It’s been awhile since I’ve posted. I’ve been working on a big post, but I’ve also been stranded without an internet connection at home. I canceled Comcast since it turns out they are a bunch of lying, thieving bastards. While I’m waiting for my DSL modem to arrive I’m experiencing life without a constant internet connection. It’s scary and lonely. I don’t recommend it.
As far as my dear, departed cable modem goes, please allow me to bitch (god i love having a blog). FUCK COMCAST!!!
Why does Comcast suck? Oh, I’m glad you asked; let me explain. Long ago, in a time known as 2005, things were good. I had a fast internet connection through Time-Warner. It was about 6 Mbps and it set me back about 43 bucks a month.
The letter makes clear that there will be no price adjustments. In fact the FAQ is still online, which says exactly:
Will my monthly fee change with Comcast High-Speed Internet?
Price adjustments will not be required because of this change. All prices reflect the increased value of our service, new product enhancements, and investments to continually improve the quality of our network and customer service. Any price adjustments going forward will be planned and communicated to customers well in advance of any change.
You can see where this is headed, can’t you?
“Price adjustments will not be required” — weasel words, if I’ve ever read them. Fucking liars. Despite the promises, both of stable prices and advanced notice, it turns out that Comcast is run by a bunch of lying, thieving scumbags who exist only to squeeze every last dime out of their unwilling customer base in order to fatten their own undeserved bonuses at the end of the year — you know the bonuses, I’m talking about. They’re 10 times the size of their average employee’s yearly salary.
I must say that every Comcast employee I dealt with — 3 customer service reps and a technician who picked up my modem — were great. Fine folks, didn’t lie to me any more, and were very apologetic. But the fact remains that they work for fascist goons who are planning to rape, pillage and plunder this fresh, unearned subscriber base in an apparent effort to show just how stupid and short-sighted management teams can be. They’re going for the gold medal in poor decision-making skills. Bravo.
So, do I even have to tell you what happened? Isn’t it obvious from my venom? Well, I’ll tell you anyway. Comcast sent me a notice, dated December 26th (yes, the day after Christmas — “Happy holidays from Comcast! Fuck you!”) informing me that my rates were going up to 60 bucks a month — plus modem rental (3 bucks a month), starting…. February 1st! Yay!
So the lying fuckers tried to squeeze me for 20 bucks more a month and gave me only a month notice. This left me no choice. I wasn’t going to stand for this shit. 20 bucks isn’t much, but 20 bucks every month adds up to quite a lot. It’s almost $250 more per year. I am not that rich, Comcast. But idiotic, greedy ploys like this explain how they can afford to pay their CEO 27.8 million dollars a year. I guess I know where my $250 would’ve went.
And so, instead of sending them a check for 40-some bucks a month they managed to convince me to send them a whole lot of nothing every month. Congrats, Comcast. Your short-sighted greed and stupidity has only managed to cost you subscribers like me. Fucking morons.
Instead of collecting money from people like me, Comcast managed to piss away subscribers like a drunk after a night of drinking cheap domestic beer. Instead of getting my money every month they’ve assured Qwest of my business instead. Bravo, fuckheads!
Check out MNspeak for an awesome thread full of pissed off former subscribers. Comcast’s goose-stepping management team deserves an award for monumental stupidity. It’s hard to motivate internet-addicted people like me to do without and overcome the inertia required to make the switch. But Comcast managed to fill me with so much revulsion that Qwest could implement a policy of jabbing me with sharp objects and I would still be happier with them.
Fuck off, Comcast. Take your golden parachutes and cram them up your ass.
When E. Howard Hunt died a few months ago, there was speculation that he would leave behind a confession. At first, it appeared he had not, but now Rolling Stone is running with a story based on a confession Hunt made to his son, Saint John Hunt (who fucking names their kid “Saint”? A fucking narcissistic fuckhead, that’s who).
The confession is compelling, but Hunt is a well-known liar. Indeed, his confession is his own version of a limited hang out. He claimed to have refused to take part in the plot, but his own lies tripped him up, as he also claimed to know the command structure (from LBJ on down) and who was the the marksman on the grassy knoll. It’s pretty clear he was up to his ears in this thing. My favorite part of the Rolling Stone piece is when Hunt’s son shreds his dad’s alibi like grated cheese:
“And then, like an epiphany, I remember ’63, and my dad being gone, and my mom telling me that he was on a business trip to Dallas. I’ve tried to convince myself that’s some kind of false memory, that I’m just nuts, that it’s something I heard years later. But, I mean, his alibi for that day is that he was at home with his family. I remember I was in the fifth grade. We were at recess. I was playing on the merry-go-round. We were called in and told to go home, because the president had been killed. And I remember going home. But I don’t remember my dad being there. I have no recollection of him being there. And then he has this whole thing about shopping for Chinese food with my mother that day, so that they could cook a meal together.” His father testified to this, in court, on more than one occasion, saying that he and his wife often cooked meals together.St. John pauses and leans forward. “Well,” he says, “I can tell you that’s just the biggest load of crap in the fucking world. He was always looking at things like he was writing a novel; everything had to be just so glamorous and so exciting. He couldn’t even be bothered with his children. That’s not glamorous. James Bond doesn’t have children. So my dad in the kitchen? Chopping vegetables with his wife? I’m so sorry, but that would never happen. Ever. That fucker never did jack-squat like that. Ever.”
