TODAY DICK CHENEY RUNS THE COUNTRY

WASHINGTON - President Bush will have a colonoscopy Saturday and temporarily hand presidential powers to Vice President Dick Cheney, the White House said. The procedure will be supervised by Dr. Richard Tubb, the president’s doctor. It will be done by a team from the National Naval Medical Center at Bethesda, Md. Because the president will be under the effects of anesthesia, Bush has elected to implement Section 3 of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, making Cheney acting president until Bush indicates he is prepared to reassume his authority. In 2002, Bush transferred presidential powers to Cheney for more than two hours. (Thanks for the heads up Ruben.)

So I’m I wondering where I can bet a bet down that we make intact it to Sunday. But while I was looking for a bookie, my eye was drawn to another item on the same AP page, that maybe says something about the state of the union. I mean, I do recall happier times when drunks only microwaved poodles, light bulbs, or Zena Warrior Princess plastic action figures.

DAYTON, Ohio - Investigators looked throughout China Arnold's home to find whatever fatally burned the woman's infant, finally identifying a kitchen appliance. The microwave was the murder weapon," detective Michael Galbraith testified Thursday at a hearing to determine if Arnold will stand trial on aggravated murder charges in the death of her month-old daughter, Paris Talley. Prosecutors and police say the infant had high-heat internal injuries but no external burn marks, evidence that led the coroner to conclude the infant had been placed in a microwave. Galbraith said the infant's DNA was found in the home's microwave. Arnold, 26, has pleaded not guilty in Paris' death on Aug. 30, 2005. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. Galbraith testified that Arnold told him during his initial questioning: "If I hadn't gotten so drunk, I guess my baby wouldn't have died."

With all of the above in mind, the secret word can only be Nuke

And this has to be the theme.

This blog is still affiliated with The White Panther Party

DOC'S PAPERBACK CLASSIC'S # 21

Big yup. Definitely. Sure as shit, Sherlock, CA is irredeemably in the crapper. It’s all those little green immigrants coming out of the cracks in the sidewalk to assault the state’s very oddly dressed womenfolk. (Thanks HCB)

And while we’re on the subject of immigrants, and being one myself, I simply have to regale you all of the wholly diabolical connection forged by Republican criminal Tom Delay between abortion and illegal immigration in a speech he gave at the College Republican National Convention a couple of days ago. I quote verbatim…

“If we had those forty million children that were killed over the last 30 years, we wouldn’t need illegal immigrants to fill those jobs.”

In other words, if you foul sluts get yourselves knocked up, you take that pregnancy to full term, bitch, because it’s your patriotic duty to keep this nation supplied with cheap unskilled labor. And you think I’m making this up – and I would if I was you – I offer a full video not only of Delay, but also an excellent expose by Max Blumenthal of the wholly unbelievable slime that are the College Republicans. Loath as I am to hit you with a link to HuffPo because Arianna’s doing a lot fucking better than I am, you gotta see this to believe it.

The secret word is Dreadfulness

MORE MUSIC! MORE MUSIC!

I’ve come up with another of those sites where you can listen to free samples of the music we’ve labored on all these years. In this instance it’s The Deviants Dr.Crow recordings from four or five years ago. If you want a quick trial shot, I’d go for track 5, “Taste The Blue.” Believe me. I sang the damned thing. (Actually I’m still pretty pleased with it.) Or you could go for “You’re Going To Need Somebody On Your Bond” where I duet with Johnette Napolitano, who sings much better than I do.

I NEED A DRINK...

…while I’m catching up on the backlog of stuff that remains after being deprived of internet access for almost five days, despite the disapproval of these cuties from The Women’s Christian Temperance League. (Another picture stolen from the great Tom Sutpen.

But fortunately Doug the Bass has come through with something truly fascinating to which, I believe, everyone with a computer can relate.
"The Japanese have finally revealed a mystery for you. How does the small arrow on your computer monitor work when we move the mouse? Haven't you ever wondered howit works? Now, through the miracle of high technology, we can see how it is done. With the aid of a screen magnifying lens, the mechanism becomes apparent. Click on the link and you will find out. The image may take a moment or two to download and when itappears, slowly move your mouse over the light gray circle and you will see how the magic works."

ALL THE LIES ABOUT DOPE

This week, LA CityBeat has a marijuana issue and I contributed a catalogue of lies. (And also do some sparring on the letters page, and preview Holly Hunter’s new TV show.)

