Thursday, June 11, 2009
you know what it's time for?
sort of a catch-22 here
Va. women's prison segregated lesbians, others
By DENA POTTER, Associated Press Writer
TROY, Va. – For more than a year, Virginia's largest women's prison rounded up inmates who had loose-fitting clothes, short hair or otherwise masculine looks, sending them to a unit officers derisively dubbed the "butch wing," prisoners and guards say.
Dozens were moved in an attempt to split up relationships and curb illegal sexual activity at the 1,200-inmate Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women, though some straight women were sent to the wing strictly because of their appearance, the inmates and corrections officers said.
Civil rights advocates called the moves unconstitutional punishment for "looking gay." The warden denied that any housing decisions were made based on looks or sexual orientation, and said doing so would be discriminatory. The practice was stopped recently after the Associated Press began questioning it, according to several inmates and one current employee.
Two current guards and one of their former co-workers said targeting masculine-looking inmates was a deliberate strategy by a building manager. Numerous inmates said in letters and interviews that they felt humiliated and stigmatized when guards took them to the separate wing — also referred to by prisoners and guards as the "little boys wing," "locker room wing" or "studs wing.".......
what is shepard smith doing on faux?
Fox host defends DHS report on right-wing extremists
By David Edwards and Muriel KaneWhile providing breaking coverage of Wednesday’s fatal shooting by a white supremacist at the Washington, DC Holocaust Museum, Fox News host Shepard Smith connected the crime with both the recent killing of abortion provider Dr. George Tiller and last April’s report on right-wing extremism from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
“For the second time in as many weeks” Smith stated, “a crime scene reminds me of a memo … from the government, warning, ‘Look out for crazy extremists out there about to go do weirdness.’”
Reporter Catherine Herridge agreed that “it does seem to be the act of an individual who had extremist views and … someone who did have a military history. And as you remember, that was the element of the right-wing intelligence assessment which was so controversial.”........
because i do so love gnarls
i thought this was all interesting AND cool as well (although sad in a way too)
Exclusive First Listen: Danger Mouse And Sparklehorse Team Up With David Lynch
Hear The Year's Most Mysterious Album In Its Entirety, Before Its Official Release
NPR.org, June 4, 2009 - When the first cryptic bits of news about Dark Night of the Soul began trickling in earlier this year, it all sounded too good to be true. Though the whole project was shrouded in mystery, it appeared that Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse's Mark Linkous, two of the most inspired artists making music today, were collaborating on a new album. That alone was enough to get our geek gears spinning with excitement. But there was an unusual twist that few of us at NPR Music could make sense of: Director David Lynch was somehow involved.
It all started back in March, at the South by Southwest music festival and conference. A number of us on the NPR Music team had noticed strange posters around downtown Austin, Texas, that read "Dark Night of the Soul." They looked like movie posters and had David Lynch's name on them, alongside names of some of our favorite artists, like Danger Mouse, Sparklehorse, Vic Chesnutt, Jason Lytle and more. We wondered if it was some sort of musical film.
A New CD That Has No Music, but Lots of Pictures
By BEN SISARIO
From the start, there was something mysterious about Danger Mouse’s latest project, “Dark Night of the Soul.”
Word of it first came at the South by Southwest music festival in March, on a poster that simply listed the name Danger Mouse — the record producer and member of the R&B duo Gnarls Barkley — along with the singer-songwriter Sparklehorse and, among others, the director David Lynch. A YouTube video in Mr. Lynch’s unmistakable style stirred interest but added no details.
