"CAVE CANEM"

Oh This is Too Rich!

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 10:44:00 -0800

Nov 2007, Dateline Massachusetts; The progenitor of all things bad in the modern public square.

If you don't know by now again the "northeast-corridor types" are trying to enshrine their "Boston values" into law. Seeking to ban spanking state wide, and to set a legal precedence so other "fellow travelers" can ape this "fringe secular view" nationwide using Article IV, Section 1 of the constitution. Ahhh but wait, as all well reasoned Americans understand, writing laws for "the plebes" and actually living under your own misguided good intentions are two different things.

Now let's spend some "a very special" moment with the bills sponsor Lexington Rep. Jay Kaufman... (orig posted Jessica Heslam)

The spanking controversy has dominated Boston talk radio for two days, but don’t ask the lawmaker behind a proposed spanking ban whether he spanked his own children.

Lexington Rep. Jay Kaufman, a Democrat, went on WTKK (96.9 FM) host Michael Graham’s show this morning to talk about his bill to ban corporal punishment, which would make it illegal for parents to spank their kids at home or in public.

When Graham asked him whether he spanked his own children, Kaufman got angry. “It’s none of your damn business,” Kaufman snapped.

LMAO... Classic! THIS IS TOO RICH,
one could not make up such a total display of "a complete lack of self-awareness," if one wanted to!

Yes of course it isn't mister Kaufman!! Hopefully when you gain a adult outlook on life and politics you will realize that, not only isnt it Michael Graham’s business it’s not the (nanny) states business either! (It's so tedious to have write this, but still... A corrective SPANKING on a childs rear, AINT A BEATING folks!) I live for the day mister Kaufman, that one of your children or grandchildren has you arrested under your own foolish law. And one can't help but openly wonder, "Will this finally be a catylist for the people of Massachusetts to stop voting for anything with a D behind it?" ...sigh I doubt it nonetheless I though this outburst spoke volumes about the progressive moral compass! (lol right)

track the story yourself:

(1) Bay State’s going slap-happy (2) Spanking past brings tears (3) Anti-spanking crusader wants his privacy (4) lol and hear his outrage now for yourself (5) Anti-spanking bill is folly

Hat tip: to Radio Equalizer for tracking this story

Blogged with Flock

Couldn't have said it better myself... :^)

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 6 Mar 2007 13:37:00 -0800

The first act of war is dehumanization...
Cave Canem/RB

Even though I thought Rosie was funny in her "Comic Spotlight" days, I have long ago come to see her as an unimaginative, deceptive, shrill, blowhard. A recent case in point, her blowing off of critics about what even David Duke knows is a derogatory affectation of Chinese language. This soon after inferring that Kelly Rippa is a 'homophobe' for merely removing a total strangers hand from touching her face and covering her mouth while he was the guest-host on her show and having the adacity to be pissed about it. Can you imagine the media howling if someone finally covered Rosie's mouth? (OMG)

Usually I 'laugh at' the woman and her antics as typical 'self-important' celebrity nonsense and move on but lately her return daytime television her preternatural ability to keep all cameras 'on her' (which means she wont be going away anytime soon) I find myself wanting to say a few things about what I truly believe is a 'Malignant Ugly American.'

Because I'm neither Asian nor Chinese and I don't feel that disgust with Ms. O'Donnell will carry much weight, or be as nuanced (lol) as it should be.

Still, saying nothing has bothered me for a few weeks.

Today I found and posted below what is a much finer response to Rosie O'Donnell hypocrisy than I would create. Her trite and cynical apology aside this is brilliant response to her original dare I say it 'thoughts.'

Couldn't have said it better myself... :^)

C.C./RB
(your thoughts please)

iWood... iTALK . Apple Cell Phone Spec Commercial

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 11:38:00 -0800

I just saw this commercial today and my hands start sweating my face turned red. Hey Steve Jobs make this device, make it as easy to use as my mac and I will mortgage the bloody house to get one.

...and yes I got a little tinging in my low tech below...

(God I need help)

C.C.

Spec commercial for a new cell phone from Apple by award winning filmmaker Christopher DeSantis with design by Gregory DeSantis.

An Open Letter to Jennifer's "Inner Femininst"

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 15:51:00 -0700

Margaret Hassan, the woman who headed a humanitarian organization called CARE International. She lived in Iraq for 30 years and dedicated herself to helping Iraqis. The thanks for her tireless efforts came in the form of a bullet to the head. The video shows her blindfolded and wearing an orange jumpsuit. Yet, just as always, the terrorist-appeasing media refuses to acknowledge the following irrefutable fact: These terrorists were Muslims, and thus can be accurately described as Islamic terrorists.

Yesterday I spoke to you old friend, a fierce and beautiful woman, whom I not only admire, I respect. But of course, you work in the creative community, live on "The Left Coast" in WE HATE BUSH, BUSH IS THE REAL PROBLEM LAND, and I know you have family in the military, and can't bear to think of what will have to be done in Iran. Fair enough, but Jen I wish to appeal to your sense of self interest. I know we have history so any argument I can voice will be colored as being "a male point of view." Nonetheless you are in grave danger and that "fierceness" which your country needs is misdirected at a man that will become a footnote on history in 18 months.

So I found a woman proud, intelligent like yourself, who can express better than I, this real enemy to the life your struggling to build. Hopefully if you can here her voice over that of the Cicadas in the Press about a culture, and a movement who's entire stated purpose is to extinguish women like you, views you express, and the freedoms we all take for granted, from the face the Earth. Beware my true friend and join arms with those who wish to save you and I both from this horrible fate. I wouldn't want to live in a world in which, women like you, were hunted or exterminated, not just irritated by public policy. One more thing please use that beautiful gift of yours for those in the fight, if not to raise them up, never to tear them down! (Jen please read the article below & email your thoughts)

Feminism’s Blind Spot
By Sarah Baxter
The Sunday Times | August 15, 2006

When Ann Pettitt, the mother of two young children, and her friends set off in August 25 years ago on a 120-mile trek from Cardiff to the little known American air base at Greenham Common in Berkshire, they gave themselves the ambitious name of “Women for Life on Earth”. Their numbers were tiny but the stakes, they felt, were dauntingly high.

The cold war world was bristling with Soviet and American nuclear weapons, posing the threat of mutual assured destruction (MAD). In a dramatic escalation of the arms race between the superpowers, shiny new cruise missiles were due to be delivered to Greenham, placing Britain’s green and pleasant land in the bull’s eye for targeting by the Soviet Union.

The modest peace march was largely ignored by the media, so on arrival at the base the women decided to borrow the eye-catching tactics of the suffragette movement. They chained themselves to the gates of Greenham and dared the police to remove them. Sympathisers began to turn up bearing makeshift tents, clothing and pots and pans. Many came and went but others stayed. Thus was the women’s peace camp born a quarter of a century ago this month and a new chapter in the history of feminism opened.

“I was motivated by fear and terror,” Pettitt recalled last week. “I was the mother of a two-year-old and a four-year-old and weapons of mass destruction were the ultimate denial of the fact that I’d created life. There was such brinkmanship, I really thought that nuclear weapons might be used.”

Mercifully, they weren’t. President Ronald Reagan once blurted out in front of a live microphone that the bombing of Russia was going to begin in 15 minutes, but it was nothing more than a tasteless joke. In hindsight Reagan’s hardline negotiating stance helped to bring about the collapse of the Soviet Union. By the end of the 1980s the Berlin Wall was down and the velvet revolutions in eastern Europe were under way.

The peace movement lost a foe in Reagan but has gone on to find new friends in today’s Stop the War movement. Women pushing their children in buggies bearing the familiar symbol of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament marched last weekend alongside banners proclaiming “We are all Hezbollah now” and Muslim extremists chanting “Oh Jew, the army of Muhammad will return.”

For Linda Grant, the novelist, who says that “feminism” is the one “ism” she has not given up on, it was a shocking sight: “What you’re seeing is an alliance of what used to be the far left with various Muslim groups and that poses real problems. Saturday’s march was not a peace march in the way that the Ban the Bomb marches were. Seeing young and old white women holding Hezbollah placards showed that it’s a very different anti-war movement to Greenham. Part of it feels the wrong side is winning.”

