So, in addition to being an untrustworthy but highly attractive fox, I'm also a bitchy princess who is a tease. So, you only get 10 for tonight. Heh, I could write a whole blog on what I experienced in London. I won't bore you with that, but rather show you what post Empire is really about. That is: bragging rights! If you can kill it, steal it, imitate it, coerce it, and be snobby about all that...you could be a Citizen of the Empire! Just kidding, blokes. Seriously:I loved your nation (what I saw of it) and I want to live there. Any Brit Dykes in need of a footrubbing, politically active, art-loving gardener and cook? I'm available for an EU contract. Standard warning, plenty of pics to follow.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you...The Rosetta Stone:

 Read more…

This is going to get me in all kinds of trouble, but feh, what else is a blog for?
Exhibit A:

CHICAGO (AP) - President-elect Barack Obama says he is saddened by allegations that Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich tried to trade favors for Obama's Senate seat—and says he had no contact with the governor or his office on the matter.

The governor was arrested Tuesday on federal corruption charges. Prosecutors say Blagojevich wanted to give Obama's Senate seat to the highest bidder.

Obama says he will have no further comment on the matter because it is an ongoing investigation.

Where have I heard those phrases before? Hmmm....

Now, the first part I put in bold is critical, as it related to Axelrod's words in this video. Notice how Axelrod is very careful not to say what subject, or any other relevant details, about what the conversation was concerning. Gee, I wonder why?

I am really trying here. It's a hard, fine line to walk. I don't want to be overly rhetorical, or run away with the latest emotion-based villification of the moment. I'm not looking for attention, and I already know: few, if any politicians in DC are going to "satisfy" me. Etc. But there are a couple of different ways to contrast and compare these two links, and most of them don't make Team Obama look good.

Boilerplate: I've read the pdf, I know what Blago said about Obama; it's clear they didn't get along and I'm inclined to believe that Obama was, let's say, too professional a politician, to get involved in Blago's blatant and sloppy corruption. But then an unpopular blogger (hey, just like me!) throws this out there, and what the hell am I left thinking? That we can't be cynical enough, and that "not quite a lie" is the new "lying their asses off."

I'm so fucking sick of it. Team Obama: just say, "Sure, we talked to him about the appointment choices. He wasn't too fond of ours. You know what he wanted in return for it? Money. We weren't prepared to give him any. That would've been wrong, and corrupt." Can't you see how much better you'd look right now if you'd said that? No, I guess you can't.

Feeling rather unclever today, I don't have the snappy intro I wish I could have for this:

KABUL (Reuters) - The U.S. general commanding NATO forces in Afghanistan has ordered a merger of the office that releases news with "Psy Ops," which deals with propaganda, a move that goes against the alliance's policy, three officials said. Read more…

Suzie asks some important questions concerning this report on young people's ethics. It doesn't surprise me at all that more boys than girls believe that lying and cheating are necessary for success in life. Now, I'm not one to bemoan Those Kids Today, as I've been doing some reading on 18thc politics and know we've got a long way to go before we hit rock bottom. But I do think that another point that should be raised re: this endemic of cheating and lying is that politics have far reaching consequences, and to me that is reflected in the survey. If the President and high elected officials lie like rugs and no one calls them on it, why shouldn't young people take that as a model and example?

Personally, I've come to understand that educators must take real care, and guard against cheating and lying, when it comes to teens today. There's a certain culture that crosses races and income levels, which lauds those teens who are able to 'get away with it,' whatever it may be. Again, I don't think this is too different than when I was a teen, or before that, but I think that teens who adopt this aesthetic will carry it on into adulthood, unless some authority in their lives teaches them that there are serious consequences.

It will be interesting, as the coming population wave assumes political and cultural power, in the many battles in which we find ourselves engaged today. People who don't believe that lying and cheating are great evils to be avoided will be more or less likely oppose gay marriage? More or less likely to believe that our nation should be engaged in wars of choice? More or less concerned with government spying? More or less tolerant of "the war on drugs?" I don't know the answer to any of that, but I suspect the political scene will be different, when this generation begins to exhibit its peak influence.

