Zinn on Obama: If you want to end terrorism, you have to stop being terrorists

Sunday Youtube Post

My inner gun enthusiast has been reawakened

I've never owned a gun. I didn't grow up around guns. Until fairly recently, I was scared shitless of guns. Inspired by a top thread in /r/politics that may or may not have implied that we should start arming ourselves to possibly defend against an NDAA-empowered government (really, front page of /r/politics, I'm proud of them), I suddenly have gun fever again. As most people who read this blog are probably aware, I've spent three years teaching shooting sports to boy scouts. That's right. I ran ranges. I was a sort of big deal. And it was just... a blast.



I haven't fired a gun since. I miss it. Maybe being prepared to overthrow a fascist police state would be a nice perk, but I'm really just thinking of shooting shit because it's fun as fuck. I'm thinking of a long ways off, but eventually I might want to purchase a personal firearm of my own. Or two. Or three. Can't decide if I want a pistol, a rifle, or a shotgun. So I think I might want all three someday. Maybe even more. If you think that's excessive, you haven't met some of the people I've met.

I've been doing research tonight, and I think I've narrowed down what sort of pistol, shotgun, and rifle I would want -- a glock 19, a Remington, and maybe a motherfucking AK. Camp Bunn had a Remmy, it kicked ass. These choices are anything but final, but I'll definitely have my eye on them once I actually start looking. Again, that won't be any time soon. It's a dream of mine. Once I get a lot of money I can waste. They're really not so scary guys. Once you get all the safety procedures and mechanical know-how drilled into your head, they're just like any other tools. Don't be a pussy hippie librul. America.

You should watch these. You have no idea how much gun shit is on youtube. Here are some videos about the guns I want. Gun porn.

I think I favor the AK-47 over the AR-15 (or M-16, whathaveyou) because it's just simply more powerful. People say that the AR's accuracy is a lot better, and while I won't deny that, that doesn't mean the AK's accuracy is anything to laugh at. Plus, it's a lot heavier, so there's a lot less kickback. And it looks fucking badass.



There's a debate between shotguns that's similar to the AK-47 vs. M-16 feud, and it's between the Remington 870 and the Mossberg 500. Google them, you'll recognize them. Camp Bunn had both, so I can attest personally that they're both fantastic firearms, and in all honesty, there's actually very little difference between them. You really can't go wrong with either, but in the end I think I'd prefer a Remington, because... well, just look at that fuck. Classy as shit. I'm pretty sure this would be my first purchase. If you're a smart shopper, you could probably pick one up for as little as a couple hundred bucks. Treat it well, and it'll be your pal for the rest of your life.

U.S. Marine who served in Iraq throws his medals to the ground

This is from 2009.

Iraq war "ends"

"We need to decide that we will not go to war, whatever reason is conjured up by the politicians or the media, because war in our time is always indiscriminate, a war against innocents, a war against children."

Howard Zinn

"I don't oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne. What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks like Karl Rove to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income, to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone through the worst month since the Great Depression. That's what I'm opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics."

Barack Obama, 2002

"Because you sacrificed so much for a people that you had never met, Iraqis have a chance to forge their own destiny. That’s part of what makes us special as Americans. Unlike the old empires, we don’t make these sacrifices for territory or for resources. We do it because it’s right. . . . Never forget that you are part of an unbroken line of heroes spanning two centuries—from the colonists who overthrew an empire, to your grandparents and parents who faced down fascism and communism, to you—men and women who fought for the same principles in Fallujah and Kandahar, and delivered justice to those who attacked us on 9/11."

Barack Obama, addressing troops at Fort Bragg last Wednesday

Barack Obama wanted to alter the deal that George Bush made with the Iraqi government, so he could keep up to 20,000 troops in Iraq. The Iraqi Prime Minister fought him, and thankfully won. 5,500 private contractors will be left behind. A massive CIA station will be left behind. Special Operations troops operating covertly out of uniform will be left behind. Tens of thousands of US troops will be left behind across Iraq’s border in Kuwait and elsewhere in the Persian Gulf, while the US Navy and the US Air Force remain in control of the country’s coastlines and airspace. Source. 4,487 Americans have been killed. Just as many have committed suicide, and an untold number of others will live with post-traumatic stress disorder for the rest of their lives. More female soldiers have been raped by their fellow soldiers than have been killed in combat. Iraqi civilian deaths vary wildly, but most estimates put it in the hundreds of thousands. Civilians. All based on lies. Lies like Obama mentioning "9/11" in the same breath as "Fallujah."

Americans are still dying in Afghanistan. The few remnants of al Qaeda are not in Afghanistan, and they are no longer operational. Osama bin Laden is dead. And yet Barack Obama finds it necessary to insert a provision the NDAA that will demolish the Sixth Amendment, just as he ignored the Fourth with his extension of the Patriot Act. Once he signs the NDAA, there will be literally nothing preventing the government from doing whatever the fuck it wants to us; meanwhile there's been virtually a total media blackout discussing this, and even a few cases of censorship. Two amendments of the Bill of Rights are no longer in effect, based on lies about "safety." I don't know what's scarier: the fact that this is happening, or the fact that the American people can be so easily manipulated, as to allow it to happen -- liberals stop speaking out against violations of civil liberties once Democrats start doing it, and conservatives opposed the bombing of Libya, which was based on similar reasons for their invasion of Iraq. War is peace.

Sunday Youtube Post

This is important.

