In Colorado Another Politician Wants New Borns to Die From AIDS

My friend Bart just forwarded me this article from the Denver Post about dip-shit, Anti-Christ moralist David Schultheis, a Republican from Colorado Springs:
who voted against a bill requiring pregnant women to be tested for HIV because, he said, it would wrongly protect women and their unborn children from the consequences of "sexual promiscuity."

What? What? Are you telling me this Colorado Springs man, probably a Creepy Christian, wants kids to die because their mothers got laid or shot up some dope?

Why do men like Schultheis want people dead to prove their point? This fucker's probably from the denomination known as "The Church of Jesus Christ Should Have Shot Mary Magdalene in Her Whorish Crotch"

Jesus Christ! Jesus Christ!

According to this article, just a few days before, Sen. Scott Renfroe from Greely argued:

homosexuality is an "abomination" and a sin comparable to murder in a debate over a bill extending health benefits to same-sex partners of state employees.

Fuckin-A Fascists! Why do you want people unlike you to die?

With Holy Roller penis-knockers like these running around, all I've got to say is, let's raise the corpse of Jesus in Colorado to set these dip-shits queer.

What a bunch of murderous thugs.

Bored in a Meeting? Tell Your Most Scandalous Story!

Late night over drinks, "What's your most scandalous story," is one of my favorite questions to ask and my favorite questions to answer. It cuts to the chase, it assumes friends have more dirt than they wear on their sleeves. In a culture where everyone's trying to cover their secrets up, it makes people just uncomfortable enough to make things interesting.

Whether it's Truth or Dare or Cliff or any other game that makes people reveal something new about themselves and how they relate to the world, it works to get everybody eager and excited.

This is what social movements need to do more of. We need to know more dirt on each other. How often do we sit in a never ending meeting, yacking about social movements, and unwilling to reveal the slightest details about ourselves, our addictions, our desires, our flaws.

People aren't interesting in their heroism, perfection, and smooth social graces. We're interesting in how we smell, where we break-down, and in the depths of our disabilities, perversions, and social failures.

Perhaps this is why folks love tragedy so much--they love to watch a hero fall.

So the next time a meeting is dragging on at your office, I suggest you play a coffee drinking game of I Never.

I never had sex with a co-worker on the conference room table.

Ok, guilty...You know who you are...Drink up.

Shout Out to Fire Witch Rising for Hillarious Commentary on the Closing of The Rocky Mountain News

Check out Fire Witch Rising's funny post about the closing of the Rocky Mountain News!

She's so good!

Roy and Silo: Powerful: Mary Tremont's Poster of Cute Gay Penguins!

Ok, so I guess I'm on a Just Seeds kick again! This poster collective puts out some of the best work of anyone working in print. Check out this friggin' adorable poster Mary Tremonte did of Roy and Silo, the gay penguins at the central park zoo.

Stealing from the Just Seeds Blog, Mary writes:

This is a reworking of a print I made in 2007, the first of a continuing series on queer animals. Roy and Silo are male chinstrap penguins in the Central Park zoo, who were sexual companions for over six years. Zookeepers noticed them sitting on egg-shaped rocks while other penguins were incubating, and they were given a fertilized egg. Roy and Silo patiently incubated it until it hatched. There are dozens of documented cases of same-sex penguin couples in captivity and the wild. After I first created this print, I found that Roy and Silo's story was made into a children's book And Tango Makes Three by Peter Parnell. This book has been banned at libraries in conservative areas throughout the United States.

All of this brings us to present political struggles over basic civil rights based on gender and sexuality, with Prop 8 and pending legislation in Allegheny County, where I live. Opponents of legal protection for same-sex couples and genderqueers often use the argument that it is 'not natural,' or a behavior rather than an inborn trait, such as race. These examples of biological exuberance counteract those views.

Speaking from the heart, I am always looking for new signifiers and icons, as General Idea did with poodles and baby seals in the 1980's. Respect your spirit! Love is powerful!

Rock on Mary!

Rumor has it one of those gay penguins started doing it with a woman. Now, I don't mean to disrupt just how awesome it is that there are gay penguins, but I think I'm more psyched that they're pansexual penguins too!

Hot Dog!

US Military Interventions Since WWII

Check out Josh MacPhee's poster, US Military Interventions Since WWII. Josh is an anarchist artist whose work decorates the houses of radicals, teachers, artists, and cultural workers alike. Check it out!

Bill Maher's Racist Remark on Afghanistan: "Maybe They're Not Ready For Freedom?"

On Real Time With Bill Maher, Maher just speculated that folks in Afghanistan are not ready for freedom. This wreaks of bizarre social Darwinism, racism, xenophobia, and cultural superiority. The idea that some people are better equipped for freedom, democracy, and human rights infuses so much of American Society. People here really think that the U.S. is superior. I'm disgusted by this attitude. With the U.S. rape rates exceedingly high, police violence rampant, the largest prison population in the world, a pathetic health care system, and a couple brutal wars (one on people in Afghanistan), the U.S. has clearly failed to be ready for Freedom.

But that's the government. That's the people in charge. People, every day folks, whether in Kandihar or Denver are longing to be free from the violence of the United States, imperialism, and brutality.

How Men Can Get Off With a Woman's Vibrator

I can't tell you how many women have told me that the Hitachi Magic Wand is their favorite sex toy. It's a humongous vibrator that looks like an egg beater. It's gigantic, much larger than the clitoris, and legions more ferocious than the hand.

But the Hitachi is not just for women. What I like most about the Hitachi is that if you stick a toy up your bum, say something like the Aneros or a medium sized butt-plug, men can actually use the Hitachi to press into the toy and get the most incredible orgasms via the P-Spot (prostate...the male g-spot). It's super fun and super hot.

Few acts can give a man such an erotic, heightened, ecstatic experience. Check it out, if you haven't.

My Top Six Words That Others Might Find "Kind of Offensive:"

My friend and I spent a couple hours on the trip back from Mississippi hashing out language--what's fucked up to say and what's not. I'm not much of a believer in the idea of "good" and "bad" language. We talked a ton about words like "lame," "sick," and "blind" and what fell into the category of ableist language and exactly how one should respond. I'm not sure we agreed on any conclusions other than the idea that being aware of the cultural/oppressive contexts of language matters.

Not long after the conversation, I received this comment from Brittany, an offended reader bothered by my post, How to Spot a Gay Man in Mississippi.

thats kind of offensive..i dont use the word dyke.

At first I wondered why she was more offended by the word dyke than by the rash generalizations about Mississippians I made. Then I wondered what it was about that word that offended her...particularly from a queer person. I asked and have not heard back. I really wish she elaborated.

Additionally, I wondered what "kind of offensive" meant. Was it that she was not sure if it was tasteless? Did she want a conversation about degrees of offense or was she just being polite.

There are many words that I don't use and perhaps I find them "kind of" offensive when others find them quite normal.

In talking to my friend on the way back from Mississippi, she asked me what words I use that others might find politically offensive. So here it goes. I present:

My Top Five Words That Others Might Find Kind of Offensive:

1) Queer: I like this word, not only because it describes my own sexuality and many others that don't quite fit in, but because once upon a time it was a phrase used to oppress and now, us queers use the phrase to say, "fuck yeah, we're oddball, pervert, badasses, and if you wanna fuck with us, you better watch the fuck out."

2) Faggot: I got called faggot so much as a kid that I began to enjoy the term. Its more risky than queer, more flamboyant, and more in your face. When the gay and lesbian mainstream is all about marriage and property ownership, faggots are all about sexual revolution and wrecking convention. I'm a faggot baby, so give it like you mean it.

3) Cunt: I can't think of a word that describes the vagina, clit, clit legs, labia, cooch better. Well, hmmmm, maybe cooch, but cunt just sounds so hot. (If you don't like the word, of course, I'd refrain from saying it around you. Just let me know.)

4) Dyke: I love dykes. Amen. I love dykes for friends, lovers, and collaborators. Dykes are so much rougher, queerer, and funner than their polite co-queers from the island of Lesbos. Dyke is tough, like a motor-biker, a construction worker, or a muscular woman with a strap-on named Big Red rushing at me from across the room.

5) Slut: This word does a great job describing sex positivity, radical desire, the inherent economic relationship between fucking bodies, and a general loose sensibility I embrace.

drumroll...and for an extra one...

6) Bisexual: So many gay men refer to bisexuals as "fence-sitters," "unable to leave the closet," and "indecisive." Now that trans-politics have taken off, "bisexual" as a term has become unpopular in queer communities, replaced by words like "queer," pansexual," and ambisexual." I like the word because it's all that a lot of kids know to use for themselves, trying to come out in small towns.

Different Faces of Homelessness: Tonight's Homelessness Marathon Broadcast

Free Speech TV will be broadcasting LIVE from The Homelessness Marathon at 7pm Eastern Time, February 23rd, 2009.

Check it out at Dish 9415 and online at http://freespeech.org


Coming to Pass Christian, Mississippi to shoot for The Homelessness Marathon, we imagined taping loads of B-Roll of homeless folks to use in the broadcast. The funny thing about making television is that things don't always work out as expected. Homelessness looks really different in small towns than it does in big cities.

I think we all expected to see folks pushing shopping carts up the street, sleeping in cardboard boxes, passed out on grates, asking for change, and out in public holding signs that say "I'm Homeless. Help." Rather, what we've seen are the destroyed foundations of thousands of homes, many quite lavish, others poor. We've heard tales of rich people being the first to receive government assistance (sound familiar) and poor people still waiting to be evicted (familiar too).

We've seen the bright green, frightfully new MEMA Trailers sitting next to houses smashed up by the storm. Many folks may be pushed out of their houses in the next few months because the government is reclaiming the trailers (stealing homes). For people who've been waiting around for promised government grants to come through that never did, they're shit out of luck.

So what's going to happen to folks displaced by the storm? They'll be evicted, thrown out on the street, and joining millions of others left to die by a state that has more money to kill people in other countries than to help folks here.

So where are homeless folks? Tonight, during the live radio cast, I hope to get a better idea, to hear directly from the people most impacted by Katrina, those stranded outside with nothing left, broken and destroyed by the state. You can check out our broadcast at Free Speech TV.

As for iconic images of the homeless as seen above, they will be scarce in our broadcast. Rather than objectifying folks, we'll be providing a live, national platform for people to be heard. Hope you can check it out.

Five Reasons the Civil War Could Erupt Again

All these brainless white people chatter about how America is in a post-race era because Obama has taken charge of the country. Here are my top five reasons this country is spinning ass-backwards into a sinking pit of quick-sand poop, a Civil War reenactment of grotesque proportions where poor Southerners fight gay Northerners and nobody gets laid.

1) At the gas station last night, here in Mississippi, a creepy gas station attendant with prominent skinhead tattoos looked at me and whispered, "Oh great, another Colorado Bitch. Fuckin' Yankees."

2) Mississippi still has a Confederate Flag stuck slap dab in the middle of the state flag just to remind the rest of the Union that the South's gonna do it again.

3) GOP Governors, convinced that taking handouts is as bad as sodomy. have united in a front to refuse money from the Federal Bailout while folks in their states suffer.

4) Long Island assholes love to talk shit on the South--both the "racist rednecks" and the "dirty Mexicans." (Why do hurricane's never strike up there?)

5) Like Robin Hood on opposite day, the bankers just ripped off public funds and gave to the rich. Do they want to get spanked by the masses?

