Electric Monkey Pants

In the wake of the New Iranian Revolution, will social media come under attack?

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 19:58:00 +0000

Perhaps it's obvious to say that there are political undercurrents at work in the Iranian Revolution 2009 we're witnessing, but it goes well beyond the streets of Tehran. This is a global phenomenon and it bodes ill for the Old Ways.

If you're reading this blog you're probably a little more savvy than most, but for those who are new to social media this coup attempt is shining a light on something certain elements within our political structure have tried to keep hidden: Iranians are just like us.

That might not seem like such a radical statement, but when you're in the business of demonizing people it's an earth-shattering revelation. Here in America, our government and our media have been in the business of demonizing Iran for the last 30 years. If the revolution succeeds and Ahmadinejad is thrown into the dustbin of history then our government will not have a despotic Iran to kick around any more. Early indications are that the people of Iran and Mousavi's hypothetical government will favor normalizing relations with America, or at least responding favorably to Obama's overtures.

You might think this would make the neocons very happy, but that is not the case. Blogger Andrew Sullivan has been on top of the revolution from the get-go and he says: "Even I am a little taken aback by the neocons' desire for an Ahmadinejad victory."

The sad truth is that a lot of people are scared of change and they don't like it when their favorite whipping-horse suddenly grabs the reins with his teeth.

Given the incredible impact that social media has had in this election/coup it should not be surprising if hardline forces --not just in Iran -- take a dim view of social media in the future.

The first thing the illegitimate Iranian government did when it saw trouble brewing was to block Facebook and Twitter. Cell phone service was taken down in many areas. Mousavi's website was taken out by government forces.

It's obvious why: Social media is an inherently democratizing force.

Allowing people to connect outside of traditional, controlled channels is dangerous for any repressive regime. People can share news instantly, they can plan, they can support each other and they can warn each other of danger. This used to be the province of the authorities with their rigid hierarchies, their walkie-talkies and their chains of command.

Now anybody with a cellphone can change the world with a hashtag.

I say again: Iranians are just like us. They love Facebook and have a Mousavi fan page with 50,000 supporters. They have been using Twitter (and Twitpic) extensively. (Check out this page for a list of English language Iranian twitterers). And videos depicting the mostly-peaceful marches today are already showing up on YouTube:

As night falls things are getting more violent. It's too early to declare victory, but I think the world is starting to see that the divisions our mainstream media has helped our government create are largely an artifice of ignorance and omission. We are all the same on Facebook. We are one on Twitter.

Social media is the bane of dictators everywhere, and I wouldn't have it any other way. But we have to be ready for the backlash against social media by those hardline forces stuck in the past. They may start to attack social media out of fear. We can't let those repressive forces have their say anymore. If Iran can stand up for democracy, we can too.

Viva la Revolution!! The Iranian People Show How to Stand Against Tyranny!

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 15:39:00 +0000

There's something thrilling going on in Iran.

You wouldn't know it from the coverage on many mainstream media news outlets this weekend (Fox, CNN and ABC, I'm looking in your direction), but there's a revolution going on in Iran!

It's a good kind of revolution; pro-freedom, pro-democracy and mostly peaceful (though many protestors are being beaten by police and Hezbollah thugs). The people of Iran are standing up for truth and justice and they are not being intimidated by theocratic thugs and government lies.

It makes me wonder why our U.S. media isn't really standing with the people of Iran. Maybe it's because I'm getting cynical in my (heh) old age, but I think it has something to do with the loss of their favorite boogey-man. It's getting harder and harder to portray Iranians as fanatical terrorists bent on the destruction of the West:

Perhaps the most moving scene involved a group of young demonstrators, displaying the green colours of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the defeated challenger, breaking into English and chanting: "We want freedom."
In an instant, these television pictures from Tehran delivered a stark reminder that Iran is not a backward country of medieval fanatics, but a modern nation with 70 million people, two thirds of whom are under 30 and have the same interests and aspirations as their Western counterparts.

These are my peers. My fellow-Twitterers. My friends. My brothers and sisters.

This is the real Iran:

No more distortions. No more hate. No more fear-mongering, Fox News! No more! We are the same, the Iranian People and those of us in the United States who still value and cherish freedom.

There is no difference between us beyond geography. Many of the Iranians even speak English and they are young and internet-savvy: they have been using Twitter to organize on the fly and there was a collective moan when Facebook was blocked. This is a youth movement that is cracking the edifice of lies that have served the hardliners on both sides for far too long.

Just don't watch television if you want the real scoop:

Today, as global geopolitics is shaken to its core by events in Iran, I turned on cable news this morning, and saw endless ads for a Larry King Jonas Brothers “interview”, Morning Joe yukking it up discussing Kuwaiti massage therapists, a video of a tomato throwing contest on CNN, talk radio blowhard Bill Bennett…and occasionally a phone call from Christiane Amanpour in Tehran. I can’t even bring myself to turn on the network morning programs, I might vomit.

The mainstream media is rapidly smothering itself into a coma of irrelevance. Do they think we're too stupid to get the news from somewhere else? Heck, I don't even need the media at this point; I can get info directly from the participants in the struggle via Twitter.

Bloggers like Andrew Sullivan are covering the protests virtually nonstop. With the Huffington Post on the case, who needs the MSM?

At this point, Big Media is just playing catch-up. They were asleep at the switch for several days, but now seem to be paying attention again... but they are definitely not leading; they are following.

I should note that I'm taking it for granted that the election was stolen. They apparently did not even do a good job of it. From the numbers I've seen, Ahmadinejad didn't even finish second! He finished 3rd, behind another reform candidate! Mousavi, the challenger and probable winner, was actually told by the Interior Ministry that he had won and to prepare his victory speech (which they insisted must be gracious and not boastful) before turning around and declaring Ahmadinejad the winner by a landslide. The numbers belie this laughable claim. The official results have Mousavi losing his home turf (preposterous) and big urban areas where he has polled higher than Ahmadinejad.

Let's face it: This election was straight-up rigged. The Iranians know it and they're not standing for it, which is more than I can say for Americans (*cough-2000-cough*). Now is our chance to repent for our laziness and apathy and support the democracy-loving Iranians with all our hearts!

