Apocalypto (2006) review

There is only one word for Mel Gibson's Apocalypto: masterwork. We have the source of his meltdown--this film. To say that Apocalypto is a major achievement would be an understatement. It is more. Gibson has created a story about now and how civilizations fall.

Yes, there are numerous references to the war in Iraq--albeit indirect ones--but also about the fear-baiting "War on Terror." The panic surrounding 9/11 is touched-on: a scene of refugees escaping warfare very early in the film conveys the need for calm during a crisis, and not for people to fall-prey to their fears (the food of all tyrants and demagogues).

For those who want to shift the debate about this film, you should realize that it's an allegory, and it's meant to exist only in cinematic space and not as a representation of a linear-history. It's thrust is thematic. We should all know this by now regarding movies and how they portray human history. Interestingly, Gibson and his co-writer crib a scene from William Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar," and it fits. I also enjoyed his take on the shamanic experience and the power of human insight.

But many of the images in Apocalypto are happening in Iraq today, many-of-which are being committed by our troops in our name. The only difference here is the absence of automatic-weapons and other "high-technologies". While there isn't 100% accuracy in the depiction of the classical Mayan civilization, the bulk of their culture and practices (including the cyclical-droughts that precipitated a decline of the cities, enslavement, and an increase in human sacrifice) are present. There is a genuine love of the Maya expressed in the film, and they are a beautiful people with their aquiline-noses and their bronze-skin.

The Maya are a lovely people with a material culture and legacy that is both gorgeous and horrific, and they are a part of us all in Gibson's filmic universe. There are no Caucasian messiahs here (a truly racist conceit), as there have been in most films featuring indigenous peoples. Virtually every actor in the film is Mayan or at least Native American.

Some critics have said the tale seems more to concern the problems of the Aztecs, but consider that the rain god Kukulkan was a feathered-serpent, just as Quezalcoatl in Mesoamerican religion. Both gods received sacrifices of blood in ways that are so similar that there has to be some connection in the genesis of both civilizations, particularly in their militarized-theocratic structures. This connection may come from the Toltec and Olmec civilizations.

We can see a contemporary desire for this theocratic-context in the efforts of the Bush administration except that they sacrifice warriors to the god Mars. And so, we have one of the major themes in most of Gibson's oeuvre: the strong desire for human sacrifice and an unquenchable bloodthirstiness that is part of nearly every so-called "civilized" culture in human history. This is what makes it a story about the human-condition, and it's clear that Mel Gibson is horrified by the way that we treat each other. This raises some valid questions.

I put it to you: how-many people has he ever killed? Critics are suffering from misdirected-anger, while others are lying-racists themselves. Others are simply being reactionary and wrong-headed.

A noteworthy aspect of the film is the fact that this is the first motion picture with dialog spoken in the language of the Maya. Because most of the public don't understand that the Maya were and are a linguistic cultural group--not a single-unit as most indigenous groups are and were--it might be confusing to see Maya enslaving and sacrificing other Maya, but this is what occurred during their classical and post-classical eras.

Human sacrifice intensified when cycles of droughts, possibly due to an over-population in the cities. Due to internecine warfare, poor harvests, and general brutality through raiding and feuds, the cities began sinking. Gibson suggests that infighting as depicted in the film was the major-contributor, and Gibson appears to have done his homework on a subject that he so obviously adores. It's still a guess as to why they fell, which reveals the tale as allegory, not a simple history.

Even the philosopher Henri Rousseau with his "noble savages" might be impressed, but the co-writer/director/producer balances this all out with a display of what the Maya really did to one another as their civilization collapsed. Because of this, and the indirect references to our own time, the story has a message that isn't isolated to the fall of classical Mayan civilization, but a warning to us all that only a people can truly undo themselves.

This is a pretty radical message during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the divisiveness and chaos unleashed by the Bush administration upon the world. In past interviews, director Gibson has compared the human sacrifices in Apocalypto with Iraqis, Americans, and coalition forces being sacrificed to the war machine in the Middle East. This is a very fine-point that literally transcends the historical setting of the film and can be taken as part of its general-thrust: a civilization that wars with its neighbors and within itself cannot endure, a reminder from history. The majority of Mayan history was warfare against each other, it's just the unfortunate truth. Apocalypto is a warning to us all.

It is curious, then, that there are voices of the so-called "Left" who want to focus on the racial tirade of a man who was having a nervous-breakdown while intoxicated. It sends a very weird message indeed. The sheer brilliance of this film illuminates the incident more clearly by its technical achievements (digitally shooting, almost entirely within the jungles of the Yucatan). Ask Werner Herzog how easy this is.

This is not an apology for Gibson's comments, but we should ask ourselves how often these things happen to people who are not famous. If he wasn't Mel Gibson, we wouldn't even be talking about the tirade, we wouldn't care. It's all about having an agenda.

All attacks on him should be viewed with a reasonable degree of suspicion and level-headedness, because even a man who has done wrong can be used to commit further wrongs for individuals with an questionable agenda (like Ari Emanuel). Many of these people are supporters of the very imperialism that Gibson rails-against in this film.

There are a number of Hollywood insiders who have said point-blank that they will never even watch this film for consideration of an MPAA award. It all reminds me of the stupidity surrounding The Last Temptation of Christ (1989), an embarrassing episode for American culture. This is intellectual dishonesty at its worst, but most of these individuals are used to this state-of-being, as are many of the critics of the film--even one Ward Churchill, and he should know better.

In-character-as-usual, the Maya are mixed in their reactions to the film at this writing. They are not a monolithic people, but a culture of disjointed familial networks.

Yet, the Maya are survivors, 800,000-strong, which isn't shabby for an indigenous people in the Americas, and they even control parts of Chiapas, Belize and Guatemala. A people have a way of coming-around for their turn again, and it's possible that the Maya will have their own autonomous civilization someday. Here's to their continued resistance to colonialism. Today, the Maya often live as they always have in their small agricultural villages. Apocalypto is essential viewing with an ending that absolutely floored me. Its cinematic vistas are food for thought, regardless of who it came from.

