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Super Mega Monkey Ultra Extreme III Alright!!!!
The left in this country has been successfully cowed by the Democratic Party. The votes of progressives are taken for granted by Democrats.... By allowing ourselves to be manipulated, we have demonstrated that we have no moral substance. We have no line that can be never be crossed, no stance so sacred and important that we are willing to stand up and fight back.
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Shame and anger
I'm going to quote this at length (no surprise) from Glenn Greenwald: When they were detained in 2001 in Bosnia, the Bush administration claimed that they were plotting to bomb the U.S. embassy in Sarajevo. Buth once they were shipped to Guantanamo, the U.S. backed off that accusation and instead claimed they intended to travel to Afghanistan to fight against the U.S. These 5 detainees were able to be heard in federal court only because the U.S. Supreme Court in the Boumediene case last June -- in a ruling John McCain called "one of the worst decisions in the history of this country" -- struck down as unconstitutional Section 7 of the Military Commissions Act, which had purported to abolish habeas corpus for Guantanamo detainees and prohibit them from challenging their detention in a federal court. The five men ordered released today have been imprisoned in a cage by the Bush administration for 7 straight years without being charged with any crimes and without there being any credible evidence that they did anything wrong. If the members of Congress who voted for the Military Commissions Act had their way (see them here and here), or if the four Supreme Court Justice in the Boumediene minority had theirs, the Bush administration would nonetheless have been empowered to keep them encaged indefinitely, for the rest of their lives if desired, without ever having to charge them with any crime or allow them to step foot into a courtroom to petition for habeas corpus. Judge Leon is a Bush-43 appointed Judge known as a right-wing ideologue and known for ruling in favor of the Government and for expansive executive power. He was Deputy Chief counsel for the Republicans on the Iran-Contra Committee in 1987, was Special Counsel to the Senate Banking Committee for the Whitewater investigation, and worked for both the Reagan and Bush 41 Justice Departments. That Judge Leon -- of all judges -- ruled that there was no credible evidence to suggest that these detainees are "enemy combatants" is as compelling a sign as one can imagine that there is no such evidence. One of the detainees ordered released today had a wife who was pregnant at the time he was shipped to Guantanamo, who then gave birth to a daughter, now 6, whom he has never met. Another of the Bosnian-Algerians had an infant daughter at the time he was put in Guantanamo who died last year of congenital heart disease at the age of 6. Another of them "suffered months of facial paralysis from a brutal beating inflicted by Guantanamo camp soldiers." And then there's this, about one of the other detainees, Saber Lahmer:When we last saw Saber in November, he was in his sixth month of solitary confinement. Since August, he has seen us, his legal team, twice and a psychiatrist on three brief occasions. For a few minutes each day, he sees the camp guards who bring his meals. He has had no other human contact. The glaring lights in his cell are on 24 hours a day, seven days a week. When we left the cell, we could hear Saber shouting -- brief, truncated cries. We could not understand what he was saying. You know this won't be an isolated incident. Feeling angry at the people who did this, shame that i didn't do enough to stop it, and a little hopeless about the lack of ability i would have had to stop it even if i had tried harder. I, for one, welcome our new Lizard People overlordsGo see how you would make decisions on the questionable ballots in the Al Franken/Norm Coleman senate race. Random Lyrics ThursdayI can give you what you want. I can be the sauce you crave. Let me give you what you'd like. I can give you what you want. What you want Ta-Nehisi also links to an article on race. (Note: This is a long essay.) About it, he says: Here's an interesting essay on the presence--or lack of presence-of non-white folks in D&D throughout history. It's a funny thing to be a black kid into fantasy. Most of this stuff is ripped from Tolkien, and as much as I love LOTR, there is, indeed, something disquieting about the total whiteness of the movies. I don't blame that on Jackson or Tolkien. If someone was doing a fantasy epic based on Xhosa creation myths, I wouldn't expect to see any white people. The article brings up some things that i've definitely thought about, back to the classic "is it morally good to kill orc children?" question. And it's something that actually came up in our campaign (with trolls, not orcs), but with no real resolution. I think a lot of the points raised in the article are accurate but can be addressed with good DMing. Other points are off based, but still worth thinking about.
