Jakeneck

Tuesday, September 30, 2003

the economic universe is collpasing onto itself

for feck's sake, someone just tell me how this is possible—consumer spending has increased by .8 percent but consumer confidence* has dipped 5 points. glaring paradox anyone? we're buying more than we want to? what, are these people trying to trick pollsters into believing they're not consumer whores, and then as soon as they're done, they scurry off to the mall? wtf?

*a market-moving monthly indicator of consumers' attitudes and buying intentions.

Way to go, Dick-Arm!

In Russia, scientists grew a new penis on a boy after he lost his in a bizarre accident. Guess he didn't hear Ren & Stimpy's track Don't Wiz On The Electric Fence. And before the comments come, no, I'm not on a dick-mutilation trend.
(c/o Old Yist)

Monday, September 29, 2003

the dead keep dying


lies, lies, lies ... impeach the f*cker

powell & rice say "our intelligence on iraq was fine!" and cheney still says, "yeah, and they were behind 9/11 too!" but two years ago, powell didn't see iraq as a threat. and now even time is saying, "the weapons were never there."

Sunday, September 28, 2003

wesley clark doesn't value your privacy

we all heard about this last week, right?
"Violating its privacy policy, JetBlue Airways Corp. gave 5 million passenger itineraries to a Defense Department contractor that used the data in a study seeking ways to identify high-risk airline customers."
welp, here's part two of the story—wesley clark is a high paid consultant for the firm that bought the data and provided it to the DOD.

wilson story hits the mainstream


the doj is investigating the bush administration's exposure of a cia operative as revenge for her husband's rebuttal of the administration's uranium claim

Saturday, September 27, 2003

NY Times: Patriot Act used to prosecute other-than-terrorists

"The Bush administration, which calls the USA Patriot Act perhaps its most essential tool in fighting terrorists, has begun using the law with increasing frequency in many criminal investigations that have little or no connection to terrorism."
A few weeks ago, Barbara Comstock, a Justice Dept. spokesperson, appeared on Nightline with Ted Koppel, to discuss the Patriot Act.

Koppel asks, "Who needs to worry about the Patriot Act?"

"Terrorists need to worry about the Patriot Act. Because the Patriot Act allows us to target in on terrorists and criminals who are supporting them."

Koppel responds, "Would you like to amend that, since you're an attorney, to suspected terrorists?"

"You're right. I'm sorry, you're correct. They're suspected terrorists."

If the Patriot Act is meant to target suspected terrorists, how come they're using it to bust people who aren't suspected terrorists... Unless, GASP, they were FULL OF SH*T!

mobius vindication

so when we were at the rnc planning meeting at blue stockings, i had made a suggestion that we try to reach out to the cops in nyc and attempt to have them side with our cause, in that they were being screwed by the republicans as royally as everyone else in the city who didn't make a six figure salary. my hope was to perhaps demoralize them by having them identify with our cause, and thus ease up on those of us who planned to partake in illegal actions. additionally, my greater hope was that the police union would send their own contingent to the 2004 convention to picket alongside the other legal demonstrators which would ultimately be a p.r. disaster for the republican party.

naturally, this was met by harsh reaction from many of the activists present at the meeting who came to regard me (of all people!) as "a friend of our foe" and an insensitive jerk ignorant of the ramifications that would have for people of color and other groups traditionally victimized by the nypd. nafta went to the extreme of taunting me with the charge of "cop lover" whenever we got into a verbal altercation. sadly, his sentiments were shared by others who have come to distrust me for this mere suggestion and as a result, i've become very disillusioned with the activist community for their response to me over this issue.

that being said, one of the editors of rncnotwelcome.org has just forwarded me this a.p. story currently offered on infoshop, which states the the boston pd plans to strike and rally at the democratic national convention in 2004 in response to the democratic local government's mishandling of its relations with local public employee unions, all 32 of which are currently operating without contracts.

wow... look at that: the boston pd protesting at the dnc, instead of defending it. and they said i was a dreamer and an agent provocateur. nail meet head, head, nail. why this would be impossible or even a bad idea here is simply beyond me.

once again, i ask you to please post these around your local precincts. it couldn't hurt to try.