Dan Carlin - The Bitter Harvest of Fear

Dan Carlin's Common Sense is the best political podcast out there. He's an extremely independent person, famous for attacking all opinions, and for his controversial thought experiments you wouldn't normally think of. When I first started listening to him back when I was a Democrat fanboy, I both loved him and wanted to strangle him at the same time. But he was the only political commentator who made me think and question myself, so I kept coming back. I just started listening to him again after a long while, and I don't know if it's because he's softened, or if my opinions have just shifted a lot, or maybe both, but I find myself agreeing with him much more often.

His newest episode, out yesterday, is about the absolute most important issue in the country at the moment: the NDAA, and the further erosion of our civil liberties.

What happens to "The Land of the Free" when it is no longer "The Home of the Brave"? You get the evisceration of constitutional protections in the name of fighting terrorism. Dan wonders why everyone is surprised.

An extremely important point Dan makes, which I really don't think is being said enough, is that the NDAA doesn't surpass anything the past two administrations have already been doing. All the the NDAA does is make indefinite military detentions of citizens "legal." He went on near the end of the episode to do something extremely drastic, and he's getting a lot of flak for it on his forums: he's actually throwing in his support for a presidential candidate. He stated very explicitly that he's going to vote for Ron Paul, and for the exact same reasons that I lined out earlier this week. He sees an extremely scary future if this shit isn't stopped now, and since Paul is the only person who's speaking out about these things at all, we should probably try to support him, in spite of how much we might disagree with him on all his other issues.

Carlin makes another great point -- he highly doubts the GOP would ever pick Paul, and the only thing he hopes to accomplish by doing this is simply to get civil liberties in the national discussion. The Bill of Rights is in ruins, the 4th amendment is practically gone, the NDAA will do the same for the 6th after Obama signs it, and nobody is talking about any of it. If nothing else, Paul would be able to call Obama out on his fascist bullshit, since the liberal "pro-liberties" class has mysteriously gone missing.

I think this is a wonderful episode, and if you were at all confused or angry about my Ron Paul post, I would strongly recommend you listen to it, if only to get a better understanding of where I was coming from. It's about 50 minutes. You should also subscribe to both of his podcasts (he also runs a history podcast called Hardcore History, simply fantastic, can't recommend it enough). And in closing I think I'll just leave this right here to scare the fucking shit out of you.

2009 The Intelligence Squared Debate

Motion: The Catholic Church a force for good in the world.

Arguing against is Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry. This is Hitchens at his best. Part 2 through 5 are up on youtube.

Christopher Hitchens dead at 62

“Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more.”

Hitch has had cancer for a while now, and I've sort of been preparing myself for this, but it doesn't make it any less painful. This is a typographic portrait of Hitchens I designed sometime earlier this year. I loved that man.

Hitchens and I had something major in common. We both had a mutual hero: Thomas Paine. I've seen Hitch describe him once as "the greatest Briton, and the greatest American." In addition to being the most passionate advocate of freedom and liberty among all the founding fathers (he supported equal rights for both blacks and women; travelled to France after the Revolutionary War, taking part in two revolutions), Paine was also an extreme critic of organized religion. I see a lot of left-leaning secularists nowadays saying "the founders were all deists!" and as much as I'd like that to be true, it's really a huge exaggeration. They were mostly Christian. Thomas Jefferson rarely shared his opinions about his deism, because he knew it would be political suicide. And his opponents used the rumors about his religious opinions to attack him. Thomas Paine was the only founder to publicly come out strongly, and radically, against organized religion, and it cost him dearly. When he died, he hardly had any friends at all, with only Jefferson writing him letters every once in a while (Jefferson distanced himself once his political opponents discovered they were still friends).

Hitchens wrote a wonderful little biography about Paine, and I'd strongly recommend it. It's a short, easy read, and mainly focuses on summarizing all of Paine's greatest writings. Hitch's love for him just shines right off the pages:

Paine's closing years, pitiful as they were, contained one closing triumph. He might have become a scarecrow-like figure. He might have been forced to subsist on the charity of friends. He might have been denied the right to vote by a bullying official, when presenting himself at the polling station, on the grounds that the author of Common Sense was not a true American. But as the buzzards began to circle, he rallied one more time. It was widely believed by the devout of those days that unbelievers would scream for a priest when their own death-beds loomed. Why this was thought to be valuable propaganda it is impossible to say. Surely the sobbing of a human creature in extremis is testimony not worth having, as well as testimony extracted by the most contemptible means? . . . Dying in ulcerated agony, he was imposed upon by two Presbyterian ministers who pushed past his housekeeper and urged him to avoid damnation by accepting Jesus Christ. 'Let me have none of your Popish stuff,' Paine responded. 'Get away with you, good morning, good morning.' The same demand was made of him as his eyes were closing. 'Do you wish to believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God?' He answered quite distinctly: 'I have no wish to believe on that subject.' Thus he expired with his reason, and his rights, both still staunchly defended until the very last.

I think I loved Hitchens so much because he reminded me a bit of Thomas Paine. Hitch was notably vicious as a debater, but underneath, you could always tell that he was just having a blast. His unrelenting wit is something to be admired, and it's something he and Paine had in common. This sort of vicious wit can be seen in even the most casual reading of Thomas Paine's argumentative writings (The Age of Reason, especially). It's just beautiful. They would've been amazing friends.

So without further ado, here comes the 'best of' video. Fuck, I'll miss this guy.

Want a lawyer? Shut up.

"If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever." -George Orwell, 1984

White House announces the president will not veto the defense bill that will allow the military to detain citizens indefinitely

Source.

Just slowly chip away at rights, no one will notice. Patriot Act, Citizens United, NDAA. Little by little. It's how Germany did it.

