Jesus' General

Is Obama secretly Amish?

2008-07-24T00:01:00.002-04:00

Pamela
Atlas Shrugs

Dear Mrs. Shrugs,

Your Sunday post was an excellent example of what patrio-blogging is all about. With nothing more than a few graphics and a lot of very technical-sounding jargon, you and techdude persuaded a lot of people that Barak Obama forged his own birth certificate. That's impressive.

But why stop there? Shouldn't we take the next step and use the same technique to create a reason why Obama would fake such a document?

I certainly think so. That's why I'm submitting the following highly technical evidence suggesting that Barak Obama is actually an Amish man named Erik Gruber.

Before we begin, let's take a look at actual photographs of both Obama and Erik Gruber's twin brother, Henry.

Notice how amazingly similar they appear. Other than a few minor differences in skin coloring, hair texture, eye color, and body fat, they are spitting images of each other.

Now let's examine the photos using a number of fairly basic forensic techniques. We'll start by applying the McMahon-McMillan Inverted Refractory Process.

Notice the cyantic response of the temporal, nasal, and lip areas. The refractive similarity is striking.

We get a similar result when we apply the Whitfield Thermal Reciprocity Sampling Technique.

Notice how the lichtgroen region is concentrated cranially with sporadic expression in the upper anterior pectoral quadrants.

Now, lets see what happens when we examine the photos employing Padminal Forensics Analysis (Post-Regression).

This is significant. The mouth and eye in the Obama photos are exactly 3.14 times larger than those in the Gruber photo. Pi equals 3.14... Pi was a very significant number to the ancient Sumerians and Egyptians and is often associated with the "Dog Star" or Sirius in Sumerian and Babylonian astronomy. Sirius radio is also where I heard an old Art Bell interview in which a Montana rancher named Douglass Hornbeck described finding the symbol for pi branded on his cattle after seeing a Sasquatch flying a black helicopter near his ranch.*

That is as far as I've progressed on my research so far. It gives us a good start. I hope you'll consider posting it.

Heterosexually yours in a biblical, chaste, and certainly non-John-Bolton kind of way,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

*I'm not sure what to make of that interview--Hornbeck does not mention finding any used condoms or seeing any gray-type or reptilian aliens in his account. But I think it might have some bearing on the Obama/Gurber study, so I mention it here.

A helmet tip to Stinkeye

At a dead end called 3:48 AM

2008-07-23T06:47:00.002-04:00

I'm in a hotel room somewhere south of Tacoma. This was not my destination.

Things started out well enough. After work, I loaded up the car and hit the freeway to Seattle to see my daughter's significant other's daughter at the hospital and to catch an Ms game.

We pulled into Children's Hospital about 8:30 pm, and it being after hours the security person demanded that we undergo special security measures before seeing the kid. I was a bit punchy after the 3 hour drive so I told him my name was Ernie Pooks Comiks. He dutifully recorded it on my name tag and passed me through security.

The little girl was doing fine considering she had undergone her second surgery in a week only hours earlier. She was up and about like it was just another day. We sat, chatted, and ate ice cream for about an hour then headed over to the Ronald McDonald house to drop off some clothes and food for my daughter and her guy. Another hour there and then we were off to find our hotel, stopping off for the finest cuisine Dennys has to offer aong the way.

We had booked a room in Seatac the night before. I don't particularly like SeaTac. It's about as ugly a place as I've seen in Washington (and hey, I've been to Asotin), but Expedia had told me that the SeaTac La Quinta had the only available room within a 50 mile radius of Seattle when I booked it through them.

We arrived at about 11 and were immediately told there was a mixup and our room had been rented. The desk clerk helpfully gave us Expedia's number. I called it and got a recording that there was special information that would be text messaged to me if I hit the pound key. I did, and immediately received a text message saying I would receive the special information if I agreed to be charged $9.99. I declined.

I returned to the desk and, after a 20 minute discussion about whether the number they originally given me was wrong or not, I persuaded them to trade a 7 for a 1 at a certain point in the dialing sequence and I was back in business.

I called Expedia. They expressed their apologies and put me on hold while they searched for another room. twenty-seven minutes later, I was disconnected.

I called again. They put my on hold again--for 68 minutes, yes, 1 hour and 8 minutes, before telling me they couldn't find a room but would gladly refund my money. I replied that refunding my money was hardly compensation for a 3 hour trip back home, a 3 hour trip back to Seattle for the game, and another three hour trip home again. I suggested that they pay my gas (about $100) and compensate me for the baseball tickets I'd never use (another $120) because I couldn't afford to drive back. They gave me a coupon worth $100 .

By then, the LaQuinta desk clerk had left from home (presumably the 1 for 7 trade had exhausted her) and a real human had taken her place. She took pity on us and found us and found us a welcome shithole somewhere south of Tacoma.

I tried to write a post, but dammit I'm too tired (and I guess I just wrote one anyway). So that's my excuse.

Please write something in the comments.

And when traveling, please remember:

La Quinta is mostly staffed by imbeciles
Expedia has no soul
Shitholes south of Tacoma are sometimes actually a kind of paradise.