It is pretty funny, imagining him at home with the wife, helping out with the cooking. Hah! This guy was a misogynist asshole, not Julia Child. If he ever used a knife for something it was to cut somebody’s fingers off, not make a dainty meal for the kids.
Anyway, that’s not to say his confession is unimportant. Even a partial confession is vastly more than what we had before: denials, denials, denials. His history as a liar makes it suspect, of course, but I think St. John’s story is compelling. He alone knew how to extract this information from his father (read the whole thing for Kevin Costner’s half-assed attempt).
This has to be one of the biggest bombshells in recent memory. These revelations will make the cover of every major news-magazine and the headline of every newspaper, right?
Wrong.
The story is over a week old and no major media have picked up on it yet. And they won’t.
I’ve been telling people for years that the mainstream media is utterly controlled by the Oligarchy. If this example doesn’t make that clear, I don’t know what else to tell you. I mean, it’s not like the allegation/confession even has to be true to be newsworthy. The media has covered all the people claiming to be the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s orphaned daughter. They can’t all be right (the parade of people claiming to have fucked Anna Nicole is like one of those clown cars at the circus).
This is newsworthy. That is not really up for debate. If somebody confesses to murdering the president, that’s fucking newsworthy. So why the deafening silence?
The media is part of the conspiracy, that’s why. The media was one of the biggest parts of the cover-up right after the fact (and some would say, before it). Shooting the president is fairly easy. Getting away with it is damn near impossible… unless you control the levers of power. The rich and powerful men who make up the Oligarchy are the same men who own and operate the mainstream media. These levers of power are known by many names: Time, Newsweek, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, etc. But they all serve the same master.
Is there anything else the Media isn’t telling you? (and how would you know?)
Even as the grassroots impeachment movement gathers steam, the mainstream media and the Democrats are doing to their best to mock, derail, ignore and sabotage the efforts of concerned Americans across this great country.
Did anybody choke over the preceding paragraph? Did you think that Democrats would be eager to avenge the impeachment of Clinton? Well, you’re wrong. The Democrats are avoiding the issue like it was radioactive. And the media, well, we all know the liberal media is… liberal. Right? Wrong. The media is not left or right, it’s corporate. The media does whatever sells, folks. Their only true ideology is profit. As the Propaganda Model states, the media does not sell news — they sell us, the consumers of news, to the businesses that pay for ads and PR. We are the product.
Who perpetuates the myth of the liberal media anyway? Oh, that’s right… The media does! Especially the Bill O’Reillys and Sean Hannitys and Rush Limbaughs and Ann Coulters of the world (there seem to be a lot of these folks. How did they manage to find employment in the big, mean liberal media machine?).
Despite their lies, the media is certainly not liberal, but the lie has become self-perpetuating so that people think “if the media does it, it must be liberal!” thereby allowing conservatives and corporatists to define liberals with their own labels and bias. It’s a really neat trick. Goebbels would be proud. The left-wing is so weak and pathetic that it mostly just nods its head and cowers in the corner lest Bill O’Reilly raise his voice again (of course, these are just the liberals the media allows us to see). In reality, the media skews conservative on many things, including the war, the economy and the prospect of impeachment.
More than 30 Vermont towns passed resolutions on Tuesday seeking to impeach President Bush, while at least 16 towns in the tiny New England state called on Washington to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq.
Known for picturesque autumn foliage, colonial inns, maple sugar and old-fashion dairy farms, Vermont is in the vanguard of a grass-roots protest movement to impeach Bush over his handling of the unpopular Iraq war.
Notice how Vermont is portrayed as pastoral. The subtle message is: “These backwards-ass hicks think they can impeach the president. Isn’t that cute?”
Now that we’ve established that Vermont’s voters are bunch of tree-hugging, bean-curd-eating hippies we proceed to “The Big Lie”, which Reuters needs to work on a bit since it really sticks out like a sore thumb in this piece. See if you can spot it:
After casting votes on budgets and other routine items, citizens of 32 towns in Vermont backed a measure calling on the U.S. Congress to file articles of impeachment against Bush for misleading the nation on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and for engaging in illegal wiretapping, among other charges.