There's about to be a national prison riot and this Titanic of a nation is about to sink into the Arctic which is melting so fast it's pouring out of my spigot in Mississippi. Guess what ya'll. We're totally screwed and the whole mother is going down.

How to Spot a Gay Man in Mississippi?

They have guts, facial hair, and very masculine tattoos. I try to give them the eye and they smile and wave. So I'm dying to figure out how to spot a fellow-traveler, a big ole' homo, a hot and hairy big-bellied bear man in Mississippi. All these Southern men look like bears and all their wives look like dykes. I love this place, but somehow, I get the feeling that if I try to take a bear to bed (or for that matter his dyke wife), he might end up pulling out the bible, burning a cross, or kicking my ass from bed to a rope dangling from the nearest oak tree. So somebody tell me--which of this trade is fair trade and how do I tell the homos from the nonos.

Urgh, I want a big Southern Man

The Economy is Dead - Art Is Alive: Props to Dylan Miner

I just checked out Dylan Miner's new print: Arte está viva…La economía está muerte. I sure hope Miner's on-point with this one. While our economy is indeed dead, the proposition that art is alive slaps the face of decades of proclamations about its death. Good news that its alive and serving folks through Just Seeds. I just hope that the rest of the art establishment catches up and starts serving the dying, starving, sick, and oppressed--the vast majority of people in this wacky world trying to get by without getting screwed.

Kudos to Dylan and the Just Seeds folks for their ongoing art for social, economic, and environmental justice.

Lotsa love!

The South Won't Do It Again: Thoughts on the Confederate Flag

Hanging out during Mardis Gras in Pass Christian, Mississippi, a city draped in Confederate Flags, I get a gut feeling that a deep love of old Southern values has not died. Unlike Virginia and Tennessee, Rebel Flags do not accompany American Flags. Rather, they stand alone, proud symbols of a defeated cause, a depressing cause, a cause as pathetic as it is forgotten.

Nobody knows better than these Confederate Flag waving Rebels that the South cannot do it again, that Mississippi, one of the nation's poorest states, has been forgotten. From slavery, to lynchings, to a government that prefers to invest Katrina Relief money into ports rather than people, Mississippi cannot help but view itself as a dying phoenix, burnt to ashes, longing to rise again, clinging to its despicable past to distract itself from the violence of the present, a violence caused by Northern neglect.

The Confederate Flag often causes anger in Northern people who believe their regions excel in social justice. What these self-righteous folks forget is that the North has a history as bloody and violent, as racist and deadly as the South. From police violence in San Francisco and New York to fast-rising hate groups like World Church of the Creator in Chicago,no part of this occupied nation founded in genocide and slavery lacks a bloodbath history and a reprehensibly racist present.

The Confederate Flag symbolizes poor, broken white people's desires to live the lives of slave-owners again. Disturbing? Yes. Threatening. Not particularly.

M ore threatening to people of color are the criminal bankers siphoning the people's money, violent cops, pre-prison schools, and the prison industrial complex. The tawdry impotence of the Confederate Flag and the broke white folks who wave it have little to do with the racism, genocidal tendencies, and violence our system continues to fuel itself on. These Rebels are victims too.

Update from Mississippi about Homelessness Marathon

I have a few moments to write so pardon the rush job.

We just finished shooting short docs for The Homelessness Marathon. We arrived back at the hotel we're staying at where Kevin and Erin are starting to log and capture footage from today's interview with Jeremy Alderson, AKA Nobody, founder and host of The Homelessness Marathon and other incredible community activists.

Seeing the devastation from Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Gustav has been troubling. Knowing that so many people are without homes, stuck in MEMA trailers they're about to lose to a state whose bureaucracy has failed the people should compel all people to action.

This week I read an article in The Nation that discussed the term Kafkaesque. The government's massive failure to release money to the survivors of Katrina in Mississippi is a glaring reminder of how dysfunctional bureaucracies fail people.

We're all tired but excited for Monday night's broadcast that will be available on Dish 9415 and freespeech.org.

We're off to chill out. More updates later.

Airport Check-in Person Talks Dirt on the U.S. Economy and the Corporate Media

Kevin and I just got to Denver International. We had a long conversation with the woman at the check-in counter about how screwed up all the foreclosures are. She was indignant that at a hearing with bankers a homeless woman was only given 1 minute to talk about her struggle.

You can tell the political climate in the country has changed when the folks at the airport enjoy talking shit on the economy and the corporate media.

Well, off to check-in!

Headed to the Annual Homelessness Marathon TV Broadcast

Gentle Readers--

Thanks for understanding the lag. I've come down with a nasty cold and have been in recovery. That being said, I've done my best to sleep it off and hell or high water I'm headed down to Pass Christian, Mississippi to shoot the annual Homelessness Marathon Radio Broadcast with Free Speech TV. The show will be available on our regular channel on Dish Network (9415) and live online (fingers crossed) at Free Speech TV Monday 7pm EST-10pm EST.

This annual broadcast is an incredible event that brings the voices of homeless folks, advocates, and activists to radio listeners and tv viewers across the nation and puts pressure on local and national politicians and business people trying to screw the poor.

Our crew will be arriving in Houston Texas this afternoon and driving to Pass Christian. Tomorrow we will be up early to start filming interviews with a variety of folks at advocacy groups and Jeremy Alderson, the coordinator of the event.

The week should be interesting. Check back here for travel updates, observations, and other tidbits. I'll post as I have access!

Somebody Should Run Over the Automakers Before They Steal More

Guess what General Motors, cars are going out of style. If the government bails you out, it's because you're yesterdays news and they're backwards. Stop asking for money when you spent the last 100 years slowing down technology to help out your buddies in the oil industry.

Listen Obama, instead of wasting more money on this unscrupulous, ecocidal industry, why don't you give the $14 billion they're asking for to community bike shops who can barely raise a thousand dollars. Why don't you give the $14 billion to Detroit's schools, community spaces, and art's centers? Why waste it on yesterday's aristocracy?

Focus on the Family's Dobson Declares War on the Civil Rights of LGBTQ People and Women

What creeps me out about Religious Right zealots like James Dobson is that not only do they prescribe bizarre "moral" codes for their cultist Christian followers, but they also have a broad disdain for civil rights and civil liberties.

In James Dobson's February Newsletter, he waxes on about his enthusiasm that the United States has a black president and then goes on to declare war against the civil rights agenda of the new administration.

In frightfully militant words, this war-mongering Christian states:

We at Focus on the Family® and Focus on the Family Action™ will do our best to defend the values and principles that have characterized this ministry from the beginning. Though our "army" may be smaller, certainly in Congress and in the state houses of government, we will continue the struggle. One of my favorite historical personalities was British Prime Minister during World War II, Winston Churchill. He said during the darkest hour when his country was facing defeat and enslavement, "Never give in—never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy."

These Christian war-mongers are the greatest threat to the safety and security of queer people, people of color, and women in the country. They impose their ideology by attacking people's psychological well being. They have declared psychological warfare against women and the LGBTQ community and framing their debate in terms of war will stop at nothing to advance their cause. Until this neo-fascist regime loses power, all queer people and women are at risk of attack by their "army."

Is Friendster Having a Comeback as A Clandestine Social Networking Site For Hipster Terrorists?

This is the million dollar question for those of us who were introduced to social networking via Friendster, the social networking site that fell out favor after installing stalking functionality. We wait and wait for it to come back, maintaining profiles, keeping our information on the site, wishing it would be hip again.

Alas. Myspace kicked Friendster in the pie hole and now Facebook beat Myspace to a pulp. So what happened to Friendster? Well, let's just say, I think it's the super-secret, hip underground space where menacing bomb-throwers conspire to swarm the American Empire wearing designer hoodies and riding fixed gear bikes.

Cops Defile Valentines Day in Annual "Sweetheart Sting"

Is it just me or is the idea of police defiling Valentines Day by showing up at suspects houses pretending to be flower delivery people a tasteless crime against love?

According to the Denver Post:

Northglenn police arrested 16 wanted people in a Valentine's Day sweep in which officers posed as delivery people to contact suspects.

Apparently, these creepy cops show up in a van that says "Flower Delivery."

If this annual sweep is their idea of a good time, I think they should eat a box of butt-chocolate candies. No wonder cop suicide rates are so high.

CIA Wimps Use Robots to Blow Up Pakistani Peasants: This Isn't War--This is a Video Game

Anyone who read the NY Times article U.S. Airstrike Kills 30 in Pakistan and saw that the CIA is flying drones over Afghanistan and Pakistan to kill insurgents realized quickly that this is not a war we're fighting. It's a video game.

In America's new style of war, a handful of Play Station nerds sit off-site in a bunker somewhere eating pizza and blowing up peasants. While real peasants are sitting down for dinner, holding hands in prayer, a gigantic "drone," ala remote control plane, flies overhead, shoots out missiles, and blows the peaceful family to smithereens.

This is a South Park fantasy atrocity born to life through the cowardice of the CIA and the American Military.

Shame on this murdersome government, too scared to fight.

It's no longer the sexist phrase, "Fight Like a Man." Now it's gender neutral and more insidious: "Fight Like a Robot."

In other news for America's Wimpiest, the U.S. Military is planning on giving immigrant military recruits citizenship status. Their justification: Americans are too culturally inept to be diplomatic in other countries. One has to wonder if this bribery is occurring because American citizens know so-well since Vietnam that our military is corrupt and fails to serve the constitution.

Even from the perspective of World War II soldiers, deemed as heroes by most Americans, the U.S. military strategies are little-more than chicken-feces, knee quivering embarrassments to this "great" country.

These wars suck and people should not fight in them. It's even worse to send immigrants off to die for citizenship status in this genocidal nation. I'm headed upstairs to send my drone to fetch me brunch.

Happy Valentines Day to Heartbroken Queer Freedom Fighters, Lovers, and Friends

Valentines Day: a day of love and possibility, shame for single folks, gloating for coupled folks, and awkward scheduling for the polyamorous. I am happily in love today--in love with the concept of radical, queer sex, polyamory, self-righteous anarchist puritanism, hedonistic defiance, and political rejection from the progressive mainstream (who as you probably know is cheating on democratic structures and having a love affair with authoritarianism and the IRS via 501c3s.)

This year, failing to collectivize an organization I deeply love, I once again remember that political failure is normal, striving for beautiful things doesn't always work, and political breakups within movements are painful. Because I feel a bit heartbroken from my misguided love affair with liberalism and the non-profit industrial complex, this Valentines Day, I cry a little.

Nonetheless, I'm happily in love with Hillary and about a dozen other friends, am constantly inspired by folks working for social change (winners and losers alike), and long with all my heart for the romantic possibility of an egalitarian world. With these things, I am in love and will live and die for them.

This evening I am going on a date with my dearest, sweetheart Hillary, pedaling back from some fancy restaurant to a slow-dance party where Denver's finest, queer punks, anarchists, and misfits will gently rock the night back and forth like awkward middle-schoolers in love.

Ah, sweet Denver. Ah, sweet Love.

Militant Iraqi Art Show and the Connection Between Militancy and Art

Today's NY Times Front Page reported that "In Iraq, Militant Group Takes on a New Role: Patron of Arts."

According to the article, Sheik Mazin al-Saedi stated:

"The goal was 'to show the entire world that we are not as the media portrays us, a movement that believes only in bearing arms and knows no culture other than that of violence.'"

The militants titled the show "Beacons of Humanity." I hope that major U.S. Art institutions decide to bring the show to the U.S.