I love the scent of gasoline in the morning

2008-07-22T00:06:00.002-04:00

I admit it. I'm not very happy about Sen. McCain posting on my blog. I think it hurts his campaign. I sent him an email about it. He responded by by sending me Joe Lieberman's pinkie finger. I think I'll just let him blogs when he wants.

Thanks again, General, for allowing me to use your electrical pamphlet typing machine. It's the best thing since the mimeograph. That's not to say that there was anything wrong with mimeograph machines. I miss the high octane scent of the mineral spirits they used. You don't get that with an electrical pamphlet typing machine. I have to wrap a gasoline-soaked bandanna around my face to get the same sensation now. But it works, so it's all good.

Anyway, I want to talk about a very sensitive subject, s...uh...se...mmm...uh you know, like that thing Cindy and I use to do back when I was married to my first wife, the one I left after she couldn't walk anymore. You know what I mean. It's when you shoot your sidewinder into an afterburner. Right? Are you understanding me?

That's something I don't think reporters should ask me about. I don't like even getting near it.

It's like the other day, when a reporter asked me if I thought it was fair that insurance companies pay for Viagra and not contraceptives. Why in the sam hell would she ask me a question like that? What does it have to do with governing?

There was no way I was going to answer her, so I said, "I certainly don't want to discuss that issue."

But then I caught onto her game. She wanted to know if I needed a little chemical help in that area --the contraceptive part was just a ruse to throw me off. So I said, "I don't know enough about it to give you an informed answer."

Ha ha. Nailed the bastard good, didn't I.

What? What's that, Lieberman? Some people think insurance companies should pay for contraception? They think it's as least as important as Viagra? Jesus H. Christ you're about the stupidest ass-kissing toady a shot at the VP slot could buy and that's saying a lot--look at Crist.

Do you really think people believe that crap?

Well, that's why transcribing my words onto the electrical pamphlet typing machine is the only job I allow you to do--that and demanding the elimination of the world's 1 billion Muslims. You're too god damned stupid to do anything else. What? Yeah, you're doing the crotchal hygiene maintenance thing as well, but you were already dong that for Cheney, so it's a given.

How's that nine-fingered typing thing working out for you? Would eight fingers be better? I thought so.

Now, finish this, apologize to the General's readers, and lets get back to the to the plane so we can resoak my bandanna and get a little hygiene maintenance in.

What? Yes, God dammit everything I said, even that last part.

[I'm very sorry. Joe]

freaking fafnir

2008-07-21T20:59:00.002-04:00

Bastards are back.

The power of the panties compels you

2008-07-21T00:02:00.001-04:00

I know Burma is just about as evil as Venezuela and Massachusetts, but I am very concerned about this approach to making change there:

The Panties for Peace campaign was launched by the women’s organization Lanna Action for Burma (LAB) on Oct. 16, 2007, in the hopes of bringing an end to the military regime’s rampant abuse of Burma’s population – and the abuse of Burma’s women in particular.

[...]

The Panties for Peace campaign plays on the regime leaders’ superstitious fear that contact with a woman’s underpants will rob them of their power. Women around the world are asked to post their panties to local Burmese embassies in a bid to strip the regime of its power and bring an end to its gross violations of human rights, especially those committed against Burma’s women.

What if the same tactics were used here? We all know how effective panties can be. They were an important part of our enhanced interrogation approach at Abu Ghraib. Do we want that kind of power turned against us?

At the very least, a panties attack could destroy our electoral chances in November--remember how sweaters sapped Our Presumed Leader's masculine vitality; imagine what a nice tiger striped thong would do to him. He might as well start singing show tunes now.

Some might say, "it can't happen here," but I'm here to warn you that it can. A fifth column of pantie warriors has arisen in the netroots. There is no-telling what damage they can do if we don't stop them now. That's why I am asking you to contact your congressman and demand legislation outlawing all feminine undergarments other than pantaloons--pantaloons are OK because a man can wear them too (yes, there is nothing wrong with that, dammit)--and, in order to get Sen. Vitter's backing, diapers as well.

Breathing in Dutch

2008-07-21T00:01:00.002-04:00

This is a friend's daughter. Be good.

This Satire Intentionally Left Understated

2008-07-20T07:30:00.001-04:00

_{Image © Austin Cline
Click for full-sized Image}

Comedy is serious business. There are many reasons why, not the least of which is the fact that when you fail, the results are far worse than when you are insufficiently dramatic. Failed comedy is painful at best and can often be offensive because good comedy typically nudges at the boundaries of what people typically find acceptable or appropriate. This is why the debate over the New Yorker cover isn't just a tempest in a tea pot, but rather touches upon a lot of serious issues which do deserve some consideration. Given what I do here, I could hardly let it pass by without comment, could I?

A lot of different people have weighed in on this, but I find the ideas from Tom-Tom to be the best: Tom Tomorrow and Tom the Dancing Bug (Dan Perkins and Ruben Bolling, respectively, but Dan-Ruben doesn't sound nearly so catchy, does it?). They disagree with each other, yet I think that both of their positions are worth reading.

Tom Tomorrow argues that satire necessarily leaves a lot unsaid and to demand that satirical art or cartoons make everything explicit is just absurd. He's right — any sort of satirical piece does not and cannot keep drawing attention to what the ultimate target of the satire is or the fact that it is satire. Good satire always forces you to fill in some of the blanks yourself and lets you make the connections between the satire's target and the stupidity that's being highlighted.

