friday random ten

[Note: This is a randomized list of some of my favorite albums of 2009 so far...]



She's a River
Gurf Morlix
Last Exit to Happyland (Rootball)




Dirty Water
Shemekia Copeland
Never Going Back (Telarc)




Turbine Womb
Soap&Skin
Lovetune for Vacuum (Play It Again Sam)




Dos Fridas
The Diamond Center
My Only Companion (self released)




Norman Bleik
I Was a King
I Was a King (Hype City)




Get Yo Shit
Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears
Tell 'em What Your Name Is! (Lost HighwayRecords)




Dues Paid In Full
Ruthie Foster
The Truth According to Ruthie Foster (Blue Corn Music)




Hallway Master
Pikelet
Not So Still [EP] (Special Award)




In a Day
Girl in a Coma
Trio B.C. (Blackheart Records)




Lorca and the Orange Tree
The Mummers
Tale to Tell (Big Bass Drum)


bonus track:


Fuck Your God
The Callas
The Callas (Out of Tune Records)

thursday reads

Right-wing advocate for domestic terrorism arrested (Hartford Courant):

Internet radio host Hal Turner — accused of inciting Catholics to "take up arms" and singling out two Connecticut lawmakers and a state ethics official on a website — was taken into custody in New Jersey late Wednesday after state Capitol police in Connecticut obtained a warrant for his arrest.

Turner, who has been identified as a white supremacist and anti-Semite by several anti-racism groups, hosts an Internet radio program with an associated blog. On Tuesday, the blog included a post that promised to release the home addresses of state Rep. Michael Lawlor, state Sen. Andrew McDonald and Thomas Jones of the State Ethics Office.

"Mr. Turner's comments are above and beyond the threshold of free speech," Capitol Police Chief Michael J. Fallon said in an e-mail announcing the warrant. "He is inciting others through his website to commit acts of violence and has created fear and alarm. He should be held accountable for his conduct."

The Rachel Maddow Show: Red Alert


E.J. Dionne Jr. gets it:

A media environment that tilts to the right is obscuring what President Obama stands for and closing off political options that should be part of the public discussion.

Yes, you read that correctly: If you doubt that there is a conservative inclination in the media, consider which arguments you hear regularly and which you don't. When Rush Limbaugh sneezes or Newt Gingrich tweets, their views ricochet from the Internet to cable television and into the traditional media. It is remarkable how successful they are in setting what passes for the news agenda.

The power of the Limbaugh-Gingrich axis means that Obama is regularly cast as somewhere on the far left end of a truncated political spectrum. He's the guy who nominates a "racist" to the Supreme Court (though Gingrich retreated from the word yesterday), wants to weaken America's defenses against terrorism and is proposing a massive government takeover of the private economy. Steve Forbes, writing for his magazine, recently went so far as to compare Obama's economic policies to those of Juan Peron's Argentina.

Barbara Ehrenreich: Welcome to a Dying Industry, J-School Grads


America's Best Christian takes time to explain to less informed Christians the curious details of the Lord's concept of marriage.

wednesday reads

Emptywheel: Why Did CIA Hide Dick Cheney's Role in Briefing?


Alaska, Missouri, South Carolina and Texas opt-out of national academic standards.


Tom Engelhardt: To the Graduating Class of American Empire, 2009


New Zealand is ranked at number one, the United States is 83^rd and Iraq remains at the bottom of the ne Global Peace Index.


John Cole: The Genius of Zero Tolerance

tuesday reads

Greg Palast: Grand Theft Auto


Pratap Chatterjee: Is Halliburton Forgiven and Forgotten? Or How to Stay Out of Sight While Profiting From the War in Iraq


BLDGBLOG: Saddam's Palaces: An Interview with Richard Mosse


Bernard Chazelle: From the Oubliettes of History: the Negligibles

monday reads

Domestic terrorist assassinates Dr. George Tiller.

Jesus's Jihadis

McClatchy takes a look at the domestic right wing terrorist suspected in the assassination of Dr. Tiller.