From my perspective, the world would be a lot better off in more spaces were open to militant movements' art. Al-Saedi is correct in his thinking that the media portrays militants as rash, violent thugs with little-to-no sense of culture, when in reality, militant movements often consist of the best read, most aesthetically advanced elements of society.

Perhaps this is why, so often, the greatest artists and intellectuals are also involved in militant struggle and ideas. Roque Dalton, Walt Whitman, Cherrie Moraga, Ernest Hemingway, George Orwell, and Mark Rothko are several classic examples.

Top Five: Why Jesus Would Be Pissed at the USA

1) Jesus would be pissed if he saw these bankers getting billions of dollars in bailouts with homeless people dying on the street. Watch out Wall Street! Jesus has a flame-thrower and he's coming for you!

2) Jesus would be pissed off at all these mega-churches with fast-food restaurants and finger pointing preachers. Watch out Mega-Churches! Jesus has a bulldozer and he's coming for you!

3) Jesus would be pissed because of all the corpses that have piled up in the name of our flag: Iraq, Afghanistan, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Palestine, Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan, the list goes on and on. Even worse, Jesus would think, "Damn, I thought the cross was the nastiest way to die...look at all these poor suckers! Watch out Pentagon! Jesus has his ass on a missile and he's flying towards you!

4) Jesus would be pissed off because the United States supports Israel which acts like Rome. As a Palestinian Jew, Jesus would be sick of the self-righteous Zionists who try to use the Holocaust as an excuse for a new genocide. Watch out Israel, Jesus is Palestinian and he's walking towards you!

5) Jesus would be pissed off because the United States builds borders and fear and war machines. Jesus liked crossing borders freely. Watch out Homeland Security. Jesus just met with Bin Ladin and he's headed towards you!

For Valentine's Day: MSNBC's Top 5 Hetero Romance Tips + One Queer's Top 5 Guide to What Hetero Men Should Know!

MSNBC is busy using Valentine's Day to bolster conventional notions of gender, heterosexuality, desire, and love. This time, they're justifying the creepy gender binary with so-called "scientific studies" that help men please their women. As always, the article is written for men.

According to the article:

Gals want looks and smarts. While you men can't control those two characteristics much, take heart: Money and character are also important to women.

Even though hetero dudes might be ugly and stupid, rest assured that money matters. Just find yourself a a woman and buy her. Buy her a dinner. A ring. A house. Her body? Wait a minute, suddenly your significant other sounds like a sex-worker...I guess it's OK if it's consensual...

Oh, wait, the economy tanked so I guess you can just use your positive disposition. If you've not been emotionally destroyed by poverty and succumbed to national depression, you still might please your mate.

(Mate is such an unfortunate term...It makes heteros sound like breeding swine.)

OK, so here is my own top 5 list!

THE TOP 5 THINGS HETERO MEN CAN LEARN FROM FAGS LIKE ME THIS VALENTINE'S DAY!

1) Bend over baby, you've got a nice rump and nobody to go out with.
2) Inside that rump is a walnut shaped do-hickey called P-R-O-S-T-A-T-E that will make you feel like one of those snake-handling holy rollers on acid.
3) Now that you've found your prostate and Jesus inside, turn around and give me that come-hither finger wag on mine.
4) Uh, first grab the lube...Ok...Much better.
5) I don't care if you tested negative three years ago and have only been with your virgin girlfriend since. I like my sausage wrapped!

Director of National Intelligence claims economic and environmental crisis will lead to terrorism, another word for self-defense.

February 12th, 2009, Dennis C. Blair, Director of National Intelligence published The Annual Threat Assessment of the Intelligence Community for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. It's findings probably won't shock you.

The primary near-term security concern of the United States is the global economic crisis and its geopolitical implications. The crisis has been ongoing for over a year, and economists are divided over whether and when we could hit bottom. Some even fear that the recession could further deepen and reach the level of the Great Depression. Of course, all of us recall the dramatic political consequences wrought by the economic turmoil of the 1920s and 1930s in Europe, the instability, and high levels of violent extremism. Though we do not know its eventual scale, it already looms as the most serious global economic and financial crisis in decades.

So why exactly is Blair alluding to the 20's and 30's? Well, you guessed it, it ain't Al Quaida. It's class war.

In the 20s and 30s, millions of people worldwide realized that thieves controlled the capitalist system. Their answer? Mass organized demonstrations, revolutions, and a proliferation of Independent Media via self-published newspapers that threatened to tople corrupt power. In Russia, it did. Well, same as now, sometimes chickens do come home to roost. (Sorry Malcolm and Ward, I just couldn't think of a better phrase...)

The Director of National Intelligence is...well...intelligent enough to know that if a robber enters the house of a gun-owner, the thief might not leave alive. Same with bankers who steal from the Treasury and homeowners. Same with a government that sent its children to die overseas. Same with an international public fed up with U.S. Imperialism.

We are sitting on a powder-keg that's sitting on a nuclear weapon that's sitting on anthrax that's sitting on depleted uranium. In short, the United States Government and its capitalist daddies have created conditions that justify violence and many people around the world are ready to explode.

Mr. Blair's assessment of American benevolence extends well beyond mine. He writes:
We are nevertheless in a strong position to shape a world reflecting universal aspirations and values that have motivated Americans since 1776: human rights; the rule of law; liberal market economics and social justice. Whether we can succeed will depend on actions we take here at home—restoring strong economic growth and maintaining our scientific and technological edge and defending ourselves at reasonable cost in dollars without violating our civil liberties. It will also depend on our actions abroad, not only in how we deal with regions, regimes and crises, but also ATA FEB 2009–IC STATEMENT FOR THE RECORD 45 in developing new multilateral systems, formal or informal, for effective international cooperation in trade and finance, in neutralizing extremist groups using terrorism, in controlling the proliferation of WMD, developing codes of conduct for cyberspace and space, and in mitigating and slowing global climate change.

So even though Blair and I strongly disagree about history (get real Blair, in 1776 our forefathers were slave owners and Indian butchers, not social justice--human rights oriented saints), he's right that the best way to combat terrorism is to combat the reasons for terrorism: economic disparity and escalating global climate change. If this unequal economic system continues, the blood of the ruling class will flow. Its happened before when people concentrated (stole) wealth and it will happen again. Oh, and by the way, this shouldn't be called terrorism when it's really self-defense.

MSNBC Reports Women Armed With Pink Panties Target Hard-line Hindu Patirarchs. Why Don't We Loose Americans Do The Same to the Southern Baptists

Legend has it that certain friend of mine, who shall go nameless, once had hot sex at the right-wing terrorist training camp, Focus on the Family, and put her panties on the projector in the screening room. While her individualistic (well, actually couplistic) act could be seen as a small act of resistance, MSNBC reports:

Thousands of Indians, many fuming over a recent assault on women in a pub, are vowing to fill bars on Valentine's Day and send cartons of pink panties to a radical Hindu group that has branded outgoing females immoral.

A "consortium of pub-going, loose and forward women," founded by four Indian women on social networking Web site Facebook has, in a matter of days, attracted more than 25,000 members with over 2,000 posts about the self-appointed moral police.

The women said their mission was to go bar-hopping on February 14 and send hundreds of pink knickers to Sri Ram Sena, the militant Hindu group that has said pubs are for men, and that women should stay at home and cook for their husbands.

Thousands of Indians, many fuming over a recent assault on women in a pub, are vowing to fill bars on Valentine's Day and send cartons of pink panties to a radical Hindu group that has branded outgoing females immoral.

So my question is: why don't women, no let me reframe that, why don't all us dirty American hussies get wads of our sexiest, dirtiest underwear and send it to the Southern Baptist Convention this year? Those Right Wing rape-mongers deserve to be drenched in the sexy fluids of U.S. self-identified whores!

Happy News From Oakland: 28 Misdemeanor Charges Dropped in Oscar Grant Rebellion

According to illvox:

Over 130 people have been arrested in connection with protests surrounding the murder of Oscar Grant III. This morning, the first arraignments were to be held for over 30 people charged with misdemeanors and felonies at the Wiley W. Manuel Courthouse in Oakland. Charges for 28 individuals charged with misdemeanors were dropped, while one person with a misdemeanor and two people with felonies are still facing their charges in court today. The next arraignments for those arrested in connection with the Oscar Grant Rebellion are February 9th, 13th, and 17th. The Oakland 100 Support Committee requests that supporters keep the pressure on until all charges are dropped.

For More Info on the Oakland 100 go to: Support the Oakland 100!

There are many more folks facing charges. Show them support!

CNN Reports on Obama Helping Homeless Woman; NY Times Reports on Obama helping Millionaires. Why did Millionaires Get Bailed Out First?

According to CNN, homeless woman Henrietta Hughes approached Barack Obama for help at a town-hall meeting in Fort Myers Florida.

Just days after the Treasury Department proposed two-trillion dollars for bankers, the President answered, "We're going to do everything we can to help you, but there are a lot of people like you."

Obama set up a meeting between Hughes and his staff.

According to the article:

Chene Thompson -- the wife of state Rep. Nicholas Thompson, R-Fort Myers -- offered Hughes and her son a house in nearby La Belle rent-free, according to a spokeswoman, and she is interested in taking it.

What's remarkable is not only the political pandering in helping one homeless person while letting millions die, but also realizing that millions are dying as the government gives handouts to bankers.

Obama was frank when he stated "there are many like you." Perhaps this is why the Democrats and Republicans have first strived to save the minority population-- the top 5% of the nation's wealthiest people--the bankers and ruling class who control 70% of the nation's wealth.

It's hard not to recall Allen Salkin's words in his New York Times article, You Try to Live on 500K in This Town:

Five hundred thousand dollars — the amount President Obama wants to set as the top pay for banking executives whose firms accept government bailout money — seems like a lot, and it is a lot. To many people in many places, it is a princely sum to live on. But in the neighborhoods of New York City and its suburban enclaves where successful bankers live, half a million a year can go very fast.

Well, I'm glad to know the administration has its priorities straight in setting a cap on bail-out money at $500,000 when women like Harriet Hughes, not lucky enough to directly approach savior-Obama, will be raped prostituting themselves on the streets so as not to freeze to death tonight.

NY Times Article About New Secretary of Energy Fails to Mention Reduction is the Only Way to Prevent of Ecological Collapse

In elementary school, I was taught the 3 r's: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. What I liked about this simple phrase, particularly the first 2, was that it was logical, simple to follow, and would ultimately save the planet.

The NY Times reports the following:
Steven Chu, the new secretary of energy, said Wednesday that solving the world’s energy and environment problems would require Nobel-level breakthroughs in three areas: electric batteries, solar power and the development of new crops that can be turned into fuel.

We do not require Nobel-Level breakthroughs, as much as teutonic shifts in our consumption pattern. We'll learn more from indigenous communities who have successfully sustained themselves for millenia than from all the Nobel Laurreattes in the world.

Problems riddle both Chu's priorities and the Times article. The Secretary of Energy fails to mention reduction as the most important strategy in stopping the world's energy and environmental crisis. Why?

The idea of reduction is rarely popular. It requires people cutting back on their commodities, and most peopel prefer more than less. Chu's desire for scientific solutions that will allow Americans to maintain absurdly large levels of consumption will lead us towards certain ecological catastrophe and further wars.

In justifying the dangerous and absurd "clean coal" fantasy, Chu cites nitrogen fertilizers as a life-saving wonder of science:

Dr. Chu, who once called coal “a nightmare” in the way it is currently used, said the United States must also lead the world in finding a way to burn the fuel cleanly, because other countries with big coal reserves, like India and China, will not turn away from coal.