Context-context-context:

http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/archaeology/sites/meso_america/chichenitza.html
http://hatherleighpress.stores.yahoo.net/secretsofmaya.html
http://www.sfusd.k12.ca.us/schwww/sch618/Maya/Maya_Aztec_Main.html
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06309/735121-37.stm
http://www.indians.org/welker/maya.htm
http://www.smm.org/sln/ma/cenote.html
http://www.britannica.com/hispanic_heritage/article-9051572
http://www.pilotguides.com/destination_guide/central_america_and_caribbean/la_ruta_maya/chichen_itza.php
http://www.utexas.edu/utpress/excerpts/extauazp.html

Revised 11.08.2008

MEL GIBSON'S APOCALYPTO NUMBER ONE

Just thought I'd remind-you. I guess that 'boycott' didn't pan-out in Hollywood, oh well. Sigh. An amazing film, you must go see it immediately. Perhaps one of the best anti-imperialist statements in cinema in decades. In case you think the Maya didn't sacrifice human-beings during their decline, you're wrong-again, but you're probably used to this. Review coming tomorrow, brace-yourselves. It will be scathing, just not in the direction you'd expect...

LOW-SCALE RIOTING IN CHILE'S CAPITOL OVER PINOCHET DEATH

SANTIAGO, CHILE--Hundreds of rioters, both for and against the legacy of deceased former dictator, Augusto Pinochet, have been fighting in the streets of the capitol for the last few-hours. Some Leftist protesters have created makeshift-barricades, and some fist-fights and rock-throwing have occurred. There have been no reports of serious-injuries yet. It's an expression of a rift that hasn't healed, but thousands are celebrating Pinochet's death, just as Spaniards did with the death of Franco. The celebrations will probably last for months, if Pinochet supporters don't act-out and violate the law (they're used to this).

No, there's no-looking-back for South America anymore. No more Monroe Doctrine, no more cheap bananas, oil and labor for Big Oil and American Fruit Company. No more, watch them fall--to their own people, a tragedy, I know. No more red-baiting, no more dominoes. The ruse is over with the Cold War gone, and democracy is winning in Latin America, much to the chagrin of the State Department and American elites. Makes you want to cry, doesn't it? Not really. It all began when they threw rocks at Nixon in Caracas during the Eisenhower years, the rocks hurled round-the-world. Thankfully, some of those rocks hit the SOB.

Center-Left politics continues to rule in Chile, as it has since 1990. There was no 'economic miracle', you see, Pinochet nearly wrecked Chile with his 'Chicago economics' deregulation. Sound familiar? A shame that red-baiting doesn't work anymore, but it's definitely Miller time in Santiago tonight. Young men will be looking for some leg, just as they did in Spain in 1975--and they'll get it. This is called being human, being spontaneous and comradely. Americans wouldn't know this sensation outside of a football game. We're not talking-about American women here, but real women. Real people. Americans aren't real, they hardly exist as individuals, just drones batted-around by the next commercial. The scared and the greedy.

Revolutions can be sexy when the people there are grounded-in-reality. There was an awful lot-of-fucking behind the barricades during the Paris Spring of 1968, you betcha. Capitalism is dowdy and wasteful, but we all know this. Thankfully, its purest-forms are deteriorating around the world. George W. Bush might have been its last-hurrah. Soon, very-soon, average-Americans will be able to travel and trade with Cuba, too. This will be an honest step-forward for both nations (and time for some leg). I might never leave if I go, and it's going to be so exciting to see Socialism continue-to-grow until it finally, finally reaches the United States. We're off to a good-start: we have our first Socialist in the Senate, and even our first Muslim in Congress! Heady-times, brother, heady-times. Viva Chavez, Viva Morales! Viva Socialismo!

Viva Venezuela:
http://redpepper.blogs.com/venezuela/spanish/index.html

FORMER DICTATOR AUGUSTO PINOCHET, DEAD AT 91

"The Chilean case raises most of the issues connected with covert action as an instrument of American foreign policy. It consisted of long, frequently heavy involvement in Chilean politics: it involved the gamut of covert action methods, save only covert military operations; and it revealed a variety of different authorization procedures, with different implications for oversight and control."

---from the 1975 Church Commission report on covert activities in Chile.

SANTIAGO--He's dead, the heart-attack sank him. It's a shame all of the thousands of victims he had murdered didn't get to live as-long as he did, but at least he was hounded and felt a siege-mentality in his final-years. Next-time, Mossad, or someone else should just grab his ilk and shoot them in-the-face. He was a tyrant and a murderer who thought he was Pericles--he wasn't, just another crook neo-Nazis everywhere could mourn. And were the executions and tortures 'for Chile', as he contended? Nope. But why did the political chaos in Chile happen? Socialist President-elect Salvador Allende had won the 1973 elections, and ITT was alarmed--violent-arrests and repression ensued.

ITT wanted cheap-copper from Chile for communications-cables (and a windfall-profit), so they tapped the Nixon administration to tap the CIA and Kissinger, and they hired Pinochet to form a coup against the newly-elected government. It should be said that CIA-activity was ongoing--it predated the Nixon administration--but reached its zenith under Nixon, as many other covert-ops did during that legendary period. Allende allegedly committed-suicide in the first hours of the coup, but this is still hotly-contested by the Left and the right in Chile today. Not every wound has been healed in the Andean nation.

Thousands were murdered by the military under Augusto Pinochet, who ascended as dictator until 1991 when his rule crumbled. Before Pinochet, Chile had known an unbroken-continuity of democracy from 1932. This was virtually unheard-of in the region in 1973. Since the end of his regime, he has been protected by the American State Department and the British Foreign & Commonwealth Office. Spain and Chile have valiantly attempted to extradite him for-years. In-light of all this, does Hugo Chavez sound paranoid, especially considering there was a coup-attempt in 2002 in Venezuela? If you think so, you're probably sympathetic with people like Pinochet and Klaus Barbie. Pinochet was little-more than a pimp and a murderer for American corporations, this is his legacy, there is nothing-else.

The Church Commission on the 1973 Coup:

http://foia.state.gov/Reports/ChurchReport.asp

Context-context-context:

http://www.moreorless.au.com/killers/pinochet.html

http://http://www.guardian.co.uk/pinochet/0,,179253,00.html

www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB110/index.htm

http://www.publica.com/news.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1380053.stm

VELVET UNDERGROUND ACETATE SELLS FOR $155,000 ON EBAY

NYC--This item has been up on ebay since late-November, and sold in the last two-days. What is it, and what was ebay's cut? It must be huge. The identity of the buyer is unknown, but wouldn't it be funny if it was Lou Reed? He has the dough. The original first-sessions for the first V.U. LP, from 1966. It's an astounding-find, because these are literally the very first studio-recordings, and were rejected by Columbia records at the time. MGM wasn't having it either, so new sessions were scheduled with producer Tom Wilson, who also recorded Bob Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel, and the Mothers of Invention (Freak Out). There are some 1965 recordings available in the V.U. box-set that are rehearsal-tapes, saved by John Cale on reel-to-reel. This acetate is different, it's a studio-mixdown for the group to listen-to for reference. Most of the witnesses to the sessions have said the sound-quality was poor, if unremarkable, so most of the interest here will be in the historical-value.