As a supporter of the peace movement in the 1980s, I could never have imagined that many of the same crowd I hung out with then would today be standing shoulder-to-shoulder with militantly anti-feminist Islamic fundamentalist groups, whose views on women make western patriarchy look like a Greenham peace picnic. Nor would I have predicted that today’s feminists would be so indulgent towards Iran, a theocratic nation where it is an act of resistance to show an inch or two of female hair beneath the veil and whose president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is not joking about his murderous intentions towards Israel and the Jews.

On the defining issue of our times, the rise of Islamic extremism, what is left of the sisterhood has almost nothing to say. Instead of “I am woman, hear me roar”, there is a loud silence, punctuated only by remonstrations against Tony Blair and George Bush — “the world’s number one terrorist” as the marchers would have it.

Women are perfectly entitled to oppose the war in Iraq or to feel that Israel is brutally overreacting to Hezbollah’s provocation. But where is the parallel, equally vital debate about how to combat Islamic fundamentalism? And why don’t more peace-loving feminists regard it as a threat? Kira Cochrane, 29, is the new editor of The Guardian women’s page, the bible of the Greenham years, where so many women writers made their names by staking out positions on the peace movement. She has noticed that today’s feminists are inclined to keep quiet about the march of radical Islam. “There’s a great fear of tackling the subject because of cultural relativism. People are scared of being called racist,” Cochrane observes.

Whatever the merits of unilateral nuclear disarmament, women were a lot braver a quarter of a century ago. Pettitt remembers how “we tried to crash the top table at Greenham. You had to be rude to interrupt because you’re never going to be invited to speak”.

I had just left university in the early 1980s when I got swept up in the peace movement. My Saturday afternoons were often spent marching from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square and on the day when cruise missiles arrived in Britain, I rushed to a protest outside the Houses of Parliament, was arrested by the police, dragged into a black maria van and shoved overnight into a south London police cell. It was nothing compared to what the women of Greenham Common endured, but I felt like a heroine when the next day my male boss at Penguin Books, where I worked as a junior copywriter, paid my fine.

I was a bit sniffy about the all-women’s peace camp because I was partial to men and disliked much of the mumbo-jumbo surrounding it. In her forthcoming memoir, Walking to Greenham (published by Honno), Pettitt writes about the “delightful irony” of liberated women using “emblems of conformist democracy” such as knitting needles and wool to protest against war, but I used to see the ghastly spider webs and children’s mittens tied to the razor wire on the perimeter fence and shudder.

Nevertheless, I attended several “embrace the base” demonstrations in support of the women who had put the issue of nuclear disarmament so defiantly on the map. I went on to get a job at Virago, the feminist publisher, and marvelled at the way the “peace wimmin” had energised the brand new field of women’s studies, sparking lively debates on the virtues and vices of separatism from men and the extent to which nuclear weapons were “boys’ toys” (a tricky one in the age of Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s first woman prime minister).

Later, as a journalist, I broke into the base with a group of Greenham women, stood somewhat pointlessly on top of the silos where the cruise missiles were stored and went on to become friends with one of the peace campers, who had been abused as a child and had found comfort in the new “family” she had made living in the rough and ready “benders” constructed of branches and plastic sheeting.

It is now largely forgotten that Greenham inspired many women to free themselves from the narrow world in which they had been brought up to live instead in ways which we take for granted today.

Looking back I think I was wrong about Reagan and too sympathetic towards the Soviet Union. There were plenty of fellow travellers in the peace movement who were cheering on the Soviet Union under their breath. I can remember making a lot of silly excuses about it myself. But the fear of mutual assured destruction was genuine enough. As long as it worked, MAD was a plausible strategy. Were it to fail, the results would be catastrophic. As President Dwight Eisenhower said after the testing of the hydrogen bomb in the 1950s: “Atomic war will destroy civilisation.” If war came, “you might as well go out and shoot everyone you see and then shoot yourself”.

The situation today is very different. Writing in The Wall Street Journal last week, Bernard Lewis, the noted scholar of Islam, pointed out that Iran’s messianic rulers are not constrained by such fears. According to their theology, the day of judgment will be glorious. “At the end of time there will be general destruction anyway,” Lewis writes. “What matters will be the final destination of the dead — hell for the infidels and heaven for the believers. For people with this mindset, Mad is not a constraint, it is an inducement.”

Hassan Nasrallah, the Shi’ite cleric who leads Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy in Lebanon, regularly issues bloodcurdling threats against the Jews. “If they (the Jews all gather in Israel,” he has said, “it will save us the trouble of going after them on a worldwide basis.”

For some on the left such words are merely understandable hyperbole, provoked by decades of Israeli ill-treatment of the Palestinians, but I prefer to take Islamic fundamentalists at their word when they spout insults about Jews being the descendants of “pigs and apes” and launch their chillingly apocalyptic tirades.

Why? Because they not only talk centuries-old nonsense about the place of women in society, but they also purposely oppress the female sex whenever they are given the chance. As regards their treatment of women, there is no discernible difference between their acts and their words.

In my own life I have been lucky enough not to experience a great deal of sexism. The 1980s and 1990s were decades of progress for western career women and working mothers. But I felt how it was to be invisible when I interviewed Hamas militants and clerics many years ago in Gaza. They were very courteous and helpful and I tried to be respectful by covering my hair with a black scarf. But they never looked me in the eye or addressed me directly. I would ask the questions; they would answer the male photographer who accompanied me.

Phyllis Chesler, 65, the writer and a founder feminist in the 1960s, has experienced some of the more disturbing aspects of Muslim patriarchy at first hand.

In the summer of 1961 Chesler married Ali, her western-educated college sweetheart, and went to live with him in Afghanistan. Nothing had prepared her for the restrictions and humiliations which Muslim women endured there, nor the gradual personality change that her husband underwent. The worst of it, she discovered, was “nothing unique happened to me”. It was the way of the world.

“The Afghanistan I knew was a prison, a police state, a feudal monarchy, a theocracy rank with fear and paranoia,” Chesler recalls in The Death of Feminism, published last year. “Afghanistan had never been colonised. My Afghan relatives were very proud of this fact. ‘Not even the British could occupy us’, they told me, not once but many times.

“I was ultimately forced to conclude that Afghan barbarism, tyranny and misogyny were entirely of their own making and not attributable to colonialism or imperialism. It is what they themselves would say.”

Six months later, travelling on false papers obtained by a sympathetic German-born friend, Chesler secretly fled the country. The ardent feminism that she embraced on her return to America was forged in Afghanistan, she told me last week. She has not recanted her support for women’s rights, she insists, but she has seen the views of others morph in alarming new directions.

“The compassion for people of colour has been translated into feminists standing with terrorists who are terrorising their own women,” she says. In the week when a massive bomb plot against civilians was uncovered in Britain, Chesler’s critique of women’s complacency in her book is prophetic. “The Islamists who are beheading Jews and American civilians, stoning Muslim women to death, jailing Muslim dissidents and bombing civilians on every continent are now moving among us both in the East and in the West,” she writes.

“I fear that the ‘peace and love’ crowd in the West refuses to understand how Islamism endangers our values and our lives, beginning with our commitment to women’s rights and human rights.” Women’s studies programmes should have been the first to sound the alarm, she points out: “They did not.”

Chesler has fallen out with many old friends in the women’s movement. They have in effect excommunicated her for writing in right-wing publications in America, but she has found it impossible to get published on the left. There are whispers that she has become paranoid, mad, bonkers, a charge frequently levelled against the handful of women writers who are brave enough to tackle the same theme.

In Britain there is the polemicist Julie Burchill, who has written incisively about the desire of terrorists to commit acts “not so that innocents may have the right to live freely on the West Bank, but so that they might have the right to throw acid in the face of innocent, unveiled women”. Well, the outrageous Julie has always been bonkers, hasn’t she.

Then there is “mad” Melanie Phillips, the Cassandra of our age, banging on that “if we wish to learn what was going on in Europe in 1938, just look around”. Of course she would say that, wouldn’t she. She’s Jewish, and anyway didn’t you know that she is crazy enough to believe in two-parent families? In America the radical feminist Andrea Dworkin died last year virtually unmourned by women on the left in part, as her friend Christopher Hitchens remembered, because “she wasn’t neutral against a jihadist threat that wanted, and wants, to enslave and torture females.