But Dr. Chu said such developments were not impossible. At the turn of the last century, he noted, scientists like Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch made Nobel-winning discoveries that allowed the development of cheap nitrogen fertilizers, saving Europe from starvation.

What Dr. Chu negelects is that those same fertilizers have contaminated the vast majority of North American and European waterways leading to a dramatic escallation of cancer. In celebrating scientific breakthroughs, he neglects to mention the scientific fantasies that never worked, that led to deeper crisis, that brought us into this mess to begin with.

Electric batteries need lithium and solar power needs basic metals. Both of these require extensive mining. If history is our guide, mining has devestated the environment, caused massive wars, and enormous labor exploitation.

Currenlty, biofuel is an unlikely candidate as we're already spending much to much of the earth's resources growing monocrops for fuel rather than a diversity of healthy foods. In order to grow enough crops to sustain biofuels, we would lose significant portions of space to sustain ourselves and ultimately use up the resource of the land.

Chu's philosophy as Secretary of Energy should prioritize persuading the public to use less, funding public educational campaigns about the perils of excessive consumption, and mandating strict regulations on energy use. It is noble that Chu is trying so-called green solutions, but the politics of optimism and scientific daydreaming are interferring with the harsh reality that if people are to survive, we have to do away with the industrial infrastructure we've grown to depend on.

Boulder High's Student Worker Club Stops Protesting Pledge of Allegiance and Starts Campaign To Rename School After Obama

What kind of weirdo world are we living in. The "Student Worker Club" at Boulder High School is pushing to name their high school after Barack Obama. I mean, come on ya'll, what happened to the days kids snuck off campus to conspire against the government while listening to Dead Prez?

According to the Denver Post, Ben Raderstorf, president of the club said:

"We think the election of Barack Obama is one of the most significant events in our country and shows the progress we've made in this country," Ben said Wednesday between classes. "We think he is deserving of recognition like this."

I'm sure Barack Obama will be happy to know that the creepy white paradise of Boulder has honored him by renaming their school; however, doing so appears to be another act of classic Boulder cultural appropriation. Obama's victory is white Boulder's. Yuck.

According to the Post, Mr. Raderstorf is proud because the Student Worker Club has moved beyond being an organization that boycotted the "Pledge of Allegiance," to the following:

"We've reinvented ourselves," he said. "We want to build up the school. It's quite the opposite" of the situation with the 'Pledge of Allegiance,' he said, explaining that renaming the school Barack Obama High would never be considered unpatriotic.

"We initiated this campaign in order to honor the momentous achievement of this African-American, inspire the community with his ideals of unity and hope, and reflect the progressive spirit that is shared by both Barack Obama and our school environment,"

Caught up in Obama Mania, Mr. Raderstorf neglects to note that Obama's policies are far from progressive. Escalating in Afghanistan and off-shore drilling hardly demonstrate a progressive agenda.

I don't know Mr. Raderstorf. I mean, I appreciate the idea that you want to fill your community with hope, but don't you think examining the racist impact of rezoning laws in Boulder might be a better place to start? It's one thing to promote naming the school after Obama. It's another to challenge white supremacy in that creepy racist town.

Baseball Star's Barebacking Girlfriend Sues Roberto Alomar for Unprotected Sex

According to The Associated Press:

An ex-girlfriend of Roberto Alomar filed an explosive lawsuit alleging the former baseball star insisted on unprotected sex for four years despite having AIDS.

This is perhaps the strangest AIDS story I've ever heard. Instead of caring for her partner, Ilya Dall demonized and criminalized him. If she didn't want to have unprotected sex with him, she shouldn't have.

According to the article:

Dall said the two began dating in spring 2002 and had unprotected sex for the next four years. She said that on several occasions during that time, Alomar refused to get tested for HIV, despite severe fatigue, sores on his mouth and throat, a constant cough and an infection of the esophagus that is associated with AIDS.

Well, guess what Ilya, if you have a partner who is showing symptoms of AIDS, rather, if you have a partner at all, perhaps you should start using rubbers. Furthermore, if you have a partner who has fallen ill, perhaps you should care.

Dall tested negative. Its strange that she would sue for $15 million rather than breath a sigh of relief.

PEOPLE: Like you haven't heard this a thousand times. Bare-Backing is a terrible idea. Don't do it with your partner. Don't do it with a stranger. Like Nancy Regan says, "Just Say No." Or rather, just grab a friggin' condom...even if you're doing it with a hot-ass base-ball player like Roberto Alomar.

Oh, and Roberto, I hope to see you in the streets fighting for all the folks screwed by the disease with a lot less money than you.

MSNBC Reports Judges Lock Up Kids to Make Millions of Dollars

MSNBC's article Pa. Judges Accused of Jailing Kids For Cash sums up this horrifying story succinctly:

In one of the most shocking cases of courtroom graft on record, two Pennsylvania judges have been charged with taking millions of dollars in kickbacks to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers.

At first, I was shocked to think that judges would be profiting locking kids up, but then, I thought better. We live in a country that has locked up 2.3 million people to expand prison industries in impoverished rural areas looking stimulate local economies ravaged by big box stores. We live in a country that replaces traditional workers with prison labor because it's cheaper. These Judges represent the extreme impulse to profit off of incarceration.

Judge Mark Ciaverella claimed:

“I have disgraced my judgeship. My actions have destroyed everything I worked to accomplish and I have only myself to blame.”

Judge Ciaverella, I beg to differ. You have fulfilled the role judges play in our society. You have profited from the suffering of others.

Excavating Perfection: The Photos of Carolyn Gentile

Last night I met up with Denver photographer Carolyn Gentile at the Vine Street Pub, a friendly restaurant with an arsenal of handcrafted beers. It’s Stout Month at the Pub. Over beer and burgers, we discussed her latest photography

Traditionally, Gentile’s work displays a deep commitment to portraiture as she documents friends and lovers flirting, sipping coffee, and living lives of extraordinary beauty. Her portrait work serves as a family photo-album of Denver’s radical, underground, queer community.

“I’m still really amazed at getting to look at the details of how beautiful people are and how perfect everybody is physically,” She said.

Excavating aesthetic perfection in her subjects’ mundane rituals, she finds power in quiet moments of intimacy and solitude. Her work documents strong emotions, occasionally light-hearted, but often grave. Like the music of The Mountain Goats or the films of Jonas Mekas, Gentile’s photographs find ecstasy within private worlds.

Recently, she has taken her work from the domestic to the streets.

“Lately, I’ve been exploring street photography and am trying to work out how you do that in a casual way and still have formal success,” She said. “I’ve been going around neighborhoods taking portraits of streets, houses, alleys, and people in public settings.

Gentile handles her subjects like a fly on the wall, a fly who happens to rigorously compose images and madly loves its surroundings.

“I think there are so many beautiful neighborhoods in Denver and I love getting that on film.”

Whether she’s scrutinizing the rotating door at the 15^th Street Telegraph Building or obsessing over primary colors in abandoned alleys, she continues to document people within neglected landscapes.

“There are so many beautiful buildings in Denver and a lot of them are being torn down to make condos.”

Gentile’s photos are elegiac. As conformity threatens alternative queer cultures and wealthy white yuppies replace gritty urban centers with sterile, faux-lofts, she documents endangered architectural species of Denver with a deft sense of composition and an uncompromising devotion to excavating perfection.

Sadly, her work has gone unnoticed by an art world all too complicit in the destruction of our cities. Not rushing towards the commercial art world, Gentile continues to hone her craft, build her portfolio, and discover perfection in daily life.

Boston Globe Says, "Cheap is Cool." I Bet They're Not As Cool As We Are!

Boston Globe writer Johnny Diaz wrote an article, "Being Cheap is the New Rule of Cool."

Oh boy, Johnny, it sure is cool that folks are drinking six-packs rather than going to hipster bars, making coffee rather than going to Starbucks, and shopping at thrift stores. Uh, maybe you forgot that most of the country lives like this and outside of a few condescending, jerk-O rich folks, we've always been cool. So cool that we eat out of dumpsters. So cool that we ride bikes not buses. So cool that we're the first to get laid off, the first to go homeless on the streets.

Look Johnny, what's totally NOT COOL is that folks shopping at screwed up corporate chains like Wal-Mart are considered hot-stuff. This is terrible. It's corporations like Wal-Mart that got us into this economic mess to begin with by screwing over small businesses and local economies. I'd rather see the indignant, broke-ass masses burning Wal-Mart down.

What's not cool is McDonalds burning down the rain forest and bringing heart-attack inducing food into poor neighborhoods because corrupt organic chains like Whole Foods have a monopoly on health and use it to serve rich, white people.

What's not cool is people getting take out and not leaving a tip for the hard-working people behind the counter. Johnny, paying tips IS cool. It fuels the local economy.

Furthermore, if you think that being thrifty is cool, you should check out the escalating numbers of homeless folks, the social service budgets being slashed, the lay-offs occurring throughout the country.

Urgh. Well, I'm off to be cool.

Goldman Sachs CEO says,"Wall Street Lost Track of its Larger Public Obligations"

How stupid does Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs think we are? The New York Times reports that he stated:
"It is abundantly clear that we are here amidst broad public anger at our industry...Many people believe--and, in many cases, justifiably so--that Wall Street lost sight of its larger public obligations."

Lloyd, I can see the feces dripping from that creepy little grin of yours.

What public obligations are you referring to? Sweat shops? Funding ecologically catastrophic corporations? Under paying tomato pickers?

Wall Street has been clumsily deep throating the global public for decades by funding capitalist ventures that exploit labor and wreck the earth. Katrina Vanden Huevel's essay Slavery in the Union cites Goldman Sachs as having its 12 top execs bringing home $200 million in bonuses while being one of the private equity firms controlling Burger King's stock when Burger King bought tomatoes picked by migrant workers in Immokalee, Florida. The 12 top executives at Goldman Sachs, on track with their commitment to the public, took home twice as much money as all 10,000 tomato pickers in Florida.

Well, Mr. Blankenfield, if your public obligations involve being fair to the public, I have to wonder if you were drunk when you spoke to Congress, and if you are still drunk, I hope you black-out in a pool of hypocritical vomit.

Thief Says: "We are Americans First, and Bankers Second"

Micro-blogging the Banker Hearings today, the New York Times captured this choice quote from Wells Fargo's head thief John "Good God I Suck" Stumpf:

"We are Americans first and bankers second."

No, Mr. Stumpf, first you are thieves, then you are jerks, and finally, you are bankers.

John "Jerk" Mack of Morgan Stanley said,

“I know that the Americans are outraged about compensation costs.”

Yeah. You think?

In an act of grotesque understatement, Kenneth "Dug My Grave" Lewis of Bank of America said,

“We understand that taxpayers are angry” and they deserve to know how we are spending their money"

These butt-nuggets have no idea how mad Americans are. They have no idea what its like to go hungry, to sleep on the street, to be beaten by cops, and assaulted by strangers...not yet...

But if they keep stealing from the treasury, these Mafioso criminals will get mugged so bad they'll barely be able to blabber about their misguided patriotism.

Someone really ought to punish them. Obama should get out of the beds of bankers and into the streets with everybody else.

Gates Reviews Policy on Banning Photos of Soldiers' Caskets; Media Still Covers War Badly

The New York Times reports that Robert Gates is considering lifting the ban on publishing photos of dead soldiers' caskets.