Click here for the simplest illustration of why i like Ta-Nehisi Coates. It's OK, it's not a long essay or anything. Just click.
Well, Bob's not crazy: Many have tried, but so far nobody has been able to pry the decade-in-the-works Guns N' Roses album "Chinese Democracy" from the hands of lone remaining original member Axl Rose. Although it turns out that it's not wacky Axl Rose making this promise, it's the soda company itself. In fact, Axl wrote: We are surprised and very happy to have the support of Dr. Pepper with our album Chinese Democracy as for us this came totally out of the blue. If there is any involvement with this promotion by our record company or others we are unaware of such at this time. And as some of Buckethead's performances are on our album I'll share my Dr. Pepper with him. Looking into more about why my favorite Sinistar-sampling guitarist isn't getting his own Dr. Pepper, i found this statement from GnR on wikipedia: During his tenure with the band, Buckethead has been inconsistent and erratic in both his behavior and his commitment, despite being under contract, creating uncertainty and confusion and making it virtually impossible to move forward with recording, rehearsals, and live plans with confidence. His transient lifestyle has made it near impossible for even his closest friends to have nearly any form of communications with him whatsoever. Tangentially, Ozzy (who sounds much more coherent in print) had this to say about him: I tried out that Buckethead guy. I met with him and asked him to work with me but only if he got rid of the fucking bucket. So I came back a bit later and he's wearing this green fucking Martian's-hat thing! I said, 'Look, just be yourself'. He told me his name was Brian, so I said that's what I'd call him. He says, 'No one calls me Brian except my mother'. So I said, 'Pretend I'm your mum then!'. I haven't even got out of the room and I'm already playing fucking mind games with the guy. What happens if one day he's gone and there's a note saying, 'I've been beamed up'? Don't get me wrong, he's a great player. He plays like a motherfucker. I also read that Buckethead put out 28 albums in 2007. He's an interesting guy. Dispite this "Brian" cover story, i still think he's either Eddie Van Halen looking for a way to play anonymously or a never-truly-died Randy Rhodes.
 Max weight 60lbs?? That's crap. **Update: Amazon has a video. Return to Hamilton Lanes I confess i don't know what "spare this show" means, but we've got some new songs and it sounds like the Timid Roosevelts are a good indie band, so come see us and bowl with the band. I support this message
 Or even if you're not. High Profile Lawyer challenges RIAAA Harvard Law School professor has launched a constitutional assault against a federal copyright law at the heart of the industry's aggressive strategy, which has wrung payments from thousands of song-swappers since 2003. Nesson argues that the Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement Act of 1999 is unconstitutional because it effectively lets a private group -- the Recording Industry Association of America, or RIAA -- carry out civil enforcement of a criminal law. He also says the music industry group abused the legal process by brandishing the prospects of lengthy and costly lawsuits in an effort to intimidate people into settling cases out of court. Nesson is best known for defending the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers and for consulting on the case against chemical companies that was depicted in the film "A Civil Action." His challenge against the music labels, made in U.S. District Court in Boston, is one of the most determined attempts to derail the industry's flurry of litigation. Nesson's argument isn't that song swapping should be legal, of course. Only that the record industry shouldn't have the right to effectively enforce a criminal law. It's all BoingBoing's fault. Goddamn the internet. The Price of FameEveryone wants a piece: Hi, Good luck with that auction.  I found this picture while looking for a good shot of Darth Vader sitting in his TIE cockpit, sipping his beer. *I* think it's funny, anyway. You've brought this upon yourselves! 