“That she could be denounced as a ‘conservative’,” he concluded, “says much about the left to which she used to belong.”

In Italy Oriana Fallaci, the 77-year-old journalist famous for interviewing Ayatollah Khomeini, recently went on trial accused of defaming Muslims. It is true that many of her comments about Islam — “a pool that never purifies” — are undeniably offensive, but no more so than comments routinely made by Muslim extremists about “the Jews”. In her cancer-stricken twilight years, the once glamorous Fallaci has been written off as a deranged old bat.

Fallaci has grown accustomed in recent years to living with death threats, as have the formidable Muslim women critics of Islamic extremism such as Irshad Manji, the Canadian feminist, Taslima Nasreen, the exiled Bangladeshi writer (and critic of the Iraq war), and Somali-born Ayaan Hirsi Ali, whose film Submission resulted in the murder by Islamic militants of Theo van Gogh, the gay Dutch film director.

Hirsi, after enjoying a brief succès d’estime, has been virtually hounded out of the liberal Netherlands and is due to arrive in America next month, where she has been offered a perch at the American Enterprise Institute, the neoconservative think tank. It is too easy to say she has sold out to the right. Where, one might ask, are her friends on the left? Something has gone badly wrong with a politically correct feminism that prefers to take aim at the United States, a haven of free speech and relative sexual equality, than to tackle the threat posed to women by Islamic fundamentalism. Just as the existence of Thatcher, the Iron Lady, at the helm of British government in the 1980s failed to impress the women’s peace movement, so the presence of Condoleezza Rice, a black woman who grew up in segregated Alabama, as US secretary of state has not dimmed the cries against American “racism”.

For this the 1980s peace movement must take some of the blame with its overbearing emphasis on the evil Reagan empire and soft-pedalling of the Soviet Union. But I am surprised, all the same, by the persistence of the ideological blind spot that has led women who are so quick to condemn the failings of the West to make transparent excuses for the behaviour of some of the world’s most anti-feminist regimes.

Recently Kate Hudson, chairwoman of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, wrote a breathtaking apologia for the Iranian nuclear energy programme, which took at face value Ahmadinejad’s claims to be developing it for “strictly peaceful” purposes. (Since when, by the way, has CND regarded Britain’s nuclear power plants so benignly?) Never mind the preposterous dancing with enriched uranium around the doves of peace nor the missiles marked “Tel Aviv” paraded in the streets.

It is fair to say that Pettitt, the original Greenham woman, has wrestled with some of these problems. She is passionately against America’s “wars of revenge” for September 11, but makes it clear in her memoir that she is no pacifist: “I didn’t regard myself as being in a peace movement, I was in a movement against nuclear weapons. There are enormously hard decisions for which there are sometimes only military solutions.”

Pettitt’s mother, Solange, was a teenager in northern France when it was occupied by the Nazis and her family sheltered a British soldier for six months.

Pettitt’s father was a communist in the 1930s who was unsettled by Stalin’s pact with Hitler. At home after the war, Pettitt remembers hearing the stories of friends of her parents who had escaped the Holocaust.

“I can understand where Israel is coming from,” she says. “I’m not a fan of Hezbollah. It worries me a lot.” But like so many Stop the War protesters, she says that Bush and Blair have opened a “Pandora’s box”, as if the birth of Islamic extremism began only with the invasion of Iraq.

It is certainly plausible, as Pettitt claims, that Bush’s actions have “accelerated the radicalisation of the Islamic world tremendously”, although this popular view conveniently downplays the growing Islamic fundamentalist movement before the September 11 attacks and the huge psychological boost that it received from Al-Qaeda’s strike on America.

Let us assume that what Pettitt says is true. I can remember when the women’s movement was told that its persistent demands for equality were leading to a “backlash”. Susan Faludi wrote a feminist bestseller of that name, based on the premise that men were fighting back tooth and nail in the gender wars.

I have just got the book down from my shelves. It says on the back cover: “The backlash against women is real. This is the book we need to understand it, to struggle through the battle fatigue and to keep going.” There was no question of slinking away out of fear that men were being emboldened to find new ways of oppressing women.

The Middle East is engaged in a titanic struggle between modernity and theocracy. Whatever one’s views about the Iraq war or the conflict in Lebanon, it deserves more than slogans about “We are all Hezbollah now” and fury against Bush and Blair.

I don’t agree with Chesler that we are witnessing the death of feminism, but for now it is MIA: missing in action.

Godspeed Margret and to women,
like you. May your kindness
survive their madness.

(hat tip) Frontpagemag.com Click Here to support.

C.C.

The Truth Behind the Power PC, Intel "Switch!"

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Sat, 8 Jul 2006 23:13:00 -0700

"In his anger it seems..."

"Tell the truth and Shame the devil"

This is exactly how I envisioned it happening. Bwahahahahahahahaha!
C.C.

Damn Life's Tuff II

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 11:58:00 -0700

When Things Look Bad, Feel Thankful You Weren't This Poor Dwarf
Originally uploaded by SeenyaRita.

Imagine if you will, the thoughts going through Od's mind in those few seconds supended in the air after realizing he's not going to land on the trampoline and looking down seeing that really big tongue!

ROTFLPMPSTC

I know it's wrong to laugh at others misfortune... but its so damn funny.

C.C.

Ira Glass? Are You kidding Me?

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 17:53:00 -0700

A recent "GET BENT" note from This American life.

A note to our streaming MP3 listeners:

You've probably noticed that you can no longer fast-forward or rewind our files. If you're using Windows Media Player or Real-Player, you can still pause as you listen; sadly, if you're using ITunes, you can't. We know that this loss of functionality isn't great – in fact, it stinks. Unfortunately, we we've been forced make some changes that protect our files from unauthorized downloads, and these changes will, at least temporarily, cause you to lose some of the features you've probably grown accustomed to. While we aren't happy with this development, contractual obligations left us no choice; unauthorized downloads were beginning to get out of hand.

Regardless, we are still absolutely committed to offer free streaming audio, and we're actively researching ways that we can again make it possible for you to grab your coffee and rewind to catch what you missed. We've also been thinking more broadly about our online audio future, and will keep you posted on new developments on our website and via our weekly email list.

Right... Liar!!!!!!!

Wake up people you've already paid for this content several times!!!!! WBEZ is a Public radio station (taxpayers paid for every brick in the joint). Ira Glass owns the copyright to T.A.L. ? my ass!!! He gets his salary, the equipment he made it on and the website he sells it on out of our pockets. (Taxes Again). As-a-matter of fact this whole Idea of privately copyrighting media made at the public trough is obscene. I wish I had the money to sue these ungrateful bastards, and force all NPR stations to opensource the content paid for by U.S. taxpayers or give our money back! Or if they think they're is there such a rabid demand for their product than compete in the open market with the rest of us (come on Ira I dare ya!). Rocketboom does it everyday, selling the same World-view.

"this whole Idea of privately copyrighting media made at the public trough is obscene."

Where does any "Public Broadcast Station" get off not giving us OUR content for free. Isn't the private monetization of public assets the very definition of corruption? If his copyright isn't illegal, (is anybody a lawyer out there?) it should be. Didn't we go through this whole looking glass situation with "Barney" and " Jim Henson's Sesame Street" using us, the public, as seed money to start their Multi-Hundreds of million (maybe billion) dollar corporations, (thanks PBS for free airtime, our copyright, our cash, so sorry) then afterwards, have the balls to pop up every three months, with their shiny teeth, crying poor, hands out demanding, "WE" dig a little deeper to pay for their broadcast, and maintenance cost to promote their private playgrounds! Good grief people one last time, "they are selling you something you've already paid for people, several times! Wake Up!

This rant was inspired by this "boingboing" post

Ted Stevko (sucker) says,
TAL is bending over backwards to be nice about this, and is going MUCH farther than most NPR/PRI programs. TAL didn't send C&D letters, they asked that people not take it down, personally. How cool is that? TAL provides MP3 formats, where almost every other NPR program is in Real-Player formats. TAL has asked that you don't provide an easy way for people to grab all they can -- that's fine. Bandwidth still costs a lot, and forcing people to stream is a way of spreading out that bandwidth usage over time. If anything, we should support this move -- TAL is doing what they can, and providing amazing work for free. Be supportive of TAL, and more people will move that way.

