The Most Anger-Inducing Article EVER!!!

The Senate is threatening to "hold up" renewal of the USA-PATRIOT Act.

They complained that the House-Senate compromise now being considered takes back some civil liberty protections that senators had agreed to, including changing a Senate requirement that the government inform the targets of a "sneak and peek" search warrant within seven to 30 days.

"Sneak and peek" search warrants allow police to conduct secret searches of people's homes or businesses and inform them later.

Why are they jackasses? Because they're seriously considering renewing this unConstitutional abomination. Threatening to "hold it up" is not anywhere near enough. Now, normally, I think the ACLU is completely full of shit, but for once, I'm wondering where the hell they and their lawyers are. USA-PATRIOT violates several clauses of the Bill of Rights, and should have been in the news every single day since its inception, being challenged in the Supreme Court.

Now, for the last few months I've been keeping my boiling fury at the current administration's horrible record relatively under control, instead focusing on silly news stories and whatnot, due to my general lack of opportunity to blog. However, sometimes you come across a news story that's just an intolerable provocation.
So, let me tell you a story.
This weekend, on Fox News Sunday, which you may or may not watch, one of the guests was the Democratic Senator from West Virginia, John D. Rockefeller.
Now, if you want to read for yourself, the transcript is available here, but the relevant quotes can be found below.

WALLACE: Senator, you're quite right. You didn't get the presidential daily brief or the senior executive intelligence brief. You got the national intelligence estimate.

But the Silberman commission, a presidential commission that looked into this, did get copies of those briefs, and they say that they were, if anything, even more alarmist, even less nuanced, than the intelligence you saw, and yet you, not the president, said that Saddam Hussein was an imminent threat.

WALLACE: Senator Rockefeller, I want to play another clip from your 2002 speech authorizing the use of force, this time specifically on the question of Saddam's nuclear program. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROCKEFELLER: There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years, and he could have it earlier.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Now, by that point, Senator, you had read the National Intelligence Estimate, correct?

ROCKEFELLER: In fact, there were only six people in the Senate who did, and I was one of them. I'm sure Pat was another.

WALLACE: OK. But you had read that, and now we've read a declassified...

ROCKEFELLER: But, Chris, let's...

WALLACE: Can I just ask my question, sir?

ROCKEFELLER: Yes.

WALLACE: And then you can answer as you choose. That report indicated there was a disagreement among analysts about the nuclear program. The State Department had a lot more doubts than the CIA did about whether he was pursuing the nuclear program. You never mentioned those doubts. You came to the same conclusion the president did.

ROCKEFELLER: Because that — first of all, that National Intelligence Estimate was not called for by the administration. It was called for by former Senator Bob Graham, who was chairman of the Intelligence Committee, and Dick Durbin.

We didn't receive it until just a couple of days before we voted. Then we had to go read it and compare it to everything else that we thought we'd learned about intelligence, and I did make that statement. And I did make that vote.

But, Chris, the important thing is that when I started looking at the weapons of mass destruction intelligence along with Pat Roberts, I went down to the floor, and I said I made a mistake. I would have never voted yes if I knew what I know today.

Hindsight is 20/20, eh, Senator? So, it's in your hands before the vote, and you read it - and still voted for the war.
JUST WAIT, IT GETS BETTER.

WALLACE: But you voted, sir, and aren't you responsible for your vote?

ROCKEFELLER: No. I'm...

WALLACE: You're not?

ROCKEFELLER: No.

?!?
WTF?!?
I mean, WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK?!?
You ignored the intelligence documents given to you regarding an upcoming vote about SENDING OUR TROOPS INTO COMBAT IN A FOREIGN COUNTRY, and now think you "shouldn't be held responsible?"
WHY THE FUCK DO WE PAY THESE ASSHOLES?!?The facts of the current brouhaha over prewar intelligence are right there. The Senators were given the intelligence documents upon which the Bush administration predicated its request for war; the Senators ignored said documents; the Senators voted for the war - even Hillary Clinton and Ted Kennedy did - and so did Barack Obama and Evan Bayh, by the way - and now, not only do they think they shouldn't be held accountable, but they blame the war on Bush.

Now, let's be clear: I think Bush is the worst president this century; maybe the worst president in the history of this country. But I don't think it has anything whatsoever to do with Iraq. I'll tell you why, before we go on:

1. "There were no WMDs." For 12 years prior to our current actions, the U.N. has been sending weapons inspectors into Iraq. This is because, according to the best intelligence available, President Clinton, now retired Gen. Wesley Clark, and most of the current "it's Bush's fault" agitators believed that Saddam Hussein possessed a vast store of chemical and biological weapons, and was working to obtain nuclear ones. The Bush administration's decision to advance with military action was a direct result of the treatment of those same inspectors by Saddam's regime, which denied them access to sites where they believed weapons to be present repeatedly, often in a pattern that the chief of the weapons inspection team called "indicative of delaying tactics, in an attempt to cover the relocation and concealment of any weapons present."
In other words, they jerked us around to buy time to hide 'em. Now, with most of the administration - namely those members who might know where they're buried - dead or in jail, it may be hundreds of years before any weapons are found. All we know FOR SURE at this point is that we haven't found any - not that there WEREN'T any.

2. "We're not getting anything done over there." Oh, really?
Well, let's see. We've liberated a country, with a population vastly greater than was our own at the time of the Revolutionary War, in about 1/3 of the time that said Revolutionary War took (8 years;) with, so far, a fraction of the casualties suffered during the Revolutionary War. We've given the newly freed Iraq an opportunity to create its own Constitution - which it has, and has ratified, a process that took our country more than a decade; we've set up public schools, for the first time in nearly fifty years in Iraq, where our country didn't have government-run schooling until the 1840s; we've set up hospitals in a country that has basically had no health care for anyone not in the military since Saddam first took power.
I challenge ANYONE to tell me that that's "nothing."

3. "There was no al-Quaeda presence or tie in Iraq!" Well, then, how come they're fighting so very, very hard to get it back? According to the Iraqi interim government - not our own intelligence sources, of course, since everyone apparently "knows" they're crap - over 70% of the so-called "insurgents" are troops funded and trained by al-Quaeda and funneled into Iraq via the Syrian and Jordanian borders, which is why the Iraqis are screaming at Syria and Jordan to secure said borders. You might have read about that in the newspapers. The "insurgents" are being led by a man named Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was one of the top officers of Al-Quaeda; yet somehow, there's no connection whatsoever. Excuse me for remaining a tad skeptical on that point. Oh, and let me add another little tidbit from the Rockefeller interview on FNS:

WALLACE: Is Zarqawi on the rocks?

ROCKEFELLER: No. In fact, it's one of my absolute frustrations throughout this entire process. Usama bin Laden, Zarqawi — we have not taken down either one. Now, Usama bin Laden is up at 15,000 feet somewhere and is hard to get to. Zarqawi is in Iraq. He's in Jordan. He's been there all along. He started up in the northeast section. He's never left it.