While I'm always happy to see censorship bite the big one, I can't help but think that the media is a bit glib in its eagerness to photograph these caskets after doing such a terrible job covering the wars. At what point with the editors at newspapers realize that the death of their industry is due to the fact that they sold out to the state's censorial laws to begin with? When do they see that the death of print journalism is not entirely dependent on technological shifts, but editorial changes?

More sadly, when will Gates ban these wars that get the soldiers shot?

Could Orgasms Be the Next Alternative Energy Source

Graham Hill's article Sexy and Sustainable, surveys the greening of the sex toy industry. From bicycle sex-toy delivery to eco-lubes, the sex industry is turning environmentalism into a hot commodity.

But wait, what unharnessed potential awaits the horny inventor--sex as an alternative energy source! I mean, lets get real. Think of all the thrusting, grinding, licking, and sucking going on out there. You know as well as I, it produces loads of energy. Imagine transporting yourself to work from the energetic byproduct of your morning quicky, heating your stove from the erotic energy of two, three or more grinding bodies, or running fans by making out.

Even better, think of how we could charge the entire energy grid with pulsating waves of orgone as millions of people lose themselves in bliss.

To all the inventors our there, I want a cut of your money if you can make this work. Our future depends on you!

Forget Peak Oil! Let's try Peak Orgasm!

The Trouble With Optimism. The Seeds of Resistance

In my years working in non-profits, I've seen dozens of people walk through the doors starry-eyed and optimistic and leave claiming organizational leadership, infighting, and hypocrisy crushed their souls. So many people enter new political eras, social movements, and non-profits with an inflated sense of hope and possibility and leave burned out and defeated. To maintain our ability to serve in social movements, we must grapple with despair. Sometimes we lose. Sometimes, the President everybody wanted can't pull us out of the recession in time. Sometimes those fleeting feelings of optimism fall under the boot of a repressive structure.

The French Revolution, The American Revolution, The Soviet Uprising, and the Iranian Revolution all serve as big examples of a classic rule: in the name of Democracy people centralize power and betray their vision. The results kill.

So how do we work towards liberation when capitalists and autocrats hijack our movements? How do we move forward when leaders value centralized power more than Democratic will?

Bankers stole trillions from the people. Obama filled his cabinet with neo-liberals and neo-cons, presuming he could get the best input from a diversity of opinions. We stand on the brink of economic and environmental collapse with a President loyal to a dialectic between two parties with identical allegiances to corporations and bankers. Where do poor people, homeless people, the mentally ill, and the battered and beaten find representation? Where do those who want cooperation from the bottom up find solutions?

Inside each of us, we yearn to create the world we want to see, not through representatives, Presidents, Executive Directors, and managers, but through communication, collaboration, and community. I can imagine the naysayer reader seeing the word "community," and saying, "I don't even know what that means.

It's simple. In love and joy, we discover the seeds of true resistance and possibility. See community as a space where people share in the cultivation of food, culture, health, and well-being. Communities can be found in neighborhoods or across cities and regions. Our future depends on these associations working to build the local infrastructure needed to survive: urban farms, alternative health structures, cultural centers, and sustainable transportation.

How we do it is up to us.

MSNBC: "Beards are Back!" The Economist: "Beards Signify Terrorist!" Me "Kiss Me With That Beard!"

Today, MSNBC reported that beards are back in style. As a bear-loving, hair-lover who likes to stick my nose into the mustache of a hairy man, I couldn't be more pleased.

(Not to mention, I believe I'm one of those standard-setting types...you know, that the fashion industry studies)

Paul Roof claims it's because of a reclamation of masculinity.

MSNBC thinks its the recession.

MSNBC goes on to ask the decidedly stupid question:

What impact do all these whiskers have on women’s skin?

Uh, the answer is obvious you het dolts. Whiskers are known as clit ticklers. And they feel good on a cock-a-doodle-doo as well!

What should terrify readers is that in 2005 The Economist claimed that beards are the sure-fire sign of the terrorist, in their bizarre piece For Jihadist, Read Anarchist:

BOMBS, beards and backpacks: these are the distinguishing marks, at least in the popular imagination, of the terror-mongers who either incite or carry out the explosions that periodically rock the cities of the western world. A century or so ago it was not so different: bombs, beards and fizzing fuses.

Well, whatever the case, I'm thankful the beard is back. Suddenly, I feel swept into fantasies of hot men in denim in the back of trucks in 1977! Yummmmmmy!

Heck, maybe all I need to do is walk outside!

My Favorite Quotes About The Dying Economy From Today's News

"It's digestion time." Jon Biele, Head of Capital Markets at Cowen and Co.

"This is not your ordinary run-of-the-mill recession. We are going through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression," Barack Obama

"the problems are accelerating, not getting better." Barack Obama

"The good news is they are going to spend a trillion dollars, the bad news is they don't know how," James Cox, Managing Partner at Harris Financial Group

Geithner's speech "basically puts a spotlight on the fact that the government has no idea how to fix the problem...The economy is in deep trouble. The stimulus plan is not very stimulative. It's not addressing the real problem," Jeff buetow, Portfolio Management Consultants

“Wall Street, I think, is hoping for an easy out on this thing and there is no easy out,” Barack Obama

“We have zombie banks that are weighed down because their liabilities exceed their assets. Without a precise mechanism for addressing toxic assets, it will be difficult to increase lending.” John Kerry

“We will make mistakes. We will go through periods in which things get worse and progress is uneven or interrupted,” Timothy Geithner, Treasury Secretary

Question of the Day: Is Property Destruction Violence?

Couch Potato Revolution readers: Is property destruction a form of violence?

From the Sabots who stuck their wooden clogs into the cogs of machinery to the Earth Liberation Front that torches the machinery of ecological devastation, tactics of property destruction have been glorified as Direct Action, demonized as violence, slandered as acts of agent provocateurs (sometimes rightly so), and deemed "terrorism" by the Federal Government.

So, what do you think?

Video Artists Take On War in the Middle East

March 5, my friend Mary Billyou is curating a series of anti-war videos with Meredith Drum at the Scope Art Fair. The series, On the Contrary: Recent Artists' Videos Concerning War in the Middle East promises to be an incredible day of artist made video. Artists Paul Chan, Mary Patten, Harun Farocki, Coco Fusco, Walid Ra'ad, Dara Greenwald, and Martha Colburn will be showing what looks like an amazing bunch of work.

I'd love to see this show go on tour...hint...hint...

Stimulus Plan Gives $450 Million to NASA so Rich Can Leave Us Behind to Die

According to Huff Post , the Stimulus Plan passed the Senate with some serious modifications. Including extra money for food stamps, social services, and green technologies, all reasonable ways to stimulate our lackluster economy, the goof-balls in congress are adding $450 million for space exploration. It looks like they see the economic and environmental destruction adding up, America's collapse in Afghanistan, and a mad rush of pissed off populists ready to storm the barracks. Clearly, this $450 will help them find a place to go when the feces hits the fan. (That or launch more satellites to spy on us).

I can imagine Warren Buffet, whichever Kennedys still living by the time I finish writing this post, Eco-Warrior Capitalist Al Gore, the Bushs, and the Obamas sipping cocktails in the great beyond as the rest of us flop about the earth like fish out of water, struggling for one last meaningful gasp of Oxygen.

Animal Liberation Front Publishes Annual Report Documenting Arson, Graffiti, Bombs, and Animal Liberation Efforts

The North American Animal Liberation Press Office has published a report covering 2008 actions, a discussion of future directions, and a section on prisoners and snitches.

From letter bombs sent to John Hopkins, Poultry shop windows smashed, banners dropped, Slaughterhouse trucks burned, dogs and rabbits liberated, computers hacked, trucks sabotaged, and a Leather Expo burned to the ground, the Animal Liberation Front has had an active of year of direct action.

16% of ALF's actions were animal liberation, 11% bombs, arson and incendiary devices, and 73% graffiti, glued locks, and sabotage.

Between Canada, the U.S., and Mexico, Mexico has the greatest number of actions.

The number and ferocity of actions against animal exploitation industries is a testament to the passion these activists feel for those creatures who cannot defend themselves. Congratulations to the good folks at the Press Office who continue to do the important work of documenting and communicating the workings of the Animal Liberation movement.

The Pump Failed and 6,000 Gallons of Sludge Contaminated the Des Plaines River

The Chicago Times reported:

About 6,000 gallons of oil sludge spilled into the Des Plaines River on Sunday morning when it overflowed a holding tank after a pump failed at the Caterpillar manufacturing plant in Rockdale, near Joliet, officials said.

Everybody is hellbent on demonstrating that the spill didn't harm wildlife. (Of course it did. if you had 6,000 gallons of oil dumped in your home it would harm you.) What's truly scary about this is that the pump failed. THE PUMP FAILED.

The next time some smarmy U.S. Government stooge tries to convince you that they can do nuclear testing, clean coal-mining, safe mountain-top removal, nuclear energy, etc..., just remind them, THE PUMP FAILED!

80% of the U.S. Wants Gays to Die in Afghanistan. Why Queers Should Fight the "right" to "serve." Stop "Gays in the Military"

According to Owen West's editorial in the NY Times, 80% of Americans believe gays should be able to serve in the military. Great! Of course they do. They also support sending brown and black people to war, and it ain't cause they like 'em. All the het bubbas sent to Iraq sitting around spitting their chew have seen just seen how screwed up war is, how war can kill. And if there is one thing het bubbas like to see, it's dead queers. (Not all het bubbas of course. I fancy myself a bit of a bubba and I've even slept with a few het bubbas, and I can guarantee you they now like queers).

Well, call me a sissy faggot, but I wish assimilationist gays would shut their pie holes. Like young queer kids don't have enough wars to fight at home: daily survival against school bullies, gay bashers, rapist Priests, homophobic parents, and thick skulled teachers.

The one thing queers don't have to suffer through is going off to war and fighting for this screwed up country and its rich leaders. There are many good soldiers who left these shores to protect their country and when they came back they were shattered.

Queer suicide rates are high enough as it is. Don't raise them by doubling the torment our population goes through. And if a draft is called, I wanna be the first to tell the lunkhead Seargent, "I love getting it up the ass and I will be checking out all of my brothers in arms. Take me to the psych ward, cause I ain't gonna fight!"

Mandatory Sentence Laws May Be Overthrown in New York

Happy Days!

The NY Times editorial team is announcing that their state is about to do away with the Rockefeller Laws that require mandatory sentencing for non-violent, low-level drug offenders. In a nation with the largest prison population in the world, its about time NY State got rid of those laws that have cost thousands of young people their lives to prison and set a dangerous precedent, not unlike Giuliani's "Broken-Windows Policing," that targets largely Black and Latino men.

What I'm not sure of in reading the article is if all the poor suckers stuck in prison will be freed! I sure hope so.

Death to Mr. Peanut, the New Bin Ladin--The War on Terror Goes to Georgia

With the Salmonella outbreak at the Peanut Corporation of America, the death of 8 innocent Americans, the news media is having a frenzy at the expense of the peanut industry. The New York Times reports that the conditions at the plant in Blakely, Georgia were well below standards. As our economy continues to tank and capitalists try to find was to cut corners, the health standards of industry will continue to decline and lives will continue to be lost. This terror stems from greed. Obama should leave Afghanistan and invade Blakely, Georgia, in a hunt for the menacing Mr. Peanut, Stewart Parnell, owner and President of this year's Al Qaida, Peanut Corporation of America.