All in all, though, Tom Tomorrow's argument isn't quite compelling. Part of the problem is that he uses his own work as an example of satire that leaves things unsaid, showing how silly it would get if he spelled everything out. His work, though, always says a lot more than the New Yorker cover. Tom Tomorrow is able to include a great deal of text and several panels of art. Even his simplest weekly cartoon can provide more information about his intent that the New Yorker cover, and that's where a major problem lies.

Tom the Dancing Bug lays this problem bare by asking the simple question: how are you supposed to discern the satirical intent of the cover? He never mistook it for having racist or negative intent, but only because he's familiar with the artist and of course with the liberal orientation of the magazine. The exact same cover could have appeared in a radically different magazine and interpreted in a completely different manner. And there's the rub: if the intended audience has to know so much about the artist/author and context in order to figure out that it's satire rather than serious, then the creator has not succeeded.

The New Yorker cover fails as good satire because there's nothing in the art itself that sends the message "I'm ridiculing the people who believe this stuff." Everything was a faithful representation of what real people really believe, a fact which Tom Toles made a point of in his cartoon about the issue. Go ahead and look at his cartoon — is it funny? The joke only works insofar as the New Yorker cover fails. Perhaps the addition of a couple of trully over-the-top elements would have helped — something like Rush Limbaugh's head mounted on the wall — but some of the anti-Obama people are so deranged that I'm not sure anything would be extreme enough to be truly "over the top."

Satire takes human follies or vices and holds them up to ridicule - usually through the use of irony, parody, lampooning, etc. Good satire is often true enough to what its lampooning to require the audience to think for a moment about whether the material is genuine or not. The less true you are to the original, the more likely you may only be ridiculing a straw man; the closer you are to the original, the more biting and effective your ridicule can be.

You cannot mimic the real thing exactly, though, because then your attempted denunciation of folly will only serve to promote it as well. You need to be "over the top" just enough for the audience to realize that however true the material sounds, it's not genuine and is instead ridiculing the genuine article. The biggest exception to this may be satire that ridicules a position not so much (or not just) through lampooning it, but also by drawing true believers into supporting a more extreme version of their own ideas in order to show just where that position leads.

I've been assuming throughout that the New Yorker cover was created with only the best and most innocent of intentions, but it has to be made clear that this assumption is not completely unassailable. The purpose of satire is to hold up some vice, folly, or idea to ridicule. If you are going to satirize racist ideas, you had better succeed in actually holding them up to ridicule. If you don't, then you are just presenting those same racist ideas in a more ironic or "hip" manner — and the effect of that is just to give racism a new outlet or form of expression. Failed satire is merely unfunny; failed satire of racism is both unfunny and denigrating — and if that happens, we have to ask about what those responsible really, truly, and honestly think.

AJ Plaid (whose blog I'm adding to my RSS reader) makes a case for racism not just being part of the effect, but also the production of the New Yorker cover:

The publication, in trying to show off its renown urbanity, showed themselves far more closely aligned to some of those “hardworking [read: non-hip, non-New Yorker reading] white folks” who may hold these beliefs that the Obamas aren’t true Americans, who will use the White House to carry out the collective and international revenge for people of color against white people, as the high afro-wearing Black militants (think 6os era Black Panthers) and non-Western garbed folks seem to signify in the popular consciousness.

The editorial staffers also must not have heard the ad nauseum arguments of their fellow media workers employing racist and sexist stereotypes of presenting the Obamas as “angry”—especially presenting Michelle as an “angry, vengeful Black woman,” as the cover more subtly conveys with the framed picture of Osama bin Laden over the fireplace, which has a burning flag in it. In other words, the New Yorker cover isn’t hip at all; it’s the antithesis—damn tired.

I touch on gender issues more than racial ones, but in neither case do I create relatively unadorned presentations of racist or sexist assumptions, beliefs, or stereotypes in a way that assumes that merely being "ironic" is sufficient. In every case, I try to include something in the image (never mind the accompanying text) designed to let the audience in on the "joke" — that while it may at first appear to be propaganda for white supremacism or male supremacism, I'm actually attacking those ideologies. Remember: satire is a form of humor, and if you have to keep explaining the joke to people, it's not funny anymore. If I have to keep explaining to people what my real intent is in my images, then I'm not actually being funny. Insofar as the New Yorker has had to keep explaining what their intent was, they failed in making good satire.

Sometimes I think I've been successful, as when I'm using Nazi propaganda posters and German fraktur fonts. The flap over the New Yorker cover forces me to stop and think a bit more about my work, though. Maybe I haven't always been successful. To what extent have my own pieces succeeded in lampooning the ridiculous and to what extent have they failed because they could work equally well as propaganda on behalf of the ridiculous? (We can pretend that those which are simply bad don't exist, OK?) I've always tried to be "over the top" in some fashion, but I've also tried to avoid hitting people over the head with the message.