This is sooooo, the wrong point-of view, we all pay little bit every paycheck. It is those at "This American Life," and others like them, whom should be on there knees, thankful, they can make a living off our largesse.

C.C.

Jimi Hendrix on Nam!

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Sun, 4 Jun 2006 12:28:00 -0700

jimi_hendrix_800_600
Originally uploaded by leslie powell.

In response to a puerile anti-Vietnam question, by a Netherlands reporter, this is what *Jimi Hendrix said…

“Did you send the Americans away when they landed in Normandy?
That was also interference, but that was concerning your own skin. The Americans are fighting in Vietnam for a completely free world, as soon as they move out, the Vietnamese will be at the mercy of the communist, for that matter the yellow danger, China, should not be underestimated. Of course war is horrible, but at present, its still the only guarantee of peace.”

I think I just went from just an admirer to a fan.

C.C.

P.S. Damn Jimi got "it!" So much so, he put "it’ in his music, his “Star Spangled Banner,” (which was boo'd @ the time) was a *tribute supporting the troops and their mission, how innovative! I often wonder why the “Blame America first” crowd that worship his music, ...can’t get "it."

Photos originally uploaded (left to right) by toofarnorth/yllan's

*Hat tip to Bill Bennett’s featured interviews

The Art of the Non-Denial, Denial

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 1 Jun 2006 20:36:00 -0700

"I would never approve the removal of 'America' or 'American' from use in our classrooms. Not on my watch." -Mike Flanagan

Yeah right Mikey, and the day after you leave?

Clearly this new educational fetish*, like diversity and internationalism before it, is designed to further rob our children of a 'clear and distinct' American history that they can be proud of, moreover fight to cultivate. What policies has Mr. Flanagan put into place to head off this "well-intentioned, but pernicious, example of political correctness?" I’m willing to bet you a dime to a donut, not one memo, not one word, has ever been sent out, just as bulwark, to his 'educated minions' against such silly but pervasive educational fashions. Will he ever put policies in writing that make it unambiguous that first, they are 'American teachers' and secondly the students they teach are (overwhelmingly) 'Americans' and the facts about their unique American history deserve to be vigorously and enthusiastically instructed? (other than his hastily scratched declaration in todays paper). Again, I'll give you any odds you want, it will never happen. It's a crime to teach otherwise than expect these students to develop into good citizens.

Bye the way he never specifically address the claim "the department's style protocol for the Michigan Education Assessment Program requires that "America" and "Americans" be expunged from our testing and grade level expectations." Does the 'style protocol' it state this or not Mr. Flanagan?

No doubt teachers will be returning from summer seminars/retreats with this "fresh new idea" about American identity. Also no doubt many of our children who already can't find our country on a map, soon will not know witch country to look for.

(Think I'm joking watch California and Massachusetts depts. of Ed. manifestos over the next year)

When will we, and our children, be able to finally 'vote with our feet' and leave such institutions that insist on indoctrinating our youth with this (and other) sick, mind-dimming world views.

School of choice now, tomorrow and forever.

C.C.

P.S. If you don't know why I'm so irate read my post below!
* See the 'Pull Quote' in the post below.

Michigan bans "America"

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 25 May 2006 13:53:00 -0700

Read the Orwellian crap below... (I posted the entire article because public education in this country so sickening and paraphrasing will not do this issue justice.)

May 24, 2006

Keep 'America' in Michigan schools

State bureaucrats want to do what Stalin, Osama could only dream about!!!

by Michael Warren

Censoring the word "America" from our own schools is something Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Osama bin Laden would never have thought possible. Michigan has done it without a whimper.
In perhaps a well-intentioned, but pernicious example of political correctness, the Michigan Department of Education is attempting to ban the "America" and "American" from our public schools. Even though the word "America" appears in the department's own civics and government benchmarks, the department's style protocol for the Michigan Education Assessment Program requires that "America" and "Americans" be expunged from our testing and grade level expectations. Last week, the department ordered that our hard-working teachers not utter the words.

We're all 'North Americans'
The Department of Education asserts that "Americans" includes Mexicans, Canadians and others in the Western Hemisphere, so referring to U.S. residents as Americans is inappropriate. In the department's view, "America" happens to include South, Central and North America. Accordingly, when referring to the colonial period, the state bureaucracy requires teachers to refer to "the colonies of North America" or "North Americans." After the American Revolution, the nation is called the United States (not of America).

The state's edict would be laughable if it were not so disgraceful. Instead of focusing on better teaching methods and educational resources to help our hard-working teachers and parents, the Department of Education spends its energy on confusing, misleading, historically inaccurate and counterproductive wordplay.

One can only imagine how teachers struggle to meet the semantic dictates of an educational bureaucracy gone awry. According to the department, before the American Revolution, George Washington, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were North Americans. But so were the French colonists in the Louisiana Territory, the Spanish settlers in Mexico and the British colonists in Canada -- not to mention the Native Americans.

No 'American' Revolution?
After the American Revolution, the Founding Fathers no longer qualified as North Americans, but apparently the British, Spanish, French and Native Americans did. What people in the United States are to be called after the Revolution is not clear, so long as they are not referred to as Americans.

The Department of Education asserts that "Americans" includes Mexicans, Canadians and others in the Western Hemisphere, so referring to U.S. residents as Americans is inappropriate. In the department's view, "America" happens to include South, Central and North America.

Although the style protocol does not require educators to change formal titles such as "America the Beautiful," the students will apparently now believe the song is about a hemisphere and not a nation. The American Revolution is now the North American Revolution. Little did the writers of the Contract with America in 1994 realize that they were making an agreement with Mexico and Canada. The Voice of America obviously is broadcasting the inspirational messages of Brazil and Belize across the globe.

'Internationally friendly'
The Michigan Department of Education considers the dictate "internationally friendly." Why being friendly to an international audience or perspective is important in teaching and learning American history is incomprehensible.
That we would sacrifice our language to the altar of internationalism is a betrayal to the American spirit. Indeed, the whole idea of America is to be a beacon of light, a shining city on the hill, which inspires the rest of the world.
The word "America" is the most important word of all in learning about the history of the United States and our civics. America is an inspiration and an aspiration for generations of souls who strove, and continue to strive, for freedom and liberty.
Ideals matter

"Americans hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights," and that governments are supposed to protect those rights. Not all people or governments in the Western Hemisphere agree with those propositions -- as communist Cuba, Haiti and other nations show.

The time has come for our Michigan Department of Education to recognize the error of its ways and proclaim that it is teaching about America and Americans in American history and civics. In fact, the department should repent by creating an "American Freedom Curriculum" in which K-12 students learn the principles and history of the greatest nation on earth. Then the department will be worthy of the treasure for which they are responsible.

Michael Warren is an Oakland County Circuit Court judge, a former member of the State Board of Education and a board member of the Michigan Center for Civic Education. E-mail letters to letters@detnews.com.

Wasn't it the Soviets that changed history not through revelation and discovery, but by scratching names and photos out of history books? Maybe this isn't America.

C.C/Race Bannon

Hat tip to the 'withering' Detroit News

Damn Life's Tuff

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 11:09:00 -0800

First of all: If your laughing at this picture your are a heartless, soulless, hateful, indifferent , compassionless, cruel, unfeeling, callous, hard hearted, unsympathetic, unkind, dismissive bastard. May you rot in the eternal flames of Hades, and may it be both hot and humid.

Secondly: It is kinda funny, aint it? ( LMAO )

Last but not least: This picture isn't a put on... I didn't make this sign,
it not a joke. I was on my way back to my humble abode when again,
out the out the corner of my eye a saw something that I had to capture. I made
a Michigan left, parked, zig-zagged in-between traffic to get to the median and grabbed these images.

