*sigh*
Any musicians want to put their music in an SG movie?looking for a guitar sound similar to the beginning of this http://tinyurl.com/yal47h2 about 1 hour ago from web
Wednesday 20 January 2010
Scottish doctors criticise ‘reckless’ drug abuse guidance
A group of doctors and drug experts has attacked the “reckless” advice given by a government agency that heroin addicts should quit the drug after the recent spate of anthrax deaths among users.
The group demanded in a letter to Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon that the Government take emergency action to stop the outbreak from claiming more lives.
It claimed Health Protection Scotland was wrong to suggest abusers give up the drug and that further deaths were inevitable unless they could get access to substitutes such as methadone.
The letter said waiting times for these opiate replacement drugs were as high as 12 months in Scotland, the longest in Britain.
In addition to the seven fatalities, another seven people are in hospital after contracting anthrax from infected heroin.
The letter said: “It is unacceptable for those responsible for public health to issue advice to those using heroin to simply stop, or access treatment which in practice is not available.
“It is clear that this kind of approach can only lead to the death of more vulnerable people.” It continued: “An immediate public health plan must be initiated – part of this plan must provide for rapid access and low threshold prescribing of appropriate alternatives to street heroin.”
The letter was organised by drugs campaign group Release and signed by academics, international drugs experts and doctors.
Gary Sutton, head of drug services at Release, said the group’s UK-wide helpline fielded 16% of calls from Scotland, a “disproportionate” number of calls.
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Ministers have confidence in the public health advice being given to drugs users.”
Australian liquor industry paints itself as defender of the people by Jeremy Bass
On Australia Day, I'll be sitting down with family and friends for our traditional barbecue lunch. My mates and I will have a beer as I turn the meat; the ladies will have a sparkling white as they prep the garlic bread and salads indoors.
That's what the liquor industry has us doing anyway. According to it, it's our right to rejoice in the pleasures of Aussie family life and mateship over a drink or two, and we should resent having that right trampled by do-gooder politicians and nanny-state troopers on account of a few mischief makers.
Such is the response to police suggestions to restrict full-strength liquor sales on the public holiday. ''We seem to be targeting everybody for the actions of a few and I just don't really understand why that's the case,'' Darren Pearson, who runs four bottle shops on the North Coast, bleated to the ABC.
The acting Queensland Premier, Paul Lucas, said he hadn't seen any such problems with Australia Day: ''I wouldn't want to be saying to mums and dads that you can't have a beer."
Buried under the romantic imagery of such responses to the threat of clampdowns is an alcoholic's argument: the notion of the right to imbibe alcohol uber alles. Notwithstanding the well-documented short- and long-term socio-economic costs, such polemics expose an element of our drinking culture that's less visible but pregnant with portent.
There's a couple of fundamental flaws to the argument in favour of a silently-sipping majority's right to a drink or two. The first lies in an inherent Catch-22: the more vehemently one argues one's right to consume alcohol, the stronger the evidence of an unhealthy love of the stuff, and the more likely it is that one shouldn't be touching it.
The liquor industry shares the tunnel vision attitude of its more dangerously loyal customers, that nothing is more important than unfettered access to full-strength alcohol. The whole stance is predicated on the idea bad apples can be easily identified and corralled away, leaving the rest of us to sip politely and chatter away in peace and harmony about the kids and the house renovations.
But this fails to take into account the random way in which personal responsibility dissolves in alcohol. On any given night, we don't know who's going to be a bad apple and who's not. There aren't many people who can seriously guarantee their good behaviour after one or two drinks. And that's not just the manifestly alcoholic ones. Many teens have visited casualty for a charcoal stomach-pump before maturing into a polite, moderate adult drinker.
Here's what the liquor industry, and the governments guzzling the excise, expediently fail to notice: the world is not neatly divisible into upright, responsible citizens and yobbos who can't hold their piss. Human nature is fluid at the best of times. Under the influence of alcohol, it is extremely so.
After a vicious glassing attack last October at the Chalk Hotel, near the Gabba in Brisbane, hotelier Jason Titman announced he was looking into civil actions against those involved (including the victim) for damage to his business's reputation and costs connected with investigation and legal compliance.
In the online trade publication The Shout, Titman has argued the tough-on-grog case fails to acknowledge that fewer than a quarter of serious assaults occur on licensed premises. This, he concluded, makes it safer to be inside licensed premises than not. "When was the last time we saw the media or politicians quoting these kind of numbers?" he asked.