On reflection, I'm concerned that I have failed too often. Merely using fraktur-style fonts may not quite enough to convey the criticism and ridicule. I'm also not sure about depicting a guy in a Klan hood overseeing an election. I know that I'm not trying to present any of that in a positive light, and fortunately no readers here have taken them that way — or at least no one who wanted to comment. What if someone saw the image without the accompanying sermon, though? What would they think?

I've benefited from being able to include text in the images and, in the worst cases, at least there is the accompanying sermons. It may be unreasonable to expect people to know you and your publication in order to know that you're being satirical, but it's not quite so unreasonable to take into account accompanying text when interpreting an image (by the same token, the New Yorker image might have done better if it had appeared inside, next to an article about all the silly beliefs people have). At the very least, though, the image is the first thing people see so perhaps I need to be more conscious of the possibility that people will form incorrect conclusions before they read the text.

Department of Book Reports: Books We're Looking Forward to Reading

2008-07-19T14:00:00.004-04:00

Seattle Tammy and I are still getting settled into the new digs and I haven't really had much chance to read anything other than the blogs and the newspapers the past few weeks. But I am making a list of new books of recently published and soon to be published books that I will get around to reading.

First, Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine:The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (Picador $16.00) is now in paperback. It tells the tale of how, under the influence of Milton Friedman, modern capitalism is transforming itself by exploiting natural catastrophe and war for more profit! There was a good discussion of the book earlier this week at Crooks and Liars.

Also recently released is a collection of Barbara Ehrenreich's essays This Land is Their Land (Metropolitan Books $24) The "Their" here would be referring to rich. She is the author of many previous books, including Nickel and Dimed (Henry Holt $14.00), her account of living a year on low-waged jobs.

Thomas Frank, author of What's the Matter with Kansas (Holt $16.00), has new book due out on August 5th, The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule (Metropolitan $25.00). Sounds delightful!

I was surprised to learn that Michael Moore's Mike's Election Guide (Grand Central $13.99) is his first in five years. Has it been that long? This book will hit the stores on August 6th.

Two novels I am anxious to read are Paul Auster's Man in the Dark (Holt $23.00) and Dennis Lehane's The Given Day (Morrow $27.95). Both ST and I loved Auster's The Brooklyn Follies (Picador $14.00) from a couple of years back. The new book will be published on August 19th and seems to center on an aging man who is recuperating at his daughter's Vermont home. Unable to sleep, he tells himself stories and dredges up memories that he would rather forget. Lehane, author of the novel Mystic River (HarperTorch $7.99) on which Clint Eastwood directed the brilliant movie, has returned to Boston with a family saga that recounts the years from the U.S. involvement in World War One to the early 20's. Lehane is a fine writer and one I highly recommend. The new book is due out on September 23rd. And in searching teh googles, I see that director Sam Raimi has already optioned the book, and is developing a screenplay.

All these books are, or will be, available at your favorite independent bookstore.

What are you reading this week?

Jessica's Makeover

2008-07-18T03:27:00.001-04:00

Dean, Clark to speak in Second Life tonight

2008-07-17T17:55:00.004-04:00

Netroots Nation is now underway in Second Life and it's shaping up to be an incredible event. You want to be there, especially this evening when Howard Dean and Wes Clark speak. These guys are the most visible leaders of democratic wing of the Democratic Party. What they say is important.

Dean and Clark are on at 5:30 Pacific Time (8:30 Eastern).

Afterwards, Daily Kos' McJoan, Eschaton's Jay Acroyd, the ubiquitous Cliff Shecter, and I will hold a panel discussion on the points made by Dean and Clark.

I wouldn't be surprised if we fill Netroots Nation Island tonight, so we're opening a number of overflow areas to handle the crowds. One of them is my political site, Wellstone's Donkey (If you're angry because I haven't responded to your emails, that'd be a great place to catch me during the Dean and Clark speeches.)

Once you sign up for Second Life (it, like NN-SL, is free) click on one of the links below to hear the speeches and discussion.

Netroots Nation Island

Overflow sites:
Wellstone's Donkey
InWorld Studios Amphitheater
Commonwealth Island 1
Commonwealth Island 2
Commonwealth Island 3
Commonwealth Island 4

Complete Schedule

NN-SL Website

An event that is not on the schedule and not affiliated with Netroots Nation:

John and Cindy McCain will be "reaching out to the youngsters" at an event called "Soul Train with John McCain" on Friday at 4pm Pacific. It will be held at the McCain booth on Netroots Nation Island (that's near the welcome center).

A Picasso of pigmentation

2008-07-17T00:10:00.005-04:00

Bob Ross
Youth Director
Windsor Hills Baptist Church

Dear Dr. Ross,

I've tried to resist writing you, but strange and intense feelings are gathering energy somewhere deep inside me. I fear that I'll explode in a embarrassing display of emotion if i don't find relief by blurting out the words that have been haunting my mind since I first saw your picture.

Your tan is outstanding. It is easily an 11 on the George Hamilton scale of traditionally-approved skin hues. I am in awe of your tanning skills. You're truly an artist in the medium of melanin, a veritable Picasso of pigmentation.

And then there is your hair. So full, so high, so white. It rises from your head like Mt McKinley; its snowy reaches brushing against heaven's floor, reflecting light as if polished by angels. It is absolutely stunning.

You are, indeed, a very handsome man.