I'll just leave this here.

I am seriously considering throwing in my support for Ron Paul

GOD DAMN IT

HELP ME

FUCK



So what did it? What pushed me over the edge? It was this.

Ron Paul furious over indefinite detention act

With the approval from the Oval Office the only thing keeping a terrifying law that will allow for the indefinite detention and torture of Americans from passing, presidential hopeful Ron Paul has finally unleashed on the legislation.

Although President Barack Obama had originally insisted that he would veto the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin revealed recently that the bill in its current wording was drafted after the current administration asked for changes.

Already making its way through the House and Senate, the Act in its current wording will allow for Americans suspected of any “belligerent” act to be detained in Guantanamo Bay-style military prisons indefinitely for any alleged crimes without trial. With it now being revealed that the president put forth suggestions to draft the latest version of the legislation, Levin told the press Monday night, "I just can't imagine that the president would veto this bill.”

"I very strongly believe this should satisfy the administration and hope it will,” added Levin.

Outside of the independent media, opposition to NDAA has remained almost nonexistent, with the mainstream neglecting to discuss the colossal implications the bill would have if it is signed into law. Speaking to radio host Alex Jones on Tuesday, however, Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul finally became one of the first main figures to attack the act.

“This is a giant step – this should be the biggest news going right now – literally legalizing martial law,” said Paul. The congressman from Texas also appeared flabbergasted that the bill managed to escape discussion in any of the recent GOP debates, despite its provisions being detrimental to the US Constitution and the freedom of every man, woman and child in America.

“This is big,” continued Paul, adding “This step where they can literally arrest American citizens and put them away without trial….is arrogant and bold and dangerous.”

The bill could be on the desk of Barack Obama as early as Wednesday of this week.

Congressman Paul has been continuously critical of the Obama administration as of late, and although his fellow candidates for the GOP nomination have been equally as opt to attack the president, Paul has largely been the only one to tackle the sacrifice of civil liberties that Obama and the Republican Party frontrunners seem unconcerned with.

“Today it seems too easy that our government and our congresses are so willing to give up our liberties for our security,” Paul said during a presidential debate earlier this election season. “I have a personal belief that you never have to give up liberty for security. You can still provide security without sacrificing our Bill of Rights.”

Paul has also condemned the Patriot Act for crushing the freedoms of Americans, while top-tier candidate and former-House Speaker Newt Gingrich has insisted on finding a “balancing act between our individual liberties and security.”

This provision in the NDAA has been pushed to my #1 issue. While the few liberals who are actually aware of it are anxiously waiting to see what Obama does, Paul goes on the radio and denounces it in the strongest language one could hope for. What do the other candidates have to say about it? Nothing. No one else has even mentioned it. And Obama's silence speaks louder than all of them. Throw me a fucking bone here guys. If only one candidate agrees with me on the only damn issues I care about, what else am I supposed to do?

I have a confession to make. I'm a libertarian. No, not that kind of libertarian. I'm a leftist libertarian.



That lower right quadrant is what most of us think of when someone says "libertarian." They're the anti-authoritarian capitalists like Ron Paul. Authoritarian left is home for the communists and Stalinists. Authoritarian right is home for religious extremists, fascists, and America's "two" major parties. The lower left is where anarchists and socialists reside. I'm pretty sure I'm in there somewhere. If you are anywhere south of that horizontal line, I am going to respect you. Simple. I respect the fuck out of anarchists. My love for freedom is a whimper, when it's held up next to theirs. And as much as we like to laugh at Ron Paul, it's important to remember that he loves freedom too. We simply disagree on the means to achieve it. (I personally don't think capitalism is compatible with freedom at all, but that's a whole other post).

I haven't caught very many Republican debates, but during the few I've watched, I always caught myself with a big fucking grin on my face whenever Ron Paul was allowed to speak. He's an idiot in many ways, and his supporters are fucking unbearable, but his feet are on planet earth. He's the one logically consistent person in a room full of fools and hypocrites.



And Dennis Kucinich seriously considered him as a running mate. Bet you didn't know they're actually really good friends.



Ron Paul is a lot of things, but he doesn't wrap flags around maimed and murdered children, and call it patriotism. At least he speaks out against fascist legislation like the Patriot Act and the NDAA. You can't say the same things about any other major candidate in the United States, especially Barack Obama. But don't worry about me. I'm not turning into one of his zombies. At best, Ron Paul is only a step in the right direction. If Dennis Kucinich or Bernie Sanders were running, I would support them over Paul in a heartbeat. I'm simply swallowing my pride and taking what I can get. I'm meeting the other side halfway. And I'm only open to meeting anti-authoritarians halfway. I'm not going to do the same with Obama or traditional Republicans, because I don't compromise with child murderers and fascists.

I'm sure as hell going to root for him, but I honestly don't know if I could vote for Ron Paul. Luckily, reality will prevent me from ever having to face that conundrum. The GOP is never going to pick him. It doesn't matter how much of a majority he might get in the primaries. Ron Paul would refuse to be the GOP's water cooler, and that's just unacceptable.



No, I'm still going to vote for a leftist third party. I was thinking either Green or Socialist, but then I heard about Rocky Anderson this morning. The former mayor of Salt Lake City just launched a presidential campaign running on the new "Justice Party" ticket. Amy Goodman interviewed him this morning. He's opposes war. He stands for things like environmental sanity, economic justice, and war criminals going to jail. You know, the things I thought the Democratic Party stood for when I voted for them. Maybe not as "radical" as some of the things I've been warming up to in recent months, but the guy has some amount of experience governing. I'd like to see what he can do, and I'm going to be following him.