And he is the great Al Qaeda threat, in my judgment, these days, as opposed to Usama bin Laden, and our good intelligence now, after 1998, and our good intelligence and our good military have failed to bring him in. I don't understand that. And I think that's a direct question that the president ought to be asked. Get Zarqawi, and our problems are going to start diminishing very quickly.

That's right. Your Democratic Senator from West Virginia admits that at the very least, one of the top al-Quaeda officers, maybe the highest remaining in the organization, has "been in Iraq all along." What's that, if not a tie?

4. "There was no need for us to be there in the first place!" Except, of course, for the fact that Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator who had killed over 780,000 people according to the most conservative estimates. Except, of course, for the fact that he had publicly asserted his intention to use military force to conquer the entire region. Don't believe me? Search online. His speeches are a matter of public record, no matter that you may have to dig a little. Except, of course, for the fact that in his invasion of Kuwait, he proved his willingness to engage other countries without provocation.

5. "The U.S. was acting unilaterally!" This, of course, ignores the other 49 countries that supported the Iraq campaign; 41 of which actually contributed troops; they are unimportant, because France and Germany, both with substantial immigrant Islamic populations, loudly voiced their opposition, because they were terrified of the kind of terrorist backlash that France has in fact suffered the last two weeks. Of course the U. S. and U. K. don't count; any use of their forces by a Republican president is automatically assumed to be wrong these days, but how about South Korea? or Italy? or Poland? or 7 different former Soviet splinter republics? (Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia) or FIJI, for goodness' sakes; Fiji contributed 335 troops to the UN security forces over there, which is nearly a TENTH of their total forces under arms. Unilaterally? Sorry, guys, the facts simply aren't there for you.


Actually, Iraq is one of the only 2 or 3 things that Bush has done right during his administration. What totally mystifies me is how his liberal critics seem determined to ignore all the really catastrophic things he's done wrong, which they could attack him for with perfect justification, in favor of screaming "THE WAR IS WRONG!!1!"
What should they be attacking him for?
USA-PATRIOT.
Also known as H. R. 3162, USA-PATRIOT purports to give law enforcement agencies better abilities to cope with the threat of domestic terrorism. In reality, it guts the Bill of Rights (which is available here.)
Want to see how?
Amendment 4 to the U. S. Constitution reads:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

The Patriot Act gives this the finger:

`(1) ATTORNEY FOR THE GOVERNMENT- Upon an application made under section 3122(a)(1), the court shall enter an ex parte order authorizing the installation and use of a pen register or trap and trace device anywhere within the United States, if the court finds that the attorney for the Government has certified to the court that the information likely to be obtained by such installation and use is relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation. The order, upon service of that order, shall apply to any person or entity providing wire or electronic communication service in the United States whose assistance may facilitate the execution of the order. Whenever such an order is served on any person or entity not specifically named in the order, upon request of such person or entity, the attorney for the Government or law enforcement or investigative officer that is serving the order shall provide written or electronic certification that the order applies to the person or entity being served.

In other words, as long as the government guy says "it's legit" they get permission to go ahead with wiretaps on you.

The Sixth Amendment reads as follows:

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

This is what the writ of "habeus corpus" is all about. Habeus corpus allows a prisoner to require that he be brought before a court to determine if he is, in fact, being detained legally. Of course, the Patriot Act couldn't let that alone, saying that

`(6) LIMITATION ON INDEFINITE DETENTION- An alien detained solely under paragraph (1) who has not been removed under section 241(a)(1)(A), and whose removal is unlikely in the reasonably foreseeable future, may be detained for additional periods of up to six months only if the release of the alien will threaten the national security of the United States or the safety of the community or any person.

which means that unless he submits a writ of habeus corpus, a suspected terrorist can be held up to six months on the sole say-so of whoever arrested him in the first place. Well, that's ok, the writ of habeus corpus can get him out anyway, right? WRONG.

`(3) APPEALS- Notwithstanding any other provision of law, including section 2253 of title 28, in habeas corpus proceedings described in paragraph (1) before a circuit or district judge, the final order shall be subject to review, on appeal, by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. There shall be no right of appeal in such proceedings to any other circuit court of appeals.

In other words, the only court that can take your petition if you are a suspected terrorist is the Washington, D. C. Circuit Court of Appeals - not your home jurisdiction, or even the one you were arrested in. This, coincidentally, violates the Fifth Amendment protection against being stripped of your freedom without due process of law, which reads as follows:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Speaking of which, according to the Patriot Act, people can be arrested, records can be obtained, wiretaps can be issued, homes / cars / storage sheds / businesses / outhouses can be searched at will, all on the say-so of the Attorney General, without any evidence of a Grand Jury involved, in direct contravention of the Fifth Amendment. Not only that, but one of the big issues the Senators are grappling with today is whether the government should have to tell you your home has been searched at all; under the Patriot Act as it stands, it's perfectly ok for the feds to get a warrant, search your house, and then wait up to a month to get around to telling you that your home was searched - this is called "delaying notice of the execution of a warrant." It goes a little something like this:

`(b) DELAY- With respect to the issuance of any warrant or court order under this section, or any other rule of law, to search for and seize any property or material that constitutes evidence of a criminal offense in violation of the laws of the United States, any notice required, or that may be required, to be given may be delayed if--

`(1) the court finds reasonable cause to believe that providing immediate notification of the execution of the warrant may have an adverse result (as defined in section 2705);

`(2) the warrant prohibits the seizure of any tangible property, any wire or electronic communication (as defined in section 2510), or, except as expressly provided in chapter 121, any stored wire or electronic information, except where the court finds reasonable necessity for the seizure; and

`(3) the warrant provides for the giving of such notice within a reasonable period of its execution, which period may thereafter be extended by the court for good cause shown.'.

Which means that if they don't feel like telling you, they can poke about in your personal business without even knocking first.

Doesn't THAT seem like a good reason to hate Bush?
Your freedom and rights as an American are under siege. I urge you most strongly to register to vote and get rid of any candidate, Republican OR Democrat, who thinks that the Patriot Act is a good idea; ultimately, their power as members of the government derives, as Thomas Jefferson said, from "the consent of the governed," and it's long past time to assert your refusal to consent to allow your home to be searched without notification or cause, your refusal to allow yourself to be detained without your right to face your accusers, your refusal to allow yourself to be criminalized without recourse.

I will leave you with a quote I think the government has every reason to fear, and one that becomes more appropriate each and every day: ladies and gentlement, I give you the list of crimes committed against the colonists by King George of Great Britain, from the Declaration of Independence:

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our People, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free system of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislature, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

Well said, indeed.

Well, There's Certainly No Shortage Of Stupid, Is There?

Karl Malone Saves The Day!

Like many during the cleanup process, Malone initially found resistance from federal officials, but he sidestepped them and eventually cleared debris for two weeks, including 115 condemned homes - to allow reconstruction efforts to begin.

