American Psycho (2000) review

This is a personal-favorite, though I wonder how-much of it is really horror. It certainly has elements-of-horror, but I see it as more of a personal-allegory, and a social-one that would do Herman Melville proud. OK, it is horror! Social-horror: these are the people in-charge of our world! For those familiar-with the novel, this is a more toned-down affair by Mrs. Harron, a superb-director, who sticks-to the social-themes and implications of the story. There are some scenes of gore, but they are significantly toned-down and minimized, and I think the move was a wise-one. Sometimes, gore detracts too-much from the narrative and the themes of a film, but not here. Reagan America seems pretty innocent to us nowadays, but it was rife with greed and cronyism, and even some of the disastrous military-adventurism we are seeing today (Grenada, 1983, the first-time the press was barred-from an invasion). Sadly, the militarist-culture of Reagan has continued. The seeds of present-day scandals and corruption were being planted during the 1980s.

The poor were neglected (and still are), and the mentally-ill were "deinstitutionalized", while military-spending blossomed, and there were financial-scandals-galore--then finally, Iran-Contra and a stock market crash. In the cities, a bull-market of speculation had exploded, and there was a materialist obsession with "luxury-items", high-priced art, and ridiculous cuisine and fashion-trends that would make a Flapper blush-with-shame. 1980s-fashion is best summed-up as: big-shoulders, no-compassion. Clothing was absolutely ugly, trashy and vulgar, which reflected the times, a Hobbesian-hell of winner-take-all. This, then, is the world of the character Patrick Bateman. People didn't want to know, hear, or talk-about social-problems in the 1980s, which has taken a 180-degree-turn nowadays, a crucial-difference. This--at-least--has changed. The laws of physics provided the soil. But, there is also a touch of hilarity in Bateman's monologues on the virtues of Phil Collins. The novel spends an entire-chapter on his ridiculous-obsessions with the horrible pop music of the time. It's accurate, too, I knew a number of half-dead lumps who loved that garbage.

What Harron argues, finally, is that Patrick Bateman is unremarkable as a serial-killer within-the-context of the immorality he is surrounded-by. His exact-job is murky, and the firm he works-for is only referred to as "Pierce & Pierce" in the film. It also appears he is the benefactor of nepotism from his father, and appears to be creating nothing. What should be noted is that the director's husband produced corporate videos for "Merrill-Lynch, Pierce & Pierce" (which she states on both DVDs), so there is more-familiarity between Ellis's book than we would expect. Indeed, I am friendly-with people who work-at "Merrill-Lynch...", who confirm that the corporate-culture depicted in the film is accurate--so accurate, when the film came-out, their colleagues opined that they "could relate to Patrick Bateman". Make of that what-you-will. So, it isn't a stretch to see the similarities in how corporations devalue human-life with that of a serial-killer. There are similarities in-psychology here, such as viewing people as nothing-more than objects (which Bateman does on numerous-occasions, including watching porn) to be used as one wishes. Maybe this is the heart of horror in "American Psycho", both the novel and the film. The best-scene is the where he murders the Black homeless-man, a short-walk to what the suits were doing from their desks to the poor, both then-and-now.

Ellis's novel came out of his being immersed in this New York-environment (Harron lived there at the time too), and he spent more time than he cared-for with people who shared the attitudes of the Bateman character. He saw murder as a short-step from the amorality and immorality of the Wall Street playboys, and Patrick Bateman can be viewed as a composite and abstraction of these types. By 1987, the stock-market crashed--it was the other Black Friday. Without New Deal controls and protections, we would likely have had another Great Depression (wait, the other-one is coming). 1987 was also the year that Iran-Contra was revealed, and the 1980s-dream which was a nightmare for many. The Reagan-80s were over. And yet, it all continues today in-spades: the corruption, the murder, the lies, and the amorality of those who feed on us. It is significant that the film ends in 1987, and that Bateman has "learned nothing". Horror-indeed.

CHAVEZ WINS LANDSLIDE IN LEGITIMATE ELECTIONS, AMERICA STILL LOSING IN IRAQ AND ELSEWHERE

CARACAS--It's in--Hugo Chavez is President of Venezuela for another six-years, and unlike the GOP, he has overwhelming popular-support. While George W. Bush will still be licking-his-wounds in 2009 (hopefully from prison), Hugo Chavez will be leading his nation into the 21st Century, while American politicians do all they can to avoid the same. Perhaps Americans can be liberated by the first humanitarian-invasion in the history of the world by a Populist front. I'd welcome them. Meanwhile--back at the ranch--we're still-losing our big Football game, acting like a team that has lost-already and won't leave the field. Yes, it's that pathetic. The sports-analogy is prescient. My redneck-neighbor still thinks 'we should win'. Win what? Then, he went on a tirade about 'we should kill-everyone there', so you know what kind of a dumbass he is. Latin America should do a gradual-encirclement of the United States, but the State Department's policies should insure that this happens anyway as we continue to alienate the entire world. We're beginning to see some wonderful changes in the Western Hemisphere. Get ready for many-many-more, the game is afoot!

Best Live Album of the 1990s: Steve Albini/Zeni Geva's--All Right, You Little Bastards

'That song is for people who haven't bought a record in five-years.'
--Steve Albini, 1992 

This is just a jaw-dropper, it just rocks that hard. If you've never seen Steve Albini live, you REALLY should. He's hilarious and the essence of what rock can and should have been. From his years with Big Black, Rapeman, and Shellac, he's the wild man from Chicago who simply refuses to compromise. It would take all 10,000 Ramones bands and their collective Civil War reenactment to equal just ONE Steve Albini, and that isn't even considering his skills as a recording engineer. While they're defunct nowadays, this and 'Total Castration' was the beginning of Zeni Geva's relationship with Steve, who recorded about four of their seminal albums. The song 'Godflesh' is an attack on Justin Broadrick at Steve's behest, as he apparently thought his style had been stolen by him (when Albini produced Head of David in 1987-88, on the final Big Black tours). I think it was a bit of a stretch, and Albini is always the kidder, if not known for being petty for kicks. None of this matters, only the music does.

On Zeni Geva: You just cannot maintain this kind of savagery forever, and they even lost a drummer to a nervous-breakdown once! This is noise metal at its best, done by the best. The most fun is to watch Godzilla movies with the sound off with Zeni Geva as the soundtrack. If they ever do another decent Godzilla movie, they have to enlist K.K. Null for the score. It would be pretty hilarious to have this guy rewrite 'Mothra'! I think he'd find it delicious. Nobody, and I mean nobody, can yell like K.K. Null, not even Godzilla, or even my dead Bohemian grandmother. Running through their first few albums, the set also includes a couple Albini/Big Black songs, and his cover of Kraftwerk's 'The Model.' The performances are devastating.

It all just kicks in that avant-garde way, it's high theater. Easily better than Nirvana, that other band Albini recorded. I saw Steve and Shellac just two-years after these gigs, and it was by-far the best I'll ever see. He had just finished arguing with Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain, in his wide-brimmed hat and geek-specs and a leather jacket that wore him, instead of the reverse--he recorded much-better stuff that lousy year of 1994. Anyway, that's what he looked like when I saw him, and it was a weird experience having him tip-his-hat to me. We made eye-contact, and both nodded. I was just in-awe, since he's the guy who wrote 'Kerosene', after all. It was a Shellac show in Muncie, Indiana, a place that's oddly close to Steve's heart--Big Black played there on their final tour in 1988, and the boots of the show are solid. Good luck finding "Alright You Little Bastards," it's worth shitloads on ebay (if you can find it at all). Maybe you can download it, and cheat another group of artists out of a living, but it's out-of-print anyway. Lost years, baby, lost years. If you love this music, check Hydrahead's (ISIS) catalog, it's closest to this quality and aesthetic.