Vatican Cardinal says Christians in the United States are 'well on the way' to being persecuted

WAAAAAAHHHH

One of the highest ranking cardinals in the Vatican has said that the United States is “well on the way” to the persecution of Christians.

Cardinal Raymond Burke, former Archbishop of St. Louis and now the head of the Vatican’s highest court, told Catholic News Agency that he could envision a time when the Catholic Church in the U.S., “even by announcing her own teaching,” is accused of “engaging in illegal activity, for instance, in its teaching on human sexuality.”

Asked if the cardinal could even see American Catholics being arrested for their faith he replied, “I can see it happening, yes.”

In his remarks to several U.S. Bishops meeting with him Saturday, Pope Benedict XVI made similarly emphatic warnings about the U.S. The pope told the bishops that “the seriousness of the challenges which the Church in America, under your leadership, is called to confront in the near future cannot be underestimated.”

He added: “The obstacles to Christian faith and practice raised by a secularized culture also affect the lives of believers.”

In the interview published today, Cardinal Burke declared that “it is a war” and “critical at this time that Christians stand up for the natural moral law.” Should they not, he warned, “secularization will in fact predominate and it will destroy us.”

[...]

Nevermind the fact that more Christians live in the United States than in any other country on the planet you guys. Just ignore the fact that 3 in 4 Americans are Christian. Ignore this recent study which shows that nonbelievers overwhelmingly don't give a shit if someone else believes in God. Or how that same study shows that believers distrust atheists as much as rapists. Nevermind the fact that the government of the United States disobeys its own constitution by endorsing Christianity.




I'm going to take a wild guess and assume this Cardinal has never taken an introductory sociology class. See, there's this thing called "privilege." Privilege belongs to the dominant group. As a white male, I am a member of probably the most privileged group in the country. But as an agnostic-atheist, I am also part of a separate minority. Most individuals in the dominant group are not aware of their privilege, because they have never lived their lives without it.

Everyone accepts privilege because it's practically invisible. "Chivalry" is an example of accepted privilege. It's sexist. It implies that men should be nice to women, not because they should act like normal human beings, but because women are weak and powerless and they'll hopefully give up sex. I hold doors for men too, but nobody thinks better of me for it. Nor should they.

When a persecuted group is given more rights, some amount of privilege is taken away from the majority. And when that happens, the majority group starts feeling like they're the ones being persecuted. There are a ton of examples of this throughout American history.




And it hasn't stopped. Here's some irrelevant racist feeling persecuted because the president of the United States is black.



And here's some bigot whining that it's no longer socially acceptable to beat up faggots.





Let me give an example of how privilege has negatively affected me as an atheist. According to the Bylaws of the BSA, Declaration of Religious Principle:

"The Boy Scouts of America maintains that no member can grow into the best kind of citizen without recognizing an obligation to God. In the first part of the Scout Oath or Promise the member declares, ‘On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country and to obey the Scout Law.’ The recognition of God as the ruling and leading power in the universe and the grateful acknowledgment of His favors and blessings are necessary to the best type of citizenship and are wholesome precepts in the education of the growing members."

They don't bother explaining why atheists and agnostics can't be the "best type" of citizen. They just assume it's fact, and don't question it. That's privilege. I've never done drugs or been arrested. I've never been pulled over. Shit, I don't even drink. Not that these things have anything to do with morality, I'm just going by what I'm assuming are their standards. I'd like to hear what their "best type" of citizen is, and why I don't fit it.

I'm an Eagle, and I've worked at a boy scout camp for three years. I've had to hide my lack of belief. And I'm not even complaining about that, I would never think of bringing that shit up at my job anyway, because it's completely irrelevant. Privileged groups don't have the same opinion though. Encouraged by likeminded people around them, they have a constant need to repeat their own opinions and stroke their egos. And they're not even aware they're doing it. As a result, their beliefs were constantly pressed on me. I once had to bullshit my way through a prayer that my boss asked me to lead so I wouldn't be fired. I was expected to go to a camp-wide religious service held once every week. When these issues are brought to the attention of a believer, they're often so unaware of their own privilege that it just doesn't compute. If someone says "Under God should not be in the Pledge of Allegiance because it's illegal for the government to endorse a religion," they warp that around to "What, so I can't believe in God now?" Whenever a persecuted group asks for equal rights, the privileged group suddenly thinks they are the ones whose rights are being attacked.



YOU POOR THING.

But as much as I'm whining about being expected to treat men and women differently, or about how people look at me as an atheist, I really don't have it that bad. At least I'm not constantly bombarded with advertisements telling me how worthless I am, or catcalls that make me fear for my safety. I've never been looked down on because of my race. And hey, it's incredibly easy to fake belief. All you gotta do is smile and nod. I worked with someone at camp who was fired and kicked out of the boy scouts for being gay. There was another gay dude who was fired a year or two before I joined. I've never met him, but I was told he was very loved among both the staff and the scouts (the gay dude I worked with was kind of an ass). The boy scouts are a great organization, and they gave me the best years of my childhood, but I'm am fucking ashamed to be associated with them.

And if you're curious, the reason why this policy is in place is because religious institutions provide over 60% of the funding for the BSA, mostly from the Mormon church. Literally every single person within scouting I've ever talked to about these things have told me that they consider homosexuality and atheism complete nonissues, and they want this policy changed. I've even had a 12 year old kid tell me it shouldn't matter if someone is gay. Religious institutions have enough money to bribe the BSA into discriminating against gays and atheists, and yet they are the ones claiming to be persecuted. It's just staggering.