I stand with the Iranian People in solidarity. We stand for Democracy, Freedom and Justice! May the winds of change bring peace and prosperity to Iran. Peace be upon you!

Metaverse promo video

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:27:00 +0000

Good news everybody! I've got a video to share. It's not the one I've been talking about, it's just a teaser, but I think you'll dig it. It's the promo video for our album, Metaverse!

Support Darkfold and buy our album! Thanks!

Darkfold's web site is live!

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:15:00 +0000

Hey everybody: Good news! Darkfold's web site is live!! Check it out:

http://darkfold.underutopia.com/

Edit: I've got the Darkfold.com domain transferring now! It's bliss.

Let me know what you think of the site. It's got two different music players, 4 downloadable MP3 tracks, plus links to a bunch of pages that are hosting the full album, like Bandcamp, AmieStreet and Jamendo. It's rock and roll overload!!

So now you know why this blog hasn't seen many updates lately. I'm hoping to get back to regularly scheduled posting soon, but I post on two other blogs as well as this one! ::wipes sweat from brow::

I'm also working on a super-secret video project that I hope to be able to share with you guys soon! I'm pretty stoked; it's coming along really well. More info soon...

Pirates? Honestly? We're fighting fuckin' pirates?

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 18:24:00 +0000

Somebody pinch me. This sounds like a shitty Johnny Depp movie (to be fair, the first one was good).

First, let me say that I don't condone the taking of hostages (unless it's an underrated Kevin Spacey and Samuel L. Jackson movie) and some of these pirates are clearly assholes.

But a large portion of them are fishermen who got sick and tired of seeing European vessels dumping toxic waste in Somalian waters. Johann Hari wrote a great short article on the piracy issue entitled You Are Being Lied to About Pirates. Here's an excerpt:

In 1991, the government of Somalia - in the Horn of Africa - collapsed. Its nine million people have been teetering on starvation ever since - and many of the ugliest forces in the Western world have seen this as a great opportunity to steal the country's food supply and dump our nuclear waste in their seas.

Yes: nuclear waste. As soon as the government was gone, mysterious European ships started appearing off the coast of Somalia, dumping vast barrels into the ocean. The coastal population began to sicken. At first they suffered strange rashes, nausea and malformed babies. Then, after the 2005 tsunami, hundreds of the dumped and leaking barrels washed up on shore. People began to suffer from radiation sickness, and more than 300 died.

This is an environmental war.

Apparently Europe and America feel they have not raped the African continent enough and are engaging in a propaganda war against the "pirates" in order to justify continued presence in the area and as a convenient distraction from the foundering economy.

Just a reminder: Do not believe the mainstream media, especially when they get whipped into a frenzy like they are now. When the media is all aligned on an issue you can bet they're wrong or lying. The pirates scare is Class A bullshit and should be treated as such. If we had more journalists like Hari this wouldn't be a problem, but most will breathlessly recount whatever government officials tell them.

Dig deeper. There's more to this story than the corporate media will ever report.

Fear and Loathing in Maplewood

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 15:08:00 +0000

Catch my review of a recent All-American Rejects show in Maplewood over at PerfectPorridge.com! Despite what you may think it was a pretty crazy time. Here's a quick excerpt:

Just when I was about to write the youth of today’s idea of rock’n'roll off as about as rebellious as a church picnic, the crowd started to raise some hell. Crowd surfers erupted in the pit and the girl next to me tried to climb onto the stage. When security dragged her back down she refused to stand up and had to be physically removed from the building; outside there were cop cars with lights flashing and sullen occupants in the back seat. Clearly, a good time was had by all.

Read the rest of it!

Bad Science and Bad Journalism are Linked: How Fundamentalist Atheists are Twisting Science to Manifest a Dark Agenda

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 03:49:00 +0000

Every now and then I come across a bad science article. And I come across badly done science with disturbing regularity -- but today I found both in an article at NewScience.com.

It's a "study" about why people believe "crazy" things like creationism and intelligent design. The authors of both the article and the study have barely bothered to mask their contempt and disdain for those who believe in anything other than cold, hard science.

But the science and written logic they bring to the table can be described as mushy branflakes at best. Check out the article and see if you can taste the bias. Here's a sampler:

People continued to agree with false teleological statements, particularly those that endorsed an Earth intended for life.

I was not aware the debate over the beginning of our world was settled. Good to know you can administer a simple true/false test and call people who believe the earth was made for life "wrong".

This is supposed to be science? It seems to be based on more assumptions than religion! [new readers: I don't believe in religion, but I don't believe evolution's reality settles the debate over our origins -v]

Either they're trying to use trick questions or they don't understand the nuance of language. This, for instance, is one of their "false" statements:

Mites live on skin to consume dead skin cells

Well... don't they? The mites are better off living there than anywhere else. Where else would mites rather be?

The supposed scientists may have been grasping for "Mites exist only to remove our dead skin cells" but they utterly failed. And these people are claiming to be able to accurately and fairly judge me, my logical abilities and the validity of my beliefs??!!

Reminds me of this, more accurate, study.

This is also shoddy, biased journalism. I expect more from a mainstream publication like NewScience. Pro-atheism cheerleading is fine and good, but there's a time and a place, just like we expect reporters to keep their Christian, Hindu or whatever views out of newscasts, we should expect the journalists over at NewScience and other consumer science outlets to do the same.

This is not an article so much as an attack on teleological thought, a legitimate philosophy of thought. Here's what Wikipedia currently says about teleology:

A teleological school of thought is one that holds all things to be designed for or directed toward a final result, that there is an inherent purpose or final cause for all that exists.

As a school of thought it can be contrasted with metaphysical naturalism, which views nature as having no design or purpose. Teleology would say that a person has eyes because he has the need of eyesight (form following function), while naturalism would say that a person has sight because he has eyes (function following form).

A classic debate. Y vs. X and yet these supposed scientists are ready to throw telelogical thought under the bus without even investigating whether it might be right. Instead they've decided to do a sort of test to see if you think like a commie--..uh, er... "teleologist" in the hopes of one day "curing" it.