  And finally, click on the Panda for even more animal birthday cakes!!!!  All cute animal pictures are part of Naked Capitalism's Antidote du jour project of keeping us from getting too depressed while reading economic news. But we all know i only start posting cute animal pictures when you all let me get too bored at work. Darth Vader Imminent (Images may not be to scale. X-Wing courtesy of the ghost of Picasso.) Evolution Not Just the Result of Random MutationsThe research, which appears to offer evidence of a hidden mechanism guiding the way biological organisms respond to the forces of natural selection, provides a new perspective on evolution, the scientists said. Read the rest here. Does anybody else get a little warm, nostalgic feeling when they read a non-textbook that calls the mitochondria the "powerhouse of the cell" and talks about ATP? *sigh* It almost makes me giddy. One very important point the article stresses: The scientists do not know how the cellular machinery guiding this process may have originated, but they emphatically said it does not buttress the case for intelligent design, a controversial notion that posits the existence of a creator responsible for complexity in nature. Not that the opinions of scientists hold any water with ID pushers. Especially when the scientists have conceded 2 points:
and Obvious answer - God did it. Duh. I request better dashboard indicators If you saw this image pop up on your dashboard on your way to work (ok, if you saw a version of it that didn't look like it was drawn by a drunken child), you might think to yourself, as i did, "Hmmm. I wonder what that means? Something with the power steering fluid, maybe? Too bad i took the car manual out of the glove compartment to make room for the GPS. Oh well, i'll check it out online when i get to work." In truth, that symbol means BREAK FAILURE IMMINENT! Which, really, would suggest a whole different set of reactions. I love you, but reading your writings makes me want to jump out of a window. See if any of this sounds familiar: As soon as the bailout was announced, it became clear that Treasury officials would hire outsiders to perform their jobs for them -- at a profit. Private companies wanting to help manage the bailout were given just two days to apply for massive, multiyear contracts. Since it was such a mad rush -- after all, the entire economy was about to implode -- there was no time for an open bidding process. Nor was there time to draft rigorous rules to make sure that those applying don't have serious conflicts of interest. Instead, applicants were asked to disclose their conflicts and to explain -- and this is not a joke -- their "philosophy in fulfilling your duty to the Treasury and the U.S. taxpayer in light of your proprietary interests and those of other clients." In other words, an open invitation to bullshit about how much they love their country and how they can be trusted to regulate themselves. There's nothing better than the ol' "We investigated ourselves and found no evidence of wrongdoing" line. Remember how Treasury Secretary Paulson said all this money that Congress just had to let him have was going to be given to the banks so that they could continue lending and thus not crash the entire system? That wasn't so much with the true: "There is no obligation for banks to lend the money one way or the other," Jennifer Zuccarelli, a Treasury spokeswoman, tells Rolling Stone. "But the banks have the understanding" that the money is intended for loans. "We're not looking to control their operations." AIG is one example of how this whole thing has failed (or succeeded incredibly well, depending on which end of the bailout you're on). The federal government is supposed to now own 80% of AIG in exchange for the $85 billion. How is it that we own 80% of something and either cannot or will not stop them from going to spa trips or staying at luxury hotels instead of using that money to save them from the imminent collapse they were crying about? Clearly, for AIG executives, they have a different idea of what a crisis means. Apparently, it means having to stay at a Holiday Inn instead of the Waldorf. Who needs some Hammer of Justice-ing? Naomi Klein does offer an idea. There is a better way to fix a broken financial system. Treasury's plan to buy up the toxic debts never made sense and should be immediately scrapped -- a move that would also handily get rid of most of the crony contractors. As for purchasing equity in banks, the next round of deals -- and there will be more -- has to start from the premise that the banks are bankrupt and will therefore accept whatever terms we choose to impose, including real regulatory oversight. The possibilities of what could be done if a chunk of the banking system were genuinely under public control -- from a moratorium on home foreclosures to mandatory investment in green community redevelopment -- are limitless. The only problem is nobody in power to do so will actually look into implementing such an idea. Though the free market laissez faire economic policies have brought us to this current low, many are unwilling to let it go. Afterall, those who have placed themselves in the right positions stand to make alot of money out of it. And that proves the system works. Random Lyrics Thursdaymust have been the devil who changed my mind rocks for my pillow and sand for my bed bitch's baby round lady ring the bells of mercy Luke Cage, originally going by the clunky name Hero For Hire, is unhappy with his lack of press.  He needs a new name. But he rejects "Ace of Spades" for being too... well, we'll let him say it:  Nonetheless, look how he settles on the name Power Man.  Also, Luke Cage is awesome: 
Democrats, including Barack Obama, have been making a lot of noise lately about a bailout for the auto industry, setting them up for a "crash" with Bush. Amazingly, i'm with Bush on this one. I'm aware that the auto industry is still a source of good paying manufacturing jobs for a decent number of Americans. But this is an industry that has shipped a lot of those jobs overseas, and it is already planning for another series of layoffs that will happen no matter how much money the government throws at it. The auto industry for decades has resisted stronger regulation in terms of mileage, safety, and environmental standards. It also refused to adapt to a changing market; as gas prices have continued to rise, they have stuck to building gas guzzling cars and trucks, while using monopoly tactics to destroy small business electric car innovators. I recognize that it will "hurt" in the short term, but if these companies can't survive on their own, i don't see why we should be artificially propping them up. Something will come along to fill in that vacuum, and it can only be better than what we have now. We have to get rid of this "too big to fail" mentality. And if we absolutely must keep them running in order to prevent a depression, then the government should take them over 100%, and the break them up and sell them to new owners after the crisis is averted. I Want Bionics!Engineers at the University of Washington have developed a bionic contact lens. "Looking through a completed lens, you would see what the display is generating superimposed on the world outside," said Babak Parviz, a UW assistant professor of electrical engineering. "This is a very small step toward that goal, but I think it's extremely promising." I have 2 problems with this.
