evanmorris.com

Posted by evan at 2:31 AM | Permalink

FEMA Meets the Press, Which Happens to Be . . . FEMA

It's so hard to keep up with this stuff, and then there's the outrage fatigue and all, but I do have a little question: Why are we using FEMA employees to pretend to be reporters and ask softball questions when Jeff Gannon is almost certainly still on the White House payroll?

Posted by evan at 4:49 PM | Permalink

Prosecutors expected to file charges against Bernard Kerik

Rudy, his former chauffeur (and his nominee for Homeland Security director), and the Gambino crime family, oh my!

Posted by evan at 11:46 AM | Permalink

Click graphic for larger pop-up.

Posted by evan at 11:27 AM | Permalink

Posted by evan at 10:18 AM | Permalink

The New Yorker staff writer talks with the magazine's editor-in-chief, David Remnick.

Posted by evan at 1:15 AM | Permalink

Orphaned hedgehogs adopt cleaning brush as their mother

The four inch long creatures are being hand-reared by staff at the New Forest Otter, Owl and Wildlife Park in Ashurst, Hants.

Workers say Mary, Mungo, Midge and Slappy get comfort from playing with the centre's cleaning brush and enjoy rubbing against it.

[more hedgehogia at link]

Posted by evan at 1:21 AM | Permalink

Updates and breaking developments are available at irrawaddy.org.

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) - Security forces fired automatic weapons into thousands of pro-democracy protesters for a second day Thursday, and the military government said nine people were killed and 11 wounded.

Tens of thousands defied the ruling military junta's crackdown with a 10th straight day of demonstrations in Myanmar's largest city, Yangon. Security forces also raided several monasteries overnight, beating monks and arresting more than 100, according to a monk at one monastery.

The protests are the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades, a crisis that began Aug. 19 with protests over a fuel price hike, then expanded dramatically when monks started leading the marches. The crackdown has drawn increasing international pressure on the isolated regime.

Thousands of protesters ran through the streets of Yangon on Thursday after warning shots were fired into the crowds. Bloody sandals were left lying in the road.

"Give us freedom, give us freedom!" some shouted at the soldiers.

---

REUTERS/Stringer

[Note: according to the Japanese news agency APF, the soldier shown shot and killed the already wounded Kenji moments after this photo was taken.]

---

REUTERS/Stringer

Posted by evan at 12:26 PM | Permalink

Posted by evan at 12:42 PM | Permalink

Virtual Friendship and the New Narcissism

Of course, it would be foolish to suggest that people are incapable of making distinctions between social networking "friends" and friends they see in the flesh. The use of the word "friend" on social networking sites is a dilution and a debasement, and surely no one with hundreds of MySpace or Facebook "friends" is so confused as to believe those are all real friendships. The impulse to collect as many "friends" as possible on a MySpace page is not an expression of the human need for companionship, but of a different need no less profound and pressing: the need for status. Unlike the painted portraits that members of the middle class in a bygone era would commission to signal their elite status once they rose in society, social networking websites allow us to create status--not merely to commemorate the achievement of it. There is a reason that most of the MySpace profiles of famous people are fakes, often created by fans: Celebrities don't need legions of MySpace friends to prove their importance. It's the rest of the population, seeking a form of parochial celebrity, that does.

But status-seeking has an ever-present partner: anxiety. Unlike a portrait, which, once finished and framed, hung tamely on the wall signaling one's status, maintaining status on MySpace or Facebook requires constant vigilance. As one 24-year-old wrote in a New York Times essay, "I am obsessed with testimonials and solicit them incessantly. They are the ultimate social currency, public declarations of the intimacy status of a relationship.... Every profile is a carefully planned media campaign."

Posted by evan at 11:14 AM | Permalink

Make-Believe Reagan : Rolling Stone:

... Well, I think as I stand by myself on the curb, so much for Fred Thompson. After all, logic dictates that anyone who's too much of a lightweight for Fox News is probably...