Friday, September 26, 2003

truth or lies?

the iraq-al qaeda connection

more reasons to hate wes clark

matt drudge shows clark pandering to g.o.p., licking bush's balls

problems with trillian this morning?

click start > run, then type: notepad c:\program files\trillian\users\default\yahoo.ini

change the line that says auto connect=1 so that it reads auto connect=0. if you are using more than one yahoo connection, change the line for each connection. save the file and reload trillian.

inequity and idiocy

the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, the rich tell us it's a fiction, more people are getting laid off, and somehow the government says the economy is rebounding. somebody's full of ish here...

Thursday, September 25, 2003

Another strike for the general...

His campaign doesn't "get" the net. The netroots sites that were largely responsible for Clark running, such as DraftClark.com and ClarkRecruits.com have been shut down by the official Clark campaign. (c/o Kos)

moore on morons

michael moore responds to his critics regarding alleged inaccuracies and embellishments in bowling for columbine

Wednesday, September 24, 2003

why and how the wto talks failed, and who's to blame

it's not often i find myself purusing a magazine such as the economist, but when i saw this cover peeking out from the rack at the 59th & lex 6 stop this evening, i decided to risk infuriation and pick up a copy...


suprisingly, i found the cover story to be exceptionally fair and balanced, heaping most of the blame on the u.s. and the e.u. for reneging on their promises to poorer nations, with regards to tariffs and farm subsidies, but also holding the poor nations and ngos accountable for their posturing and rhetoric.

in the end, the reality is that these poor nations may ultimately suffer worse than if the talks had succeeded—that is, if you believe free market capitalism will save the 3rd world. honestly though, they do make a valid point...

uh.. this is fucked up right here

Diebold electronic voting machines are WIDE OPEN to meddling from anyone with access to the machine, including through the internet.

[update: Diebold has shut down blackboxvoting.org, the site that has been following this Diebold drama, on alleged copyright violation charges. Blackboxvoting.com, a sister site, is still up.]

Angels' Trumpet = The Devil Made Me Cut Off My Trombone

The latest craze in Germany involves a hallucinogenic tea derived from a drug called Angels' Trumpet. It seems that the drug is very dangerous because it cannot be dosed. How dangerous? Well this 18 year old student just cut off his penis & tongue!

holy shnikey!

wesley clark is beating bush in the polls ALREADY ... check out #6

Monday, September 22, 2003

Open Source Democracy

Political structures need to change. They will emerge from people acting and communicating in the present, not talking about a fictional future.
Media theorist and cultural critic Douglas Rushkoff has created a document for the British thinktank Demos (an organization closely tied to Tony Blair's Labour Party), entitled Open Source Democracy: How online communication is changing offline politics, which, as the title suggests, deals with the manner in which online communities are affecting the democratic process and what we can learn from it.

Scheduled for release in print sometime next month, the book will be made available under a Creative Commons license, and is a result of research that transpired during Rushkoff's writing of Nothing Sacred: The Truth About Judaism (which was originally intended to be subtitled "The Case of Open Source Judaism"). You can gank a PDF version here, and, as it is public domain, feel free to share it with anyone whom you feel may benefit from it.

Democrat Dillema

The UK Guardian examines the problem with Clark and The Washington Post favors Dean. And in other news, Bush's approval rating is worse than it was pre-9/11.

Cato says, "You're broke cuz you're a commie!"

"The world's inequality is due to capitalism. Not to capitalism making certain groups poor, but to its making its practitioners wealthy. The uneven distribution of wealth in the world is due to the uneven distribution of capitalism."

we have come to liberate.. your state run utilities

Iraq's new Governing Council has decided, with a little help from their new friends at the IMF, to privitize everything except oil. After all, it wouldn't be right to give Halliburton some compitetion.. err I mean give the Iraqis the impression we were after their resources. It is no surprise that this has taken place before any democratization has occured in Iraq, before any elections have taken place. These are unelected officials, appointed by the US making these decisions; if this isn't colonialism, what is?