If Banks Tank, Stimulus Won't Work

According to the the Time:

The stakes for the Obama administration’s bank bailout proposal are high, economists say. Regardless of the specifics of the differing economic plans pending in Congress, no spending stimulus is likely to have much long-term effect unless the bank bailout works.

“The simple truth is that a self-sustaining expansion in a capitalist economy absolutely requires a functioning banking system,” said Robert Barbera, the chief economist of ITG, an investment advisory firm. There is a general agreement that previous efforts have yet to succeed.

So if this is the case, isn't it a fact that this stimulus package probably won't work? Outside of the handful of C.E.O.s who seem to be doing pretty well after holding up the National Treasury, the bank system seems on the brink of total meltdown.

On Nancy Pelosi's graph of recession job loss, if the green line were a waterslide, you'd die by wedgie

The Speaker of the House has a blog where he's graphed just how deep we are sinking into a bottomless well of feces. She has a chart comparing job loss in the 1999 and 2001 recessions compared to this one.

Basically, if we were at a waterpark and your friend asked you to plumet down a slide as steep as the green one you'd either smartly refuse or get a wedgie so far up your crack that you'd feel your swim suit split your head in two.

People, we're screwed.

Pelosi quoted Obama:

We can’t embrace the losing formula that says only tax cuts will work for every problem we face; that ignores critical challenges like our addiction to foreign oil, or the soaring cost of health care, or falling schools and crumbling bridges and roads and levees. I don’t care whether you’re driving a hybrid or an SUV — if you’re headed for a cliff, you’ve got to change direction.

Let's get our parachutes people. The whole beast is tanking and many are going to die--stimulus package or not! A wedgie this fierce could kill us all.

Iran Needs Nuclear Weapons to Defend Itself From Nuclear Powers or all Nations Should Disarm

Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert claims that no Israeli government will let Iran get nukes. Benjamin Netanyahu, the leading candidate in the race to replace Olmert, has suggested that Israel would consider nuking Iran to prevent their enemy from building nuclear weapons.

Now I'm not for nukes, but as long as war-mongering Americans and Israelis have them, I say Iran should be allowed to have them too. Its only fair. If two gangs agree to meet behind the school-yard and fight with knives and one gang shows up with a gun, the other should have a gun as well.

At the end of the day, if we want to be safe, we should strip the United States, Israel, and Iran of sovereign national powers and rule the planet democratically. Likely outcome? No. More likely, before it's over, the U.S. and Israel are going to start World War 4 (or 5 depending on how you look at it.)

As C.E.O.'s Rob the Treasury and Senators Scam Taxes, Where Does Frank Rich See a "Tsunami of Populist Rage?"

Frank Rich bases his respectable New York Times Editorial Slumdogs Unite in the premise that there is a "tsunami of populist rage coursing through America." He argues that this is why Obama had to apologize for Tom Daschle's failure to pay taxes. Were Tom Daschle a Kathy Kelly saintlike tax resister, I'd give him street cred and demand that he join the cabinet. But the fact of the matter is, much like the top 1% of Americans controlling more than 20% of the wealth, Daschel is a fat cat creep.

Frank Rich claims that this populist tsunami is "bigger than any C.E.O.'s bonus." Yeah right. If populist rage swept the United States, the banks would be in flames, the C.E.O.s would be hanging from street lamps, and democracy would prevail. In the words of Lewis Lapham in his Harpers Essay, By The Rivers of Babylon:

The looting of the U.S. Treasury is never an easy trick, but to carry off more than $1 trillion in broad day-light while the members of Congress stand around applauding the exist strategy as one certain to guarantee the health and happiness of the American people is a wonder of entrepreneurial enterprise that surely deserves some sort of tip of the hat.

If our country were swept with Rich's "populist rage," we'd tip our hat by tearing down the capitalists and creating a true democracy with actual equal opportunity for all.

Rodriguez, Phelps, Obama, and Bush: National Role Models are Druggies

Let's get real. We live in a nation filled with druggies. Whether its the prescription type that keep so many of us afloat to the booze (Mel Gibson? W?), to pot (Phelps), and Steroids (Rodriguez), the United States is filled with role models who use abuse chemicals to reach fame. If we lived in some lawless, libertarian society, that would be A-OK. People could abuse the substances they wanted to to achieve fame and fortune. (uh, pass me some more coffee please) The reality is unless you're powerful and/or white, your drug abuse will wind you up in prison for ridiculously long sentences. This, my dear readers, is a travesty. 2 million folks in prison in a nation led by druggies (the last 3 presidents at least: Obama, Bush, Clinton), with sports' hero junkies like Rodriguez and Phelps, and drunk writers to boot.

The War on Drugs should be a war on our national role models, substance abusers every one.

Teacher is Arrested After Giving Entire Class A+

According to The Globe and Mail, Professor Denis Rancourt told his students that they'd all get A+s because it wasn't his job to train them to be "information transfer machines." Prof. Rancourt's bold stance not only got him fired but arrested for trespassing when he came to the University of Ottawa to conduct his documentary film society meeting.

Rancourt has been outspoken against the traditional methods of teaching and grading referring to those tactics as "paternalistic."

According to The Globe and Mail, he stated:
“Grades poison the educational environment. We're training students to be obedient, and to try to read our minds, rather than being a catalyst for learning.”

Not too suprising that a University would back regressive strategies like "grading" to help students learn. Rather than inspiring a desire for education, strategies of self-guided learning, and collective pedagogical community building, the contemporary academy insists on generating the next legion of robots to maintain the status quo.

Israel May Have Used White Phosphorous Against Palestinian Civilians

The Christian Science Monitor reports that doctors in Gaza are fairly certain Irsrael used munitions containing white phosphorous. The Israeli Defense Force claims they only use weapons permitted by international law; however, the evidence from Palestinian burn victims points in another direction.

Dr. Khalil of the Shifa Hospital's burn unit stated:

"It's the first time we've seen anything like this," he says. "It's completely different from the usual burns we see every day. It's very deep, and if you smell it, you have a hard time breathing. It goes beyond a fourth-degree burn. It can burn through the muscle and can reach the bone."

According to the CS Monitor:

His description matches one about white phosphorous found on the globalsecurity.org website:

"The particles continue to burn unless deprived of atmospheric oxygen. Contact with these particles can cause local burns. These weapons are particularly nasty because white phosphorus continues to burn until it disappears. If service members are hit by pieces of white phosphorus, it could burn right down to the bone."

Anarchist People of Color and NYC Zine Project's New Zine

According to illvox, folks in Anarchist People of Color (APOC) and the New York City Zine Project are putting out a new zine focused on "decolonizing our diets." This all around rad zine is looking at the politics of food, land use, animal issues, and practical strategies for struggle. Anarchist people of color a are being asked to submit by March 7th. For more info check-out this link.

Obama and NATO Play Russian Roulette in Afghanistan

According to the Washington Post, Obama's team thinks our chances of winning a war in Afghanistan against the Taliban are weak. General Petraeus pointed out "Afghanistan has been know over the years as the graveyard of empires. We cannot take that history lightly." Richard Holbrooke claims that "...it's going to be much tougher than Iraq."

Perhaps this is why Iraq started in the first place. Americans were losing back then, are losing now, and even with Obama's massive escalation of force, we'll be losing some more. By continuing in Afghanistan, NATO and the United States are playing Russian Roulette with the fate of their empire. While personally, I don't mind them igniting a bullet in the barrell, if they want to maintain global domination, they best find a way out of Afghanistan.

"Kill Coyotes!" Votes Greenwood Village, CO City Council

According to the Denver Post:

A war against coyotes in the Denver metro area has begun with Greenwood Village firing the first shots.

Greenwood Village's City Council, in a special session Thursday, approved limited shooting of coyotes in public areas of the city, including parks, greenbelts and watersheds.

The council passed an ordinance allowing a contractor, Animal Damage Control Wildlife Management Services, to fatally shoot coyotes.

We live in a country where coyotes are considered more dangerous than people with guns.

Here is a link to the bios, photos, and numbers of the City Council that passed this ordinance.

Here is a link to Animal Damage Control Wildlife Management Services who brags to be "the most experienced wildlife removal service."

When defenseless animals whose habitats have been converted to concrete by human species are simply trying to live, what is the appropriate response ethical people should have to their senseless slaughter? What lengths should we go to save animals lives? If you were a defenseless animal whose family had been shot, what would you want done to those who killed your family? What responsibility do able people have to carry out the will of the defenseless?

The Animal Liberation Front would argue by any means necessary.

From the Collapse of Iceland's Government to the Riots in Oakland: All of Them Must Go!

Naomi Klein's article All of Them Must Go takes a look at all the people pissed off around the world rioting and attacking their governments these last few months. From the collapse of the Icelandic Government at the hands of pot-banging matriarchs to the riots in Greece, the General Strike in France, and the protests in Latvia, she brings her keens sense of history and memories of the early 2000's uprising in Argentina to one final conclusion:

The pattern is clear: governments that respond to a crisis created by free-market ideology with an acceleration of that same discredited agenda will not survive to tell the tale. As Italy's students have taken to shouting in the streets: "We won't pay for your crisis!"

The question that we have to ask in the United States is how can we, in the midst of this crisis, take on this system. The riots in Oakland against the police murder of Oscar Brown, the occupation of the Republic Windows Factory, and the fury in our hearts demonstrates that we aren't going to take this system much longer. For once in world history, the Icelandic people show the way.

Christians Nail Lesbian to a Cross: Visitation is a Civil Right

As a queer who hates the idea of institutions based in slavery, I'm not too fond of the idea that marriage is a good idea; however, I do believe anybody who wants to be visited in the hospital by their partner or partners should get to do so. This is a basic right. That's why this story breaks my heart.

According to The Miami Herald:

As her partner of 17 years slipped into a coma, Janice Langbehn pleaded with doctors and anyone who would listen to let her into the woman's hospital room.

Eight anguishing hours passed before Langbehn would be allowed into Jackson Memorial Hospital's Ryder Trauma Center. By then, she could only say her final farewell as a priest performed the last rites on 39-year-old Lisa Marie Pond.

Creepy Christians in Florida who voted to "protect marriage" should be held responsible for this violation of Langbehn's civil right to visitation. Once, Christianity was a religion that advocated for the oppressed. That once noble religion of the cross now occupies itself crucifying people. Not surprising, but heartbreaking. Langbehn and others denied visitation rights suffer on a cross, hands nailed by the self-righteous followers of Jesus.

My heart goes out to Langbehn and the heroic people in Florida who fight for Civil Rights despite the hate-monger pharisees in the Christian church who deny the foundations of their religion: love for all people powerfully equal in the eyes of God.

FYI, I don't believe in God but I did grow up Christian and wish that religion practiced what its founder preached. Fewer people would suffer.

Denver Police Arrest Old Lady for a Crime She Commited 40 Years Ago.

It makes me sick that the Denver Police arested Tina Louise Lester, a 65 year old woman accused of murdering a man in 1968. I mean, why doesn't somebody arrest those criminals in the government who murdered Dr. King, Malcolm X, and Fred Hampton. Shouldn't there be a statue of limitations? If a woman survives for 40 years not getting caught, she should be allowed to walk free. According to Denver police representative Sharron Avendano, Lester had the oldest warrant on the books in Colorado.

Damn, cops, leave an old lady alone and try to help somebody out instead.