I think of this as one of those "what comes around, goes around" sort of things. Republicans have enshrined lying and cheating as legitimate forms of public behavior, and Democrats have failed to oppose that in a significant way. Soon, we'll get to find out just what it's like when a large portion of the population shares those beliefs. Short form: if the rubes don't follow the rules set up for them, it's a lot harder to suck up obscene profits from their enslavement.

I know this is linked to below, and that Avedon has joined the bandwagon, but I think this simple point is worth repeating, over and over and over. Call *me* boring, I can hack it, but don't dismiss the essential truth of this:

No presidential administration keeps its promises without relentless pressure from below.

From the American Revolution to the Civil War, abolition to women's rights, the Civil rights era to Stonewall, it's the same story every time. Ugly, poor, fat, tranny, unhip, powerless, "criminal," outcast, unpopular, drug using, cat loving, "loosers" have been at the forefront, in the vaanguard, the most vocal and far-seeing, when it comes to progressive change. You can add "unpopular C list bloggers" to that list, now. But the bottom line is that no one listens to "people like us," until they do, because they have to. On so many issues (FISA, Iraq, the "bailout," health care) we're sofa king right, and have the only real and lasting solutions, and everybody else, no matter how well connected, paid, or "popular," are wrong and will be proven so, in the "meaningless" eyes of historians, people who benefit from the programs we advocate, and those millions of current and future generations not killed or forced to suffer so that a few hundred rich people can be richer. I know this in "my soul." More importantly, the history of the West, the religious wars, and science, back me up. Read more…

This is likely the wrong blog to ask this kweshun, but I'm still curious. For the sake of argument, let's say Obama wins, very clearly and obviously in your own mind. And let's say that somehow, insert your own 2000 redux here, "they" (try to) take it away from him, via Brooks Brothers riots and SCOTUS foolishness and other sundry undemocratic methods. What is your response, if any? And why? How would it be different than if HRC had had it stolen from her? Or the candidate of Your Choice?

I don't think McSpain has the ground game to steal it this time; I also don't think Wall St/Telco Ave money wants Obama to lose. So honestly I'm not so worried about it. I think we'll get a "democratic" prezint next Jan. But let's say the paranoid, insane racist members of the Franchise refuse to give up power, and pull out all the tricks, and declare at 3am Nov 5 that "McCain Wins!" What do you do?

Marching? Molotovs? Sit ins? Strikes? LTEs? Turning the channel? Knitting? Nothing? Just wondering...

Been a while since Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) has been exercised here at Corrente, and there is good news and bad news – of a sort. Read more…

I hate headcolds. Anyway, hope you all are having a good harvest. Here's some planting of the seeds of the future, yesterday, muscially speaking:

I also love the next two songs/numbers in this movie, but I figured one race-traitor lo-fi offering was enough for one night.

Please read Paul Jorian's blogpost regarding the implosion of the credit markets, the reasons, the influence of "The Chicago School" of economists whose assumptions continue to help us not understand how economies work, and "What it All Means".

Don't feel bad to reread each sentence, mouth-moving to form the words, just as I must do. Just read it. (plus it's fucking footnoted. My god, who footnotes a blog!!!????)

Here are some teasers:

The opener: Read more…

Here we go again.

Democratic voters in at least two Wisconsin communities have received absentee voter forms from the McCain campaign that -- if used -- could cause their votes to be ignored.

Is it a simple error? Or campaign shenanigans and voter fraud? You be the judge.

Keith Heck, a former Racine Unified School Board member who lives in Mount Pleasant, reports receiving a mailing containing two tear-out requests for an absentee ballot. The preprinted request form -- an 11x17 piece of card stock folded over twice for mailing -- is addressed to the clerk in the the village of Caledonia.