I freeze. Probably what? Probably a shoo-in for the presidency, that's what! I shudder as I realize my mistake, and suddenly the candidacy of Fred Thompson, which seemed impossibly silly just a few minutes ago, makes deadly serious sense. Thompson may act like a blank slate -- a homespun version of Being There hero Chauncey Gardiner running on a platform of "Whatever you say" and "I'll get back to you on that" -- but he represents something else that no one, after seven years of George W. Bush, could possibly have expected: a new low. It was bad enough when the GOP field was led by a grinning Mormon corporatist and a fascist ex-mayor itching to take his prostate pain out on the world, but Thompson is the worst yet -- a human snooze button, campaigning baldly for the head-in-the-sand vote by asking Americans not to think but to change the channel.

Much more at link, and well worth reading. Matt Taibbi is right on the money, as usual.

Posted by evan at 1:20 AM | Permalink

Video Professor upset by criticism, sues 100 anonymous critics:

You've probably seen infomercials for the Video Professor on late-night TV; a kindly-looking John Scherer has been pitching his company's computer training videos for two decades now. But Video Professor, Inc. has no problem using less-friendly tactics when confronted with criticism, and the company is now suing more than 100 anonymous Internet posters over derogatory comments that they made about Video Professor's business.

Derogatory? Perhaps. Unjustified? They sound pretty reasonable to me:

9/24/2007 - Melissa writes:

I ordered the Excel cd from Video Professor June of 2007. I ordered it through a promotional offer stating "free, just pay shipping and handling" I figured $6 shipping to try the product should be fine. I received it in the mail a few days later, never opened it. 5 days after I was charged the $6 shipping, a $89.95 fee shows up. I sent the unopened disk back and called the main phone number. After waiting on hold for 20 minutes someone tells me they will refund my money. Today, September 24th, I have not gotten my refund. On top of it all, I am STILL receiving disks in the mail. Excel, Quickbooks, Windows, you name it! I receive them every 2 weeks, a $6 shipping fee shows up THEN ANOTHER $89.95 fee for each and every disk they send. I had to cancel the credit card to prevent them from charging me. I have called their main number numerous times to cancel the disks and to get my money back and no one is able to help me. They tell me there is no refund for the disks. I have sent each and every one back unopened. SCAM. Do not use this so called "program." It is a waste of money.

Gosh, and to think that all this time I've been assuming his product was merely the useless crap it so clearly is. But a scam, too! You really get your money's worth with these folks.

Posted by evan at 9:53 PM | Permalink

Posted by evan at 12:43 PM | Permalink

Slang from Operation Iraqi Freedom

Death Blossom : The tendency of Iraqi security forces, in response to receiving a little fire from the enemy, to either run away or do the "death blossom" spraying fire indisciminately in all directions. The term originated in the 1984 movie "The Last Starfighter" as a maneuver in which a single starfighter can single handedly wipe out an entire armada.

A grimly interesting glossary.

Posted by evan at 5:20 PM | Permalink

Childhood TV viewing linked to teen attention problems - New Scientist

Watching television more than two hours a day early in life can lead to attention problems later in adolescence, according to a large long-term study.

The roughly 40% increase in attention problems among "heavy" TV viewers was observed in both boys and girls, and was independent of whether a diagnosis of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder was made prior to adolescence.

"Those who watched more than two hours, and particularly those who watched more than three hours, of television per day during childhood had above-average symptoms of attention problems in adolescence," Erik Landhuis of the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand, wrote in his report, published in Pediatrics on Tuesday.

Symptoms of attention problems included short attention span, poor concentration, and being easily distracted. The findings could not be explained by early-life attention difficulties, socio-economic factors, or intelligence, says the team.

Posted by evan at 4:05 PM | Permalink

ScienceDaily: Psychologists Attribute Yawning To The Need To Cool The Brain And Pay Attention

Evidence shows that blood vessels in the nasal cavity and face send cool blood to the brain, and by breathing through the nose or by cooling the forehead, the brain is cooled, eliminating the need to yawn. Recent evidence has linked multiple sclerosis, a demyelinating disease, to thermoregulatory dysfunction. Excessive yawning is a common symptom of multiple sclerosis, and some MS patients report brief symptom relief after they yawn.

Thank you. I thought I was going nuts. And some people thought I was being rude.