Often when I review this picture I think of the back-story here. Irwin's owner clearly, deeply, loves his pet, the surgery, the pills, had to cost a pretty penny to keep Irwin alive. Clearly the owner is one those "no cost is too great for my baby" people, commendable but a little scary. Now let's "flip the script." If you ask me I think the damn thing ran off to find a quiet, peaceful place to die (no really). Imagine what it was like living with this owner the constant hovering, the unending pain, all the baby talk, at some point I would want "do myself" too. I can't tell you how this story ended but I hoped things worked out.

C.C.

I thought long and hard about putting this image online I know what
ripe bastards people can be. It's been sometime since I took this shot,
still, I'm afraid some asshole may call and torment these poor people further.

Don't be that guy.

'On the field' at SBLX

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Mon, 13 Feb 2006 01:04:00 -0800

Halftime Rox
Originally uploaded by UrbanTiki.

"Their I was no..." standing on the 43 yard line during the Super Bowl last Sunday, at the end of a two week journey holding a 'tongue' over my head as explosions went off around me. Cue the Stones singing "Start me up," and you may get an impression what it was like to be center stage, center field at Super Bowl 40. It all started with an excited email from a friend who wrote me, "hey you said you wanted 'in' the Super Bowl right? Well here's the deal show up at the Pontiac Silverdome tonight they're holding auditions." Now I had heard about the 'cattle call' for groups of twenty or more 18 -24 year olds, you the type of bubbly, cute, gyrating fans, one sees all the time in videos, to be part of the "volunteer audience members." Look, I long ago passed my expiration date for that group, but "what the hell" the gig is 'the GIG' is the super bowl for Christ sake, maybe they were just short a few bodies. So, I went anyway no head-shot, just me and my smile.

What I had gotten myself into was way more interesting than waiting to be told to "be enthusiastic" and had nothing to do with being cute. I became part of a crew that helped assemble the stage for the Super Bowl half time show viewed by an estimated 100 million people U.S. (no pressure there). Our first few attempts at quickly, efficiently putting the stage together at 'Super Bowl speed' was... how shall I put this... Imagine 700 monkeys trying to fuck one football at the the same time. The effort was hilarious, straps broke, wood chips were flying everywhere, a flat out riot. Nonetheless by show-time, I had seen the stones perform three times, (I like to think just for me), and "we happy few," the stage crew was so sharp we could hustle that "30 piece mouth" together in almost 4 minutes flat. The whole experiences was amazing! Mick was 'on fire,' the stadium was 'with us,' and, I was "literally" center stage, taste bud #375 (lol), camera left wearing a "Where's Waldo" (for tape visibility) shirt jumping around like a 18-24 yr. old during the Super Bowl half-time show.

What a life.

Note: I was on camera four times, really, trust me. I watched 'the tape" in slow motion a million times, just to prove it. (LMAO)

Good times,
C.C.

I’m in the Motherf*&king Superbowl !!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Sun, 5 Feb 2006 02:27:00 -0800

Ok, quick note I’ll be in the freaking Superbowl Halftime Show dead center-left (in the tounge) wearing the “Where’s Waldo” shirt. More later on how I got there and what it was like... Holy shit I’ll be on the field during the Superbowl !!!!

The Shame of it All

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:12:00 -0800

After what I'm sure was some tough judge shopping, the ACLU is opening the 'legal fiction' component of the "IMPEACH BUSH NOW agenda" in my 'fair city' this week, it will take the form of a "NSA class action lawsuit". I've seen interviews where ACLU lawyers admit they have no evidence that their clients have been targeted, but what the heck it's free money. (You do know "we the people" pay for every ACLU lawsuit whether they win or not?) I'm embarrassed, no ashamed that they choose my hometown as 'the base' for these 'shenanigans'. I will predict this foment will reach its peak during Sheehan's hissy fit this summer, and none of this 'noise' will go anywhere. America I apologize, this is shameful town where people come to do shameful things. (sigh)

C.C.

The Gorillaz: Live in Europe

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 00:01:00 -0800

The Gorillaz; Feel Good Inc.

Viewing this file properly may require Quicktime 6 or greater.
Please be patient while your media loads.

I'm posting this simply because the idea is so freaking cool! The Gorillaz, 'The Greatest Virtual Band in History', won Best Group at the MTV Europe Music Awards in Lisbon on November 3rd, 2005. Afterwards, they took the stage to play "Feel Good Inc" live, in the form of holograms forever leaving the limitations of 2d film behind them, How crazy is that? If you ever heard the song Feel Good Inc. and didn't bop you're head, your way over thirty and should click over to the 'OReilly Factor'.

Anybody still there? O.K. This preformance is freaking Unbelievable, Sick, and simply Amazing! Life size holograms not projected on a some screen, but actually in the room performing for a live crowd, joined later by the living "De la Soul" to jam the crowd together. The Gorillaz, "the world's most popular virtual band'', hands down are, the most ambitious, creative, multimedia, concept in entertainment I've seen in a decade. Enjoy Good times

My rating: ❶❷❸❹⑤

My 2WORD review... Brilliant Execution!

C.C.

Hat tip to MilkandCookies.com.

The Funniest Tv Show of the Season...(unwittingly)

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Mon, 16 Jan 2006 02:42:00 -0800

NBC's "The Book of Daniel" premiered last Friday with a two-hour special that was heralded as the next "Desperate Housewives" but ' stank up the joint' with a third-place showing in the ratings. Actually it's hilarious not in the Sienfeld way but in the 'Plan Nine from Outer Space' way. Pat Robertson and room full of angry Bob Jones graduates couldn't have written a more hyperbolic satire proselytizing the pitfalls of 'liberal Christian theology' and its inevitably ends. This "toleration" approach to sin was so prosaically demonstrated in Reverend Webster's "sermon" it left the viewer with impression that the 'Good Reverend' has no coherent understanding of sin not to mention the human condition. That sermon was an almost perfect distillation of liberal theology expressed as mind-numbing non-judgmentalism. This priest 'Daniel', and his family are poster children for postmodern times. I cannot recall a series in which a greater number of characters seemed so desperately detestable. The real writers perhaps realizing they've created a crop of characters who are so morally compromised, irredeemably mean, venal and idiotic, that they try to tell us these people are really sweethearts, using a therapeutic Jesus as head cheerleader. Amazingly, this "Christ figure" just wants humans to get over their 'hang-ups' about sin. Sin!!! Sin!!! This show wouldn't recognize a sin with both hands on a bible! It was so bad I actually shed tears... laughing very hard at its flailing attempt to push the cultural envelope. But, believe it or not I think this show could be 'saved' (Pun intended).

First things first, who was the executive genius that saw this and said "this make sense to me, this is a plausible story, I think people are gonna wanna watch this, go forth and make it so"? This guy should be 'Soooooooo fired'. Tom Shales of the Washington Post observes, "There ought to be a worse punishment than cancellation for a show that tries this hard to be offensive and, even at that crass task, manages to fail." I agree wholeheartedly, crucifixion anyone? (LOL) Ironically, the show may succeed in accomplishing what it almost surely does not aim to do – demonstrate clearly that 'tolerant liberal theology' inevitably leads one into being trapped by almost every form of sin, temptation, and dysfunctional syndrome imaginable with no end in sight. This I think is a foundation you can build on, for bitter sweet-comedy. I see that with just few tweaks NBC could be sucking in millions of Christian eyes now turning away offended, while staying edgy enough to win awards from their media friends.**

How to Move This Debacle from 3rd to 1st

Make it a ½ hour comedic morality play (think My name is Earl)

Simplify Give him a 'holy adversary' 'Jimmy the evangelist priest' (think Cheers, Melville's/Gay's Olde Towne Tavern) who's every success, stable family, larger flock, etc drives Daniel to all of Seven Deadly Sins and let the hilarity ensue.

Dump the carpool buddy, hippy Jesus, The mere portrayal of him in this way turns people off, accept it, move on.

Streamline the show plot "how does Daniel of keep church growing to please his bosses, his ego, God etc., keep his flock sinless, and family together. Not how to 'shock and awe' Christians this week.'

Hire a religious "advisor" someone, anyone who's cracked a bible open to help all the priestly "inside baseball" scenes ring more true. (details count)

Start the show with sermon (think early Seinfeld) quoting a scripture, which he spends the entire show tying to fudge for his own petty ambitions. The more he tries the more his life humorously spirals out of control.