For most youth pastors, that, and a command of the hip language of our youth, would be enough. But you bring so much more. You bring a special knowledge of what teens desire most of all.

It's that insight that inspired you to offer the prize of an assault rifle as an incentive to attract teens to your Summer youth conference.

It's a brilliant idea. Teens live in a very restrictive social milieu. They are confined within strict pecking orders that serve as incubators for feelings of powerlessness and rage. They crave escape; they crave the power to move to the top of their social hierarchy; they crave empowerment. And nothing is more empowering than weight of an AR-15 in one's hands. It's the ultimate equalizer. It provides one with the power to take a life or grant mercy. What teen wouldn't want that?

And that's why i admire you so much. You're the full deal, brilliance in an attractive, yet manly, package.

I want to be your friend. I want to watch gladiator movies with you. I want to wrestle you in the manner of our ancient Spartan warrior forebears, naked and oiled, like the true men we are.

What do you say?

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

Update: Thank you Raskalnikov.

Doug Sutherland, a "hands-on" Lands Comissioner

2008-07-16T01:37:00.004-04:00

Doug Sutherland
Commissioner of Public Lands
State of Washington

Dear Commissioner Sutherland,

I imagine this isn't a very good time for you. You're probably catching a lot of hell from all those timber and mining interests who've staked so much on your reelection. They can't be too happy with the news that you may have blown everything simply because you could resist copping a few feels in the middle of a couple of staff meetings.

Well, I don't think an inability to check one's libido is necessarily a fatal thing for a candidate. It's sure doesn't seem to be a problem for Sen. David Vitter. All you need to do is turn the whole affair into a selling point for your candidacy. I'm enclosing a few ideas in the form of print ads to help you do that.

Heterosexually yours,

Gen. JC Christian, patriot

About Email

2008-07-15T20:49:00.002-04:00

In the last week, two readers I respect have sent me angry emails lambasting me for never responding to their notes. I don't like to receive such missives. They create a lot of stress, and I'm pretty much at my maximum as it is. So please read the following and try to understand.

I get 300-400 emails a day. Most of them are from mail lists I'm on in order to stay in touch with what's going on politically and in the blog world. It's very hard to manage that much mail. I do so by frequently scanning my various accounts through out the day. If I see something I to which I feel I must respond, I do so immediately if I'm not jammed with work. If I can't respond then, I make a mental note to do so later and, more often than not, I lose the email or forget about it.

During the day, I scan my accounts using my cellphone. I can't respond if the message is sent to one of my charter addresses, because their servers will not accept mail from my phone -- it's one of their anti-spam measures. So I make a mental note to respond when I get home and, again, more often than not, I lose the email or forget about it.

Additionally, between work, family, blogging, research, and the satire, parody, and community building I'm doing in Second Life (come and attend Netroots Nation there this week), I don't have a lot of time to respond to email, not even that sent by real-life friends like Seattle Dan and Tammy (thank God they understand).

I enjoy receiving your email--especially the tips and reader feedback, so please keep sending it. But please don't be disappointed if I don't respond. Most of the time, I simply can't.

I'm basically doing the best I can, and although that is often not good enough, it's the best I can do. Please try to understand that.

Minister's Kids Love the Dead

2008-07-15T00:48:00.003-04:00

Once again, the black-robed fascists of our activist judiciary have handed down a decision that deepens the sad, sorry plight of the white, Christian male. In Wisconsin v. Grunke, the state supreme court emasculated the men of Wisconsin by denying them the right to have intimate relations with a corpse.

The case sprang from an incident in which "three men, carrying shovels, a crowbar and a box of condoms, went to a cemetery in southwestern Wisconsin" in order to dig up a date who might be more amenable to the idea of "gettin' lucky" than the living young women they knew in their daily lives.

The Court based it's decision on the concept of "consent," arguing that the deceased are not capable of saying, "yes." It's the kind of argument that passes muster in places like Wisconsin, and that's a shame. If these young men from good Christian stock* had attempted this somewhere deeper in the Heartland, the issues of the corpse's provocative dress and failure to say "no" may have come into play.

*My inner Frenchman won't allow me to post a link out of respect for the deceased's family. But, apparently, two of the young men are the sons of a Methodist minister.

Fifty Percent of White Supremacists Give Barack Obama a Half-assed Endorsement

2008-07-14T21:05:00.006-04:00

It could happen.

++++

The greatest of sins

2008-07-14T02:36:00.007-04:00

The Confederate Yankee on PZ Myers' comments about abusing a cracker:

A university employee—an associate biology professor, if that matters— has gone out of his way to publicly pronounce his intention to desecrate a core religious symbol of a well-established religion, and promises to post pictures of that desecration to a personal web site.

[...]

My own response to Mr. Myers would be that while he does have the freedom of speech, he is not free from responsibility for his speech. He has the right to say what he wants (with all the usual caveats), but others also have the right to express their opinions in response, including calling for his firing.

The Confederate Yankee on torture:

[Nothing]

Elsewhere: Miss Poppy (quoting Norman Cohn) reminds us how the Church did it in the old days:

Between the years of 1243 and 1761 thousands of Jews were tortured and executed for the crime of host desecration. Most were burned, many were mutilated. In 1370 almost every Belgian Jew was massacred, man, woman and child, for the crime of host nailing.