Heck says, "I spoke with the Caledonia clerk and learned if we (in Mount Pleasant) used the form and sent it to the pre-printed address they would have to forward it to the right jurisdiction (if they had the time and the people) who would then have to send out the absentee ballot. As the deadline to submit a request is Oct. 30, and the clerks have a deadline of Oct. 31, this bogus form not only gums up and overworks the process to get absentee ballots sent out, it could cause some to not even be mailed."

Inside, were two forms like this. see original post for pic

The election officials Heck spoke to -- Racine County and Caledonia -- said sending the absentee ballot request to the wrong clerk would not jeopardize a voter's registration, but might result in the absentee ballot not getting sent due to overworked personnel, or the possibility of missing the deadline.

Another report comes from Jennifer Jackson, a Kenosha County supervisor. She says a friend in Middleton received similar McCain literature, containing a large post card which was an application for absentee ballot. The return address was wrong. Instead of the Middleton address for her clerk's office , it was a Madison clerk's office address. Had she filled this out and sent it back, "her vote would never have been counted," according to Jackson Read more…

No one here doubts that the Constitution is officially a piece of toilet paper, I hope. In case there are still a few bitter dead-enders on this point (heh), Glenn reminds us of just how far we've come from "free speech zones." Now, the only point I'll add is that they has been happening to little old Black grandmothers and disabled Latinas and suchlike for a looong time. But Nice, Polite People from MN? Hell no! We're all Niggers now, people! (video below) Pre-emptive Freedumb! Savor the term, you could be next, hippy!

Protesters here in Minneapolis have been targeted by a series of highly intimidating, sweeping police raids across the city, involving teams of 25-30 officers in riot gear, with semi-automatic weapons drawn, entering homes of those suspected of planning protests, handcuffing and forcing them to lay on the floor, while law enforcement officers searched the homes, seizing computers, journals, and political pamphlets. Last night, members of the St. Paul police department and the Ramsey County sheriff's department handcuffed, photographed and detained dozens of people meeting at a public venue to plan a demonstration, charging them with no crime other than "fire code violations," and early this morning, the Sheriff's department sent teams of officers into at least four Minneapolis area homes where suspected protesters were staying.

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Mostly, I'm very proud that this website has not joined in the woman-bashing trend that is the so-called "progressive" blogosphere's response to news of Palin's various family issues. Like Sean-Paul, I agree that her family's private issues are not worthy of my attention. Her Hypocrisy? Wingerism? Cronyism? Yes, let's talk about that. But leave her kids out of it. Period. SP speaks for me:

It's a private family matter. Leave it be. And leave Palin be. What McCain wants more than anything is to discuss Palin, not McCain.

If McCain wins, I guarantee you that Palin will not be Cheney to McCain's Bush (heh). People here have defended pro-Iraq war Hillary for many legit reasons, including the sexist crap she endured during her run. Let's not all make ourselves fools and hypocrites now. Palin sucks, for many reasons. The behaviors and failures of her family: not among them. Read more…

No, that's not what I'm saying. But recently, Obama lost an intellectual heavy hitter, our friend Mr. Newberry. SN's got his detractors, but one thing no one ever says about him is that he doesn't understand economics. A sample:

The blame lies, of course, with two groups: the monetary authority for its decision to accept all of the risk from the bad debt of the last decade, and hand out fresh money in return, without taking any direction over the resulting financial entities. These entities, of course, flooded the money into the pockets of those in possession of the company.
The write downs obscure how buy outs, golden parachutes, and assorted swap deals have prevented any major reorganization on Wall Street or globally. The same bankers who got us into this mess, by and larger, are still in charge.