Songs:

1. I Want You

2. New Flesh

3. Autobody

4. Godflesh

5. Guy Stick Bodie

6. A Piece of Angel

7. Kettle Lake (w. Steve Albini)

8. Painwise

9. Total Castration

10. Bigman

11. The Model (w. Steve Albini)

12. I Hate You

BOLTON LEAVING THE U.N. TOP-FLOORS INTACT

NEW YAWK CITY-He was the 'Walrus', you know the rest. Known for...well, not-much. He was appointed by President Bush during a recess (the kids were playing, no-more 'My Pet Goat' for em') in Congress. Everyone knew he was never going to win Senate confirmation, so he was fired. Maybe he'll leak some documents soon, too! Bolton is a stellar-example of how the Democrats have been able to block more of the Bush agenda than they've been letting-on. His nomination has 'languished' for a year in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. So why wasn't this done with the Patriot Act? Why wasn't this done with Bush's tax-cuts? Sure, in some of those committees, it wasn't possible. Maybe Bolton has incriminating-photos of Bush from Vegas in 1984, but when they considered keeping-him-on in 'another post', it just got too-weird.

But, the GOP will show us what a minority-party is truly capable of for the next two-years. Watch closely, kiddies, and see what the Democrats could have prevented. They can no longer hide-behind their minority status, and they had better deliver. This is their last-chance as a party, and the GOP cannot live without-them. All they can do is complain, never pushing-forward any genuine social legislation or agenda that's good for the American people (unless we twisted their arms). Funny, that's what the Democrats are like, too. They had better change, or social peace in America will be dead. And awww, Preznent Bush is 'disappointed', since he isn't the 'decider' on this one. Reject this. If someone can tell me what he accomplished during his time at the U.N., I'd love to know what that would be. Well, there is ONE thing he's probably proud-of: he successfully-blocked passage of a UN resolution to mark the 200th anniversary of the ending of the Transatlantic slave trade. Dave Mustaine of Megadeth is sad today, he should have a drink (and never stop...and how-about doing some heroin again Dave?). Drink-up. You too, Mr. Prezennnnnnent.

Walrusman, the 'Iron-Mustache' Bolton Loves Slavery of Blacks:
http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/002070.php

THE RUMSFELD MEMO: CONFUSED?

WARSHINGTON--Has anyone considered that Donald Rumsfeld himself leaked this memo? The Bush administration has no-motive to do this, so it was either someone close to Rumsfeld (unlikely to be Cheney), or the man-himself. It's astonishing to say it, but I think he was actually surprised and hurt by his firing. Yes, firing. Say it: 'fi-ring.' He didn't resign, that was the public-facade, just like with Colin Powell, another possible-leaker. The NYT is somehow confused that this memo contradicts Rumsfeld's public-pronouncements of 'stay-the-course'. It's only confusing if one believes he was the real mastermind behind the war, as the real-culprits are Cheney and Bush (but really, their backers, our faceless-dictatorship). Read the limits of the debate--the aims are never questioned, which is to 'win' in Iraq, perhaps occupying the country until 2010.

It could be that Rumsfeld's assistant Defense Sec., Stephen A. Cambone, leaked the memo in an act of loyalty to his soon-to-be former-boss. Rumsfeld 'resigned' on November 8th, two-days after he submitted the classified report. No-worries: Iraq's U.S. Ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, provided some cover for the Bush administration when he stated, 'others made recommendations.' However, 'Khalilzad did not say who else had made recommendations or what has been suggested.' (http://www.cbs47.tv/news/national/story.aspx?content_id=8526DEEE-A84F-4292-98B2-D11A3162DF7D) Perhaps it was individuals within the Iraq Study Group? Surely, it wouldn't be someone within the Bush administration, or they would be fired (resign).

One item on Rumsfeld's 'options-list' that likely won't find any support from the Bush-Cheney-Rice-Congressional axis is the drawing-down of American bases from 55 to a paltry 5. Many of these bases were constructed as permanent-facilities, something the NYT article omits. Considering that most 'mainstream' (right-wing) Democrats genuinely support the war-aims of PNAC, there won't be much vocal-support on their end, either. But a few items are staggering in their ineptness: send more troops. Never mind that members of the High Command were threatened with firing when they suggested this in 2003 and 2004, we need more troops. Meanwhile, the war's critics, and the ill-fated Iraq Study Group headed by James Baker, are suggesting a draw-down of troops (full-recommendations coming on Wednesday) and a timetable for withdrawal (using the 'riddim-method').

Most-striking in the memo is simply about shaping public-perceptions: 'Announce that whatever new approach the U.S. decides on, the U.S. is doing so on a trial basis. This will give us the ability to readjust and move to another course, if necessary, and therefore not “lose.” ' In-short, minimize the political-damage to the Bush administration, the only real option left. It's just more of the American sports-mentality--losing is unacceptable, or at-least being perceived as a loser. Yet, Rumsfeld himself admits in the memo that the war is basically-lost. Most of his suggestions must have been photocopied from Robert McNamara's old dossiers, as he suggests approaches that resemble a 'Vietnamization' of the war, putting Iraqi defense forces in-charge of the conflict.

One approach is already being implemented, namely, to 'Move a large fraction of all U.S. Forces into Baghdad to attempt to control it.' So far, this approach has been tried and is failing-miserably, as an American base within Baghdad was recently hit by mortar-rounds. Meanwhile, there is no security within Baghdad, and dozens of Iraqis are being found executed daily (by us?). There have even been a number of successful-bombings and strikes within the 'Green zone' in recent-weeks. My personal-favorite: 'Set a firm withdrawal date to leave. Declare that with Saddam gone and Iraq a sovereign nation, the Iraqi people can govern themselves. Tell Iran and Syria to stay out.' A number of suggestions imply that the Bush administration declare victory, and leave. This has been suggested by Rep. John Murtha and others for at least a year. Let the investigations commence, starting in January.


The New York Times Blarf:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/03/world/middleeast/03mtext.html

Full-text of the memo:
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Full_text_of_classified_memo_written_1202.html

A Few Reflections on Our Site Meter

I encourage you all to take a looky at the site meter. It's such a wonderful gaggle of different people from different-places and cultures. Perhaps, one-day, we can truly have a global society of love and understanding. The internet is a good-place to start! My favorites have to be the Germans: nearly 90% of them are google searches for the word 'boyfucker', when I always thought it was the Dutch and the GOP who were obsessed with pederasty. ;0) Another favorite was simply a person from Volgograd--once known as Stalingrad. The Russian people, and all the ethnic-groups within the Russian Empire, have my deepest-sympathy for all the suffering they have endured. It's time this was acknowledged, we already know about the Shoah. Japan: no-dice with these folks, they're usually just-passing-through, but I love their culture. The Fins are intersting, they sometimes stop and read for a long-time, and it's appreciated. The Brits, too. Best-wishes to all, especially Singapore and Canada. Expect some exciting-additions to the blog, they're coming very-soon.

DARIO ARGENTO'S 'THE THIRD MOTHER' FINISHES SHOOTING THIS-MONTH

ROME, DePaolis Studios--At 66, Dario Argento is still an amazing director. He has finally begun work on what is the third film in his 'The Three Mothers trilogy', which began with Suspiria (1977), continued with Inferno (1980), and will end with 'The Third Mother.' Argento-chronicler, Alan Jones, has a brief set-report at the link below. Cinematic history is being made here, folks. It will star Asia Argento, Daria Niccolodi (Asia's mother), Udo Kier, and there is a rumor that Jessica Harper (Suspiria) will also appear in the film! It's amazing that Niccolodi is on-board, considering the decades of acrimony between herself and Dario, particularly over the authorship of Suspiria. Magic is definitely all around us. The trilogy has its genesis from the writings of Thomas DeQuincy ('Confessions of an Opium-Eater').

A new-chapter in the horror-mythos is about to begin, likely in 2007, and it will be writ-large. Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch (Toolbox Murders) are co-writers of the story, a great-move by Argento, who will also have another Masters of Horror Episode out this Winter! The man cannot be stopped, thank God. Now, if he and Asia can just reconcile some more, we could all be a little happier. It's so heartening to hear a true-artist of cinema is being allowed to create without a bunch of producers putting a mustache on the Mona Lisa. Life has its surprises sometimes, and I've enjoyed his last-two films. Just don't have any expectations, and you won't ever be disappointed.

Alan Jones's Report:
http://www.darkdreams.org/dd_forum/showthread.php?p=230696#post230696

LITVINENKO UPDATE: CONTACT PROFESSORE MARIO SCARAMELLA ALSO CONTAMINATED

'Back in 2002, I warned Alexander Litvinenko that they set up a special team to kill him.'