The Wilson recordings became the stereo and mono versions of the first LP (mono sounds best on the rockers), while the sessions on the acetate vanished. Stories have always been vague about their whereabouts, and one has to wonder if Lou bought them to keep them suppressed. It's unclear what his opinion of them might be, we'll have to have a listen, won't we? The acetate-record was bought in 2002 by a record-collector from Montreal in a 'Manhattan flea market' for 75 cents. Now, if someone can find sound-synched footage of them live from the same period, we'll all be happier! Shame-on-you, Andy, for not filming the Exploding Plastic Inevitable shows, a multi-media extravaganza that can only be remembered now. How someone had this 12" acetate in their possession is a total-mystery. It's possible they were someone close to Warhol's Factory entourage, and died before 2002, their belongings being sold and disseminated blindly. It's been 40 years, and mortality surely played-a-hand here.

We can expect this acetate to surface as a release, someone will make sure of this. By-all-accounts, the engineering on these sessions was poor, and acetates from this era aren't great for sound-quality. But, the acetate is close to the original-tapes (first-generation), so it could be salvageable. With advanced digital sound-restoration being so good these-days, a team of engineers could make it presentable. It's unclear whether the recordings are mono or stereo. Let the NEW bidding begin! There's another aspect to these historic-recordings: they were produced by Andy Warhol. All are different versions from the final LP. They coulda used the money 40-years-ago, and they probably won't be making much this-time, either. Guitarist Sterling Morrison died in 1995 0f cancer, but there might be a few royalties for the survivors. Easily as influential as the Beatles, it's official. Kraftwerk also shares this distinction. Kiss, however, does not. We can thank God for this.

The AP story:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061210/ap_en_mu/vintage_velvet

10,000 RAMONES BANDS RE-ENACT ENTIRE CULTURAL MOVEMENT POORLY, DWARF WOODSTOCK FOR SHITTY-SOUND

Punk still sucks and has no cultural-relevance anymore, especially emo--just thought I'd remind everyone. Think-up something original that requires a modicum-of-talent and creativity. That girlfriend who makes you listen to it, ditch her. She sucks in bed anyway, and she has no-taste in music. Get a real woman who loves funk, techno, smokes-cigarettes, and even listens to some industrial and postpunk (no Goth, that's over too, and it's goofy), something new and avant-garde. Something different.

Even pop is better than punk (or are they the same now?). Just tag someone with an open-mind, maybe a stripper. She'll fuck you in-half, I guar-an-tee it. I know these things. Just NEVER allow a woman to dictate your tastes, it's pathetic. Over-is-over, and your understanding of culture and how it works is funny. Punk is still-dead, I checked...no-pulse. You look silly, ya' got punk on your face, kid. You remind me of all the ass-rockers from the 80s who STILL dress like they did then, spandex-n'-all. They look pathetic. So do you, though some of the girls look cute punked-out. Kinda like dressing as a flapper (if it looks HOT, it's timeless, yes)...

Blake Fleetwood, American Commissar Amongst a Forest (If he falls, does he make a sound?)?

"All empires in history have ceased to exist. It's a historically inevitable process [my emphasis] that was pre-determined for the USSR too."

--Former Russian President Boris Yeltsin commenting-on the fall of the Soviet Union last-week, which could be applied to American Empire at this moment, too.

HUFFINGTONPOST--I'm not sure why they have individualss like Blake Fleetwood writing their flibber-flabber at Huffington Post, it must be their attempt at 'balance' (why bother in a media environment like ours?). It probably has more to do with Arianna Huffington's wooing of 'star' writers (GEORGE CLOONEY). How's that for balance? In case you didn't know, Fleetwood has written for the New York Times, the New Yorker, Village Voice, and a bunch of other rags that cater to the cognoscenti and other bourgies. Today, he's 'commemorating' (masturbatory worshipping?) the fall of the Soviet Union on this day in 1991--notice how alone he is? I know-I-know, look at all the parades today in both nations, it's everywhere! All is now pure, and everyone is prosperous! It reminds me of all the parades they had for Condi Rice--the first Black woman to be Sec. of State. Or what about the ones in the Hispanic community for Alberto Gonzales, our first Latin Attorney General? Wow! They were cleaning-up the ticker-tape for weeks. Man, those were BIG parades, especially in Black communities. Those were glorious days amigo.

Nobody cares, we didn't get any of the 'peace-dividend' we were promised, just a world where another superpower couldn't keep us in-check anymore. China is about to make it plain on this count. Hell, we knew that the Soviet Union was over when we invaded Panama and Kuwait, with December 9th & the 31st being a formality. Corruption and mortality killed the Soviet Union. But Fleetwood decides on some revisionism from that dusty old bag of corporate agitprop. He writes about how all the different Soviet Republics fell-away, then inserts this in for all us children who must be told everything:

Meanwhile, the Soviet economy continued to deteriorate and collapse from internal economic contradictions [Ed.-which he conveniently doesn't elaborate on]. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs"was not working, nor was it ever going to work. People are greedy and materialistic. By December 1991, food shortages in central Russia resulted in the introduction of food rationing in the Moscow area for the first time since World War II.

Being an potential American commissar, he had to omit several-things, like the fact that the Soviet system wasn't Socialist but authoritarian Marxist-Leninist forced production. Maybe this is part of the brevity required of blogging, I don't know. He's just vague about a lot, and the subject is too complicated for a blog of the length he submitted. But, Fleetwood knows what side his bread is buttered on, and his mortgage is more important than the truth. Under the Soviet system, there were no incentives because everyone there knew it wasn't a system but a regime that merely paid lip-service to Populist Socialism. Only hacks (like Fleetwood?) were rewarded for their obedience, and this was if they were lucky. Indeed, worker's councils were always portrayed in Cold War propaganda in the West as fundamentally anti-democratic, but Fleetwood ignores this aspect of the propaganda matrix he's dipping-into. Maybe he has the good fortune of brevity in blogs on his side, just like with TV. His point--if there is one--is muddled.