Presumably what happens at 2.30am on the footpath outside a pub, and on the way to the other licensed premises nearby, doesn't count.
Such nonsense bears all the sincerity of those microscopic reminders on bottle labels to ''enjoy in moderation''. And those bourbon billboards admonishing consumers to ''please, drink responsibly''.
The blatant conflict of interest in all such reminders is evident in the wording. If they meant it, they would say ''please, drink less''. But there is not a liquor distiller or retailer in the capitalist world who would not prefer that you bought two bottles of its product rather than one.
No doubt, to answer such accusations, they would retreat into that old tobacco defence, the one about taking market share from competitors rather than increasing it overall. Rubbish. While one bourbon distiller is no doubt keen to wrest market share from another, both want to maximise the wider bourbon market and their share with it.
After that, the bourbon distillers might argue that they are working to wrest a bigger share of the wider spirits market, by persuading scotch and vodka drinkers as to the virtues of bourbon, and then they might say they are trying to turn existing wine and beer drinkers to bourbon.
But at the bottom of all such arguments is the laughable idea of a concrete ceiling on the number of drinkers and how much they will drink, and that no amount of persuading will get them to buy more and no amount of suggestive advertising will increase that ceiling. But any advertising worth its cost will expand not just the advertiser's share of the market, but the market itself.
It is common practice among barristers to emphasise a point by way of extreme analogy. Heroin users have been known to burgle, bash and rob others for money to feed their habit and avoid the pain of withdrawal. Such is the intense discomfort, they lose the ability to balance their interests against those of others.
The liquor industry displays the same kind of self-centredness - and on Australia Day as on every other, the fairest game for all these desperadoes is the drunk community.
A week after Haiti quake, aid for all is elusive
Even as U.S. troops landed in Seahawk helicopters Tuesday on the manicured lawn of the National Palace, the colossal efforts to help Haiti are proving inadequate because of the scale of the disaster and the limitations of the world's governments. Expectations exceeded what money, will and military might have been able to achieve so far in the face of unimaginable calamity.
"God has abandoned us! The foreigners have abandoned us!" yelled Micheline Ursulin, tearing at her hair as she rushed past a large pile of decaying bodies.
Three of her children died in the quake and her surviving daughter is in the hospital with broken limbs and a serious infection.
Rescue groups continue to work, even though time is running out for those buried by the quake. A Mexican team created after that nation's 1985 earthquake rescued Ena Zizi, 69. She had survived a week buried in the ruins of the residence of Haiti's Roman Catholic archbishop, who died. Other teams pulled two women from a collapsed university building.
But most efforts are focused on getting aid to survivors.
"We need so much. Food, clothes, we need everything. I don't know whose responsibility it is, but they need to give us something soon," said Sophia Eltime, a 29-year-old mother of two who has been living under a bedsheet with seven members of her extended family. She said she had not eaten since Jan. 12.
It is not just Haitians questioning why aid has been so slow for victims of one of the worst earthquakes in history — an estimated 200,000 dead, 250,000 injured and 1.5 million homeless. Officials in France and Brazil and aid groups such as Doctors Without Borders have complained of bottlenecks, skewed priorities and a crippling lack of leadership and coordination...
Continue reading
Oh-No's at it again!
Billboard reports that U2 and Jay-Z, two of the biggest musical entities on the planet, are teaming up to record a charity song for Haitian earthquake relief. Speaking to the Irish radio station 2FM, U2's the Edge confirmed reports that Swizz Beatz was producing the collaboration: "Last night, we wrote a song... Bono got a call from a producer, Swizz. He and Jay-Z wanted to do something for Haiti. So Bono came up with the phrase on the phone, and last night we were here. We wrote a song-- finished, recorded, and sent it back to them. So that might be the next thing you hear from us!" Billboard reports that the collaboration will probably be sold on iTunes.@'Pitchfork'
Please Bono stick to your mediocre rock'n'roll (that you do SO well) and don't be such a disaster whore. You want to help? Well you know all that money that you have saved by basing your (tax)self in The Netherlands...
The people of Haiti have suffered enough!
Please Bono stick to your mediocre rock'n'roll (that you do SO well) and don't be such a disaster whore. You want to help? Well you know all that money that you have saved by basing your (tax)self in The Netherlands...
The people of Haiti have suffered enough!