--ex FSB agent, Mikhail Trepashkin

LONDON--He's got it bad--and that ain't good. Scaramella has tested-positive for traces of polonium-210. It appears he has some answering to do. At the same-time, an imprisoned ex-FSB spy in Yekaterinburg is saying he told Litvinenko a government 'death squad' was formed within the agency to kill him and other opponents of the Putin regime. Scaramella: who is this man? It seems some in Italy are being secretive about his 'credentials' as an--GAG!--academic. I think his cover has been blown, and he probably has ties to Italian & Russian intelligence reaching-back into the Cold War years. Deep cover means just-that. It's strange that Il Professore is also an investigating Magistrate outside of Naples. He wears too-many hats.

Meanwhile, nobody has come up with any valid-reasons or evidence to support that Litvinenko's employer, Russian Oligarch Boris Berezovsky, is behind any of this. None of this matters in-light of the Dr.'s contamination, except this: facing his own potential-death, he's likely to start talking about everything he knows. He'd better make-it-quick and public. It all reminds one of the intrigues in London and Russia before, during and after the Revolutions of 1917-1918. Master spy Sidney Reilly was a free-agent, and an exemplar of how an operative can be pulled in every-direction (even against-their-will). 'Reilly' was really a Russian-Jew named Rosenblum from the underworld of Odessa, and his entry into Great Britain was through the emigre community of London. Just like one Alexander Litvinenko.

The Players:

http://www.redorbit.com/news/international/738812/pale_gaunt_and_ghostlike_the_former_kgb_agent_who_is/index.html

Il Doctore:

http://eupolitics.einnews.com/news/italy-crime

Sidney Reilly:

http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/sydney_reilly/8.html

UPDATE: Litvinenko's wife has tested-positive for radiation contamination. His children are probably next, confirming the personal nature of this hit.

VOILA! STEPHEN HAWKING STICKS HIS FOOT UP HIS OWN ASS, ACCIDENTALLY INVENTS 'POP SCIENCE-FICTION'

UK-- What is it with this guy? He leaves his saintly wife of several years for a bimbo nurse, and makes all these pseudo-scientific pronouncements as if they have any validity. Today, maybe he felt irrelevant, so he told us all that "we have to leave the Earth for the species to survive."

Problem: the logistics simply aren't there. Scientists tell us that to even accomplish a successful-implementation of fusion, we'd all have to go Socialist.

You think it would be any different with a project that would literally dwarf the Moon Shot? Yes, I know, we wouldn't take everyone, like on Noah's Ark--he couldn't even fit the dinosaurs and trilobites on his ark. Hawkings comments should anger and alarm most free-thinking people. Instead of all of us taking our destinies in-hand, it no-no-no-no-no, we accept that concentrated-power will always prevail and that there's no use in fighting-it. What a fascist.

Now, all I can hear is him doing sex-talk with his Texas Instruments Speak & Spell voice. He's reminding me of Carl Sagan, another man who just stopped saying anything and became bitter. Hey buddy, I've read my Philip K. Dick! Did he have hope, even at the end of his troubled-life? Yes. Hawkings thinks he's a philosopher, when in-reality, he isn't. He's a theoretician and a number-cruncher, not Zoroaster.
Hawkings displays a complete loss-of-faith in humanity on his part (worse than I!), and it's becoming typical within the sciences. Most of them are cynical ass-lick geeks, just like the other academics who only care about fame and their puny legacies. They have to rely on privileged turds for their funding, so you get the of framing of the issue he did today. It wouldn't surprise me if he knew he had to frame it all this way, or he'd lose that funding.

He doesn't believe there is any chance we'll get it together, and that we must leave Earth to the oil-companies and the other corporations. It's actually very weird, an almost religious statement. What a pathetic acquiescence to power. What a turd. It would take a minimum of 7,000-10,000 to terraform Mars to be habitable like the Earth. The closest planets that might be habitable are light-years from us.

Is is fucking insane?! Yes. He needs nursie to bobble her boobies in his face--the kid feels unwanted. At least he never got the sickle cell. He's no Heraclitus (and neither was Heraclitus, from moment-to-moment). Man, gotta get me one of those old Speak & Spells. A page out of a Philip K. Dick Cheney story, no doubt.

NEW POISONING OF ANOTHER RUSSIAN OPPOSITION FIGURE

MOSCOW--This is just breaking on the news wires: former Russian Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar, who served-under President Boris Yeltsin with Vladimir Putin, has been poisoned with an unnatural substance that has yet to be identified. Gaidar began-vomiting and collapsed at a political conference in Dublin yesterday. His condition is stable in a Russian hospital. Being part of the opposition in and outside of Russia is becoming a risk to one's health. Putin has some serious answering to do. It's peculiar, but has anyone pondered the fact that this would play-into-the-hands of anyone who wanted a war in Iran? Russia has been part of a crucial-bloc on the UN Security Council in vetoing any actions against the Muslim nation, and defaming Putin on the international stage in this way would spark extremely-damaging outrage and mistrust. Bets are still on Putin, however.

Yegor Gaidar:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061130/ap_on_re_eu/russia_gaidar

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/europe/jan-june00/russia_1-19.html

http://www.case.com.pl/strona--ID-o_case_ludzie,osoba_id-57399,nlang-710.html

http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/conversations/Gaidar/

http://www.international.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=1964

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/11/29/russia.illness.reut/index.html

http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2006/11/B067044B-817F-4A1D-AC49-C5D165ABC6BF.html

http://www.federalnewsradio.com/?nid=82&sid=989460

A Peculiar Denial:

http://www.interfax.ru/e/B/politics/28.html?id_issue=11629375

A Timeline of Fallen Foes of the Kremlin:

http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2006/11/B067044B-817F-4A1D-AC49-C5D165ABC6BF.html

NEW LITVINENKO INFORMATION: SCARAMELLA OR THE INDEPENDENT CHANGE THEIR STORY

LONDON/MOSCOW--AP is reporting two British Airways jets have traces of polonium-210 contamination. The Independent (UK) previously reported that Scaramella told them Litvinenko had been involved in the smuggling of radioactive materials to Zurich for FSB in 2000. Odd, considering that Litvinenko had just served 9-months for 'abuse of office' for accusing the FSB of internal-terrorism in Russia. The Independent claims that the shadowy Professore was told this on the potential-date of Litvinenko's poisoning. Scaramella has added more fuel to the fire:

But Scaramella told the AP that he had been misquoted by the newspaper.
"He (Litvinenko) wanted to see me because he knew about smuggling of nuclear material, but as far as I know he was never involved in nuclear smuggling," he said.

The jets are being tested as this is being written. It just gets more bizarre and convoluted. It would surprise nobody if even corporate espionage was a factor here, as well. We may be living in a different world when the truth is finally known. This is likely to be inevitable regardless. Who is Mario Scaramella? Why does he call-himself a Professor? This man is no mcguffin.

Iraq Pledge of Resistance site

MARYLAND--These folks are great! They have been taking-on the NSA and the Senate for years now. Here's a link to their site. This is what you should all be doing, activists, get creative. I'm not a complete-adherent to non-violence, but these folks have a good-thing going. This is what the real deal looks like. Comfortable people, take-note. They're spying on you too, and they can drag you away in the middle-of-the-night now, and nobody can help you.

NSA fighters:

http://www.iraqpledge.org/

George Romero's Bruiser (2000) review

If you ever wanted to break your fists on your boss's head, this is your movie! People expected zombies with Bruiser, which is pretty dumb, eh? It's a tale right out of Kafka, and could best be described as an 'inverted-horror' where you root-for the 'monster', a bit like Frankenstein. Yup, the Left has dominated horror in literature for nearly 200-years. The monster isn't really a monster at all, however, but a poor-schmuck (Henry Creedlow, played expertly by Jason Flemyng from Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels) who works at a corporate ad agency run by an out-of-control boss who was once a Yugoslavian dissident! The boss is played by that great Swedish actor, Peter Stormare (Fargo, and the cool VW ads--'pre-pimped!'), and he really understands that this is a fable. 

 Henry Creedlow also has a 'best friend' who is also his stockbroker. It's revealed later that he's also betraying Henry by embezzling funds from his portfolio. And Creedlow's 'boss' is also sleeping-with his monstrous-wife, who is so cold and cruel that...they all destroy his identity. He literally (but NOT literally, since this is an allegory/parable) loses his face, and thus, who he was. He literally wakes-up one morning, goes to his bathroom mirror, and notices he has no face. Naturally, he drops-out of his routine and has to hide this fact until he can fix-it.