That's right. Karl Malone, NBA star, also owns a huge construction company, and volunteered his entire organization to help with Katrina relief in New Orleans. The government's response? "Don't call us. We'll call you." So, being the swell guy he is, Malone gives them the finger, and goes ahead and helps out anyway - to the tune of six million dollars. He cleared 115 condemned homes and "rubble" out of the way of rebuilding efforts, despite the efforts of the feds to stop him. Being as that's more work than the feds have done since the storm, I would say the same thing he did. SportsByBrooks has an audio clip of his on-air, non-FCC approved interview with Los Angeles radio host Fred Roggins, and you should check it out.

In a great big publicity-hound extravaganza of surprise, someone got shot at the 50 Cent movie. You heard it here first. Not that it'll stop you from going to see it if you're so inclined, but as an actor, 50 Cent sucks.

Remember the other day, when I was ragging on Sony's new DRM scheme? Well, I was right (what a surprise.) Hackers have now figured out how to hide a virus in Sony's DRM software, allowing them to demolish your firewall and gain free access to your PC. Sony, of course, could not provide a spokesman who was available for comment. Be aware that if you listen to Celine Dion, you could be hating your life really soon, when your computer is seized by hackers to perform DDoS attacks against all-and-sundry. Of course, if you listen to Celine Dion CDs, you probably already hate your life, but I guess that should've gone without saying. Don't mind me; sometimes I just don't pay attention to what I'm talking aboot.

NEWSFLASH! If you're going to show off for your friend by twirling your gun on your finger, you might oughta make sure it's A. unloaded, and B. has the safety on. This Public Service Announcement has been brought to you by Allen Lee Cooke.
(Note that "alcohol was not a factor," in other words, he died of terminal stupidity. Time for a Darwin Award. Save your time - I already submitted it.)

Ok. I hate to be the one to tell you, but cell phone use has gone too damn far. How do I know? Well, over the last two weeks, the same woman has robbed four different branches of Wachovia banks in Virginia - while talking on her cell phone the whole time. Now, I know the conversation must be important, but if you can't be bothered to put the phone down to point a gun at someone and ask them for money, it's JUST TOO MUCH, ok?

And as though pop music wasn't predictable, formulaic, and cookie-cutter enough for you, here come two MIT grads who don't get out enough: Drs. Whitman and Jehan, everyone! That's right, they've developed a computer program that can listen to a song and tell the record companies if it will be a hit or not before they even sign the band. You guys are sure saving the world. See, this is why there's a brain drain to India: our scientists are working on big questions like "How can we sell more Christina Aguilera albums?" while in India, they're working on genetic engineering, medicine, and bioengineering.

Now, remember when Bill Clinton was running for election and they asked him about his history of drug use? Now I would have said "Um, it was the sixties, EVERYONE used drugs." But, instead, he made history by denying that he'd inhaled, which was both stupid and nonsensical. However, it looks like SOMEONE learned from it; a Canadian politician gained himself 11 points in the polls by admitting he used cocaine. Now if only other politicians would have moments of honesty like this: I can just see Ted Kennedy's. "Yes, it's true that I've never actually had a real wage-earning job in my entire life, and I've been a useless drunk my entire time in politics; but you should still pay attention to my oh-so-well-informed opinions anyway."

The Russians surprised no-one by admitting that over 80% of their satellites are basically useless junk that needs replacement. Like Ted Kennedy, most of their satellite force appears to be aging poorly, broken, and clearly past their official service life. Oh, yeah, and they love vodka, too. (Yes, I'm digging at Kennedy today. But frankly, there's a professional wrestler named Kennedy who does more for society than Ted Kennedy does, and he cryingly, screamingly needs to get thrown out on his ear in the next election.)

Blockbuster's thinly disguised publicity stunt with the late fees has failed to save them; they lost over $490 million this quarter. Apparently customers weren't fooled by being charged the full purchase price of a movie instead of a mere late fee. Blockbuster is hinting around about bankruptcy; here's a good idea, instead: lower your stinkin' prices. You charge too freakin' much for movie rentals. This is why everyone has started using Netflix or their local video store; it's almost always cheaper.

Now you, too, can self-incriminate without even knowing it. Robert Petrick of Durham, N.C. found his Google search history used as evidence against him in his trial for murdering his wife. I admit that the guy probably did it, and I'm glad they busted him, but it seems to me that using records he probably wasn't even aware his computer was keeping on him is a little cold. Microsoft, and any other company, ought to be banned from hiding secret record-keeping routines in their software. Maybe that's just me. (But then, I actually know how to remove those records myself, so it's not that big a deal to me.)

Bill Clinton is a bit touchy about having been impeached, it seems; too bad. For those of you who don't know, Bill Clinton's impeachment didn't stem from his behavior with Monica Lewinski. Really! The impeachment charges were perjury and obstruction of justice - over Whitewater, primarily, but also over the fact that he lied openly when sworn in and testifying before Congress. You may not think it was justified, that's fine, but it was hardly an "abuse of the Constitution." The article goes on to discuss Clinton's retelling of his administration's "achievements," which I just HAVE to say something about. Clinton claims that he turned around the U.S. economy - which is technically true, since the economy was in good shape when he took office and collapsed before he left it - and that he created "Middle East peace initiatives." Now, for my money, you ought to get credit for peace in the Middle East only if you actually achieved it. The Middle East still looks pretty torn up to me, not in small part due to Clinton's habit of negotiating with Yassir Arafat, who was an admitted terrorist.

One can only hope that this particular lawsuit will work out: Chuck Berry is suing three different karaoke distributors, saying that their use of his songs without royalties of licensing constitutes copyright violation. Oh, I hope the courts agree; karaoke is a horrifying nightmare that should really go away, soon.

If you're a child molester addicted to kiddie porn, online chat rooms are already risky enough for you. But you gotta hate your life if you're Bill Pollock of Connecticut; logging into a chatroom to hit on a 14-year-old is dangerous enough, but it's really bad when the 14-year-old in question is really a police detective who is in the process of showing an Assistant State's Attorney how they use the chatrooms to snare, um, Bill Pollock of Connecticut for trying to show his pecker to a 14-year-old. Ha, ha, ha, sucks to be you, dude.

For anyone who's this stupid: don't send your dope through FedEx. That Is All.

Also, if you're currently wanted for conspiracy to commit arson, you probably shouldn't apply for a job as a Dallas sheriff's deputy. They do check for that sort of thing, you know.

Ok. While I admit that what the copy editor of the Danbury, Connecticut News-Times did was wrong, and mean, it was also damn funny. And, after all, he DID get fired for it. Picture this: the Immaculate High School girls' soccer team just won a game, and they take a picture; copy editor sees it, makes private copy of the photo with a somewhat different caption; private copy is the one that gets on front page. Before you know it you've got controversy, because the picture that was published was labeled "Immaculate High School girls' soccer team celebrates teammates' decision to come out of the closet as a lesbian." Whooooo. Funny, but baaaaaaaad.

