perfidy

is why I'd like to award that kid with the highest plaudit I can offer: honorary residency in the Great State of Ohio. Come to Ohio, kid! Texas doesn't want ya!

You automatically have gone too far if you post a link to Bonsai Kittens.

We had potato guns when I was a pup, my friends and I built them ourselves from PVC tubing. But I thought everyone knew - especially everyone in Texas, that you never look down the barrel of a loaded gun. Ever. Even if it's only loaded with frogs. Frogs! You don't load potato guns with frogs. It's just not right. Apples, maybe. Pears, sure. Even squash. Frogs, definitely not. Kittens are right out. Especially Bonsai Kittens.

From Dallas/Fort Worth comes this story. Moral: It's all fun and games until the frog causes you to lose both your eyes.

"Beam me up, Scotty!"

A couple things. First. I sincerely doubt that the RIAA lawsuits named today (I really should provide links, so here you go. Here too. not bothering -ed.) will go to trial. I suspect that these are primarily a scare tactic aimed at curtailing trading through the simple threat of prosecution. And, they did choose their targets carefully-- people who maintained libraries of tens or hundreds of thousands of files. Not even I have bought that many albums. I could be wrong though. The RIAA's leadership seem to live in a dream-world where copyright law trumps individual privacy, so it is possible they could proceed, and even sue more people.

Next. I am fully aware that trading thousands of songs via peer-to-peer networks is mainifestly illegal. While I believe that suing people that engage in this behavior is offensive and wrongheaded, I also think that such people are ruining a good thing for the rest of us. So-called victimless crimes like going 70 in a 65-mile-per-hour zone, downloading a single track, like say the ? and the Mysterions klassic kut "96 Tears", or sneaking your recycling in with the neighbors, are fairly innocuous though nominally illegal. Much as I would be furious at all parties if a bunch of teens started drag-racing their riced-up shitmobiles down I-95 with the result that all speeders automatically recieved jail time, I am furious at all parties here, both defendants and plaintiffs.

There's a lot of us in the pool, folks. Stop dropping Baby Ruths in it.

As an added fun Wednesday bonus, check out these nutty charts and documents from the Total Information Awareness Office! 

Those government pointy-heads sure have some ca-razy ideas! 
 

Once again, huzzah and kudos to Bootsy to pointing me to this depressing article from Editor & Publisher. It discusses the media's coverage of the Iraq crisis prior to the actual war, suggests that the American public is horribly misguided about the war in Iraq, and blames the media for making the situation worse. I'm not going to argue with the media-bashing, but more worrying are the poll numbers. Check it out: 

In a Jan. 7 Knight Ridder/Princeton Research poll, 44% of respondents said they thought "most" or "some" of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers were Iraqi citizens. Only 17% of those polled offered the correct answer: none. This was remarkable in light of the fact that, in the weeks after 9/11, few Americans identified Iraqis among the culprits. . . . In the same sample, 41% said that Iraq already possessed nuclear weapons, which not even the Bush administration claimed. Despite being far off base in crucial areas, 66% of respondents claimed to have a "good understanding" of the arguments for and against going to war with Iraq. . . . 

The same survey found that 57% of those polled believed Saddam Hussein helped terrorists involved with the 9/11 attacks, a claim the Bush team had abandoned. A March 7-9 New York Times/CBS News Poll showed that 45% of interviewees agreed that "Saddam Hussein was personally involved in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks," and a March 14-15 CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll found this apparently mistaken notion holding firm at 51%. . . . 

Carroll Doherty, editor of the Pew Research Center, told me last week: "It's very rare to find a perception that's been so disputed by experts yet firmly held by the public. There's almost nothing the public doesn't believe about Saddam Hussein."

Oh, for God's sake. It's not old news that the American people will believe anything, but this is remarkable. 

Well, maybe it's not so remarkable. 77% of Americans believe angels exist. Half of Americans believe that humans once co-existed with dinosaurs. Reportedly, 60% of Americans believe in psychic powers. Luckily, only 7% of Americans believe The King is still alive. 

All of this only proves that public opinion, whether for or against the war, is not rooted as much in facts as in each person's personal interpretation of history. And, as we all know, history is not necessarily fact-based.

For his next trick, John Ashcroft has determined that EBay has violated the USA-PATRIOT Act.

That's right. America's Shiny New Anti-Terror Legislation is now being brought to bear against EBay, for the horrendous crime of facilitating payments through its PayPal service to... not terrorists... not drug lords....not Communists... Online Casinos.

Imagine. Non-terrorists prosecuted under the USA PATRIOT Act. Bet nobody saw that coming.

Imagine.

Did you know there's a war on?

Huh.

Did you also know that there are many regimes out there just as crazy as Iraq's?

Huh.

