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Archive for July, 2006

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The Occupation of the Media

Filed Under : fascism, MSM, war by vemrion
Jul.9,2006

The American military occupies Iraq and, by extension, the Iraqi people. But it also occupies the American media, especially the embedded reporters. The military will go to great lengths to get a positive story, but if the story looks negative the military will do nothing to help the reporters. It’s only logical, after all. Iraq is a dangerous place. So should we be embedding reporters at all since it’s such a one-sided story?

The producer said that it was impossible to pursue stories frowned upon by the military—for example, on how the local population viewed the occupation and American troops—because she was not permitted to leave the base on her own. The height of absurdity came when the Tikrit compound came under serious attack one evening and the producer was asked by the Reuters bureau in Baghdad to phone in a report on the situation. “We couldn’t find out anything [from the U.S. military],” she said, so Reuters had to cover the fighting from Baghdad, despite having a TV producer and reporter on the ground at the compound in Tikrit.

The producer frequently filmed foot patrols and nighttime raids. She said that for the latter, the military and the embedded journalists would drive for long stretches in pitch darkness. The raids themselves, she said, were blurry and confusing, and afterwards soldiers would round up suspected insurgents and sympathizers for interrogation. It was routine for the producer to wait in one room of a house while detainees were questioned in another. “Not always, but there were times when I would hear detainees screaming during the questioning,” she said. “I’m not sure what was happening but they were screaming loudly—they weren’t just being slapped around.” Because she obviously was not permitted to film the interrogations, none of that material could be included in her pool feeds.

The war is corrosive not just to American ideals but to the spirits of our troops over there fighting. If they don’t need to be placed in such an amoral situation then they should be thrust into that kind of world. Iraq was a war of choice. Dick Cheney’s choice.

The military’s occuption of the media as long as the media cowers at the idea of biting the hand that feeds it. We need more independent reporting in Iraq, although I sure as hell wouldn’t want to be over there without support. Where can we find the real story of Iraq? From the sound of things, it’s worse than we know.

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More spying programs? Bush lied about informing Congress

Filed Under : Congress, fascism, NSA, Shadow Government, spying by vemrion

It seems that Bush isn’t really telling Congress everything. One of his major supporters wrote him a letter to complain about his committee being left out of the loop on several new spying programs which presumably have not been made public yet:

In a sharply worded letter, the Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee has told President Bush that the administration is angering lawmakers, and possibly violating the law, by giving Congress too little information about domestic surveillance programs.

Rep. Peter Hoekstra (Mich.) has been a staunch defender of the administration’s anti-terrorism tactics. But seven weeks ago, he wrote to Bush to report that he had heard of “alleged Intelligence Community activities” not outlined to committee members in classified briefings.

“If these allegations are true,” he wrote, “they may represent a breach of responsibility by the Administration, a violation of law and . . . a direct affront to me and the Members of this committee.”

Hoekstra’s four-page letter of May 18 was posted yesterday on the New York Times’ Web site. His staff confirmed the letter’s authenticity but said it was meant to remain private. Spokesman Jamal D. Ware said Hoekstra “has raised these concerns, and they are being addressed. He will continue to push for full disclosure so the committee can conduct vigorous oversight.”

The letter is significant because few congressional Republicans have complained publicly about Bush’s surveillance programs, which include warrantless wiretaps of some Americans’ international phone calls and e-mails as well as the massive collection of telephone records involving U.S. homes and businesses.

Well, nice of them to finally speak up. Or one of them, I guess. He seems pretty steamed about being left out of the loop:

In his letter, Hoekstra complained of unspecified alleged surveillance operations that had not become public at the time and that, perhaps, remain undisclosed. It was written five weeks before newspapers divulged that the administration has been secretly tapping into a vast global database of confidential financial transactions for nearly five years. It was unclear yesterday whether Hoekstra and other top-ranking lawmakers had been briefed on that program by the date of the letter.

So I guess the Bush administration was lying when it said that it keeps Congress well-informed of it various spying programs. One more lie to add to the growing pile.

I wonder what those undisclosed spying programs entail? Maybe it’s only the SWIFT financial records spying program, but it could be a whole new one, or a bunch of new ones. Either way, Bush lied. Let me say it again: Bush Lied.

But when he says, “trust me” some people still believe him. How stupid can you get? The man is a habitual liar and a politician. He cannot be trusted. Let’s not keeping making that mistake, okay?