The second group, of course, is the fiscal authority of the US. Namely the Rahmite Congress, unconvinced of the existence of a recession but willing to engage in their favorite pass time of handing out subsidies to the middle class to consume. The checks sent out were, as I said at the time, partial rebates on the inflation tax for some, who proceeded to do exactly what should have been expected: namely, they spent it on goods that were inflating. What Rahm should have done was just written a check to the oil companies of the world for 150 billion dollars, because that is exactly where all of that money ended up.

The problem here is that the progressive and Democratic spheres have embraced - the supply side economics of Reaganism - so long as their right to fuck is not going to be gutted. Read more…

I guess they do this every year, but it's new to me and of course made me feel the weight of my years. Politically, it's useful in understanding the group supposedly behind Obama the most: the young. It's helpful in other ways too, as we seek to understand what will and will not motivate people to engage in political action. Speaking of this year's batch of incoming 'traditional' (~18) frosh college students:

Harry Potter could be a classmate, playing on their Quidditch team.

Since they were in diapers, karaoke machines have been annoying people at parties.

They have always been looking for Carmen Sandiego.

GPS satellite navigation systems have always been available.

Coke and Pepsi have always used recycled plastic bottles.

Shampoo and conditioner have always been available in the same bottle.

Gas stations have never fixed flats, but most serve cappuccino.

Their parents may have dropped them in shock when they heard George Bush announce “tax revenue increases.”

Electronic filing of tax returns has always been an option.

Girls in head scarves have always been part of the school fashion scene. Read more…

I know there's a big party going on in Denver, but things seem to be equally hoppin over on the other side of the pond. Cheney is going over there, and that makes me worried. Russia says 'bring it on, bitches! We've got your oil/gas, and can turn it off anytime.

The G7 — Britain, the US, France, Canada, Germany, Italy and Japan — said in a statement released by the US State Department: “We deplore Russia’s excessive use of military force in Georgia and its continued occupation of parts of Georgia.” Read more…

"300,000" seems like a fairly large number, no? I know there's all sorts of exciting things happening in Denver right now, but I'm not alone in viewing Pakistan as a sort of lynchpin to what happens in the Middle East/Central & South Asia. Reuters:

By Mian Saeed-ur-Rehman

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Authorities in northwest Pakistan are urgently seeking millions of dollars to help up to 300,000 people who have fled from fighting between government forces and militants.

The displaced people are one more problem for a coalition government riven by disputes and grappling with mounting militant attacks and a sagging economy. Read more…

[UPDATE: I've included a post from Registan with a totally different take] I confess to great ignorance, when it comes to this conflict and the region in general. But Sean-Paul's latest makes great sense to me.

"Where's NATO?"

I remember the conversation so clearly, as if it happened yesterday. I was meeting with Alex Rondeli, a tall, smart, well-connected Georgian involved in the formation of the country's foreign policy. Everyone interested in the foreign policy of the region, I was told, who traveled to Tbilisi, had to meet with him. So I did. Obviously I don't have my notes of the interview with me, as they are in storage back home in America, but I remember when the conversation turned towards NATO and America helping Georgia. Alex was clear that he thought, from a rational, realpoplitik perspective, that Georgia's best hope was in joining the West and all its institutions. But he was also realistic enough to realize that Georgia had to find a way of living with its giant northern neighbor.

And I asked him, point blank, "what makes you think the US will keep its promise to Georgia in the event of war with Russia? Can you really trust the US?" And then I made it clear, before he answered, that I thought it was folly to trust the US, that Georgia's best course was to find a modus vivendi with Russia and develop its economy on its own terms because the Russians aren't going away.

They haven't. Now they are attempting to split the country. And Georgians are wondering, where is NATO? NATO isn't coming. Deal with it. Read more…

So, first off: Happy Birthday MJS! We miss you! And love you! And your beautiful, gracious, thoughtful wife, who in turn gave me a gift by asking me to give you one. I hope you enjoy your book. Secondly, I'm too heartbroken to explain Tel Asmar; just google "Tel Asmar UChicago dig house" and you'll understand- it's gone. My pain is nothing to the families of the dead who have lost infinitely more than that thanks to a reckless war of lies and greed.