Saturday, September 20, 2003

hey george

i hope the oil was worth it, ya piece a shit ... in the meantime, the dollar's about to collapse thanks to your ingenious economic policy

...when hurricaine isabelle swept through d.c. i sincerely prayed it would take you

Friday, September 19, 2003

argh, what's that leafy green stuff ya got bundled below deck?

last month alaska legalized the herb, saying one can have up to four ounces in their possession. the state's attorney general, however, said "fine, don't arrest 'em. but take their pot so we can build a federal trafficking case against 'em instead!" this is what democracy looks like?

on the same note, neighboring seattle has voted to make prosecuting marijuana offenses the city's lowest police priority. one small step for man...

[update 9/20] it may be on a technicality, but marijuana posession is now legal in british columbia

Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition, yaaaargh

"People embrace political conservatism (at least in part) because it serves to reduce fear, anxiety and uncertainty; to avoid change, disruption and ambiguity; and to explain, order and justify inequality among groups and individuals."

Yaaaar! In other words, they're scared shitless of a future they're not in control of.

haaaargh haaaaargh!

pirate jokes for dumb people and for smart people

is it moore iced tea ye be needing?

before it consumes the shoutbox...yaaargh! salon offers this great booty: michael moore sings jolly praises of general wesley clark! arrrr! now swab my deck matey!

Thursday, September 18, 2003

takes one to know one... a crook that is

"Three former Merrill Lynch bankers pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to charges they conspired to help client Enron Corp. record a phony profit and pad its earnings with a loan disguised to look like a sale."

and wouldn't you know it, merill lynch is the #1 contributor to bush's reelection campaign!

Wednesday, September 17, 2003

Dep. Sec. of Interior Is An Oil Co. Lobbyist

"Steven Griles is the deputy secretary of the Interior, which means he oversees our national parks - places like Yellowstone, Yosemite and the Grand Canyon. the definition of his job is to protect these places for generations to come. it has come to our attention that he has been leading the efforts to drill for oil and gas on these public lands and he's been working to weaken the laws that protect the air.

"To fill you in a little bit more on Steven Griles: Before he started working for the government, he would speak on behalf of oil companies and electric utilities to congress (i.e. lobby/support them). It turns out that he's still lobbying for them. Steven Griles is being paid $284,000.00 a year by his old lobbying company while working for the Federal government (which we feel is a pretty big conflict of interest). When he was hired by the government, he promised to stop working for his old clients, and he hasn't done that."

Visit FireGriles.com.

Tuesday, September 16, 2003

drug czar flogs misinfo

john walters says that 11 million americans have driven under the influence of illegal drugs, and that, most importantly, driving under the influence of marijuana is bad. very bad.

that's odd, cuz according to the national highway traffic safety administration, "Drivers under the influence of marijuana retain insight in their performance and will compensate where they can, for example, by slowing down or increasing effort. As a consequence, THC's adverse effects on driving performance appear relatively small."

i guess marijuana has gotten a lot more potent and dangerous in the 10 years since the government released that report. oh wait, that's a lie too! for this and more information debunking walters' bullshit, check out the vaults of erowid.

you want to throw money at a drug problem, why not focus on a real one?

and so it begins...

wesley clark throws his hat in the ring...

Monday, September 15, 2003

hoser dirt weed

canadians can't grow government weed for shit. maybe they should've hired ed rosenthal. now that's some good shit!

patriot used against everyone BUT terrorists

"In the two years since law enforcement agencies gained fresh powers to help them track down and punish terrorists, police and prosecutors have increasingly turned the force of the new laws not on al-Qaida cells but on people charged with common crimes."

funny, cuz when koppel asked that doj spokesperson "who needs to worry about the patriot act," the lady said "terrorists." since when is illicit drug manufacture terrorism? uh, since that bill passed, i guess.