Michael Moore: Goodbye, GM

saturday reads

Amnesty International called Saturday for an independent probe into the number of civilians killed in the final weeks of Sri Lanka's civil war and also urged the UN to reveal its own estimates. (AFP)


One Pissed Off Liberal: GBCW


Violet Blue: Don't Marry Me, Bro


Man who tracked Che for CIA awarded $1 billion in lawsuit (McClatchy)


Car-driven society poses health risk for Americans (Reuters)


Lucky duckies and perverted pandas

friday reads

Scott Horton on the torture photos coverup.


The commander of Fort Campbell army base in Kentucky has ordered a three-day suspension of regular duties to focus on a spike in suicides among his troops amid concern over a wider trend across the armed services. (AFP)


Dispatch from Mogadishu: One week in hell


Foreclosures, mortgage delinquencies climb at record rate.


Tomgram: William Astore, Educating Ourselves to Oblivion

wednesday reads

Sibel Edmonds: Two Sides of the Same Coin


Recently declassified documents obtained by investigators Jeremy Bigwood and Eva Golinger reveal that the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has invested more than $97 million in “decentralization” and “regional autonomy” projects and opposition political parties in Bolivia since 2002. (Bolivia Rising)


Andy Kroll: The Greatest Swindle Ever Sold


Scott Horton: Cheney Prepares the Twinkie Defense


Robert Reich: Sotomayor and the Republicans


'Western Germany Wants Stasi's Influence to Remain Hidden' (Spiegel Online)

The revelation that the policeman who shot Berlin student Benno Ohnesorg in 1967 was a spy for the Stasi East German intelligence service has led to an intense historical debate in Germany. Ohnesorg's death radicalized many students and is seen as one of the factors that lead to the 1968 student protest movement and the emergence of the far-left Baader-Meinhof terrorist group.

Now Germany is asking itself what would have happened if people had known that Karl-Heinz Kurras, the policeman who fired the fatal shot and became the epitome of what students saw as an authoritarian West German establishment, was a communist and a Stasi informant? Would 1968 have happened? Would the country have been terrorized by left-wing urban guerrillas for over a decade?

wednesday reads

Tomgram: Noam Chomsky, Unexceptional Americans


Emptywheel: The CIA's Comedy of Briefing List Errors


America's poor are its most generous givers (McClatchy)

The generosity of poor people isn't so much rare as rarely noticed, however. In fact, America's poor donate more, in percentage terms, than higher-income groups do, surveys of charitable giving show. What's more, their generosity declines less in hard times than the generosity of richer givers does.

"The lowest-income fifth (of the population) always give at more than their capacity," said Virginia Hodgkinson, former vice president for research at Independent Sector, a Washington-based association of major nonprofit agencies. "The next two-fifths give at capacity, and those above that are capable of giving two or three times more than they give."

Indeed, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' latest survey of consumer expenditure found that the poorest fifth of America's households contributed an average of 4.3 percent of their incomes to charitable organizations in 2007. The richest fifth gave at less than half that rate, 2.1 percent.

Darwinius masillae

monday reads

Chris Hedges: The Disease of Permanent War

A record number of suicides has prompted Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Chiarelli to launch a massive house-cleaning plan with orders to garrison, installation and medical commanders to revive lapsed health and welfare programs, and restore discipline in the barracks.


Glenn Greenwald: The myth of the parasitical bloggers


Torture News Roundup


Unpaid wage claims on the rise in Austin.


Will Patrick Roy return to the Avs as head coach?

friday reads

The Luis Ramirez Murder: A Logical Step in the Process of Establishing a Subhuman Class


Glenn Greenwald: Obama's kinder, gentler military commissions

What makes military commission so pernicious is that they signal that anytime the government wants to imprison people but can't obtain convictions under our normal system of justice, we'll just create a brand new system that diminishes due process just enough to ensure that the government wins. It tells the world that we don't trust our own justice system, that we're willing to use sham trials to imprison people for life or even execute them, and that what Bush did in perverting American justice was not fundamentally or radically wrong, but just was in need of a little tweaking. Like warrantless eavesdropping, extreme secrecy doctrines, concealment of torture evidence, blocking judicial review of executive lawbreaking, one can now add Bush's military commission system, albeit in modified form, to the growing list of despised Bush Terrorism policies that are now policies of Barack Obama.

