aren’t we all bankrupt?
yesterday in nz herald, “even as house prices are at ‘histrical’ low, people are still not buying. and banks ain’t helping”
then they go on about affordability in housing prices here in nz. Most ‘affordable’ is Southland, middle of nothingness in the south island. sheep country, stunningly beautiful, but no way for people to make a living other than farming/tourism.
The houses there are very cheap compared to Auckland, so i could put my nest egg there and buy, but i could still not ‘afford’ the house, due to my inability of making an income.
Why do people consider affordable only in form of buying price, and not in form of upkeep. I read somewhere that most people that lost houses during the great depression did not loose them because they did not pay their mortgage, they lost their houses because they could not afford the upkeep, maintenance i.e. Rates, Taxes and such.
i continue to rent and buy with cash, i like the flexibility that comes with it, i sleep better that way.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 21 2009 20:26 utc | 3

I’m sure you’re right the financial sector in UK has been too big, and it will go down the drain.
In between time I thought this story about how far things have gone in Iceland tells us how other countries may go.
Iceland’s government is on the point of collapse as angry protesters stake out the parliament in Reykjavik

Our currency has lost more than half its value, rampant inflation has already eaten up most people’s savings, property values have dropped by more than a third and unemployment is reaching levels never seen before in the life of our young republic. The fault is clearly shared between the business elite and the government, which failed to regulate the newly privatised financial sector, allowing a few incompetent and egotistical business tycoons to gamble with the nation’s fortune. And yet neither the government nor the bankers – who, by the way, seem to have disappeared into the cold thin air – see anything wrong with their own behaviour.

Posted by: Alex | Jan 21 2009 20:52 utc | 5

In this country, we have certain constitutional protections. One of the most important of these is the presumption of innocence. But as I’ve posted repeatedly in the past, this no longer exists in drunk driving cases. See, for example, Whatever Happened to the Presumption of Innocence? and If You Can’t Prove It, Make the Defendant Disprove It. And for those who think this is limited to DUIs, keep in mind that we are a nation of legal precedent — that if the Constitution is ignored in drunk driving cases today, it can be ignored in free speech cases tomorrow.

From the very excellent DUI Blog.

Posted by: Jeremiah | Jan 21 2009 21:24 utc | 7

the contemptible creature livni leading the europeans at the eu in thei babitual dance of betrayal to the palestinians
like apartheid south africa – they are completely fucking stupid. so fucking stupid. they talk about the facts on the ground being changed
well, they have changed allright in way the state of israel & its complicit crew cannot comprehend
they have lost the war & their brutality on show for many decades has become too much for the mass of people. & like woseto you cannot turn the clock back – it is going to be a terrible terrible time for the palestinian as it was for south africans after soweto
after soweto the ‘leaders’ of apartheid south africa went mad – weekafter week of bloody murder & that is exacly the path that israel will take especially with that brutal buffoon netanyahu at is head but the liberation of the palestinan people is a certainty as the liveration of south africa was inevitable
now, i finally comprehend – perhaps i am too slow – what ahmadinijad said – & it is a correct assertion. the world could not live with south africa as the world cannot live with israel – something very fundamental needs to be altered

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 21 2009 21:42 utc | 9

an extraordianry film – ‘memories of rain’ – about the underground in apartheid south africa – profoundly resonant – directed tby two german women filmakers – extraordiany care & precision

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 21 2009 22:14 utc | 11

Someone much wiser than I once wrote:

Also, to be honest, over the past few months I’ve noticed a definite deterioration in the quality of the conversation here at the bar. Trolls I can usually give the bum’s rush pretty quickly – at least most of the time. But I’m seeing more and more stuff on the threads that strikes me as marginal at best – people who seem to get their main kick out of insulting or picking fights with the other patrons; people who don’t have anything particularly intelligent to say, and aren’t very articulate about saying it; people who don’t seem to have anything better to do with their time than to cut and paste long passages from mainstream media stories, or the unabridged lyrics of old rock ‘n roll songs; people who appear to be mentally unbalanced, and not always in a good way.

I fear I’m becoming one of these people, and I don’t want to be. As a *very* long time reader, I may come across in many of my comments as “hey I own the place, too”, when I realize indeed, it is quite the opposite. Many of the heads that visit this blog are astonishingly bright, and I think my casual relationship (“I post on days when I have the time” yada yada..)has been a bit less than respectful of people’s time.
For the time being, I’ll be content to share links in the OT threads (which i hope b will keep in plentiful supply) that I think MoA readers will appreciate, and take a step back from the “Post” button while my keyboard’s still aflame.
h/t to Malooga (who’s post b frontpaged the other day) for a great post that made me reconsider how/why I post here.
(raises glass)

Posted by: Jeremiah | Jan 21 2009 22:56 utc | 13

Drunkasarule
stupid racist insinuation in the name. Certainly not Irish.
Ireland is in the Euro and is very sound . They have problems with land bought at too high a price. The one who supplies land stopped making it long ago. It will rise again.
USA toxic paper is not a feature.
Sterling will fail in the near future when North sea Gas runs low as they have nothing to sell. It will try to join the Euro.

Posted by: watcher | Jan 21 2009 23:26 utc | 15

“And then what?”
Obama declares martial law, the entire apparatus is in place.
Rather than associating Obama with hope or (positive) change, think of him as the Official Decommissioner of our society, the same way our excess military bases were decommissioned some years ago and turned into something else or left vacant.