Five Vermont towns passed similar resolutions last year.
The idea of impeaching Bush resides firmly outside the political mainstream.
The new Democratic-controlled Congress has steered clear of the subject, and Wisconsin Sen. Russell Feingold’s call last year to censure Bush — a step short of an impeachment — found scant support on Capitol Hill, even among fellow Democrats.
Did you find it? It’s the mostly-unsupported argument in the middle. “The idea of impeaching Bush resides firmly outside the political mainstream.” THIS IS A LIE. A big one, too. If the reporter/propaganda-spewer (Jason Szep) had done any research (and I believe he must have), he would’ve noticed that Americans overwhelmingly support impeachment. From the Zogby poll:
By a margin of 53% to 42%, Americans want Congress to impeach President Bush if he lied about the war in Iraq, according to a new Zogby poll commissioned by AfterDowningStreet.org, a grassroots coalition that supports a Congressional investigation of President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003.
This is “firmly outside the political mainstream”?!!
Well, in the reporter’s defense it must be said that the Democrats and the Mainstream Media (MSM) have done everything in their power to keep it out of the political mainstream. This is done via articles such as the one we’re talking about, wherein people supporting accountability are mocked as pastoral peasants, slandered as left-wing nutjobs or talked down to like illiterate boobs. So much for the free and impartial press.
Not surprisingly, Democrats supported the consideration of impeachment by a broad margin (76 percent) while Republicans opposed (66 percent). However, 29 percent of Republicans told Zogby pollsters that they supported Congress examining impeachment over Iraq.
It should be noted that AfterDowningStreet.org had to commission this poll because the Media certainly wouldn’t do it themselves. If we had waited on them for such a poll, we’d still be waiting.
Despites the media’s lies of omission and distortion impeachment is gathering steam across the nation, not just in Vermont as the article tried to imply. New Mexico, Washington state and cities across the nation are moving towards, or have already passed, resolutions supporting impeachment. The Media doesn’t want you to know this.
As for the Democrats, their spinelessness is appalling, especially considering what happened less than 10 years ago. Funny, I don’t remember people taking to the streets to demand Clinton’s impeachment. In fact, polls showed most people opposed impeachment for Clinton. I would’ve liked to see Clinton impeached for other reasons, but the charges he was impeached for were pretty trivial, and it was clearly a political witch-hunt. This time around the polls favor impeachment, but the Media is nowhere to be found whipping up impeachment fervor, and the Democrats, far from leading the charge, are carrying up the rear. They’re being dragged into this fight by the common folk, and many of them show no signs of supporting impeachment. It’s as if Bush were there best buddy all of a sudden. Suspicious, wouldn’t you say?
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: The Mainstream Media is a corporate-controlled institution that the oligarchy is using to promote and maintain fascism. Bush, as a fascist, is their hero. The MSM and Bush led us into this bloody war in Iraq, hand-in-hand; t
hey’re practically attached at the hip. They would sooner spit on their own mothers than encourage the impeachment of their pretty-boy fascist führer. The Democrats are controlled by the same oligarchy and their part is to basically “rollover and play dead” for the fascist Republicans. We must feed the war machine with our babies. The economy depends on it, since so much of it is rooted in the military-industrial complex.
So what can you do about it? Well, start by supporting the organizations out there that are spearheading the impeachment effort. Quite frankly, there are so many that I have a hard time keeping track of them all. Here’s a quick list of some of the bigger ones:
The BBC has been in the middle of a blogger firestorm the last couple days after clear and incontrovertible evidence appeared, showing that the Beeb had reported the collapse of the Salomon Brothers Building — better known as World Trade Center 7 — before it actually collapsed! Check out the screen grab below (I’ve circled WTC7):
The BBC engaged in some quick (and pathetic) damage control but failed to calm the boiling outrage erupting around the world. In so doing they revealed that they’ve lost all of their tapes from 9/11 and doefully ask somebody to send them a copy, plz. (I’m not fucking kidding. Check the link):
We no longer have the original tapes of our 9/11 coverage (for reasons of cock-up, not conspiracy). So if someone has got a recording of our output, I’d love to get hold of it.
I don’t even know where to begin.
Okay, Beeb… so you’re telling me that nobody fucking bothered to save or secure any of the tapes from an entire day of broadcasting — a day that, even for the Brits, would have to rank as one of the most important in a generation at least, and then you meekly ask for a copy as if it’s our job?! What the hell?! Then you claim incompetence (just like the Bush regime)?! Well, your excuse is so fucking pathetic I’m inclined to agree that you are a bunch of morons.