Training a new generation of brown shirts.

The Explorers program, a coeducational affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America that began 60 years ago, is training thousands of young people in skills used to confront terrorism, illegal immigration and escalating border violence — an intense ratcheting up of one of the group’s longtime missions to prepare youths for more traditional jobs as police officers and firefighters.

“This is about being a true-blooded American guy and girl,” said A. J. Lowenthal, a sheriff’s deputy here in Imperial County, whose life clock, he says, is set around the Explorers events he helps run. “It fits right in with the honor and bravery of the Boy Scouts.”

The training, which leaders say is not intended to be applied outside the simulated Explorer setting, can involve chasing down illegal border crossers as well as more dangerous situations that include facing down terrorists and taking out “active shooters,” like those who bring gunfire and death to college campuses. In a simulation here of a raid on a marijuana field, several Explorers were instructed on how to quiet an obstreperous lookout.

The Cure for Layoffs: Fire the Boss!


Paul Krugman: "I have seen the future, and it won't work."


The MPAA is a 'price-fixing cartel'.

wednesday reads

Tamil war zone hospital hit again.


Glenn Greenwald on Jesse Ventura and the massive expansion of America's "Hard Left.


Conservatives Leading the World Headlong into the 18th Century


Pepe Escobar: Pipeline-Istan


More Than Nuremberg: Thaousands Prosecuted For War Crimes After World War II


Matt Taibbi: Being anti-torture doesn’t make you pro-terrorist

friday reads

Scott Horton: The Bush Era Torture-Homicides


Pentagon’s Black Budget Grows to More Than $50 Billion


Paul Krugman senses that prospects for fundamental financial reform are fading.


Naomi Klein on the bank bailouts.

thursday reads

Dan Froomkin: Complicity -- and Accountability -- on Torture


Scott Horton: Bolton's Spanish Delusions


Glenn Greenwald: What 'Oversight' Means in Washington


The "Churchill gene"

wednesday reads

Jane Hamsher: Bailout Recipients Spent $13 Million Lobbying Against Consumers, For Their Own Bonuses in 1Q 2009


Clear Channel implodes.


U.S. airstrikes in Afghanistan kill over 100 civilians.

Taliban takes control of Pakistan's Swat valley.

Spencer Ackerman: Send Warlords, Guns and Money

New Star Trek Movie

Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film As 'Fun, Watchable'

friday reads

Supreme Court Justice David Souter to retire.


May Day riots start a day early in Berlin.


Orcinus - The Far Right's First 100 Days: Shifting Into Overdrive


The Rude One: Arlen Specter, Tuesday Morning, First Light


Violet Blue: Why the SF Weekly should be 'whipped and gagged'


Rock Paper Scissors Spock Lizard

thursday reads

In a ruling in Madrid today, Judge Baltasar Garzón has announced that an inquiry into the Bush administration’s torture policymakers now will proceed to a formal criminal investigation.


'Probable' case of swine flu closes Austin school. Flu panic sweeps Texas.


Condi Rice pulls a Nixon

monday reads

Could the swine-flu outbreak be linked to a factory farm?


Europeans urged to avoid Mexico and US as swine flu death toll exceeds 100


Scott Horton: Broder for the Defense


Nick Turse: A Tsunami of Hunger


Jürgen Klinsmann sacked.

thursday reads

War Criminals

A newly declassified narrative of the Bush administration's advice to the CIA on harsh interrogations shows that the small group of Justice Department lawyers who wrote memos authorizing harsh interrogation techniques were operating not on their own but with direction from top administration officials, including then-Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

Ray McGovern: Obama Plays Hamlet; Shredders Hum

Terry Jones:If Dick Cheney can trumpet the 'success' of his torture policies without fear of retribution, why can't us ordinary criminals?