America is becoming a fascist state

It's good that people automatically tune out whenever the word "fascist" is used, because it's used so often and so without merit that it's ultimately become meaningless. But it's bad because when there is actually a legitimate comparison to be made, nobody pays attention.

Nazi Germany was not the only fascist government. Let's go back and put the politics of the 1930s into context. Fascism was a legitimate political system. There were 'moderate' fascists like Franco in Spain. Italy (which was not as extreme as Nazi Germany) would constantly urge Franco's regime in Spain to be more 'fascist' so they would not come off simply as conservative reactionaries against the socialist government they overthrew (which they were). Franco murdered and tortured political dissidents and threw them into camps, and yet he had widespread support all the way up to his death in 1975 (he remained in power after World War II because he was neutral during the war. Spain had just gotten out of a brutal civil war when WWII broke out, and they didn't have the capacity to wage another one).

I watched a six-part documentary series on the Spanish Civil War a couple months back, up on youtube (I think it's been taken down. Nevermind, here it is). It was made in 1980, and they interviewed supporters of both sides. You have no idea how weird it is to see old grannies talking about how much they love monarchy and totalitarianism, with portraits of Spanish fascist military leaders hanging up on their wall in the background.

The reason I'm going through all of this is because I want to get the point across that it is very easy for normal people to fall in love with fascism. This seems like common sense with everything we learn about fascism in history, but when it actually starts happening, the dots just never connect. World War II is often considered to be "the good war," but the United States government actually cared very little about stopping fascism, as a government. U.S. corporations supplied Franco and the fascists during the Spanish Civil War. The CIA brought in hundreds of Nazi spies after the war ended. Richard Nixon, founder of the modern Republican party, once toasted Franco, and said upon his death that he "was a loyal friend and ally of the United States." Utilizing the tactics of the Nazi Gestapo, the FBI once drugged and murdered a man in his bed because they didn't like his political opinions. I'm not typically a conspiracy theorist, but the circumstances surrounding MLK's and Malcolm's deaths are extremely suspicious. King's own family doesn't think Ray was the shooter. Seriously, read that. They took out Fred Hampton, I see no reason why they wouldn't have the capacity to do the exact same things over again.

FDR said:

"The first truth is… a democracy is not safe if people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism - ownership of government by… any controlling private power."

Sound familiar? How 'bout now? Click to enlarge.



The United Nations says the U.S. is not protecting the rights of the Occupy protesters. Barack Obama does not support the Occupy movement. He made a few gentle words towards it at the start, and then he immediately backed off once his donors on Wall Street got mad at him. It seems like the only argument Obama apologists have left is "At least he's not a Republican, and at least I'm doing something." This is extremely dangerous and self-manipulative. It's the last refuge of someone who actually believes he holds some amount of power in the way our government works. You have no power. When a petition to free Bradley Manning popped up on the White House's website, the White House simply removed it. Right now, Senator Bernie Sanders is pushing for a constitutional amendment that will overturn Citizens United and establish that corporations are not people. He has a petition on his website with over 110,000 signatures right now. It's not going to happen. It will never happen.

The sooner everyone realizes that we do not live in a democracy, the sooner we can focus our attention on the real enemy: every person who holds a position of power in the government. The House of 'Representatives' voted 406-17 to keep the NDAA conference committee closed to the public. This, of course, is the act that will allow the government to lock up anyone they want on American soil, for as long as they want, by simply calling them "terrorists." Obama was threatening to veto this, but the language his administration used seems to imply that it's for the wrong reasons: that it doesn't go far enough.

"We have said that the language in this bill would jeopardize our national security by restricting flexibility in our fight against al Qaeda… Any bill that challenges or constrains the President’s critical authorities to collect intelligence, incapacitate dangerous terrorists and protect the nation would prompt his senior advisors to recommend a veto."

But he likely won't veto it at all, since he's the one who wanted the provision in there in the first place.



I've tried being tolerant of Obama supporters (among friends at least) but if he signs this, there are no longer any excuses. If this happens, and if you vote for Barack Obama anyway, you are giving him permission to take away your rights. This goes way beyond what George Bush ever did, but I suppose Obama apologists wouldn't care, because they never raised a peep when he extended illegal wiretappings and assassinated American citizens either. I think I'll end this with a fitting quote from George Orwell (who opposed strict pacifism, and who actually had the courage to fight against fascism when he carried a gun for the socialists in the Spanish Civil War)

All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts. A British Tory will defend self-determination in Europe and oppose it in India with no feeling of inconsistency. Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage — torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians — which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by ‘our’ side. . . . The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.

Sunday Youtube Post

This is why I think Star Trek is the greatest franchise ever made, and why I think it may have been a mistake for the new movie to replace "yay humanism!" with "yay lens flare!"

Favorite albums of 2011, part 2

As promised from the first part from back in July, here's the rest and/or things that have been released since then. The Mars Volta pushed their new album back to next year, but that's okay because we're still left with a lot of other great stuff.

Maybeshewill - I Was Here For A Moment, Then I Was Gone



Maybeshewill has an interesting style. They're very Mogwai-ish, but often with the precise electronics and drumming of math rock, like with 65daysofstatic or Toe. This is pretty stereotypical post-rock, so if you're not into the genre you probably won't find it very interesting. Explosion in the Sky's Take Care, Take Care, Take Care is still probably my favorite post-rock CD out this year (and probably my favorite CD overall, to tell the truth) but this is still pretty great.