Do you believe them? I don’t. This is bullshit. I’m starting to think that the BBC, and all the other major news organs, are in fact part of the conspiracy — after the fact.
So how did the Beeb get the news that the WTC7 building was about to collapse? Well, that certainly could be fairly innocent on their part. If a “trusted source” informed them of the collapse, they would be inclined to report it, and not bothering to check and see that the building is still standing does reek of incompetence. However, they seem quite competent at getting videos removed from YouTube and GoogleVideo. Strange for a news organization that was supposedly trying to get their tapes back.
I managed to find a clip on YouTube that hasn’t been taken down yet. It’s got a full 25 minutes of the BBC’s feed from 9/11, so you’ll have to fast forward ahead to the 15 minute mark to see the footage in question.
What are we to make of all this? Well, I think that’s pretty obvious. The corporate-controlled media is lying to us. Every day, with every breath, and every death in Iraq or from the growing numbers of dead or dying first responders… they’re lying to us. They know which way the evidence points, and they’re doing everything they can to cover it up. After the BBC’s litany of pathetic excuses they had the gall to mock those of us who question the official story:
If we reported the building had collapsed before it had done so, it would have been an error – no more than that. As one of the comments on You Tube says today “so the guy in the studio didn’t quite know what was going on? Woah, that totally proves conspiracy… “
So they’re not only mocking those of us genuinely concerned about the events of 9/11 (if we don’t learn what really happened, how can we prevent another one?), they’ve sunken so low they’re using a Bush regime apologist’s anonymous comments on YouTube to make their case. FUCKING PATHETIC.
What’s even more intriguing is how the BBC flak, Richard Porter, seems more interested in carrying water for the Bush regime than he does in showing his news organization as a competent and trustworthy news source. In fact, he goes out of his way to make the BBC appear utterly incompetent — no doubt because it helps the Bush regime with their own claims of incompetence rather than malfeasance. Instead of acknowledging legitimate questions about that fateful day he does all he can to back up the official story (which, by the way, is a conspiracy theory no matter how you slice it). I say again: FUCKING PATHETIC.
That’s it. You’re done, Beeb. I had you in my bookmarks, but you’re gone now. You’re fucking gone. You are nothing more than an agent of evil to me now. I will give you the same amount of trust I give the Bush regime — less than zero.
I’m calling for a BOYCOTT, folks. We can’t let our media LIE to us and get away with it. Going back to them and reading their deception-stained news would be like an abused wife going back to her drunked and violent husband. Enough!
What’s the number one thing a news organization is supposed to do? Tell the truth, right? When a news outlet refuses to do that, what good are they? They’re about as useful as a knife in the eye. They’re about as helpful as gonorrhea.
I’m calling for a boycott until such time as the BBC fires that arrogant, pandering fuckhead, Richard Porter, head editor of world news… AND launches a full and impartial investigation into the tragic events of 9/11 — giving all theories equal credence until the evidence makes clear which is most likely. And not a trashy hit-piece like that Conspiracy Files piece of shit (which was debunked about 5 minutes after it aired).
It really pains me to do this. The BBC has a lot of quality programming and some of their shows have really hit hard and exposed lies and crimes in government. However, they are tainted meat to me now. I can’t eat the rest of it just because it looks okay — how do I really know? Trust is such a fragile thing, and getting it back after losing it is not easy. Good luck, BBC. I hope you do the right thing.
Last week, Libby’s attorney Theodore Wells made a stunning pronouncement during opening statements of Libby’s trial. He claimed that the White House had made Libby a scapegoat for the leak to protect Karl Rove – Bush’s political adviser and “right-hand man.”“Mr. Libby, you will learn, went to the vice president of the United States and met with the vice president in private. Mr. Libby said to the vice president, ‘I think the White House … is trying to set me up. People in the White House want me to be a scapegoat,'” said Wells.
Cheney’s notes seem to help bolster Wells’s defense strategy. Libby’s defense team first discussed the notes – written by Cheney in September 2003 for White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan – during opening statements last week. Wells said Cheney had written “not going to protect one staffer and sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his head in the meat grinder because of incompetence of others”: a reference to Libby being asked to deal with the media and vociferously rebut Wilson’s allegations that the Bush administration knowingly “twisted” intelligence to win support for the war in Iraq.
However, when Cheney wrote the notes, he had originally written “this Pres.” instead of “that was.
The “meat grinder” is generally taken to mean “the DC press corps”. So, after re-inserting “this Pres” into Cheney’s note it reads: “not going to protect one staffer and sacrifice the guy this Pres. asked to stick his head in the meat grinder because of the incompetence of others.”