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Fear Mongering? Our government? No way!

Filed Under : fascism by vemrion

Yes way.

They will do whatever it takes to maintain control. Using fear to keep Americans from waking up is a dastardly move, but not surprising.

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Terrorists Outsource Terror to the Government. Or is it the other way around?

Filed Under : fascism, fraud, Shadow Government, terror, war by vemrion

In the government’s continuing effort to show that it is more terrifying than al-Qaeda or Hamas, the FBI is planning a new push to give itself more Internet-tapping powers than it already has:

The FBI has drafted sweeping legislation that would require Internet service providers to create wiretapping hubs for police surveillance and force makers of networking gear to build in backdoors for eavesdropping, CNET News.com has learned.

FBI Agent Barry Smith distributed the proposal at a private meeting last Friday with industry representatives and indicated it would be introduced by Sen. Mike DeWine, an Ohio Republican, according to two sources familiar with the meeting.

The draft bill would place the FBI’s Net-surveillance push on solid legal footing. At the moment, it’s ensnared in a legal challenge from universities and some technology companies that claim the Federal Communications Commission’s broadband surveillance directives exceed what Congress has authorized.

The FBI claims that expanding the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act is necessary to thwart criminals and terrorists who have turned to technologies like voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP.

Okay, first: Why the fuck is the FBI drafting legislation?! I didn’t know that the FBI was a legislative body, blessed with the power to write laws for our society. I always figured that the FBI was a law-enforcement agency and arm of the Justice Department! What the fuck is the FBI doing?!

I suppose that this law was actually written in a Republican-controlled think tank, farmed out to the FBI for approval, and then routed up to Congress through the office of Mike DeWine. But still, I consider the way laws are written these days to be nothing short of treasonous. Laws should be written and voted upon in the Senate or the House. The “think tank” system is full of shit. It’s a way of routing around constitutional protections and letting Big Industry, Big Media and Big Defense to write their dream legislation with the help of the think tanks who then send it up to the Congress Critters and watch them scurry around and make cosmetic changes to secure alliances and votes. What a crazy system we’ve developed. It needs to be examined, but obviously any congressional oversight will consist of looking the other way.

Anyway, I’m so pissed at how this legislation was written that I haven’t even gotten around to what they wrote yet:

The 27-page proposed CALEA amendments seen by CNET News.com would:

  • Require any manufacturer of “routing” and “addressing” hardware to offer upgrades or other “modifications” that are needed to support Internet wiretapping. Current law does require that of telephone switch manufacturers–but not makers of routers and network address translation hardware like Cisco Systems and 2Wire.
  • Authorize the expansion of wiretapping requirements to “commercial” Internet services including instant messaging if the FCC deems it to be in the “public interest.” That would likely sweep in services such as in-game chats offered by Microsoft’s Xbox 360 gaming system as well.
  • Force Internet service providers to sift through their customers’ communications to identify, for instance, only VoIP calls. (The language requires companies to adhere to “processing or filtering methods or procedures applied by a law enforcement agency.”) That means police could simply ask broadband providers like AT&T, Comcast or Verizon for wiretap info–instead of having to figure out what VoIP service was being used
  • Eliminate the current legal requirement saying the Justice Department must publish a public “notice of the actual number of communications interceptions” every year. That notice currently also must disclose the “maximum capacity” required to accommodate all of the legally authorized taps that government agencies will “conduct and use simultaneously.”

So basically, they want to tap our routers, tap our chatrooms, tap our VoIP calls and they want to not have to tell anybody about it. Great. How ’bout we just give you the keys to our house, too? Maybe we could install a camera in our bathroom for ya? Would that make it all better, FBI?

Jesus fucking Christ on a pogo-stick. They are shooting for the moon with this legislation, which would make the FBI much more powerful than it was back during the abuses of the 60s and 70s.

Hopefully this bill won’t make it out of committee, but we can’t count on that with all of the neo-fascists in the Senate. Apparently our constitutional rights don’t count for much these days. We’ll see. In the meantime, we get to contemplate a future in which the FBI has a copy of all our internet surfing (the NSA already has a copy).

Wait a minute, didn’t the FBI just get hacked by some two-bit script kiddie who brought their system to its knees?

A federal judge yesterday postponed the sentencing of a former government computer contractor who hacked the e-mail passwords of all FBI employees, including the director, several times in 2004.