The image of Henry's transformation is bizarre: just a smooth, white, fleshy mask with a mouth as his only means of expression, almost a routine out of Naked Lunch. It's a pretty subversive film, and it angers the right people. It has to be said that it looks great too, and Romero's rapid-editing is smooth and ever present. In time, he realizes that the only way he can regain himself is by killing his wife, his boss, and everyone else who has compromised his sense of self and dignity. Yes, it's a story where we root for the 'monster', only the real monsters are the so-called 'victims', his oppressors who have robbed him of identity by their daily-sleights and betrayals of this man. In this sense, the film advocates a kind of revolution of the mind, and ponders the whole concept of identity. For this reason, it's an existentialist film. This is why many so-called horror fans didn't like it--it's smarter than they are, which isn't hard in America.

Very little of this film is meant to be literal, however, it's a story that is very expressionist, allegorical, and therefore, psychological. If you ever had a bad marriage, and if you ever had a boss or co-workers you simply wished were run over by a train (a great scene realizes this fantasy!), this is YOUR film. We can beat our so-called superiors by outwitting them, the battlefield is a psychological one where the individual must assert themselves, or be conquered. This is the American workplace, it isn't pretty. Romero's films are always political in some way, and Bruiser is no exception. His usual subtext is anti-capitalist, which is somehow exotic to many North Americans, though not the rest of the world (especially Latin America, right now in 2006).

After all, America is capitalism. I have to say again that Flemyng is incredible in this film, and a performance that would have done Lon Chaney (not Jr.) proud. Also great is the performance of Tom Atkins (The Fog, Escape From New York, Two Evil Eyes, etc.) who plays the detective investigating all of Creedlow's crimes. He paints an accurate picture of the impotence of cops in an American society where money and power negate law and order. The rest of the cast is comprised of some of the finest Canadian actors, everyone is solid.

So why is it so hard for people to make films for adults? I understand that sometimes you just want to turn the brain off, and escape, that's fine. This is probably at the heart of why some don't like this film. It reminds them of how shitty their lives are! Granted, but how long are we going to run away from confronting our collective problems? Bruiser also challenges the individual to do something about it, which I applaud. Romero literally had to screen the movie in major cities with his own money! Why is a man in his sixties gutsier than all these young directors? Because he isn't a coward. Bruiser is scary because most of it is an accurate reflection of how sick our culture is. People sublimate their individuality to the demands of power and rarely even ponder why they do it. They accept the values of conquerors unconsciously, sleepwalking through life, and hurting people without much regard at all. All in the name of money and comfort. Suck on that, Roger Ebert.

The Lion's Gate DVD is pretty good (actually widescreen), with a commentary that excels. Too bad they didn't bankroll a bigger project with Romero after this one, as Romero's films have a great catalog value in the long-term. Lion's Gate is notorious for managing catalog poorly, however, so perhaps it's better they just distributed this as a DVD. At least they got it right with Eli Roth and Rob Zombie. The problem is, they never invented any new steps in the genre, as skilled as they are in their own ways. George Romero practically invented modern horror with Night of the Living Dead. Astonishingly, it took French (Canal) and Canadian (tax credits in Ontario) money to get a movie that critiques the American workplace made at all, a sad statement on our ability to look in the mirror.

NON-STORY: FRIST NOT RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT IN 2008

WARSHINGTON--Must have been that poor medical-advice he gave on Terry Schiavo, or the fact that his family's medical corporation has been under-investigation for ten-years. Oh yeah, and he and his poor non-leadership lost the GOP the elections, and the majority of the public hates him and his party because he let the President (and still does) do whatever he wanted--even if it was illegal. Now, the Democrats seem to be unlearning this lesson, and think the public won't punish them in the next-elections if they don't withdraw us from Iraq, rollback the tax-cuts for the wealthiest, and basically send these clowns to-jail. But, maybe that's just me. ;0)

MY CONFIDENTIAL SOURCE IN IRAQ: IT'S CIVIL WAR

IRAQ--Having seen the worst, my source contends that it's situation-critical in Iraq. Religious factionalism is unstoppable in-country now, it cannot be fixed. Iraq isn't a real country, it was created by the British after WWI, and they arbitrarily subdivided all these groups into a geopolitical entity that could only be governed by tyranny. We all know all this, yet the American media is just barely beginning to report it as fact. Insulting, isn't it? Perhaps this is part of why newspaper-subscriptions are plummeting, and why when the other media-outlets actually take a stand and vocalize what is really happening in Iraq that they begin gaining-on Fox's ratings. And while the FCC grants people like Murdoch a licence-to-kill on the American airwaves (legally-owned by the public, incidentally), Al-Jazeera is barred from any access to even one cable system in the United States. Is someone so convinced the 'conventional wisdom' is wrong? It would have that we aren't 'at war with Iran', but we are. We've been sending-in Special Forces and Rangers for almost three-years now, according to my source. They're doing reconnaissance and hitting infrastructure-targets with raids. That's an act of war, kids.

Are they afraid that if any shred-of-truth was put alongside it, their 'line' would simply vanish as the obvious rubbish it is? Yes. This was the reason to gut the Fairness Doctrine of the FCC in 1987, ordered by Ronald Reagan and Roger Aisles. To their credit, the Democratic party of that time fought it twice. The last-time in 1993, when they attempted to make it law. Nonetheless, technology fills-the-gaps.The internet is going to continue to expose these things. You can arrest us, but it won't stop anything for long. Arresting bloggers is a clear act of desperation--it couldn't be any clearer. The jig is up. Your boy in the White House has given the game away, and the public has noticed--even the kids. You could have twenty Trilateral Commissions, and it wouldn't help. Yes, you'll be fighting for your scraps for an entire generation, the genie is out of the bottle. Adam Smith was right: the 'wealth of nations' rises and falls, with time. But the acceleration of this is thanks to George W. Bush and his incompetence. We can be thankful that empires end, but where will the next begin? Probably with China, and the world will have to wear them down too. To my source: keep your head down, and be safe. This isn't over yet.

LITVINENKO'S SUSHI BAR CONTACT CHANGES HIS STORY A TAD, WORLD PRESS MISSES IT, BUT LEARNS MORE ELSEWHERE...

Rome--Italian Professor Mario Scaramella is beginning to talk, but he just contradicted-himself. Originally, he mentioned that he felt-strongly that the Russian mafia were involved in the assassination of former FSB Colonel, Alexander Litvinenko.

But now, the London Times is reporting that he's saying 'he had no doubt that the Kremlin was behind the death of Mr Litvinenko.' It might be nothing, or it might mean a lot. Scaramella is insisting on his innocence in the affair, and is still under-suspicion. It gets worse:

...and La Repubblica yesterday published interviews that it conducted last year with Mr LitvinenkoEvgeny Limarev, another former Russian intelligence officer, in which both men claimed that Mr Scaramella used his status within the commission to run a shadowy parallel intelligence operation with right-wing aims.

It seems possible that Mr. Litvinenko was well-aware of another-side of Professor Mario Scaramella, and wanted to pump him for information on Russian intelligence networks in Italy and elsewhere. There is a linchpin here somewhere that is typical of the modus operandi of all intel-operations, and it is ugly. It's possible a variety of interests feared information Mr. Litvinenko possessed--including Western ones. Bets are still on Vladimir Putin's regime and the FSB.

The other theories make some sense, but the hit seems very personal and not based on rational aims...yet. The London Telegraph has stated it would have been impossible for Litvinenko to drink polonium-210, as "the drink" would bubble and the heat would be too intense.' The notion that the ex-spy committed suicide to defame Putin isn't worthy of comment, and simply favors Putin.

Speculation about missing radioactive elements from Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union are also preposterous, as polonium-210 has a half-life of 138 days. He could certainly have become poisoned by it after this duration, so it is a wait-and-see. The fact that Litvinenko left a radioactive trail is disturbing, however, scientists assert that the element must be ingested or inhaled.