Hey, it's all we got

2008-07-14T02:14:00.003-04:00

Face it. We have John freaking McCain at the top of the ticket. That's not a lot to work with, but at least we have the establishment on our side.

Big Brother Obama: Defending Liberty by Ending Liberty

2008-07-13T07:30:00.001-04:00

_{Image © Austin Cline
Click for full-sized Image}

So, Barack Obama hasn't even received a single vote for president yet and he's already adopted both Bushian rhetoric and Bushian attitudes towards an imperial presidency. Obama made all the right noises in the past about how it was wrong and unconstitutional for the government to monitor citizens without warrants or accountability, but now he has come out four-square in favor of just such power being invested in the presidency.

Some people try to portray this new FISA bill as a "compromise," but when one side gets everything they want while the American people lose all protections and constitutionally-guaranteed rights, the notion of "compromise" has lost all meaning. This is probably appropriate, because an Orwellian society of unchecked surveillance deserves an Orwellian vocabulary to describe it. It's hard not to suspect that Barack Obama's dramatic change in tone over the past months has at least something to do with the fact that today he stands on the brink of becoming Big Brother himself. Why, though, should we trust him and his administration with unchecked, unaccountable power any more than we should trust Bush and his cronies with such power?

The telecoms wouldn't have wanted immunity unless they knew they had broken the law, so we can be confident that laws were broken. What laws? Well, laws protecting Americans' privacy, so we can be confident that many people's privacy and conversations were illegally monitored on government orders. We can also be certain that the telecoms wouldn't have suffered any legal problems for refusing because some companies did protect their customers' privacy; those which complied with "orders" did so, however, because it was profitable to do so. They put corporate profit over our privacy, just as government actors put government power over the Constitution.

Unfortunately, we may never know who was harmed or how many people were harmed because the government which ordered this illegal activity and the corporations which were all-too-eager to "just follow orders" have conspired to cover it up — and by "government" I'm including Democrats like Barack Obama. Republicans were unable to pass a bill like this when they controlled the Senate; only under Democratic control was it possible for the Bush administration's illegal behavior to acquire the cover it needed.

As bad as all this is, it gets worse: Barack Obama has also essentially endorsed the idea that when the government asks corporations to do things which might break the law, those corporations have no obligation to determine whether the demands are legal and should be immunized from any eventual illegal behavior. He may have voted to remove it from the final bill, but when he voted for a bill hat contained this provision, he voted to support it. There have been plenty of complaints about the FISA immunity being handed to telecommunications corporations, but has anyone stopped to ask what it is about that immunity which should, in principle, be limited to just corporations?

In principle, the immunity which was handed to corporations could be handed to individuals. So if you think it was appropriate and reasonable to say that corporations shouldn't be held responsible for illegal behavior so long as the president tells them that behavior is OK, then there is no reason to refuse the same privilege to individuals. In effect, then, the FISA immunity provision legitimizes and enshrines "I was only following orders" not merely as a defense, but as a positive principle of action. So who will be next to receive such immunity in a "compromise"? How about those behind Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay?

This bill also enshrines the principle that the president somehow has the power and authority to give citizens or corporations "orders" at all — legal or illegal. When and how did Americans get duped into believing that any president or any administration official can "order" them to do anything? To be blunt, anyone who accepts the principle that the president has the authority to issue orders to citizens has necessarily rejected some of the most basic principles upon which America was founded. The president, whether he is George W. Bush or Barack Obama, isn't out "leader," our "commander in chief," or anything similar. He's an elected official with narrowly defined powers who can and should be yanked out of office when they try to overstep those boundaries.

If Barack Obama's support for warrantless domestic spying and immunization of illegal behavior weren't bad enough, large numbers of his supporters have been actively engaged in defending him and attacking his critics. Obama's detractors have frequently raised concerns about "cult of personality" surrounding him and if there were any evidence for this, it is being eagerly provided by those who are adopting the attitude that Obama can do no wrong — he was right when he opposed warrantless spying and immunity and he's right now that he supports it, so shut up and stop being critical of him. We've seen the same attitude in die-hard Bush supporters and it's no less ugly and dangerous when coming from the left.

Department of Book Reports: Smells Like Dead Elephants

2008-07-12T12:16:00.002-04:00

A few weeks back, when I asked "What are you reading?" Pissed Off Patricia mentioned Smells Like Dead Elephants: Dispatches from a Rotting Empire, by Matt Taibbi (Grove Atlantic, $14.00). There was an ARC at the house we were staying at so I borrowed it.

Since it was a publisher's Advance copy, there wasn't finished art or cover copy, other than the Washington Post saying "A political reporter with the gonzo spirit that made Hunter S Thompson and P. J. O'Rourke so much fun." As I started reading, I thought this guy must be writing for Rolling Stone, no one else would print this stuff! And indeed, the essays start when he got an editorial job at Rolling Stone.

Taibbi spends time with Bernie Sanders, watching him try to address the House Rules Committee and present 4 amendments, all of which have bi-partisan support. As he describes the lobbyist leprechaun rules that govern DC, it becomes a mirror fun house, all bent on not really doing anything.