It’s not surprising that strategy concerning the Plame affair would be discussed at the highest levels. But Bush has been denying all along that he knew anything about the leak.
When Cheney testifies will he throw Libby under the bus like Addington? I can’t wait to find out. What happens when the top two liars in the country are implicated in a scandal, tied to an illegal war that’s been used to justify illegal wiretapping? Well, if Republicans are in charge: Nothing. However, I have a smidgen of hope that the Democrats will pursue impeachment. They’d better hurry up about it because I keep hearing more and more noise about starting a war with Iran. It sounds like the preparations for a joint U.S./Israeli strike are almost complete.
Last month, the state Agriculture Department finished its work on rules farmers may use to grow industrial hemp, a cousin of marijuana that does not have the drug’s hallucinogenic properties. The sturdy, fibrous plant is used to make an assortment of products, ranging from paper, rope and lotions to car panels, carpet backing and animal bedding.
Applicants must provide latitude and longitude coordinates for their proposed hemp fields, furnish fingerprints and pay at least $202 in fees, including $37 to cover the cost of criminal record checks.
Johnson said the federal Drug Enforcement Administration still must give its permission before Monson, or anyone else, may grow industrial hemp.
“That is going to be a major hurdle,” Johnson said.
Yeah, the DEA are basically a bunch of assholes when it comes to common sense and hemp. They won’t give permission unless they feel cornered. Keep the pressure on; some more media coverage would be nice.
But all this obscures the larger and more potent question: Why is “marihuana” still illegal? Certainly industrial hemp should be legal since it has none of recreational ganja’s psychoactive properties. But why is cannabis in general illegal? Most people would agree that Prohibition was a titanic failure. But we’re still stuck with many of the after-effects of the prohibition mentality, including the idiotic, wasteful, racist and anti-freedom War on Drugs. The War on Drugs is a total failure and a fraud and even many former cops and DEA agents will testify to that fact.
An excellent article called Why Is Marijuana Illegal? tackles that very issue, with some surprising revelations… Or not-so-surprising. I guess it depends on how jaded you are when it comes to politics and business.
America’s first marijuana law was enacted at Jamestown Colony, Virginia in 1619. It was a law “ordering” all farmers to grow Indian hempseed. There were several other “must grow” laws over the next 200 years (you could be jailed for not growing hemp during times of shortage in Virginia between 1763 and 1767), and during most of that time, hemp was legal tender (you could even pay your taxes with hemp — try that today!) Hemp was such a critical crop for a number of purposes (including essential war requirements – rope, etc.) that the government went out of its way to encourage growth.
The United States Census of 1850 counted 8,327 hemp “plantations” (minimum 2,000-acre farm) growing cannabis hemp for cloth, canvas and even the cordage used for baling cotton.
But racism may have been the weapon that was used most effectively against hemp and cannabis. Harry J. Anslinger (who looks like a gangster/mafioso to me) led the charge against “marihuana” (the word itself is a propaganda invention designed to draw up racial fears).
Anslinger immediately drew upon the themes of racism and violence to draw national attention to the problem he wanted to create. Some of his quotes regarding marijuana…
“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others.”
“…the primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races.”
“Marijuana is an addictive drug which produces in its users insanity, criminality, and death.”
“Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.”
“Marihuana leads to pacifism and communist brainwashing”
“You smoke a joint and you’re likely to kill your brother.”
“Marijuana is the most violence-causing drug in the history of mankind.”
There were a lot of lies said about pot back in the day. But it’s 2007 and we know better, so why is it still illegal? I mean, people don’t seriously believe that pot causes “insanity, criminality and death” — everyone knows it only causes the munchies and drymouth. But we still allow the government to lie to us every year and keep spending millions of dollars to send inner city youth to jail for with harsh mandatory minimum sentences? Pete Guither’s article does a great job of explaining how cannabis first became illegal, but it does not really tell us why it’s still illegal 70 years after the Marijuana Stamp Act.
On October 31, 1996, the Washington Post ran a follow up story to the San Jose Mercury News series titled “CIA, Contras and Drugs: Questions on Links Linger.” The story drew on court testimony in 1990 of Fabio Ernesto Carrasco, a pilot for a major Columbian drug smuggler named George Morales. As a witness in a drug trial, Carrasco testified that in 1984 and 1985, he piloted planes loaded with weapons for contras operating in Costa Rica. The weapons were offloaded, and then drugs stored in military bags were put on the planes which flew to the United States. “I participated in two [flights] which involved weapons and cocaine at the same time,” he told the court.