There is a strong-possibility that Litvinenko's clothing was dusted with the material and inhaled over the period of one day. Another possible motive has emerged: Litvinenko had passed-on a dossier to a Russian billionaire living in Israel, and it covered FSB infiltration-tactics (directed by Putin) into the Yukos energy company--the largest in the world. Russia is a major supplier of energy to the EU. Another twist:

The building near the Millennium Hotel [Ed.-site of a bar Litvinenko visited and contaminated] contains a business intelligence company, Titon International Ltd. — whose CEO was a former U.K. Special Services director, and Erinys UK Ltd., an international security and risk management company. Erinys confirmed that Litvinenko had visited the office "on a matter totally unrelated to issues now being investigated by the police," but declined to elaborate. (AP, 11/27/2006)

It could be a constellation of interests are involved here at a time when oil and natural gas have reached dazzling heights in value. It could even be a corporate hit. An autopsy might commence this week. Curiouser and curiouser, further and further down the rabbit hole we go, Alice. People are forgetting another possibility: America was also involved.

This isn't as strange as it might sound, and (geo)politics makes for strange bedfellows. In 2004, American intelligence helped the FSB assassinate Chechen separatist leader Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev in Qatar. The State Department has been curiously supportive of the genocidal war in Chechnya since its inception in the late-1990s.

If it was rogue elements of FSB, Putin is still responsible, and in serious trouble from his own security agency. This, however, seems doubtful as he is a creature of the KGB, and has survived this long. I believe Vladimir knows exactly what he's doing.

A final question: why was Professor Scaramella allowed to exit Great Britain so easily?

Maybe MI6 has some questions to answer. The contention that the polonium-210 was purchased on the black market sounds dubious in the face of a 138 day half-life. You have to have state-clearance to obtain it in this form. What would the world reaction be if it came from an American or British reactor? Or what about an Israeli one?

Revised 09.10.2008

Shake-Hands With Beef:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2473384,00.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/11/27/nspy127.xml
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2473385,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1957704,00.html

SOCIALISM ON THE MARCH: NOW ECUADOR!

'The people will have the opportunity to punish the oligarchy and the political parties.' --Rafael Correa


ECUADOR--AP is reporting that Leftist economist Rafael Correa has won the Ecuadoran Presidential election in what appears to be yet another rejection of IMF policies by the people of a Latin American nation. Correa also includes-himself amongst the allies of Hugo Chavez, and so we can see that a nexus of Populist control of South America is emerging here. These are heady-days for the region, and will likely embolden progressive-tendencies in the United States and Mexico, lynchpins in pushing-back what has been decades of a corporate-advance on the poorest populations within the Western Hemisphere. Correa has called President George W. Bush 'dimwitted', like the majority of humanity.

I like this man already. Correa has a Doctorate in Economics from the University of Illinois. He flatly-refuses signing any free-trade agreements with Washington. I hope he defaults on all of those loans, the Rockefellers and the other financiers are rocks. They'll be OK, their interests aren't mine or the average American's. Also in his favor: he is not allowing any US military bases in Ecuador. He has similar leverage as Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, as Ecuador also has substantial oil-deposits. Thanks, George W. Bush, you're making that wave of Populist Socialism I always wanted happen faster than any of us would have dreamed possible! And those pesky exit polls--you'd think the rest of the entire world found them valid (except when a Bush runs-for-office, then the bets are off).


Rafael Correa:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061127/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/ecuador_election
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6187364.stm
http://www.rafaelcorrea.com/
http://www.tonisolo.net/correa.html

American Intelligensia Panic-Response:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/26/AR2006112600311.html
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=a31B5.qZxWgo&refer=news

Bobby (2006) review

This was an unexpected surprise, a very enjoyable movie! The pundits/talking-necks have been slagging this film as a deification of Bobby Kennedy, but I never noticed any Oliver Stone overreaching here. The story is simple: you have around 20 different-characters in their little subplots during a 24-hour period at the Ambassador Hotel on June 5-6, 1968, the site of Bobby Kennedy's assassination. It seems many reviewers were expecting JFK (1991), which is goofy. Maybe they're just liars? ;0) It's obvious from the beginning of Bobby that all the characters are composites of real-people who were there, and they are mostly-fictitious. There's a good-reason for this, because the film is not about recreating specific-events. It's a cultural and social 'photograph' of the hopes and dreams of the American people in 1968, and today. Yes, the ensemble-approach is a lot like Robert Altman,'s but Emilio Estevez has his own style that has a nice flow and sheen (pun-intended) to it. A young Czech-journalist informs us about the Prague Spring that was occurring in Czechosolvakia, while others illustrate the racial-tensions of the time. Other subplots are about the dynamics of marriage at that time, and the torture women had to endure under the fashions of the time! There are hints of the emergence of feminism, and 1968 was that year. We have guests of the Hotel, Mexican busboys, waitresses, beauticians, but RFK is only seen as he can be, in clips that weave throughout all the lives of the characters. It's pretty effective, but it was surprisingly subtle.

For the jaded, you just won't like this, and that's too-bad. I really feel-sorry for you. On just a technical-level, Estevez did a great job here. The performances by William H. Macy as a manager of the Ambassador, or Lawrence Fishburn as a wizened head-chef are satisfying and drew me in. All the characters drew me in, and I never felt distracted by star-cameos. The performances are too-good for that to happen. Harry Belafonte's (a prominent-critic of the Bush administration) geriatric-rapport with Anthony Hopkins' Ambassador concierge is so warm and genuine, and adds to a tapestry of what is a compelling-swath of Americana. I valued these characters, and I cared about them. Like I said, this is Frank Capra territory, with all the Populist sentiment of the originals (without being derivative). There isn't any moment where I felt the film beat me over-the-head with any particular-message, it just made some very humble and quiet-observations about where America has been, and where it's at today. From the references to hanging-chads and Black Americans being-denied the right-to-vote in the 1968 primaries, or Lindsey Lohan's war-bride pondering why her government hasn't provided adequate reasons for the American-invasion of Vietnam (or Iraq now), this is about 1968 and 2006. The writer/director did his homework, and the film is as densely-packed with bits of that fateful year as it can be.

But there is more. Ashton Kutchner (groan, but he was funny!) provides some comic-relief and some cultural context with his hilarious drug-dealer, a freak who's holed-up in the Ambassador selling-dope. Yes, like Altman, a number of the subplots intersect with each other. You either like the style or you don't, and I'm with the former. Bobby isn't a perfect movie by-any-means, but it is a very entertaining and enlightening set of stories about average-Americans on a very bad-day in our history. What struck me was how much happened in such a short-time--it was as if the public was truly overwhelmed by the assassinations of JFK, and Dr. King, but after Bobby, we sank-into a daze that we only seem to be awakening-from now. The 1960s was peppered with political-assassinations of progressive leaders, and by the late-1960s so much had been invested in them that their deaths were almost a body-blow to American enthusiasm and a social-movement. We lost our inertia and our positivity. With the murder of RFK, there wasn't much hope left for many people. It seemed a watershed, and a shared-sense of destiny evaporated for a time. This was a tactical mistake-in-thinking. We all have to be leaders now.

But forgetting all that, it's just a very competent film from a guy I had written-off! Visually, it just looks beautiful, and there was an excruciating effort to capture the styles and the look of 1968. Even mannerisms and dialect fit very well with what I know of the period. Seeing two geeky Kennedy campaign volunteers drop acid (via the Kutchner character) for the first-time is a more-accurate depiction of the 1960s than most period-pieces of the era--the whole-point is that the 'normals' from the suburbs were turning-on and joining the counterculture and the anti-war movement, folks. That was the reason why there was such a violent-reaction from the beltway, there were massive cultural-changes emerging. Freaks and hippies were rare, even in 1968, just like 'dropouts' of any era. Bobby gets this right. But watch other movies on the 1960s, and it seems they were everywhere! It's untrue, the counterculture was widely-distributed and fragmentary.

Emilio Estevez just gets so much right, it's hard to fault him here. Rather than obsess over the counterculture, the movie simply shows us the lives of a variety of ordinary-people. Bobby is a time-capsule of where the culture was at, and what the concerns of people were. It is their and our ideals that are important in the story. Bobby Kennedy was merely invested with those ideals by the American public, and he was responding to us. This is what made him special, and it's what the public wants from the new Democratic majority in Congress today. Will they rise to the occasion? Why RFK was murdered is another story, this isn't a story of para- politics or conspiracies, but of life as it is lived. It really isn't about Bobby Kennedy at all, but about us. This is what makes it Capraesque, like the Populism of "Meet John Doe."