incredible poetry tonight @ the bowery

An evening of wordsmiths, perf'n'party, plus a benefit for the Bowery Mission and the BPC: at 7pm, The Bowery Mission Represents: Poetry from the Bowery; Orion, Poet Laureate of the Sunshine Hotel, & Bingo Gazingo, King of the Street Poets; then at 8pm, get ready: Butch Morris's "Chorus of Poets" including: Sapphire, Edwin Torres, Roger Bonair-Agard, Lynn Procope, Hal Sirowitz, Regie Cabico, Taylor Mali, Moonshine, Bob Holman, Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz, Jackie Sheeler, Celena Glenn, Dawn Saylor, Cheryl Boyce Taylor, Galinsky, Steve Cannon, Melanie Maria, Jade Sharma, Matthew Lydon, Guy LeCharles Gonzalez, Binz, Pavel Vasquez, Tsaurah Litzky, Shappy, Laurel Barclay, Deanna Zandt, Shawn Randall. But wait, there's more! At 9pm, we have Maggie Estep and at 9:30pm there's Sekou Sundiata, followed by our Monday night faves The O'Debra Twins with a special anniversary edition of "Show & Tell", featuring Rev Jen, Girlbomb, and Sarah Fisch and open mic. Stay the whole night for a mere pittance: $15, $10 for students.
my faves are in bold. also, as far as i know, chris 9 is reading during the o'debra twins' set. get tix online.

time to switch back to the landline

your cellphone may very well make you senile.

and speaking of being a dufus, all y'all mofuckas who said they was comin' tonight and backed out seriously missed out on what might have been the very best dufus performance i've ever witnessed. they were freaking incredible.

victory in cancun!

the wto talks have collapsed as poor nations have refused to be further "bullied into bad deal[s] by the dominant trading powers."

Sunday, September 14, 2003

phuck tha police

check out the latest b3ta challenga: photoshop the police. here's my entry.

washington times hates rnc protesters

it's old but i just found an article in the moonie-controlled washington times about the rnc protests next summer and critical mass earlier this month. the tone taken by the article should sicken and disgust you all thoroughly.

Saturday, September 13, 2003

randomotica

john walters has nothing better to do than discourage democracy | slate takes a moment to remind us, bush knew and are joined in their suspicion of the day's events by the philadelphia daily news | with no weapons in sight, wolfowitz changes his tune | the 9/11 spinsanity and the exploitation of an atrocity | click here for a pdf version of naomi klein's no logo | and on a lighter note, september 19th is talk like a pirate day

Friday, September 12, 2003

We Only Do Feet in Pink

In August 2003, Brit Ingrid Nichols was faced with a lower extremity amputation, and replacement with a flesh-colored prosthesis. The only problem was Nichols is a black woman and the prosthesis would have to be pink. The Thames Valley Strategic Health Authority has since apologized, clearing up the misunderstanding that if Nichols wanted a dark-colored prosthesis, she would have to pay for it herself.

shrouded in black



american legend johnny cash passes at 71

Thursday, September 11, 2003

thanks for bringing this to our attention, now put your hands on the hood

in an attempt at investigative journalism abc news managed to smuggle depleted uranium into the u.s. in order to expose the faults in the nation's homeland security system. rather than address the overwhelming issue at hand, the doj has decided to prosecture the journalists involved instead.

too bad patriot overrides the whistleblower protection act.

the other 9/11

counterpunch takes the day to remember "the other 9/11"—the 1973 c.i.a.-backed coup which oustered chile's democractically elected president salvador allende and replaced him with the vicious dictator augusto pinochet, who oversaw the brutal torture and death of at least 77 of his political opponents in the course of his rule.

bush said on 9/11/01, "today, our fellow citizens, our way of life, our very freedom came under attack in a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts."

i wonder if that's what allende said when dubya's daddy helped overthrow his government.

omg omg omg

wesley clark contemplating being dean's running mate ... take that pookie!

9/11 is not patriots day

during a speech at the fbi academy, in which he demanded the expanded unconstitutional powers he would receive under the victory act, resident bush declared 9/11 "patriots day." what a way to quelch dissent—this is like the ultimate personification of goering's all-too-often invoked quote about rallying citizens by questioning their patriotism.