Arms and Sleepers - The Organ Hearts



Now this is a real gem. I just found out about these guys a couple months ago, and they've become one of my favorite new bands. This performance comes from a great website called WeArePostRock, but to be honest it's a little hard to put them in that genre. "Post-Rock" is kinda hard to pin down anyway, people usually just take instrumental music and call it "post-rock" to sound more hipster. But it usually has the same elements: somewhat minimalist, and if vocals are ever used, then they're used as just another instrument, and lyrics are irrelevant. Arms and Sleepers don't really do those things, this is more ambient and trip hop. I suppose they're all just labels anyway, ask any person on the street and I guess he wouldn't be able to tell the difference.



The Black Keys - El Camino



I actually haven't listened to this yet, but I thought I'd put it here in case anyone doesn't know about it. I'm sure it's great because it's the god damn Black Keys.



M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming



M83 take their name from the Messier 83 galaxy, which is awesome, because that's one of my personal favorites too. I've read in interviews that M83 is inspired a lot by the 1980s. I hate 80s music. Unfortunately for me, they've sort of grasped onto that feeling a little more in recent years. I fell in love with their earlier songs on Dead Cities and Before the Dawn Heals Us -- the ambient stuff, the stuff that made me want to play Mass Effect and go stargazing. And some of that's still there, but Hurry Up, We're Dreaming feels very 80s pop. It's still not too bad because you can still pick up their style in it. You will love this CD if you're into this kind of music.



Pretty Lights - Unreleased 2010 Remixes



Pretty Lights is fucking good. The Sunday Youtube Post this week is off of this album. It's all remixes, he takes from James Brown, to Kanye West, and even Pink Floyd. And it's weird, because I'm usually not all that into this music, but it's just catchy as hell and I can't stop listening. It's very Daft Punk. Pretty Lights makes his money playing shows, so he puts all of his music up on his website for free.



Immortal Technique - The Martyr



Recently I've started listening to Rage Against the Machine for the first time, so I was wondering what other sort of revolutionary music is out there. It didn't take me long to find Immortal Technique. This guy is an arrogant jackass, and somewhat of a conspiracy theorist, but he does his fucking research and his lyrics usually hit the nail on the head. The Martyr was released in support of the Occupy movement (he's personally been visiting the encampment at Wall Street a lot), and he put it up online for free.



Sun Rise Above - Every Day I Wake Up on the Wrong Side of Capitalism



I discovered Sun Rise Above through the same search. He seems a lot more grounded than Immortal Technique, which is good, because it feels like Immortal Tech's obsession with keeping with his 'hardcore' image sort of undermines his central message. Sun Rise Above's talent as a lyricist is pretty damn impressive, and it seems like only a matter of time until this guy takes off.

International Socialist Organization's Year In Review

Good year guys.

ISO Year In Review 2011 from N Alexander on Vimeo.

Sunday Youtube Post

Pretty Lights - "Finally Moving" Live Visual Display from Anders Rostad on Vimeo.

lol

I don't know if anyone remembers a post I made back in July about my favorite albums of the year so far, but I named the Hole Punch Generation among them. Well, I was wondering if the band was up to anything new, so I just checked their site. And I see this right on their front page.



YOU'RE WELCOME, HOLE PUNCH GENERATION, GLAD I COULD HELP.

Here's the Waco you'll never hear about

Sunday Youtube Post

We don't live in a democracy.

Arab Spring / OWS Update

For the fourth day now, Egyptian protesters in Tahrir Square are demanding an end to military rule, and a transition to civilian government. In the protests over the last few days, at least 33 people have been killed, many with live gunfire, and at least 1,500 people have been injured. Here's some footage.



But they held on. You want to know why the protesters are still able to remain in Tahrir Square after the military and police tried to evict them? Because they refused to be stepped on, and fought back. What a concept. Here's an excerpt from a letter that a group of Egyptian activists sent to the Occupy movement:

It is not our desire to participate in violence, but it is even less our desire to lose. If we do not resist, actively, when they come to take what we have won back, then we will surely lose. Do not confuse the tactics that we used when we shouted “peaceful” with fetishizing nonviolence; if the state had given up immediately we would have been overjoyed, but as they sought to abuse us, beat us, kill us, we knew that there was no other option than to fight back. Had we laid down and allowed ourselves to be arrested, tortured, and martyred to “make a point”, we would be no less bloodied, beaten and dead. Be prepared to defend these things you have occupied, that you are building, because, after everything else has been taken from us, these reclaimed spaces are so very precious.

They're absolutely right, and it's a shame we're not listening. Here's a bunch of protesters at UC Davis sitting on their asses allowing themselves to be maced.



As Orwell said, "Pacifism is objectively pro-fascist. This is elementary common sense." The result of this nonviolence? Everyone was arrested and the protest ended. Good job guys. I'm all for using nonviolence to win over the public, but my patience is really running thin. Police have no more right to hurt you than any other man in the street. If someone attacks you, then you defend yourself. This isn't hard.

Ward Churchill, in "Pacifism as Pathology," writes:

Pacifism, the ideology of nonviolent political action, has become axiomatic and all but universal among the more progressive elements of contemporary mainstream North America. With a jargon ranging from a peculiar mishmash of borrowed or fabricated pseudospiritualism to "Gramscian" notions of prefigurative socialization, pacifism appears as the common denominator linking otherwise disparate "white dissident" groupings. Always, it promises that the harsh realities of state power can be transcended via good feelings and purity of purpose rather than by self-defense and resort to combat.