Posted by evan at 7:24 PM | Permalink

Lawmakers Describe 'Being Slimed in the Green Zone' - washingtonpost.com

... Brief, choreographed and carefully controlled, the codels (short for congressional delegations) often have showed only what the Pentagon and the Bush administration have wanted the lawmakers to see. At one point, as Moran, Tauscher and Rep. Jon Porter (R-Nev.) were heading to lunch in the fortified Green Zone, an American urgently tried to get their attention, apparently to voice concerns about the war effort, the participants said. Security whisked the man away before he could make his point.

Tauscher called it "the Green Zone fog."

"Spin City," Moran grumbled. "The Iraqis and the Americans were all singing from the same song sheet, and it was deliberately manipulated."

But even such tight control could not always filter out the bizarre world inside the barricades. At one point, the three were trying to discuss the state of Iraqi security forces with Iraq's national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, but the large, flat-panel television set facing the official proved to be a distraction. Rubaie was watching children's cartoons.

When Moran asked him to turn it off, Rubaie protested with a laugh and said, "But this is my favorite television show," Moran recalled.

Porter confirmed the incident, although he tried to paint the scene in the best light, noting that at least they had electricity.

Posted by evan at 1:25 PM | Permalink

The Great Iraq Swindle: Rolling Stone

There isn't a brazen, two-bit, purse-snatching money caper you can think of that didn't happen at least 10,000 times with your tax dollars in Iraq. At the very outset of the occupation, when L. Paul Bremer was installed as head of the CPA, one of his first brilliant ideas for managing the country was to have $12 billion in cash flown into Baghdad on huge wooden pallets and stored in palaces and government buildings. To pay contractors, he'd have agents go to the various stashes -- a pile of $200 million in one of Saddam's former palaces was watched by a single soldier, who left the key to the vault in a backpack on his desk when he went out to lunch -- withdraw the money, then crisscross the country to pay the bills. When desperate auditors later tried to trace the paths of the money, one agent could account for only $6,306,836 of some $23 million he'd withdrawn. Bremer's office "acknowledged not having any supporting documentation" for $25 million given to a different agent. A ministry that claimed to have paid 8,206 guards was able to document payouts to only 602. An agent who was told by auditors that he still owed $1,878,870 magically produced exactly that amount, which, as the auditors dryly noted, "suggests that the agent had a reserve of cash."

In short, some $8.8 billion of the $12 billion proved impossible to find. "Who in their right mind would send 360 tons of cash into a war zone?" asked Rep. Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Oversight Committee. "But that's exactly what our government did."

The war in Iraq currently costs 12 billion dollars a month. That's $7,000 per second.

The average price of an individual health insurance policy for an adult American, incidentally, is $7,000 per year.

Posted by evan at 12:58 AM | Permalink

Personal History: Parallel Play: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker

In the years since the phrase became a cliche, I have received any number of compliments for my supposed ability to “think outside the box.” Actually, it has been a struggle for me to perceive just what these “boxes” were—why they were there, why other people regarded them as important, where their borderlines might be, how to live safely within and without them. My efforts have been only partly successful: after fifty-two years, I am left with the melancholy sensation that my life has been spent in a perpetual state of parallel play, alongside, but distinctly apart from, the rest of humanity.

From early childhood, my memory was so acute and my wit so bleak that I was described as a genius—by my parents, by our neighbors, and even, on occasion, by the same teachers who gave me failing marks. I wrapped myself in this mantle, of course, as a poetic justification for behavior that might otherwise have been judged unhinged, and I did my best to believe in it. But the explanation made no sense. A genius at what? Were other “geniuses” so oblivious that they couldn’t easily tell right from left and idly wet their pants into adolescence? What accounted for my rages and frustrations, for the imperious contempt I showed to people who were in a position to do me harm? Although I delighted in younger children, whom I could instruct and gently dominate, and I was thrilled when I ran across an adult willing to discuss my pet subjects, I could establish no connection with most of my classmates. My pervasive childhood memory is an excruciating awareness of my own strangeness.

[more at link]

A remarkable essay by Tim Page, music critic of the Washington Post, about living with Asperger's Syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism.

Posted by evan at 12:21 AM | Permalink

'Nightmare' tarantula rescued in N.Y.