Ok, does everyone remember that there were terrorist attacks in the US on September 11, 2001? Good. Everyone remember the recent bombings and such in London? Good. Ok. Now those are both good reasons why you shouldn't mail talcum powder to government officials with a note claiming it's anthrax. Of course, we're all smart people here, so we wouldn't do that, but if we did, we'd get arrested, just like Anthony McLoughlin did. Geez, you government guys are so touchy about these things!


Now, having fed you a diet of rich, creamy stupid, I'm going to actually give you some real news. How's that for variety, eh?

Smart kids live longer. Remember my mention earlier of the Darwin Awards? Wendy's been right all along. So has Darwin. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Intelligent Design.

Speaking of Intelligent Design, you may remember me mentioning the controversy over said creationist theory in recent weeks in Dover Township, Pennsylvania. Well, election day came and went, and the voters have spoken: they booted the entire school board of Dover Township out of office. Every. Single. Member.
For those of you who don't know, basically, the Dover School Board decided (because it was an election year, and time to get their names in the news,) to force their science teachers to read a prepared statement about so-called "Intelligent Design" in their classes. They promptly got sued, and the case went to federal court; both sides just rested their cases this week, so theoretically we'll hear about it from the judge sometime soon. Anyway, the township wasn't delighted to be dragged into the national news, apparently. Despite Pat Robertson announcing, post-election, that "God has abandoned Dover Township," the town's apparently not anti-ID, but rather just anti-publicity; the new school board has already flatly stated that they will abide by the judge's decision in this case, whatever it may be.

Bush is yelling about historical revisionistas with regard to Iraq; the odd thing is, he's right. Since he's usually a moron, I'd say this deserves a bit of attention. In case you can't be bothered to read the article yourself, his main complaint is that the Democrats are trying to portray this as a Republican war, when in fact military action was approved by both parties in Congress - including such Democratic luminaries as Barbara Boxer of California, Hillary Clinton of New York, and Ted Kennedy's drunk ass from Massachusetts. I am frankly amazed that the man can even spell the name of his constituents' state.

And finally, I would like to close by saying that yesterday was Veteran's Day. As I am a veteran, it is a holiday near and dear to my heart, and should be accorded more attention than it has so far received. In particular, we should remember those who've contributed so much to our freedom and are on the edge of being forgotten. One such is the most highly-decorated soldier in our nation's history: Audie L. Murphy. Audie Murphy was a soldier during World War 2; he was awarded every decoration for valor in combat authorized by the U.S. Army, as well as 5 awards from France and Belgium. You should go check out his page and learn a bit about him, and the tremendous service he, among so many others, has accorded to this country.
And while I'm at it, be cool to the veterans of Iraq, too: whatever your opinions of the situation over there, the fact is that our armed forces have served well and with gallantry, and they deserve our support and respect.

France Riots! In Other News, No-One Cares...

300+ Riots Happen Across Farnce

Australia, Britain, Germany and Japan advised their citizens to exercise care in France, joining the United States, Russia and at least a half dozen other countries in warning tourists to stay away from violence-hit areas.

That's right. Don't go to France, and if you just must, stay away from the parts that are on fire and burning. Of course, if you're so screamingly stupid that you run TOWARDS fire and bloodshed, then I hereby pronounce you "Proof of Natural Selection" and wish you luck.


Oil companies are making tons of money right now. This is true, but still not due to "price gouging." See, if the price of crude oil hits $70 a barrel, then the oil companies will make more money than they would if they are selling it for $10 a barrel. Oh, hell, let Rich Lowry explain it; I'm tired of retreading the same ground.

New Jersey sums up the reason behind the current state of immense election fraud: total, crippling incompetence on the part of election officials. So, one judge in NJ has demanded a list of all registered voters in NJ who've died prior to the elections; this is, of course, because the official who was supposed to be doing it "didn't know it was his job." The judge said it was "truly alarming," that people might have used the names of dead voters to commit fraud; I call it par for the course in New Jersey, but who's counting these days?

You gotta love going online and forgetting to do something important, like get your domain name registered. That's what the Madison Observer found out the hard way, when they set up their website and discovered that the .com extension of their proposed domain name had been locked up by their competition - and plastered with a huge practical joke. Want to check it out? The hoax is at www.madisonobserver.com, while the real Observer is located at www.madisonobserver.org.

No, I'm not bored today, why do you ask?

Sony was dealt yet another blow yesterday in the controversy over its new DRM scheme, when Kaspersky Labs, a major anti-virus software maker, classed their DRM scheme as Spyware. Apparently, the rootkits which Sony released as DRM on their new media can actually induce new security vulnerabilities on your computer, as well as potentially crashing Windows. Since, of course, the safety of the music from pirates who don't buy it is far more important than the usability of the product to the customers who do buy it, Sony doesn't care.

Finally, even though Kaspersky classes Sony's DRM software as Spyware, apparently the software has also been found to call home by connecting to Sony's website. While it appears like it only looks for updated lyrics or images each time one of its copy-protected CDs is loaded, there is a potential for the remote server to log the IP addresses and how often the disc is played. However, according to a company spokesman, no information is ever collected.

Of course, that's what they're going to SAY. There is as yet no evidence one way or the other, so I'm currently withholding judgement, but I wouldn't be surprised in the least to hear about someone getting information stolen by Sony "as an experiment" sometime real soon.

And yet another boneheaded lawsuit just got settled, namely Chavez vs. Netflix, Inc. Apparently, Chavez got all pissed off that he couldn't rent 100 movies a month on Netflix' "unlimited" service, despite the logistics of sending and receiving 3 DVDs at a time fast enough to do so. Also, he was annoyed by the claims that the service averaged "about one business day" in snail-mail turnaround time; the fact that the actual delivery time is subject to the whims of the USPS seems to have escaped him.
Now, to me, "unlimited" rentals doesn't mean I can rent 1 billion movies, it jsut means that no-one's going to call me up and say "Hey, you're renting too many movies, and we're going to have to charge you more." I don't recall ever seeing a guarantee that you could rent upwards of a hundred movies a month on the Netflix ads, but hey. What do I know, anyway? And as far as I know, a claim of an "average" delivery time IMPLIES IN ITS NATURE the notion that "this might just not apply to you, there, chief."
But then, I have a brain that functions, at least some of the time. So I can figure out these really hard, unreasonable things - it's kind of like how I know when I buy HOT COFFEE from a fast food joint that it'll probably suck a lot if I pour it on my genitals; like my deep understanding that cigarettes are bad for me, and that therefore if I choose to start smoking it's my own damn fault when I die; and like my understanding that being molested as a child does not change the fact that you are now a full-grown adult with a brain, and as such, if you choose to anally rape little boys you are a horrible criminal who commits crimes of your own free, conscious will.
I also understand, dammit, that sometimes people are just plain CRAZY, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the music you listen to, the movies you watch, books you read, games you play, or some comment made in passing by a stranger. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE THINGS YOU DO, not anyone else. Deal with it.