9/11, in my opinon, is the worst day in american history, because it is clear-cut evidence of america's wrongdoings in its approach to foreign policy. 9/11 was the day when the national security state's frankenstein came back and bit it on the ass, killing thousands of innocents in the process. 9/11 exemplifies the failures of the american government to truly represent the interests of its citizenry, as opposed to the interests of the frickin' shadow government that really runs this country. 9/11 is a disgrace. it is a day on which we should seriously reflect on our government's policy decisions and really take a good look at how we allegedly benefit from training guerilla armies and arming terrorists, like we continue to do in the middle east and latin america today; a day upon which we should weigh short-term interests against long-term effects. a day upon which americans stand up and hold their leaders accountable, rather than blindly rallying behind them in cowardice and fear and "resolve" against a "common enemy."

thus, by declaring 9/11 "patriots day," bush invokes language that makes questioning the governmental policies which led to these attacks "unpatriotic," thereby making such dissent easily dismissable and/or the dissenting party unwelcome, to say the very least. it is yet another attempt to silence his critics, and to scare legislators into giving him everything he wants; in this case, unchecked power to strip any citizen of their citizenship, and in turn, their rights. it is a subversion of democracy to suggest, even subtextually, that finding the president in the wrong is unpatriotic. but bush doesn't seem to care. apparently he doesn't like america, he doesn't like our constitution and he doesn't like democracy. but rather than tell it like it is, he will position himself to make those who question his motives "unpatriotic."

9/11 isn't patriots day. it is "the day of great disgrace." don't kid yourself, and don't sleep on the truth. i may mourn the loss of life on 9/11, but i just don't see that as a reason to throw away my sensibility.

Tuesday, September 09, 2003

"nothin' to proper 'bout your propaganda"

nazi propagandist leni riefenstahl is dead. her film "triumph of the will" is allgedly the greatest propaganda film of all time. her contributions shall live on forever, as we will surely see in this upcoming election season. i can't wait to see the 9/11 exploitational short they run at the r.n.c.

gilligan for president


i always thought dennis kucinich looked really familiar.
i think i just figured out why.

  

the resemblance is striking, isn't it?

too many aunts and not enough time

aunt 1. a prostitute, especially an old prostitute. [since the early 1600s] 2. the madam of a brothel; a procuress. [slang, 1900s] 3. an aged sodomist. [U.S., 1900s] 4. an aged fellator. Cf. auntie. [U.S., 1900s, Goldin, O'Leary, and Lipsius] 5. the women's restroom, especially "the aunt." Cf. uncle (sense 1). [slang, 1900s]

—slang and euphemism, third revised edition by richard a. spears

caught in the act


now for what conceivable reason might arnold schwarzenegger be holding a spliff right there? well, one thing's for sure, "it's not a tumor!" we'll just have to see what his drug policy's like if & when he gets elected. (c/o shred)

Monday, September 08, 2003

justice for lori klausutis

some of you may remember this shtv post about a congressional aid being found dead in a republican's office at the same time as the gary condit investigation was underway. investigators ruled the death one by natural causes, even tho it was the most unnatural of circumstances.

well, wouldn't you know it, the congressman in question, joe scarborough, resigned from office shortly after a messy divorce alleging infidelity on the congressman's behalf. and it turns out the doctor who ruled the death one of natural causes had his license revoked previously for reporting falsely on an autopsy.

however, never having been prosecuted, nor even suspected of a crime, scarborough is now sitting pretty as the host of the nightly msnbc program "scarborough country."

gotta love the criminal justice system in america. maybe chris rock was wrong, "run! it's the media!"