It's worrying to see what could be subtle, arch-conservative propaganda on Huffington Post, but it won't be the last time. This about our assumptions about how the world works and it's a point that is very susceptible to manipulation. Here's my reply that may, or may not be there today. I emailed Mr. Fleetwood with a slightly different version. This site doesn't expect a coherent or logical reply. Strangely, Fleetwood makes another observation that was part of his byline, and which doesn't support his central thesis (or does it?):

But today, Fifteen years later, 56.3% of Russians regret the disintegration of the Soviet Union, according to a survey by the Bashkirov and Partners consultancy as reported by Granma, the Cuban Press Agency.

They had certainty, at least, that's what Russians are saying. Under capitalism, they have almost none. He just sounds cagey, doesn't he? Just spell-it-out. Saying the Soviet Union had real Socialism is a relic of Cold War propaganda, it doesn't wash anymore. Newsflash: the younger-generation doesn't care about that period. They weren't indoctrinated for decades with anti-Left (RED BAITER) propaganda like many of you were. What an ass-licker. Not that telling a commissar any of this would have any effect! The commissar is deaf, dumb and blind to anything that doesn't support the aims of the power they serve, or their own selfish interests. Judith Miller & Bob Woodward, take note. 

My response, with an excerpt from his piece:

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" was not working, nor was it ever going to work.

People are greedy and materialistic [Ed.-Especially Blake Fleetwood & Co.?].

Well, nice try anyway. One obvious reason why the Soviet system did not work is that it was based on cronyism and absurd power relationships. It NEVER had anything to do with that slogan. Most production--which I am sure you know, and omit--is that the Soviet system was authoritarian, and based on capitalistic 'Taylorism'--scientific management. The Marxist-Leninists adored the notion of forced production, and authoritarian management styles, because it reflected their own attitudes and desires.

No, the average worker in the Soviet Union knew full-well that their work would never be rewarded, no matter how hard they toiled. The result was: shoddy manufacturing quality, poor distribution networking, and a system based more on power-relationships and cronyism. What you had was a national slowdown of work and quality on the part of the Soviet worker, and innumerable-analogies can be found in our own labor history. Poor reasoning and oversimplification by the blogger. We will meet a similar fate, for similar reasons. In the end, it was just a regime of cronies who had seized power illegally--sound familiar?

And this wasn't even figuring-in the devastation to infrastructure created by WWI and WWII, another reason the Soviet system was dysfunctional. Crisis breeds even more social ossification. The real Communists/Bolsheviks spout what Fleetwood writes, they just call themselves capitalists. We just have a corporate authoritarianism, and as long as it continues to erode democracy, societal decay will accelerate.

I hope someone gave Blake Fleetwood his dacha, because his writing sucks, he might need property that's already paid-for. Anyone want his job? Maybe it'll be outsourced to India soon. The end of the Cold War has only been good for elites in both countries, not for working-class people. Told you so. Has Blake Fleetwood has ever read Eliot's 'The Hollow Men.' Why do I know he doesn't see the irony in his blog? Or does he? Trust: a rare commodity in America, especially concerning journalists and the media in general. I just cannot trust this man, but I could easily be wrong! This is the mess many of them have created. Too slippery, we want clarity. If he wanted to stimulate a dialog, he succeeded and deserves the credit due to him.


Blake Fleetwood on his own sense of importance:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/blake-fleetwood/56-of-russians-regret-fa_b_35939.html


12/12/2006: A reader has suggested that Fleetwood is being sarcastic, but I believe this is a very subjective reading of the piece. If he was attempting to make a dry-observation, he failed, and he hasn't added anything new to the dialog. Maybe that wasn't his aim. We've known for years that people in Russia have wished for a return to the assurances of the Soviet system that aren't present under 'market-discipline'. They still do. Who can blame them? The Republicans, of course.

WE'RE NUMBER ONE AGAIN...FOR MOST-INCARCERATED

THE UNITED STATES GULAG ARCHIPELIGO--American can-do has reached a new zenith: Reuters reports we have 7 million people in our prisons and jails, and on-parole or probation, hurrah! We're no quitters, we'll find something new to punish in America. This is significantly-higher than either China or Russia, we beat them! This is how we deal with social-problems--rather than social programs that lift poor Americans out of poverty, we simply allow chaos to build-up, then we throw them into prison. 2 million of all persons within the criminal justice system in America are there for drug-violations, usually for minor-posession. This is more than all of Europe's drug-offenders in their systems combined, and can be seen as an indicator of social-decline. You make something illegal, and--voila!--you instantly have a new class of criminals to incarcerate, especially if they're poor and have brown-skin. I understand the Police have to implement-laws that they might happen to disagree-with, but if you think these policies are working--cop-or-not--you're a P-I-G.

The DOJ's Report:
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/prisons.htm

THE LAST BILL FROM THE GOP-MAJORITY'S FINAL HOURS IN THE BUNKER

"House Republicans believe in letting Americans keep more of their hard-earned money, and this legislation does just that. Absent today's action by House Republicans, taxpayers would have been hit with an automatic tax increase totaling more than $35 billion over the next five years." --House Majority Whip Roy Blunt, Missouri Republican, last-night (Washington Times,a rag)


WASHINGTON--I watched Fox News this morning (I know, pity me), and they were whining about the fact that the tax-breaks for the wealthiest weren't being extended in this House bill (H.R. 6111)--anyone else see this? It was around 10-10:30 am Central. Seriously, if you did, let me know, someone probably already has it posted on Youtube, and we can string a link to it. Yet, I read the Reuters and AP stories--both are extremely vague. Correct, they aren't just going to tell us the actual-story, or if these tax-cuts that have created one of the biggest deficits in American history have been renewed. That would be too easy, and editors have to kiss ownership's you-know-what. That's what editors do, they seek the approval of owners by skewing anything that would jeopardize their lifestyles and mortgages to the right. This generally favors the richest...like H.R. 6111? Even the Bill that was passed last-night is cloudy in the language, a sprawling 269-page document of flibber-flabber and bloviating.

And there were some dissenters with the GOP who didn't even want this bill to pass. Amazing, no? What a country! Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg (NH) : 'You must have to ask yourself how we as a party got to this point when we have a leadership that is going to ram down our throats of our party the biggest budget buster in the history of this Congress, under Republican leadership.' Easy, your greed and tunnel-vision allowed the original 2000 tax-cuts to be extended during a very-expensive war. This is unprecedented in almost all of Western politics! This aspect is never reported. Ask an accountant, they'll just laugh...