The security breaches temporarily shut down an FBI classified records system containing data about witness protection and counterespionage, according to records in U.S. District Court in Washington.

Some hacker has the FBI Director’s password and you want me to trust the Director with my private conversations? …Fuck that!

Besides, I don’t see why we should give the FBI access to our internet usage when the NSA is already doing their own internet-tapping. We don’t need any more redudancy in government. We’re paying a lot in taxes to have our rights continually infringed as is, and you think we should be paying higher taxes so our rights can be violated more efficiently? …Fuck that!

And people wonder why I’m cynical about government. Are you telling me I should trust these fuckers? …Fuck that!

Honestly, I don’t worry about those cave-dwelling terrorists at all anymore. Worrying about my own government’s increasing fascism is enough.

Kinda makes you wonder who’s really behind terrorism…

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Album cover for Iron Maiden’s A Matter of Life and Death

Filed Under : Iron Maiden, metal, music by vemrion
Jul.8,2006

I just found the cover artwork for Iron Maiden’s upcoming concept album, “A Matter of Life and Death“, which is rumored to be based on a British film of the same name. This is a very “Maiden” thing to do. They’re all about putting cool stories to music and taking themes into their world.

Here’s the cover art:

Fucking sweet, I love it! Can you spot Eddie? Looks don’t mean shit in music, but from what I’ve seen so far it looks like a classic Maiden album. I don’t wanna get my hopes up too high, but damn… can’t wait.

The album’s coming out in the U.S. on September 5th, 2006. If you missed the tracklist you can find it here.

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Monkeys and money

Filed Under : monkeys, sex by vemrion
Jul.7,2006

Okay, I’m not trying to position this blog as a resource for monkey news or anything, but this article is hilarious. It’s about teaching capuchin monkeys to use currency. This is the best line from the article:

The data generated by the capuchin monkeys, Chen says, ”make them statistically indistinguishable from most stock-market investors.”

Ouch. Haha! Okay, that was taken out of context, but it’s still funny. Here’s some more info on the experiment:

It is sometimes unclear, even to Chen himself, exactly what he is working on. When he and Santos, his psychologist collaborator, began to teach the Yale capuchins to use money, he had no pressing research theme. The essential idea was to give a monkey a dollar and see what it did with it. The currency Chen settled on was a silver disc, one inch in diameter, with a hole in the middle — ”kind of like Chinese money,” he says. It took several months of rudimentary repetition to teach the monkeys that these tokens were valuable as a means of exchange for a treat and would be similarly valuable the next day. Having gained that understanding, a capuchin would then be presented with 12 tokens on a tray and have to decide how many to surrender for, say, Jell-O cubes versus grapes. This first step allowed each capuchin to reveal its preferences and to grasp the concept of budgeting.

Isn’t this basically what happened to humans? Certain humans invented money and then they had to convince all the other humans that money was valuable. Of course, if you’ve been reading my screeds on the Federal Reserve you’ll know that the “evolved” humans pulled a fast one. After having convinced us that money is valuable they removed the U.S. from the gold standard and put us on fiat currency. So essential, our money is worthless; it has no inherant value and it’s not backed by gold, silver or even copper. It’s paper. What kind of monkey games are we playing here?

Back to the article. It amused me to no end when the monkeys started going a little crazy in a very human manner. They start stealing money and the humans bribe them to get it back. Who’s testing who?

Once, a capuchin in the testing chamber picked up an entire tray of tokens, flung them into the main chamber and then scurried in after them — a combination jailbreak and bank heist — which led to a chaotic scene in which the human researchers had to rush into the main chamber and offer food bribes for the tokens, a reinforcement that in effect encouraged more stealing.

Something else happened during that chaotic scene, something that convinced Chen of the monkeys’ true grasp of money. Perhaps the most distinguishing characteristic of money, after all, is its fungibility, the fact that it can be used to buy not just food but anything. During the chaos in the monkey cage, Chen saw something out of the corner of his eye that he would later try to play down but in his heart of hearts he knew to be true. What he witnessed was probably the first observed exchange of money for sex in the history of monkeykind. (Further proof that the monkeys truly understood money: the monkey who was paid for sex immediately traded the token in for a grape.)

He taught monkeys prostitituion! Boy, I bet he’s proud… er, well, maybe “proud” isn’t the word for it. Anyway, it’s a good article; check it out.