Lukery: First Merchant Bank exposed

wednesday reads

McClatchy - Report: Abusive tactics used in effort to find Iraq-al Qaida link

The Bush administration put relentless pressure on interrogators to use harsh methods on detainees in part to find evidence of cooperation between al Qaida and the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's regime, according to a former senior U.S. intelligence official and a former Army psychiatrist.

Such information would've provided a foundation for one of former President George W. Bush's main arguments for invading Iraq in 2003. No evidence has ever been found of operational ties between Osama bin Laden's terrorist network and Saddam's regime.

The use of abusive interrogation — widely considered torture — as part of Bush's quest for a rationale to invade Iraq came to light as the Senate issued a major report tracing the origin of the abuses and President Barack Obama opened the door to prosecuting former U.S. officials for approving them.

Spencer Ackerman: Senate Armed Services Document Outlines How Pentagon Used Torture Resistance Training in Interrogations

A wealth of new details emerged Tuesday about how techniques designed to help captured U.S. troops resist torture formed the basis for the post-9/11 interrogation policies of the Bush-era Pentagon.

Instructors of those techniques proved to be eager in 2002 and 2003 to disseminate them to an emerging crop of inexperienced military interrogators facing the prospect of wresting information out of new captives. “I believe our niche lies in the fact that we can provide the ability to exploit personnel based on how our enemies have done this type of thing over the last five decades,” said Joseph Witsch, an instructor for the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (JPRA), a component of U.S. Joint Forces Command that oversees the so-called Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Evasion (SERE) program for U.S. special forces, during a 2002 training session for U.S. military interrogators, according to a newly released report.

Emptywheel: Did Cheney Order Up Abu Zubaydah’s 83rd Waterboarding?

Moon of Alabama: The Sadism Report

The Colbert Coalition takes on NOM

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
The Colbert Coalition's Anti-Gay Marriage Ad
colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor NASA Name Contest

Do you know the difference between a rollergirl and a snack food?

Crackerjack vs. Frito Lay (via Texas Rollergirls)

"Plano-based snack company Frito-Lay North America, Inc. recently put the corporate kibosh on local rollergirl Colleen "Crackerjack" Bell's attempt to trademark her nickname for roller derby competitions. In their opposition, filed April 8, Frito-Lay essentially alleges that their tasty caramel popcorn treat runs the risk of being confused with a bunch of tough ladies who try to bruise each other while skating around a circular rink." – Austinist

Frito-Lay claims in their opposition of the roller derby-specific trademark that Crackerjack is merely descriptive, not a proper name; they claim there is a great likelihood of confusion between the candied popcorn and the rollergirl; that use of the word crackerjack by a rollergirl dilutes the connection between the words Cracker Jack and candy popcorn, and/or tarnishes the image of the snack; and finally they claim that Crackerjack is falsely suggesting a connection between herself and candied popcorn, and the insinuation is causing harm to Frito-Lay.

Crackerjack talks about her trademark on Austin Fox and CBS affiliates:
on Fox - http://tinyurl.com/crackerjack-FOX
on CBS - http://tinyurl.com/crackerjack-CBS

The story has also gotten coverage in the Madison, WI local press
http://77square.com/citylife/features/story_447246


Balderdash. Or should we say, Poppycock. If you still don’t get it, watch this:



We think that people are generally smart enough to tell the difference between a rollergirl and a snack. If we’re right, please tell Frito-Lay and encourage them to drop this opposition. http://www.fritolay.com/about-us/contact-us.html

friday reads

Glenn Greenwald on Obama's release of the OLC torture memos.

Didgby on "professional" courtesy.

Christy Hardin Smith asks: Which language is from Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn's seminal work The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956 and which is from US Department of Justice OLC memoranda issued in the last few years.

Spencer Ackerman on OCL's medieval documents.

---

$40M fuel theft prompts global manhunt

thursday reads

Can Paraguay's President Survive a Scandal?


Gov. Goodhair, jackass.


TMP interviews New York Time's Eric Lichtblau on the ongoing warnetless wiretapping program.


General Growth Properties Inc, the second-largest U.S. mall owner, filed for bankruptcy protection on Thursday in the biggest real estate failure in U.S. history.

tuesday reads

Spanish prosecutors will seek criminal charges against Alberto Gonzales and five high-ranking Bush administration officials for sanctioning torture at Guantánamo. (Scott Horton)


Frankin Wins Again!


