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Sep 7, 2008
COMMENTS
it is being called the new dr strange love. apparently gore vidal really liked it.
July 6, 2008, 8:09 pm - ladybeans
back and forth it sways
we rise and get trampled.
why all that yellow cake?
enrichment begins
emotions are silenced
it's coming, can you feel it?
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2008/07/20087813165610303.html
http://recreate68.com/
--------------------------------
NEWSNEWSNEWS (audio here & video at democracynow. org)
http://media.switchpod.com/users/democracynow/ftp/dn2008-0708-1.mp3
Democracy NOW! Tues, July 8, 2008
http://media.switchpod.com/users/democracynow/ftp/dn2008-0707-1.mp3
Democracy NOW! Mon, July 7, 2008
You can watch the program by going to the site through 'past shows' and selecting any specific day.
---------------------------------
Speaking of Gonzo Journalism and Hunter S Thompson and one of the best journalists today, Amy Goodman. There was a different documentary I saw and I can't remember the name of it, about commemorating the life of HST. Anyhow John Cusack was one of the people interviewed and he talked about meeting Hunter and how influential HST was in informing Cusack of how to look at politics. So it was really interesting to me to see Cusack puttin gout a film with such a title as War Inc. I was hesitant to watch it thinking- what does this guy have to say out the situation, he's just an actor that's all I know about him. But to my suprise and delight, the film was most enjoyable. Funny, accurate, you hear a few quotes from the more prominent reporters like Naomi Klein, Chomsky quoting elites, etc. It is a tragic farce indeed. And the best piece of art I think I have seen come out of Hollywood in while.
War Inc
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_cc00XMjY5NzYxMTY=.html
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_cc00XMjY5NzY4MTI=.html
John Cusack ... Brand Hauser
Joan Cusack... Marsha Dillon
Marisa Tomei... Natalie Hegalhuzen
Hilary Duff... Yonica Babyyeah
Ben Kingsley... Walken
Dan Aykroyd... The Vice President
While watching it i had a suspicion that it was inspired by Naomi Klein and low and behold it is loosely based on this essay
Baghdad year zero: Pillaging Iraq in pursuit of a neocon utopia
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2004/09/0080197
It was so spot on and just ridiculously hilarious. If you would like a way to view a cartoon of a piece of America and the world today, this is a good example.
thanks japan.
If you would like any clarifications of references to reality from the film just let me know. This movie is just littered with truth and analogous truth it's disgusting. I guess that is why it is so funny.
---
For an update about IRAN, please read the article bellow.
Preparing the Battlefield
The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran.
by Seymour M. Hersh July 7, 2008
Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran’s suspected nuclear-weapons program.
Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of “high-value targets” in the President’s war on terror, who may be captured or killed. But the scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which involve the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), have now been significantly expanded, according to the current and former officials. Many of these activities are not specified in the new Finding, and some congressional leaders have had serious questions about their nature.
Under federal law, a Presidential Finding, which is highly classified, must be issued when a covert intelligence operation gets under way and, at a minimum, must be made known to Democratic and Republican leaders in the House and the Senate and to the ranking members of their respective intelligence committees—the so-called Gang of Eight. Money for the operation can then be reprogrammed from previous appropriations, as needed, by the relevant congressional committees, which also can be briefed.
“The Finding was focussed on undermining Iran’s nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change,” a person familiar with its contents said, and involved “working with opposition groups and passing money.” The Finding provided for a whole new range of activities in southern Iran and in the areas, in the east, where Baluchi political opposition is strong, he said.
Although some legislators were troubled by aspects of the Finding, and “there was a significant amount of high-level discussion” about it, according to the source familiar with it, the funding for the escalation was approved. In other words, some members of the Democratic leadership—Congress has been under Democratic control since the 2006 elections—were willing, in secret, to go along with the Administration in expanding covert activities directed at Iran, while the Party’s presumptive candidate for President, Barack Obama, has said that he favors direct talks and diplomacy.
The request for funding came in the same period in which the Administration was coming to terms with a National Intelligence Estimate, released in December, that concluded that Iran had halted its work on nuclear weapons in 2003. The Administration downplayed the significance of the N.I.E., and, while saying that it was committed to diplomacy, continued to emphasize that urgent action was essential to counter the Iranian nuclear threat. President Bush questioned the N.I.E.’s conclusions, and senior national-security officials, including Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, made similar statements. (So did Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican Presidential nominee.) Meanwhile, the Administration also revived charges that the Iranian leadership has been involved in the killing of American soldiers in Iraq: both directly, by dispatching commando units into Iraq, and indirectly, by supplying materials used for roadside bombs and other lethal goods. (There have been questions about the accuracy of the claims; the Times, among others, has reported that “significant uncertainties remain about the extent of that involvement.”)