NOTE: COMMENTING FOR EVERYONE ENABLED!

I've enabled commenting for non-Google members. Here's the rules, and if you don't follow them, I'll delete your comments and block you from the site permanently:


1. Only constructive and civil comments. Non-negotiable.

2. No trolls. If I notice you, you're gone. You won't be tolerated here. Why? Because. Start your own blog, shithead, it's your right.

3. No advertising bots, though if you want to promote your blog, that's fine, though I won't hesitate to delete ones that promote right-wing agendas/ideologies, or anything advocating the overthrow of the United States government (it's illegal since 1940). Again, go create your own blog.

4. Not set-in-stone, but please try to keep on-topic if a thread exists. However, if you attempt to hijack the dialog, you'll be ejected permanently (see 2).

5. Any comments that advocate any violation of state and federal law, implicate yourself at: your own blog.

6. Friendly discussion/dialog is always welcome on this site.

777. You can always disagree with the opinions posted here, but you had better come-prepared. Don't bring a butter-knife to a gunfight. In-other-words, are you up to it? Do you have anything pertinent to add? Things to consider.

8. Friends can always tell me to 'get fucked.'

9. Any new facts you can bring here makes you my hero.


Otherwise, if you want to write about your mother's douche-bag, the time your dog died, actual intellectual dialogues, why punk still sucks, the bully everyone piled-on, a brush-with-death, your herpes warts, why you hate the GOP, your favorites things, your first or best-lay (usually not your first-one), how to give better blow-job instructions for the ladies, a brush with the famous, a crime you witnessed, your war-stories, or when you first dropped-acid or smoked pot--you go, girl!

Everyone's free to disagree, but you had better have a good argument here, and state your case with some prior thought invested in your post. But, if you just want to 'chat' and play nice, that's cool too. If you want to talk sex, that's fine, as long as it's nothing related to pedophilia or bestiality. Normal human-beings are intolerant of these things.

Postscript, 12.29.2008--Since the time of this post there were abuses, so I screen comments. Don't like it? I don't care.

IT'S OAXACA TIME AGAIN

"The only one who can dismiss and impose governors is God." --Gov. Ulises Ruiz, November 2006

OAXACA, MEXICO--Demonstrators (primarily APPO--the Popular People's Assembly of Oaxaca) again engaged Mexican Policia for control of the center of the city in what has been almost six-months of stand-offs and confrontations that began as a teacher's strike in July. But the strike has been met with extreme violence from off-duty cops, and unidentified vigilantes, and has grown into a movement against the corrupt Oaxacan state governor, Ulises Ruiz who is thought to be behind the vigilante-attacks as well. This can all be seen as a continuation of a cycle in Mexican politics that extends back to Aztec rule, as it is well-known that Oaxacans suffered under their domination before the time of the conquistadores.

Oaxacan-auxilliaries comprised most of Hernan Cortez's forces that took what was once the Aztec capitol, but is now Mexico City. It seems little has changed, and Vincente Fox, the oligarchs and foreign-interests have merely replaced the Aztec rulers who still harbor that cannibalistic-urge for human-sacrifice to maintain the social-order. In-response to the October invasion of the town by Federales today, protesters attempted to encircle the Policia, sometimes throwing fireworks and molotov cocktails. This is an escalation regarding the gasoline bombs, as protesters have previously refrained from using them in past-confrontations.

Presidente Calderon will be sworn-in on December 1st, and he will have his hands full. Protests by supporters of Leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador are also still very active in Mexico city. Viva la Mexico! Viva Zapata! Before the uprisings, Oaxaca was known as a tourist-center, but that ended in-substance after July. Much of this has been brewing in Oaxaca for some-time (years), with Leftists, Zapatistas, and the general-population being fired-on by PRI-supporters and municipal-backed vigilantes. In many-cases, nobody is safe from state-repression in the city and the state that bear the same name. It's hardly an exaggeration to say that local and federal Policia hold a monopoly on violence in the state. The vast-majority of fatalities are APPO-members and the local-citizenry. Imagine that. You don't have to, and dozens of people are disappearing in Oaxaca.

Viva la Muerte (to imperialists):

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N25398452.htm

http://ww4report.com/node/2810

http://deletetheborder.org/node/1332

Viva la Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos:

http://www.narconews.com/Issue40/article1673.html

First-Hand Account from October 31st:

http://www.globalvoicesonline.org/2006/10/31/mexico-first-hand-account-of-oaxaca-violence/

Oaxaca News Blog (En English):

http://mexico.indymedia.org/oaxacaNews

Just a Few Happy-Reminders for the Holidays...

'Happy talk, keep talking happy talk, talk about things you like to do. You got to have a dream, if you don't have a dream, how you gonna have a dream come true?'

Mark Foley is a pedophile. Dennis Hastert and the GOP-leadership covered it up, and Arlen Specter is old, ugly and a loser. Mainstream feminism is still an impotent and divisive club for rich women. The GOP and Democratic leadership in Congress still support the war in Iraq, which will sink them, God-willing. The American dollar will soon be almost-worthless (too-late). Habeus Corpus (the right to know why you've been dragged-to-jail) is still gone, and we're still in deep-shit with a future that looks apocalyptic. Columbus did not discover America, it discovered him. There's always hope. The Korean War never ended. You suck. The human-race is a lethal-mutation. There is no God. The vent-worms at the bottom of the oceans will survive us, since our desire to return to being primordial-slime is so strong (we're not quitters). Fortunately, Republicans don't have to take any steps in this direction, they're already there. Ewige Blumenkraft! Prague is a seat of the occult. Let's fuck! 'Republican friend' is an oxymoron for twats. The Simpsons were hilarious for 5-years. Friedrich Nietzsche died of syphilis. In-laws usually suck. Have a nice day! We will fall. There is no justice. I collect stamps. Did you take-out the trash? Punk died in 1978. Are you 'metrosexual'? Yes? You must be young and stupid then. Heavy metal hair-bands will always suck. Gay men are better conversation than the hottest women who ever-lived in the entirety of human history. We suck. Canada is friendlier than America. Many gay men hate women. Over 50% of all American marriages fail in the first two-years. Finland has a higher suicide-rate than the United States, even proportionally. Kurt Vonnegut's last decent novel was Deadeye Dick. Most women are attracted to men who show 100% certainty at-all-times. Men have nipples--why?! Yu look good in that dress (madame Yu). No, you don't look fat (I'm lying to you now). You suck. Stanley Kubrick is still dead. Happiness is a transitory-sensation. The world is round. Uranium is not the heaviest-element. People are more-interesting when they don't talk, especially young women. Iraq is a disaster. Germans do indeed love David Hasselhof. There is no truth. Dutch Elm disease changed America's landscape. The carrier pigeon tasted good. The human-race is a dead-end proposition. Men are generally taller than women. Kurt Cobain is still dead. Children are cruel. Men are base. Nobody ever got-laid at a party by whipping-out a bag of pot in a room full of women.

VLADIMIR PUTIN, STATIST MURDERER

"You have shown yourself to have no respect for life, liberty or any civilized value. You have shown yourself to be unworthy of your office, to be unworthy of the trust of civilized men and women." --from Alexander Litvinenko's final-statement of Nov. 21


LONDON--Astonishing all of us who know-better, London's Medical Examiner stated that the death (by a deadly-isotope called polonium-210) of former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko by ingestion of the substance on November 1st was 'not an act of violence.' What could me more of a violation of a human-being than this? Well sure, this happens all the time in London sushi restaurants, and now traces of polonium-210 have been found at the establishment and the victim's residency. Details are sketchy right-now, which one would expect in a criminal investigation. There is an off-chance his killers did a black-bag job and put the contaminant in his home. Still want kids in a world like this? But, fortunately, London Police are investigating the situation as a 'suspicious poisoning'. Kremlin reactions are varied from 'it was accidental' [?!], to allegations of Putin's involvement being 'sheer nonsense.' But who was Litvinenko? MSNBC is reporting that:

In a 2003 book, “The FSB Blows Up Russia,” he accused his country’s secret service agency of staging apartment-house bombings in 1999 that killed more than 300 people in Russia and sparked the second war in Chechnya. Litvinenko joined the KGB in 1988 and rose to the rank of colonel in its successor, the Federal Security Service, known as the FSB. He began specializing in terrorism and organized crime in 1991, and was transferred to the FSB’s most secretive department on criminal organizations in 1997.