Posted by: James Crow | Jan 21 2009 23:43 utc | 17

james crow
it is not me that associates Obama with hope and/or change, but it does scare me that so many believe that slogans and buzzwords can bring change/hope.
the reality is so grim, and the ‘leaders’ so useless, maybe the masses need slogan and buzzwords to be kept in place.
Collective mass denial, yes we can!!!!
It does scare me, as i will be one of the many thrown under the bus.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 22 2009 0:06 utc | 19

Here’s a cool graphic from Ezra Klein.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jan 22 2009 0:33 utc | 21

what an extraordinary film
it is like having a part of your life explained to you
& the resonance with what is happening in occupied palestine
the murderousness of the state of israel is exactly the same as apartheid south africa
watching this film & remembering when inkatha was used against the anc – the last breath of apartheid – how bloody it was & how removed were the racist scum from their own acts & the filth of the policy, the filth is exactly the same that comes out of the mouths of a livni, an omert, a negev

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 22 2009 1:34 utc | 23

U$@24
I guess I don’t have a monopoly on weird, and I had so hoped 🙂
The Plague scare reeks of something funny. I originally found it on the RSOE EDIS website and now it has started to filter into the mainstream press. I can only imagine what is really going on, but one thing the RSOE article mentioned was how easy to treat with modern antibiotics the disease is. I wonder why they chose to mention this?
Remember these “Oops!” moments?
Monkeying around with ebola
Enough to make me lose sleep at night.
And something I’ve always expected is starting to be proven…
HIV=AIDS?
I thought it was weird the HIV virus was blamed for so many AIDS cases, yet I’ve known quite a few people with HIV that never showed any symptoms of AIDS. I wonder how many lives have been changed because people wrongly believed they were going to die?
If you want longer, better written scary bug books read Michael Crichton.
And remember the truth is always stranger than the fiction.

Posted by: David | Jan 22 2009 2:30 utc | 25

Agree with you David re HIV ≠ AIDS.
A good place to start looking for those that are interested is ‘Rethinking AIDS’ since this is a non-partisan, non-profit grouping of concerned scientists.
http://rethinkingaids.com.93.seekdotnet.com/Content/AboutRA/tabid/59/Default.aspx
[Disclosure : I am a signatory]

Posted by: Anonymous | Jan 22 2009 3:51 utc | 27

CIA Director Hayden talks about torture. “Yeah, we did it, but our motives were pure…”

Posted by: Obelix | Jan 22 2009 4:49 utc | 29

It seems the israeli plan to hide their crimes by keeping the media out of Gaza hasn’t suceeded in concealing all the psychopathic behaviour of the IDF.
This BBC story here concealed under the seemingly innocuous headline “Father finds out child survived” details a hooror story that has just been shown on the main evening news here in NZ.
During the horror of Gaza last week, an israeli tank pulled up outside a house on Northern Gaza and thru a loadspeaker demanded all occupants come out. Three young girls came out of the house along with their grandmother who was holding a tick with an improvised white flag attached. The children were standing in a line while one IDF asshole dismounted from the tank and shot the girls one by one with an automatic rifle. Two of the children died on the spot the third who seems about 9 or 10 was wounded, shot in the spine she will never walk again.
GranMa who was shot in the arm said the other soldiers sat eating chocolate and crisps, laughing while the psychopath slowly murdered the little girls.
Of course maybe the children being killed was deliberate not just the accidental slaughter of a serial killer armed by the state which the israelis would like the most cynical to believe, but a serious planned attempt to restrict Palestinian population growth.
Whatever the real reason was, unless an independent investigation is forced upon the israeli pricks doing this we all know what the outcome of an investigation will be. Despite the many witnesses to the contrary who have told the same story unaware of the others corroboration, the murdering israeli soldiers will claim they were being shot at. israel will announce the result and refuse to resile from it even if a video of the horror is produced.
israeli racism towards arabs has become so bad that israelis will refuse to believe whatever a palestinian says, no matter how much evidence is produced, no matter how irrational the israeli ‘excuse’ sounds. The murdering fools can’t see that others won’t believe a word of their lies and that more and more people are coming to regard israel as a nation of mendacious murderers.
So they stay eating and laughing while under fire? yeah we’re the brave IDF. Yeah right, assholes. . .

Posted by: Debs is dead | Jan 22 2009 6:04 utc | 31

there is so much more tragedy debs, the counting has just begun. i remember reading about that family @ the guardian link a few days ago. they just shot them.

Posted by: annie | Jan 22 2009 6:29 utc | 33

The PackBot is only one of the many new unmanned systems operating in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan today. When U.S. forces went into Iraq in 2003, they had zero robotic units on the ground. By the end of 2004, the number was up to 150. By the end of 2005 it was 2,400, and it more than doubled the next year. By the end of 2008, it was projected to reach as high as 12,000. And these weapons are just the first generation. Already in the prototype stage are varieties of unmanned weapons and exotic technologies, from automated machine guns and robotic ­stretcher ­bearers to tiny but lethal robots the size of insects, which look like they are straight out of the wildest science fiction. Pentagon planners are having to figure out not only how to use machines such as the PackBot in the wars of today, but also how they should plan for battlefields in the near future that will be, as one officer put it, “largely robotic.”
…
And they are changing the experience of war itself. This is leading some of the first generation of soldiers working with robots to worry that war waged by remote control will come to seem too easy, too tempting. More than a century ago, General Robert E. Lee famously observed, “It is good that we find war so horrible, or else we would become fond of it.” He didn’t contemplate a time when a pilot could “go to war” by commuting to work each morning in his Toyota to a cubicle where he could shoot missiles at an enemy thousands of miles away and then make it home in time for his kid’s soccer ­practice.
As our weapons are designed to have ever more autonomy, deeper questions arise. Can the new armaments reliably separate friend from foe? What laws and ethical codes apply? What are we saying when we send out unmanned ma­chines to fight for us? What is the “message” that those on the other side receive? Ultimately, how will humans remain masters of weapons that are immeasurably faster and more “intelligent” than they ­are?