A Little Discussion Of The Asian Cinema

I am an American. Now, to most people, that says right at the outset that I don't speak any language besides English, and that not very well; that I'm biased in favor of all things American; and further, that I have a resolute willingness to be lulled into inactivity for extensive periods by forms of "entertainment" not requiring a great deal of brainpower.
All of the above are true.

However, that does not totally remove my ability to distinguish between things which suck and things which don't. And it is for just this reason that I would like to make a blanket recommendation for anyone reading this: go check out some Asian movies. No, really.
In the last few years, movie critics all over the country have been bemoaning the lack of innovation and creativity in American cinema, weeping and wailing over the near-total triumph in Hollywood of the formula over the new storyline, and absolutely agonizing over the notion that creation of a franchise is more important than just plain telling a good story.
These same critics have hailed a few foreign films, notably Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and House of Flying Daggers, while somehow managing to conveniently avoid noticing that there are, in fact, other movies coming out in Asia and the rest of the world.
Now I grant that we in America are resistant to anything different from our culture, whatever group you choose to identify yourself with; (how many black people went to The Station Agent? And how many whites went to Barbershop?) but sometimes we just need to get out a little more. The Academy Awards lump anything not made in Hollywood into one category, giving out a single Oscar for "Best Foreign Film." We ought to either open things up a bit (and maybe lower the number of bribes taken by Academy voters,) or rename the proceedings "The American Movie Awards."
Recently, there has been a bit of a renaissance of the horror film; it's amazing how many people really don't know where it comes from. Well, I'll tell you. Asia.
That's right. You may have heard of The Ring? Or, should I say, Ringu? Or its sequel, The Ring 2? I mean, Ringu 2? You've gone to the theater to be scared witless by The Grudge (by which I mean Ju-On,) and some of you may have noticed your local video store being invaded by Infection, Premonition, The Eye (1 and 2,) and Inner Senses? You SHOULD have heard of Dark Water, starring Jennifer Connelly, I mean Dark Water, starring Hitomi Kuroki?
A moment that absolutely made me grit my teeth was during the Halloween festivities on TV this year: Bravo ran a special on "the 100 scariest moments in movie history," or something like that. What's so bad about that? The fact that the idiot talking heads they got to comment on the "moments" spent 15 minutes raving about the innovation of the filmmakers who shot "The Ring," _completely ignoring the fact that it was a remake of a vastly superior movie (Ringu) that has been out for 10 years._
While we in America have been stifling innovation every chance we get, Asia has been blowing things up in a big way, and now it's starting to carry over into Hollywood, and we don't even seem to realize it. Over the next 3 years, over 30 Japanese and Chinese, and about 10 more Thai, movies of various stripes are planned for release in the U.S. in one form or another. They range from the excellent (Kairo, Ong Bak) to the pretty good ( Whispering Corridors) to the really out there(Versus.) Not only that, but literally dozens and dozens of remakes of Asian films, or outright ripoffs of the same, are planned, and yet we seem to be nearly totally unconscious of everything aside from the fact that "horror movies are cool right now."
Well, let me dispel an illusion for you, right now. AMERICAN horror movies are NOT cool right now. They suck. Anyone watch The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or The Amityville Horror, both terrible, pointless remakes of movies that frankly weren't all that great to start with? How about Wrong Turn, or Cabin Fever? These movies did poorly at the box office, and poorly so far on home video, because of one simple fact: they SUCK.
The Ring did well in theaters, and does well at home, because it doesn't; although it's not as good as the movie it's ripped off from, The Ring is actually a pretty sharp movie. Damn shame we didn't come up with the idea.
And why didn't we? More and more, Hollywood studios are treading the path of the reliable sale, and while this may lead to temporary profits, in the long term it's disastrous for their business, as more and more consumers are figuring out that you really can get anything you want on eBay, including really good movies from Asia. After all, why watch bad horror movies, when you can instead watch good ones?
More disturbing is the fact that American movie companies, and even American TV stations, don't seem to realize this. If you didn't notice while it was going on, take a look at the Halloween TV Guide; there was a parade of Halloween horror movies, nearly all of them bad. The Relic, a sad case taken from a really good book; the TV movie of The Shining, which stayed true to the book and somehow managed to suck anyway; Rose Red and Storm Of The Century on four different channels apiece; Halloween 5, Friday the 13th 6; need I go on?
Apparently, the TV stations' thinking went something like this: "Hey, horror movies are doing pretty good right now. (Notice there was barely any sign of the festivities this time last year.) Let's get some cheapie movies that we don't have to pay much for and run them, people will like them."
I don't get it. We, by and large, HATED those movies the first time around; just because we're enjoying the NEW, GOOD movies doesn't necessarily mean we will automagically love the OLD, CRAPPY movies.
You should definitely check out the Asian cinema, if you're interested in seeing some movies that don't suck, and you're willing to read subtitles.
I'll even give you some standout recommendations:
The Eye 2: oddly enough, this is vastly superior to the first one.
Premonition: low-budget, but manages to give you chills anyway.
Kairo: if you're not disturbed by this movie something is terribly wrong with you and you should seek professional help.
Not just horror, though: there are some really fantastic movies coming out of Asia right now that have nothing whatsoever to do with horror.
House of Flying Daggers: A great love triangle / assassination movie.
Hero (Jet Li): a wonderful, and overlooked, movie about sovereignty and the nature of governing;
Ong Bak: a Thai movie about a young fighter;
Yee Do Hung Gaan (Inner Senses): the Asian Sixth Sense, I will not call this a horror movie, although some of the circumstances surrounding it are a little weird.
And that doesn't begin to cover the animated movies, among which are the delightful films of Miyazaki Hayao, whose "Studio Ghibli" has produced some of the greatest animated films of all time. Don't believe me? Princess Mononoke, upon its release, became in short order the highest-grossing film in the history of Japan. Numbered among Miyazaki's cinematic accomplishments are Spirited Away, Howl's Moving Castle, Whisper of the Heart, Castle in the Sky, Grave of the Fireflies (possibly the saddest movie ever filmed of any kind, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED) and Kiki's Delivery Service.
You could also catch Steamboy, the latest feature film by the director of the internationally acclaimed movie Akira; it took 10 years to make, and looks it - Steamboy is one of the world's all-time most beautifully animated movies.
Or, you could go see Chicken Little.
It's up to you, but as time goes by, I'm paying more and more attention to the Asian cinema, and in the process rediscovering classics that most Americans never even knew existed. Did you know the classic Western movie The Magnificent Seven was a remake of a Japanese film, The Seven Samurai? Or that movies like The Usual Suspects owe their existence to a film called Rashomon, directed by Akira Kurosawa? Or that A Fistful of Dollars was originally a Kurosawa film as well? Or, for that matter, that the original Godzilla (Gojira) was an anti-war protest film, and Raymond Burr was nowhere to be seen?
It makes me wonder how long Hollywood has been stealing from Asia without us even knowing about it. As far as I'm concerned, it's long past time for some credit to be given where it's due: go rent an Asian movie today. You might be surprised.
(Just don't watch them in English. While the original audio features the finest actors in Asia, the English audio tracks often appear to have recorded by the bums sleeping outside the distribution houses in the streets, and can really detract from the impact of otherwise fine films. Think I'm kidding? Go watch Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon in English. I dare you.)