The secret word is Viper

A LOVE SUPREME

Thanks to Doug the Bass for reminding me the that John Coltrane died forty years ago today.

BREAKDOWN!

WELL MAYBE NOT, BUT THE DOC40 MODEM BLEW ITSELF OUT ON SATURDAY MORNING. IT TOOK UNTIL NOW TO GET A REPAIR MAN FROM THE MIGHTY TIME WARNER.

MORE TO FOLLOW WHEN I'VE STAGGERED THROUGH THE BACKLOG

The secret word is Bollocks

(pic stolen from M.Boufant)

I AIN'T GONNA SAY A WORD

BUT BEFORE YOU SETTLE DOWN FOR YOUR WEEKEND JUST WATCH THIS! AND THIS TOO!(Thanks Valerie)

MAYBE I'M ILLUSION IT?

I like nothing more than to smoke a whole lotta dope on a Saturday and stare at an optical illusion. But I’m not too sure about this one. I seem to be seeing less action than some have claimed, although the little snake tongues are a puzzle. I guess illusion is in the opticals of the beholder.

The secret word is Look

FOR WOODY

Woody Guthrie was born on this day in 1912. He died almost forty years ago, but is far from forgotten, and the same damned fight for dignity and equality still goes on. (See the last minute stuff above and ask yourself how come The Taser victims are all black or Latino?)

"Yes, as through this world I've wandered/I've seen lots of funny men/Some will rob you with a six-gun/And some with a fountain pen."

(And the very moment I finished writing this came in from The LA Times – “A nationally lauded program that has helped thousands of mentally ill homeless men and women break the cycle of psychiatric hospitalization, jail time and street life is now on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's list of budget cuts”)

FREE SAMPLES

It’s weird how these things appear and you have no idea why they are lurking on the web or how they came to be there. This collection was recorded in 1995 in front of a live audience in Santa Monica, and the players – in addition to me and Jack – include Wayne Kramer, Andy Colquhoun, Doug Lunn, and Brad Dourif (that’s right, Doc from Deadwood and Wormtongue from LOTR.) All the tracks are fucking great, but I’m kinda fond of “The Disgruntled Employee” and “When The World Was Young.”

If you want actually to buy a copy hit Alive/Total Energy mail order, linked on the right.
I also discovered these weird Google books that seem to be portions of novels and I have no idea why they exist. This is the one for Darklost, and, if you haven’t read any of The Renquist Quartet, this is at least a taste. Who knows? Maybe it’ll hook ya.

REASONS FOR IMPEACHMENT

It’s all fine and dandy to laugh at Dick Cheney and cast him as a human-devouring, A. E. Van Vogt space monster, but, something has to be done about that bastard. I lifted this impeachment plan from a much longer piece in HuffPo that had in turn lifted it from Slate. I’m not a lawyer but it holds water for me.