Seeing as how Corrente is now a High Literary Society, I thought I should contribute something. The background on this short fiction is this: it's "historical" in feel and tone, but in no way up to the scholarly standards of my past. I feel badly I'm fuddling some historical and philological fact for the sake of fiction, so to my Assyriology friends: take it easy on a sister, yo? Also, due to a mix-up on the due date, I wrote this in exactly one morning and gave it all of one look-thru before publishing it for MJS' gift. So forgive the slightly choppy and unfinished element to it, it's essentially a first-draft. Someday, I may go back and clean it up and turn it into a long book; I've been sitting on a larger story of which this is part for some time. Anyway, here you go, Birhtday Boy and Gentle Readers.

"The Ashes of the House of Ur"
I

The tall brute looked and sounded exactly like his name implied; son of the war goddess indeed. Hulking over Ibrahim’s second wagon like a trained ape at the temple fair, he could hardly articulate the goods of passage, let alone write them. Lucky for him, a clever palace scribe was there to cover his ass and get the job done.

“Twelve woven blankets,” the brute slurred.
“Actually, your honor, “ said Ibrahim. “That’s ten. The other two are for the flooring.” He tried his best to look unconcerned, but the high ranking palace scribe's presence implied that the political scene was as dangerous for him as ever, perhaps more so. “That looks like more than ten to me,” the hulking mass of a beer-guzzling Akkadian said. “Are you saying I can’t count?” His muscular concern mirrored the urgency with which his scribe sought to insert herself into the conversation. Ibrahim took advantage of this.

“Lady Lali,” he said to the skinny scribe and using her nickname, which was known to him because they shared the same blood of the old families. “What say you of these blankets?” His deep, liquid eyes pleaded with her. He knew she knew all he wanted to do was leave; to escape the increasing burdens of all merchants of the Old Blood in a crumbling empire. To take his family, herds and goods to a new land; one long since abandoned by the ancient people of the sea, where the hills where green, and lightly populated by wild flocks or predators. The rumors of the place had spread in the last famine, when the empire had failed to provide for the people. Ibrahim had spoken out against the temples and their increasingly anti-traditionalist leadership then. He had paid for it ever since.

Lali looked at the small herds and poor-quarter quality of Ibrahim’s carts. Another reject of the new order, refugees taking flight, she thought. They were so common these days, what with the empire restricting its support to the “loyal families” and all. Sad, she thought. In the old days, merchant princes like Ibrahim would’ve been invited to compete for choice temple bids, their herds culled for the finest representatives for use at the city festivals and temple competitions. But no longer; the young prince was woefully easy to sway, and mostly a fool. His advisors had convinced him that a “loyalty” purge was long since due, and that the gods demanded it.

“Geb,” she called to her co-worker. “I’ve got to get some beer, and take a piss. It’s too fucking hot for this shit.” It was true, the midday was nigh, and they’d been processing passers at the gate for six hours. Some beer and dates, and an indoor break, were long overdue. Read more…

Via Booman, read the whole thing.

Back in the great state of Louisiana, Baron "Scooter" Pikes was spotted by the police while walking peacefully down the street. Given his outstanding warrant for possession, one Officer Nugent gave chase, and Pikes was cornered. Due to his failure to submit, Nugent tased him. Nine times. In 14 minutes. While Pikes surrendered and begged him to stop.

Pikes died shortly thereafter. He was a healthy man of 33 years. Nugent claimed that, in an apparent Bob Woodward-style near-death confession, he told them (in between the screams of pain and death rattles) that he was high on crack and PCP (never heard that one before!) and had asthma. The coroner found no evidence for any of these claims and ruled the death a homicide, but hey, what are you gonna believe, hearsay from a hardly-impartial participant or hard science from a 33-year veteran?