Sunday, September 07, 2003

bush guarantees a bleak future

brace yourselves for another terror attack kids. bush's approval rating has hit a new low. with all the dirt coming out now from both the left and the right, be it response to the patriot act, the lining of halliburton's pockets, the cover up of saudi connections to 9/11, the increased layoffs and far-from-rebounding economy, the failure in containing the situation in iraq and lack of WMD, or any of the myriad of other reasons you can think up, bush is doomed to fail in the upcoming election.

however, it's unlikely that the f*cker would come this far and give up the american dictatorship without a fight, so, i'd like to spell out some disaster scenarios for you.

scenario #1: with the advent of electronic voting machines, the potential to rig an election has grown incredibly. nebraska senator chuck hagel has already proven that to win an election, all you need to do is own the machines, and since the companies aren't required to disclose their conflicts of interest, it's really hard to catch someone in the act. beyond that, even if you can't rig the machines, you can still rig the voter rolls. not that the popular vote means shit anyway. as florida secretary of state, katherine harris blocked a recount and handed over the state's electoral votes to bush while the official count was still in dispute. harris was also, incidentally, the chariman of bush's campaign.

taking this all into consideration, it's quite feasible that g.o.p. could just rig the election. they're obviously capable. that's all there is to it. and we couldn't do a friggin' thing about it.

scenario #2: as i've contended previously, and shall continue to contend, bush either oversaw or simply permitted the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the united states in order to further his agenda. in doing so, a president with no mandate was suddenly a respected world leader with a license for endless war, and with his citizenry throwing their rights at him like bitches throwing their panties at elvis. in the face of an ever declining popularity rating, bush's only available option (aside from rigging the election; which, if the scales tip far enough, won't be possible), is to stage another such attack against the u.s. and to declare marshall law with emergency powers. under the war powers act, with the aid of the national security council and the federal emergency management agency, bush can postpone elections indefinitely and virtually proclaim himself emperor of the united states, taking total control of the nation's manufacturing, utilities & transportation systems. americans, gullible as ever (as demonstrated by the previous post) will allow this to transpire because "we could not possibly change nor dare even question our leadership during a time of war upon our nation."

subsequently, the victory act will pass as near-unanimously as the patriot act did, and soon enough, bush will take advantage of the bill, in conjunction with his executive powers, to relocate his political opponents into internament camps where they will be held indefinitely without being charged with any crimes. whereas "americans could have their citizenship revoked, if found to have contributed 'material support' to organizations deemed by the government, even retroactively, to be 'terrorist,'" those of us who have contributed to leftist radical organizations that have been deemed terror groups by the fbi, such as the worker's world party (aka international a.n.s.w.e.r., the largest organizers of domestic opposition to the iraq war) and reclaim the streets (a non-violent tactic of civil disobedience—note, not even really a group), will quickly find ourselves behind barbed-wire, potentially labeled enemy combatants, denied the right to legal counsel or any of the other inalienable rights available to american citizens which, under the law, we shall be no longer. if this doesn't seem feasible, perhaps the no fly list might convince you otherwise.
Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger.

—hermann georing @ nuremberg
thus, neutralizing his opposition, bush will be able to rewrite the entire nation's system of government, unchecked by any of the checks and balances ensured by our constitution, and will then proceed to run the nation into the ground, advancing an imperialistic, war-driven agenda, bankrupting our government by enriching corporations with public tax dollars and in turn slashing the taxes of the wealthy he imbues (thus creating no reciprocal flow into the nation's coffers), and in the end, the american republic will fall, and all the rich bastards who were in on the take will be sitting pretty, as the american populace has no choice but to enslave itself to the new corporate pyramid state. they will be filthy rich, everyone else will be f*ckin' broke, and they'll have no choice but to go with their tails between their legs to any rich bastard who's got a factory job for 'em at sweatshop wages.

thus is the future that awaits us. you say it can't happen here; but sh*t, that's what they say every time.

9/11 was the burning of the reichstag. this time the jews are suspected "terrorists." bush may not necessarily push 'em into ovens... but he'll still have his way, as we rot away in prison camps, and americans become slaves. in the end, isn't it just a little fitting that karl rove is the grandson of birchenau's engineer, and that bush is the grandson of the nazi party's primary american financiers?

saddam did it, even if he didn't

despite admissions otherwise by both the bush administration & the congressional panel that no such links exist, 70% of americans believe saddam was responsible for 9/11.
"Although that belief came without prompting from Washington, Democrats and some independent experts say Bush exploited the apparent misconception by implying a link between Hussein and the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the months before the war with Iraq."
another mobius contention finds validation. i refer you to my brochure on the subject.