"A bill of particulars against the vice president has been sketched by constitutional law expert and former Justice Department official in the Reagan years, Bruce Fein, in Slate of June 27: "Impeach Cheney: The Vice President has Run Utterly Amok and Must Be Stopped." He urges the House Judiciary Committee to commence an impeachment inquiry: "As Alexander Hamilton advised in the Federalist Papers, an impeachable offense is a political crime against the nation. Cheney's multiple crimes against the Constitution clearly qualify." Moreover, Fein posits that President Bush has outsourced a major share of his presidency to Vice President Cheney. Here is his review of the record of Cheney's abuses and excesses:
- The vice president "asserted presidential power to create military commissions, which combine the functions of judge, jury, and prosecutor in the trial of war crimes."
- Cheney "claimed authority to detain American citizens as enemy combatants indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay on the President's say-so alone, a frightening power indistinguishable from King Louis XVI's execrated lettres de cachet that occasioned the storming of the Bastille."
- The vice president "initiated kidnappings, secret detentions, and torture in Eastern European prisons of suspected international terrorists...The legal precedent set by Cheney would justify a decision by Russian President Vladimir Putin to kidnap American tourists in Paris and to dispatch them to dungeons in Belarus if they were suspected of Chechen sympathies."
- The vice president "has maintained that the entire world is a battlefield. Accordingly, he contends that military power may be unleashed to kill or capture any American citizen on American soil if suspected of association or affiliation with al Qaeda."
- Cheney "has championed a presidential power to torture in contravention of federal statutes and treaties."
- Cheney "has advocated and authored signing statements that declare the president's intent to disregard provisions of bills he has signed into law that he proclaims are unconstitutional, for example, a requirement to obtain a judicial warrant before opening mail or a prohibition on employing military force to fight narco-terrorists in Colombia. The signing statements are tantamount to absolute line-item vetoes."
- The vice president "engineered the National Security Agency's warrantless domestic surveillance program targeting American citizens on American soil in contravention of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. He concocted the alarming theory that the president may flout any law that inhibits the collection of foreign intelligence, including prohibitions on breaking and entering homes, torture, or assassinations."
- The vice president "has orchestrated the invocation of executive privilege to conceal from Congress secret spying programs to gather foreign intelligence, and their legal justifications."
- Cheney "urges application of the Espionage Act to prosecute journalists who expose national security abuses, for example, secret prisons in Eastern Europe or the NSA's warrantless surveillance program."
- He "retaliated against Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame, through Chief of Staff Scooter Libby, for questioning the Administration's evidence of weapons of mass destruction as justification for invading Iraq." (Does Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald think that the vice president, and not just Scooter, was involved in obstructing justice?)
- Fein puts forward a provocative argument questioning what could be termed a sanctioned coup d'etat: "The Constitution does not expressly forbid the president from abandoning his chief powers to the vice president. But President Bush's tacit delegation to Cheney and Cheney's eager acceptance tortures the Constitution's provision for an acting president. The presidency and vice presidency are discrete constitutional offices." Section 3 of the 25th Amendment provides a method for the President to yield his office to the vice president, when 'he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.' There is no other constitutional provision for transferring presidential powers to the Vice President."
But "without making a written transmittal to Congress, President Bush has ceded vast domains of his powers to Vice President Cheney by mutual understanding that circumvents the 25th Amendment. This constitutional provision assures that the public and Congress know who is exercising the powers of the presidency and who should be held responsible for successes or failures. The Bush-Cheney dispensation blurs political accountability by continually hiding the real decision-maker under presidential skirts."
Bruce Fein's conclusion: "Cheney is impeachable for his overweening power and his sneering contempt of the Constitution and the rule of law."

The secret word is Thirteen

DOC'S PAPERBACK CLASSIC'S # 20

Why does looking at this make me immediately think of Dick Cheney. Like an “origin” episode in which he stows away on the spaceship, eats the crew, assumes human form when he reaches Earth and…

(And the only way we know he’s not human is that he can’t shoot straight.)

THE BOVINE DIVERSION

“Maybe the aliens had the right idea.”

The following, sent over by Rich is all perfectly true, except cow fart -- and now cow belch -- has been used over and over by GM and Exxon, and a host of other corporate polluters as smokescreen (so to speak) for their own environmental atrocities. It’s just the agri-industry doing their bit to wreck the planet. Shall we talk about the disposal of pig shit by the pork corporations?
"Cows could be doing more damage to the environment than four-wheel-drive cars, scientists have warned. Methane emissions from cattle account for a quarter of the gas in our air and researchers are trying to find a new way to feed cattle which leads to less belching. Michael Abberton of the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research said the key is developing new varieties of food that are easier for cattle to digest and also provide a proper balance of fibre, protein and sugar. He told a briefing on farming and climate change at London's Science Media Centre that this could open up plant-based solutions as alternatives to reducing stock as farmers look for ways to cut methane emissions amid warming climates. Mr Abberton said the average dairy cow belches out about 100 to 200 litres of methane each day, making diet changes a key potential factor in reducing this greenhouse gas. "There is a common misperception about how methane gets into the atmosphere," he said. "It is actually through belching rather than the other end," he said. He said introducing easier-to-digest legumes that tend to reduce methane emissions is an example of an approach scientists are beginning to explore. Legumes such as clover and alfalfa are commonly used for animal fodder. It also requires farmers to balance cows' legume intake with other food and to develop different species of grass that are also more digestible, he added. "What I'm saying is there are approaches within plant breeding that can lead to reduced emissions," said Mr Abberton. "

The secret word is Moo

A CONNECTION WITH CATTLE MUTILATION?

