[dovate.com] » political
So Second Life is kind of for weirdos, but when someone takes an idea from Second Life (flying penis) and makes it a reality… and buzzes Chessmaster/Russian opposition leader Gary Kasparov with said flying penis, then it’s fucking awesome.
At a minimum, it’s better than Polonium poisoning. Now at the risk (or absolute guarantee) of sounding like an asshole, wouldn’t something like this be great at a Hilary Clinton rally? I’m seeing a big black one. But maybe I’ve gone too far… Still had to say it though. Sorry.
Last night I waited 5 hours (3 spent on my feet, completely immobilized by a crowd of 35,000 people… I think the Bush Administration calls that a “stress position.”) to hear Obama’s stump speech and get this um… awesome 300mm shot, which I then cropped down from 12.8 to 0.6 megapixels. All in all, the 15 minutes he spoke was pretty cool. The people I waited in various lines with were all nice, but 5 hours? Damn.
The atmosphere was like a non-competitive sporting event. Next time, I gotta get a press pass.
Yes I’m really saying that I judge my own shots from the pre-”debate” rally at the same standard as the New York Times. Actually Times photographer Béatrice de Géa has a slightly nicer Canon camera and a much wider lens… but in my own defense, I was told by a cop to get back on the curb before I could get the wider shot myself.
Here’s mine:
And here’s hers:
And acting as judge and editor, I like just like my Obama shot better than theirs. Mine:
Times:
And since this is my site, here are a few more of mine:
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Jesus Fucking Christ. The elephant in the room of the whole Reverend Wright thing is that aside from his whole “white man made AIDS” spiel, he’s not so far off base.
Don’t think racism is still endemic in the United States? Troll the Northeast section of Phillyblog for about 10 seconds. Or read the comments on the story of the South Philly guy who died after an altercation with some North Philly kids on Wednesday. Here’s a selection. Reverend Wright has NOTHING on the people of Philadelphia:
If the government would just supply free iPods for the poor, these kids wouldn’t have to steal them and no one would get hurt… It’s all Bush’s fault.
All right. Haha. Very funny jab at the liberals.
We need harsh penalties! You steal, then you get a finger cut off. You rape then you can get you genitals cut-off. I guarantee crime would drop drastically.
Crime in Iraq wasn’t a problem under Saddam Hussein and penalties along the lines of that one are exactly why.
This is a hate crime against whites by blacks. As a 35 year old white male, I will not sit back and let this happen anymore. Enough is enough.
Sometimes the anonymity of the internet can be a lot like wearing a white sheet.
Why would a school for kids like that have a Jewish name? As a Jew, I want them to change it to Cecil B. Moore or Tubman High.
As a (half) Jew, Fuck you.
I assume my earlier comment is being censored - typical. Septa is having a boon year - how bout more officers on the platforms/trains, or placing security cameras on entry/exit locations?
That seems… sensible. And now on to:
why do we keep electing a mayor who is a loser? no one learned their lesson with Street?
This never would have happened with a white guy in City Hall!
Wow! And everyone was so angry because Rev. Wright exspressed himself, to what people said were imflamtory and racial remarks. Now look at all the imflamtory and racila remarks coming from the mouths of good wholesome hard working americans.
Although a little rough around the grammar, seems sensible.
I went to simon gratz and proud of it..these children need guidance..
So do you think this is the kind of person who Obama was talking about when he said:
“That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table.”
It’s no secret that Jewish people are obsessed with nazis. Just look a those google trend stats I posted the other day. Now while I’m only half Jewish and never grew up doing all the Jewish things that all the real Jewish kids did, I have absorbed a nice chunk of the cultural trappings.
Aside from my cultural heritage, I was also a student of history and am endlessly fascinated with general cultural observation. Put all these things together and this Calvin College web archive of nazi propaganda, spanning the rise and fall of the third reich is incredibly interesting to me. For example, the photo at the top of this post is a Holiday card featuring Hitler and a tinsel laden Christmas tree. (I bet Hitler would be so mad if he knew some half-breed was referring to it as a ‘holiday’ card.)