In an apparent goodwill gesture to shock Pikes back to life, Nugent admitted that he tased Pikes twice while he was unconscious and in custody.

I really wish I could link to the part of the Milgram experiment wherein the actor "dies" and the unwitting partipant shocks him again, and again, and again. Gee, I don't know why. A person administering an electrical shock that they are told is, well, maybe-sorta-safe, but they definitely won't be held responsible if things go awry... nah, never mind, there's no similarity there whatsoever. I don't know what I was thinking. Read more…

This move of the 2008 Democratic Convention to an outdoor venue for the Nominee’s acceptance speech isn’t the first time it has occurred. Read more…

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB12149545...

The Wall Street Journal notices what we noticed too:

Bush’s Third Term
July 2, 2008; Page A12

“We’re beginning to understand why Barack Obama keeps protesting so vigorously against the prospect of “George Bush’s third term.” Maybe he’s worried that someone will notice that he’s the candidate who’s running for it.”

Cross-posted from The Global Sociology Blog.

Two good pieces on Al Qaeda landed in my Newsreader this week and they both point in the same direction, albeit in different terms. The first one is from Tony Karon who questions the current relevance of Al Qaeda as the big post-9/11 bogeyman. For Karon, Al Qaeda is irrelevant and always was. In this respect, Al Qaeda is comparable to Trotsky... Huh? How does the comparison apply?

"Al-Qaeda is irrelevant, and yet U.S. hegemony in the Middle East is facing an unprecedented challenge from Islamist-nationalist groups. To understand the link between al-Qaeda’s weakness and the greatly expanded strength of groups such as Hamas, Hizballah, the Muslim Brotherhood and, of course, Iran, over the past seven years, it’s worth turning to the 20th century precedent: Leon Trotsky and his followers vs. the larger, nationally-focused parties of the left in the mid 20th century.

Trotsky rejected pragmatism and compromise by nationally-based leftist movements and insisted, instead, that they subordinate their specific national interests and objectives to the fantasy of “world revolution.” And as a result, long before his murder by Stalin, he found himself holed up in Mexico City, manically firing off communiques denouncing all compromise, and being largely ignored by the more substantial parties of the left world-wide. He had become an irrelevant chatterbox, caught up in a frenzy of his own rhetoric while world events simply passed him by. The same can be said of Bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri — it is not al-Qaeda, but the likes of Iran, Hamas, Hizballah, and the Muslim Brotherhood that represent the future of the nationalist-Islamist challenge to Western power in the Middle East."

What makes Al Qaeda seemingly powerful are two factors: the one mentioned by Karon, that is, the fact that the United States treats Al Qaeda as this omnipresent threat of global proportion and reacts to every action as if it were the beginnings of a terrorist apocalypse. The second one, which I think is relevant here and contributes to the first, is that fact that Al Qaeda, being a non-state group, articulates itself opportunistically to nation-based movements (Algeria, Philippines, Indonesia, or Iraq). Read more…

It's really true that the full moon brings out the Crazy in people. And completely unrelated to that point, JimmyJeff Gannon runs a blog for the National Press Club. If that's not a Zen moment of truth about our times, I don't know what is. Read more…

No pics and just a short one from me today, as it's too durn pretty outside to stay on the machine for long. But: in case you don't know, many vegetable plants only require 30-90 days of growth before harvest. And many are very easy to grow; lettuce and chard and potatoes and even tomatoes. There are many foods that freeze well, or can be stored dry.

Why am I reminding you of this? Because the flooding in the Midwest is going to utterly ruin a lot of our corporate farms, the farms that we still rely upon for our system of cheap and readily available food. No, I don't predict starvation and food shortages, but yes, I do predict a rise in the price of food starting this fall or sooner, an even more dramatic rise than is already coming due to inflation and energy prices.

Spade up some grass. Fill a couple of pots. Head over to a community plot, or just create one on some unused land in your 'hood. It's not too late.