Oh No! I've Got Something In My Eye - Both Of Them, Even!

There is a phenomenon prevalent enough in American cinema (and I suppose everywhere else, too,) that it has earned its own name: sequelitis. This is the syndrome suffered by moviemakers who, having made a profitable (or even not-so-profitable) movie, attempt to cash in on the "franchise" by making a quick-and-cheap sequel which almost always sucks. Even hugely popular movie franchises suffer from this; look at Star Wars. The original movie, and indeed Empire Strikes Back, were both excellent; by the time Return of the Jedi rolled around, though, the production values were beginning to suffer a little. The Phantom Menace sucked outright, Attack of the Clones was nearly unendurable, and Revenge of George Lucas' Giant, Inflated Ego is a blasphemous monstrosity.
It is, in fact, so rare that a sequel is better than the original that it deserves a special pat on the back for the filmmakers who managed it.
So here goes:

The Eye 2. (Jian Gui 2.)
Go see it.
NOW.
In case you didn't see it, The Eye was a decent, though low-budget, Cantonese movie by the Pang brothers, who apparently are a kind of reverse clone of the Wachowski brothers. (You know the Wachowskis: they made one of the all-time good S/F action movies, The Matrix, and followed it with two horrifying and insipid sequels.) The Pangs, on the other hand, created a good-side-of-mediocre original, and followed it up with a sequel that is absolutely stellar.
The Eye is sort of like an Asian version of The Dead Zone, a film based on Stephen King's novel about a guy who can foresee people's lives following a terrible accident. In The Eye, Wong Kar Mun has a corneal transplant which goes really well until she starts to have visions of catastrophes, visions of the dead, and generally starts seeing all kinds of really wacky crap that makes her very nervous. The film follows her quest to find the donor of her eye, and find out why she's seeing all this weird stuff.
Ok. Now that I've told you all that, disregard it entirely; the sequel has nothing whatsoever to do with any of it.
Instead, it focuses on a beautiful young woman who is pregnant by her married lover, who suddenly begins to be haunted by the ghost of another woman who is determined that she stay pregnant - for reasons that, when they become clear, will severely disturb you, to say the least. (Follow all that? Good.)
One of the things I respect the most about the Pang brothers as filmmakers is the fact that they don't flinch from their own storylines. Too often directors shy away from showing the things that happen in their storylines directly. Now, this can work, when used as a technique; take a look at Yee Do Hung Gaan (Inner Senses) sometime. There is in that movie an absolutely horrifying scene involving a high school girl and a pair of pruning shears, that is absolutely guaranteed to make even the toughest audience hide their eyes and curse, despite the fact that the filmmakers never actually show you anything. However, too often in movies it is not a technique, but rather a lack of grit (and maybe a fear of directorial typecasting) that makes the director avoid showing the consequences of storyline events.
A good example that is almost always seen in movies is when a character falls off of something high; how many times do you recall seeing someone fall and be followed by the cameras ALMOST all the way to the ground, only to then cut away from the actual impact at the last second? The frequently used shot of "the gory remains" later on is merely a cop-out; the real horror is in the impact itself. A dead body is just a dead body, however messy. The moment that sends chills up and down your back is the moment that someone's life is actually snuffed out, not the later examination of their now-vacant body. Autopsies may be disgusting, and frequently repulsive, but they're almost never horrifying.
The Pang brothers, on the other hand, flinch from nothing, and when their character hurls herself off a roof not once but TWICE, they follow her all the way down both times. It is absolutely guaranteed to make you bite through your lower lip, especially after the first time, as you watch her drag herself up the stairs to try again.
However, as horrifying as this movie can sometimes be, there's another factor at work here. The Pang brothers are not only unflinching when it comes to horror; they are equally unsparing of hope, and ultimately that's how this movie plays out.
Have you ever watched all the way through a movie, and then in the last few seconds, turned to your neighbor at the movie and said "Now if _I_ was writing this, here's what _I_ would do...?" I bet you have. Everyone has at least once in a while. But how often do filmmakers actually end things that way? Not very, huh? Usually, at the last second, where they might cross the line from "decent" to "brilliant," they back off, step away from the risky choice, and retreat into the safety of established theatrical formulas. This is not one of those films.
Rarely in cinema do I experience a moment like the one at the end of The Eye 2, when I unpaused my DVD and watched the very scene I had just finished describing to my wife unfold before me. This movie is a fantastic cinematic experience, and although not for the theatrically faint-of-heart, it is well worth the effort required to find it on DVD. I was able to get it at my local video store, but then, I've had good luck with them lately. (It may have something to do with the amount of time I spend pestering them to get more foreign films, and Canada doesn't count.)
I will add one qualifier to my description of this film, however; do yourself the favor of steeling yourself for the subtitles, and watch this movie in the original Cantonese. The original voice acting is incredible, but the English dub isn't that great. It's not TERRIBLE, mind you, like that of some well-known films I could name, but any letdown diminishes the impact of this film, which deserves better. Watched in its original, compelling Cantonese, with fine acting by Shu Qi, Eugenia Yuan, Philip Kwok, and Rayson Tan, this is one of the best movies I've seen all year.
Granted, this is hardly surprising, considering the astonishing lack of anything approaching good movies this year from Hollywood, but still.

I Can See The Future! Oh, Wait, It's Just A Premonition...

Premonition (Yogen) is an excellent movie based on a comic originally by Jiro Tsunoda. Like Ringu, (which you may know better as "The Ring,") this movie is almost certainly better in its original form than any Americanization of it will turn out to be; this is because American directors just seem to miss the point a lot of the time when reshooting foreign films.