A first round of experiments suggested that adults make more teleological mistakes when pressed for time than when not. Yet Kelemen and Rosset also noticed that no matter how much time they had, test subjects tended to endorse false statements implying that the Earth is designed and maintained for life. [emphasis mine]

This is some of the most biased reporting I've ever seen, but it could be Ewen Callaway is just regurgitating what he was told. Then it would piss-poor reporting. But even more offensive to me as a rational person is the implicit goal laid bare in this study, which is clearly to find a way to eradicate teleological thought.

That's the same kind of thinking that led to the Spanish Inquisition. We don't need any more of that crap. These "scientists" need to learn how to take on their ideological opponents in an intellectual field of battle and quit trying to find ways to cow the populace into submission. If they have proof that the teleological school of thought is wrong, then they should firstly present it, then defend it.

Instead they use mouthpieces like NewScience, which I thought was a reputable publication, but now seems to be nothing more than a bloodbath battlefield between believers and nonbelievers. Here are some recent articles (among the most popular):

I guess it's all about the page-views and contentious article bring in visitors galore. But then why not try and keep an editorially even hand and write balanced articles? There's a good reason spiritually-minded folks often sound defensive in those forums. They know they're being taunted -- or else they wouldn't be there, trying to explain deeply held beliefs to this generation's most vicious nihilists.

What's even more disturbing is that the atheists rarely stand up and say, "Hey, I agree, but let's keep things respectful and balanced here." Opinion Editor Amanda Gefter is particularly over-the-top. Here's a typical passage:

Misguided interpretations of quantum physics are a classic hallmark of pseudoscience, usually of the New Age variety, but some religious groups are now appealing to aspects of quantum weirdness to account for free will. Beware: this is nonsense.

Free will has been debated for many millennia, but dear old Amanda won't let us even consider the possibility that... what, quantum physics might be involved somehow? How the hell does she know? She clearly doesn't because she chose ridicule over reason and neglected to back up her claims. If I print out the Wikipedia article on Free Will, it's over 20 pages, but Ms. Gefter dismisses it with a warning: Beware!! Don't read any further or you might turn into a commi- er, I mean "creationist!"

This is all about attacking the philosophical underpinnings of the opponents of strong-atheism, whom include religious folks, anti-religion/pro-metaphysics people like me, and many agnostics and weak-atheists.

It's sad that people can't find any common ground on this issue. It's one of the most pressing of our times, especially with the growth of atheism in the young and urban. But it's still a religious discussion and I remain somewhat aghast that a publication like NewScience would stoop to taking sides in the culture wars. Are they about to fold and need every page-view they can get?

I'd be more likely to read them in the future if they displayed a little more objectivity.

As for the "scientists" who are out to "cure" creationists or anybody who entertains metaphysical thoughts, well, I guess we'd better keep our eyes on them before they try to beat Religion's high score in the killing game. Studying ways to eradicate thought that doesn't conform with the scientific establishment's is really beyond the pale.

I don't think most atheists think this way. Certainly there is some bitterness about Christianity, the dominant religion in my culture, but few would actually seek to destroy it. They just don't want fundamentalist Christians (like those that infested the Bush administration) enforcing prayer in schools, Intelligent Design in schools (ID should be in schools -- the Philosophy Department) and various faith-based activities.

Totally understandable. But let's make sure that we don't end up with the mirror image as humanity gives up its superstitious beliefs. We don't need fundamentalist atheists running amok any more than we need fundamentalist Muslims or Christians in charge. The extremists are the problem, and they hurt whichever side they are arguing for. Please, people, look for common ground in the culture wars!

Go in peace / Science be praised

OppositeLand: How Washington Really Works

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 19:14:00 +0000

If you're like most Americans, you probably think that organizations like the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) are there to protect the common man from white collar criminals on Wall Street.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The reality is that the SEC is an agency dedicated to protecting the criminals from the gimpy arm of justice. The Madoff scandal is a perfect example. His Ponzi scheme was operating right out in the open and anybody with enough financial sophistication to work on Wall Street would've been able to figure out the fraud if they had bothered to add up the numbers.

Former fraud investigator Harry Markopolos did add up the numbers:

"The SEC was never capable of catching Mr. Madoff. He could have gone to $100 billion" without being discovered, Markopolos testified. "It took me about five minutes to figure out he was a fraud."

Markopolos had been warning about Madoff's scam since 2000. Nobody listened. He sent his detailed warnings with his reasonings attached and written in such a way I, a financial neophyte, could understand the brazenness of the fraud. It should have been obvious to any SEC fraud investigator within a matter of minutes.

Here's why they didn't pursue the matter:

Madoff, who was at one point chairman of the Nasdaq Stock Market and sat on SEC advisory committees, was "one of the most powerful men on Wall Street and in a position to easily end our careers or worse," Markopolos said.

The SEC would have been investigating one of their own, and that's just not gonna happen; then or now. That would be like Cheney investigating Bush or vice versa. Ain't gonna happen.

You see, Washington D.C. is kind of like OppositeLand: Everything is the opposite of the way it should be. Our biggest criminals are not just coddled, they are given the keys to the kingdom. When our banks screw up they are given billions for free, but when you are deep in debt you can bet on the credit card industry bribing Congress into passing tougher bankruptcy laws.

If you're able to wrap your head around the absurdity of the situation you might not be that surprised to find that the CIA is funding terrorism, the FBI is protecting criminals and the DEA is protecting drug smugglers. That's the way things work in OppositeLand. Bill Clinton gets impeached for a blowjob and Bush didn't even get censured for pissing all over the Constitution and starting two illegal wars in which over a million people died.

Welcome to OppositeLand, where if you fuck up, you move up. If you have ethics and morals, you can expect to be a social leper or maybe even have your ass killed for your troubles.

Hipster Holocaust: 9 Reasons Hipsters are Annoying

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 17:10:00 +0000

Being a hipster is sort of like being grotesquely fat; everybody can see that you are, but it's considered impolite to actually mention it.