Funny how the news doesn’t do investigative reports on stuff you might actually want to know. The press could have found a lot more dirt on this scandal, but they steered clear after a limited hang-out. That’s because the whole system is set up to demonize drugs so that they will be so much more profitable. Legalization would utterly destroy the CIA’s little “fundraising” operation and it would effectively end the careers of many DEA agents, who’ve become like a parasitic wasp, sucking at our nations’ failed and painful drug policy.
It’s time to end the lies, the racism and the idiocy of the War on Drugs and declare peace. It needs to end, and there needs to be an investigation. Those who profited from the war by playing both sides should be punished according to their own rules.
The video above is Dealing with the Demon, an excellent look into the CIA’s activities in Afghanistan during the war against the Soviets. Perhaps we should not be surprised that Afghan poppy production has exploded since we “liberated” it from the Taliban. How… interesting.
Updated on 1-16-07 with new links, a video and various spelling-error fixes.
Update 2 (Oct. 30, 2010): In the process of moving this blog over from Blogger to WordPress I imported all posts to the new platform. However, certain posts didn’t survive the process and this was one of them. I have reposted it above, but because the post didn’t transfer correctly I lost all of the comments that were posted to the original. I have a backup of the original so I was able to save them. I’ll post them below (but above WordPress’ comment system) for posterity’s sake:
14 SICK LITTLE MONKEYS SAID:
Anonymous screeched…
funny. no one’s ever just randomly offered me a marijuana cigarette like that poster warns. i must be doing something wrong ….
18 JANUARY, 2007 12:25
Vemrion screeched…
yeah, you better work on that.
this propaganda is only hurting their cause. That dime-store novel looks pretty good, and that tagline is classic: “a cheap and evil gril sets a hopped-up killer against a city.” Nice. I like how they mention that she’s “cheap.” Does this mean she’s a prostitute or a miser? So many questions, I must read it! 🙂
18 JANUARY, 2007 21:45
greg screeched…
Just wanted to thank you for the excellent article and let you know that it made the front page on Newsvine.com yesterday, 1/25 — http://rochester92.newsvine.com/_news/2007/01/25/536949-why-is-cannibis-still-illegal-in-2007
26 JANUARY, 2007 18:24
sean paul screeched…
legalize it, time to recognize it!
31 JANUARY, 2007 13:31
Anonymous screeched…
Not many things make me mad. But damnit! Legalize the bloody hemp before I kill ya! 😛
03 FEBRUARY, 2007 05:23
Anonymous screeched…
I’m not sure that the government will ever legalize marijuana. Think about it. There is no way (at least at this time) to detect how much marijuana that you had to smoke today. If you have a few drinks, a breathalizer test can be administed or a blood test and you can get a reading of how much alcohol is in your system. Thus, a police officer can determine if you are over the legal limit. With marijuana, you can test positive for it but they cannot tell if you smoked it today or a week ago. For this one reason, I don’t think that the legalization marijuana will happen any time soon.
30 JULY, 2007 12:30
freedom screeched…
Im tired of feeling like im doing something wronge for smoking pot, I think its time for us to realize that we were born FREE… not free to kill or commit true crime, but free to live our lives the way we choose, not the way the govt has choosen for us. What is it going to take to make lawmakers realize that a war on pot hurts people more than pot does. What good is it to throw a person, who has a family, in jail ruin their career and their life over a bag of pot, a bag of naturally grown plants, shouldnt cops be trying to prevent real crime. Im sure in the time it takes a cop to arrest a person for posetion, he/she could have been helping someone who truly needed help. OPEN UP YOUR EYES…FREEDOM
28 AUGUST, 2007 21:27
Anonymous screeched…
ok 1 pot does not make you do ofter druges its the persons dicishion to do otfer druges and 2 pot is better for you then tabaco so they sould make pot legal and tabaco ileagale or both legale
I’m very torn on the issue. But I agree with Anonymous on July 30, 2007. If you want to legalize marijuana, someone needs to invent a device to detect current levels in your system so that individuals are not driving under severe influence. This will eliminate at least one (if not the most prevalent) argument as to why marijuana is illegal.
20 NOVEMBER, 2007 17:18
Anonymous screeched…
his topic always fires me up because of how ignorant people can be. Its our decision and making it legal could help hrthe economy, eliminate the badass feel of it that makes people so it just because it is illegal. We need a strong leader who has the balls to speak out about the truth of marijuana. Legalize it now
16 JUNE, 2008 19:42
Anonymous screeched…
Using pot irresponsibly should be regulated the same as alcohol. But a Federal ban against everyone who does use the drug responsibly is wrong. I’ve smoked for years and I’m a productive, functional member of society. If I went to jail for smoking I would no longer pay taxes and more of your tax money would go into the court & correctional systems. And when I got out of prison after a harsh mandatory minimum do you think I’d be a better citizen after hanging out with murderers and rapists for the past 3 years?