Enough with the cowboys and aliens, already. This is getting out of hand. (See Tuesday) HCB sent this over long along with the trailer for The History Of America which looks kinda interesting. Seemingly it’s a day for trailers, the remake of Vincent Price’s I Am Legend has been beamed over by Dimitrios “new adaptation of Richard Matheson 's classic with Will Smith. If the fuckers keep the unbelievably pessimistic ending, it should be cool. I’m not holding my breath.”
AND FINALLY I have two pieces in the current LA CityBeat. One on Keith Olbermann and the other on the viruses that lurk on money.

Take a look and get pissed off!

A SHOT OF H.P.

Must write. Must work. Must drive myself crazy. But must leave the DOC40 visitors a quick shot of H. P. Lovecraft in the form an animation of The Terrible Old Man, and promise to be back later.

Or would you rather see a penguin being taught to swim, or a demonstration that in Europe they really have TV commercials, or, if none of that appeals, how about a clip of Spinal Tap with Ric Parnell, a once and future drummer of the Deviants hammering his heart out?

The secret word is Haste

PLUS A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

(The disturbing part is that the lady in the picture looks uncommonly like old photos of my late mother.)

Donated by Hermit

THE TECHNOLOGY OF SUBVERSION
Valerie has sent us two killer clips of laser graffiti in action. The first is happening in Barcelona and is the more exciting of the two. The other is in New York and starts kinda slow but is worth some perseverance. I wish I knew a great deal more about how this works and could see it in live action. I firmly believe that we may well have to take to the streets before this current power cabal is run out of office and the era of hideous bullshit ends, and I could see laser graffiti, flash mobs, and any other 21st century technological innovations being totally applied to direct action and rising up angry.

AND talking of angry, China just executed the head of its pure food and drug agency.

DOC’S PAPERBACK CLASSICS # 19

A very bad attack of genre confusion going on here. I mean spaceships, whips, horses, spurs, aliens, girls in boots, cross-dressing cowboys, aside from qualifying as a few of my favorite things, this whole concept is something of a mess. On the other hand, back in the later 1980s, HCB (who supplied this gem) other Doc40 plas and I all wrote scripts for a TV animation show The Galaxy Rangers which had a cowboys in space theme made only slightly less preposterous than Spurs Jackson and his Space Vigilantes by making the horses mechanical. Oddly, I believe The Galaxy Rangers became something of a cult in Germany. Here’s a clip.

The secret word is Yippie

THEY DON’T MAKE BANDS LIKE THAT ANY MORE #2

I came across this picture while working on the super-fine, up coming Bomp magazine wonder book (More about that in the future.) They are the Pandoras from the fabulous 1980S and there is a website about them with video and audio and beaucoup fine stuff.

A GROWTH INDUSTRY?

The above was photographed on Sunset Boulevard and submitted by munz. A few weeks ago the CIA was running recruiting ads during the Fox11, 7.30 reruns of The Simpsons (?), and I’ve also been noticing that those mail-order home-education mills that advertise on late night TV are pushing all manner of forensic-related courses. Could law enforcement be a new growth industry, especially the kind privatized law enforcement about which that Dick Cheney must have wet dreams.

The secret word is Copper

I HAVE TO WONDER WHY SUDDENLY, FOR NO REASON THE BLOGGER POST TITLE FIELD CEASES TO WORK. I GUESS IT WILL COME BACK, OR MAYBE IT WON'T.

SINCE BUSH AND CHANEY HAVE FAILED TO RESIGN, LET'S TURN TO THE ODD FOR THE WEEKEND

A good place to start is to stare into the blue sphere for as long as your attention span can take it. If you see anything of any rare significance, it would probably be best to stop there, because you are a long way ahead of the game. (Is Farren putting us on?) If nothing materializes then I would suggest heading on to a rather strange connection supplied by MrMR about the nature of time and perception that will at least fill in some time until the next episode of Dr Who.

"Our journey starts with an experiment conducted in 1976. Dr. Kornhuber asked a number of volunteers to be wired with EEG electrodes to measure their brain activity. He then asked the volunteers to flex the index finger of their right hand, suddenly and at various times of their own choosing. He wanted to measure how fast it took for the mental decision to move the finger to actually make the finger move. His results were not what he expected"…(more?)

And, yes, the dot (you'll get to it) does change color.


The secret word is Chronometer

RESIGN!