Punks wear their tattered threads and studded leather jackets with honor, priding themselves on their innovative and cheap methods of self-expression and rebellion. B-boys and b-girls announce themselves to anyone within earshot with baggy gear and boomboxes. But it is rare, if not impossible, to find an individual who will proclaim themself a proud hipster. It’s an odd dance of self-identity – adamantly denying your existence while wearing clearly defined symbols that proclaims [sic] it.

Hipsters and indie kids try so hard to fit in, but it's embarassing to have someone point out that fact. The punks would call them posuers, but punks put a lot of thought into their image, too. I guess fashion is always supposed to appear effortless, but the hypocrisy bothers me.

I thought I was the only one annoyed by the judgmental, hypocritical self-righteousness of hipsters, but Douglas Haddow's adbuster's cover story from July (forgive me, Hipsters, I am behind the times) is an anti-hipster manifesto brimming with insightful eviscerations of the hipster lifestyle without being too condescending or preachy.

But after punk was plasticized and hip hop lost its impetus for social change, all of the formerly dominant streams of “counter-culture” have merged together. Now, one mutating, trans-Atlantic melting pot of styles, tastes and behavior has come to define the generally indefinable idea of the “Hipster.”

So basically, hipsterism is the McDonalds of countercultures. It's unoriginal, manufactured and monolithic. It can't be reasoned with or defeated because it's constantly morphing into whatever happens to be cool at the moment -- but not too cool:

But the moment a trend, band, sound, style or feeling gains too much exposure, it is suddenly looked upon with disdain. Hipsters cannot afford to maintain any cultural loyalties or affiliations for fear they will lose relevance.

If it's mainstream, it sucks. But what happens when hipsterdom goes mainstream? Your mom might not be a hipster, but if you're 15 to 40 it's likely you or one or more of your friends are a hipster (there should be a 12 step program). Hell, everyone you hang out with might be a hipster.

Not that there's anything inherently wrong with a herd mentality -- it keeps you safe. But there are several annoying things about hipsterdom that really bother me. A list:

Denying what you are: If somebody calls you a hipster and you angrily deny it; you're probably a hipster.
Following trends while pretending to be a trendsetter: Are you consistantly cool and fashionably dressed? Well, trendsetters take risks, make mistakes and often look goofy; it's part of the deal. If you don't take the risk of being uncool, you are not a trendsetter.
High school is over: 15 year-old hipsters notwithstanding, the Coolness Hierachy of hipsterdom is basically High School 2.0 -- enough already! I thought you were rebelling against status-obsessed drones who are now working their way up the real power hierarchy.
Smoking cigarettes is not rebellion: You're a good little Democrat-Hipster, aren't you? Then why do you smoke cigarettes? Profits from tobacco fund the right-wing hate machine you claim to oppose. Smoking Parliaments does not make you cool. If you want to be (somewhat) rebellious, smoke weed.
Claiming to be so open minded, yet only listening to hipster-appoved music: Indie rock is full of great tunes and good bands, but there are tons of bands out there playing excellent music who don't get love from hipsters because they don't have skinny jeans, ironic trucker hats or bed-hed haircuts.
Atheism-chic: As any hipster knows, atheism is "in". But haven't you noticed that hardcore atheists are just as annoying as fundamentalist Christians? Most Christians, while misguided, are nice people who respect others' beliefs. Atheists should remember to do the same.
Conflicting values: You can't be both an environmentalist and a shopaholic. You can't jump into the indie side of consumer culture and think that insulates you from the repercussions of materialism and consumption culture. Not driving an SUV does not make you green. Your fancy, designer shoes were probably made by orphan children in the Phillipines and then shipped over here at great expense to the environment... but not your conscience apparently.
Loyalty means nothing, only fashion: Hipsters will often hide their love of uncool things, or cloak their love in a vaccinating veil of irony. This only causes more self-loathing and hypocrisy. There's a whole generation of hipsters out there who love -- truly love -- AC/DC but would never, ever admit it, except through irony.
Conformity kills: Okay, so let me get this straight... you're rebelling against the conformist mainstream in the same manner as everyone else -- by joining a subgroup that is undeniably mainstream in your age group. Congrats on being both a hypocrite and a conformist in one fell swoop.

What it really boils down to is hypocrisy and herd mentality. I'm not saying I'm immune to either, but they both bug me and I'm committed to avoiding them wherever possible.

I understand the need to form subgroups. I do. It's 21st century tribalism and it has its benefits. Countercultures shouldn't be blamed for going mainstream if it's a positive force in the world, but I'm afraid hipsterdom has become a regressive force that's more based on exclusion, ego-driven hypocrisy and ironic apathy than any positive force. What part of hipsterism is positive? Will anyone stand up and defend hipsters... or even admit to being one?

2005 Bankruptcy Law Finance Industry Sought has Strangled Economy

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 01:51:00 +0000

Was the banking industry screwed over by its own bankruptcy law? It sure appears to have hurt the economy...

“Before the reform, overindebted households might file bankruptcy and get rid of their credit card debt, and that would free up income to pay the mortgage,” Morgan said. “The new law blocks that escape route and forces better-off households to continue paying credit card debt, which makes it harder than before to continue paying the mortgage.”

The conclusions of Morgan and his colleagues echo earlier findings that the new law’s tougher requirements appear to have increased the number of people defaulting on their mortgages or walking away from their homes rather than seeking bankruptcy protection.

“One of the great lessons and ironies” of the new law, Treasury Department economist David P. Bernstein wrote in a recent paper, was that, by increasing the dollar value of assets susceptible to default, it has weakened many of the financial institutions that sought the new law in the first place.

Man, those guy are fucking idiots, right?
Hmm... I suspect that we need to reference incompetence theory here. These assholes didn't get to the top of the finance industry by being clueless morons eager to throw their body into the arms of Defeat. No, these hard-asses know a lot more about the economy than most people do and they're using that insider knowledge to time the crash of the economy and profit from it.The bankruptcy law was an important part of the crash: it was the trigger. It was the pin that popped the bubble.