At the end of each show, have have him break the fourth wall with a 'Final Thought', as he gets the point of his own sermon.

Bitter-sweet Character Arch (over years); as Daniel slowly "gets it' and accepts the priestly life he's chosen and all its requirements. He'll divorce his wife, come to an impasse with his gay son, etc. but becomes more at peace with himself. (sam never got Diane or played baseball again)

Move the show to Tues. Leave it be, so people can find it and let it grow.

Fire the mutton-head who green lighted this mess! TODAY!!

**Discloser I'm part of the 'godless' creative class... and I'm a Christian.☻✒⚉

Hat tip to Dr. Albert Mohler's who's commentary inspired me to post this and from which I borrowed 'liberally'

C.C.

First Day of Many...

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Sat, 7 Jan 2006 21:53:00 -0800

Happy New Year, Mayor
Originally uploaded by "CAVE CANEM".

Jan 1
I pour myself out of the bed bright-n-early today somewhere around 3pm, head pounding, angry at the freaking world. I'm hating this year already as my fridge greets me empty and unyeldingly white.

More pissed I, drag my remains to the car... "orange juice, I must have orange juice". I arrive a few blurry minutes later at Parkies liquor Store (isn't this how I got in this condition anyway?). Just I step out of my car, I catch in the corner off my eye, a sticker that brightens by my world view.

...I laugh so hard when I see this sticker that it made my already throbbing head hurt more, I don't care. This is 'Simply Brillant'. For those of you that don't live in my 'Fair City', 'hizz honor' the mayor, 'Kwame' just won relection two months back, which in this town means life-long employment. And at the rate this city is losing talented, capable, citizens to the burbs (about 4000 familes a month) last election was the 'last best chance', we who love this city would have to remove this big ape for the next 20yrs.

Ape? Think I exaggerate? Chris Rock based his bafoonish political movie character off of this guy. His spin during any of his many scandles is laughable, and he put this city nearly 300 million in the red. (sigh) So it goes. You'll get to see our fearless leader during the next Super Bowl, he'll have his mug plastered all over the Tv next to rappers, video hoes and overpaid players, no doubt in some club using the city credit card. But for now, how can I best describe him lets see...? The man has the moral scruples of Harold washington, with the managment skills of Ray Nagin.

'nuff said'

This sticker told me I'm not alone in this fallen burg, today is a good day.

(yesterday was my birthday)
@ feel free to use this image on your blog

C.C.

My 2006 predictions

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 5 Jan 2006 01:06:00 -0800

It's 2006... Well here we go again. I've decided to try my hand at the prediction game this year. I've never had a format before to check my world veiw against reality and grade my self with. Hey everyone else is doing it this time of year why not me.

Foreign

China;
- Will continue to build its 'deep blue' navy, and its joint military exercises with the Russians
- Will begin to sink billions into the N. Korean infrastructure, renewing it's economy, in preparation for Chinas' post Olympic expansionist aggression.
- Will continue to intimidate and bribe the world community to disregard Taiwanese' sovereignty.
- Will sell billions in US debt to slow the US economy, (dry run for later)
- Will continue to develop Cuba, and Argentina into 'client states' by increasing cross training with 'military advisors'.

Iran;
- Will announce plans to test their nuclear weapons
a. The EU, will ring their hands in mock outrage, and continue to sell Iran the means to build them.
b. Israel will ring their hands, with real dread, but will not attack.
c. US will ring their hands, but will do nothing until after the Nov. Elections.
- Will step up the systematic slaughter of the 70% of the population that doesn't support the current government.

EU;
- The Euro will reach new heights increasing in value by 8 - 12% as Iran transitions from PetroDollars to PetroEuros. This move and the damage it will cause the U.S. economy will inspire other oil countries to follow suit (e.g. Argentina)
- The will continue to move away from cradle-to-crave befits for all
- The Birth rate for Europeans will continue to drop.
- Germany will begin to move away from anti-military restrictions in its constitution
- Islamic youth will rise become more violent in France. I predict a long hot summer!

Iraq;
- Will continue double digit economic growth and form a parliament with the Sunnis fully participating.
- Saddam will be sentenced to death and his popularity at the time will be higher than ever.
- Troop levels will be reduced to 32,000 and moved out of major cities.

Palestine;
- The elections will be a disaster of violence, and voter fraud, Hamas will win the majority of seats.
- They will immediately declare their desire to exterminate Israel.
- They will fail to provide trash pick up, free education for children, or any economic growth.

US Domestic

Bush;
- Popularity will hover more-or-less at 47 - 51%. The press now claim polls are unimportant.
- The press will blame everything from rainy days to the smell of farts is his fault. (ok, this is a gimmy no points)
- Cindy Sheehan will camp out at his Crawford Ranch surrounded by more press than followers.
- There will be no terrorist attack on America him to fight.
- There will be no 'bird flu' in America for him to fight.
- Will get one more Supreme Court pick.

Elections;
- Hillary Clinton will win in a landslide.
- Republicans. Will lose two governorships
- Republicans. Will lose 6 House seats and no margin of total Senate seats

N. Orleans;
- After a successful Mardi-Gras it will fall of the media radar.
- Ray Nagin will be rewarded with reelection for his stellar performance and leadership during hurricane Katrina (LMAO)
- The project cost for levies will double before a plan is drawn up.
- The levies wont begin to be rebuilt due to local infighting.
- The cities population will stabilize at 73% of pre Katrina levels
- The 'ninth ward' will be 'stolen' by city officials to give to casinos and big developers (thank you supreme court)

Republicans;
- Will continue to treat Senate Democrats as colleges as they continue to pull stunts and grandstand to make Republicans. Look like Fools.
- Will lose both House And Senate leaders to scandals.
- Will lose the (legal) redistricting fight in Texas.
- John McCain and Arlen Spencer will use the Alito Nomination to embarrass the Bush administration (which helped them get in office). He will be confirmed anyway.
- Will fail to renew the most effective parts of the Patriot act.(McCain will block)
- Will fail to use everyday red state folks as advocates (Counter Sheehans)
- Wont have the balls to make permenats the Bush tax cuts
- Will maintain their majority in both parts of congress

Democrats;
- Will take more of they're "talking points" directly from blogs like Daily Koz, and MoveOn.org
- Following the Jay Rockefeller 'memo plan' will push for Bush's impeachment. They will fail, with no help from the Republicans.
- They're election strategy is we're less corrupt than those other guys.
- Will continue to describe US armed forces as terrorist like thugs, broken, living hand to mouth, Nazi like, and lifes losers (See Kerry, Howard Dean, Dick Durbin, John Murtha, Nancy Peilosi.)
- Will continue to run away from their earlier votes for the war. (The story: Bush tricked us)
- Will splinter leaving at the party leadership only the most shrill, throwback-leftist at the head of party
- Will continue to deligitmize the war and those who fight it, while claiming to support the troops.

- Will think they have the juice to filibuster Aleto they will fail.

Economy;
- US growth will slow to between 2 and 3% growth after alt min tax kicks in, the Bush tax cut isn't renewed, and shift monetary policy around the world (see Iran)
- Apple stock will max out $89 before dropping to current levels.
- Dow Jones will reach new unrecorded heights 11,200+

US Mainstream Press
- Will continue to predict the inevitable 'Civil War in Iraq'. It wont happen.
- Will claim any gains by Dems.. as the "Death of the republican revolution"
in a heretofore unprecedented media orgasm.
- Times' man of the year will be Hillary Clinton.
- Will breathlessly claim Hillarys' victory means that the country is 'finally' ready for a Woman President.
- Cindy Sheehan 'summer camp' will be better produced (better graphics, slower theme song, bigger softball questions) She will be visited be by Hillary Clinton this year.
- Will ignore the medicines, real uses, and concrete advances of adult stem cell research, and continue to tout the 'glorious potential' of stem cell research from embryo destruction.

Entertainment;
- The 'Jon Stewart Oscars' will be the most political, Bush hating, and gay worshipping in history, and have the worst ratings ever.
- He will be invited back next year.
- Spielberg will win a second Oscar for, portraying Israeli heroes as more morally 'dirty' than the terrorist butchers they hunt, in his movie "Munich".
- Movie sales will improve, (slightly) only in contrast to the dismal sales of last year.
- Michael Jackson will file bankruptcy to keep 'Neverland'.

