drawing to go with it...
A is for Amy who fell down the stairs, B is for Basil assaulted by bears. C is for Clair who wasted away, D is for Desmond thrown out of the sleigh. E is for Ernest who choked on a peach, F is for Fanny, sucked dry by a leech. G is for George, smothered under a rug, H is for Hector, done in by a thug. I is for Ida who drowned in the lake, J is for James who took lye, by mistake. K is for Kate who was struck with an axe, L is for Leo who swallowed some tacks. M is for Maud who was swept out to sea, N is for Nevil who died of enui. O is for Olive, run through with an awl, P is for Prue, trampled flat in a brawl Q is for Quinton who sank in a mire, R is for Rhoda, consumed by a fire. S is for Susan who parished of fits, T is for Titas who flew into bits. U is for Una who slipped down a drain, V is for Victor, squashed under a train. W is for Winie, embedded in ice, X is for Xercies, devoured by mice. Y is for Yoric whose head was bashed in, Z is for Zilla who drank too much gin. -- Edward Gorey "The Gastly Crumb Tines"
CRYPTIQUE – Elvis didn’t live long enough to feel the tongue stud.
Yup
Sunday, March 20, 2005
MAD ON THE EQUINOX
I have been attempting not to get violent, disgusted, or sick over this whole Schiavo keep-the-brain-dead-alive bullshit down in Florida, and screaming at everyone who will listen that real objective here is the will of the Fundamentalist SS to usurp total control over our very bodies – be they alive, dead, pregnant, or stoned. At risk of sounding like Uncle Bill Burroughs, it's the rise of the psycho-civilized slave state. In that context the anti-abortion/pro-death penalty mindset ceases to be a contradiction. THEY will decide how you live, when you die, what you believe, what you ingest, and how and why you fuck.
The secret word is Patriarchy
One attempt at distraction was to do yet another of those cyber-quizzes. This outfit seems more fun than Quizilla that had now fallen to total "My Little Pony" pre-teen whimsy.
Which Horrible Affliction are you?
A Rum and Monkey disease.
And here’s another that turned out cunningly deceptive or maybe Dadaist...
CRYPTIQUE – Holy shit. I’m reviewing online quiz sites.
I have been attempting not to get violent, disgusted, or sick over this whole Schiavo keep-the-brain-dead-alive bullshit down in Florida, and screaming at everyone who will listen that real objective here is the will of the Fundamentalist SS to usurp total control over our very bodies – be they alive, dead, pregnant, or stoned. At risk of sounding like Uncle Bill Burroughs, it's the rise of the psycho-civilized slave state. In that context the anti-abortion/pro-death penalty mindset ceases to be a contradiction. THEY will decide how you live, when you die, what you believe, what you ingest, and how and why you fuck.
The secret word is Patriarchy
One attempt at distraction was to do yet another of those cyber-quizzes. This outfit seems more fun than Quizilla that had now fallen to total "My Little Pony" pre-teen whimsy.
Which Horrible Affliction are you?
A Rum and Monkey disease.
And here’s another that turned out cunningly deceptive or maybe Dadaist...
What kind of pirate am I? You decide!
You can also view a breakdown of results or put one of these on your own page!
Brought to you by Rum and Monkey
CRYPTIQUE – Holy shit. I’m reviewing online quiz sites.