Legalize drugs, reduce violence.


#@%*! thieving dwarves


teabagger blowback

monday reads

Soldiers close in on anti-government protesters after day of running battles in Bangkok.


A 5-day standoff with Somali pirates comes to an end.


Scott Horton: Upholding the red Cross


Longer Unemployment for Those 45 and Older


Paul Krugman on those crazy Republicans.

thursday reads

A landmark human rights lawsuit, accusing Royal Dutch Shell of complicity in the execution of author and human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa some 14 years ago, will proceed to trial in a New York courtroom.


billmon: Scalia's Nightmare

Maybe I'm wrong, maybe it was the electroshock therapy. But I've suspected for some time that conservatives would eventually have serious reservations about where Norm and his mouthpieces are trying to take them. Maybe it's finally dawning on some of them that making a federal case out this election contest risks a long-term disaster for the GOP -- one that would completely outweigh the short-term benefits of depriving the Democrats of their 59th vote.

After all, what Norm is threatening to do -- if he can't get his way in state court -- is to demand that the US Supremes go storming through the equal protection door they opened just a crack, and then promptly tried to close again, in Bush v. Gore.

Berlin's Admiralspalast theater will break new ground in May by staging the first production in Germany of the Mel Brooks musical "The Producers."

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Full Metal Budget
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

wednesday reads

Tom Engelhardt - Terminator Planet: Launching the Drone Wars


Army doctors pressured to not diagnose PTSD.


A military team sent to evaluate electrical problems at U.S. facilities in Iraq determined there was a high risk that flawed wiring could cause further “catastrophic results” — namely, the electrocutions of U.S. soldiers.


Pirates overboard


Cat Shit One - The Animated Series (h/t Truthdig)

tuesday reads

[An] ICRC report describes "three principal roles" played by medical professionals in the torture of prisoners in U.S. custody.


A newly leaked terrorism assessment from a law enforcement fusion center in Virginia shows that police and feds are targeting "historically black colleges" as "radicalization nodes" for terrorists.


Tomgram: Michael Klare, Boom Times for Criminal Syndicates


The Great State of Piffle

monday reads

Powerful Earthquake Strikes Central Italy


Glenn Greenwald: There are no excuses for ongoing concealment of torture memos


Moyers Journal: Maddoff Was A Piker -- America's Big Banks Are a Far Larger Fraudulent Ponzi Scheme


Visit the George W. Bush Presidential Librarium. (h/t watertiger)


Take the 2009 State of the Republican Party Survey.

friday reads

The U.S. unemployment rate soared to 8.5 percent in March, the highest since 1983, as employers slashed 663,000 jobs and cut workers' hours to the lowest on record, government data showed on Friday.


Joseph Stiglitz: "It's going to be bad, very bad"


Michael Lewis: Wall Street on the Tundra


James Wolcott: What's Wrong with Washington

New NIN Album!

Strobelight



track list:
1. intro skit
2. everybody's doing it (featuring chris martin, jay-z AND bono)
3. black t-shirt
4. pussygrinder (featuring sheryl crow)
5. coffin on the dancefloor
6. this rhythm is infected
7. slide to the dark side
8. even closer (featuring justin timberlake and maynard james keenan)
9. on the list (she's not)
10. clap trap crack slap
11. laid, paid and played (featuring fergie of the black eyed peas and al jourgensen)
12. feel like being dead again
13. still hurts (featuring alicia keys)
14. outro skit

drop me

Amanda Palmer - A Song for Roadrunner Records

tuesday reads

Scott Horton: Cheney's Snuff Squad


Billmon

Now the homeless unemployed have Mylar tents and air mattresses and plastic chairs for their camps, whereas in the '30s those things hadn't been invented yet.

Also the pictures are in color, instead of black and white.

So it all looks very, very different.