Wilson Center via A&L Daily.
Note: I bolded the second paragraph because i thought it was an interesting turn of phrase to lay the responsibility for friend/foe identity on “new armaments” as opposed to the actual planners who call the shots.

Posted by: Jeremiah | Jan 22 2009 8:17 utc | 35

Thanks to Uncle $cam and David @ 24 and 25. One can only wonder if something along these lines is going to be “surfaced” to further some nefarious agenda.
In the last months of the W administration one frequently read of insiders who were waiting until January 20 to “tell all” (or at least blow some whistles). If indeed such exposés are forthcoming it might put the question of prosecution on the front burner (but I am not holding my breath while waiting). Any links in this regard would be highly welcome.
A further question to those interested: Does anyone have access to the information
hinted at in this link regarding the attack on the USS Liberty from W. Madsen’s site? The usual grain of salt would be needed in evalutating the contents, but the question is, to me, still of great interest, and a continuing scandal.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Jan 22 2009 10:03 utc | 37

A partial (self)-response to a point raised in 37:
New revelations from Tice. Not much that wasn’t already conjectured by anyone with a minimally functional paranoia gland, but perhaps this is a trickle that will become a stream and then a river of revelations.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Jan 22 2009 11:00 utc | 39

Debs id dead @ 40
The controversy as to whether HIV has anything to do with AIDS is not anti-gay in the least, and it is not a conspiracy theory. It’s called science. That is how science works : someone thinks they have discovered something and it seems to be correct. Then there are just too many anomalies, the hypothesis is altered, and new discoveries are made. And so on.
Generally this proceeds quietly without much fuss, unless the science challenges a powerful orthodoxy, a blight that goes back at least as far as Gallileo versus the church. Virtually no scientific theory has stood the test of time and remained unchallenged or unchanged.
But with AIDS – probably because of the gay connection in part – everything has been stood on its head : see here for example. Gallo who claimed to have made the discovery has been shown to be a crook who has made millions from it, and Montagnier who did discover HIV (and won this year’s Nobel Prize in Medicine) has stated publicly that HIV alone does not cause AIDS.
The HIV thesis – that this is the causative agent for AIDS – has been an unmitigated disaster driven by money, money, phoney reputations, big pharma, and more money. So much so that the pushers of this theory (many of them paid) have managed to turn it into a religion, with disciples and followers, very few who of whom know anything at all about science.
And this religious zeal has set back the chances of a real cure, despite the billions of dollars spent on AIDS research. Actually, that is wrong. I mean spent on HIV research : anyone that does not buy the HIV = AIDS theory does not get funded. And what has it led to? The use of retroviral drugs that were discovered over 20 years ago, tested for cancer treatment, then discarded because they were toxic and didn’t work. So there they sat on big pharma shelves until the big HIV opportunity came along.
Where are the big new discoveries,after the expenditure of billions of dollars and the sacrifice of tens of thousands of monkeys in vaccine research? I am unaware of a single disease-causing virus for which a vaccine has not been quickly developed when money is applied to the problem.

Posted by: Fred | Jan 22 2009 12:25 utc | 41

Yes David @42
That is truly another disastrous consequence of the HIV thesis (religion). It does not fulfill Koch’s postulates : in particular, if you inject HIV into monkeys they do not get AIDS, or anything like it (just flu-like symptoms). OK the HIV disciples say, but would you inject yourself with it ? As a matter of fact I would, – and many have, and some can be found on U Tube if they have not been removed.
But when these volunteers don’t develop AIDS, the answer of course is ah, but just wait, you will even if it takes 20 years “incubation”. You can’t win, and meantime you are stuck with the “stigma” of being HIV-positive which big pharma has ensured will affect your insurance policies and even travel to some places.

Posted by: Fred | Jan 22 2009 14:29 utc | 43

b real@44
That reads like a Monty Python script, except I guess it’s real, which makes it really scary.
“People may still die, but it will be a secondary consequence,” Canning said.
I’m sure for the person or people dying it will feel like a first consequence. But as long as these machines only kill in the name of g_d it’ll be OK!

Posted by: David | Jan 22 2009 16:04 utc | 45

Hey Bernhard Paul Craig Roberts has publicy catch your purpose about CDS. Do you think that this position will gain enough steam to prevent the worst scenarios??