"It's funny," Sanders says. "When I first came to Congress, I'd been mayor of Burlington, Vermont - a professional politician. And I didn't know any of this. I assumed that if you get majorities in both houses, you win. I figured it's democracy, right?"

Well, that's what they call it, anyway.

Taibbi attempts to see Cindy Sheehan during the first sit in near Crawford, trying to get past her oh so protective handlers. In Oct 05, he goes to New Orleans with Sean Penn, whose star power is often the only thing that gets them past the barricades for his article Apocalypse There. Later in the book, How To Steal a Coastline from April 06 will show what a massive land grab reconstruction has been. Taibbi is truly humbled by these experiences.

Fort Apache Iraq, Darwinian Warfare, or the Worst Congress Ever, it's really hard to pick my favorite essay. They will all enrage you. This volume tempts me to subscribe to Rolling Stone again, after some 24 years. But I will keep Matt Taibbi's name handy for googling.

This really is a great recommend, thanks so much P.O.P.!

Smells Like Dead Elephants originally came out in Oct 07, so you may have to have your Fine Independent Bookstore order it for you. Or ask your favorite librarian.

So, what are you reading this week?

Latinos [and Allies] Want Specifics, Not Soundbytes

2008-07-11T21:37:00.005-04:00

MMMM! DO YOU SMELL WHAT NEZUA'S COOKIN'? It's the flava of the voting week, and that flava is currently simmering and spiceh!!! It may fade in a few, but for now, that flavor is Obama and McCain's Concern for Latin@ Issues. It also means that the "Left Blogosphere" or the "Liberal Blogosphere" is alight with talk of Immigration! Of course too much of this talk is related to electoral possibilities bereft of a moral context, and on the part of the candidates is frankly quite vague or rearrangeable from moment to moment.

WASHINGTON -- In a new ad targeted at the battleground states of the West, John McCain presents himself as a champion of Latino immigrants, making particular effort to highlight his differences with other members of his party on the issue.

It is a message that threatens to disrupt the delicate balance McCain had sought on the issue by simultaneously defending of the contributions of illegal immigrants to American life while demanding secure borders to prevent the arrival of new ones.

"So let's from time to time remember that these are God's children. They must come into the country legally, but they have enriched our culture and our nation as every generation of immigrants before them," McCain says in a clip from a Republican-primary debate in June 2007 in which he celebrated the sacrifice of Latinos, including those not yet citizens, to the US military.

—McCain goes west with pro-immigration ad

It's rather moving, eh? Especially given how lately he has been pushing the security-laser-fence-raid-detainment-punishment aspect of the issue. But you know. "Maverix" are people who say, quite honestly and from the belly, whatever they think will increase their popularity.

And we know Obama cares, right?

The American people are a welcoming and generous people. But those who enter our country illegally, and those who employ them, disrespect the rule of law. And because we live in an age where terrorists are challenging our borders, we simply cannot allow people to pour into the United States undetected, undocumented, and unchecked. Americans are right to demand better border security and better enforcement of the immigration laws.

—Floor Statement of Senator Barack Obama on Immigration Reform

Oh wait, wrong quote! Sorry. Here we go.

The time to fix our broken immigration system is now. It is critical that as we embark on this enormous venture to update our immigration system, it is fully reflective of the powerful tradition of immigration in this country and fully reflective of our values and ideals.”

—[Obama Statement in U.S. Senate, 5/23/07] (PDF)

Good.

This is why The Sanctuary has created a survey of very specific questions through which the candidates (and we don't mean just Democrats and Republicans) can flesh out just what these very noble phrases mean in the context of some issues that are pressing, not only to Latin@s, but to those concerned with Human Rights.

Here's a sample:

8. Would you support the addition of funding for stricter enforcement of general labor standards such as wage and hour or safety regulations as
part of CIR legislation?

Yes No
Please explain.

How long have you held this position?

9. Would you support an increase in the cap of low-skilled
employment-based green cards issued each year from it's current level of
5000?

Yes No
Please explain.

How long have you held this position?

10. Would you favor raising the 65,000 cap on high-skilled H-1B temporary work visas, in light of the fact that in the last two years, H-1B visas were quickly filled in a matter of days?

Yes No
Please explain.

How long have you held this position?

11a. If so, would you also favor limiting the number of H-1B professionals a company can hire?

Yes No

It's not stuff you can sing to the tune of an anthem, or give to CNN for a tasty soundsnack, but we get enough of that everyday. Answers to these questions will show quite specifically what each candidate thinks and plans to do on matters behind which many families and humans at this very moment are suffering. And their responses will also show just how much they really mean to address the Latino/Hispanic community on these issues.

Read the entire survey here.

We sent the questionnaires last month, and received no response. In the silence, we watched Barack Obama and John McCain offer assurances, speeches, ads, and statements to the mainstream press.

It took our publishing the survey on a list-serv which is watched by people in a few different organizations and administrations, before Vince Casillas of the Obama campaign sent us this:

Just so you know we haven't forgot this survey. As you can imagine we recieve hundreds and hundreds of these which is no excuse just a reality. I'll follow up with the status and hopefully have an update this afternoon. Thanks.

Vince Casillas

So. The wait is on.