Aides Graffiti
It is my job, as this copyranter character, to try my hardest to type caustic hatred about every ad ever produced by anybody. Usually, it’s easy. Occasionally, I have to fake it. But sometimes, rarely, I can’t muster much real or synthetic bile. Like with this new French AIDS awareness video
The spot, via TBWA in Paris, is for France’s AIDES Foundation. It’s irresponsible because: 1.) it’s promoting random underground Metro bathroom sex; 2.) the silly animation belittles the sacred act of fucking; and, 3.) the penis does it with all those orifices while wearing the same condom. There. That’s the best I can do. Actually, it’s a fun video that effectively delivers a simple message. You really want to see some terrible AIDS awareness ads, here you go. Btw, TBWA Paris also produced one of the best AIDS print campaigns I’ve seen. |Video: Creativity|
The spot, via TBWA in Paris, is for France’s AIDES Foundation. It’s irresponsible because: 1.) it’s promoting random underground Metro bathroom sex; 2.) the silly animation belittles the sacred act of fucking; and, 3.) the penis does it with all those orifices while wearing the same condom. There. That’s the best I can do. Actually, it’s a fun video that effectively delivers a simple message. You really want to see some terrible AIDS awareness ads, here you go. Btw, TBWA Paris also produced one of the best AIDS print campaigns I’ve seen. |Video: Creativity|
Copyranter@'Animal NY'
US magazine claims Guantánamo inmates were killed during questioning
Human rights campaigners protest against Guantánamo Bay in front of the White House. Photograph: Jacquelyn Martin/AP
US government officials may have conspired to conceal evidence that three Guantánamo Bay inmates could have been murdered during interrogations, according to a six-month investigation by American journalists.
All three may have been suffocated during questioning on the same evening and their deaths passed off as suicides by hanging, the joint investigation for Harper's Magazine and NBC News has concluded.
The magazine also suggests the cover-up may explain why the US government is reluctant to allow the release of Shaker Aamer, the last former British resident held at Guantánamo, as he is said to have alleged that he was part-suffocated while being tortured on the same evening.
"The cover-up is amazing in its audacity, and it is continuing into the Obama administration," said Scott Horton, the contributing editor for Harper's who conducted the investigation.
When the three men – Salah Ahmed al-Salami, 37, a Yemeni, and two Saudis, Talal al-Zahrani, 22, and Mani Shaman al-Utaybi, 30 – died in June 2006, the camp's commander declared that they had committed suicide and that this had been "an act of asymmetrical warfare", rather than one of desperation.
According to an official inquiry by the US navy, whose report was heavily censored before release, each man was found in his cell, hanging from bedsheets, with their hands bound and rags stuffed down their throats.
However, Horton spoke to four camp guards who alleged that when the bodies were taken to the camp's medical clinic they had definitely not come from their cell block, which they were guarding, and appeared to have been transfered from a "black site", known as Camp No, within Guantánamo, operated by either the CIA or a Pentagon intelligence agency.
The men said that the following day, a senior officer assembled the guards and told them that the three men had committed suicide by stuffing rags down their throats, that the media would report that they had hanged themselves, and ordered that they must not seek to contradict those reports.
Harper's says that when the bodies of the three men were repatriated, pathologists who conducted postmortem examinations found that each man's larynx, hyoid bone and thyroid cartilage – which could have helped determine cause of death – had been removed and retained by US authorities.
The men's bodes did show signs of mistreatment, however, including bruising and needle marks. Al-Salami's jaw was broken and several teeth missing, injuries that an earlier US pathologist's report attributed to an attempted resuscitation.
Aamer's account of his mistreatment on the same evening as the three deaths appears in papers lodged with a district federal court in Washington. His lawyer, Zachary Katznelson, wrote in an affidavit that Aamer had been beaten for two and a half hours by seven naval military police after he refused to provide a retina scan and fingerprints.
"He reported to me that he was strapped to a chair, fully restrained at the head, arms and legs. The MPs inflicted so much pain, Mr Aamer said he thought he was going to die."
The MPs are also alleged to have pressed on pressure points and held Aamer's eyes open while shining a torch into them. "When he screamed, they cut off his airway, then put a mask on him so he could not cry out," Katznelson wrote.
Aamer, 41, whose British wife and four children live in London, has been held at Guantánamo for almost eight years. Next Friday marks the first anniversary of President Obama's order that the camp be closed within a year, but around 214 other men are also still detained there.