Posted by: C.A. | Jan 22 2009 16:22 utc | 47

For Israel the issue now is not just guns but also butter as Israel cannot revitalize its moribund economy nor recoup its spent WMDs thrown at Gaza the way German weapons were thrown at a surrounded and strangled Warsaw Ghetto. Some Israelis have chosen to do onto the Palestinians what the Germans did onto the Jews– that makes them “Zionazis”! In fact, their lebensraum policy– not HAMAS trash-can rockets– that produced thousands of empty houses at US taxpayers’ expense for non-existent olims. Sharon’s command that by 2020 all Jews must make the Great Aliyah to Israel or they will be damned because “they will lose their Jewish souls,” was fell on deaf Diaspora ears. Today 78% of all the “settlers’ homes” built are empty because there are no settlers; these edifices are merely “facts on the ground” for Greater Israel expansionism. HAMAS, an Egyptian Muslim Fundamentalist group, was brought to Gaza by Sharon in hope that it would destroy the PLO, a Palestinian secular nationalist leader recognized as representative of the Palestinians by the world. BUT THERE IS ONE ISRAELI GOAL THAT EXPLAINS EVERY BULLET, MISSILE OR PHOSPHOROUS BOMB THROWN BY THE IDF: TO KILL THE PALESTINIANS THAT WILL NOT LEAVE WITH A BRUTAL “IRON WALL.” Now here’s the problem with that. The Israel the Zionazis built is a 60 years old expanding fetus of a state living off an engorged American $ placenta. But the US is now broke, so the placenta will shrivel. Livni hoped to create an anti-Semitic backfire to Stampede Diaspora Jews to Israel with all their assets. But most World Jewry deems Israel a nice place to visit but they wouldn’t want to live there. So, no more money from a broke US…no more olims for the Great Aliyah. The future looks bleak for Israel as a nation unless Iran gets its puny A-bomb and the Arabs run to Israel’s nuclear umbrella for deterrent security. And, as we lose our addiction to Arab oil, Arab leaders will realize that their nations can’t live as one crop (oil) banana republics without violent revolutions. If Israel creates a common economy with the Palestinians in a two-states format, the Palestinians will serve as Israel’s brokers for integration of Israel into the region. It can then lead its neighbors to high-tech modernization, thus becoming what the Founding Fathers of Zionism had originally hoped for: that Israel become “a light onto the [Arab] nations.” That requires that Israel be ruled by decedents of the Progressives who originated that idea and saw the poison of “lebensraum Zionazism”– their term, not mine–for what it is. Learning to speak Arabic will do more for Israel’s security that learning to fly a bomber. The placenta is shriveled and the garbage spewed by that hefty trash bag, Abe Foxman, will never rein gorge it again. A few years ago, at a Zionist Conference, he apologized for not focusing on Zionism because his so-called ‘Anti-Defamation League” was too busy fighting “assimilation” by cursing groups like Jews for Jesus as anti-Semites. Well, 50% and growing of Jews are so assimilated that Israel is no more to them than a Holy Land to visit. The Diaspora is very loyal to its homelands in Europe and America, not to the Great Aliyah. The Diaspora will not be stampeded by a call to form a Fifth Column for the Zionazis. So Israel must invariably become an integrated leader of the Arabs, its long lost cousins, into modernity for the sake of Jews and Muslims alike. Bush and Sharon made that inevitable by rendering any other solution untenable; and political opportunism by Olmert, Livni and Barak has only made them a footnote in a shameful bloody Zionazi history, discrediting lebensraum’s immoral means and ends. I pray the anti-Semitism that these three tried to provoke in order to force a Great Aliyah in fear is as dead as the Zionazi dream of a Jewish state from the Nile to the Euphrates.

Posted by: DE Teodoru | Jan 22 2009 17:05 utc | 49

Many of the people I knew who were HIV, never, ever got sick.
i knew a person who lived w/HIV for 10 years w/minimal illness. then i called one day to invite him to a party and found out he’d died of aids quickly a few weeks before. there was a time that would never have happened because word spread so fast when someone in the gay community i was intimately connected with passed.
but that group i partied w/ (SF hunga dunga/greenleaf) are all for the most part long gone. dead. all of them. the acid/orgie/parites and the days of harvey in the castro, my generation of gay people from SF, at least the ones i knew, they are all dead. dead. i have my photos. group photos. me and sarah and her daughter layla are the only ones still alive. every other face dead. gone just dead. anyone can go to the SF library and check out the Annemarie Madison Papers to read their letters and journals and see the photos. steve and lizzie and joel and raymond, butch..richard, oh well no sense naming them all. the christmas parties and pool parties up in sonoma, gone w/my youth.
we must have hung w/different crowds in SF david, cuz all my gay friends from that era are long gone. dead. i’m not dishing your experience of knowing lots of people who had HIV and never got AIDS, but i would have to say it is completely divorced from my personal experience. i went to more funerals than to care to remember. i suppose it is normal for people to look back on their youthful past and remember how young and beautiful and wonderful everyone was. i feel really lucky to have lived and loved then, but its such a fucking bummer all my friends from those days are gone. we had about 15 good years together and i will always cherish the memories of how we met and gravitated to eachother. i was very very lucky.
anyway, sorry for the musings. i guess that’s part of what OT threads are for.

Posted by: annie | Jan 22 2009 18:28 utc | 51

I read years ago that private debt in Britain outweighed private income: in other words, the nation was living off its credit cards.
And I remember a time when almost every third ad on British Television was from a company either offering quick, easy credit or offering debt consolidation loans.
And after new Year’s there was always a spate of ads offering detox cures and preparations…somehow there seems to be a connection related to their behavio(u)r.