Military and civilian leaders in the Pentagon share the White House’s concern about Iran’s nuclear ambitions, but there is disagreement about whether a military strike is the right solution. Some Pentagon officials believe, as they have let Congress and the media know, that bombing Iran is not a viable response to the nuclear-proliferation issue, and that more diplomacy is necessary.
A Democratic senator told me that, late last year, in an off-the-record lunch meeting, Secretary of Defense Gates met with the Democratic caucus in the Senate. (Such meetings are held regularly.) Gates warned of the consequences if the Bush Administration staged a preëmptive strike on Iran, saying, as the senator recalled, “We’ll create generations of jihadists, and our grandchildren will be battling our enemies here in America.” Gates’s comments stunned the Democrats at the lunch, and another senator asked whether Gates was speaking for Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney. Gates’s answer, the senator told me, was “Let’s just say that I’m here speaking for myself.” (A spokesman for Gates confirmed that he discussed the consequences of a strike at the meeting, but would not address what he said, other than to dispute the senator’s characterization.)
The Joint Chiefs of Staff, whose chairman is Admiral Mike Mullen, were “pushing back very hard” against White House pressure to undertake a military strike against Iran, the person familiar with the Finding told me. Similarly, a Pentagon consultant who is involved in the war on terror said that “at least ten senior flag and general officers, including combatant commanders”—the four-star officers who direct military operations around the world—“have weighed in on that issue.”
The most outspoken of those officers is Admiral William Fallon, who until recently was the head of U.S. Central Command, and thus in charge of American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. In March, Fallon resigned under pressure, after giving a series of interviews stating his reservations about an armed attack on Iran. For example, late last year he told the Financial Times that the “real objective” of U.S. policy was to change the Iranians’ behavior, and that “attacking them as a means to get to that spot strikes me as being not the first choice.”
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/07/080707fa_fact_hersh/?currentPage=2
we rise and get trampled.
why all that yellow cake?
enrichment begins
emotions are silenced
it's coming, can you feel it?
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2008/07/20087813165610303.html
http://recreate68.com/
--------------------------------
NEWSNEWSNEWS (audio here & video at democracynow. org)
http://media.switchpod.com/users/democracynow/ftp/dn2008-0708-1.mp3
Democracy NOW! Tues, July 8, 2008
http://media.switchpod.com/users/democracynow/ftp/dn2008-0707-1.mp3
Democracy NOW! Mon, July 7, 2008
You can watch the program by going to the site through 'past shows' and selecting any specific day.
---------------------------------
Speaking of Gonzo Journalism and Hunter S Thompson and one of the best journalists today, Amy Goodman. There was a different documentary I saw and I can't remember the name of it, about commemorating the life of HST. Anyhow John Cusack was one of the people interviewed and he talked about meeting Hunter and how influential HST was in informing Cusack of how to look at politics. So it was really interesting to me to see Cusack puttin gout a film with such a title as War Inc. I was hesitant to watch it thinking- what does this guy have to say out the situation, he's just an actor that's all I know about him. But to my suprise and delight, the film was most enjoyable. Funny, accurate, you hear a few quotes from the more prominent reporters like Naomi Klein, Chomsky quoting elites, etc. It is a tragic farce indeed. And the best piece of art I think I have seen come out of Hollywood in while.
War Inc
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_cc00XMjY5NzYxMTY=.html
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_cc00XMjY5NzY4MTI=.html
John Cusack ... Brand Hauser
Joan Cusack... Marsha Dillon
Marisa Tomei... Natalie Hegalhuzen
Hilary Duff... Yonica Babyyeah
Ben Kingsley... Walken
Dan Aykroyd... The Vice President
While watching it i had a suspicion that it was inspired by Naomi Klein and low and behold it is loosely based on this essay
Baghdad year zero: Pillaging Iraq in pursuit of a neocon utopia
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2004/09/0080197
It was so spot on and just ridiculously hilarious. If you would like a way to view a cartoon of a piece of America and the world today, this is a good example.
thanks japan.