In the days that followed the deaths of the three men, US navy investigators seized every piece of paperwork possessed by other inmates. Harper's reports that when the US justice department subsequently went to court to defend the seizure of correspondence between inmates and their lawyers, the judge commented on one aspect of the department's case: that its "citations supporting the fact of the suicides" were all drawn from media accounts.
Harper's also reports that two of the three men had been due for release when they died, and that family members doubt they would have taken their own lives.
One of Horton's sources, a former staff sergeant in his mid-40s called Joseph Hickman, approached the department of justice via his lawyer in February last year to report his concerns, but Harper's says a subsequent investigation appears to have been shelved, raising concerns that the department had been compromised by its own role in the use of torture in the "war on terror".
"Under George W Bush, the CIA created an archipelago of secret detention centres that spanned the globe, and authorities at these sites deployed an array of justice department–sanctioned torture techniques – including waterboarding, which often entails inserting cloth into the subject's mouth – on prisoners they deemed to be involved in terrorism," Horton says.
"The experience of Sergeant Hickman and other Guantánamo guards compels us to ask whether the three prisoners who died on 9 June were being interrogated by the CIA, and whether their deaths resulted from the gruelling techniques the justice department had approved for the agency's use – or from other tortures lacking that sanction."
Art funding or arts funding by David Byrne
Instead of funding multi-million-dollar operas and museum programmes, even if they feature long-dead masters, the state should fund music and art in schools. Funding future creativity is a real investment - there’s a chance these kids will build, write, draw or play something that will fill theaters, clubs, stadiums, web pages… As singer-songwriter and former Talking Head David Bryne says, the dead guys won’t write more symphonies.
The LA Opry production of Wagner’s “Ring Cycle” is budgeted at US$32 million. 32 million! Jeez, Broadway shows don’t cost that much; U2’s concert tour might, but then that’s a stadium show… and in those latter two instances the people who wrote them are still living! (And presumably get paid, which is part of the cost.)
Wagner has been dead for a long time last I heard, so one assumes it’s not the composer or the librettist whose agent is charging the moon. Granted, it is a four-part epic so that budget might be divided in four. A recent article reported that they are worried about being able to cover $20 million right now. I shouldn’t wonder they’re worried, especially in LA, not known for its arts funding.
Here’s a production picture. Who knew that Wagner anticipated the light saber?
Or that he was into profound silliness:
A $14 million bailout for the opera is coming from the county, as the LA city government is called. The Opry folks need that $20 million this week… so, reach into your pockets, opera fans. What makes this situation notable is not the amount of money - movies often cost a lot more than $32 million to produce - but the fact that the audience will be so small, and that the state is footing part of the bill.
Simultaneously, a number of museums around the world have scuttled their plans for new buildings or expansions, some of them designed by starchitects. Part of these austerity measures are of course due to the economic downturn, but my guess is that most of these projects were underway well before the crash, and were going to result in a mess anyway - as these institutions simply thought that, like Bilbao, if they built a wildly impressive new museum in, for example, Milwaukee (Calatrava did the new entranceway and the car garage - the car garage!) or in Indianapolis, that folks from all over the world would come to visit.
Take that money, that US$14 million from the city, for example, let some of those palaces, ring cycles and temples close - forgo some of those $32M operas - and fund music and art in our schools. Support ongoing creativity in the arts, and not the ongoing glorification and rehashing of the work of those dead guys.
I was in Indianapolis recently, and would have gone to the art museum, but as we only had one afternoon, we went to the Indy 500 museum instead. Never was there ever any mention of what amazing and innovative shows would go into these future spaces, which were regularly featured in magazine articles with lovely renderings attached - that didn’t seem to be a priority.
Granted, Bilbao did work, in the sense that it gave tourists a reason to visit a place that many US citizens had never heard of before. It was truly amazing to behold how one building could change a whole town. The show that’s up there now is a Frank Lloyd Wright survey (previously exhibited in NY’s Guggenheim), and a permanent collection hodgepodge - not exactly reasons to make a special trip.
One can imagine how tempting it must have been for city councils and museum board members to hope that the Bilbao Effect could be replicated in their own town. LA’s Disney Hall looks almost exactly like the Bilbao Guggenheim. Everybody wanted one.
However this mess ends up, my thoughts are that maybe it’s time to rethink all this museum, opera and symphony funding - and I refer mainly to state funding. A bunch of LA museums just got a bailout from LA real estate king Eli Broad, and that’s great, but I suspect there will be county money involved there somewhere too.