Were Bush's original 2000 tax-cuts for the wealthiest extended? That is the 1 Trillion dollar question. Whether it is nobler to take up arms against a sea of legalese--or capitulate, and read the funny-papers? Decisions, I know. It's unclear from this rambling-document whether the rich can build that Villa, so let's get-to-work on it, do some deciphering here. My feeling is they've (the GOP and their Democratic allies) hidden it within the text's language somehow, and certain (right-wing) Democrats had no-problem with this approach. The vote reflects this possibility. It gives them an 'out', like with Iraq: 'I didn't knooowww!' But you did know, and we know that you know this was a possibility. You've had your noses rubbed-in-it for twelve-years. Time for payback? Nah, just follow the letter of the already-existing laws, and convict the guilty. Ooops! That might mean some Democrats, too. The dilemmas behind 'winning', I tell ya. The notion of winning has been changed in the American-lexicon, it's just that the rednecks are slow here.

My feeling is that Bush's income-tax cuts, which upended New Deal progressive taxation, have been extended, but not made-permanent as an insurance-policy. They've virtually bankrupted this country with the war in Iraq, conjoined with their absurd tax-cuts during wartime, which is reckless in every-respect. So, a little restraint and sneakiness here is based on theirs and Democratic readings of the outcome of the November elections. The media also lends-a-hand here, as they usually do, by not reporting all the pertinent-details. It wasn't simply the war, it was the corruption, nepotism and crony-handouts too. It was the weekly-scandals, and the feeling that we're constantly being lied-to.

They're scared, and we need to keep them all that way ad-infinitum. Congressional incumbents should be made to feel that they will be gone shortly if they don't deliver to the public what the public needs to survive and prosper. If they continue to push us, we'll keep pushing-back like we did in the midterms of 2006, only harder. When both parties are fighting, American democracy hums-with-contentment. They aren't supposed to 'get-along', that isn't a democracy, folks. Their job is to convince you this is bad, and they are liars for doing-so. Why do I think they hid it under 'Other Tax Relief Provisions'? If what you're doing is so obviously correct and good for America, why do you have to hide it from the public? The answers should be obvious.

H.R. 6111's Text:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/ResourceKits.asp?section=2544

The Washington Times' Peculiar-Take:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20061209-121512-4620r.htm

AP's Cagey & Peculiar-Take (Shhh! No talk of tax-cuts for the richest):
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061209/ap_on_go_co/congress_rdp

The Reuters Touch (Ditto on Tax-cuts for the richest):
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061209/pl_nm/usa_congress_dc_7

ETHICS PROBE: GOP NEGLIGENCE IN FOLEY SCANDAL

WARSHINTUN--It seems the House Ethics committee reads the newspapers too. Obstruction of justice is a serious offense in America, and I foresee the GOP's slim-margin eroding further. Inevitable. Maybe they should have just had the victims wear an adult's dress-suit (too-big), and had them hold the committe hearings. They could lower their voices, it'd be a bourgeois-hoot. This is just the beginning, prepare to be entertained. Stock-up on the brewskies, chips, macrobiotic foods, etc. 2008 will be an uphill battle for the GOP and their counterparts in the Democratic Party. This is unprecedented, and could have been ended ten-years-ago. Instead, they covered-it-up to preserve their majority at the expense of children. Why not? They're murdering thousands in Iraq and elsewhere every day. We all knew this was being obstructed by GOP representatives like Arlen Specter and Dennis Hastert. More will fall.

LITVINENKO POISONING: A PRIVATE SECURITY HIT?

London, UK--Now that the case is a murder investigation, a reiteration is in-order. It now appears that the sushi bar was probably not the site-of-contamination, but the bar at the Millennium Hotel, or thereabouts. So? It's right next-to the British offices of two private intelligence/security firms:

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)

"Private" could be a coy means of saying it's an MI6 front company, a common occurrence in the world of spooks and operatives ("ops," a very old term). Could they obtain polonium-210? If they have State security-clearances, or they were 'hired' as contractors to do the hit, most-certainly.

Considering the possibility that they really are a private firm, a hit could go to the highest-bidder, regardless of nationality or motives. Since most ex-spooks and analysts have to do something after "retirement," this is a possibility--you have interlocking-networks where the State and corporations fuse.

The shadowy Titon International Ltd. and Erinys UK Ltd. have a lot of answering to do, even if it means an army of Bobbies have to drag it out of them. We can even expect deportations of some of these folks if it is found they had any involvement in the murder of Mr. Litvinenko. At-stake here is the sovereignty of Great Britain, and if private contractors were used, the finger could point to the American State Department, meaning the executive branch.

Nothing is out-of-the-question here, nothing. These are individuals and organizations that owe no allegiance to any nation or people. They are the essence of corporate-terrorism, and the public mind is in for a huge-shock. That dystopian future is upon us, unless we dismantle such organizations and neutralize their operatives. This will be a tall order.

Titon International Ltd.:
http://www.titoninternational.co.uk/

Erinys UK Ltd., Security Contractor in Iraq (works for Bush):
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Erinys_International_Ltd.

FOLEY REPORT DROPS TODAY, 5PM EASTERN TIME

WARSHINGTUN--Today will mark the official-end of neocon ideology, it's over at 5PM (Eastern). There is a slim-possibility that a few Democrats will be snared in this, but it's really the GOP's baby (pun-intended). We needed this reminder: the GOP will cover-up molestation of a minor to preserve their political power. They are our American Bolshevist Party, with the sexual-proclivities of the Nazi-hierarchy. They showed their hand--alway a poor-move in Poker--and the mask is off, we know what they are--ruthless criminals who will do anything to seize and hold-onto power. This makes them profoundly dangerous, and they must be dealt-with in the harshest-terms by our legal system. The American public isn't going to have anything less.

SOCIALISM ON THE MARCH: EUROPEAN SOCIALISTS WOO DEMOCRATIC PARTY

"We are not anti-American, we want the real America, your America."
-- Former Danish Prime Minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, president of the European Socialist Party, to Howard Dean (Reuters)

OPORTO, PORTUGAL--Reuters is reporting that the dominant European Socialist Party, whose elected officials control just over half of the governments in the European Union, want to reforge security-ties with the United States--just not with the GOP. Beginning today, the party is holding a two-day conference in Portugal, and they are warming to Howard Dean and his Populist agenda as DNCC chairman--it seems Rahm Emanuel, Chuck Schumer, Joe Lieberman and Hillary Clinton weren't welcome. The reasons for this are clear--they are viewed as right-wing elements by European Socialist politicians who hold a significant-majority in Continental politics. Clinton was too-busy holding a press conference on violence in video games, while real people were out making history. Welcome to the new world, folks, and it's Socialist. More-and-more nations will continue to swing Leftwards, which can be viewed by American workers as a very hopeful-development indeed.