No one gets high and beats their wife. No one gets high and passes out in a gutter. People get high and eat too much and annoy their friends who are not high. Just don’t get high when you have something important to do and don’t get high everyday or you’ll become a douchebag hippie. There’s no reason for the government to punish you any further. Being a douchebag hippie should be punishment enough.
20 MARCH, 2009 00:01
Please feel free to add additional comments below:
You have to understand Dean that an online business should be higher in Google than a blog.
Don’t forget that Google is a business as well, they obviously make more money from other businesses than they do from blogs, so it is in their interest that I am higher than you for certain searches.
I have also contacted my lawyer about this issue, so you should expect a letter in the post very soon.
Let me be the 472nd to say, “AAAAAhahahahahahaaaaaaa!!! Haahahahaa! What a fucking moron!
Yes, Google is a business, but no, they don’t think businesses should be ranked higher than blogs. In fact, I bet they love it when that happens because then the business is compelled to start buying Google AdWords to bump up their ranking (well, really, they’re a “sponsored result” at that point).
This guy (who hasn’t been “outed” yet by Deano) is clearly a bully, and a particularly stupid one at that. Dean intends to stand strong and I support him all the way. People shouldn’t have to fear success on the internet, nor should bloggers be preyed upon by ruthlessly inept businessmen who seem to view the world only in terms of money and power. Fucking moron. I’ve got your back, Dean, and I know a lot of other bloggers do too.
You know, the internet really does have the power to change things for the better. We’re more connected now than ever before, and that gives power to “the little guy” who would’ve been steamrolled as little as 10 years ago. This inevitably must have a profound affect on our society, including the political realm. People are going to start demanding more transparency in government and business, and people are less likely to be cowed by bullying demands from the elite and those who dream of becoming the elite (like this fucktard).
Consequently, there are no more excuses. Is there something you don’t know that you wish you did? Have you encountered a challenge that is beyond your present abilities? Well, it’s time to step up to the plate. You’ve got an incredible resource like at your fingertips if you’re reading this, so don’t let limitations that would’ve previously been crippling get in your way! You now have the power to change your lot in life. Educate yourself. Better yourself. Rally your allies. Stand up to your enemies. Embrace the change that now must come. In previous centuries most of us would be nothing but peasants, living under the rule of some despotic king or lord. With no access to learning, no power to organize resistance or communicate with distant allies there was no way to fight against the yoke of oppression. But now, most of us are “free” and we have been given a great gift — a gift that our ancestors would have died for. The internet is the greatest gift to democracy in 200 years. Use it!
Update:Some folks on slashdot are saying that this is a hoax by Dean Hunt. That’s certainly a possibility. Let’s wait to see for sure that he’s telling the truth, but I think my rosy description of the potential of the internet is still valid. Just gotta remember to check our sources, verify info and don’t forget our assumptions. As for Dean, let’s hope he wouldn’t resort to something like this, but his blog is about SEO, which is about as respectable a profession as prostitution. Perhaps less so.
The two-part television interview, titled “O.J. Simpson: If I Did It, Here’s How It Happened,” will air Nov. 27 and Nov. 29 on Fox, the TV network said Tuesday.
“O.J. Simpson, in his own words, tells for the first time how he would have committed the murders if he were the one responsible for the crimes,” the network said in a statement. “In the two-part event, Simpson describes how he would have carried out the murders he has vehemently denied committing for over a decade.”
Not only is he a murderer, he’s also a publicity hound.
Normally I’d insert something snarky and sarcastic here, but is there really any need? I mean, this pretty much says it all, doesn’t it? He’s had 10+ years to think about it, and now he’s going to tell us how he would rather have done it, given what he knows now. Well, that’s just great.
Perhaps he can take on the Kennedy assassinations next. Hell, why not do a reality TV show:
“It’s O.J. Simpson in… How I Would’ve Murdered Those People:The Most Famous Murders in History, Seen Through the Eyes of a Calculating Psychopath. This week O.J. tells us how he would’ve whacked JonBenet Ramsey!”
Haggard, seen here trying to strangle God, was one of the nation’s leading religious nutjobs. He was the president of the National Association of Evangelicals (representing 30 million people) until it turned out he was having gay sex with a male hooker while snorting meth. Haggard initially claimed that he had bought the meth with no intention of using it, to which millions of meth addicts replied, “Riiiiiiight, buddy. Suuuure.”
Well, now he has been fired. And he’s even resigned from his own New Life Church in Colorado. What, do the Evangelicals have a little rule about gay sex or something?