Army Attempts to Stop Soldier Suicide with Balanced Checkbooks

Well, our Army is at it again, trying to save soldiers from suicide. Instead of admitting that sending kids off to murder and kill for an unjust cause will lead to extraordinary despair, they're preventing the increase in soldier suicide by teaching soldiers to balance checkbooks to avoid debt. Now assuming returning soldiers weren't caught up in the predatory lending schemes of bankers and that they weren't robbed blind by crazy interest rates on credit cards, still, don't you think that the choice to kill yourself is rooted directly in the moral, psychological, spiritual, and social implications of carrying out state murder for oil? If the army wants to save the lives of soldiers, hold the chicken-hawks who prayed on these kids accountable. Send Bush, Cheney, and the rest of the war criminals to the Hague.

NY Times Attacks Machetes and Validates Bombs

The New York Times article, U.S. Aided a Failed Plan to Rout Ugandan Rebels tells yet another tale of U.S. folly in Foreign Policy. The U.S. helped pay for the Ugandan government to wage an attack on the Lord's Resistance Army, a 20 year old group of insurgents who originally formed to overthrow the official government. When the attack failed, the rebels dispersed and ran from town to town killing, raping, and slaughtering people. Human Rights Watch, Doctors Without Borders, and other international aid organizations have criticized the violence of Uganda.

The trouble is that the New York times plays out a misguided line: people who kill with bombs are humane and people who rape and kill with machetes are monsters. As the New York times has failed to tell the limb severed, skin peopled, children raped accounts of the U.S. wars against Iraq and Afghanistan, it seems strange that they focus on the specific acts of violence committed by the Lords Resistance Army?

From the testimonies of soldiers coming back to the United States at the Winter Soldier Hearings, U.S. violence has been as atrocious, only the media failed to report on it.

The Times insistence on focusing on the brutality of Ugandans and failure to note the incredibly barbaric violence of our own government is a testament to its role in concealing U.S. violence and demonizing Africans with less expensive and destructive weapons.

Categorically separating the violence of the Lords Resistance Army from the violence of the American Army, the NY Times aids and abets white supremacist, American terrorism and maintains the racist illusion that Africans are "more" violent than Americans. I have no doubt that in the last 20 years the U.S. Government has more blood, rape, and incarceration on its hands than any insurgent group in Africa. The difference is that the American Army is validated by the New York Times.

Above, I have included Nick Ut's classic photograph taken in June 1972 of Kim Phuc, a young girl running from her village after it was attacked by U.S. napalm. Ut's photograph
represents the most powerful of journalism, an image that has spread around the world. Rather than censoring the impact of American violence, the photo reveals it.

If only the Times maintained this standard of journalism today.

What are your thoughts on the situation in Uganda, Iraq, and Afghanistan? What are your feelings about the New York Times coverage?

Waste Not Want Not:: Planned Obsolescene Revealed

Nearly 600,000 jobs in the toilet last month and Apple decides to do this campaign:



Planned obsolescence has never been more succinctly defined. Capitalists profit from mocking their worst sides again!

Digging the Blogs 1.6.09

Fire Witch Rising reports that a Fox News Reporter plead guilty to police interference during the Democratic National Convention.

Favianna Rodriguez takes on Shepard Fairy's white privilege and the troubles with intellectual property law.

Free Speech TV's Online Community shows PETA's censored superbowl ad that successfully objectives women and vegetables.

Earth Liberation Front Saves the Planet Through Arson as Judges Promote Debate

According to Green Inc, after giving eco-hero Marie Mason a 22 year prison sentence for a 1999 arson attack on Michigan State Univerrsity's Agriculture Hall, U.S. District Judge Paul Maloney called her acts an "abandonment of the marketplace of ideas."

Maloney, WAKE UP! The marketplace of ideas will not rescue us from the ecological catastrophe at hand. If a person walked into your home and attacked your closest friend, would you resort to the marketplace of ideas? Would you quote Foucault, Sartre, or Shakespeare? If so, shame on you.

When corporations continue to threaten our species and life on the planet with coal-fired power plants, toxic dumping, monocrop agriculture, destruction of the rain-forest, contamination of water, these dangers fail to participate in a "marketplace of ideas." These deadly corporate crimes are murder. Burning down machines of destruction preserve your precious "marketplace of ideas." Stopping capitalism saves life on Earth.

Perhaps in the mid-1800s, intellectuals should have held salons about the devastating potential of industry. In the 1950s, legislators should have taken action. Vain regrets fail to save our species. As for now, debate wastes time.

Marie Mason and the other compassionate people destroying the infrastructures of murder and destruction attempt to protect humanity from its self-destruction. May the Earth Liberation Front arise from its ashes as the "marketplace of ideas" advocates for freeing those people trying to save us. May Judges who aid and abet the corporate terrorists threatening the planet, enter the "marketplace of ideas," wake-up and realize the time for direct action and sabotage is now, and join the Earth Liberation Front.

Wanna-Be Assassin Criticizes Obama's Economic Plans

While I am no fan of poseurs or wanna-be assassins, my heart goes out to Timothy Ryan Gutierrez, the 20 year old Colorado man facing 10 years in prison for allegedly sending emails to the FBI threatening to assassinate President Barack Obama and blow up the Mall of America.

Threat Level reported Gutierrez saying:

"I'm not mad about him becoming president, but he's not doing what he said he was going to do," he said. "He's not doing anything for the lower class — just the middle and upper class. Medications are going up, not lowering, and jobs are being lost. His actions are going to get him in trouble."

Unlike a lot of the racist assassin-wannabes, Gutierrez was motivated by government’s failure to address poverty in the United States. Like many whose hopes are being dashed as the administration fails to find a quick fix for the economy and focuses its attention on helping the wealthy and the middle class but not the poor, Gutierrez represents the voice of the oppressed, the frustrated, and the fed-up.

In as much as Gutierrez articulated a frustration with Obama’s complicity with capitalism, I share his critique, though not his methodologies. He is correct. Those who have centralized power in the name of Democracy and help homeowners rather than the homeless will most certainly get in trouble with the people.

I’ve certainly watched a number of people’s jaws drop that Bush was never assassinated and a number of other people who wish he had been; however, Obama seems to be protected from the harsh critiques of a much-relieved Left. While Bush deserves a trip to the Hague and might very well deserve a Saddam-like sentence, I fear that Guttierez is correct in that Obama might be in trouble.

Gutierrez frustration and rage reveals a disturbing but understandable shift in U.S. consciousness-a shift towards militant solutions for very real problems. Politicians who bail-out CEOs and neglect the poor cannot maintain their power forever and will be held accountable in the history books, in courts of law, or in the hands of a self-righteous vigilante.

The Top 5 Reasons Cutting Bus Routes and Raising Fares Sucks!

With the economy crashing, high gas prices, and capitalists babbling madly about “Green Alternatives,” many city transportation departments are cutting routes and raising prices. These are the top five reasons why this sucks!

1) Higher rates mean broke-ass people can’t take public transit. This sucks all around.

2) Fewer routes mean poor people will get stuck in their neighborhoods and not be able to get to work. Without public transit, the property rates in these neighborhoods will plummet further and jobless, folks will be evicted.

3) Why invest in green capitalism when you de-fund the eco-friendly, community based solutions that exist?

4) Many disabled people with mobility issues can’t ride bikes. How will they get around cheap?

5) Organizing against these super-rich jerks is going to take time away from other valuable endeavors.

In short, city by city, we have to fight for public transit. Otherwise, we’re all screwed.

Crazy Capitalist Terrorist Threatens Other Capitalist Terrorists

OK, everybody wants to call anarchists terrorists. But what about investors like Richard Goyette, the 47 year old capitalist who according to the NY Times sent “65 threatening letters on Oct. 18 from a post office in Amarillo, Tex., to branch offices of Chase Bank, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Office of Thrift Supervision, a financial regulatory agency.”

Some of the letters included white powder and a note to those poor secretaries that they would die within 10 days of opening their mail.

According to The Times, Goyette goes on:

“I’ve paid a terrible price for those who will do whatever it takes to defraud, steal, manipulate” from average stockholders, one message said. “This seizure was the final straw and I will now pursue any path to get the return of my investment.”

This just goes to show that Capitalist Investors are the real terrorists. This white-collar thug is threatening to kill people because he has finally realized that investing in the blood and misery of the working class and third world poor doesn’t work. He doesn’t care about the people who slaved their lives away so he could sit around and get rich. He only cares that he didn’t get his.

Road Signs Warn of Zombie Attack in Austin, TX

At No Fear of the Future, I found the following post about a series of road signs warning drivers Nazi Zombies were taking over Austin. The author can't determine if its an ad for a Norwegian Nazi Zombie movie or an artistic intervention. Personally, I like the idea that its a creative prank by some bored road-worker, tired of the drudgery of her job, and attempting to liberate poetry from the mundane. Either way, kudos to whoever pulled this brilliant intervention in road signs off.

Homeless Freeze to Death as CEOs Make Millions

As homeless people literally freeze to death on the streets, Obama is praised for capping CEO bailouts at $500,000. In the United States, CEOs give themselves $20 Billion in bonuses as the economy tanks and millions face the grim realities of eviction, layoffs, and foreclosure. When people horde wealth while others die in the streets, those with the money should pay. And if they aren't willing to pay by giving up their personal assetts, they should be held accountable by the friends and family of the dead, homeless, and jobless in the court of the streets, where they would not only be forcefully mugged, but probably torn apart limb from limb.

Too many people have died under the boots of corporations. Too many are suffering from the greed of the banks. Globally for decades, nationally in recent years. The time for accountability has come.

When criminals like Bank of America CEO Kenneth D. Lewis make over $20 million and General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner make $14.4 million, they deserve to freeze in the streets and those in the streets deserve a home, a hot meal, and a shower.

Nazi Pope Reinstates Holocaust Denying Bishop

It's amazing that people who criticize Israel for attacking schools and civilians in Gaza are called antisemitic when the highest officer in the Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI, was a Nazi soldier. Everybody loves to attack Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for his Holocaust Denial. At least Iran's president didn't participate in the Holocaust.

Now, according to the NY Times, the pope is revoking the excommunication of Bishop Richard Williamson, who just last month denied the Nazi gas chambers.

According to the Boston Globe, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel chastised the Nazi Pope for giving "the impression that Holocaust denial might be tolerated..."

At what point do Catholics unite against Nazi leaders in their church? Now, I admit I grew up Protestant and now identify with some hodgepodge of secular humanism and neopaganism. As you can imagine, I don't have a whole lot of understanding of religious hierarchies, so maybe I just don't get it that Jesus would send his mandate to earth in the form of an ex-Nazi. But wasn't Jesus a Jew? Wasn't he reforming Judaism. Would the young Pope have gassed Jesus and now deny it?

Kyrgyzstan Sticks it to U.S. Imperialism

According to the NY Times, when Kyrgyzstan's president Kurmanbek Bakiyev announced he planned on closing a U.S. military base critical to NATO's supply lines to Afghanistan, he lifted his fist, turned his hand, and raised his middle finger to U.S. military ambitions. As so-called "Anti-War" president Barack Obama prioritizes invading Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan's decision will be a major impediment to U.S. plans to murder more Afghan civilians. In 2005 Bakiyev claimed that Kyrgyzstan would not be a "place for the fulfillment of someone else's geopolitical interests."

Well, you go honey. Tell those Yankees what you think! And if it saves thousands of impoverished Afghan peaasants, hell, even I'd vote for you! Now, if the other hundreds of countries harboring U.S. bases would shut them down, U.S. military might finally be disrupted.

Top Five Reasons “Obama vs. Assault Weapons” Interests Me!