Stan Marsh takes us through the mortgage crisis.

monday reads

Scott Horton: Information Secured Through Torture Proved Unreliable, CIA Concluded


Chris Hedges: Obstruction of Justice


Juan Cole: Obama's Domino Theory


Jeremy Scahill: Why you'll be paying for the occupation for years to come, withdrawal or not.


Spiegel Online: US Used by Afghan Drug Clan to Take Out Rival

wednesday reads

Pepe Escobar - Liquid War: Postcard from Pipelineistan


Israel's military fired white phosphorus over crowded areas of Gaza repeatedly and indiscriminately in its three-week war, killing and injuring civilians and committing war crimes, Human Rights Watch said today.


EU without a Leader after Czech Government Collapses


Legal expert Michael Ratner calls the legal arguments made in the infamous Yoo memos, "Fuhrer's law."


CREW: Keeping tabs on all things TARP

Violet Blue - Stands Smoking & Drinking Gasoline, in a Lasso Shaped Circle of Matches, in The Kitchen, With Explosives in The Oven, on The Stove & in The Fridge While an Open One Gallon Can of Karate Lies Open on The Floor

Violet Blue - Stands Smoking & Drinking Gasoline, in a Lasso Shaped Circle of Matches, in The Kitchen, With Explosives in The Oven, on The Stove & in The Fridge While an Open One Gallon Can of Karate Lies Open on The Floor
Originally uploaded by merkley???

The Real Scandal of AIG

Robert Reich

The real scandal of AIG isn't just that American taxpayers have so far committed $170 billion to the giant insurer because it is thought to be too big to fail -- the most money ever funneled to a single company by a government since the dawn of capitalism -- nor even that AIG's notoriously failing executives, at the very unit responsible for the catastrophic credit-default swaps at the very center of the debacle, are planning to give themselves over $100 million in bonuses. The scandal is that even at this late date, even in a new administration dedicated to doing it all differently, Americans still have so little say over what is happening with our money.

[snip]

This sordid story of government helplessness in the face of massive taxpayer commitments illustrates better than anything to date why the government should take over any institution that's "too big to fail" and which has cost taxpayers dearly. Such institutions are no longer within the capitalist system because they are no longer accountable to the market. To whom should they be accountable? As long as taxpayers effectively own a large portion of them, they should be accountable to the government.

But if our very own Secretary of the Treasury doesn't even learn of the bonuses until months after AIG has decided to pay them, and cannot make stick his decision that they should not be paid, AIG is not even accountable to the government. That means AIG's executives -- using $170 billion of our money, so far -- are accountable to no one.

thursday reads

Executive Assassination Ring (Raw Story)

Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh dropped a bombshell on Tuesday when he told an audience at the University of Minnesota that the military was running an "executive assassination ring" throughout the Bush years which reported directly to former Vice President Dick Cheney.

The remark came out seemingly inadvertently when Hersh was asked by the moderator of a public discussion of "America's Constitutional Crisis" whether abuses of executive power, like those which occurred under Richard Nixon, continue to this day.

Hersh replied, "After 9/11, I haven’t written about this yet, but the Central Intelligence Agency was very deeply involved in domestic activities against people they thought to be enemies of the state. Without any legal authority for it. They haven’t been called on it yet."

Tomgram: Frida Berrigan, How Shovel-Ready Is the Pentagon?

FDA Approves Salmonella

WASHINGTON—Calling it "perfectly safe for the most part," and "not nearly as destructive or fatal as previously thought," the Food and Drug Administration approved the enterobacteria salmonella for human consumption this week.

The federal agency, which has struggled in recent years to contain the food-borne pathogen, and repeatedly failed to prevent tainted products from reaching store shelves, announced Monday that salmonella was now completely okay for all Americans to enjoy.

friday random ten

Dark Stormy Night
The Coolies
The Coolies (2001)



Everlasting Love
Sandra
Ten on One: (The Singles) (1987)



Follow Me Down
Swallow
Blow (1982)



Whisper
Schnell Fenster
The Sound of Trees (1988)



Beatles and the Stones
The House of Love
The House of Love (1990)



Ghetto Child
Shemekia Copeland
Turn the Heat Up (1998)



Vous comprenez pourquoi
Pas Chic Chic
Au contraire (2008)