Posted by: ralphieboy | Jan 22 2009 19:20 utc | 53

i want to again sing the praises of the film memories of rain
never have i seen a film that reflected my own experiences & its proper problematic
the film is like battle of algiers because even though it doesn’t feel in the least pedagogic – it is indeed instructional. at a level deep in our hearts
it also goes to the heart of my absence of interest in obama because i have known state power all my life & i am quite sure the renseignement generaux ici are quite familiar with my communications tho i imagine that a community artist/teacher, to them is small potatoes
i understand enough of my marxism to tell me that we are all in our different countries going to pass theough a period of even more overt & covert repression
i am certain, that once again i will feel in one way or other the fascists boot. as will, you. so too, our community. that is not romanticism – quite the contrary – power, especially in our time cannot live with any form of resistance & if i am not dealt with then my brother or my sister down the line will be
for the last month it is my palestinian brothers & sisters who have felt that boot & frankly my brothers & sister, including myself even though we fight in all our ways against power, are the beneficiaries
i had an argument yesterday with my colleague – who being a cultivated men & politcally rigorous – cannot findi it in his heart to defend hamas – for me hamas is a tool in the hand of the palestinian people & not the other way around & i asked him to be aware of the seas of murder that create armed struggle & that the nature of that armed struggle has a character often determined by your enemies. i wanted to make clear to him – that if the people applies gandhi’s lessons there would be further bloodbaths & it is important that the so called israeli peace movement dissapeared up its own ass
to defeat the us empire in vietnam it took a great deal of work on every front both in vietnam & internationally – but the connection made the defeat of the us inevitable. the courage of the youth, the student & workers dismantled the dictatorship in greece that u s imperialism created. apartheid south africa was defeated at home & abroad as israel shall be defeated
the wondrous & multiple people of all latin america have taken their destiny in their own hands & i will not judge their delicate & clumsy movements towards their liberation. it is in their hands & we ought to support them at every turn
the aspect of writing here may be small but it a truism to say that we live in times every bit as dark as the times of galileo, of vico, of bruno & journalism has been degrade to a point where it is of no use whatsoever. none at all. research, yes. connections, yes. creating card & maps of our proper oppression. yes. there are people who are writing, reporting or transcribing the truth(s) of their struggle & yes they are useful. more than useful, necessary
resistance is built brick by brick & that is what we are doing here – building
i imagine it is the error that some of my sisters make. they think that i or a malooga or a debs are destroyers but in fact in our crude & perhaps inefficient ways are trying to build. to make the problems of our own practice a geography that others can use – because the illussions of chjange have to filtered through very real changes of practice.
pagan idolatory as oppossed to human understanding is not the answer.
in my heart i see the falling to kindom come of us imperialism. it will be a violent & volatile time & this or that politician do not have a great deal of space to manouver – their manouverability is based on the practical will of the people & the capacities of those people to engage & fight power
it is in this sense, that the film memories of raincame as a gift to me

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 22 2009 19:59 utc | 55

Ok – Mitchell really gets the Middle East job in Obama’s crew. Much better than the Israeli tool Dennis Ross and others. Let’s see if he can do something. Most likely the lobby will try to shoot him down over some made-up “scandal”

Posted by: b | Jan 22 2009 20:18 utc | 57

tariq ali, hobshawn & others

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 22 2009 20:26 utc | 59

annie, I watched “Tales of the City” while I lived there but that show was SF during a different time. Sad it ended like it did… I’ve always wondered if there wasn’t some religious nut case in the shadows…
My days in SF were of a later time, mid ’90’s and most of my friends were between 20 and 25. Strange days.
There was plenty of kookiness to be had for anyone looking for it, I still recall a story in the SF Bay Guardian about a woman who decided she was gay and so became a lesbian. She said she never felt right as a lesbian, so she got a sex change and became a man. Up to this point it’s a pretty straight (sorry for the choice of words) foreword and understandable story about someone with a mixed-up sexuality.
It gets weird (to me) when after she becomes a he, he no longer feels comfortable having sex with women and it is at this point in his/her story we find out that she (are you still with me?) must have really been a gay man trapped in a woman’s body. And so she/he went through a sex change to become a man to have gay sex with other men. And this was one of four or five people interviewed for this story. I guess this isn’t as unusual as I’d think. But then until the internet I never knew such a thing as “plushies” existed either.
Sorry for the Vanity Fair post, not intentional to fill the thread with what some might consider fluff. But I can never remember San Francisco enough. There is a magic in being amongst all the varied and unique denizens of those hills and streets; where most everyone is willing to accept you for who you are and only asks the same in return.
San Francisco is what gives me hope that it’s possible for people to get along, regardless of their differences. Not being an international traveler, San Francisco is the closest to what I imagine Beirut or Paris or another multi-cultural city was/is like. I could get lost in alleyways in China Town and forget I was in america. Go to up to Russian Hill or Japan Town or hop over the Golden Gate and up to B– or just watch storms come in at Seal Beach. I could go on and on but I’m sure annie feels crowded enough as it is.

Posted by: David | Jan 22 2009 20:59 utc | 61

remembereringgiap
As you say, we must first change our beliefs before we can change.
It is destructive to remove old ways of thinking. Concrete thoughts become like tall concrete walls – too high to climb and too thick to easily bust through. But, by continuing to voice our opposition to government actions that we know are wrong, we help other people to also find their voice to speak-out. If enough people are willing to say “no” even if each does so in a whisper, those whispers collectively become a roar that our leaders would ignore at their peril.