I think the right wing gun fanatics have outdone themselves with the ad: Obama Vs. Assault Weapons! I love guns and as long as the police have them, I think it’s quite alright for you and me to as well (sorry to any cops reading this—I presume my readers are not thugs like you and would never shoot you unless it was an act of self-defense). So, in this top 5 list, I’d like to point out why this ad turns me on, terrifies me, and ultimately reveals the real bomb this nation’s sitting on.

1) Obama Vs. Assault Weapons is truly hot! I’m not sure which gets me harder—shirtless, grimacing Obama or this AK, Kalashnikov, or whatever the hell this gun is. I’d love to feel either the man or the weapon firmly in my hands!

2) This is a first-rate portrait of Right-Wing, Gun-Toting, White Power homoerotic fantasy. You can tell the NRA artist is totally turned on by the president. The difference between me and the artist is that he doesn’t get why he’s hard. He thinks it’s just the gun.

3) What’s scary about this ad is the obvious dialectic established.

Thesis (Obama, a black president that hates guns)

+

Antithesis (White Power Assault Weapons, hot, patriotic, and much deadlier than the president…well, we’ll see how Afghanistan goes…)

=

Synthesis (Either Obama will destroy the assault weapon or the assault weapon will destroy him).

I’m sorry but when my friends get screwed for wearing Arabic on their shirts, shouldn’t these Gun Source people be detained by the Secret Service? (Not that I like the Secret Service…I wish they didn’t exist…In fact, I wish presidents didn’t exist…and if the Secret Service is reading…I don’t condone murdering people...Nor do I condone your job nor the job of the President.)

4) Do the Right really think Obama has a campaign tattoo on his Left Bicep?

5) This image represents a stewing conflict. If the president is assassinated, the race war simmering since the Founding Fathers celebrated freedom while owning slaves will erupt into a full boil and overflow this melting pot. Trust me. My cracker Uncle says so.

My Conclusion

To the White Power Scumbags arming themselves to defend Dixie: guess what, you’re not the only ones ready to fight and your hard-on reveals your true desires!

Top Five: Why Electric Cars Are Earth Killers

1) To run electric cars you need Lithium-Ion Batteries. These require Lithium mining. That requires massive resource extraction from Bolivia that will ultimately lead us to war.

2) To run electric cars you need electricity. Just because a car isn’t run on gas doesn’t mean it's clean. The electricity will come from either hydro-electric dams that kill fish populations, coal-fired power plants that generate mad CO2 emissions and depend upon mountain-top removal which causes sludge that floods poor Appalachian communities.

3) Cars run people over. 40,000 plus people die from car accidents each year in the U.S. alone. Electric Cars will smash people and animals just as fast as gas cars.

4) People who drive cars suffer from all sorts of health problems: stress and anxiety from road-rage, obesity, back and knee problems, etc…

5) Resources that run cars are NOT renewable. First it will be Peak Oil, then Peak Coal, then Peak Lithium, etc…

What's the solution? Obvious. Ride a bike!

Purple, Gold, or Green: Capitalism Screws People-Screw The Electric Car!

What irks be about smug Green Capitalists rambling about the importance of electric cars is that they ignore that it requires all sorts of resources to manufacture and run them—in other words: new ecosystems devastated, new communities pillaged, and future wars created.

Yesterday’s New York Times reported about the automobile industry’s desire to mine lithium in Bolivia for lithium-ion batteries that could run electric cars. Evo Morales, the badass Bolivian president, indigenous activist, and radical has already nationalized the oil and natural gas industry. If he nationalized Lithium, First World Gree(dy)n Capitalists may turn his decision into a hot-button issue. I can only imagine the US PR-machine, the corporate media, further demonizing the hell out of Morales, like they have Chavez in Venezuela.

I can hear my fellow-protesters 10, 20, or 30 years down the line: “No Blood for Lithium,” as the U.S. races headstrong into war with Bolivia.

Here’s the problem as I see it. People use too much stuff. They need resources to build and fuel their stuff. When resources are scarce, they go to war and kill for stuff. This is the grim future of the human species—the future of all life on the planet. Eventually, our greed, our need to conquer will destroy us. Whether its green, fuchsia, purple, or gold, Capitalism is based in exploitation and it will destroy both people and the planet.

Why Regulate Hate Speech When You Can Destroy Capitalism?

According to Hispanic Business, the National Hispanic Media Coalition is trying to create a scientific process for the F.C.C. to use to hold broadcasters accountable for hate speech. Personally, I think this is a bad idea.

• Regulating “hate speech” can backfire and be used to stop oppressed peoples from calling out oppressors.
• Allowing people to exercise “Hate Speech” gives others the power to hold those politically vile individuals accountable. (The K.K.K. organized itself as the invisible empire. Refusing to name things can increase their power.)
• Limiting freedom of speech is a practice of authoritarian regimes of all stripes and sets dangerous precedents for those who want to control public discourse.

What irks me about the NHMC’s attempt to regulate hate speech is that it can’t see the forest for the trees (and then burn down the forest). The trouble is not with a few individuals speaking their obviously racist minds. Rather, the trouble is that a handful of corporations have seized control of broadcast infrastructure and are using tools of communication for propaganda and mass manipulation leading people to support and commit egregious acts of racism (a 40% rise in hate crimes against Latinos).

I’m not saying the big media monopolies should get to use hate speech. I don’t think these monopolies should exist at all. The use of hate speech by these conglomerations is truly dangerous. If the NHMC wants to stop hate speech, it should fight for broader access to broadcast infrastructure and airwaves and work to destroy the media monopolies. As the strongest organs of propaganda in the United States, perhaps in history, when corporate media speak, people listen. The trouble is, if you want to stop Big Media from committing mass acts of violence, you can’t simply ask them to use nicer language. You have to challenge these media entities right to exist and replace them with something better.

If the NHMC wants to stop the media from propagating acts of violence against the Latino community, they should work to broaden the discourse and fight those who have consolidated power. Until there is a vibrant, diverse (in all senses of the word), media justice movement that redistributes access and offers viable trainings, no reformist nitpicking of F.C.C. regulations will liberate the airwaves from those who want to use it to consolidate white power and build personal capital.

Israel Blames the Victims It Bombs

Israel is back to nighttime bombing raids in Gaza, continuing to wreak havoc on civilians caught in the crossfire. In this renewal of a war that killed hundreds of Palestinian civilians, Israel justifies killing innocents by blaming Hamas. You cannot ethically attack masses of innocent people because a handful have chosen to use missals. Israel does not have global support. Its' ongoing violence must stop.

Below is a video of LA Jews who shut down the Israeli consulate a couple weeks ago.

Prisoners Riot But Don't Blog

Thousands have rioted at the Reeves County Detention Center in Texas. Sadly, nobody seems to know why. The silence from the prisoners, their inability to articulate the trouble inside, gets at the heart of the trouble with the contemporary prison system--those on the inside are silenced and nobody really cares.

Imagine for a minute being locked in a cage. Furthermore, think about how devastating it would be to be maltreated, locked away from society, and unable to articulate the full range of thoughts and emotions going on inside. How could you articulate a grievence without a podium to speak from.

I am disturbed that the state denies access to computer technologies and the Internet to most prisoners. For those with family on the inside and those who care about the conditions of the most oppressed people in our society, it would be a blessing to hear from those people locked away. In the history of literature, some of the greatest writing has come from incarcerated people. From Boethius's Consolation of Philosophy, many of the writings of the Marquis de Sade, Martin Luther King Junior, Henry David Thoreu, Oscar Wilde, and Jean Genet came from behind bars. Imagine how rich the blogs of prisoners could be.

As the situation at the Reeves County Detention Center fades into the annals of history, do not stop questioning why the riot began, what the conditions are like at Reeves, and how the situation might have been different had the inmates been given a voice, a chance to connect with the outside world.

For more information about prison abolition, check-out Critical Resistance.

For information about writers who have been jailed, go to the Pen website.

Crashing Economy Frees Prisoners

According to the Denver Post, our crashing economy forced Colorado's Larimer County to cut the Sheriff's budget by 1.8 million dollars. Voters in the county refused to pass legislation to build new prisons. Now Sheriff Jim Alderson, described as a John Wayne-type, is petitioning to free prisoners and stop imprisoning people for stupid reasons: drug dealing, burglaries, and DUIs.

This terrible economy which is leaving millions without work does have its positive side!

Evangelist's Life Work Crumbles as Millions Smile

According to the Denver Post, "Once one of the nation's most popular televangelists, the Rev. Robert H. Schuller is watching his life's work crumble."

Don't these words make you smile? Knowing that evangelical Christianity can't keep it up in these times of economic collapse brings a BIG smile to my face. Praise Jesus!

Banks are collapsing. So are churches. So are right wing media empires. I hate to feel so happy...but...well...ok, I'm fine feeling good. Is this the apocalypse?

In the above-mentioned article, Schuller goes on:

"I don't see a scenario for maintaining a TV-based megachurch anymore. The days of doing that in the models of Schuller and Jimmy Swaggart and Oral Roberts are over," Schultze said. "It's amazing to me that the 'Hour of Power' was able to keep going as long as it did."

Praise be. Maybe some day all the churches will be abandoned by the religious and be used by those seeking housing, cultural alternatives, and seeking real solutions.

Oh wait, my friend Andrea Grover has already done this at The Aurora Picture Show, an alternative cinema space in Houston that showcases a broad variety of radically Independent Film.

Happy Imbolc

Happy Imbolc, pagan and non-pagan readers alike!

Today, Celts celebrate the Goddess Brigit and eagerly await the return of the spring (as do I!).

According to chalicecenter.net:

Bride with her white wand is said to breathe life into the mouth of the dead Winter and to bring him to open his eyes to the tears and the smiles, the sighs and the laughter of Spring. The venom of the cold is said to tremble for its safety on Bride’s Day, and to flee for its life on Patrick’s Day.

All I can say in celebration of this Spring holiday is that I'm ready for biking to be fun again! This past month has been rough and I'm eager for some change!

Favianna Rodriguez

If you're not familiar with the art and cultural work of Favianna Rodriguez, you must check out her blog.

Rodriguez was trained in free neighborhood art classes in the 1980s in Oakland. She has gone on to make work about immigration, economic justice, food justice, the war, and occupations at home and abroad.

Rodriguez writes about her work,

There has never been a movement for social change without the arts, posters in particular, being central to that movement. All art is political, but not all art is overtly political. Protest posters flaunt their politics and court discussion. They can deepen compassion and commitment, ignite outrage, elicit laughter, and provoke action. The power of the poster is that it is produced in multiples, and therefore can be easily distributed for all to see.

In addition to her political posters, she serves as president of Tumis, the woman/people of color owned, community-based design firm.

I Hope It's Warm Outside

It's nearly noon. I showered, sipped my first cup of coffee, and am leaving Hillary's to go too Barricuda's for more coffee and eggs. As we get ready to go, I'm centering myself, moving forward, and preparing to enjoy the day. The Senate is arguing over the economic stimulus package, Iraqis have finished at the polls, the U.S. military is leaving Iraq and entering an escallated era of occupation in Afghanistan. This morning, I'm happy, ready to ground myself in the movie I'm working on, the articles I'm writing, and the day-in-day-out work of programming TV. I hope it's warm outside, but even if not, I'm rekindling an inner warmth, a sense of joy and liberation, a desire to move beyond the chaos of the mundane towards the tranquility and possibility of radical renewal. I love so many people in the world and struggle to love so many others. I recommitt myself to try.