It doesn’t matter to me that he’s as gay as a spring parade. What bothers me is that Ted Haggard has preached against homosexuality for years, saying it was a sin, and taking a firm stand against gay marriage… meanwhile he was getting his balls licked by some male prostitute named Mike Jones once a month.
Haggard’s sickening hypocrisy was actually what got the better of him. His fuck-buddy-for-hire ratted him out because he grew tired of getting Ted off one day and watching him preach about the evils of homosexuality the next.
Now Haggard has admitted, “I am a deceiver and a liar.” Well, I for one am refreshed by his honesty (about being a liar). Most religious scumbags lie continually and refuse to admit that they are deceptive sacks of shit, so it’s nice to hear Ted come to grips with his problem. (The problem: being a liar. Who gives a fuck if he’s as gay as Gore Vidal?) Of course, once you admit that you’re a liar you can never really be trusted again. So that kind of sucks for him. He went from “trusted religious leader” to “lying, drug-abusing fag” in one week. Tough week.
So, here’s a question for y’all: When are you gonna stop believing these self-righteous assholes? They continually turn out to be fuckheads and hypocrites. They always attack the same people (gays, women, minorities) in order to gain power for themselves. When are y’all gonna wake up and figure this scam out? I guess it’s as old as humanity and there’s a sucker born every minute, but I still have hope that people will figure out that their religious leaders (especially the ones at the top) are far more immoral than the people they accuse of immorality.
That doesn’t mean you can’t believe in God or have a community of believers. But you have to be aware that the most ambitious and most charismatic people are also the ones most likely to be in league with the devil, as it were. To a person driven to succeed at any cost a few lies on the way to the top are well worth the price. And maybe that’s okay in business (is it?), but that’s an extremely toxic outlook in the religious sphere. A few lies are NOT okay. In fact your whole job is to tell the truth!
I would suggest that the “sheep” in Ted’s flock learn how to read and pick up a Bible for themselves rather than letting sick men like Haggard interpret it for you. Make up your own mind about the purpose of life on Earth. Nobody knows for sure, so you can’t just abdicate your responsibilty and throw your trust in men like Ted and expect it to be okay. The only way to be sure is to cut your own path.
Oh, and for what it’s worth, I don’t think Ted “Gay Druggy” Haggard is correct about homosexuals. Although he obviously knows more about gay sex and the Bible than me, I still think my limited knowledge is sufficient to come to a better conclusion on the issue. Personally, I don’t remember Jesus saying, “Love your neighbor…unless he’s a fag.” Nope, I’m pretty sure Jesus told us to love everyone…and leave the judging to the guy upstairs.
Congressional pages involved in the Foley sex messages scandal are receiving threats via emails, Representative Rodney Alexander (R-LA) told CNN today.
We need to have an investigation of the threats as well as protect the safety of these pages. They could lead us much deeper down the rabbithole and they should not be punished for speaking out.
Meanwhile, it looks like the Republican leadership are all turning on each other in a desperate scramble to save their own asses. And it’s looking more and more like everybody except me knew about parts of this case months or even years ago.
Oh, and now Foley says he was molested by a clergyman and that he’s gay…and a drunk. And he’s been sold into sexual slavery in Uganda. Okay, not that last bit, but Foley is trying his best to make himself into the victim here. I don’t think that’s going to work. Keep trying, though.
I’m mostly concerned about the pages. We need to protect them and guard against any threats making them clam up. The only way we can get to the bottom of this and protect future pages is if everybody speaks out about what they know. The FBI needs to run a competent and thorough investigation and we need to make sure they don’t try to cover for those in power. Keep the pressure on!
There is so much political corruption on Capitol Hill that the FBI has had to triple the number of squads investigating lobbyists, lawmakers and influence peddlers, the Daily News has learned.
For decades, only one squad in Washington handled corruption cases because the crimes were seen as local offenses handled by FBI field offices in lawmakers’ home districts.
But in recent years, the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal and other abuses of power and privilege have prompted the FBI to assign 37 agents full-time to three new squads in an office near Capitol Hill.
FBI Assistant Director Chip Burrus told The News yesterday that he wants to detail even more agents to the Washington field office for a fourth corruption squad because so much wrongdoing is being uncovered.
My advice for the FBI: Keep up the pace. We’re gonna need a lot more agents if we want to get all of it. But I fear that the FBI lacks the political will to push too far, especially if the trail of corruption reaches too high up the chain of command. We need squeaky-clean corridors of power, but right now they’re covered in filth and decay. Does the FBI have the strength to arrest all of the perpetrators, not just the ones who get hung out to dry by their masters?
Really, if we wanted to stop corruption we’d have to arrest everybody in Washington except the janitors and the maids.
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Apr.9,2007
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