I know-I know, who doesn't want universal health care? Who doesn't want weekends-off, fewer work-hours, and more vacation and sick-time? Why, employers and dummies, of-course. For those of you out there who fear excessive-taxation, I ask you this: how many rich people do you know? Progressive taxation means they pay higher-taxes so we don't have to pay for everything, they do. They pay their share, or they face boycotts from all of us, and embargoes from worker-friendly governments, and even general strikes if we have to do it. Strangely, it could all come-down to Iraq, an illegal war. Most observers--myself-included--knew that this would all have to play-out, that it was a disaster from-the-start, but I would never have predicted it would increase the credentials of the Left globally. Neither did the rest our two-party system, and their quaking. Their bosses are scared that their time in the sun is over, as it is for all nations, eventually (read your Adam Smith).

This outcome was predicted before the war even began in European policy-circles. This is something the right in America has held-back with their irrational Red-baiting, and we can thank them for this result. They have blundered so-profoundly in their corrupt incompetence that they have insured many-more nations will move Leftward. Recently, Bolivia and Ecuador have. But the neoliberal policies (favoring World Bank and IMF loaning-policies that basically indentured nations to Western elites) of the Clinton years also insured most of this. Nonetheless, domination of Latin America by Europeans has been ongoing for nearly 500-years, and the election of Evo Morales in Bolivia (who is indigenous) is a watershed. Hopefully, it is the beginning of a permanent reversal of that trend. Cuba deserves their share of credit by simply holding-out against Washington and American elites--they showed it could be done. Mexico is also showing tendencies towards a move to the Left, including uprisings in Oaxaca and Chiapas.

Latin America has also had enough of a purely market-dominated world, and Populist governments are emerging almost monthly. It didn't all happen overnight, it took a lot of meddling and exploitation to foster these reactions, and the ongoing-efforts of Populist networks throughout the region. Tens-of-thousands of them were murdered by State Department policies from the postwar period until very-recently. Even with all the CIA-backed death squads, they just couldn't mend Humpty Dumpty, and our puppets were either voted or forced-out. Not even hundreds-of-millions in drug-interdiction funds to Colombia's oligarchs (dishonestly used for counterinsurgency) have made so much as a dent in FARC's control of the South.

But the reasons for the shift in Euro-American relations are simple, and can be summed-up in the results of the November midterm elections. The American public has had enough of the war in Iraq, and were always uneasy about it. With scandals coming day-after-day, and many of them being related to policies surrounding the conflict, a breaking-point was reached. The landslide routed the GOP's 12-year hold on Congress, and ended their hold on every branch of the Federal government--and left the Bush administration with virtually no allies whatsoever. This hold once enabled President Bush and his foreign policy team to run-roughshod over a number of EU nations, and in Italy and Great Britain, the neocons had Silvio Berlusconi and Tony Blair as their crucial allies.

Blair's support was especially crucial as a means of legitimizing the invasion, but with such revelations as Abu-Ghraib, torture, flouting of the Geneva Conventions, the missing $9 Billion, secret rendition programs in several EU nations, no WMDs, no coherent war-aims, an unwinnable conflict descending into civil war, and on-and-on, this legitimacy has finally eroded towards the point of lack. It seems calling European leaders 'cheese-eating surrender monkeys', and Europe in-general as 'Old Europe' (a very-serious insult to diplomats and politicians there), wasn't working to insure their cooperation and fraternity. Knowing nothing about diplomacy, the neocons simply threatened and badgered. It was all they had to offer.

Now that both houses of the legislative-branch are in Democratic hands, they feel there's an historic opportunity to recast these relationships in a positive and more-equitable direction that was unthinkable with the GOP. It is a development that Americans should find heartening, they still like us. They just knew we nearly had a total-coup here (still not out-of-the-woods yet). All of this is important due to the geopolitical-mess the Bush administration has created, and collective-security and diplomacy are crucial if we want to clean this mess up. It can only happen with genuine international cooperation, not one through coercion and brow-beating. That never works, and it never will. It has nothing to do with governance, and more to do with a seizure-of-power. Europe will expect us to deal with these criminals in our legal system. If we don't, they cannot trust us. Howard Dean is that leader who can accomplish this. He can still make a great President, it's up to him. BOO-YAHHH!!

BUCKAROO BANZAI & THE HONG KONG CAVALIERS:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061207/pl_nm/europe_socialists_us_dc
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/07/AR2006120701081.html

Forget the "L-word", Let's Say the "S-word":
http://clubs.ccsu.edu/recorder/editorial/editorial_item.asp?NewsID=107

What the Assholes (the right) are Saying:
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/article/20684.html

GOP TAKES-ON MARXIST STANCE...

WARSHINGTON-- Groucho's-version from 'Horse Feathers' (1932, when WWI vets were being tear-gassed by the GOP, Eisenhower and Douglas MacArthur) :

Whatever It Is, I'm Against It!

I don't know what they have to say,

it makes no difference anyway, whatever it is,

I'm against it!

No matter what it is or who commenced it, I'm against it.Your proposition may be good,

but let's have one thing understood,

whatever it is, I'm against it!

And even when you've changed it or condensed it,

I'm against it. I'm opposed to it,

on general principles I'm opposed to it!

(Chorus)

He's opposed to it! In fact, in word, in deed,

he's opposed to it!

For months before my son was born,

I used to yell from night till morn,

whatever it is, I'm against it!

And I've kept yelling since I commenced it, I'm against it!

CHENEY'S DYKE DAUGHTER PREGGERS

Turkey-baster? She was in a John Waters movie once, right? I think it was Desperate Living (1977), she was 'Mole'. Feed the crazy bitch to the Religious wrong, she's earned it. Take the kid away, and give it to a decent lesbian-couple who won't raise the child as Ayn Rand, Roy Cohn, or J.Edgar Hoover would have--resulting in a child who would be self-loathing, like the mothers. Gay groups never disappoint-me, they're fucking-up (as is their wont) and defending her.