- The most promoted and critically acclaimed movies of the year will be... (easy no points)

a) Anti-military, (portrayed as malevolent or mind numb robots, think Stealth, Jarhead)
b) Anti Bush/America, (portrayed as evil/to big/too stupid to eat, think Fahrenheit 9/11)
c) Pro Gay, (sold as the next Brokeback Mountain)
d) Anti-Religious, (priest will be pedophiles, confused, or leaving his faith)

List Total Points: 100

This should be fun to see how this turns out at the end of the year, I have a feeling this is going to be wild ride.

C.C.

SNL - The Chronic of Narnia Rap

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 27 Dec 2005 08:50:00 -0800

Ok, time to lighten up, it's the end of the year...

For those last 10 hardcore 'Mac haters', that don't have a ipod or itunes yet, I give you, "The Chronic of Narnia Rap." Happy New Year. Enjoy, Good times.

My rating: ❶❷❸❹⑤

My 2WORD review... (sigh :) White People!

Quote of week #2

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 22:59:00 -0800

Week ending December 25, 2005

Harry Reid: Pride & Treason (VIDEO)

No need to wait till the end of the week, I knew I had it watching the Sunday morning gab shows. Sen. Harry Reid gave me the quote of the week while standing in front of a mob of proud democrats and smugly pronouncing...

"Think about what happened 20 minutes ago in the United States Senate. We killed the Patriot Act."

— Harry Reid (D - NV)

DOWNLOAD - .WMV/ DOWNLOAD - .MOV/ DOWNLOAD - .MP4

As I watched the full video clip, I almost retched, pay special attention to the smug expression of pride & statisfaction on his face as he declares the destruction of the The Patriot Act, which passed the Senate by a vote of 98-1 (yes, he voted for it) in the weeks following the September 11, 2001, attacks. The Patriot Act was created "to deter and punish terrorist acts in the United States and around the world, to enhance law enforcement investigatory tools." This bill help fix the "connect the dots problem" and tore down the "Jamie Gorelic wall" ( I'll explain that 'nightmare' in later blog) which prevented intelligence agencies from talking to each other,and continuined the deconstruction of US intelligence services that began with Church commission, in the 70's. The USA PATRIOT Act brought all that silliness to a end. Sadly all 16 provisions of the Patriot Act that were scheduled to expire at the end of this month, Its renewal would make 14 of these provisions permanent, it would reauthorize critical national security tools, while bolstering the Patriot Act's significant protections of civil liberties. It also includes provisions to fight crime and terrorism at America's seaports, and tougher criminal penalties and increased resources to combat the dangerous spread of meth-amphetamine abuse throughout our country. (bonus)

Here is a list of Senators who will be directly to blame for the next time (God forbid) America is attacked again, responsibility will rest squarely on their shoulders, I can't to hear them explain how they could strip away America’s ability to protect herself from terrorists and why they always stand up to protect the "rights" of terrorists over the rights of Americans.

Akaka (D-HI); Baucus (D-MT); Bayh (D-IN); Biden (D-DE); Bingaman (D-NM); Boxer (D-CA); Byrd (D-WV); Cantwell (D-WA); Carper (D-DE); Clinton (D-NY); Conrad (D-ND); Corzine (D-NJ); Craig (R-ID); Dayton (D-MN); Dorgan (D-ND); Durbin (D-IL); Feingold (D-WI); Feinstein (D-CA); Frist (R-TN)(tactical reasons); Hagel (R-NE); Harkin (D-IA); Inouye (D-HI); Jeffords (I-VT); Kennedy (D-MA); Kerry (D-MA); Kohl (D-WI); Landrieu (D-LA); Lautenberg (D-NJ); Leahy (D-VT); Levin (D-MI); Lieberman (D-CT); Lincoln (D-AR); Mikulski (D-MD); Murkowski (R-AK); Murray (D-WA); Nelson (D-FL); Obama (D-IL); Pryor (D-AR); Reed (D-RI); Reid (D-NV); Rockefeller (D-WV); Salazar (D-CO); Sarbanes (D-MD); Schumer (D-NY); Stabenow (D-MI); Sununu (R-NH); Wyden (D-OR).

Make special note of the four yellow-bellied Republicans turned their backs on America.

Hat tip to Political Teen still the best source for online political/cultural videos

Barber Kong

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Mon, 19 Dec 2005 23:32:00 -0800

Street Theater: This weekend I stopped by the barbershop to get cleaned up, a quick 'lop and chop' to get ready for the Christmas visiting. This shop like most others has a Tv in the corner, usually playing "the game", the news, or sometimes even running Madden 2005. As I settled in the chair I caught out the corner of my eye the preview for King Kong. I know, I know, Kong just came out last wednesday, and they'll probably run them every 10 minutes for the next two weeks, "so it goes." Shortly afterwards the barber began his grim work, and after a few minutes I saw it again, buzz, buzz, cut, cut more Kong. Then it hit me, "thats not a preview that's the damn movie..." (Good Grief) It just opened 4 days ago.

Allow me to recommend you go see, it looked pretty good... LMAO.

That's right 'Big Media', keep suing children, and adding Draconian DRM code, and root-kits that wont work with my next computer upgrade, that'll stop media copying dead in it's tracks. Riiiiight! Hey you moronsHere's a marketing strategy (no consultants ness.) make your content easier to download, easier to buy, easier to use, and more easily portable, than some street hustler. I don't know like iTunes maybe, you heard of it?

Quote of the week #1

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Sun, 18 Dec 2005 15:55:00 -0800

Week ending December 17, 2005

Iraqi Voter, Dearborn Michigan: "Go To Hell" (VIDEO)

“Anybody who doesn’t
appreciate what America
has done and President Bush,
let them go to hell”

– Iraqi Citizen, voter Betty Dawisha

DOWNLOAD - .WMV /DOWNLOAD - .MOV /DOWNLOAD - .MP4 (VIDEO IPOD)

You tell 'em sister

             - Race Bannon

If this woman is representative of most Iraqis (which I doubt), Iraq is headed down the same path the U.S. is on — ever increasing division, bitter partisanship and ineffectual government. That's indeed something to "cheer" about.

               Your typical, joyless, defeatest, 
               deviant, liberal blogger, 
               -The Subjective Scribe 
               (no hotlink find his ramblings yourself)

Hat tip to Political Teen still the best source for online political/cultural videos

Mr. One Thousand and One

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 03:35:00 -0800

Total time to 'completion of Justice'
36 min 15 sec... 12:35am

By the time you read this, Stanley Tookie Williams will be dead. Tookie the self confessed cofounder of the notorious international gang called the "CRIPS" will have been put to death buy the state of California. As I write this, there is as a tempest in teapot going on, over this piece of human debris. All the usual suspects will be holding court at San Quentin prison, Rev. Jackson, the Hollywood elite as well as 'fringe leftist' who will find a way to connect (blame) this execution to capitalism and, George W. Bush. All are in attendance, wailing, jostling for the next hot mic or live camera. This for someone, who's name they couldn't spell a few weeks ago, and will not be able to remember after the holiday season? They're bloviating, never missing an a chance to parot to anyone one who'll listen, what a rotten, barbaric country America is... (and the drumbeat goes on) They'll hit every talking point, making sure not to miss an a opportunity to play upon the conflicted feelings, any normal person should have over state sponsored ritualized killing.

My feelings over this event are conflicted but just barely? I should be totally honest it's because of who this man was. Remember this man didn't just choose to join a gang, he set up a self perpetuating machine (still in motion btw), to shepherd countless others into his "CRIP lifestyle," who will then victimize countless others in the future. Let's us reflect a little, I doubt that Hitler ever shoved a Jew into the showers himself, but he built the system that fed the ovens and deserved his fate in the end and so does Stanley. Tookie isn't just convicted of a killing, these were brutal, callous, murders.

As the execution hour approaches, let's keep the focus where it belongs.