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Blog of the Day

Filed Under : Minnesota by vemrion

Somehow this blog was chosen as the Minnesota Blog of the Day over at City Pages’ The Blotter. I can only imagine this was some sort of horrible mistake, and they were actually trying to link to the Happy, Fluffy Bunnies Blog. Alas, they linked to me and now you’re here. So better make the best of it. I should mention that there are a few offensive sections on this blog. They would be… let’s see… everything below this post. 🙂

Thanks, City Pages.

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Two-thirds of American want us to withdraw from Iraq

Filed Under : impeachment by vemrion

That is according to a new poll by Gallup:

A new Gallup poll finds that roughly 2 in 3 Americans urge a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, with 31% wanting this to start immediately.

Gallup’s director, Frank Newport, sums up the results today: “Taken together, it is perhaps fair to say that a significant majority of Americans would like the United States to either withdraw troops from Iraq or make specific plans to do so, although there is no majority demand that troops be withdrawn immediately.”

The poll was unusual in that rather than give respondents a list of options, it allowed them to respond in their own words. Gallup then grouped the varied responses and labelled them with a common theme.

I’m glad that they let you state your opinion in your own words. I hate it when they have a bunch of preselected choices for you to pick from — what if your option isn’t on there? Anyway, I bet you’re all just itching to know what my response would be. It is this:

I believe we should immediately and without delay impeach President Bush and Vice President Cheney. That completed we should apologize to the Iraqi people, and the world community as a whole for the murderous and vile actions of our former leaders. Then we should begin a phased withdrawal, hewing to a timetable set by the Iraqi government and approved by the UN and Congress. During this time (which will probably be pretty damn quick — they want us out of there) we should repay the Iraqis for their suffering in cash, but we should not expect mere money to heal their wounds. Money cannot resurrect the dead, after all. Lastly, we should turn Bush and Cheney over to the Iraqi court system so that they can be tried by the same tribunal currently trying Saddam Hussein. Hell, they could all be co-defendents.

That should put a band-aid on the situation at least. I think the insurgents would be genuinely shocked if we held our leaders to the same high ethical standards they preach. The incarceration of Bush & Cheney along with the withdrawal of American troops (and Coalition troops… both of them) would go along way to ending the daily massacres. They would still have to contend with the possibility of civil war (but then again, so would America), but I think they would at least feel more like talking about their differences, rather than just killing indiscriminately. I think splitting Iraq into 3 countries is a possibility. A Kurdish state, a Sunni state and Shiite state could be formed from the ashes of Iraq, which was arbitrarily formed by the British Empire anyway. Limit them to small, defense-oriented armies and you shouldn’t have to worry about them fighting amongst each other. Hopefully Iraq can be saved, but Bush/Cheney really did a number on that nation. They fucked it up bad.

Oh one more quote from the article above should prove that my suggestion, rational as it may be, will never happen:

The poll also found that while 64% feel they “understand” the Bush administraton’s argument for staying in Iraq, only 54% understand the Democrats’ view–whatever that is.

The Democrats are so fucking useless. They have no unity, no strategy and no backbone. Isn’t being united the whole point of a political party? I think we could make an argument that the Democratic Party isn’t a party at all. It’s just a distraction for Bush and for America. What a bunch of fucking useless losers. The two party system has conspired to fuck us once again.

Congress as a whole looks totally out of touch since 2/3 of Americans support withdrawal but The House of Representatives opposes withdrawal by an almost-2/3 margin. They say that withdrawal isn’t politically feasible… what the fuck does that mean? You’ve got well over 50% of the population calling for withdrawal and Republicans and Vichy Democrats are saying it’s not feasible?!! Kinda makes you wonder who they’re really serving, doesn’t it? It’s certainly not us.

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FBI says: "No Hard Evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11"

Filed Under : 9/11, conspiracy by vemrion

I saw this earlier, but I forgot to post it:

The Muckraker Report spoke with Rex Tomb, Chief of Investigative Publicity for the FBI. When asked why there is no mention of 9/11 on Bin Laden’s Most Wanted web page, Tomb said, “The reason why 9/11 is not mentioned on Usama Bin Laden’s Most Wanted page is because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting Bin Laden to 9/11.”