Saturday, September 06, 2003

koppel trashes doj on patriot & the greatest videoblog ever

check out the video of ted koppel on the patriot act from nightline this week. he rips into a justice department spokesperson and gets her to admit that the bush administration is designating enemy combatants at their will, denying them the protections of the constitution. he closes calling them boneheads that would make the founding fathers wretch!

lisa rein, who ripped the video, simply rocks my face. her video is hosted by the internet archive which is run by the library of congress. thus your tax dollars pay for this site, which, i might add, has a large archive of daily show footage. take full advantage! it's non-stop goodness. (c/o aphid)

Friday, September 05, 2003

homegrown

Corruption or Crackpot?

So what the heck do we make of this?
According to reliable sources, as well as our own Al Martin Raw.com investigation, Karl Rove is, in fact, the grandson of Karl Heinz Roverer, the gauleiter of Mecklenburg, who was also a partner and senior engineer of Roverer Sud-Deutche Ingenieurbüro AG. They built Birchenau, the concentration camp in Nazi Germany.

So Karl Rove has been identified as the leaker responsible for the deaths of more than 70 CIA assets overseas [...] When Ambassador Wilson was asked how he knew it was Rove, he had documents in his possession identifying Rove as the leaker from a secret investigation of the State Department’s Internal; Security Unit. It was a from a small clique, four Clinton holdovers in that department of the State Department that were sympathetic to what had happened to Wilson.
Al Martin either has the biggest scoop of the year, or is nuts.

i don't get it

93,000 people lost their jobs last month, but unemployment is down?! talk about spin control!

Thursday, September 04, 2003

anti-semitism vs. anti-zionism & the left

ok, here's the deal... i'm sure not everyone wants to hear it. and frankly, i don't want to clutter up jakeneck with this shit. most of you folks here are my friends, and if you wish to continue to be, obviously you're going to have to respect—at the very least—my right to believe what i want. you don't have to respect what i believe, but i contend that if you're going to formulate opinions on a subject, you should be honestly well-versed in both sides of the argument and not just the side that speaks most to you.

that being said, i don't want this debate to rip our crew apart, nor to detract from the general theme which jakeneck presents. whether some of you like it or not, jakeneck does have an inherently leftist bend to it. now, i'm all up for the discussion of libertarian vs. socialist economics, and so on, but an issue such as the israeli-palestinian conflict is just too personal for some of us and gets a little too heated to preserve jakeneck as the light and fun reading it's intended to be. with that in mind, i've decided to refrain from posting on the subject any further, and urge all of you interested in furthering the discussion in a more logical and open-minded manner in a thread i have created on the open source judaism website.

the thread is available here. click here to sign up for an osj account.

let me be clear: i hope to make this a structured and helpful discussion, as opposed to the frustrated rambling i, and others, have resorted to on the neck. it is my intention to come out of this with a clear understanding of the line between antisemitism & anti-zionism (if there is in fact one), and to determine whether any evidence exists supporting my contention that there is a heavy antisemitic influence on the anti-zionist stance taken by many in the global justice movement, and on the left in particular. i don't want to fight, i don't want to throw shit around—i want answers... i want truth. if you want the same, join me there.

who's running this country anyway?

epa says less soot, bush admin says more!

ok, now, this is what i'm talking about

nj solidarity, the pro-palestinian activist group that organized rutger's divestment conference (which has incidentally been moved to ohio), is falling apart.
Seven of New Jersey Solidarity's 25 members — representing all of the group's Arab members — resigned in protest recently, as the group pushed an increasingly radical anti-Israel agenda explicitly calling for the destruction of Israel. These seven formed a splinter group that aired its concerns on a pro-Palestinian Internet message board.

"NJS members have recently been involved in actions that have been thoughtless and immoral," wrote the seven dissidents. "Those who prefer reckless rhetoric have tried amending the mission statement to include 'Israel has no right to exist' and have openly welcomed the idea of inviting Hamas to events. We have had debates against steering committee persons who hold tight to the idea that there are no Israeli civilians and when confronted with 'Even the kids?' the reply was 'Yes, everyone's fair game.' This has been escalating for a number of months now. It has gone well past the point of return."
even the arabs are saying the left goes too far! full story here.