More later, because I have a column to write, but, if you haven’t already seen it, I can’t urge you more strongly to watch Keith Olbermann’s call for Bush and Cheney’s resignation on MSNBC.

George Melly -- RIP

THE ROCKETS' RED GLARE

SIGN A PETITION TO IMPEACH DICK CHENEY
Except, as I filled in the boxes a feeling of unease came over me. Was I putting myself on some future list as a target for retribution? But I went ahead anyway realizing that such anxiety is the power and product of a potentially fascist state, and all the more reason to haul the sons of bitches out of power.

The secret word is Now

GOTTA KEEP ON RISING

Ruben reminds us that Jim Morrison died thirty-six years ago today. I could only imagine, had he lived, he’d be drinking harder than ever as society spirals even faster to a pointless consumer hell where the future's more uncertain and the end decidedly weirder. He also serves to remind me that, when all is said, and done, no one here does get out alive, and the only legacy we leave is the work we produce. Thus, the dead must rest, and I have to get back to my keyboard and my imagination. There is no other option.

A Morrison artifact (courtesy fidicen, like the photo)

The secret word is Perception

IF THIS NATION RETAINS A VESTIGE OF CIVILIZATION, THE PRESIDENT AND VICE PRESIDENT SHOULD FORMALLY RESIGN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY

What is there left to discuss? Their evil must be held to be self-evident. Their corruption stinks for sea to shining sea, and their homicidal, criminal stupidity is taking the nation to the brink of dysfunction.

NONETHELESS THE TIGERS ARE IN THE TANK

Meanwhile, with amazing synchronicity, as Valerie sends the tigers, noudela gives us this clip of Muddy Waters doing “I’ll Put A Tiger In Your Tank.”

The secret word is Grrrr.

Beverly Sills – RIP

SLIME DOES NO TIME

As Bush lets Scooter Libby walk, our favorite southern belle writes "I am nuts with anger. Please write something."

Well darlin' I'll try, but right now all I can do is shake my head, and wonder if I ever expected anything else from these shameless, clean-shaven sons-of-bitches. Gandhi always advised patience and that the swine would always get their’s in the end, but, the Mahatma forgive me, mine is wearing dangerously thin. Not to mention it has wholly spoiled Nation UFO Day.

(In fact, the actual quote is “There have always been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible but in the end, they always fall. -- think of it, ALWAYS.” – Mahatma Gandhi)

NATIONAL UFO DAY

Seemingly, in some quarters, this is National UFO Day. So if you see an alien, I recommend you buy it an ice cream. Beyond that, here’s the read-all-about-it. (Although I fear the cow is toast.)

The secret word is Mutilated.

On the other hand, ain’t much that was more alien than Dr. John back in the day. (From MrMR)

SUNDAY IN THE HEAT WITH ELVIS

I’ll frankly admit that I think the dog-days of summer are on us here in bloody LA and the prospect of two months of rising temperatures plus all the other crap that flesh is heir to is starting to depress the hell outta me, but I guess I’ll survive it. (But is that the good news?) Peromyscus sent me an amusing clip of Elvis. And Elvis is always good for impending depression because, his story was more beaucoup fucked-up than any other in our rock & roll universe, especially when I stumbled across this clip of “Unchained Melody”, recorded about six weeks before the man’s death when he had degenerated to a bloated, sweating hulk, sans mind, sans pride, sans everything except the power of that miraculous voice. A real case of “observe thou mortals and tremble at the downfall of a god and the distance it is possible to fall.”

The secret word is Royal

Thanks Hermit

HOWL AT THE FULL MOON, MY DROOGS, FOR SURELY THERE'S MUCH TO HOWL ABOUT

The secret word is Luna

GEORGE'S CRUSADE -- THE ENDGAME

Our pal aeswiren has sent the following from Truth Out with the comment – “As the death spiral of the Bush Administration tightens and Dubya feels the grip of history's contempt on his collar, the temptation to bring down the entire world – to wreak Gotterdammerung and Armageddon in one blow will grow stronger.” The story by JP Briggs II, Ph.D., and Thomas D. Williams starts…

"President George W. Bush has become dangerously steeped in ideas of Armageddon, the Apocalypse, an imminent war with Satanic forces in the Middle East, and an urgency to construct an American theocracy to fulfill God's end-of-days plan, according to close observers. Historians and investigative journalists following the "end-time Christian" movement have grown alarmed at the impact it may be having on Bush's Middle East policies, including the current war in Iraq, the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian crisis, the strife in Lebanon and the administration's repeated attempts to find a cause for war against Iran."
The rest of this story is long, but a major eye opener.