She Bad She Throwed
Linus Pauling Quartet
All Things Are Light (2007)



Inquiring Minds
Hamell on Trial
Songs for Parents Who Enjoy Drugs (2006)



I'll Make You Happy
The Easybeats
It's 2 Easy (1966)


bonus track:



Dues Paid In Full
Ruthie Foster
The Truth According to Ruthie Foster (2009)

thursday reads

Naomi Wolf: Yoo and the Subversion of Liberty Narrowly Averted

The Rude One :John Yoo and His Merry Band of Traitorous Lawyers


Bloodbath in Ciudad Juarez.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Joke of the Day

Rove and Miers to testify under oath.


Rush Limbaugh, last asshole standing.


Unhappy with kosher salt, wingnut plans to market "Christian" salt.

wednesday reads

The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Sudan's president on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur.


This is "a great leader for conservatives"? Media Matters looks back at some of the worst of Limbaugh.


Digby: The Smoking Wreckage of Limbaugh Nation


Companies cut 697,000 jobs in the U.S. in February as the recession’s grip tightened, offering no sign the pace of the decline in payrolls is easing.


Gawker

All of the government's pesky market intrusions have people snapping up copies of Atlas Shrugged like they were bailout packages. Since it's not like Ayn Rand's laissez-faire fantasies got us into this mess.

tuesday reads

Fourteen masked, heavily armed gunmen remain at large today after launching an audacious commando-style attack on the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, killing six policemen and injuring seven players and officials.


Documents reveal that Bush gave himself sole power over terror suspects.


Rush Limbaugh really is the leader of the Republican Party.


Chip Ward: Rethinking National Security on a Sinking Planet


The building housing Cologne's municipal archive collapses.

monday reads

Tomgram: The Dictionary of American Empire-Speak


Narco-tourism


Socializing loses.


Astroturf "tea parties"


Wingnuts freak out

Prepare to be horrified

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse on what's to come...

friday random ten

Activity Grrrl
Evil Stig
Evil Stig (1995)



Fade Away and Radiate
Blondie
Singles Box [Disc 4] (2004)



I'm Gonna Booglarize You Baby
Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band
The Spotlight Kid (1972)



Welp, He's Gone
The Budget Girls
Miso Hornie 7" (1999)



Icarus
17 Pygmies
Captured In Ice (1985)



The Handclap Shake
Thee Almighty Handclaps
Make You Mine 7" (2006)



Question of Temperature
Lords of the New Church
Lords of the New Church (1982)



Mr. Evasion
The Pretty Things
S.F. Sorrow [Remastered] [Bonus Tracks] (2003)



The Art of Deception
The Act
Too Late at 20 (1981)



The Black Queen's Beads
Bob Crew and Charles Fox
Barbarella OST [Bonus Tracks] (2002)


bonus track:



I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives
Television Personalities
I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives 7" (1981)

album meme

1 : Go to Wikipedia. Hit “random” or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random The first random Wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2 : Go to Quotations Page and select “random quotations”
or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four or five words of the very last quote on the page is the title of your first album.

3: Go to Flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”
or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

4 : Use Photoshop or similar to put it all together.


My result:





1. Jola Sigmond

2. Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.
--Albert Szent-Györgyi (1893 - 1986)

3. Geat cover by attina


(h/t Echoes In The Wind)

wednesday reads

Tomgram: Michael Klare, A Pandemic of Economic Violence


The Senate is quietly preparing plans to investigate allegations of torture under President George W. Bush, according to comments published Wednesday by Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI).


Pirate Bay prosecutor altered the copyright-infringement charges Tuesday to make it easier to convict the four defendants who co-founded the world's most notorious BitTorrent tracker.


Report sharply criticizes sex education in Texas schools

tuesday reads

Paul Krugman: Banking on the Brink

American Insurance Group, the insurance giant that is 80-percent owned by the US government, is in discussions with the government to secure additional funds so it can keep operating after next Monday, when it will report the largest loss in U.S. corporate history, CNBC has learned.