Another Victory for File Sharers

Are you tired of walking into places like Tower Records, Sam Goody, and Virgin Megastore to find CDs priced at $18.95 mocking you from their polished racks? Are you one of the many that are currently pulling for the thieving bastards of the recording industry to get their great and just comeuppance? Well, in the midst of the RIAA's futile battle against music piracy and the worst decline in retail record sales in history, Universal Music Group has just announced that they are drastically slashing the prices of their records. It's about damn time.

Will this be enough to save the music industry as it exists today? Hell no. This is just the beginning of the end for those greedy thieves. That said, it'll probably be enough to get some of the other majors to slash prices, too, which means that for the time being, at least, the average working man can afford to buy music again. That is, if he can't find what he's looking for on Soulseek.

Time to stock up on some old Jimi Hendrix Records.

Wednesday, September 03, 2003

Arafat is the Greatest Threat to ME Peace

Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas will resign from office if his government doesn't start backing him up, he says, rather than deferring power to Yasser Arafat and his Fatah faction. The Palestinian Parliament has responded by saying, "Leave us out of this!"

Abbas, who is seen by moderates as Palestine's best chance for peace, has been consistently undermined by Arafat since he took office 100 days ago, with Arafat most recently taking control of Palestinian military forces, and going as so far as to call Abbas a traitor for merely meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

In the meantime, Arafat has declared the road map "dead," blaming Israel for killing it with its attacks on Islamic militants. The attacks came after a suicide bombing in Jerusalem which killed 20 Israeli civillians. Israel retaliated by going after the head of Hamas, the militant faction which claimed responsibility for the attack, effectively ending the cease-fire called by Islamic militant groups two months prior. Since the cease-fire (or "hudna") had been declared, however, five Israeli civilians had been killed and 28 others injured in a spate of over 180 Palestinian-led attacks.
Hudna has a distinct meaning to Islamic fundamentalists, well-versed in their history: The prophet Mohammad struck a legendary, ten-year hudna with the Quraysh tribe that controlled Mecca in the seventh century. Over the following two years, Mohammad rearmed and took advantage of a minor Quraysh infraction to break the hudna and launch the full conquest of Mecca, the holiest city in Islam.

When Yassir Arafat infamously invoked Mohammad's hudna in 1994 to describe his own Oslo commitments "on the road to Jerusalem," the implication was clear. As Mideast expert Daniel Pipes explained, Arafat was asserting to his Islamic brethren that he will, "when his circumstances change for the better, take advantage of some technicality to tear up existing accords and launch a military assault on Israel." Indeed, this is precisely what occurred in Sept. 2000 when Arafat & Co. launched a terror assault upon Israeli citizens.
As suspected, Palestinian militants used this hudna as an opportunity to regroup, and to improve their long-range weapons.

So, uh, Yasser, who was it that killed the road map there buddy? Huh? Huh?

Do you ever believe me when I tell you the spin is out of control?

Tuesday, September 02, 2003

"the lacerates ran down my cheeks"

A British psychologist analyzes the American president.

Monday, September 01, 2003

the NFL, the DOD, britney spears & pepsi-cola: the four horsemen of the apocalypse

Picture the commissioner of a certain professional football league with a new season to kick off. And the commander of a certain mighty military with some troops to thank. And the manufacturer of a certain cola with a new flavor to unveil. And the secretary of a certain interior with some national parks to fix up.

[...]

Oh, oh! They could get together and throw a party on the Mall! Invite Britney Spears and her bellybutton! Use the Capitol as theatrical backdrop! Put Jumbotrons on the grass facing the Washington Monument! Get the troops to attend in uniform by promising them free T-shirts and proximity to the bellybutton! Show it live on prime-time television!
say hello to nfl kickoff live. the end times are at hand... (c/o jughead)

idiot prince at it again

the verbal gaffes are one thing of course. but then there was the pretzel. and if that wasn't bad enough, there was the segway too. dropping his dog at the little league world series, on the other hand... that's just priceless.