The robberbarons in charge of this economy aren't stupid. They know that their inflationary, fiat monetary system creates boom and bust cycles so they simply manipulate those cycles to their favor and crater the system at a time of their choosing.

Cheney's invested in Europe. The Bushes are in South America and the Middle East. I'm sure Hank and Ben are well taken care of, too. The rest of us will be the ones to deal with the fallout from this avoidable disaster. Don't assume the bankruptcy law was unimportant; it emanated from the very heart of the banking industry and its passage was assumed/assured in Congress. That law is now adding to the misery of those suffering in this corpse of a system.

It's time to change. We need to switch to a gold-backed system wherein people can feel safe and plan for the future without the economic rollercoasters juiced by Big Media's propaganda system, creating fear at the opportune moments. We ride on, strapped into a rickety system that is doomed to fail, and soon. The government hasn't been keeping up the rollercoaster. In fact, the top of the hierarchy have sold all the screws and bolts to China for a tidy profit. We are held aloft by hope, inertia and the wings of big-tittied angels.

Well, don't look down. Like Wile E. Coyote, we'd fall if we did. But we have to fall, don't we?

It's time to fall up
refuse to die
and start to fly
away from the lie

Crushed under a Ponzi Economy

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 05:14:00 +0000

[[blink]]...[[blink]]

Uh, what? Is it New Years yet? ... Wha? whatsdat? It's the 8th already? Of 2009? Seriously?

Shit.

Well, happy new year, folks. Time flies.

I guess I've been so busy working, being sick, celebrating the holidays, working up for sick days, working on a website, practicing with the band, and working some more, that I haven't had time to express my growing rage at the economic situation, which is clearly the work of vile capitalists who know how to make money off the market whether it's going up or falling down.

Bernie Madoff's got nothing on the dollar itself. The whole American monetary system is gigantic Ponzi scheme, waiting to collapse at the slightest provocation. This economic house of cards might just get us all killed -- you remember World War II started from the ashes of the Great Depression, of course. Well, between nukes, bioweapons and chemical weapons this shit could be even worse if we don't get out of this mess.

Does anybody know how?

From what I can tell the very same people who got us into this mess are being asked to get us out. The people who saw this coming, the Peter Schiffs and the Ron Pauls of the world, they are not being asked for their counsel, strategy or even the time of day. Nope. The Willfully Blind rush feverishly forward, wailing the whole way about how they could never have known.

Bullshit. They knew. Alan Greenspan can wade eye-deep into technical obscurity on any number of topics concerning money and markets. But you're telling me he couldn't see he was creating bubbles left and right? Bullshit. He knew exactly what he was doing and this downturn was planned long ago.

They plan to soak us dry, for every last penny we've got. The Ponzi scheme's house of cards crushes the people at the bottom when it falls. That's the whole point. The guys high up the hierarchy escape with the aid of their golden parachutes and insider knowledge; the rest of us get to hold the damn thing on our shoulders until it finally breaks our spines and we die, another generations of slaves beaten, broken and used by their illuminoid masters. We wore ties instead of chains but the end result -- endless work for pitiful rewards -- remained constant. We are a planet of serfs, dutifully laboring away for the guy in the castl-.. er, "mansion" up on the hill because if we don't we don't receive the resources necessary to live.

Maybe we should just learn to enjoy it. But sometimes these elite assholes like to deny us even the courtesy of a job to slave away at. And so we enter another such time, when you can smell the desperation in the air and wages stay stagnant while business cut back and hope to survive the storm. Desperate men are easy to manipulate; desperate businesses have to cut costs -- the cycle is not a happy one for the wageslaves.

Oh God, I'm gonna go to sleep before I rant all night, typing my fingers off in the uncaring darkness. I gotta let it go; just roll with it. Sometimes I actually hope for the apocalypse (preferably a zombie apocalypse) so we can dispense with the bullshit.

Happy 2009, slaves. Let's hope Master doesn't whip us too hard this year.

Happy Thanksgiving!

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 02:10:00 +0000

Reality's a bitch

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 23:43:00 +0000

Obama is picking moderates and center-rightists for his cabinet. That sound you hear? It's the sound of a million hopes and dreams thudding to the earth like balloons suddenly alchemized into lead.

We can only hope things will get better under Obama. I'd say they can't get worse, but that's not true. Evil has built up quite a momentum under Bush. The decisions he made (or his fellow cabalists made for him) over the last 8 years will continue to reverberate through the nation for the foreseeable future. Bush's legacy of wickedness and the destruction he wrought on our nation's principles and people will not be easily forgotten. Or forgiven.

But Obama seems very much of the same mind as Bush when it comes to the economy and the dire imperative of taking care of the ultra-rich at the expense of everyone else. Citigroup should've been allowed to fail. Instead we've given the supposed pillars of capitalism 7.76 trillion in taxpayer money:

The pledges, amounting to half the value of everything produced in the nation last year, are intended to rescue the financial system after the credit markets seized up 15 months ago.

If one of the pillars of American capitalism is made of butter, which Citigroup seems to be, then they must crumble (melt?). New ones will rise, if you believe in the free-market.

Neither Bush nor Obama does.

And with those two messing around with the economy I don't either; there never was and never will be a true free market because somebody's always got an agenda and if they have influence in government they will use that power to affect change to their benefit, principles be damned. People who talk lovingly about free markets are full of shit. They want open markets, the same way horny guys want loose women: They don't really love them (captains of industry prefer monopolies over competition), but they sure will take advantage of it while it's there. A "free" market is just one that hasn't been spoiled yet... but it will be. It will be.

The only way to fix this is to reconfigure the fundamentals of our economy so the super-rich don't control everything. But how are we gonna do that if they already do? Are they going to just let us? Fuck no. They have to have a reason first, and we haven't given them one.

Until we do, nothing will change. Reality's a bitch, ain't it?

Cutting costs

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 19:46:00 +0000

The Big Three automakers are in trouble. So naturally, they do what all captains of industry and hard-nosed capitalists do when the chips are down.

They fly to Washington in splendor to ask for a hand-out from the taxpayers.

