new bill would make p2p illegal

the pirate act could impose up to 10 years of imprisonment for file trading over p2p networks

DOJ Docs Prove Bush Admin's Weak On Terror

Since September 11, President Bush and his supporters have repeatedly intimated that many of the President's political opponents are soft on terrorism. In his State of the Union address, the President declared: "We can go forward with confidence and resolve, or we can turn back to the dangerous illusion that terrorists are not plotting and outlaw regimes are no threat to us." In comments aimed at those who seek changes in the Patriot Act, Attorney General John Ashcroft said: "Your tactics only aid terrorists." One recent ad asserts, "Some call for us to retreat, putting our national security in the hands of others."

But the real story is far different, as the following internal Department of Justice (DoJ) documents obtained by the Center for American Progress demonstrate. The Bush Administration actually reversed the Clinton Administration's strong emphasis on counterterrorism and counterintelligence. Attorney General John Ashcroft not only moved aggressively to reduce DoJ's anti-terrorist budget but also shift DoJ's mission in spirit to emphasize its role as a domestic police force and anti-drug force. These changes in mission were just as critical as the budget changes, with Ashcroft, in effect, guiding the day to day decisions made by field officers and agents. And all of this while the Administration was receiving repeated warnings about potential terrorist attacks.

Full report here.

Why Do Blacks Seem So Down On Gays?

Several dozen Black pastors rallied against gay marriage in Georgia yesterday, claiming to be "offended by the gay rights movement's claim that their struggle is the same as the effort for equal racial rights"

A recent AlterNet article examines the source of this alleged cultural homophobia.

From cradle to grave, much of America has drilled into black men the notion that they are less than men. This has made many black men believe and accept the gender propaganda that the only real men in American society are white men.

In a vain attempt to recapture their denied masculinity, many black men, mirror America's traditional fear and hatred of homosexuality. They swallow whole the phony and perverse John Wayne definition of manhood, that real men talk and act tough, shed no tears, and never show their emotions.

Click here for full story.

Urge Your Senator To Vote No On The Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act!

Next week the Senate will vote on the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act (SB 2056) which directly impacts performers and announcers and has significant ramifications for free speech and artistic freedom. click here to sign AFTRA's petition and make your voice heard!

Almost there...

The Wikipedia entry for Jew is now #5 on Google. Pardon me while I Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew. If you haven't Jew'd it up on your blog yet, might I ask, what are you waiting for?

Bush Admin Removes Job Protections For Queer Feds

"Gay and lesbians in the entire federal workforce have had their job protections officially removed by the office of Special Counsel. The new Special Counsel, Scott Bloch, says his interpretation of a 1978 law intended to protect employees and job applicants from adverse personnel actions is that gay and lesbian workers are not covered."

Sophia Stewart...The Mother of the Matrix?

Sophia Stewart claims to have had her script stolen from her. Who really wrote The Matrix? Listen to an interview with mommy here.

Halliburton: Same Old Tricks

First they overcharge $61 million for distributing oil and pin it on antiquated accounting procedures. Then they overcharge $141 million in providing meals to soldiers. But Dick Cheney's on the payroll, so I guess that makes everything okay.

agh! good music season is at hand!

3/18 amon tobin & kid koala @ irving plaza
4/13 air @ hammerstein ballroom
4/18 stereolab @ irving plaza
4/21-22 tortoise @ bower ballroom
4/28 gary wilson @ the knitting factory

wah, i was i was rich and had a private jet

excuse me while i google bomb

jew. see jewschool to find out why this is here.

Communism Crumbling In China

"China's parliament has agreed landmark changes to the constitution that will protect private property for the first time since the 1949 revolution. Sunday's endorsement came on the final day of the National People's Congress annual meeting in Beijing. The BBC's Beijing correspondent says with this vote, China is abandoning one of the key pillars of communism. Parliament also voted to enshrine human rights in the constitution for the first time."

bush in trouble for sneaky campaign ads

beware the video news release, and see spin if you haven't already.

repugnant pundits spin spanish victory

you've just got to adore the way these conservative scumfucks are spinning the story in spain.

yes, after staging countless protests against the war in iraq over the past three years, in which millions of spaniards protested the prime minister's joining of forces with ol' dubya (with 100,000 protesting in madrid just last month, several million throughout the country on 02/15/03, several million again staging a walkout on 03/14/03, and other numerous actions having taken place since the pm's commitment to war), the spanish people legally and democratically ousted an elected ruler who by no means represented the people's will nor interest, despite several years of extraordinary outcry to do otherwise. and thus democracy has finally prevailed (without bloodshed, without a conspiracy, a rebel army, or a coup), and spain is pulling its troops out of iraq.