FILE UNDER SCARCELY BELIEVABLE

THE LEPER OF CABLE NEWS

The last few days have proved somewhat fragmented, to the point that I totally forgot to provide a link to a savage attack in my LA CityBeat media column on the fetid Lou Dobbs.

The secret word is Liar

THE FUTURE'S GETTING HARDER, BOYS

Posting pictures today, neighbors, because if I don't get some work done, I'll be begging for energy.

AND NOW FOR THE COMMERCIALS

Man, have I gotta cough. Which way to Stone Street?

(from HCB

DOC'S PAPERBACK CLASSIC'S #18

As Dr Kinsey noted at some length, the sexual mindclamp of the mind 20th century, that tried to jail Lenny Bruce for saying “cocksucker”, produced some barely explicable weirdness, in those days of yore when perversion meant perverted, not online nipple-clamp vendors. In this decidedly odd illustration, I can fully understand how the ladies might employ the Ping-Pong bat, but why does the peeping tom need one? Comments are more than welcome.

JACKSON POLLOCK CROP CIRCLES?

Actually no, much as it would be a blast to believe there were abstract impressionist aliens, the real story from Steve UK goes as follows...
Authorities in Holland successfully managed to capture a man on the loose in his father's car after he crashed it in a ditch, but not before managing to ruin an entire corn field and four police cars. The individual, who was using cocaine, was trying to make an escape from the police when he entered the field. Officers damaged the cars as they attempted to prevent the drug user from returning to public roads. (From Metro freesheet)

AND BY POULAR DEMAND…
An Iggy encore. Not a dry eye in the house. (From noudela)

Oh, and one more time for the thespian prairie dog

The secret word is Torch

THEY DON'T MAKE BANDS LIKE THAT ANY MORE

“Why do I have to be Mr. Pink?”

This is the Move in 1966, when acid was a fairly rare, esoteric source of recreation, so quickly made illegal because its users appeared to be having too much fun. The Move's hit that year was “Night Of Fear.” A year later they’d be wearing paisley and singing “I Can Here The Grass Grow.” (Photo and link from 00Soul.)

The secret word is Combo

CREATURES FROM THE BLACK BUDGET

The Pentagon black budget is a secret iceberg that makes all horrors plausible. As in “gee, guys, wouldn’t be nifty to tailor a sexually transmitted long-incubation retro-virus to depopulate a whole third-world mineral-rich continent like Africa. And we can test it on the gay communities in New York and San Francisco.” (Thanks Valerie)

"Creating armor that renders a soldier invisible. Stimulating the brain to suppress sleep for days. Arming sharks with chemical implants and cameras to work as spies. This year the Pentagon will spend $78 billion, about half of all government research and development dollars, on a variety of projects, according to the American Association for the Advancement for Science (AAAS). The vast majority - about $68 billion - goes to traditional spending, like weapons development and space systems. But some fringe research mimics the best of science fiction. There seems to be no failure of imagination in advancing warfare, but some experts fear these farfetched projects show a little too much imagination. Just this month, the government confirmed that an Ohio Air Force laboratory had asked for $7.5 million to build a nonlethal "gay bomb," a weapon that would encourage enemies to make love, not war. The weapon would use strong aphrodisiacs to make enemy troops so sexually attracted to each other that they'd lose interest in fighting. Last year, scientists at Boston University developed brain implants that could steer sharklike dog fish with a phantom odor. Just three years ago, the military funded a specious study of psychic teleportation, according to the Federation of American Scientists. An 88-page report prepared by the Air Force Research Lab contended that moving through mind powers is "quite real and can be controlled."
"The military has a lot of crazy ideas," said Noah Shactman, editor of the Wired blog Danger Room. "But it's hard to turn these ideas into action." For the rest…

The secret words are Need To Know

But if the above has depressed the fuck out of you, here’s Iggy at Glastonbury. (How the fuck does he do it at his age?) Thanks Tim B.

AND it would also seem that Peromyscus has worked out a way to save images from the Jackson Pollack Machine, see yesterday’s comments.