But anyway, after scanning a couple dozen articles, I have to say that the nazi party really had something against the Jewish people. They blamed them for absolutely everything.
Also, for all those who think that the U.S. now is like nazi Germany, all I have to say is that our propaganda is completely different. All in all, (the description of Liberalism and not the racially motivated, nefarious Jewish causes of it) are more in line with a 1943 SS pamphlet on “racial policy” which read:
The French Revolution (1789) introduced Europe to a new guiding idea, summarized in the phrase “Freedom, Equality, Brotherhood.” It was an uprising of racially inferior elements who took over ideas that in part had entirely different racial origins, and could only be perverted by them. The Jews had a decisive influence. Like the Church, liberalism taught that all people were equal, that there were no value differences between the races, that external differences (e.g., body type, skin color) were unimportant. Each person, regardless of race, might be a hero or a coward, an idealist or a materialist, creative or useless to society, militarily able, scientifically able, artistically gifted. The environment and education were the important elements that made men good and valuable. If one provided the proper environment and freed people from their chains, the peoples would join to develop their abilities in a unified humanity, and eternal peace would result. Therefore liberalism demanded equality for all, the same opportunities for everyone, in particular the Jews, equality and freedom in the economic sphere, etc.
That quote pretty well sums up the whole nazi thing. Race is king, they are the master race, Jews are the root of all evil and everyone else is wrong. Happy Holidays!
Sometimes it’s helpful to imagine humans as you’d imagine any large, biologically driven teeming mass of life. Strike out the idea of the individual and see humans as ants, bees, or bacteria. Look at the macro patterns, the things that drive our populations, the behavior that we can’t break down into actions of singular personalities.
Even from 100 feet, we appear as strange little tumors with spindly protrusions for arms, legs and fingers. From farther out, we multiply like bacteria in an open wound. Cities grow and swell. Every day they hemorrhage trillions of tons of sludge and waste. In the past hundred years, earth lit up like a magnesium fire. A time-lapse view from space would see the planet flaring up as we consume the planet’s buried energy. As our civilizations rise and fall, that light will peak, flicker and diminish.
Or maybe I’m being pessimistic.
For now, look at earth at night. Those lights are made possible by petroleum. The power plants that make them, the people fed by the crops grown by it and the trade networks dependent on it. Looking at this map, ask yourself which countries have the most to lose? Which have the most to gain? Who is the most powerful and who doesn’t have a leg to stand on? A basic familiarity of world politics and a thoughtful study of this map are worth as much as a year of political science classes.
What will happen in the next 100 years? The petroleum fires will go out, but will anything replace them?
The only deserts that are full of light are in the Middle East and the American Southwest. Which one will stay lit or will they both go out? Really think about it. Can the United States really afford to light its deserts? What sacrifices have we made to ensure that we can? What foreign policy decisions? How far overextended are we? Is the war in Iraq motivated by a growing desperation? Are we really that weak? Aside from oil entirely, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Reno, don’t have enough water for the next 100 years. We’re living off of others’ credit. Outside of military power and the hegemony of the dollar, we produce almost nothing. The dollar is falling out of style and our military can be defeated.
I know I’m being pessimistic, but what will this map look like in 100 years?
I don’t write about politics much. It’s mostly because as someone who chose history as a college major, I’ve got this arrogant, jaded perspective on things. This is what I’m talking about:
On April 17, Michael Scheur, the designer and manager of the United States’ rendition program and the chief of the CIA’s “bin Laden” unit in the Clinton Administration testified before the House of Representatives. Scheur, who is no friend to any political party noted:
“I know there was much more consideration under Bush about how to handle these people (them) than under Clinton, sir, when we joked about what would happen to them in Egyptian prisons.”
So what does this mean? It means that in the big picture, the Bush administrations most disgraceful act isn’t rendition and torture, it’s the legitimization of it… publicly. Not to discount the power of legitimization, it has a tremendous existential affect on our national identity. I’m sure historians will study its consequences for generations.
(John) Kerry, all the while attempting to continue his address, is drowned out by the man’s screams and the clicking of the electrical gun.
First of all, I firmly believe that all 5 candidates should be forced to rule Philadelphia as an oligarchy.