Scott Horton: "The Stupid Party"

---

Greg Anderson

A federal judge has scheduled a hearing to determine whether Barry Bonds' former trainer, Greg Anderson, will agree to testify when the home run king's perjury trial begins next month in San Francisco, although Anderson is not expected to change his mind about helping the government prove its case against Bonds.

U.S. District Court Judge Susan Illston, who will preside over Bonds' trial when it is set to begin March 2, ordered Anderson to appear at a morning hearing Wednesday. Illston told the United States Marshals Service to notify Anderson about the hearing, and to provide him transportation to the courthouse if necessary.

Anderson's attorney, Paula Canny, told the Daily News last week that it is unlikely that the trainer will agree to testify at Bonds' trial, as he has refused to do in the past. Anderson spent more than a year in prison for contempt of court rather than testify against his former client, and if he refuses to testify next month, he could be jailed for the duration of the trial, which is expected to last up to three weeks.

Karl Rove

For the third time, the former Bush official – and newly crowned king of D.C. TwitsTwitterers – failed to appear before the House Judiciary Committee to testify about his alleged involvement in the firing of U.S. Attorneys and the alleged political prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.

Rove's no-show Monday is not surprising – especially to Siegelman, who said Monday in an exclusive Raw Story interview that Rove will never testify under oath "because he is guilty as sin." Rove's attorney has vehemently denied that his client was involved in the prosecution of Siegelman.

Will the House hold Rove in contempt before March 4?

Lance Link

Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp is an American television show that originally aired on ABC from September 12, 1970, to September 2, 1972. The Saturday morning live-action film series featured a cast of chimpanzees given apparent speaking roles by overdubbing with human voices.

The Reluctant Robot



The Royal Foil

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Lancelot Link and the Evolution Revolution
Lancelot Link and the Evolution Revolution
(ABC S-175 [1970])

A1 Sha-La Love You
A2 Teaser
A3 Wild Dreams (Jelly Beans)
A4 Kissin' Doll
A5 Magic Feeling
A6 Live
B1 Rollin' in the Clover
B2 Yummy Love
B3 Vibrations
B4 Daydreams
B5 Blind Date
B6 The Evolution Revolution

saturday reads

Sam Quinones writes in Foreign Policy about Mexico's State of War.


Threat Level: With Landmark Trial Half Over, Pirate Bay Crew Celebrates Early Victories


“We’ll hire clowns from Wall Street”


Republicons investing heavily to keep Al Franken from being seated as Senator.


Bob Herbert: The Invisible War


Charges will not be filed against 323 people who were arrested on the Marion Street and Cedar Street bridges during the fourth day of the Republican National Convention, the St. Paul city attorney’s office announced today.


What Digby said.

friday reads

Scott Horton: Our Voyage to Brobdingnag


Michael Hudson: The Oligarch's Escape Plan


Joseph L. Galloway: Afghanistan has the smell of South Vietnam in 1965


Rastî: Capitalists, Mercenaries, and the Same State Secrets Privilege


Prosecution Baffled by Pirate Bay's Anarchic Structure


The British government has banned Fred Phelps and his daughter Shirley Phelps-Roper from entering the United Kingdom.


RNC Chairman Michael Steele, beyond cutting-edge.

friday random ten

All Her Favorite Fruit (Orchestral Version)
Camper Van Beethoven
Camper Van Beethoven Is Dead. Long Live Camper Van Beethoven (2000)



Baby Dragon
Old Time Relijun
Songbook Volume 1 (1997)



Weighing Anchor
I Was a King
I Was a King (2009)



Sinun tässä salissa
Regina
Puutarhatrilogia (2009)



Bad Time
The Boonaraas!!!
Go Get Goo Goo (2003)



Alamo
Jaks
Here Lies the Body of Jaks (2005)



A história da vida de cada um
Autoramas
Vida Real (2001)



You're My Girl
The Cavestompers!
The Cavestompers! (2008)



Manic D
Beefeater
Plays For Lovers / House Burning Down (1992)



You'll Know Why
The Miracle Workers
Inside Out (1985)


Bonus track:



Crow Baby
The March Violets
Natural History (1984)