SMITHTOWN, N.Y. (AP) – An orange tarantula with venomous fangs was rescued Friday after its owner said he could no longer care for it.

''This is the kind of spider that nightmares are made of,'' said Roy Gross, chief of the Suffolk County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

He said the spider is aggressive and can jump 3 feet and bite with its large fangs. The bites are dangerous to humans.

The spider, known as an ornate golden baboon, has a fat body 5 inches long that is covered in orange hair. Male baboon spiders can have a leg span of about 8 inches, and the female is even larger.

Gross said he was glad the owner, whose name was not released, called the SPCA instead of dumping the spider.

''This spider is so aggressive, it will bite you just to bite you,'' he said. ''It's not a pet you want to cuddle up with at night.''

Baboon spiders have a life span of up to 25 years, are native to southern Africa and spend most of their time near their nests, which are usually holes in the ground.

The SPCA took the spider to a sanctuary for reptiles and other animals.

Posted by evan at 12:47 PM | Permalink

An excellent article in Esquire from Charles Pierce:

The Beauty Contest

... On May 15, Mike Huckabee, a greasy Rotarian gasbag from Arkansas, made a funny. Speaking at a debate with the other Republican presidential contenders, Huckabee said of the Congress that it had "spent money like John Edwards at a beauty shop." This nasty little bit solicited gales of laughter from the studio audience and almost unalloyed approval from the traveling political press, and nobody enjoyed it more than the lads at The Politico, a brand-new political fanzine that combines the biting wit of a high school slam book with the nuanced policy analysis of Tiger Beat.

...

Not to put too fine a point on it, but the political culture seems to be determined to fag-bait John Edwards out of the race this time around. Channeling the conservative id from the swamps of its birth, as always, Ann Coulter flatly called him a "faggot" at a conference of conservative activists, and Rush Limbaugh regularly chaffs him as "the Breck Girl." From there, apparently, the affair of the haircuts has mainstreamed Coulter's position into more polite precincts. In April, Maureen Dowd wrote a column in The New York Times that speculated that the country was not ready for a "metrosexual in chief," comparing Edwards unfavorably with her dear departed Irish-cop daddy, who used to get his hair cut at the Senate barbershop for fifty cents. You could almost hear the gentle ringing of sputum in the spittoons. Thus are the issues. Thus are the watchdogs. Thus are the politics while people are dying.

The important thing to remember is that toughness is a semiotic dumb show now. In that same debate in which Mike Huckabee flexed for the camera, John McCain pointed out that in his experience, which is considerable, torture doesn't work. On this, he was disputed by a former mayor of New York, who once was tortured by the thought that his second wife would not vacate the mayoral digs in favor of his second mistress, and the former governor of Massachusetts, who once was tortured by the fact that gay people were getting married. Toughness was now a performance skill in a cowardly country taught to fear the best things about itself.

[much more at link]

Posted by evan at 8:08 PM | Permalink

Posted by evan at 4:03 PM | Permalink

Temperature Index 106.3 F plus crappy little window air-conditioners that keep blowing the breakers equals FUN!

National MS Society : Sourcebook: Heat/Temperature Sensitivity

Heat/Temperature Sensitivity

From The MS Information Sourcebook, produced by the National MS Society.

Many people with MS experience a temporary worsening of their symptoms when the weather is very hot or humid or they run a fever, sunbathe, get overheated from exercise, or take very hot showers or baths. For example, some people notice that their vision becomes blurred when they get overheated-a phenomenon known as Uhthoff's sign. These temporary changes can result from even a very slight elevation in core body temperature (one-quarter to one-half of a degree) because an elevated temperature further impairs the ability of a demyelinated nerve to conduct electrical impulses. Myelin is the protective sheath that surrounds and protects nerve fibers. The destruction of myelin causes the formation of plaques-abnormal areas-on the nerves that slow nerve impulses and produce the symptoms of MS.

The 'Hot Bath' Test Used for Years to Diagnose MS
For many years, the "Hot Bath" test was used to diagnose MS. A person suspected of having MS was immersed in a hot tub of water, and the appearance of neurologic symptoms or their worsening was taken as evidence that the person had MS.

...