Enough with the worker's slogans. Let's look to the the children, their families, and the workers themselves. It is their work, after all, that takes care of so much of us. Until the cruel treatment and violence and apathy we return to them is addressed, I am not interested in any more speeches or soundbytes.

UPDATE: Alicia Stewart with CNN has contacted us and wants to feature this survey and story, and Kety of the Sanctuary (also a board member of the Institute for Progressive Christianity and founder of CrossLeft) has been chosen by our gang to represent.

Crossposted to The Unapologetic Mexican, Culture Kitchen, and OpEdNews.

---

Soldader@s Showin' Solidaridad in the SanctuarySphere:
• Marisa (LatinaLista)
• Kai (Zuky)
• Manuel (LatinoPolitico)
• M/Sylvia (ProblemChylde)
• Maegan La Mala(VivirLatino)
• Kety Esquievel (CrossLeft, The Sanctuary)
• Symsess (Citizen Orange)
• XP of the Sanctuary (and Para Justicia Y Libertad)

Concert for the Netroots Streamed to your Computer

2008-07-11T18:44:00.003-04:00

Join us in Second Life as we kick off Netroots Nation In SL with the Concert for the Netroots. We've lined up a great group of musicians to begin the festivities.

Saturday, July 12 (All times SLT/PDT)

At the Netroots Nation in SL Ballroom:

4pm: Thumper Boucher, Master of Future Funk.

5pm: Robie Bloch, Electro-acoustic folk rock diva.

6pm: JueL Resistance, Edgy alt-acoustic with a conscience

I was a cable guy for the FBI

2008-07-11T18:26:00.000-04:00

Details in my Air America post.

The Body of Christ Held Hostage

2008-07-11T03:29:00.004-04:00

It was a beautiful Sunday morning. The sun was shining. The birds were chirping. You could almost smell the minty freshness of God's breath on the edge of the gentle westerly breeze.

But the beauty of that morning was soon shattered by an act so brutally ugly it pains me to recount it here. That act was the abduction of Our Lord's sacred flesh by a college student named Webster Cook. Yes, you read that right. Cook took the Eucharist wafer into his mouth and smuggled it out of mass back to his dorm room at the University of Central Florida. Once there, he peeled Our Savior's moist body from his tongue and placed it's bleeding, pulsating flesh upon his desk.

No one but Cook knows what happened after that. One imagines he may have performed any number of sick acts on Our Lord Jesus' immobile body. Perhaps Cook licked His immaculately crunchy skin or touched Our Redeemer inappropriately, or even worse, made Him listen to rhythm and blues. All anyone knows for sure was that the young student was holding Jesus hostage.

The Church reacted angrily. A spokesperson for the local diocese called it a "hate crime." Father Migeul Gonzalez called it a "kidnapping" and a "mortal sin,' and loudly worried that the whole diocesan community would "have to make acts of reparation" in order to get back into God's good graces.

Then the lay community weighed in. Outrage professional Bill Donohue demanded Cooks expulsion for "taking the Body of Christ hostage." Other, more action-oriented worshipers, responded with death threats.

That was too much for Cook. He returned Our Saviors broken body to the church and apologized.

The diocese, in an effort to discourage another kidnapping, assigned a nun to guard the Eucharist during campus services by presumably doing tongue inspections at the door. The University threw in a pair of armed cops to assist her.

That should have been the end of it, but unfortunately, squid doctor PZ Myers, a man who doesn't even believe in God, wrote about the story on his unspellable blog, derisively referring to Our Lords transubstantiated flesh as a "cracker," Yes, he called Jesus Christ a baked cereal-based product. Worse yet, he asked his readers to kidnap the Corpus Christi and send it to him so he could film himself committing unspeakable acts upon it.

Bill Donohue was quick to respond, demanding that the University of Minnesota Morris fire Myers. Emails immediately began filling Meyers and the University President's mailboxes. In the first day alone, Myers received:

39 pieces of personal hate mail of varying degrees of literacy...Four of them have included death threats, a personal one day record. Thirty-four of them have demanded that I be fired. Twenty-five of them have told me to desecrate a copy of the Koran, instead, or in some similar way offend Muslims.

Undoubtedly, his boss, the university president has received even more.

So that's where we are as of this writing. On the one hand, we gave a Godly man, Bill Donohue, who collects libislamunisto scalps like a cannibal witchdoctor in a cheap pulp novel, and, on the other, a scientist/blogger who doesn't even believe in God.

Elsewhere: PZ Myers writes:

I would appreciate it if you would write a short note to President Robert Bruininks in support (he's going to hate me for this). I have to ask for a few constraints, though: only do so if you are willing to sign a real name to it — most of the complaint mail I'm getting uses fake names, making it much less persuasive — and that, unlike the religious screeds I'm seeing, you take the time to proofread and send him something that at least looks like a high school graduate wrote it, which will put you way above the level of the hate mail. Be polite and rational, too!

If you really want to impress, send him regular mail at this address:

President Robert H. Bruininks
202 Morrill Hall
100 Church Street S.E.
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN 55455

Bill Donohue has a loud, braying voice, and he's already trying to stir up a witch hunt. We need a counter-campaign from the secular community.