ABC News has more:

The CEOs of GM, Ford and Chrysler may have told Congress that they will likely go out of business without a bailout yet that has not stopped them from traveling in style, not even First Class is good enough.

All three CEOs - Rick Wagoner of GM, Alan Mulally of Ford, and Robert Nardelli of Chrysler - exercised their perks Tuesday by flying in corporate jets to DC. Wagoner flew in GM's $36 million luxury aircraft to tell members of Congress that the company is burning through cash, asking for $10-12 billion for GM alone.

I wonder if the idea of curbing executive bonuses, perks, jets, options and salaries has even been seriously discussed in any of the corporate boardrooms from whence this plan to get taxpayers to pay for their failures came. Here's how I imagine it would go down:

SVP: "Hey guys, I have an idea: How about we curtail our perks, slash our salaries, eliminate our massive bonuses and quit giving the executive team stock options until we get the company back in the black!"

Rest of board: " .... HAHAHAHAAA!!!!"

EVP: "Good one, Chuck!"

SVP: "Thanks. I also know jokes about Mexicans."

All the people who scream about socialism being some intrinsic evil never seem to mind corporate welfare or socialism for the rich. The supposed-capitalists who run the American economy don't blink an eye before bailing out an incompetently-run company for billions of dollars. But if you suggest we spend money on infrastructure, schools or the poor they will scream "SOCIALIST!!!" at the top of their lungs. They're all about privatizing profits and socializing losses, which I think is the calling card of Evil 2.0 -- they get you on both ends, coming and going.

The rich play by their own set of rules and we are merely spectators. We just voted in a new Congress but we sure and hell didn't give them the okay to go around bailing out private enterprise. But in Washington money talks and the populace is told to shut the fuck up and go buy a TV. Nevermind the fact you can't afford it! You've got to do your part, just like all those CEOs who rode on their private jets to complain about how poor they are!

Just play your role, America: that of a lamb being led to the slaughter.

A new era? Meet the new boss...

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 18:32:00 +0000

So Obama's president-elect. Whoopee.

A lot of people are saying that either Obama will be way, way better than Bush or that Obama will be significantly worse.

I think it will be neither.

I simply can't imagine anybody being worse than Bush II. I mean, the guy didn't do a single thing in 8 years that I 100% agreed with. And committing treason, launching an illegal war on false premises and doing everything he could to destroy the environment and the middle class will be tough to top.

On the other hand, will Obama be that much better? Well, he will be hard-pressed to even get us back to where we were in 2000, before W took over. Simply put: there is no way Obama will be as good as we hope. For one, he's a moderate when we are in need of a radical. He's good at compromise and bringing people together, but I don't want to be brought together with the neocons who destroyed our country; I want to see them rot in jail for their crimes.

Secondly, he's surrounded by advisors and colleagues who got us into this trouble in the first place. There were economic advisors on both sides of the election (Phil Gramm for McCain and Robert Rubin for Obama) who helped create the current crisis and who continually denied that there even was a crisis. This is extremely bad news for those of us hoping for a quick turnaround (and for "change" in general) and it puts Obama's judgment and independence into question.

Let's say, as a wonderful thought experiment, that Obama does intend to bring big change to Washington, and is largely successful based on his penchant for bipartisanship and his crew of old-hands who know how the game works. Then what? Then he gets shot! Simple as that; the system will not allow massive, systemic change without a fight.

For instance, the only way to solve the current financial crisis is to rid ourselves of the pestilence known as the Federal Reserve. This private bank has impoverished America and robbed her of her economic liberty. But the last president who attempted to get rid of it was shot in broad daylight in Dallas by multiple gunmen and there was never so much as a trial.

Until we get back on the gold standard our economic problems will persist. If you have the time, watch a movie called Zeitgeist: Addendum, which lays out all the problems with our current (fiat and fractional reserve) monetary system in great detail, and how it's basically a pyramid-scheme and a scam to enslave us via money.

Will Obama make the painful changes necessary to rescue our nation from the inhuman greed of the international bankers and their cabal of cronies? Only time will tell, but it certainly doesn't look good. Add to this the fact that he's reinforcing Bush's laughable al-Qaeda myth and encouraging attacks on both Afghanistan and Pakistan and you've got a continuance of the U.S.'s crypto-imperialist policies and the War on Terror scam, which is actually a war on civil liberties. These are the tools the Bush admin used to manipulate people, spread fear and crush dissent. If Obama uses them as the neocons did, we will know that he is a threat to liberty too.

I'm willing to give him some time and a short honeymoon, but we must continue to be critical and relentless in our pursuit of justice, liberty and freedom. I don't care which party he's in, what he professes to believe, what color his skin is, or what he says he's going to do -- it's what he actually does that counts. And that's what I will judge him by.

Darkfold at the Dinkytowner this Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 07:11:00 +0000

Hey kids, my band Darkfold is playing the Dinkytowner Cafe this coming Wednesday. It'd be great to see you there, but I totally understand if you can't make it on a weeknight -- plus we don't go on until 11 pm. But we'd love to see you if you can make it! We're gonna bring the rock and there's no cover!!

And so it shall be done...

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 16:11:00 +0000

Haunted and evil

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 03:39:00 +0000

Take a listen to this hauntingly beautiful rendition of Vader's Theme:

Destroying the village in order to save it

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 16:59:00 +0000

I had to laugh when I saw this quote:

Community banking executives around the country responded with anger yesterday to the Bush administration's strategy of investing $250 billion in financial firms, saying they don't need the money, resent the intrusion and feel it's unfair to rescue companies from their own mistakes.
[snip]
"These measures are not intended to take over the free market but to preserve it," Bush said.

This sounds so much like Vietnam-psychosis it's sick. Destroying the village in order to save it didn't make sense then and it doesn't make sense now. Once you've started down that path you never find a reason to stop interfering -- something, somewhere always needs to be saved. Somehow I suspect that Bush will "save" the economy in the same way he saved Iraq!

Peter Fitzgerald, chairman of Chain Bridge Bank in McLean, said he was "much chagrined that we will be punished for behaving prudently by now having to face reckless competitors who all of a sudden are subsidized by the federal government."