Cold Can Also Be a Problem
Some people with MS notice that symptoms, particularly spasticity, become worse in cold weather. It is generally recommended that people with MS who are sensitive to temperature try to avoid extremes of either hot or cold, and that people who are considering a move to a better climate try to visit first to see if the climate change is, indeed, beneficial.

Posted by evan at 4:13 PM | Permalink

Just two of my favorite scenes, which must be watched in order:

Posted by evan at 10:00 PM | Permalink

Romney Speaks Up for Sons' Decisions

BETTENDORF, Iowa (AP) -- Despite his call for the nation to show a ''surge of support'' for U.S. forces in Iraq, Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney on Wednesday defended his five sons' decision not to enlist.

The former Massachusetts governor said his sons were showing their support for the country by ''helping get me elected.''

Posted by evan at 11:55 AM | Permalink

Rare film of Tom Lehrer performing songs on a math theme from 1997.

Internet Archive: Tom Lehrer

Posted by evan at 7:48 PM | Permalink

More California E-Voting Reports Released; More Bad News

... Some of these are problems that the vendors claimed to have fixed years ago. For example, Diebold claimed (p. 11) in 2003 that its use of hard-coded passwords was “resolved in subsequent versions of the software.” Yet the current version still uses at least two hard-coded passwords — one is “diebold” (report, p. 46) and another is the eight-byte sequence 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 (report, p. 45).

Posted by evan at 3:41 PM | Permalink

TheStar.com (Toronto) - News - 10 things we learned this week

Jul 29, 2007 04:30 AM

George W. Bush has a pillow named Pilly, which he takes with him on all his trips. (word-detective.com)

Of course it's true. I'm just not sure that will matter.

Posted by evan at 10:20 PM | Permalink

Oversight Testimony

... Let me say again, we are in SiCKO not because our story is so unique. We are in this film because we are not unique – we represent what is happening to so many others Americans. That is sad for us all. I worry every night that somewhere out there sits a woman like me who is at the end of her rope and has nowhere to turn. She works, so she earns too much for government-based help that do not allow for extreme medical emergency, but her pay after paying her insurance premiums is not enough to support her family. And tonight she’ll sit alone and hurting, not knowing that I pray for her and for her strength to face another day.

I want the members of the committee to know that if HR676, Medicare for All, had been in place for us, we would have weathered the storm. We are hard-working people who under normal conditions make sound money decisions. But placed under the strain of mounting premiums, co-pays, deductibles and out-of-pocket costs, we did whatever we had to do to stay alive.

I am so angry with you. I lived the American dream as my father taught me and as his father taught him. I worked, I educated myself, I voted, I bought a home and then moved up into a better home, I raised my children responsibly and I served in my community – and you left me broken and battered because you failed to act on health care reform.

And out there today are hundreds of thousands of people struggling to make ends meet at the same time they are dealing with cancers and heart attacks and all manner of terrible personal health crisis and yet you still fail to act. These people are average, middle class Americans like me who want nothing more than to live a good and decent life surrounded by friends and family in a modest home with enough income to make ends meet.

I am also a Christian. And I do not know what type of Christianity, if any, the current system represents. I hear a lot about family values and respect for human life, but are those just empty words said to placate the religious right voting block or the powerful pro-life lobby? Other good and decent Christians might not share your blind devotion to those points of view. The Christ I learned about as a child attending Arlington Heights First United Methodist Church in Illinois and the Christ I continue to hear about in Sunday services at Cherry Creek Wesleyan Church in Colorado would not allow this to happen to the sick. In fact, I don’t think I’ve heard of any religious group that would allow the sick to be so deeply wounded – and especially not at the hands of other believers. I am asking you to value life and to value it outside the womb too.

And my lobby group will be growing more powerful too. Just as I have come out of the shadows of economic ruin and shame, so too will others come forward to hold you accountable. My faith demands that I love God with all my heart, and to do that I must love my neighbors and care enough to speak up for those too downtrodden to speak for themselves.

But I can only speak here today. You have the power to carry this onward to action. I ask you to search you hearts and your own value systems. Remember hard-working people, put yourselves in the shoes of your constituents and act accordingly. Their bankruptcy shame due to medical crisis really is your shame. You are the body that could have acted and has not. Move forward now, and please do not wait for a new president or for favorable political winds. That course takes no courage whatsoever, and I know each of you has shown courage in stepping up to serve this nation. I just think many of you have lost your way in remembering who elected you and who needs your bravery now.