Posted by: David | Jan 22 2009 21:20 utc | 63

obama today equates the deaths of 3 israelis for all those of martyrised gaza – then repeats a bushism in relation to hamas & then to add insult to injury announces two men who have their hands thick not only with their relation to aipac but to hoodlums of the old school like john negroponte
that combined with the almost certain election of the likudniks & netanyahu in the house of horror does not augar well for the people of palestine
is it necessary for the world to burn down before the palestinians can receive justice

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 22 2009 23:29 utc | 65

bolivia poised for historic vote

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 23 2009 0:07 utc | 67

The Physics of 911
Part 1 of this excellent series, which includes links to the other two of Garcia’s articles in the series, can be found here
There is also an article by Counterpunch editor Alexander Cockburn which contextualises Garcia’s pieces whilst debunking many of the myths around 911 called The 9/11 Conspiracists and the Decline of the Anmerican Left (sic)

Posted by: Debs is dead | Jan 23 2009 0:52 utc | 69

66 was me.
debs, i here you.
“All people who died of an aids related infection also had an HIV infection; but because not everyone who has an HIV infection has contracted an ‘aids related’ illness that means HIV doesn’t cause aids.”
i am totally not understanding the upside of this statement. i’m not a scientist. HIV Without treatment, about 9 out of every 10 persons with HIV will progress to AIDS after 10-15 years. Many progress much sooner….A strong immune defense reduces the number of viral particles in the blood stream, marking the start of the infection’s clinical latency stage. Clinical latency can vary between two weeks and 20 years.
that is fact. hiv1 progresses to aids whether it causes it or not. hiv cause the depletion of CD4+ T cell count, once they are depleted to a certain level..you’ve got aids. hiv/aids prevention should be mandatory in all societies and communicating hiv doesn’t cause aids isn’t helpful in the least, in the wrong minds that message will be deadly. the fact that that some people, thru treatment or a bodies ability to keep up their T cell count may never reach the depletion levels for the progression of aids to develope..isn’t useful for the prevention of the disease except to scientists who would seek to sustain those levels of t cells indefinitely.
it is very frustrating having this message out there that HIV doesn’t cause AIDS. HIV creates the environment for the body to become infected with AIDS. because some peoples bodies have a resistance to the strain is immaterial in terms of prevention.
There were a lot of overweight gay men as it was a way to prove they hadn’t yet been infected. There were kooks going around trying to infect others (at least this was what my friends told me)
david, it is hard for me to wrap my mind this, especially in SF. anyone who wants to prove they don’t have the disease can get tested. people who are overweight can most certainly carry the virus.

Posted by: annie | Jan 23 2009 2:30 utc | 71

annie, Deb is dead and Fred-Regarding HIV and AIDS.
First let me apologize for creating an atmosphere of angst for annie and Debs, it wasn’t my intention to piss anyone off when I originally posted regarding HIV, it was more of an afterthought to what I’d written regarding scary little bugs and government. Unfortunately, my mental attachment to the disease ended when I left San Francisco too many years ago and I haven’t paid any real attention to any new information. Stupid Dave!
I’ll admit after reading up on the latest “official” information that I’ve been ignorantly ignoring a lot of recent research, and by doing so I’ve limited my point of view to a time-period ten years older than present knowledge. Thankfully Debs and annie were able to voice their opinions and I was able to hear.
That said, and before I start laying out what I found out about HIV and AIDS, I want to say (briefly) that I get as offended by what I view as ignorant remarks regarding 9-11 as you do about the subject of HIV/AIDS. Anyone who thinks the ever-changing and modified NIST report has anything to do with fact, should probably go and get injected with HIV…
Then again you may not want to try that injection thing – Fred I’m speaking to you man, read this first…
Link to HIV/AIDS understanding
This is really long and fascinating reading, I’ll copy a couple of interesting pieces from the beast and post below.
In the interest of discourse, this is the website where I found the above link:
Link Denialism
I didn’t agree with some of the statements (I’m just too damn contrary, I guess) but it did link me to the site with better information.
I find this part interesting:

Early Events in HIV Infection
Once it enters the body, HIV infects a large number of CD4+ cells and replicates rapidly. During this acute or primary phase of infection, the blood contains many viral particles that spread throughout the body, seeding various organs, particularly the lymphoid organs.
Two to 4 weeks after exposure to the virus, up to 70 percent of HIV-infected people suffer flu-like symptoms related to the acute infection. Their immune system fights back with killer T cells (CD8+ T cells) and B-cell-produced antibodies , which dramatically reduce HIV levels. A person’s CD4+ T cell count may rebound somewhat and even approach its original level. A person may then remain free of HIV-related symptoms for years despite continuous replication of HIV in the lymphoid organs that had been seeded during the acute phase of infection.
One reason that HIV is unique is the fact that despite the body’s aggressive immune responses, which are sufficient to clear most viral infections, some HIV invariably escapes. This is due in large part to the high rate of mutations that occur during the process of HIV replication. Even when the virus does not avoid the immune system by mutating, the body’s best soldiers in the fight against HIV-certain subsets of killer T cells that recognize HIV-may be depleted or become dysfunctional.
In addition, early in the course of HIV infection, people may lose HIV-specific CD4+ T cell responses that normally slow the replication of viruses. Such responses include the secretion of interferons and other antiviral factors, and the orchestration of CD8+ T cells.
Finally, the virus may hide within the chromosomes of an infected cell and be shielded from surveillance by the immune system. Such cells can be considered as a latent reservoir of the virus. Because the antiviral agents currently in our therapeutic arsenal attack actively replicating virus, they are not effective against hidden, inactive viral DNA (so-called provirus). New strategies to purge this latent reservoir of HIV have become one of the major goals for current research efforts.
Course of HIV Infection
Among people enrolled in large epidemiologic studies in Western countries, the median time from infection with HIV to the development of AIDS-related symptoms has been approximately 10 to 12 years in the absence of antiretroviral therapy. Researchers, however, have observed a wide variation in disease progression. Approximately 10 percent of HIV-infected people in these studies have progressed to AIDS within the first 2 to 3 years following infection, while up to 5 percent of individuals in the studies have stable CD4+ T cell counts and no symptoms even after 12 or more years.