Litvinenko has been writing and speaking against the regime of Vladimir Putin since his defection--the resurrection of a Cold War term--in 2000. He knew too-much, it seems, and was meeting with an Italian Professor (Mario Scaramella) who studied KGB activities within Italy during the Cold War. Scaramella was a 'contact' as part of Litvinenko's investigation into the assassination of his compatriot, journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Politkovskaya was also a well-known critic of Putin's regime and the war in Chechnya. It seems almost certain that the Kremlin ordered this action, as it likely did in the attempted-murder through poisoning by dioxin of Ukrainian President-elect Viktor Yuschenko in 2004. At any rate, poison is a preferred method by intelligence operatives because it is discreet. But what is the element Polonium? It's a naturally-occurring element used in atomic-weapons:

In the summer of 1942, the Corps of Engineers organized the Manhattan Engineer District. The purpose of the District's Manhattan Project was to build an atomic bomb. Polonium-210 was vital to this program, because it was to be used in a neutron source that would ensure initiation of a chain reaction. An initiator is a device that produces a timed burst of neutrons to initiate a fission chain reaction in a nuclear weapon. Initiators made of polonium-210 and beryllium were located at the center of the fissile cores of early atomic weapons. (globalsecurity.org)

But beyond this, polonium-210 is sometimes used to convert nuclear power into electricity at a reactor site. All access to polonium-210 requires security-clearances. Admittedly, as broken-up as Russia is now, organized crime could obtain it through corruption in key-positions related to the military, intelligence, or even nuclear plants. But there's a hitch: polonium-210 has a half-life of 138 days. This would make a surreptitious-use by organized crime unlikely, though not impossible. But, it would be quite a feat.

Yet strangely, the Italian Professor thinks it might be the Russian Mafia, which seems unlikely unless they were used as contract-killers. This is coming from Litvinenko's 'contact', so he is certainly under-suspicion here, the comment is peculiar. While surveillance of organized crime was part of Col. Litvinenko's work with FSB, we simply don't know all of the details of what he did under the super-secret agency. But with crimes like this, one has to ask: who gains the most from the action? The motive for Russian organized crime simply isn't as significant as it is for Putin who has a legacy and a power-structure of his own to protect. Compared to the state, any mafia group is small-change, even in the face of a weakened and partially-decentralized Kremlin.

An October 12th article in the Economist states that Russia is potentially heading towards the 'F-word'...fascism. Considering many of Putin's speeches and public-statements on his aims, he sounds much like an incubating Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible, or even a Joseph Stalin. Relations with the West can be expected to cool as long as his associates hold-power in Russia. Maybe a Marshall Plan for Russia after the end of the Cold War wasn't such a bad-idea, but someone named Bush was in-office at that historical-moment. It was an opportunity that he squandered. This is a time of martyrs, and the world is aflame. This is our fault, and the species is sinking-fast. Yes, it's Miller time, only I drink real beer, not piss.

Polonium:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/intro/polonium.htm
http://216.239.51.104/search?q=cache:_xpnuebqNmAJ:www.ead.anl.gov/pub/doc/polonium.pdf+polonium-210&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=7

The Poisoning (Don't Anger Vladimir!):
http://www.680news.com/news/international/article.jsp?content=w112459A
http://www.topix.net/world/ukraine
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6165482.stm
http://blog.kievukraine.info/rss/atom.xml
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15808119/

The 'F-word' (Not FUCK, nope.):

http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8031597

MIDDLE-OF-THE-ROAD...

'The middle-of-the-road is the most-dangerous place to be.'
--from John Carpenter's THEY LIVE

THE UNITED STATES AGAIN--Watch for Democrats like James Carville, Rahm Emanuel, 'ittle Chuckie Schumer, Hillary Clinton, and all the other DNC conservatives get kicked to the curb in the next-year. Wha? Yup. Americans don't want a rush to the center, they didn't vote that way in the elections. How do I know this? Look back at the campaign-ads, and you will see a clearly progressive-message. The pols at the DNC & DCCC (like Emanuel) know damn well the public wants some substantial-reforms, not just some half-measures that accomplish nothing. We want change now. If they don't deliver on serious oversight and investigations into GOP-wrongdoing, end the war in Iraq by the end of next-year, and rollback illegal-wiretapping and Bush administration tax-cuts for the wealthiest, they're done. This is the last-chance here, this is it. Either Democrats deliver on reforms, or we have a breakdown of this society, and it's not coming later, it's coming sooner this-time. There will be nowhere to run.

If the Democrats don't deliver some relief for the American worker, we can expect upheavals that could shatter their party. The GOP's time could well-be-up too, since they literally have nothing to offer voters in the economic realm, just a lot of race and gay-baiting, but nothing of substance. Most Americans know that the GOP is 100%-beholden to corporate-interests, and they want new laws that break these ties to both parties. Do both parties generally seem 'moderate'? Maybe compared to public-opinion, but that's relative, isn't it? There is an obvious disconnect in opinon. Look at the polls on various social-issues: does public-opinion look moderate now? The 'prevailing-wisdom' is a crock, and it just comes-off as another insult to the intelligence of even the most daft of individuals (like mainstream Democrats and Republicans). The 'prevailing-wisdom' is actually the extremist-side of the spectrum, but they can keep calling themselves 'middle-of-the-road', because that's where they're going to stay until they're no-longer holding public-office. Yes, even a good chunk of Democrats in Congress are basically Republicans in-disguise (and not very good ones either). Fortunately, there are now enough progressives in both houses to cause some trouble for these shills. Young people are aware of these ploys, and voted-accordingly.

But think of the term 'middle-of-the-road'. Does it sound sexy? Would you have-sex with someone who was 'middle-of-the-road'? Would you hire a mechanic who was middle-of-the-road to fix your car? Would you go see a middle-of-the-road movie (don't answer)? Do the last six-years seem like a moderate course? Well, you would if you were ugly, stupid, perverted, and greedy like most politicos (and Americans). You think the GOP is alone in being corrupt, and that all-is-well now? You're daft. Nobody but a nut, a loser or a coward likes being lukewarm, it sucks. But, as the last six-years have proven, continuing a so-called 'centrist' position just means you're right-wing, with an agenda that will wreck this nation. Most of the same Democrats (John Kerry, Hillary Clinton) who voted-for the invasion of Iraq still cannot form a coherent-strategy because they also want to 'win' the war (whatever that means).

They're against protecting American jobs, the wages of workers and their ability to form unions and bargain with their employers, or even access to adequate medical-care--anything the public wants, they don't want for the public. Sounds radical and extremist, doesn't it? You would think they don't have any respect for democracy at all. Claiming a centrist-stance just means you're a liar who's using the phraseology of the demagogue. Middle-of-the-road? Not sexy. Nancy Pelosi is off to a great-start and they haven't even begun the next-session of Congress, so the same interests who back many DNC and GOP-hacks are attacking her. Howard Dean's approach is the future of the Democratic party, or there isn't one for it. Grassroots, or death.

PS: 'tt', fuck-you.

Let's Go to Prison (2006) review

While Sascha Cohen's 'Borat' may be the most-popular comedy of 2006, there is an even funnier one, and it's this movie! Astonishingly, Universal distributed this little indie, but has given it virtually no publicity whatsoever. That must have been the trade-off, because it's a pretty uncompromising story that could be compared-to Richard Linklater's Fast Food Nation. Directed by Bob Odenkirk (Mr. Show, SNL-writer during the Phil Hartman era, Ben Stiller Show, Conan O'Brien), it's an interesting-take on our corrections system, and it's loosely-based on a non-fiction book called 'You Are Going to Prison', by a former inmate named Jim Hogshire. Much of his humor is intact in the film, but writers Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon have taken it into the realm of fiction/non-fiction . The book was literally just a 'how-to' guide to survival in prison, so you know this isn't going to be a flattering-portrayal of it. Most Americans know full-well their prison system is corrupt, and basically dysfunctional, but our culture has a lust for punishment at its core. Don't believe me? Let's go to prison, and find-out!