More at link.

Posted by evan at 4:58 PM | Permalink

This is it. Frontier Psychiatrist (2001). Brilliant.

Posted by evan at 12:45 AM | Permalink

Posted by evan at 10:01 PM | Permalink

It is one of the great, dark, evil lessons of history.

A country — a government — a military machine — can screw up a war seven-ways-to-Sunday… it can get thousands of its people killed… it can risk the safety of its citizens… it can destroy the fabric of its nation.

But as long as it can identify a scapegoat, it can regain… or even gain power.

The Bush Administration has, tonight, opened this Pandora’s Box, about Iraq.

Posted by evan at 12:27 AM | Permalink

OK, it's pathetic. I sit at my desk, surrounded by corn fields, and watch 46th Street at Times Square on earthcam.com.

Look! Other people! Walking! And some of them are talking at the same time! And not a Buckeye t-shirt in sight!

Yes, I know most of those people are tourists. But even tourists get temporarily smarter in Manhattan.

Posted by evan at 8:27 PM | Permalink

Report: War costing US $12B a month

WASHINGTON - The boost in troop levels in Iraq has increased the cost of war there and in Afghanistan to $12 billion a month, and the total for Iraq alone is nearing a half-trillion dollars, congressional analysts say.

All told, Congress has appropriated $610 billion in war-related money since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror assaults, roughly the same as the war in Vietnam. Iraq alone has cost $450 billion.

The figures come from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, which provides research and analysis to lawmakers.

For the 2007 budget year, CRS says, the $166 billion appropriated to the Pentagon represents a 40 percent increase over 2006.

The Vietnam War, after accounting for inflation, cost taxpayers $650 billion, according to separate CRS estimates.

The $12 billion a month "burn rate" includes $10 billion for Iraq and almost $2 billion for Afghanistan, plus other minor costs. That's higher than Pentagon estimates earlier this year of $10 billion a month for both operations. Two years ago, the average monthly cost was about $8 billion.

[more at link]

I dunno, Louie. What do you suppose we could buy with a bit over 16 MILLION DOLLARS EVERY FREAKING HOUR.

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."

Dwight D. Eisenhower, 34th president of the US, from a speech before the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953.

Posted by evan at 5:39 PM | Permalink

Armed autonomous robots cause concern - New Scientist

A MOVE to arm police robots with stun guns has been condemned by weapons researchers.

On 28 June, Taser International of Arizona announced plans to equip robots with stun guns. The US military already uses PackBot, made by iRobot of Massachusetts, to carry lethal weapons, but the new stun-capable robots could be used against civilians.

"The victim would have to receive shocks for longer, or repeatedly, to give police time to reach the scene and restrain them, which carries greater risk to their health," warns non-lethal weapons researcher Neil Davison, of the University of Bradford, UK.

"If someone is severely punished by an autonomous robot, who are you going to take to a tribunal?" asks Steve Wright, a security expert at Leeds Metropolitan University, UK.

When I was a very small boy, my parents took me to the Hayden Planetarium in New York City, where I was encouraged to sign up as a passenger on "The first trip to the moon," then (circa 1955) still far in the future. I even got a little certificate. A gullible lad, I should have been thrilled at the prospect. But, once home, I was consumed with anxiety. For months I was convinced that someday large men would come to our door, drag me away, and send me, weeping piteously, to the moon.

Now I wish they had.

Posted by evan at 1:47 AM | Permalink

Because I really can't think of another explanation for this:

Posted by evan at 4:15 PM | Permalink

Jobs warns knockoff iPhone "lacks many key features" | Brad Ideas

Steve Jobs of Apple Computer warned today that a rumoured cheap Chinese iPhone knockoff making its way toward America is an inferior product which lacks many of the important features of the iPhone. “It may look a bit like an iPhone, but when consumers discover all the great iPhone features that are missing from it, we think they’ll still line up at Apple Stores for the genuine article,” said Jobs in a released statement. Designed by software nerds, the knockoff, dubbed the “myPhone” by fans, has not yet been confirmed.