THE NAMES OF THE VICTIMS:(and the crimes)

ALBERT OWENS

TSAI-SHAI YANG

YEN-I YANG

YE-CHEN LIN

Funny the older I get the more pro life I get. Yes I believe that I Terry Schiavo should still be alive, and that abortion is killing a child, if it isn't, then let's be honest, why do it? So, I have to ask myself... why am I not more upset over this 'completion of justice'? My answer; because I believe in evil and 'the evil that men do'. I know and that they live among us, just waiting to separate one of us from the herd. Men who take joy and pleasure in hunting others human beings, raping them, cutting off their arms and leaving them in a ditch. The recent sociopath short list? BTK, the Green River Killer, Scott Peterson, and Tookie Williams.

(sidebar) I went to the Timothy McVeigh execution In a effort to make short film a local woman said something that stuck with me when I asked her the 'what do you think question'.

"...When he, (Timmy) did what he did, took himself out of the 'American Family' He deserves to die..." This comment facinated me on many levels, but the idea that 'in doing these evil things' one is betraying ones 'family', intrigued me so that even today it adds a special intensity to all murders I hear about.

Nonetheless... this is the taking of human life, and if I may paraphrase a gagline from my pro-choice friends it should be "safe, legal and rare". In sharp contrast to others who are also way 'less disturbed' by capital punishment (than let's say the media), I'm not at all upset with the systems lengthy appeals process, I think if we choose this form a punishment it's best to be through. In the case of mister Williams it gave him 26 more years of life than he gave to his prey, and judging by the way 'he was living' at the time of his arrest, he's probably lived way longer in jail than he would have if he stayed on the street. I also believe all capital cases should require automatic DNA test, whether or not it was key to the case. The finale irony is, I'm proud that I live in a non-death penalty state, and yet... I don't object to states who choose differently. Again truth-be-told, I'm not so much sadden when these men are put to death, as relived. (To the right; 3 of Tookies the last four, victims).

Three things Tookie could have done to Show 'Redemption'
and save His Life

1) Admit to the killings - Give the family peace and closure. Hey, if he didn't do it why'd he need redemption? Forthermore if he didn't,, who did? He was the 'man' on the street he, would have heard who did a triple homicide.

2) Denounce the "CRIPS", very vocally as a violent, dead-end criminal organization.

3) Submit to "debriefing": In debriefing, a prisoner has to divulge everything he knows about the gang, and even agree to testify against other members. (and thus saving lives)

These simple acts of true redemption would have made it easy for me to at least write a letter on the side of saving his life maybe even sending money, but I found his crimes way to disturbing to do anything more than just on sit my hands and let the states machine grind him under.

In the end he never took these steps, (a few ghost written books don't get it done) so I'm incline of agree with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger about why not to grant to executive clemency... (See full trans. script below)

(Acrobat file)

C.C./RB

One Last Point; Why do you think the media didn't show the victims faces?

Stunts for Punks

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 1 Dec 2005 23:10:00 -0800

Feel the guilt, send a check...

Here we go again,when will the activist learn? Recently PeTA started yet another propaganda campaign, this time in a comic book style, and handed them out to your children at schools across America. Bottom line message: If your father fishes he will kill your cat or dog. Parents go berserk who, how, why, they'll ask? Talk shows, then will invite the very ernest, the very smug, and the very young PeTA representative to explain themselves, of course during the interview the PeTA rep. will avoid any direct or meaningful answers to questions about their despicable and fanatical tactics, as they proceed to shill their web sites, "1-800 numbers" and future protest rallies. Soon the fervor over their stunt dies down, and they will "rinse and repeat" this media strategy. This is all done in the name of "the just and right cause" of respecting all animal life, expanding conscienceness, and stopping any and all harm of "our furry friends." (the reality about that last part in the last next paragraph). Seriously Hats off, it's brilliant viral marketing, and they get national air time for free! They're a fringe group that now has the media footprint of a major movement all for the cost of a few hundred printed handouts.

But I wish to warn our friends at PeTA about the law of diminishing returns, that is to say they need to learn "the lessons of Reefer Madness." Everyone remembers that film right? It was a health and welfare type film made in the 1930's to warn wayward preppies of the dangers of drug use. It is still used today as a metaphor for anti-drug hysteria (not true it's just campy, and very bad story telling) Even today, after living through the druggy wasteland of the 70's, the crack epidemic of the 80's, and the very public decline (due to drug use) of most of the media's heros in the 90's, when someone dare try to suggest the idea that drugs may not be best way to spend your time what do you think is thrown out an rebuttal? After some very condescending head shakes and chuckles they say "isn't that what they told us in Reefer Madness" and then the "fill-in-the blank" Talk show runs a 5 sec clip of 30's flappers doing the charleston in a living room before (gasp) falling on a couch together. Over the top ok, funny for sure, good tv you bet, but that wasn't the point was it? Why is this film a joke? You see that film wasn't the way most people experienced marijuana therefore drug advocates or if you will the anti-drug detractors had a powerful weapon to use for decades to come to frame their enemies. Which is my point PeTA who do you think your converting with this stunt? Your group is already suffering from perception of being a "fellow traveler" whose ultimate goal is anti-property, anti-family, and hostile in general to American culture. How again does that help Animals? PeTA wouldn't it be more effective to dial it back a bit? I mean, every kid that sees their dad fish and not kill the family dog, every family building their first home only to find it burnt to the ground by you (or your tree hugging allies in Earth Alliance ), and every-time your tactics/claims/asertions are proven untrue through their experience you losing a future zealot not just today but for decades.

Finally lets all remember the only reason we listen to PeTA at all... misplaced GUILT! (probably over some cruel act done as a kid) Were told that these people morally superior to you or I. They set a high standard don't they, "never to eat, wear, experiment on, or use for entertainment any animal." No fur, no testing, heck PeTA doesn't even want us to keep them as pets. These people are the vanguard of compassion and ethical treatment of animals, right? (can you fill the guilt) Then again...you can understand how I was shocked, shocked I tell you, to find out that PeTA kills 79.6% of animals they received as rescues (people believe its a none kill shelter) over the last 6 and a half years. PeTA even got busted for illegally killing, and dumping the bodies in a North Carolina Piggly Wiggly. (now thats irony!) This wouldn't been so shocking if PeTA hadn't raked in nearly $29 million last year in income. I also learned that in 2000, when the Associated Press first noted PeTA's Kervorkian-esque tendencies, PeTA president Ingrid Newkirk complained that actually taking care of animals costs more than killing them. "We could become a no-kill shelter immediately," she admitted. I wonder where the money, went printing & shipping perhaps? Sigh, 29 million people, 29 million dollars aint that enough for puppy chow?

C.C.

Here it is one more time your 29 million at work (pitting kids against parents).

Thanksgiving HAIKU

noreply@blogger.com (Race Bannon) — Thu, 24 Nov 2005 16:40:00 -0800

time's up!
Originally uploaded by karins_pics.

Sixteen Pound Turkey,

Fall changes to Winter,

Gods' bounty, belt; tight!

-me

"CAVE CANEM"

Oh This is Too Rich!

Couldn't have said it better myself... :^)

iWood... iTALK . Apple Cell Phone Spec Commercial

An Open Letter to Jennifer's "Inner Femininst"

The Truth Behind the Power PC, Intel "Switch!"

Damn Life's Tuff II

Ira Glass? Are You kidding Me?

Jimi Hendrix on Nam!

The Art of the Non-Denial, Denial

Michigan bans "America"

Keep 'America' in Michigan schools

Damn Life's Tuff

'On the field' at SBLX

I’m in the Motherf*&king Superbowl !!!!

The Shame of it All

The Gorillaz: Live in Europe

The Funniest Tv Show of the Season...(unwittingly)

How to Move This Debacle from 3rd to 1st

First Day of Many...

My 2006 predictions

SNL - The Chronic of Narnia Rap

Quote of week #2

Barber Kong

Quote of the week #1

Mr. One Thousand and One

Three things Tookie could have done to Show 'Redemption' and save His Life

Stunts for Punks

Feel the guilt, send a check...

Thanksgiving HAIKU

Sixteen Pound Turkey,Fall changes to Winter,Gods' bounty, belt; tight!

Three things Tookie could have done to Show 'Redemption'
and save His Life

Sixteen Pound Turkey,

Fall changes to Winter,

Gods' bounty, belt; tight!