At Evergreen Federal Bank in Grants Pass, Ore., chief executive Brady Adams said he has more than 2,000 loans outstanding and only three borrowers behind on payments. "We don't need a bailout, and if other banks had run their banks like we ran our bank, they wouldn't have needed a bailout, either," Adams said.

Hahahaa! The biggest socialist in Washington these days sits in the White House. Comrade Bush has decided that we need a planned economy, managed by the Executive Branch for the good of the rich.

Comrade Bush has managed to combine the worst parts of both socialism and fascism in his flailing "efforts" to save the economy, which, upon closer inspection, actually seem to be more about re-making the economy in his own image. Let the little guys die, save the big guys with massive amounts of free (taxpayer) cash and then claim you were trying to save the economy as a whole.

Others banks judged too sick to save will be allowed to fail.

Guess who gets to judge? Bush, Bernanke and Paulson, of course.

We're in deep shit.

Darkfold shows -- Are you ready to Rocktober?

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 13:42:00 +0000

I've got two Darkfold shows coming up in October (plus two more in November). Sorry for the short notice on the first one, but it's on Thursday October 16th at the legendary 400 Bar in Minneapolis!

Then the next gig is on Friday October 24th at Station-4 in St. Paul at 10pm. Both shows are with Foresight for Sore Eyes and Human Bean.

Check out a quick review on PerfectPorridge and find our tunes on MySpace or Last.fm. Be sure to check out PerfectPorridge for a chance to win the album just by saying you deserve it!

We're all gonna die: Why we need a soft landing

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:51:00 +0000

Things look grim. I'm sure we're not out of the woods yet -- there's a long way to go before we hit rock bottom.

You can probably guess my reaction to the bailout: SCAM!!

So, our plan is to give the people who fucked the economy billions of dollars with no real plan to get it back? Brilliant! How could that not work?

The assholes basically just got us to pay them for ripping us off. Quite the smooth move on their part.

But you know, it's basically rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic at this point. I don't think $700 billion (actually, with all the pork it's closer to $850 billion) will make a lick of difference. The problem is much deeper than that; it has to do with the way we create and regulate money, at the fundamental level. Basically, we need to return to the gold standard, eliminate fractional reserve lending and dissolve the Federal Reserve.

This will make for some bumpy transitions, as a nation used to 5% growth every year realizes that maybe 0.2% is more appropriate. Of course, the 5% growth stat is illusionary. You have to grow by 5% every year just to stay ahead of inflation. If you want to actually make money you need an even higher rate -- which leads to risky investments. Wall Street wants ever-better numbers and the strain of achieving them has led many an executive to make risky, negligent or downright stupid investments. We need fiscal sanity! It may be boring, and less people will be able to make a living moving electronic numbers around, but it will bring stable beneficence to the majority of the world.

Problem: How to get there from here.

Step one: Reach rock bottom.

We're well on our way there. I'm afraid nothing will change without suffering because there's no motivation otherwise. It's a sad truth. The problem is that we're speeding too fast towards rock bottom. We may hit it with the impact of a dinosaur falling off a thousand-foot cliff. That would basically end our civilization as we know it.

We need a soft landing. But how to get it? The fat-ass rich people stole the golden parachutes, but in a world where money is worthless paper what help will those parachutes be?

There's no way out of this one, folks. We're all gonna die unless somebody has been planning ahead with an altruistic and audacious plan to save us from our high-velocity trajectory straight into the ground.

We can't look to the people in charge to save us -- they're the ones who got us into this mess. So I guess we don't have many options. Who has a plan? Who has the resources to make it work? Who among us is bold enough to listen?

We are fast approaching the Rubicon.

Look out for falling banks

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 14:33:00 +0000

Holy cow -- lookout! There's banks falling like boulders all around us!

Luckily for them, when big, important institutions such as investment banks fail, they fall right into the loving arms of the Bush administration.

AIG, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch this week alone. Am I forgetting one? Probably. Now regulators are calling other banks looking for buyers in case Washington Mutual fails too.

Wall Street couldn't be in worse shape if it was literally on fire.

But, the GOP is there to bail these irresponsible banks out of trouble with -- you guessed it -- taxpayer money.

That's what the Establishment truly believes in: Socializing losses and privatizing profits.

God bless America, Comrade.

RNC 2008: Thoughts on the mass arrests and the role of police

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 21:47:00 +0000

I don't hate the police for arresting me without probable cause or any concern for my civil liberties. The problem is institutional and systemic. The police merely carry out orders. The leaders in government and business are the ones who have erected this steel-barricaded oligarchy, and they are ultimately to blame for the sad state of civil liberties in this country, which in turn has lead to a serious downturn in the quality of our political system. Politicians are merely corporate whores; they spend 90% of their time schmoozing for cash in order to afford re-election, which incumbents manage to do over 90% of the time.

People are pissed about this. I am one of them. The cops are no different than barbed wire and steel barricades. They're just an obstacle to freedom set up by the ruling class in order to protect them from us, no matter how peacefully we approach them with our greivances. They don't want to hear about it because it's a zero sum game -- their power depends on the abdication of our liberties. They are not inclined to hear or obey the people because they are not of the people. They are the Oligarchs; the Ruling Elite. They rule by force and manipulation. They are not a government by and for the people, they are a fascist oligarchy run by megalomaniacs for their own twisted gain.

Never take your eye off the ball. The cops are pawns in this just like the rest of us. To see who's playing the game, look to the Superclass.

RNC 2008: I was arrested after filming this video. The cops fired flash grenades, herded us onto Marion bridge and arrested us

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 04:52:00 +0000

I went downtown to St. Paul in order to get some pictures and observe the situation (I already protested on Monday), but John Ireland Bridge was blocked by the police with dump trucks when I got there. The cops said there was a bomb threat to the Minnesota Historical Society, but that was quite clearly a lie since they were standing so close to it and they'd already closed the other bridges as I found out later.

So I went over to the capitol on foot using the Marion Street Bridge instead. I saw more cops than protesters.

The cops had the city in a headlock. All the other bridges were closed by the police; cops, BCA agents and national guardsman were everywhere. St. Paul was on fucking lockdown.