the horror! yes, ladies and gentleman—democracy prevailed! but don't you see! the terrorists have won!

huh? what?

yes, you heard me. according to these self-important jingoisitc scumdit fuckwads, the terrorists have won.

that the spanish people have sense enough to realize that instigating further troubles in the middle east with a war for profit does nothing to secure the world from terrorism (but rather only further validates the idiocy perpetuated by islamic extremists) appears to be an anathema to these jackwads. rather, they are concerned with the 'disturbing' revelation, that "If al Qaeda was responsible for [the recent] attacks [in Madrid], it appears to have a significant influence in changing the government of a leading Western democracy." heaven forbid a democratic socialist movement should come into power to rival the prevailing order of capito-fascism. that'd be, well...progress (tho of course, it's being labelled "regressive"). no, no—the majority of spanish people (you know, the millions that turned out to protest the bombings last week), they're actually just terrorist sympathizers—senseless animals who let osama bin laden pull the lever for them.

you know, the confines of these people's reality tunnels is staggering, really.


you believe this shit?
inset image is from the anti-war protest in madrid on 02/15/03.

Friends Don't Let Friends

Please check my blog for my rough-draft statement on why I don't drink Starbucks, titled "Half-decaf ristretto double-tall one-half two-percent one-half soy almond-cinnamon lite-ice iced latte with two equal, please." I propose additional chapters on who picks our coffee, what Howard Schultz can kiss, and where, if you must, to buy your coffee instead (hint: not Seattle's Best, nor Torrefazione Italia).

The Redemption of Howard Stern

"Declaring a 'radio jihad' against President Bush, syndicated morning man Howard Stern and his burgeoning crusade to drive Republicans from the White House is shaping up as a colossal media headache for the GOP, and one they never saw coming."

Howard, I was wrong about you.

dubya's campaign lies: #3 a stronger economy

bush's first pick for "assistant secretary of manufacturing" in the department of commerce, a role intendend to help "shore up US manufacturing", was nebraska businessman anthony raimondo, who's been outsourcing work to china, while firing his american workers and closing his plants in the u.s.

it's get better—we now have the largest trade deficit in u.s. history! (coupled with the budget deficit, that's a $1 trillion annual debt c/o dubya.) how does the administration respond? by demanding competing nations allow for more "foreign direct investment." whuzzat mean? they want to export more american money out of the country! brilliant! i mean, why invest here, right? that might -gasp!- create jobs!

Carlin Chimes in on Indecency and Censorship

"The whole problem with this idea of obscenity and indecency, and all of these things — bad language and whatever — it's all caused by one basic thing, and that is: religious superstition. ... There's an idea that the human body is somehow evil and bad and there are parts of it that are especially evil and bad, and we should be ashamed. Fear, guilt and shame are built into the attitude toward sex and the body. ... It's reflected in these prohibitions and these taboos that we have." — George Carlin on the Janet Jackson nipple uproar

dubya's campaign lies: #2 kerry's weak on intelligence

President Bush, in his first major assault on Sen. John F. Kerry's legislative record, said this week that his Democratic opponent proposed a $1.5 billion cut in the intelligence budget, a proposal that would "gut the intelligence services," and one that had no co-sponsors because it was "deeply irresponsible."

In terms of accuracy, the parry by the president is about half right. Bush is correct that Kerry on Sept. 29, 1995, proposed a five-year, $1.5 billion cut to the intelligence budget. But Bush appears to be wrong when he said the proposed Kerry cut -- about 1 percent of the overall intelligence budget for those years -- would have "gutted" intelligence. In fact, the Republican-led Congress that year approved legislation that resulted in $3.8 billion being cut over five years from the budget of the National Reconnaissance Office -- the same program Kerry said he was targeting.

buck fush.

The time is right to free Tibet

Today we commemorate the 45th anniversary of the Tibetan people's uprising of 1959 against the Chinese invasion and occupation of Tibet. I pay tribute to the many brave Tibetan men and women who have sacrificed their lives for the cause of Tibetan freedom. They will always be remembered.

[...]

My hope is that this year may see a significant breakthrough in our relations with the Chinese government. As in 1954, so today I am determined to leave no stone unturned in seeking a mutually beneficial solution that will address both Chinese concerns, as well as achieve for the Tibetan people a life of freedom, peace and dignity.