Aren't human-beings funny? They can't even agree on how to organize their parades most of the time. Identity politics reaches the limits of its own obvious internal-paradoxes...and crashes into that wall that was always there, waiting. I'm having a good-laugh over this one, you bet. She's a criminal, just wait gay folks, you defended a criminal. Fight the good fight, just learn what it actually is (yo, what-it-is). Like the feminists, you've stupidly-ignored the issue of class, another dumb-move for so-called 'progress.' Gay mafia indeed, the rich gays are making monkeys out of you (like everyone-else--see, we are all equal). Hilarity-ensues. Suck on that. Suffah.

THE REAL REASON YAHOO STOCKS ARE PLUMMETING

THE BLOGOSPHERE--Why the hell do you think? "Hello? Hello? I hear clicking on the other-end of my phone-line...hey, someone's tapping my conversation! And someone's tracking my yahoo searches!" That's why theirs and the stocks of most of the other telecom companies have dropped, Jesus Christ. If you cannot provide secure-lines, what do you really have to offer? Businesses don't even want this. Suffah.

THE BAKER REPORT: THE SITUATION IN IRAQ IS DETERIORATING

WARSHINGTON--They waited 9-months to tell us what we already-knew: Iraq is a quagmire created by the Bush administration and every sitting Democrat and Republican who voted to invade Iraq. The American people were already well-ahead of the pols, and voted-accordingly in November. Isn't it great they waited until after the elections here? This is because the worthless study-group is headed primarily by veteran GOP-pols and conservative Democrats. This is a study by Reagan-era criminals, giving-advice to Bush II-era criminals.

It is an utterly-irrelevant report, a real half-effort. But that's what most Americans expect from their elected-leaders, and political-hacks on the sidelines: a half-assed job at governing and an insulting limiting of the debate. Their problem is, we're tired of it and them. This means both parties. What is so galling is that the report was an obvious move by the GOP to define and grab the debate before the Democrats could, though it's doubtful it will have any effect in this direction. It's not a legitimate governmental study, anyway, and the 'bipartisan' nature is just another sham.

Many of these recommendations have been voiced by the public and even in Congress, for over a year. Baker states, 'these are policy recommendations that have a chance'. Fine, let's say the political-class is stupid enough to continue down the same-path--Iraq will still be a disaster, American power will continue to wilt at an alarming-rate worldwide anyway, and we'll have the happy-result of a bipartisan demise. Incumbents of both-parties will be swept-out permanently if there is no solid-path out of Iraq. 'We're the only bipartisan commission,' says the study-group. Rumpelstiltskin-Rumpelstiltskin-Rumpelstiltskin.

THE RETURN OF THE RETURN OF THE RETURN OF FURIOUS GEORGE

THE UNITED STATES AGAIN--My little droogies, it appears George W. Bush is finally cracking...a bottle open, that is. Cee-ment ponds, movi-eeee staaarrrss. He's drinking some Wild Turkey right now, yup. Maybe some Maker's Mark (good shit). Maybe some 12-year-old scotch. But first, he needs to swallow that stick of butter to coat his (Lynyrd) innerds, like that other GOP-dumbass, Joe McCarthy von Wisconsin. Dry-drunk my ass, he's no quitter. 'That'll learn ya', he'll say at his next press conference. I'm wondering if he'll start talking to all the Presidential-portraits in the White House like Nixon did, but he probably wouldn't know any of them unless they had those great name-plates at the bottom of the frames. But then, he would have to read. This would cause him mental-pain, and he would have to summon a Secret Service agent to read-it-aloud for him. He must whine like Dr. Smith from Lost in Space.

Then, however, he'd have to figure-out which century they served during. This could pose-a-dilemma. He might have to think, and that hurts. He still thinks FDR oversaw Reconstruction ('Freed the niggers, didn't he, haw-haw-haw! How you like that one Karl?'), so maybe he'll just bust-out a photo of Frank Sinatra, or Dean Martin and start touching-himself. OK, you-got-me: Nixon was superb, a gem. He actually had to work to achieve what he did. Bush has created more-confusion in government than anyone since Hitler, and I defy anyone to prove me wrong on this in the intervening-years of investigations.

He is President Niedermeier, our Animal House Chief and decider. Well, at least before November 8th. What a fucking-hick. He sure is from Texas, yup--the asshole of Texas, the Permian basin. Besides misinterpreting everything else in both books of the Bible, he had delusions of adequacy: when Jesus said, 'Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and give unto the Lord what is the Lord's,' he didn't mean you should suck-off Caesar (Bush's superrich backers) over-and-over, like a dog. I mean, really, what a pervert he is. Not everything stays in Vegas, baby. Imagine Telly Savalas reading this piece (with the sucker in his mouth, sounding jaded and drunk).

He's getting angry again at those pesky reporters. Just listen to the tone of how he's speaking: he's yelling! Now his dad is crying-in-public again, something he woulda never done when he was in-office, nosirree. He really should get into some of that Skull & Bones dope-stash they have at 'the crypt' at Yale, he's got the key. He can use Geronimo's skull for a bong, he knows the drill. I wish I was joking about this last-part. Get the god damned 'nuk-laar-foohbahhhhhl' away from this asshole, please? Maybe the Secret Service will be forced to shoot-him, like Caligula was stabbed-to-death by the Praetorian guard, but I can see them pondering if they should even bother. Why bother? Congress and the courts will likely do all of that, including the Hague. We should put all of them in Spandau prison, where they had Rudolf Hess and Albert Speer, all those great guys.

The alternative is finding-out what Cuba has lived-through for decades, an almost total-isolation on the world stage. Why? Because we signed fucking treaties, that's why, you dumbass Middle American Libertarians and hicks. And enough of your anti-Masonry conspiricism, you all sound like the Muslim Brotherhood, you crazy beer, meth, and crack-soaked assholes.This isn't a fuckin' football game or pro-wrestling, it's reality. If other nations cannot trust you anymore, you're basically-fucked as a country and a people. Trade embargoes, boycotting of nearly all American goods and services, potential wars where the world has to gang-up on the U.S. because we're in a free-fall like Germany was in the 1930s-40s, etc. And with Russia's shenanigans and China added to this toxic-mix, we really don't need to add a collapsing USA to the list of failed-states. It would probably mean the end of human society as we all know it. What a phagocyte, George W. Bush. He's the patron saint of crooked-rednecks; Chinese overlords, oilmen and energy executives, the Saudi oligarchs, and the twisted rich. 'Pathetic-asshole' was invented for him, and him-alone.