Secondly, yesterday in the Metro I read the results of a study that found no correlation between IQ and income. Tom Knox proves that. Millionaire or not, over the last couple nights of debate he’s colored himself as the stupidest candidate.
Moving On
I remember why I and a few dozen other people voted for Dwight Evans in 2000. I like him. He’s probably a lot of people’s second choice. If we had a ranking voting system in place for the first round of a crowded election (like we should) Evans might actually win. But we don’t and he won’t. That’s a shame. For the record, here’s my ranking: Nutter, Evans, Brady, Fattah, Knox. If we really voted with a weighted system, I’d put Evans first and think harder in the runoff if he made it to the next round with Nutter.
In order of sheer, unapologetic arrogance, the candidates rank as follows: Fattah, Knox, Nutter, Evans, Brady.
Another thing. I don’t hate Chris Matthews. I never have. Sue me.
Fireworks
Fattah’s comment to Nutter’s level of blackness last night was as desperate as Bob Brady’s hope to be Philly’s next mayor. Still though, it was interesting to see Brady attack Knox to Fattah’s advantage, while Fattah attacked Nutter to his own. While I enjoyed watching Knox piss himself, while he shouted physical threats at Brady I’d hate to see Fattah win this. I like him less and less as this campaign wears on.
Predictions
If history means anything, the stupid, rich, white guy will win. Sorry to the smart, black public servant, but I’m pessimistic. Then again, you never know, this is Philadelphia. Where’s Marty Weinberg these days?
OK, back to normal commentary. Today I take on war and public education. Here are a few things that will crush your will to care.
The whole thing is broken by design.
All wars, every single one that’s ever been fought has been fought over either land, resources or a combination of these two things. Leaders and power brokers of the time create wars by claiming that they’re about other things like God, ideology or the nation. This is true from from Egypt to Osama bin Laden. Anyone who says it isn’t true is wrong. Sure people fight and die for other reasons, but none of those dead people ever started a war.
Moving on, Public Education is under funded on purpose. An educated population is not in the best interest of the state. This is well understood across the third world. No one in the U.S. seems to notice or care. If you don’t believe me, then why are public schools funded by local property taxes? Why do private schools exist at all?
I was once in a class at Penn where all the students from countries across South America (the elite of their respective countries) made this point to us stupid Americans. “Why is it so hard for you to believe. You’re no different.” And we aren’t. I’ve mentioned these things before on this site, but they’re worth repeating.
With all that said, I endorse Michael Nutter for mayor of Philadelphia. Thank you and goodnight.
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
PHILADELPHIA - After talks broke down late Monday, Community College of Philadelphia president Stephen Curtis watched helplessly as his teachers and staff walked off their jobs and took to the picket lines. “It was awful.” Recounted Curtis. “I didn’t know what to do. I usually have all the power here and suddenly I was powerless.”
That’s when the CCP President decided to call in the Pinkertons. “I wasn’t sure if they were still around. But there they were in the Yellow Pages. I called immediately.”
Wednesday morning, as the aging, professors buckled up their sandals for another day of strikes, the Pinkertons descended on the scene. Donning dark blue suits and bowler style hats, 50 mustached men on horseback paraded up Spring Garden Avenue, yelling threats and spitting on strikers as they arrived.
“They stood between us and these scab workers that they harvested from local graduate schools.” recounted biology professor Ralph Piles. “They told me that if I intervened, they’d split my skull open.”
Violence did erupt briefly as a team of Pinkertons threw English professor Judith Adler to the ground after she refused to let a scab professor pass. In a separate incident, an administrative worker was reportedly kicked in the head by a horse. The worker – who was not named – and Adler were taken to Jefferson Hospital late Wednesday afternoon. This evening, they were both listed in critical but stable condition.
Although it was unclear who initiated the violence with Adler, the Pinkerton tactic of intimidation has been extremely effective. “What can we do?” asked a frail, flabbergasted professor.
The rest of the day passed without incident as the strike was strong-armed into virtual submission. Mayor Street could not be reached for comment.
This is worth watching. Best part is at 5:30 or so, so keep watching.