Pacifists, with seemingly endless repetition, pronounce that the negativity of the modern corporate-fascist state will atrophy through defection and neglect once there is a sufficiently positive social vision to take its place ("What if there was a war and nobody came?"). Known in the Middle Ages as alchemy, such insistence on the repetition of insubstantial themes and failed experiments to obtain a desired result has long been consigned to the realm of fantasy, discarded by all but the most wishful or cynical (who use it to manipulate people).

If these protesters want change, then pacifism is extremely ineffective in accomplishing it. You know what Egypt accomplished by fighting back? Their interim government offered to resign yesterday. That's change. The military finalizes this, so it's unlikely to happen, but it's still an extremely significant step. Three days of real protests: Egyptian government resigns. Two months of peaceful protests in America: nothing. Absolutely nothing.

This photograph, which has become famous at this point, shows Jennifer Fox, 19, being carried off at Occupy Seattle after being maced in the face by police.



When Jennifer tried explaining to the police that she was pregnant and she wanted to leave, the police responded by kicking her in the stomach, hitting her with a bike, and spraying mace in her eyes with two separate spray cans simultaneously. Her baby miscarried. Here's video of Jennifer immediately after her chemical attack. Don't look away.



I don't know what the hell it's going to take for people to start taking this seriously. If "fetishizing nonviolence," as the Egyptians put it, is what this movement is about, then we've already lost. Dancing around in drum circles and allowing women to be assaulted seems to be the fun thing to do, but it will never give us our freedom. Ever.

Game Review - The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Once or twice in a console generation, there comes along a game that just blows everything out of the fucking water, and sets a new bar. NES had Super Mario Bros. 3; SNES had Yoshi's Island or Starfox; N64 had Goldeneye and Ocarina of Time; sixth gen had Knights of the Old Republic and Grand Theft Auto; now we have Skyrim. It's going to be very hard to put this into words. Because after putting god knows how many hours into this, I'm pretty sure I can say that I've never played a better video game in my entire life.

Bethesda first hit it big with Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind in 2002. I've never met anyone who has played the first two Elder Scrolls, but Morrowind is what put them on the map. Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion came out in 2006, which took place in Cyrodiil, capital province of the empire. All these games take place on the continent of Tamriel, all part of the same empire. Skyrim takes place 200 years after Oblivion.



I've spent at least a couple hours on the Elder Scrolls wiki reading about this world's lore and history and politics. It's fucking insane. You don't have to read about it at all if you don't want to, the games never explain any of these things in the story. The way you find out about them is by reading books within the game. I'm not talking about "using" a book and then pretending like your character read it, like what you would expect from a video game, I'm talking about Bethesda literally wrote books, and you can read them if you find them.



I spend a lot of time just hunting down books to place in my library in my house. There are history books, instruction manuals, books of the dark arts, and choose-your-own-adventures (really) and even smut. Smut. Here's the classic Lusty Argonian Maid. Argonians are the lizard people.

Act IV, Scene III, continued

Lifts-Her-Tail: Certainly not, kind sir! I am here but to clean your chambers.

Crantius Colto: Is that all you have come here for, little one? My chambers?

Lifts-Her-Tail: I have no idea what it is you imply, master. I am but a poor Argonian maid.

Crantius Colto: So you are, my dumpling. And a good one at that. Such strong legs and shapely tail.

Lifts-Her-Tail: You embarrass me, sir!

Crantius Colto: Fear not. You are safe here with me.

Lifts-Her-Tail: I must finish my cleaning, sir. The mistress will have my head if I do not!

Crantius Colto: Cleaning, eh? I have something for you. Here. Polish my spear.

Lifts-Her-Tail: But it is huge! It could take me all night!

Crantius Colto: Plenty of time, my sweet. Plenty of time.

END OF ACT IV, SCENE III

It's the little things like that that make the game. And the history is really interesting too. Going through the game, you'll see a lot of racial tension between the Nords and the Elves. If you never opened an in-game book, you'd never understand why. All humans in Tamriel are descended from the Nords of Skyrim. Led by Ysgramor, the humans originally landed in Skyrim from some vague continent way up north, fleeing a civil war. The Elves were already living in Tamriel. The Nords and the Elves initially lived peacefully, but the Elves got scared because they thought the Nords would eventually become too powerful. So they waged a war of extermination, and when they burned the last human city to the ground, only Ysgramor and his family survived to flee back to their continent. When they returned, the civil war was over and there was peace. So Ysgramor gathered up an army, sailed back, and conquered Skyrim.

And this history feels real. You can go and visit Ysgramor's tomb. You can hold Ysgramor's battleaxe. Unf.



And the great thing is, if this stuff seems boring or nerdy, you don't have to pay attention to any of it if you don't want to. You could just wander around killing people and be a dick and ignore the story entirely. And sometimes that's exactly what I do. And Skyrim makes it very easy to do such things, because you are Dovahkiin, Dragonborn. You wield the magic that dragons use -- shouts -- which don't use mana like typical magic, there's simply a 15-30 second cooldown. The first time I acquired Fus Ro Dah, this is what I spent an hour doing.



It's awesome when you get about five or six enemies right in front of you, and you just effortlessly send them all plummeting off a cliff. BEST.

The main plot of the game is that dragons are coming back. They went extinct centuries ago, and nobody knows why they've returned. As Dovahkiin, you sort of become their main target, since you are the only one capable of stopping them. Once you reach a certain point early on in the story, dragons will start attacking you in completely random places at completely random times. They could attack you when you're wandering on the road, or they could attack you when you're in a city. You're not safe anywhere. Okay, tired of reading? Wanna see some gameplay? Watch what happens out of fucking nowhere when this guy starts fucking with some giants and their mammoth herd. This is completely unscripted.