If you would like any clarifications of references to reality from the film just let me know. This movie is just littered with truth and analogous truth it's disgusting. I guess that is why it is so funny.
---
For an update about IRAN, please read the article bellow.
Preparing the Battlefield
The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran.
by Seymour M. Hersh July 7, 2008
Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran’s suspected nuclear-weapons program.
Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of “high-value targets” in the President’s war on terror, who may be captured or killed. But the scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which involve the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), have now been significantly expanded, according to the current and former officials. Many of these activities are not specified in the new Finding, and some congressional leaders have had serious questions about their nature.
Under federal law, a Presidential Finding, which is highly classified, must be issued when a covert intelligence operation gets under way and, at a minimum, must be made known to Democratic and Republican leaders in the House and the Senate and to the ranking members of their respective intelligence committees—the so-called Gang of Eight. Money for the operation can then be reprogrammed from previous appropriations, as needed, by the relevant congressional committees, which also can be briefed.
“The Finding was focussed on undermining Iran’s nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change,” a person familiar with its contents said, and involved “working with opposition groups and passing money.” The Finding provided for a whole new range of activities in southern Iran and in the areas, in the east, where Baluchi political opposition is strong, he said.
Although some legislators were troubled by aspects of the Finding, and “there was a significant amount of high-level discussion” about it, according to the source familiar with it, the funding for the escalation was approved. In other words, some members of the Democratic leadership—Congress has been under Democratic control since the 2006 elections—were willing, in secret, to go along with the Administration in expanding covert activities directed at Iran, while the Party’s presumptive candidate for President, Barack Obama, has said that he favors direct talks and diplomacy.
The request for funding came in the same period in which the Administration was coming to terms with a National Intelligence Estimate, released in December, that concluded that Iran had halted its work on nuclear weapons in 2003. The Administration downplayed the significance of the N.I.E., and, while saying that it was committed to diplomacy, continued to emphasize that urgent action was essential to counter the Iranian nuclear threat. President Bush questioned the N.I.E.’s conclusions, and senior national-security officials, including Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, made similar statements. (So did Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican Presidential nominee.) Meanwhile, the Administration also revived charges that the Iranian leadership has been involved in the killing of American soldiers in Iraq: both directly, by dispatching commando units into Iraq, and indirectly, by supplying materials used for roadside bombs and other lethal goods. (There have been questions about the accuracy of the claims; the Times, among others, has reported that “significant uncertainties remain about the extent of that involvement.”)
Military and civilian leaders in the Pentagon share the White House’s concern about Iran’s nuclear ambitions, but there is disagreement about whether a military strike is the right solution. Some Pentagon officials believe, as they have let Congress and the media know, that bombing Iran is not a viable response to the nuclear-proliferation issue, and that more diplomacy is necessary.
A Democratic senator told me that, late last year, in an off-the-record lunch meeting, Secretary of Defense Gates met with the Democratic caucus in the Senate. (Such meetings are held regularly.) Gates warned of the consequences if the Bush Administration staged a preëmptive strike on Iran, saying, as the senator recalled, “We’ll create generations of jihadists, and our grandchildren will be battling our enemies here in America.” Gates’s comments stunned the Democrats at the lunch, and another senator asked whether Gates was speaking for Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney. Gates’s answer, the senator told me, was “Let’s just say that I’m here speaking for myself.” (A spokesman for Gates confirmed that he discussed the consequences of a strike at the meeting, but would not address what he said, other than to dispute the senator’s characterization.)
The Joint Chiefs of Staff, whose chairman is Admiral Mike Mullen, were “pushing back very hard” against White House pressure to undertake a military strike against Iran, the person familiar with the Finding told me. Similarly, a Pentagon consultant who is involved in the war on terror said that “at least ten senior flag and general officers, including combatant commanders”—the four-star officers who direct military operations around the world—“have weighed in on that issue.”
The most outspoken of those officers is Admiral William Fallon, who until recently was the head of U.S. Central Command, and thus in charge of American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. In March, Fallon resigned under pressure, after giving a series of interviews stating his reservations about an armed attack on Iran. For example, late last year he told the Financial Times that the “real objective” of U.S. policy was to change the Iranians’ behavior, and that “attacking them as a means to get to that spot strikes me as being not the first choice.”
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/07/080707fa_fact_hersh/?currentPage=2