How’s that for a tick, tick, ticking time bomb? The way the virus lurks has been the cause of why so many people (like me) remain confused about the link between AIDS/HIV. Reading up on it is pretty creepy, there seems to be so much new information it’s too bad I didn’t find it sooner.
In the course of reading the report I found I needed to quickly grab my shiny sombrero because lurking in the text of the report was this strange fact:

Recent research has shown that most infecting strains of HIV use a co-receptor molecule called CCR5, in addition to the CD4 molecule, to enter certain of its target cells. HIV-infected people with a specific mutation in one of their two copies of the gene for this receptor may have a slower disease course than people with two normal copies of the gene. Rare individuals with two mutant copies of the CCR5 gene appear, in most cases, to be completely protected from HIV infection. Mutations in the gene for other HIV co-receptors also may influence the rate of disease progression

Now, is it just me and my sombrero, or does this reek of the science lab?

Posted by: David | Jan 23 2009 10:39 utc | 73

The posts about the black death and AlQ intruiged me. I looked up the Algerian press.
The meme ‘the plague is killing the terrorists’ is an old one, see link 1 from 2003, it is jingly in French as both are called ‘la peste’. The article links terrorism, corrupt Gvmt, laissez faire, and disastrous hygiene (garbage collection, water purification, etc.)
There was an outbreak of bubonic plague or Black Death in Oran in 2003. Yersina pestis orientalis is endemic in the region – Tunisia, Lybia, etc. and every year (or few years) some cases are reported to the WHO. There are a lot of scientific articles/presentations about it.
The articles about 40 terrorist deaths from the plague are all recent, from 19 or 20 jan, and seem to come from the International press, the Sun, the Telegraph, WaPo – uptakes. I only skimmed. Some articles turn it into a Gvmt. (not terrorist) plot to kill Algerians!
The report of the deaths may be partly or completely true, though I saw no official confirmation and the number 40 is just a number. One commentator relates the death of an acquaintance who fled home and how terrified everyone was… the symptoms match exactly. Nothing to do with biological weapons, I think. The ‘terrorist’ meme appears to arise because the first victim found dead near a road was a member of ALQIM.
link 1, french
scientific paper, eng.

Posted by: Tangerine | Jan 23 2009 11:07 utc | 75

Recently, long after that encounter, I came upon a fascinating study of Jewish thinking on nuclear retaliation—all this nuclear doctrine leads you ultimately to theological questions. In particular there was a fascinating passage in a paper written by Warner D. Farr, a colonel in the U.S. Army.
Farr had made a careful study of the theological literature on the Last Resort question of retaliation when deterrence fails.
“In Jewish law,” he wrote, “it is asserted, ‘there are two types of war, one obligatory and mandatory (milkhemet mitzvah) and the one authorized but optional (milkhemet reshut).’ … Interpretation of Jewish law concerning nuclear weapons does not permit their use for mutual assured destruction. However, it does allow possession and threatening their use, even if actual use is not justifiable under the law.” (Italics mine.)
Threat, yes? Use, no? Who knew the Talmudists had parsed nuclear war so closely. The footnote to this assertion refers to a paper by a scholar named Michael J. Broyde called “Fighting the War and the Peace: Battlefield Ethics, Peace Talks, Treaties, and Pacifism in the Jewish Tradition.”
Here’s the relevant section on deterrence and retaliation and the Decision of Last Resort:
The use of nuclear weapons as a weapon of mass destruction is very problematic in Jewish law. In a situation of Mutually Assured Destruction if weapons are used, it is clear that the Jewish tradition would prohibit the actual use of such weapons if such weapons were to cause the large scale destruction of human life on the earth as it currently exists. The Talmud explicitly prohibits the waging of war in a situation where the casualty rate exceeds a sixth of the population. Lord Jakobovits, in an article written more than thirty years ago, summarized the Jewish law on this topic in his eloquent manner:
“In view of this vital limitation of the law of self-defense, it would appear that a defensive war likely to endanger the survival of the attacking and the defending nations alike, if not indeed the entire human race, can never be justified. On this assumption, then, that the choice posed by a threatened nuclear attack would be either complete destruction or surrender, only the second may be morally vindicated.”
However, one caveat is needed: It is permissible to threaten to adopt a military strategy that it is in fact prohibited to use, in order to deter a war. While one injustice cannot ever justify another injustice, sometimes threatening to do a wrong can prevent the initial wrong from occurring. Just because one cannot pull the nuclear trigger does not mean one cannot own a nuclear gun. [Italics mine.]
It is important to understand the logical syllogism which permits this conduct. It is prohibited—because of the prohibition to lie—to threaten to use a weapon that is prohibited to actually use. However, it can be clearly demonstrated that lying to save the life of an innocent person is permissible. Thus, this lie becomes legally justifiable to save one’s own life too. An example proves this point: If a person desired to kill an innocent person and one cannot prevent that act by killing the potential murderer, one could threaten this person by saying “if you kill this innocent person, I will kill your children.” While, of course, one could not carry out the threat in response to the murder …

Found at Slate.