Apple released a list of features reported to be missing from the “myPhone.”

* The iPhone has special software that assures you will always use the trusted AT&T cellular network. Lacking this software, the myPhone accepts any SIM card from any random network. Users may find themselves connected to a network that doesn’t have the reputation for service, trust and protecting the privacy of customers that AT&T has. In addition, users may be stuck without 2 years of guaranteed AT&T service.

* The iPhone is configured to assure you the latest iTunes experience. The myPhone might function before you have installed the latest iTunes and registered your phone with it. Indeed, the myPhone lacks the protections that block it from being used without registering it with or reporting back to anybody, depriving the user of customer service and upsell opportunities.

* The iPhone has special software that assures all applications run on the iPhone have been approved by Apple, which protects the user from viruses and tools that may make the user violate their licence agreements. The myPhone will run any application, from any developer, opening up the user to all sorts of risks.

* The iPhone protects users from dangerous Flash and Java applications which may compromise their device and confuse the user experience.

* myPhones don’t forbid VoIP software that may cause the user to accidentally make calls over wireless internet connections instead of the AT&T network. Quality on the internet is unpredictable, as is the price, which can range down to zero, causing great pricing uncertainty. With the iPhone, you always know what calls cost when in the USA.

More at link. Very well done.

Posted by evan at 2:41 PM | Permalink

"We Can't Make it Here Anymore"

Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign
Sitting there by the left turn line
Flag on the wheelchair flapping in the breeze
One leg missing, both hands free
No one's paying much mind to him
The V.A. budget's stretched so thin
And there's more comin' home from the Mideast war
We can't make it here anymore

That big ol' building was the textile mill
It fed our kids and it paid our bills
But they turned us out and they closed the doors
We can't make it here anymore

See all those pallets piled up on the loading dock
They're just gonna set there till they rot
'Cause there's nothing to ship, nothing to pack
Just busted concrete and rusted tracks
Empty storefronts around the square
There's a needle in the gutter and glass everywhere
You don't come down here 'less you're looking to score
We can't make it here anymore

The bar's still open but man it's slow
The tip jar's light and the register's low
The bartender don't have much to say
The regular crowd gets thinner each day

Some have maxed out all their credit cards
Some are working two jobs and living in cars
Minimum wage won't pay for a roof, won't pay for a drink
If you gotta have proof just try it yourself Mr. CEO
See how far 5.15 an hour will go
Take a part time job at one of your stores
Bet you can't make it here anymore

High school girl with a bourgeois dream
Just like the pictures in the magazine
She found on the floor of the laundromat
A woman with kids can forget all that
If she comes up pregnant what'll she do
Forget the career, forget about school
Can she live on faith? live on hope?
High on Jesus or hooked on dope
When it's way too late to just say no
You can't make it here anymore

Now I'm stocking shirts in the Wal-Mart store
Just like the ones we made before
'Cept this one came from Singapore
I guess we can't make it here anymore

Should I hate a people for the shade of their skin
Or the shape of their eyes or the shape I'm in
Should I hate 'em for having our jobs today
No I hate the men sent the jobs away
I can see them all now, they haunt my dreams
All lily white and squeaky clean
They've never known want, they'll never know need
Their shit don't stink and their kids won't bleed
Their kids won't bleed in the damn little war
And we can't make it here anymore

Will work for food
Will die for oil
Will kill for power and to us the spoils
The billionaires get to pay less tax
The working poor get to fall through the cracks
Let 'em eat jellybeans let 'em eat cake
Let 'em eat shit, whatever it takes
They can join the Air Force, or join the Corps
If they can't make it here anymore

And that's how it is
That's what we got
If the president wants to admit it or not
You can read it in the paper
Read it on the wall
Hear it on the wind
If you're listening at all
Get out of that limo
Look us in the eye
Call us on the cell phone
Tell us all why

In Dayton, Ohio
Or Portland, Maine
Or a cotton gin out on the great high plains
That's done closed down along with the school
And the hospital and the swimming pool
Dust devils dance in the noonday heat
There's rats in the alley
And trash in the street
Gang graffiti on a boxcar door
We can't make it here anymore

Music and lyrics by James McMurtry

Posted by evan at 10:13 PM | Permalink

[transcript]

A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. -- Declaration of Independence.