Did you know that it is now a proven fact that one can turn Godwin's Law on oneself? Check out this stirring proclamation from Robert "Big Fun" Mugabe! In response to the BBC's comparing him to Hitler, Crazy Bob had the following reply: ''This Hitler has only one objective: justice for his people, sovereignty for his people, recognition of the independence of his people and their rights over their resources. 'If that is Hitler, then let me be a Hitler tenfold.''

You fucking wish, asshole. You're going to die like a dog in the mud, and the sooner the better.

Mike, thank you for the thoughtful posts. You know how I can tell you're an historian, and a recent veteran of class discussions? You embedded the counter-arguments to your argument right there in your argument.

Speaking of academics, how do you like that fuckwit at Columbia who called for "a million Mogadishus" and said "The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military"? I wish I could believe that such beliefs were exceedingly rare. At least Eric Foner (a sponser of the rally this guy spoke at) finally found the stones to disavow this bloodthirsty idiocy.

Five!

Three, sir!

Three!

From Yahoo News: "The Justice Department lifted a requirement Monday that the FBI ensure the accuracy and timeliness of information about criminals and crime victims before adding it to the country's most comprehensive law enforcement database."

Well, that's just great. Hypothetically, some asshat gives his name as "Johnny Two-Cents" to the Effa Bee Eye, and suddenly I'm a criminal. Way to go, DoJ. Would you like a crack at those pesky habeas corpus laws next? Oh, wait...

[update: from the world's tiniest violin department] I should point out that, according to the story, the accuracy rule has been lifted due to FBI claims that they can no longer manage the massive flow of information they now have coming in. Oh, forgive me if I'm not overly sympathetic.

From the website Democratic Underground:

HappyLibLady (1155 posts): The "coalition" POWs
"It was interesting to see the interviews being held with a few of the POWs captured by the Iraqis.

I noticed that the interviewers spoke in calm, comforting voices, and I saw how one of them put a gentle hand on the shoulder of the young African-American female. Her eyes seemed to express a terrible fear, and that is likely because she was trained/brainwashed by the US miltary to believe all Iraqis are blood-thirsty murderers.

I have faith that the experience of these POWs will leave them non-plussed and very confused. I expect that they will be given good treatment, decent food and clean quarters during their confinement, and that they will be released, unharmed when the time comes.

Maybe I'm just dreaming, but it is my hope that the POWs will discover that they were treated better by the Iraqis than they have ever been treated by the very people who are supposed to be protecting them on the battlefield. And, in the case of the African-American woman, she may find that people in the Middle East, unlike too many of the folks back home, do not consider her a second-class human being because of her dark brown skin!"

I am shocked, shocked that someone could be this completely naive. Although I shouldn't be, because everytime I visit that website, I see something equally stupid. (And she uses scare quotes, too.)

[updated] Limit one coupon per family per visit. May contain nuts or nut fragments. Close cover before striking. Offer void in Oceania. Long live Eurasia!

...what the hell that last thing was about, I direct your gaze here, and here.

Zig now for great justice!

OPERATION BRENDAN FRASER

Hey ho, Operation: Iraqi Freedom. Good grief. What's next? I've got a few additional suggestions myself. How about Operation: Kick yo’ ass, bitch! That would certainly get the attention of white suburban teenagers. What a demographic! Women are a huge demographic, they need to get them on board, too. How about, Operation: Protect the Freedoms of Women Abroad to Make Them Just like Americans? Soccer moms love Operation: Minivan. Or Operation: Never Discipline your Children, Instead let them run around, scream, and annoy people in public places? Metalheads are a neglected demographic, in my opinion. Operation: Speak English or Die? The original satiric nature of the title might be lost on today's Metalhead. 

But why do that, when you can keep the same Operation: Iraqi Freedom title and add corporate sponsorship? How about the Amazon.com Operation: Iraqi Freedom? The Bank One Operation: Iraqi Freedom. How about the New York Stock Exchange Operation: Iraqi Freedom? The Motorola Operation: Iraqi Freedom? It could be just like sports stadiums, and the government could raise additional revenue by selling the naming rights of the war! What a concept! It's free market capitalism and atavistic ass-kicking rolled into one! Like a football game! 

Hey, we have to teach the Iraqis to be good free market capitalists anyway. Let’s start right away! 
 

Texas Senator John Carter is proposing that the government bust a few teenagers for file trading and send them to prison to make an example of them for the other, like, billion people who do this. 

I think this strategy of deterrence is a GREAT allocation of time and money. It's already worked like magic against pot smokers! I mean, nobody smokes pot anymore, do they? 
 

What do you think the chances are that this news, about a new wave of violent government repression of dissent, will inspire marches and demonstrations from the activist Left in the USA? 

Since it's happening in Cuba, (aka, "happyland"), and not in the fertile plains of their imaginations, I think the chances are pretty fucking slim indeed.