The bad news: it might kill about 30% of you. The startling case of an AIDS patient who underwent a bone marrow transplant to treat leukemia is stirring new hope that gene-therapy strategies on the far edges of AIDS research might someday cure the disease. Although it's not likely to be used as a treatment, it's a major breakthrough in treatment and eventually a cure. I was starting to believe that all these foundations who claim to do research to find cures for diseases (cancer, aids, etc.) weren't doing jack since the money's in the treatment, not the cure. As they say, the last thing we cured was polio. Mebbe it's still true. Afterall, this was discovered in Berlin, not the States. Everybody Loves NateHe "was a numbers fanatic," said his father, Brian Silver, a political science professor at Michigan State University. Like many, i religiously checked Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight site twice a day (once in the morning, once in the afternoon, and ok, i admit it, sometimes before bed, too), everyday for the last several months to get the latest on election poll numbers. My favorite part was watching the pie chart representing McCain's win percentage go up and down a tenth of a percentage. That and the scatterplots. Who doesn't love scatterplots? Thank god for computer graphing programs. It sucked having to actually figure out the line graph based on scatterplot data. It was pretty clear based on his site that Nate Silver's a big nerd. After reading this International Herald Tribune article, i now see that Nate Silver is a big, nerdy genius. Btw, he's started on 2010 Senate races over at his site. I'm staying far, far away. People Who Have Forums Who Shouldn't Even Be Allowed to Use ResourcesLet alone get to host a radio talk show. On the November 6 broadcast of The War Room with Quinn & Rose, co-host Jim Quinn compared "slave[s] in the Old South" to welfare recipients today, stating that the "difference" is that "[t]he slave had to work for" the benefits Quinn said they received. Quinn said: "You know, if you were a slave in the old South, what did you get as a slave? You got free room and board, you got free money, and you got rewarded for having children because that was just, you know, tomorrow's slave. So, you got a free house, you got free money, and you got rewarded for having children. Can I ask a question? How's that different from welfare? You get a free house, you get free food, and you get rewarded for having children. Oh, wait a minute, hold on a second. There is a difference: The slave had to work for it." The show then aired an audio clip of a buzzer sounding and a voice repeating, "Insensitivity!" Quinn then stated: "Ah, the truth stings, does it not?" This on the heels of a conservative Polish lawmaker stating Obama's win of the presidency signals the "end of white civilization" (don't worry. he says he didn't mean that in a racist way) should decisively answer the moronic question of whether or not Obama's presidency marks the "end of racism". Cat-in-the-BoxNow that this election is finally over, we can get back to things that are really important.
I was reading through the comment section of a few posts this morning (something I rarely can bring myself to do anymore) and I realized that I need to remind people of something that's very important for successful governance: Bluer  Random Lyrics Thursday
Push my foot through the door
Speak of the truth
Calibrated Arkela
Jewels in your eyes
No need to stop here. There's plenty more SuperMegaMonkey where that came from.
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