Prediction: The United States and/or Israel will launch air strikes against Iran sometime between mid-March and early May. If it doesn’s happen then, there will be another push in the autumn. If it doesn’t happen then, it won’t. Keep your fingers crossed.
In other news, I’ve added a fade-in script to the photoblog. Now images will ease their way onto your screen like an old man into a warm bath. That’s all for now.
In light of the recent news that a young Barack Obama “trained” at a radical Muslim school in Indonesia, here are some other illuminating scandals to watch out for.
- Anonymous sources citing 5,000 year old papyrus manuscripts, allege that many of our leaders (including - Republican hopeful John McCain) actually belong to a race of human-reptilian hybrids of an alien origin.
- Where her clitoris should be, Hilary Clinton has a single male testicle.
- Sam Brownback wet his bed well into his 30’s.
- Russ Feingold was implicated in a 1994 plot to blow up Canada’s CN Tower.
- Republican George Allen was linked to a brutal string of ritualistic murders in the early 1980’s. During the reign of terror, Allen and accomplice were alleged to have beheaded at least a dozen prostitutes at truck stops across the Midwest.
- Evan Bayh’s first marriage ended because of his all consuming interests in model railroading and ham radio.
- Bill Richardson is a drunk.
- Denis Kucinich is short and funny looking.
That’s all for now.
Personally I’m upset that Rep. David Wu’s public comparison of Bush and neo-conservative ideologues to Star Trek’s Klingons is raising such ridicule among the masses. I think that had his analogy been more accurate, his statements had great communicative potential. But Klingons? Come on.
Wu’s remarks would have been much clearer (and better received) had he drawn a parallel between the neo-conservatives and the Dominion Founders, while linking Bush and like-minded Republicans to Gul Dukat and the Cardassian government. (After mid-2373 of course) In this comparison, Pakistan would (obviously) take on the role of the Klingon Empire with Iraq playing the part of Bajor. U.S. citizens are Jem’Hadar, with oil the equivalent of ketracel-white.
Unfortunately I can’t think of this world’s equivalent to the Vulcans.
A government consultant with close ties to the civilian leadership in the Pentagon said that Bush was “absolutely convinced that Iran is going to get the bomb” if it is not stopped. He said that the President believes that he must do “what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the courage to do,” and “that saving Iran is going to be his legacy.”
- Syemour Hersh for the New Yorker, April 2006
There was a glaring subtext to last night’s speech and to the last 4 years of Bush foreign policy that too few people are acknowledging or talking about. In George W. Bush’s mind right now, the entire war in Iraq, troop increases, decreases, debate, whatever, all of it is a red herring. This president wants a confrontation with Iran. As committed as this president once was to invading Iraq, he is now moving with the same determination towards an attack on Iran.
You can read about this conviction in Seymour Hersh’s articles in the New Yorker. You can hear it from the man himself with his announcement of a naval buildup in the Persian Gulf, or his refusal to bring Iran anywhere close to the dialogue concerning Iraq. You can read about last weekend’s leaked military reports out of Israel detailing planned “tactical nuclear” airstrikes on Iranian nuclear research facilities. After last night’s speech, Keith Olbermann pressed the escalation issue to little avail, repeatedly bringing up the point that Bush is trying with all his remaining power to expand this war to include Syria and Iran.
How to do it ?
The president’s power has become limited. Direct provocation or the fabrication of an event is key to the “success” of this expansion. This isn’t a conspiracy theory. Spain never blew up the Maine and the Gulf of Tonkin incident never actually happened. The first event ignited a war against Spain, while the second non-event opened the door for the massive escalation of the Vietnam War.
Digging deeper through American history, the Mexican American War began when the United States up and claimed a sliver of land near the Rio Grande previously under the control and occupation of Mexico. The army then walked onto that land and was attacked. Headlines read, “Mexican Army kills Americans on American soil.”
Foreknowledge or not, even Pearl Harbor was prodded and instigated.
The president’s push for a war with Iran is following this same, well tested path. Over the next year, the United States of America will work very hard to provoke or even invent an incident that justifies an escalation of the war onto Iranian soil. This escalation may be limited to airstrikes, or it may include another full invasion and regime change. This is obviously completely, outrageously and incomprehensibly insane.