For example, the Tom Cruise movie "Vanilla Sky," which did SO very well in American theaters, is actually a remake of a great film called "Abre Los Ojos (Open Your Eyes)." Now, Abre Los Ojos is a fantastic movie, alternately really creative and very disturbing, and its conclusion will absolutely knock your socks off. Vanilla Sky, on the other hand, sucks. Despite frequently reshooting scenes using what looks like the same sets (they weren't, just very detailed recreations) as the original, all too often the impact of a scene is lost completely when the American director focuses on parts of the scene irrelevant to the story, rather than on the crucial clues shown in the far superior original.
Ringu suffered the same treatment at the hands of director Gore Verbinski, who just plain didn't understand the point of a lot of the scares in the original. Everyone knows kids are creepy, which of course is why we still have them in droves, so I can sort of understand replacing the 18-year-old girl from the original movie with the 8-year-old girl in The Ring (but not really.) However, if you watched The Ring, maybe you remember my favorite scene in the movie: the ghost comes out of the television, and rather than GET TO HIS FEET AND RUN AWAY, like a sensible human, Noah Clay flops around on the floor like a dying fish, allowing the ghost to catch him with ease and kill him. Why, you ask? What sense does this scene make, you ask? Why, after all, DIDN'T he just get up and run away?
Well, because the script demands that he's supposed to die. This is because the character died in the original; however, to understand how profoundly (the American director) missed the point, let me paint you a picture of life in Tokyo. The average bachelor salaried worker, called "sarariman," (say it in a bad Japanese accent if you don't get it on sight,) lives in an apartment smaller than a typical American living room. A small family (husband, wife, 2.5 kids) typically lives in an apartment the size of an American living room with a den. When Sadako (Samara in the American version) comes out of the television in Ringu, Ryuji Takayama is less than 5 feet from the television, with his back to a huge wooden railing which divides his "den" from his "living room." He has nowhere to go; he CANNOT simply leap to his feet and escape. The entire point of the scene is claustrophobia, and a comment on the cramped nature of city life for Japanese, something Gore Verbinski totally failed to understand.
What does all this have to do with Premonition?
Well, I'll tell you.
Premonition is a movie intimately concerned with the nature of fate and destiny, in a way often explored by the Asian cinema, yet often ignored by the West; this is not, in itself, a problem, but I cringe at the thought of this excellent, contemplative little horror movie being remade by hands as callous as those of Gore Verbinski.
Hideki is an associate professor looking for tenure; he is out for a drive with his wife and daughter and stops to phone in some crucial work, when he sees a newspaper clipping in the phone booth that reports a horrible crash that hasn't happened yet - one in which his daughter is killed (picture and all.)
He attempts to save his daughter but fails; a huge truck, whose driver had suffered a heart attack, veers onto the side of the road and crushes their car, daughter and all. His wife, understandably in shock about this disaster, thinks he's crazy when he starts raving about having seen it coming.
Think I'm giving something away? That's the first 3 minutes of the movie. Hideki continues to see "premonitions," and begins to wonder if he can change their outcome, attempting to enlist his (now estranged) wife in his efforts to stymie destiny's plan, much like Final Destination. Unlike Final Destination, however, the consequences of meddling with fate play out in a very different fashion, at one point even placing him (in a vision) in the truck responsible for his daughter's death moments before impact.
This movie speculates about destiny in a way American movies have forgotten, if they ever tried to explore it in the first place, and hopefully it will receive its just respect from audiences in its original form, rather than in a watered-down form deemed acceptable for the obviously painfully stupid American audiences by the Hollywood executives responsible for The Ring and The Ring 2, which was an even greater butchery of a good film than was the original.
Think not? Watch Ringu 2. They left out the single best scene in the film in its entirety - didn't even attempt it. Oh, yeah, and there's a "Ringu 0" also, which comes chronologically before Ringu, and explains how Sadako got dead in the first place. Of course, since they A. explained all that in The Ring, and B. made the girl so young that the story prior to her death is almost irrelevant, I'm not exactly sure what they have planned for the next movie. It will almost certainly have nothing whatsoever to do with the original.
At any rate, Premonition is a first-rate movie, and deserves your attention in its original form; you can get it at most video stores on DVD, and I recommend you try, as it is definitely worth the effort to find it.

France Riots! In Other News, No-One Cares...

300+ Riots Happen Across Farnce

Australia, Britain, Germany and Japan advised their citizens to exercise care in France, joining the United States, Russia and at least a half dozen other countries in warning tourists to stay away from violence-hit areas.

That's right. Don't go to France, and if you just must, stay away from the parts that are on fire and burning. Of course, if you're so screamingly stupid that you run TOWARDS fire and bloodshed, then I hereby pronounce you "Proof of Natural Selection" and wish you luck.


Oil companies are making tons of money right now. This is true, but still not due to "price gouging." See, if the price of crude oil hits $70 a barrel, then the oil companies will make more money than they would if they are selling it for $10 a barrel. Oh, hell, let Rich Lowry explain it; I'm tired of retreading the same ground.

New Jersey sums up the reason behind the current state of immense election fraud: total, crippling incompetence on the part of election officials. So, one judge in NJ has demanded a list of all registered voters in NJ who've died prior to the elections; this is, of course, because the official who was supposed to be doing it "didn't know it was his job." The judge said it was "truly alarming," that people might have used the names of dead voters to commit fraud; I call it par for the course in New Jersey, but who's counting these days?

You gotta love going online and forgetting to do something important, like get your domain name registered. That's what the Madison Observer found out the hard way, when they set up their website and discovered that the .com extension of their proposed domain name had been locked up by their competition - and plastered with a huge practical joke. Want to check it out? The hoax is at www.madisonobserver.com, while the real Observer is located at www.madisonobserver.org.

No, I'm not bored today, why do you ask?

Sony was dealt yet another blow yesterday in the controversy over its new DRM scheme, when Kaspersky Labs, a major anti-virus software maker, classed their DRM scheme as Spyware. Apparently, the rootkits which Sony released as DRM on their new media can actually induce new security vulnerabilities on your computer, as well as potentially crashing Windows. Since, of course, the safety of the music from pirates who don't buy it is far more important than the usability of the product to the customers who do buy it, Sony doesn't care.

Finally, even though Kaspersky classes Sony's DRM software as Spyware, apparently the software has also been found to call home by connecting to Sony's website. While it appears like it only looks for updated lyrics or images each time one of its copy-protected CDs is loaded, there is a potential for the remote server to log the IP addresses and how often the disc is played. However, according to a company spokesman, no information is ever collected.

Of course, that's what they're going to SAY. There is as yet no evidence one way or the other, so I'm currently withholding judgement, but I wouldn't be surprised in the least to hear about someone getting information stolen by Sony "as an experiment" sometime real soon.