OAXACAN PROTEST 'LEADER' ARRESTED BY FEDERALES

OAXACA, MEXICO--The AP is reporting that Flavio Sosa, a symbolic leader of the Oaxacan uprising, has been arrested by members of Mexico's Federal Police Force. The wire story is rife-with-contradictions and falsely-attributes violence as a tactic of the Oaxacan protesters (the APPO). It is well-known by natives and observers in the state that the protesters are doing all the dying. Sosa has been accused of fire-bombings, and other acts leading to the destruction of property:

"Sosa ... is known for his use of violence, damaging private property and public byways, and also burning vehicles and buildings in Oaxaca City," federal prosecutors said.
Sosa was charged with kidnapping, robbery, causing damages and injuries and taken to a maximum security prison just west of Mexico City that holds some of the nation's most dangerous prisoners.

Yet, not-so-ironically, all these acts could be attributed to the Policia. As we all know, when one applies-pressure to an organism, it strikes-back. This all began as a peaceful movement, but more-and-more APPO members (and even unaffiliated-natives) are simply disappearing. APPO claims over 200 members taken in this one-raid, while the government states 170 have. Who will reemerge from the hellish-prisons surrounding Mexico City? The Leftist Democratic Revolutionary Party will likely intervene in this, and we can expect even more repression in-reaction.

The irony is that Sosa is not a leader of the movement, as it is more syndicalist in-nature. This is scary to authoritarian-regimes, as they don't entirely understand this kind of structure, or how exactly to combat it. Solidarity isn't something they're used to--or tit-for-tat. One can safely-assume Sosa was seized during the early-morning hours, a favorite destabilizing-tactic of shock forces.

None of this will likely have any effect on the resolve of APPO, and it wouldn't surprise this author if earlier-contacts between EZLN and other Leftist-elements come-to-fruition sooner, rather than later. If Sosa dies in a Mexican prison, it will be done to stimulate APPO towards a violent-reaction. So much for tourism in other people's misery. Expect action by Saturday, it's coming to Oaxaca. Ever notice how nobody in the media wants to seriously-confront all the obvious acts of police-brutality and murder there? I have. Everyone but the average American knows the Policia are irredeemably corrupt. Being a cop in Mexico is an entrepreneurial occupation.

Flavio Sosa Interview:

http://burning.typepad.com/burningman/2006/11/interview_with_.html

More on Sosa and the APPO (Some En Espanol):

http://www.red-libertaria.net/noticias/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1700

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/11/07/america/LA_GEN_Mexico_Explosions.php

http://www.blog.com.mx/sociedad/flavio-sosa/

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/pictures/HNR12.htm

http://www.examiner.com/a-390995~Sosa__Unrest_in_Oaxaca_Start_of_Upheaval.html

http://www.narconews.com/Issue43/article2364.html

The Geico Caveman ads, and Jessica Simpson's Gaffe (tits-n'-ass)

I'm with Orson Welles on this: many technical-innovations in the movies begin with advertising on television. When Welles visited Europe, the first-thing he when he entered his king-size Hotel room was to turn on his TV, turn-off the sound, and watch the images and editing of the latest-ads. Look, I don't like corporate-advertising, it's propaganda by-another-name, but he was right. Commercials are very high-end affairs, with many of the best directors being hired to to do them. They are cutting-edge, because they have to convey a lot in 30-seconds-or-less. This is a tall-order, particularly if you want to convey a smidgen of a narrative. The Geico caveman-ads are pretty-good: they're vaguely funny, with some jabs at bigotry (and PC, the other white-meat), and they feature some very-good editing, cinematography, makeup, and writing. Like Arrested Development's humor-torrent, they convey their information rapidly--there's no dead-air. But they also have a sense of where the culture is at, and what imagery will be most-effective. Dontcha wish they put this-much work into movies? ;0)

Speaking of work: Jessica Simpson can work that shiz! Jesus, man, she makes Jayne Mansfield look thin, she's so voluptuous. Her boobs could feed a nation. This can only be good, the whole thin-look is gross and ugly, so eat-something, ladies. Most men desire wimmen-folks who have a full-body, who look natural. We love your curves, we love chubby-girls, it's true. Most of us don't like ectomorphs, they look weird and anorexic, sometimes because they are. That's a rich-man's conceit: the scrawny, stringy-haired cave bitch. OK, so Jessica Simpson fucked-up during a concert. It's still not as bad as sissy's SNL-gaffe that reminded everyone of Milli Vannilli.

Girl, you know it's true: we want the strip-tease, we want the gams, the boobs, and that sweet-ass. We want to see her pop-out of that dress. That's why we watch. It's like the Indy 500, we want to see an 'accident'. I'll never buy her albums, but she's a dish. Hot doesn't even describe her, she is a joyous-celebration of the human-form. Let's celebrate the human-body! She didn't need to cry, these things happen. We should try to cheer-her-up, the pressure she has to endure as a young-woman in 'showbiz' is a bit much. This is an issue for debate, and a dialog is overdue. Is it ethical to even have child-stars, or saddle a young-woman with fame? Right, someone will be offended. Who cares? Women are beautiful. Tits are beautiful. Women's bodies--excepting the vagina--are beautiful. Yup, there is a group of lesbians who contend-otherwise, because they're conformists of another-stripe. They even have pornography that focus exclusively on the vagina. Yes, dykes can be stupid too, we know this. Sorry ladies, it's not beautiful, wrong-again. You just want some attention. Yup, only at J.J.J.J.J.J. can you go from Orson Welles to tits (not Orson's), to the vagina in one-piece. All-said, you'll never hear me complain about women enjoying pleasure, or going to see male-strippers.

But, as we all know, it's wrong and evil for North American men to express-themselves sexually. Lesbians--no-problem, they can objectify a woman's body without getting any shit from the more-liberal-than-thou crowd (really, just more Puritanical-assholes). Of course, who wants PDA's? Not me, get a room. That's where I draw-the-line. But, if you're a gay man, a dyke, or a tranny-- I don't care. I'm indifferent. Identity-politics is for kids who just got out of the closet, or had their first-orgasm. We don't care, and this should please you, because this is called tolerance. Andrea Dworkin was fat, ugly, and unimportant. Why do I mention her? Because the impulse to hate Simpson is the same as Dworkin's for stating that 'all sex is rape'. She was ugly, she didn't want anyone-else to get-laid if she wasn't. Maybe she's in her happy hunting-ground-- Massachusetts Bay colony, she must feel at-home there. What a toad she was. At least Valerie Solanas had a sense-of-humor, and she liked sex. She was cool.

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.