It was classic teaser marketing. And yet when “Dark Night of the Soul” was finally unveiled a few weeks ago, it still left fans puzzled. The project, it turned out, is a large-format book-and-CD package that Danger Mouse was releasing by himself, with 50 photographs by Mr. Lynch intended as accompaniment to the album’s 13 songs. But the CD is blank and recordable, and a sticker on the shrink wrap explains cryptically: “For legal reasons, enclosed CD-R contains no music. Use it as you will.”...........pic: From left: David Lynch, Sparklehorse and Danger Mouse.
and
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
fuck faux 'news'
guess what faux speculated about the (alleged) murderer of stephen tyrone johns
Security guard shot dead inside National Holocaust Museum
...........Fox News spent considerable time Wednesday afternoon speculating whether the shooter was of Muslim descent, but stopped soon after MSNBC reported the shooter was white...........he was 88 or 89 (i should say is)
Stephen Tyrone Johns is dead. he was shot to death. he was murdered. the alleged killer is a white supremacist. mr johns worked at the holocaust museum for six years. HE WAS MURDERED BY A DOMESTIC TERRORIST. i am way more afraid of them than i am of any al qaeda or militant muslim.
to the family and friends of mr johns, my heart is with you. my thoughts and prayers as well.
we must stop the evil. no more dancing around. it MUST be stopped.
Gunman Shoots, Kills Guard at Holocaust Museum
Suspect Identified as White Supremacist
Washington Post Staff Writers
A lone gunman known to authorities as a white supremacist shot and fatally wounded a private security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in downtown Washington today before being shot and wounded by guards who returned fire, officials said.
The security guard, who police identified as 39-year-old Stephen Tyrone Johns of Temple Hills, and the gunman were both taken to George Washington University Hospital.
Johns died at the hospital, authorities said later, and the gunman, who was not identified, was reported to be in critical condition. A third person sustained minor injuries in the incident, according to police.
Museum officials said in a statement that Johns had worked at the museum for six years. The museum said it would be closed tomorrow, and lower its flags to half-staff, to honor Johns's memory. "There are no words to express our grief," the statement said.
A law enforcement source identified the gunman as James W. von Brunn, 88.............and why the HELL was this dude loose, read this: (he should have been behind bars FOREVER
Security Guard Is Killed in Shooting at Holocaust Museum in D.C.
............
The police chief, Cathy Lanier, said the gunman walked into the museum’s main entrance and simply began shooting without warning. Within moments, at least one security guard was returning fire, and a total of five or six shots are believed to have been fired.
Mr. von Brunn, whose latest address is believed to be in Eastern Maryland, was convicted in 1983 of trying to kidnap members of the Federal Reserve Board two years earlier. In that incident, he was captured by a guard in the board’s headquarters after running to the second floor, where the board was meeting. He was carrying a revolver, a hunting knife and a sawed-off shotgun in a shoulder bag, the police said..................Tuesday, June 09, 2009
please tell me we're NOT this lazy?
pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Beanzawave: The World's Smallest Microwave
...........The Beanzawave, which measures just 7.4 inches tall by 6.2 inches wide and 5.9 inches deep, doesn't even need to be plugged into an electrical outlet. The device contains a USB port, so mid-afternoon snacks can be heated up at the computer without expending excess power..........
(come on now, geeze. )
(via boing boing)
just like chiquita, shell washes their hands
here's a link to a link to all my chiquita postings
Shell settles Nigeria deaths case
Royal Dutch Shell has agreed to pay $15.5m to settle a lawsuit which accused the oil firm of complicity in rights abuses in Nigeria.
The case, due for trial in the US next week, was brought by relatives of a group of anti-Shell activists executed in 1995 by Nigeria's military rulers.
The families say Shell helped the government to punish the campaigners.
But the company insists it did nothing wrong and said the payment was part of a "process of reconciliation".
Shell official Malcolm Brinded said: "This gesture also acknowledges that, even though Shell had no part in the violence that took place, the plaintiffs and others have suffered."........
a death is a death
a murder a murder. a jew, a person of color, a man, a woman, a gypsy, a beggar, a blond-blue-eyed child. it's all the same. not one killing by the nazis (or anyone else for that matter - the turks committing GENOCIDE against the armenians for example) should go unacknowledged or unpunished
hey dov, you're an asswipe
No Gypsies, Tramps, Thieves Allowed at Brooklyn Holocaust Memorial
By PareeneEveryone knows (many people don't know) that the Nazis also exterminated homosexuals, gypsies, and Jehovah's Witnesses, so there is no reason to include that information on a Brooklyn Holocaust Memorial. Assemblyman Dov Hikind is fighting to keep the memorial pure!