To help you truly grasp what this game is about, let me describe what happens every time I sit down to play it. Last night, I decided I needed to work on my blacksmith skill. To do that, I need ore to work with. So I went off to the mines. A few hours later, after I stopped playing for the night, I still had not reached those mines. I could've reached them fairly easily if I had just made a straight shot, but the world of Skyrim is so utterly massive, with so many things to do and find and explore, that I got sidetracked probably a dozen times on my stroll.

The first thing that stopped me was some ancient ruins I stumbled on. I decided to check them out. When I entered, a fucking ghost walked up to me and told me that some long dead warlord who's buried there is gathering power, and he's planning his return to conquer the world. So then I spend an hour or more traversing through these ruins gathering the ancient relics I need to stop this guy, before the final climactic battle to shut him up for good. This wasn't part of any quest. I was never told about these ruins. I wandered in just because I could. These random scripted events are spread everywhere throughout the game, and it's like a drug. You're constantly wondering what you're going to see next.



What stopped me next was a city which was fairly close to these mines I'm trying to get to. The first thing I see after wandering in? Some guy murdering a woman right in the middle of the street. I couldn't do anything to stop it, but I immediately ran up to the murderer and ran my sword through his back, which may or may not have been a good idea, I didn't know if I could've questioned him or what, but in the heat of the moment I felt I needed to kill him right then and there, and so that's what I did. Instead of going to the mines, I'm sidetracked for another hour or two trying to track down what the hell just happened. The city guard tried intimidating me to look the other way. When I refused to do so, they killed the man I was working with to solve this murder, framed me for it, and locked me up. They threw me into their mines to work slave labor for life (not necessarily the type of mining I had in mind when I set out from my home in Whiterun). And the thing is, this game gives you so much freedom, that you didn't even have to go quietly if you didn't want to. And I didn't at first. I must have killed at least five city guards before finally sheathing my sword and going peacefully. I just wanted to see what would happen if I did. I could've escaped the city if I wanted to, and I would've never been arrested.

On the inside, I ended up meeting the man responsible for the murder I saw on the street. He was a revolutionary leader fighting against the Nords, who was giving orders from prison. After getting all buddy-buddy and earning his trust, I shanked him in the back, and used the secret passage he meant for both of us to escape in.



The string-puller of this city greeted me at the exit, the man responsible for framing me. He had received word that the revolutionary was dead, thanked me for it, gave me a full pardon, and even gave me his family ring for the trouble. The moment he turned his back to walk away, I slit his fucking throat and ran like hell. I'll probably never return to that city again. Nobody crosses me and lives. Nobody.

See that? "Nobody crosses me and lives." This game is making me develop an entirely new personality for my character to use. This is typically called "role playing," and I usually make fun of gamers who do it. Here I am doing it, and I can't even control it. For example, one time I met a very old orc along the road. He told me that he doesn't want to pass away in a bed like a coward, and his only wish is to die with honor in battle. I agreed to fight him to the death. After I had done the deed, I felt so proud for him that I wanted to stop and bury him, and then I got pissed that the game doesn't allow me to dig holes. Then I felt a little weird for wanting to do this anyway, because it wouldn't affect the story in any way, and as soon as I walk away, the body would despawn and never be seen again. I felt a little better once I saw what the redditors did when they came across him. One guy said he took the body to an outdoor shrine nearby, laid him on it, and then put his weapon in his hands. Another guy said he dragged him into the river, and shot an arrow out at him to give him an old Nordic funeral. They felt just as weird about it as I did. What the fuck are you doing to us, Skyrim. This game does that to you. It immerses you inside of an entirely new world, and you feel like you're a part of it. Every time I stop playing Skyrim, I feel like Neo waking up from the Matrix, disappointed at how much this world sucks. Here's a short video from Bethesda describing just how much effort they put into creating this world.



Oh and did I mention you can get married? The game even lets you get teh gay married, if that's your thing, gender doesn't matter. There are dozens of people you can marry, and if you don't mind cheating, you can use the console to open up the marriage dialogue with literally any person in Skyrim. Me? I chose Aela the Huntress. She calls me "dear" and "love," and she also cooks me dinner. She also happens to be a werewolf. We went on our honeymoon crawling through an ice cavern underneath an lighthouse, killing giant bugs.



And I haven't even mentioned mods yet. The Elder Scrolls modding community is fucking insane, and it doesn't help that Bethesda releases all the tools the need, encouraging it all. The nude mod was out only three days after the game's release. Three. Days. But there are still a lot of cool mods out there worth downloading. There are ones that improve performance, others that improve textures and graphics. A couple days ago, a mod was released enabling you to kill children, who were previously invulnerable. I need to check that one out. In the last game, Oblivion, the modding community completely rebuilt the province of Morrowind in Oblivion's engine. They remade the entire fucking game. And you want to know what's even better? Skyrim players were messing around with noclipping, and discovered that south of Skyrim, the entire province of Cyrodiil is inside the game. And what's more, they even found the gate leading to it. It's locked. This screams expansion pack, which Bethesda says they're going to be doing instead of typical DLC. And if not, then the modding community will take care of it.





I don't really know how to end this. I could keep talking about this forever, and I sort of want to. I think this is the best game I've ever played. It's perfect. I guess I'll just end it with a bunch of screenshots I've taken. I don't even know why the fuck I wrote this, I'm going to go play Skyrim.