Or amphetamines can have similar effect but eliminate the need for boiling water and a mug. (And talking of coffee mugs, I really think a Doc40 coffee mug needs to be organized. Sadly, Café Press doesn’t do a secret decoder ring.)

THE FUTURE'S GETTING HARD, BOYS

SUNDAY DIVERSION -- THE JACKSON POLLACK MACHINE

Hello. Missed a couple of days. Have not been feeling well for the last twenty hours, and have been hiding from the computer, and although there is much to discuss, I still feel a tad tired to be sitting at the keyboard for hours on end. On the other hand, I do feel the Doc40 funhouse should not every be closed and shuttered, and also, thanks to our good friend Yukiko, we have a fab toy with which to waste our time. The Jackson Pollack Machine, is truly amazing, but it’s more frustrating that an Etch A Sketch in that I have not found a way to preserve the creation. (Left click to change color.)

We also have amazing aerial photos of highway intersections, a Simpson’s movie trailer from Dimitris, and a killer video of the singing Tesla Coil.

The secret word is Weak

Dave Howson -- RIP

HELLO SAMURAI KITTY

(That’s Kitty-san to you, gaijin.)

Having read the piece below and aware that armed Europeans surround him, Newton is now lobbying for a suit of samurai cat armor. (Thanks Valerie)

FIRST TO CATCH A BULLET IN AMERICA

Both MrMR and some girl have sent over versions of this fascinating report about the discovery of what might be the first shooting victim in the New World. We particularly like the line – “The individual may have been escaping from the Europeans.” (And, of course, the victim was an Inca, not a cowboy playing poker. I just liked the pic.)

"Archaeologists in Peru have uncovered the human skeleton of what they conclude is the earliest known gunshot victim in the New World. Digging in an Inca cemetery in the suburbs of Lima, they came on well-preserved remains of an individual with holes less than an inch in diameter in the back and front of the skull. Forensic scientists in Connecticut said the position of the round holes and some minuscule iron particles showed that the person most likely was shot and killed by a Spanish musket ball. Ceramics and other artifacts in the 72 examined graves established the approximate time of the burials, archaeologists said, and this indicated that these were casualties of combat between Inca warriors and Spanish invaders, who seized the Andean empire in 1532. Spanish chronicles describe a pitched battle, a last stand of the Incas that was fought in the vicinity in 1536.
Conquistadors were equipped with some of the first effective firearms, which had been developed recently in Europe, military historians say. The National Geographic Society announced yesterday the discovery of the gunshot victim by the independent Peruvian archaeologists Guillermo Cock and Elena Goycochea, who have conducted research at the Puruchuco cemetery for years. A NOVA-National Geographic television program on the research is scheduled for next Tuesday.
In a telephone interview Monday, Dr. Cock said that at least 35 of the excavated skeletons bore evidence of violent injuries: cheekbones crushed by heavy blows, broken hands and limbs, a smashed chest. Some had presumably fallen in hand-to-hand combat or been trampled by Spanish horses, another instrument of warfare new to the Americas. No similar evidence of a death by gunshot this early has been found elsewhere in the Americas, Dr. Cock said. The musket shot appeared to have entered the back of the man’s skull, punching a piece of bone from outside to inside, and emerged through the face.
“The individual may have been escaping from the Europeans,” the archaeologist said. These particular graves attracted the attention of the excavators because they were shallow and the bodies appeared to have been interred hastily. They were not ritually wrapped in shrouds and placed in a crouched position facing northeast, as was customary in Inca burials. Forensic experts at the University of New Haven, in Connecticut, confirmed the violent nature of the deaths. Albert B. Harper, executive director of the Henry C. Lee Institute of Forensic Science at the university, said, “We tried to rule out all kinds of causes of the hole — a rock from a slingshot, spear, sledgehammer.” An examination of the skull with a scanning electron microscope detected the otherwise invisible iron traces, Dr. Harper said, sealing the verdict of death by a musket ball fired from a range of perhaps 100 feet."

The secret word is Capped

THE GREEN GODDESS GOES PUBLIC

The New York Times discovers absinthe at sixty bucks a bottle. My hope is that it will drive the apple martini crowd drooling insane and then return to being the secret of the bohemian elite. But I’m blind drink and hallucinating on my own green dragon home brew that I am unable to think this through. I will consider it tomorrow. (Thanks to Munz and Alex for the links.)

The secret word is Rimbaud