City officials approved the addition of markers honoring some of those non-Jewish victims of the Nazis. But if this Sheepshead Bay memorial mentions the millions of non-Jews killed in the Holocaust, everyone will forget about the Jews, and then there will probably be some pogroms, or something............
Monday, June 08, 2009
i'm going to download this
and listen to it when i get home from work today (it's 2 am and i'm not doing it NOW)
Life of Emma Goldman on Tank Riot podcast
Posted by Cory Doctorow,
Viktor from the excellent Tank Riot podcast sez, "The Happy mutants at Tank Riot dedicated a show to the one and only Emma Goldman. The team discusses the intriguing life of the controversial 'Red Emma', an anarchist, free-speech advocate, social activist, and spokesperson for women's freedom and birth control rights............................
here's her wiki entry (i'm not all over being an anarchist but i AM all over women having equal rights, women speaking their minds and women being heard and listened to). i find her story interesting
once again i'm shouting out
happy birthday tetris!
25 and still counting
25 Years of Tetris: From Russia With Fun!
By Scott Olstad
Sputnik burned up in the atmosphere, Berlin is now one city, but 25 years later, the Soviet-designed Tetris remains one of the most popular and ubiquitous video games ever created. It has sold over 125 million copies, been released for nearly every video-game platform of the past two decades and even been played on the side of a skyscraper. Yet creator Alexey Pajitnov almost never saw a ruble for his creation. While studying at the Soviet Union's Academy of Science in 1984, the 29-year-old Pajitnov designed a bare-bones version of the game in his free time for the Elektronika 60, a Soviet terminal computer.................
pic:
Sunday, June 07, 2009
this is a DAMN good idea
i've never had my camera stolen but my friends have. (oh i've had OTHER stuff stolen all right)
how to do it at the link below
(DO IT)
make your camera theft proof: harness the power of ugly!
sunday humor insanity
Creation Museum "Scientists" Hilariously Explain How to be Skeptical of Science, But Accept the Bible Without Question
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Meg White
My wonderful boyfriend, knowing how much I love reading the ravings of religious nut jobs, sent me this article from the people who brought you the Creation Museum in Petersburg, KY called "Noting News: How to Interpret Science News."
The article itself does not feature a byline, but it appears on the Web site for Answers in Genesis (or AiG, as they shorten it), the organization that built the Creation Museum to support their beliefs about the incorrectness of evolution and the Big Bang.
The article is basically a checklist of how to deal with science writing when it contradicts creationism. But it contains a fair point: There are tons of inaccurate scientific articles in the media, especially about complex subjects and new discoveries that journalists don't have the time or training to fully understand on deadline. As someone trained in anthropology as well as journalism, I've struggled with the shortcomings of both academic and news compositions............
here they are
Gingrich: Americans ‘surrounded by paganism.’
On Friday, Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, and Oliver North visited Rock Church in Hampton Roads, Virginia to give a three-hour long lecture on “Rediscovering God in America.” The speakers warned the audience about the “continuing availability of abortion, the spread of gay rights, and attempts to remove religion from American public life and school history books.” The Virginia-Pilot reported that Gingrich argued that, while Christianity is the foundation of American citizenship, Americans are experiencing a period where they are being “surrounded by paganism”:.............well, they went ahead and did it
at any rate a shout out to governor bredesen for trying to STOP this ridiculousness and insanity
Tennessee lawmakers approve handguns in bars, override veto
By Joe Byrne
Both the Tennessee House of Representatives and the Senate have overruled a veto by Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen on a bill that makes carrying handguns into bars legal, it was announced Friday. Consuming alcohol while carrying a handgun will remain illegal, but those with a permit to carry a weapon will be allowed to do so in any restaurant or bar. Owners can still opt to ban handguns from their establishments.
Though the governor expected the state congress to vote against his veto, he stood by his decision in a statement released on Wednesday afternoon, after the House of Representatives voted 69-27 in favor of the override. “He’s disappointed with this action but that doesn’t change his belief that we can exercise our second amendment rights and common sense at the same time. He believes guns and bars simply don’t mix, and this legislation doesn’t provide the proper safeguards to ensure public safety.”.............