The movie makes the case by stating we have 2 million Americans in-prison now, only being surpassed by China and Russia. But this bloodlust is most-obvious during our elections, mostly the local-ones, though Reagan and Bush thrived on the 'crime-and-punishment' issue. And man-oh-man, is there some punishment in the first-quarter of this movie, wow, it really was only slightly-funny until...the story has some very unpredictable and hilarious twists to it! Odenkirk did the Midwest proud by placing the tale in Illinois, and they filmed the prison-scenes at the old Joliet Prison.

There is a scene with the warden of the facility that is priceless ('Take all of your complaints, write them on a piece of paper--and stick it up-your-asshole.'). In a few-areas, it's almost too-close to reality, but this changes as the story progresses.The movie begins with the story of repeat-felon, John Lyshitski (played to-the-hilt by Dax Shepard who plays rednecks alot) who is unfairly put on a path to crime by a certain judge at the age of 8. He has what is euphemistically called 'bad-luck', and gets snared into the system like so many others in America.

Judge Biederman just keeps sending him further-and-further into the corrections system, much like what happened to make John Dillinger a gangster, and untold-scores of minor-offenders into murderers. Because we are so harsh in our penalties here, we actually have created a situation where felons are manufactured. Let's Go to Prison makes this point many-times throughout the film, but it does it with a lot of laughs at the expense of the story's other protagonist, Nelson Biederman IV (played by the brilliant and funny Will Arnett from Arrested Development), the son of the judge. Lyshitski gets-released at the beginning of the film, and we get a voiceover of his story. The man wants revenge, but he realizes that judge Biederman died three-days-before his release, so he decides to take-it-out on his son instead. Like I said, the first-quarter of the movie is grim!

Lyshitski is constantly giving Biederman the worst advice you could give to someone imprisoned, and the plot takes a radical-turn in a confrontation between the judge's son and an Ayran Nations gang-leader that must be seen to be believed. The worm-turns for Biederman, the pathetic yuppie-fop who loves the 1990s pop-tune 'Shake That Body', and Lyshitski is in for quite a ride as his target becomes the 'big man' in the joint. It just gets funnier, and telling you any more would just ruin the ride for you, but you get a greater understanding of life in prison.

This was something I never expected, because...well, we all think we've seen-it-all with prison movies, but Let's Go to Prison goes further than all of them! From Biederman getting-punched everyday, to his being-sold to a Black inmate called 'Barry' (the always-great Chi McBride) for an ounce-of-pot and a carton-of -smokes, to their ongoing 'courting', it's hilarious. It also has an ending for the ages that I would personally love to see in real-life! If the movie says anything, it's that the criminal justice and corrections system is a joke on all of us, and it actually finds some hilarity in this fact. That's a tall order that it fills, no-problem. Flawed, but hilarious. Score.

www.letsgotoprison.com

DEATH OF AN ICON: ROBERT ALTMAN, DEAD AT 81

LOS ANGELES--Maverick filmmaker Robert Altman (1925-2006)has died in a Los Angeles hospital of currently undisclosed-causes, though a heart-attack is likely. Mr. Altman was known for directing M.A.S.H. (1970), Nashville (1975), 3 Women (1977), Gosford Park (2001), Short Cuts (1993), The Player (1992), Prarie Home Companion (2006), Private Honor (1984, one of my favorites), and many-more classics of independent film. He was a great man who showed the world that Hollywood isn't the only-route to make a movie, a member of a dying-breed of indie-filmmakers in a world of followers and yes-men (like Uwe Boll). Robert Altman was also a veteran of WWII. He will be missed by millions because he loved people. I recommend virtually all of his films, just not Kansas City, it's awful! ;0) I strongly-recommend cineastes watch his Private Honor, however, it is a damning-statement on our political system by none-other than the late Richard Nixon. Nixon mailed Altman a signed-copy of one of his own books after seeing the film. He loved it.

PS: It appears Mr. Altman died from complications related to cancer. What a man.

KRAMER LOSES IT: SOME OBSERVATIONS (HAPPY THANKSGIVING BOO!)

THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AGAIN--As Americans, we are bombarded in our daily-lives with bigotry, and racism (both everyday and the institutionalized form). It is literally part of the fabric of our lives to-the-point that we are all conditioned with racist-attitudes. This includes Black Americans, though they will protest-loudly--the fact is, it's true. A majority of Blacks hate homosexuals, which is racism. All Americans harbor racist and xenophobic-attitudes, period. But some of us are hypocrites about this fact. When someone like Mel Gibson or Michael Richards does what many of us do while driving when somebody cuts-us-off in traffic, the hypocrites swarm to throw-the-heat off of themselves. He really should have just said something like, 'Wow, Black men with small-dicks, who woulda thought?' Yes, what Mr. Richards said was unacceptable, but it is protected-speech by the First Amendment. You don't believe in democracy if it only applies to what you agree-with, and I find it ludicrous to think that this man is a racist. We'll see about Gibson, but he still has the right to think and say what he wishes within the law.

It's absurd, but the more-liberal-than-thou crowd need fodder to further their ambitions and agendas. Let Black Americans have-their-say on this, it isn't your place to judge this man you rich, lily-white assholes. His career should not be affected, but we aren't a tolerant nation in a lot of cases. He has my support in this incident, but as we all know, he attended the lynching of a Black man afterwards. This is fucking ridiculous when thousands of Iraqis are being murdered by the Bush administration and much of Congress right-now. Not 160-years-ago, now.

Yes indeed, I have used the word nigger in-anger myself, and it shocked and surprised me. I felt ashamed, but should one be ashamed forever about it? No. Do I hate Black Americans? No, I like them better than so-called White America--they've done little to hurt my life. It was wrong, but there it is, not a high-crime like lying about WMDs to get us into a phony war. How about trying to understand why people say such things? You know, an open-dialog? Oh, that would disempower those with a questionable agenda. Welcome to America, home of the pseudo-liberal (you're a joke). Meanwhile, the media gets-rich on your stupidity (like that's new). Want fries with that?

DEMOCRATS.COM RUNNING AN IMPEACHMENT PETITION COVERING EVERY AMERICAN VOTING DISTRICT

THE INTERNET (HERE)--Yep, they've included Vice President Bush as well!

It's Your Call, Man:
http://www.democrats.com/peoplesemailnetwork/88

DEMOCRATIC REP. CHARLES RANGEL REPEATS INTENTIONS TOWARDS REINSTATING THE DRAFT

WASHINGTON--I heartily-agree with Rep. Rangel, and while we're going to do this, let's hammer-shut all the deferrments. This is something I am certain Rangel wants, too. Yes, I'm against-the-war, and I believe it's a good-idea. Americans--especially the youngest of young-adults--will no-longer be able to ignore a war like Iraq again, there will be no room for apathy. Especially when the children of the middle class and the wealthy start getting-killed in large-numbers. But this is key to readoption, making it a shared-responsibility in a time of war. It's a hard argument to disagree-with, as an all-volunteer military has still been disproportionately-populated by the poor since the removal of the draft in 1973 (by the GOP). Rangel's primary-aim is to change this fact. Yes, even white trailer-trash. But he really does have an overarching-goal in bring the draft back, and that's to damage the war machine's ability to expolit the poor.

Congressman Rangel says he wants the draft to provide more-troops for Iraq as a counter to McCain's call for more-troops, but I think this is a bit of a red-herring. He knows full-well it would hasten the end of the war by the inevitable groundswell that would occur. Americans only respond when things affect them directly--something Rangle wants to make tangible and real, and I support his approach. The American public should never be able to escape the responsibility of their or their government's actions. You want a war? Great, we're sending your kids too. Still want this war now? This logic is inescapable, and I love it. Sure, a bunch of bleeding-hearts from the more-liberal-than-thou crowd will gripe, but they're wrong. Rangle even offered the alternative of a couple-years doing public-service as an alternative to duty in a war-effort. He submitted a bill requesting a return of the draft prior to the invasion of Iraq, and I supported that move then. I like this man, he shook Malcolm X's hand when it was dangerous to. He also said Malcolm was Harlem's best-citizen, which was also unpopular during the mid-1960s. Rangel also looks like Caesar Romero, which is cool. He is a swank-looking man, with the class of Percy Sutton and W.E.B. DuBois, impressive. And he has his hair conked (the process), which looks smart coupled with a nice-suit. Just increase those Estate taxes and enact some progressive taxation again, Rep Rangel. The American people expect this from you.