By the time I found out how totally heavy-handed the police presence was I was getting tired and decided to split. I was trying to get back to my car on the other side of the Marion street bridge when I saw a group about 200 protesters approaching the bridge. That's why I'm walking against the flow at the beginning of the video. Unfortunately I was too busy trying to get good footage and didn't notice the cops had surrounded us on all sides.

Soon the police started firing flash grenades, smoke bombs and generally scaring the shit out of me and all these peaceful protesters. We were corraled onto the bridge where they told us we were all under arrest, but not before all of us were shellshocked by the overwhelming police response. Watch the video, but beware that it's intense, chaotic and there's swearing and explosions.

Notice how none of the protesters resisted or attacked the cops in any way. This is ironic because we were charged with "resisting a lawful order" along with the 1st amendment-killing crime of "presence at an unlawful assembly." Whatever happened to the right of people to peaceably assemble?

We are not free; The Bill of Rights is no longer operative.

If you aren't reading this from jail that simply means the cops haven't bothered to arrest you on trumped up charges yet. They can clearly do exactly that whenever they want, with no repercussions. I wasn't even part of the protest and I was charged with being part of an "unlawful assembly."

The whole arrest process took hours. We were told to sit and put our hands on our heads, which many people had to do for several hours (your arms get sore). I was cuffed after an hour or so and stood around for another hour waiting to get my mug shot (on the bridge; this was all very ad hoc). Since we were on the bridge for so long they eventually hauled at least 3 porta-potties onto the bridge itself, for both police and protester usage (under heavy guard, of course).

Eventually I was led onto a city bus with 40 other arrestees and brought to the Ramsey County jail for booking. They searched me about 5 times, confiscated all my stuff, and gave me a paper bag with a peanutbutter and jelly sandwitch and two apples. See, even oppressive police tactics have a Minnesota Nice aspect. Of course we didn't get knives so we had to spread the jelly and PB with our fingers.

Hours dragged by as we waded our way through the bureaucracy and were eventually cited and loaded onto a paddywagon and driven out of the jail. They let us out just outside the fences and we were free -- and on our own far from where we were arrested, but at least the incredibly awesome Coldsnap Legal Collective were there to offer us hugs and access to free legal advice.

People without rides or places to go were able to sleep on the grass outside the jailhouse thanks to sleeping bags the Coldsnap folks brought. Somebody sent the angels last night; they're doing great work and need your support!

The problem with good things is that the police like to infiltrate and ruin them from the inside. That might've been the case with the protest last night. I heard several people talking about police plants -- agent provocateurs pretending to be protesters, inciting violence and keeping their superiors informed about where they are headed.

Unfortunately, this is standard practice for police departments these days, including Denver during the DNC. How many acts of vandalism and violence that you read about in the mainstream media were actually committed by undercover cops in order to incite and defame activists?

Imagine the embarrassment of the police and governments if they held a convention with massive protests and no one was arrested! They'd have spent millions upon millions of dollars for nothing! They've got to earn their outrageous security budgets, which is why they were so keen to arrest anybody who happened to be near Marion St. Bridge last night, including media folks and medics (at least 5 were arrested, along with a dozen credentialed photographers).

Of course they also wanted to show who's boss. Clearly they are, and clearly they are not going to allow us to change the system peacefully or otherwise. We are not free. We are only permitted to do what they let us; truly free expression is verboten. Believe it or not, America used to be a pretty anything-goes society as long as it wasn't overtly violent (think of the Old West). Nowadays we cling to our police state as if that makes us safer. But what have we lost in the process?

RNC 2008: Rage Against the Machine tried to play a free show but the cops refused to let them -- then shit got ugly

noreply@blogger.com (Vemrion) — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:32:00 +0000

This is the BEST video I've found of the Rage Against The Machine free show that didn't really happen. The cops refused to let Rage take the stage. After arguing with the police for awhile Rage decided to bust out an a capella version of a few of their songs. This video captures that moment (props to PP for finding):

Then the band urged the crowd to join the Poor Peoples' March. The police didn't like that much and things started to get a little tense. Here's an account from Matt Snyders on what happened next:

There is currently a buffer zone between the corner of Wabasha and 7th and the corner of St. Peter and 7th St. near Mickey's Diner. In that buffer zone, there are two ambulances, an SUV and a white van. Police are also blocking 10th St. in both directions.

At about 7:55, advancing police began creating the buffer zone. Police told demonstrators, media and onlookers to move back. At 8:15, they started blocking off the way south. At 8:25, there were a few small explosions, and plumes of smoke began to rise. Some bombs went off, and we got the hint of tear gas on the air.

Demonstrators were chanting "We want peace, we want peace," before the gas went off.

I was on Wabasha and 7th Street when this happened.

The cops received orders to begin advancing at us in order to close off the intersection.

I started capturing video of this and it's some scary shit. About 80 seconds into the video a series of explosions go off. I can only assume these were the smoke bombs and/or tear gas cannisters being launched. The cops were chanting as they marched towards us in lockstep. It was some freaky shit:

At the end of the video the teargas starts blowing our way so we got the heck out of there.

I wasn't even with the main protest group. There was a much larger group (the Poor Peoples March and the Rage Against the Machine crowd) that was being broken by the cops. I met up with fragments of this larger protest after they had been tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed.

This guy was getting some assistance from a friend after being doused in the face with pepper spray. It looked more than a little bit painful.

The cops continued clamping down and pushing the protesters back across the Cedar bridge. They didn't seem to be encountering any resistance, but they were intent on smashing the protest. They set up perimeters and used the barricades to corral the marchers back across the Wabasha bridge:

The protesters made a last stand of sorts at the (heheheh) Peace Officers Memorial.

They used cops on bikes to quickly block off streets and other avenues of escape and then sent in the baton-weilding foot soldiers to disperse us completely.

I can say with 100% accuracy that the police stormed the Peace Officers Memorial. Apparently the irony was lost on them.

Check out my earlier post about the more peaceful Anti-War protest the previous day. And there are more photos to view in my photostream.