—The Dalai Lama in Tuesday's Globe & Mail.

dubya's campaign lies: #1 our first responders are more prepared thanks to him

"Dammit, the problem is not that the ad is in bad taste, the problem is that Bush screwed the firefighters in a famous case of his favorite bait-and-switch tactic, and now he has the chutzpah to exploit them anyway and that, my friends, is gall. Bait, switch and then claim credit anyway."

Bad Week for the Masons

On Tuesday, a Masonic initiation went horribly awry, when an new initiate was accidentally killed during his initiation rites.

And in Turkey yesterday, a Masonic lodge was the target of a suicide bombing attack. See what happens when you feed conspiracy theories regarding specific religious groups?

We interrupt this program...

A STATEMENT FROM THOSE ARRESTED AT THE PEACE DEMONSTRATION IN NEW YORK ON FEBRUARY 15th, 2003:

We represent a cross-section of the roughly 500,000 Americans who came to New York last February 15th to support peaceful solutions in Iraq and to condemn the Bush administration's rush to war. We include students, working people, and senior citizens from a diverse range of racial, gender, and cultural backgrounds. On this day, we came from near and far: “peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances,” a constitutional right guaranteed to all Americans.

What many of us encountered at this demonstration was a highly confrontational police response to peaceful protest. Police blocked off streets to keep us from reaching the demonstration and those of us who were able to assemble at First Avenue were forced into barricaded pens. They subjected us to verbal and physical intimidation, and mounted officers charged into crowds of people who had nowhere to go.

They arrested more than 300 of us. Many of us were arrested arbitrarily and without just cause. Some of us were physically abused by police during and after our arrests. All of us were subjected to cruel and inhumane treatment during our captivity.

The repercussions of this police misconduct go beyond the injuries and inconveniences to those of us who were arrested. Taxpayers of the city of New York must now absorb the cost of prosecuting these cases, and the cost of civil rights lawsuits justly filed against the city. Harder to measure, though, is the loss to every American of constitutional rights, now under threat both from the so-called “Patriot Act” and from Bloomberg's police actions.

On March 20, people will gather again in New York and around the world to voice their continued opposition to the war in Iraq, and to demand that those responsible for this bloody quagmire be held accountable. How will the NYPD respond this time? We invite the people of New York to join us in calling on Mayor Bloomberg and the NYPD not to repeat their mistakes. Police must no longer be trained to view demonstrators as the enemy and corral them into barricaded “protest zones”. Instead of provoking conflict, officers should be given specific training in de-escalation and effective non-violent methods of crowd management. They must be instructed to allow peaceful protest and to respect each individual's rights.

The NYPD prides itself on “Courtesy, Professionalism, and Respect”. On February 15, 2003, they fell sadly short of these basic standards of decency. We hope, and we demand, that they live up to their motto on March 20 and beyond.

Sincerely,
Stephanie Abraitis – Manhattan, NY
Matthew Andrews – Lexington, MA
Lee Blaney – Philadelphia, PA
Thomas Bozeman – Seattle, WA
Elizabeth Carson, Woodside, NY
Liz Cole – Philadelphia, PA
Simon O. Collum – Plantation, FL
Jeff Duritz – Cambridge, MA
Scott Fitzgerald – Brooklyn, NY
Rebecca Garte – New York, NY
Andrew Gersick – Brooklyn, NY
Richard Goodwin, Bethesda, MD
Sarah Herard – Ann Arbor, MI
Rachel Jones – Easthampton, MA
Nada Khodl – Manhattan, NY
Eric Larson – Providence, RI
Charles Libin – Brooklyn, NY
Ian Lippincott – Brooklyn, NY
Brian MacDevitt – New York, NY
Luis Manriquez – Brooklyn, NY
Nicholas S. Martielli – Huntington, NY
Jay Marx – Washington, DC
Aura Lee Morse – Portland, OR
Robert C. Padilla – Manhattan, NY
Sara Parkel – Brooklyn, NY
John Pool – Ithaca, NY
Christopher Rodriguez – Woodside, NY
Eric M. Rodriguez – Brooklyn, NY
Jesse Scherer – Stone Ridge, NY
Jennifer Schneider – Brooklyn, NY
Ryan Schwarz – Annandale, NY
Daniel Sieradski – Ithaca, NY
Marvin Sochet – New York, NY
Eric Socolofsky – Brooklyn, NY

New Paltz mayor faces charges for marrying gays

It hits the fan.

Aphid's Dad in Lifestyles

Check out my mom's article (nice pseudonym, huh?) on Aphid's pops in the latest ish of Lifestyles. It's a PDF.