Posted by: Jeremiah | Jan 23 2009 19:51 utc | 77

Sorkin sums up the inbred insecurity of this landscape simply enough by saying: “What makes the new War on Terror more singular – more sinister – is that the convergence of unsettling fear, shadowy demonized foe, hyper-technology of ubiquitous reach, and the communal power of the corporate state, has truly globalized the condition of fear. If every space is susceptible to attack and every person a potential attacker, then the only recourse is to watch everyone and fortify every place. If every communication is potentially a fragment of conspiracy, then all must be recorded. Walking the streets nowadays, with troops at the subway entrance, barricades around buildings, cameras staring from lampposts, metal detectors and card swipes at the office door, cops profude, newsstands billboarding alerts from every corner, involuntary anxiety at the sight of handbags and kerchiefs, it feels – more and more – like the battle for freedom is being lost.”

via the excellent Subtopia.

Posted by: Jeremiah | Jan 23 2009 20:13 utc | 79

from drunkasarule “link”:

missiles fired from suspected US drones killed at least 15 people inside Pakistan today, the first such strikes since Barack Obama became president and a clear sign that the controversial military policy begun by George W Bush has not changed.
Security officials said the strikes, which saw up to five missiles slam into houses in separate villages, killed seven “foreigners” – a term that usually means al-Qaeda – but locals also said that three children lost their lives.

good wars, bad wars
dumb wars, smart wars
change – NO WE DON’T!
hope – NOT FOR YOU!
riverbend wrote once:”take your dumb soldiers and your smart weapon and go home”
i often wonder what has happened to her. she made it to syria, and since no word.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 23 2009 21:25 utc | 81

breal
hope you have a better platform for the film – babelgum was infuriating – it stopped all the time

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 23 2009 21:42 utc | 83

& in latin america – it seems u s policy will not change at all

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 24 2009 3:02 utc | 85

the demonic dershowitz at it again – this apologist for torture dives even further into degradation – i won’t even link to shit like that
he just need norman finklestein to slap him down again – to prove what a fraud this caricature of a man really is

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 24 2009 3:14 utc | 87

Gaza, Greece, and the meaning of solidarity

Posted by: Lizard | Jan 24 2009 4:36 utc | 89

lizard, good read, heart warming indeed.
the write up from Jesus rivas (thx rgiab), is very good as well, and i think the answer is known, the american people will not resist, and and Obama can’t resist the corporations.
compared to the greek, the us americans don’t know hardship, don’t know war in their own country and sofar have never had a totalitarian regime that went mayhem on them – this is reserved for countries far far away.
as such, they still believe that by changing one pres against another, all will be well – give the man some time. for obama it is quite simple, give a little bit, ‘close’ gitmo – but no mention of all other black sides, shuffle a bit more healthcare to the needy – if he finds the money somewhere, stop the global gag rule on abortion and allow for some more sex ed, maybe adjust no child left behind regulations etc. but real change of attitude, of how not only to view the world but to interact with the world, seeing all people as equal and disowning us american exeptionalism will not come.
the moment he tries he is dead. simple really.
there might be change when the US puplic wakes up to the fact that they might have elected (purple finger) the pres, but the corporations and lobbys for various interest groups own him. maybe when that realization sinks in it could get messy, but i don’t hold my breath.
In the beginning of pres. bush II term, a lot of people moaned about the dems caving and not opposing. I never understood why the same people would not go to the offices/houses and other places where these dem senators/congresspeople worked/lived to bring the demonstration right there. How would i have enjoyed seeing shoes thrown at liebermann, clinton and others in the run up to the iraq war. I proposed it on other sites, i was told to stop trolling, i was told that it is not in the nature of US american, that people could not do that because they would loose their jobs etc. so why would they now oppose obama or any other politician that is happy to sell out to the highest bidder.
sorry for the long post, but who really expects much of either the president or his people?
And yes i know, there are us americans that are deeply disturbed by what happened and continue to happens, unfortunately for the US and the world they are not in the majority.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 24 2009 6:18 utc | 91

“… only natural to experience a twinge of anxiety while celebrating at the edge of an abyss”

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 24 2009 7:42 utc | 93

Charles Tilly – War Making and State Making as Organized Crime.
Full text available.
Via John Robb.

Posted by: Jeremiah | Jan 24 2009 19:19 utc | 95

via dk
Levin Says He Now Supports Lynn for Pentagon No. 2

Jan. 23 (Bloomberg) — Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin today said he is satisfied with steps promised to avoid conflicts of interest if Raytheon Co. executive William J. Lynn is confirmed as deputy secretary of defense.
Levin, a Michigan Democrat whose committee has jurisdiction over the nomination, said in a statement that he supports Lynn and seeks “prompt” action on his nomination by the U.S. Senate.
Lynn is senior vice president in Washington for Raytheon, responsible for overseeing government lobbying for the nation’s fourth-largest defense contractor. He was a registered lobbyist until March 2008. The Pentagon role would include reviewing major weapons programs and setting defense-spending priorities.
Levin yesterday asked the White House to explain why Lynn was granted a waiver from new ethics rules issued by President Barack Obama that ban lobbyists who join his administration for two years from working on issues they were previously involved with.

Posted by: sabine | Jan 24 2009 19:26 utc | 97

my american friends here are really going to have to explain to me – why i shouldn’t see the ‘developments’ in this administration especially over gaza – with dark foreboding

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 24 2009 19:28 utc | 99