Posted by evan at 7:24 PM | Permalink

Wow. It's clear this wasn't written by the US media:

US evangelist Jerry Falwell dies - Financial Times - MSNBC.com

The Rev Jerry Falwell, whose evangelical convictions and organisational abilities, including as a founder in 1979 of the Moral Majority movement, did much to place religious conservatives in a role of great influence in American politics, died on Tuesday in Lynchburg, Virginia, of apparent heart failure at the age of 73.

He was a figure of immense controversy over the last 40 years, outspoken to the point that his apologies appeared almost as regularly as his thundering denunciations. To him the three great scourges afflicting his country were "atheism, secularism and humanism," and nothing would deter him from defeating his evil trinity.

Most notoriously, he laid the blame for the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001, at the feet of his domestic opponents. "I really believe," he said at the time, "that the pagans, the abortionists and the lesbians … and all those who have tried to secularise America helped this happen." His subsequent recantation attracted less attention.

Early in his career he was an avowed segregationist, frequently featuring the likes of Lester Maddox and George Wallace, the diehard southern governors, on his tele-evangelical programmes. He often spoke scathingly of what he called the Civil Wrongs Movement, a position from which, in later years, he again retreated

He strongly supported the apartheid regime in South Africa, once dismissing Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Nobel Peace prize laureate, as "a phony". He was an equally ardent backer of Israel, believing that turmoil in the Middle East was the precursor of the Second Coming of Christ, with the stipulation that "the Anti-Christ must be, of necessity, a Jewish male."

[more at link, unless MSNBC has pulled it]

Update: Of course they pulled it. You can find it here.

Posted by evan at 4:42 PM | Permalink

Radio Paradise - eclectic online rock radio

Posted by evan at 2:15 PM | Permalink

Blowing the lid off the pet food industry

Aisles upon aisles in stores like PetsMart and PetCo are devoted to shiny displays of brightly colored bags and cans of dog food. A look at the lengthy list of ingredients on the side of the bag could leave the well-intentioned pet owner confused. What is "animal digest?" "Meat and poultry meal?" "BHA and ethoxyquin?"

Ann M. Martin, author of "Foods Pets Die For," will tell you that none of these things are what animals should be eating.

"In my opinion, when we purchase these bags and cans of commercial food, we are purchasing garbage," she said.

The FDA soothingly states that "consumers can take comfort in knowing that pet food is manufactured under a series of standards and regulations," but concedes, in a monumental understatement, that it "contains parts of the animal not normally eaten by people."

The pet food industry, to put it bluntly, uses food unfit for human consumption.

If the buyer envisions plump chickens and choice, juicy cuts of beef going into that expensive bag of dog food, he is in for a rude awakening. "Meat meal" is ground-up slaughterhouse discards, often containing disease-ridden tissue and high levels of hormones and pesticides. Cancerous tissue and worm-infested organs are perfectly acceptable. Whatever remains of the carcass after it is stripped of the muscle meat reserved for humans are ground up into an unsavory mess.

What are known as 4D animals - "dead, dying, diseased or disabled" - are routinely rerouted into pet food. Plastic foam packaging containing spoiled meat from the supermarkets, ear tags and spoiled slaughterhouse meat also make their way into the mix. Restaurant grease is used to coat the outside of pet food, making it more palatable to pets.

The grains included in pet food are those deemed unfit for humans because of mold, contaminants or poor quality; they also can include hulls and other remnants from the milling process.

High temperatures and lengthy processing procedures rob the mixture of whatever nutrients it might contain; to compensate, a long list of chemical additives are dumped in. These are usually added all together as a premix, and if there is a mistake in making up the mix, it can throw off the entire balance, resulting in a potentially toxic imbalance. Dyes (to add eye appeal) and preservatives such as BHT and Ethoxyquin can accumulate in the pet's body, resulting in organ damage.

Posted by evan at 4:39 PM | Permalink

Iraq For Sale - The War Profiteers - Google Video

Can be downloaded as .avi from link.

Posted by evan at 1:43 PM | Permalink