Surprised by the ease in which this FBI spokesman made such an astonishing statement, I asked, “How this was possible?” Tomb continued, “Bin Laden has not been formally charged in connection to 9/11.” I asked, “How does that work?” Tomb continued, “The FBI gathers evidence. Once evidence is gathered, it is turned over to the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice than decides whether it has enough evidence to present to a federal grand jury. In the case of the 1998 United States Embassies being bombed, Bin Laden has been formally indicted and charged by a grand jury. He has not been formally indicted and charged in connection with 9/11 because the FBI has no hard evidence connected Bin Laden to 9/11.”

Ummm… yeah. So, why isn’t anybody talking about this revelation?

Could it be that we’re in shock? The media has assured us since day one that Osama Bin Laden carried out the attackes on 9/11. The government (well, many other parts of it) has insisted he is responsible. But we dont’ have any freakin’ evidence?!

I guess that wouldn’t be a big deal except for the fact that we went to war on that assumption! What the hell is going on here?

So, since nobody has been charged in a federal grand jury for the crimes in New York, Washington D.C. and Pennsylvania on September 11th, 2001, that means that there’s still an open investigation, right?

Right?

Let’s check the FBI’s Top 10 Most Wanted Fugitives for their page on Bin Laden:

Aliases: Usama Bin Muhammad Bin Ladin, Shaykh Usama Bin Ladin, the Prince, the Emir, Abu Abdallah, Mujahid Shaykh, Hajj, the Director

DESCRIPTION

Date of Birth: 1957 Hair: Brown
Place of Birth: Saudi Arabia Eyes: Brown
Height: 6′ 4″ to 6′ 6″ Complexion: Olive
Weight: Approximately 160 pounds Sex: Male
Build: Thin Nationality: Saudi Arabian
Occupation: Unknown
Remarks: Bin Laden is the leader of a terrorist organization known as Al-Qaeda, “The Base”. He is left-handed and walks with a cane.
Scars and Marks: None

CAUTION

USAMA BIN LADEN IS WANTED IN CONNECTION WITH THE AUGUST 7, 1998, BOMBINGS OF THE UNITED STATES EMBASSIES IN DAR ES SALAAM, TANZANIA, AND NAIROBI, KENYA. THESE ATTACKS KILLED OVER 200 PEOPLE. IN ADDITION, BIN LADEN IS A SUSPECT IN OTHER TERRORIST ATTACKS THROUGHOUT THE WORLD.

CONSIDERED ARMED AND EXTREMELY DANGEROUS
Hmm…. nothing about 9/11 on there. It’s July of 2006. What the hell have they been doing the last 5 years? Almost 5 full years and no evidence yet?

Does that mean the evidence isn’t there, or that they haven’t found it?

….Well, I guess we should consider it an open question as to who was really responsible for those attacks. Too bad the FBI doesn’t seem more concerned about cracking the case.

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Idiots and fireworks: The love affair continues

Filed Under : funny, idiots, stupidity, videos by vemrion
Jul.6,2006

Sooo funny. What the fuck did he think would happen?

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Monkeys on acid

Filed Under : monkeys by vemrion

You know you wanna see it, man. Monkeys on fucking acid.

Hollywood, here I come!

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Update on Mexico recount

Filed Under : corruption, elections, fascism, fraud by vemrion

It looks like the leftist challenger has taken the lead in the recount. That’s quite a surprise. They should’ve sent Karl Rove to rig those voting machines himself. If you want something done right…

Oh, what a difference a day — and a recount — makes. Mexican and international press is reporting that the official recount has put PRD candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador in the lead over opponent Felipe Calderón, who had just a day ago seemed to be the victor in this race, full of all the twists and turns of a telenovela.

Whoever wins, let’s hope this is a fair election. That’s the main concern. I couldn’t help but notice this little comment, though:

President Vicente Fox put the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, out of power in 2000 in elections that ended 71 years of single-party rule.

The PRI would often rig elections to make sure its candidate, handpicked by the president, was chosen.

The recent drama surprised many Mexicans.

“We’ve never seen this before. The president used to always announce it on the first day,” said Joel Montoya, a gas station attendant.

The Mexicans are so used to corruption at every level that this drama is starting to look like… well… real democracy to them! How bitterly ironic (for Americans) that this is playing out this way. Mexico is rising up in the democracy standings just as America is steadily tumbling down the standings with our successfully rigged elections and rampant corruption and creeping fascism and god-knows-what-else.

If we weren’t so stubborn and arrogant we could ask them for help.

Thanks, neocons. You’ve made America look like a despotic dictatorship compared to fucking Mexico! Oh, I’m so fucking proud.

On the other hand, good for Mexico!

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