So I’m in a mood tonight and my mind is attached wholly to ideas that I believe are clear and wide encompassing. This evening I discuss art or more specifically, the merits of photographing one’s own (if one is male) stream of ejaculate.
Why am I writing about this? I was reading Zoe Straus’s blog when I saw this post. Her photo of Mummer spewed silly string may have been unconsciously derived from photographer Andres Serrano’s ejaculation series.
Geoff Dyer wrote an entire book about street photographers influence on one another over the past 100 years. I strongly recommend buying and reading it. But that’s not my point.
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My point and my opinion is that Serrano’s work has reached a position of total and almost embarrassing obsolescence. The internet killed it. Photographs of blood and semen? Photographs of a semen stream?
Let me add here that at one time, the series wasn’t pointless. It roused all sorts of pretentious and important questions to do with freedom of expression and the limits of art. That time has long past.
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There was an argument in the Mexican muralist movement that muralism smashed the idea of easel painting. Painting in Mexico City (as it is in 2700 different ways in Philadelphia) was a public. It was not contained within a frame and exhibited in a prohibitive environment. It was vibrant, colorful and most importantly free and open to be witnessed and experienced by anyone at any time.
In contrast, museum art, or easel painting is restrictive. It’s selected and promoted by an elite class for an elite class. Even in the rare cases and selective times that they’re not cost prohibitive, museums are not inviting to proles. They’re constructed by upper and upper-uppers, mainly for the middles and above. (or to a lesser extent for the creative class itself)
That’s not to say there isn’t a place for museums. There absolutely is. But when a form or genre of artwork becomes so utterly separated between the world of the museum and the world of the world… that form or genre becomes wholly obsolete.
To come back to Serrano. Never again should a photo series of human semen find its way onto a museum wall. To illustrate this, turn your google safe search off and look for images of “cum.” Not extreme enough? Try “dog fucking” “dead bodies” “war dead” or “cock splitting.” Keep in mind that google image search is nowhere near comprehensive. The photo results you get barely skim the top layer off of a very deep and disturbing cesspool.
While muralists brought artwork outside the museum, technology and the ability to share and distribute any and all information, has given any individual with the access the means and the aptitude, the capacity to create and share a tremendous quantity of material with an unlimited audience.
This is the crux of the argument, so pay special attention here. I’m not saying that every citizen is now an artist or that every cumshot caught on camera makes every person who photographs semen an artist. I’m saying that any artist who takes a well balanced and aesthetically pleasing portrait of their own semen, isn’t really accomplishing anything.
So many photoblogs are filled with beautiful photos of apples, flower petals and housecats. There’s nothing wrong with them except that they’re boring. There’s nothing wrong with the photographers except that I see nothing truly significant in a perfectly composed still life.
New technology and the ability to share raw information freely and instantly has destroyed the significance of Serrano’s ejaculation series and the vast bulk of his other projects. There are millions of photos of semen. Nuns mastrubating, men drinking piss, blood, gore? It’s been done and published thousands of times.
Making a fine art portrait of one’s own semen is at this point about as edgy or artistically relevant as taking a really fine art portrait of the head of broccoli I’m about to eat. As muralists brought art out of the frame and into the public, the internet is storming the museums and tearing the frames apart.
As a person with a concern for the viability of freedom of expression, I can’t think of better news than the obsolescence or Andres Serrano’s art. Remember Jesse Helms damning Serrano’s Piss Christ on the Senate floor? The debate is over. People rightfully worry about so many of our rights being ceded and destroyed, but freedom of expression has never, in the history of the world been stronger. Serrano’s cumshot is now just a lonesome drop in a vast ocean of semen.
Ted Kennedy brought this up earlier today:
“It became clear that if we were prepared to stay the course, we could help to lay the cornerstone for a diverse and independent [region]. If we faltered, the forces of chaos would smell victory and decades of strife and aggression would stretch endlessly before us. The choice was clear. We would stay the course. And we shall stay the course.”
- Lyndon Johnson