And yet another boneheaded lawsuit just got settled, namely Chavez vs. Netflix, Inc. Apparently, Chavez got all pissed off that he couldn't rent 100 movies a month on Netflix' "unlimited" service, despite the logistics of sending and receiving 3 DVDs at a time fast enough to do so. Also, he was annoyed by the claims that the service averaged "about one business day" in snail-mail turnaround time; the fact that the actual delivery time is subject to the whims of the USPS seems to have escaped him.
Now, to me, "unlimited" rentals doesn't mean I can rent 1 billion movies, it jsut means that no-one's going to call me up and say "Hey, you're renting too many movies, and we're going to have to charge you more." I don't recall ever seeing a guarantee that you could rent upwards of a hundred movies a month on the Netflix ads, but hey. What do I know, anyway? And as far as I know, a claim of an "average" delivery time IMPLIES IN ITS NATURE the notion that "this might just not apply to you, there, chief."
But then, I have a brain that functions, at least some of the time. So I can figure out these really hard, unreasonable things - it's kind of like how I know when I buy HOT COFFEE from a fast food joint that it'll probably suck a lot if I pour it on my genitals; like my deep understanding that cigarettes are bad for me, and that therefore if I choose to start smoking it's my own damn fault when I die; and like my understanding that being molested as a child does not change the fact that you are now a full-grown adult with a brain, and as such, if you choose to anally rape little boys you are a horrible criminal who commits crimes of your own free, conscious will.
I also understand, dammit, that sometimes people are just plain CRAZY, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the music you listen to, the movies you watch, books you read, games you play, or some comment made in passing by a stranger. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE THINGS YOU DO, not anyone else. Deal with it.

My Heroes, (Oddly Enough,) The U. S. House Of Representatives

House votes to counter Eminent Domain Abuse

The House legislation, passed 376-38, was in response to a widely criticized 5-4 ruling by the Supreme Court last June that allowed eminent domain authority to be used to obtain land for tax revenue-generating commercial purposes.


That decision, said the House's third-ranked Republican, Deborah Pryce of Ohio, "dealt a blow to the rights of property owners across the country."

Finally, the House gets something right. You may remember me yelling at the residents of New London, Connecticut about this a few weeks ago; I was really angry about it, and you should be too. Basically, in brief, the case was decided by the Supreme Court, and essentially said that it was perfectly legal for the government to boot you out of your house in order to build things that give them better property tax revenue, like gas stations and office parks.
Now, in a rare stroke of sanity, the House has voted to deny federal "economic development" funds for two years to any locality using eminent domain as a means of economic development. The Senate still has to approve it, but with support that wide (look at the quote, 376-38) it seems fairly likely to pass. Astonishing: in an era of wide-spread governmental corruption, ineptitude, and general malfeasance, they actually managed to get something right. Now if only they would do away with eminent domain entirely...

Wishful thinking, I know. But still. I'd like to one day own my own home, without being afraid that 20 years of my work and earnings can be wiped out in an instant because they want to build a road.

You know you're a mom whose kids love you when: your 19-year-old son hears you getting attacked, and bludgeons a knife-wielding thug unconscious with a frying pan to protect you.

I had just made sausages with the frying pan and I was in the kitchen when I called the police. The pan was the first thing I saw so I brought it outside and gave it to Shaun. It broke in half when Shaun hit him but I didn't mind under the circumstances. The police took it away as evidence anyway!

...says Coreen Forsyth. You gotta think of the cricket-bat-wielding scene in Shaun of the Dead, don't you? Hey, now that I think about it, Shaun, Shaun, where do I know that name from, anyway?

Yet again, so-called "intelligent design" is in the news and the courts again. Oddly, this time the ACLU is doing something right- trying to keep the religionists out of the classroom, and science in it. Now, you may remember my article about this a few weeks ago, to which I'd like to add the following:
Science classes are concerned with the mechanisms by which things happen. The "intelligent design" theory, propounded by religionists (although they are trying to cover it up by cleverly not using the word "God," and instead using "a guiding force") claims that God is responsible for species change. However, proving that it is in no fashion a scientific theory, it makes no attempt to explain the mechanism through which said deity actually effects the species changes; it merely states that it happens. Well, DUH. The theory of evolution, on the other hand, doesn't concern itself with "Life, the Universe, and Everything," instead confining itself specifically to the physical mechanism through which species change occurs.
What's that mean? It means that although "intelligent design" might in fact be true (I myself believe in it,) it does not disprove or exclude evolution as the mechanism by which species change happens, and thus is not a competing theory. Further, not only is "intelligent design" not an opposing theory to evolution, it is a theory which is not based on any scientific evidence whatsoever, and therefore is inherently a non-scientific theory, and therefore does not belong in a science class. (Oh, and before I forget, and interesting and related side note: Even the Catholic church recognizes that science and theology are different. Really.)

Ever hear about cold fusion? Well, if you haven't, don't worry; that power source you've never heard of may be obsolete before it ever actually gets made. A scientist at Blicklight Power claims to have figured out a way to violate the established understanding of quantum physical "laws" which would potentially produce more power than conventional fuels by a factor of up to 1000. Is it possible? I'm not sure, but his arguments are certainly sound, and there's no reason he couldn't be right; physics has been completely turned on its head, with established "laws" completely disproven several times in the last few centuries, and this might just be the next such overturning.
Quantum physicists, of course, are violently opposed to even discussing his theories; one scientist at the University of Antwerp went so far as to say

Physicists are quite conservative. It's not easy to convince them to change a theory that is accepted for 50 to 60 years. I don't think [Mills's] theory should be supported,"

What's interesting about this, of course, is the fact that the people who are the most qualified of anyone in the world to discover if he's actually correct are basically sticking their fingers in their ears and yelling "LALALALALA" until he goes away, rather than actually trying to disprove his theory. It shouldn't be "supported" ?!? WTF?!? Um, this is SCIENCE, kids, not politics. Either prove or disprove, and move on with life, "Support" has nothing whatsoever to do with it.

The U. S. Patent Office has done something so astonishingly stupid that words fail to adequately express it. All I can really say is lawyers will love it: they have allowed someone to patent a movie plot. I just don't see a way this will fail to generate lawsuits.

Just in time for the theatrical release of Chicken Little, come the Taurid meteor showers. If I didn't know it was impossible, I'd say Disney planned this; but failing that: THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!

Cleveland police Tazered the same guy twice in one week. Oddly, he was wandering around naked both times. More oddly, the second time he was trying to pull people out of their cars and bite their heads. Not oddly at all, the cops think he's on PCP. Even less oddly than that, the cops made sure they did a better job this time, zapping him 3 times instead of only once.

The MPAA is at it again, folks: this time it's a 67-year-old grandfather being sued for "up to $600,000." Of course, what makes this really ridiculous is that they're holding this guy responsible for his grandson, who is 12, downloading four movies to his computer - three of which they already legally owned on DVD. That, of course, doesn't matter; it's the DOWNLOADING that's bad. They're blaming the guy for something that's actually impossible, too: they say that since his grandson DOWNLOADED the movies from a service known as iMesh, the files are now available to anyone who uses iMesh, and it's HIS FAULT.
Of course, if his grandson downloaded them from iMesh in the first place, they were already available on iMesh before this poor guy even got involved, and therefore it's impossible to attach $600,000 worth of legal liability to him for allowing his grandson to use his computer, even if his grandson DID illegally download a whole, scary $60 worth of kids' movies. Especially since they deleted the files as soon as they got the letter and found out about it.
Only thing I can say: however the court case turns out, that's one grandkid who will get a stocking full of coal for Christmas, you bet your ass.