I think maybe it’s time to stop, or more reasonably, curtail somewhat, state investment in the past - in a bunch of dead guys (and they are mostly guys, and mostly dead, when we look at opera halls) - and invest in our future. Take that money, that $14 million from the city, for example, let some of those palaces, ring cycles and temples close - forgo some of those $32M operas - and fund music and art in our schools.
Support ongoing creativity in the arts, and not the ongoing glorification and rehashing of the work of those dead guys. Not that works of the past aren’t inspirational, important and relevant to future creativity - plenty of dead people’s work is endlessly inspiring - but funding for arts in schools has been cut to zero in many places. Maybe the balance and perspective has to be redressed and restored just a little. Plus, there are plenty of CDs and DVDs of the dead guys out there already, should one be curious.
Funding future creativity is a real investment - there’s a chance these kids will build, write, draw or play something that will fill theaters, clubs, stadiums, web pages, whatever. The dead guys won’t write more symphonies.
The problem of course, as far as private funding goes, is that what billionaire wants to fund school education? Where’s the glamour in that? You don’t get your name etched in marble on the outside of a hall for that, or get invited to amazing galas, so what’s the point? That’s why I’m focusing on public and state funding - let the private funders bankroll the opry halls, if that’s where they want to hang out.
I sense that in the long run there is a greater value for humanity in empowering folks to make and create than there is in teaching them the canon, the great works and the masterpieces. In my opinion, it’s more important that someone learn to make music, to draw, photograph, write or create in any form than it is for them to understand and appreciate Picasso, Warhol or Bill Shakespeare - to say nothing of opry.
In the long term it doesn’t matter if students become writers, artists or musicians - though a few might. It’s more important that they are able to understand the process of creation, experimentation and discovery - which can then be applied to anything they do, as those processes, deep down, are all similar. It’s an investment in fluorescence.
So how did things end up like this?
In my opinion, it’s more important that someone learn to make music, to draw, photograph, write or create in any form than it is for them to understand and appreciate Picasso, Warhol or Bill Shakespeare.
Well, there is the aforementioned glory of getting your name on a museum or symphony hall rather than on an elementary school - David Geffen got his start managing popular folk rockers, and now his name is on art museums (and AIDS charities). But I think there are other factors.
Thomas Hoving, the former king of the Met Museum in NYC during the ’60s and ’70s, just passed away. He and his rival, J. Carter Brown, king of the National Gallery in DC, both felt that democratizing art meant getting everyone to like the stuff that they liked. It meant letting everyone know and feel that HERE, in the museum, was the good stuff, the important stuff, the stuff with aura and depth. Here is a promotion the Met did in the ’60s in LIFE magazine:
The idea was that even reduced to postcard size, reproductions of verified masterpieces still had enough power to enlighten the American heathen. It seems almost humorous - as if postcards of certified works of art had some mystical power to educate - or, more accurately, to indoctrinate.
Music is the same. Here’s an ad in today’s NY Times book review section:
This isn’t about learning to play for enjoyment, creation, expression or fun - it’s purely about valuing the classics more than anything you and your pathetic friends can make. It’s a little more expensive than the $1.25 the Met was asking back in the day, but then, times have changed.
Hoving and a couple of others, following this line of thinking, created the blockbuster museum show - which famously brought Tut to the masses, and made the Met and other like-minded museums into temples for all, instead of the dusty halls for academics they had become. Hard to remember, but the Met was once a fussy old place, and now it’s super popular - which is not in itself a bad thing.
Although the idea was loudly espoused that art was for all, and all could benefit from exposure to it (something like a flu shot), this idea was not exactly democratic, not as I would define it - though it was certainly portrayed as democratizing art and culture. What the movement was actually doing was letting more people know that culture was, and is, HERE, and you slobs, you hoi polloi, are over HERE. We want you all to look at it, and listen to it, but don’t even think you could ever make it, or that your feeble efforts are anywhere close to these Himalayan peaks we have on display.
I know it’s not exactly the same, but I would say: show someone three chords on the guitar, show them how to program or play beats, or play a keyboard (something I can’t really do), but don’t expect virtuosity right away. Everyone knows you can make a song with almost nothing, with really limited skills, so be satisfied and enjoy that, and don’t feel inadequate because you’re not Mozart.
I myself wish I’d learned keyboard, but I did find that on guitar, I gravitated to where my interests (and abilities) took me. Over time I learned a lot more chords, began to be able to “hear” harmonies and tonal relationships, and, of course, I learned a lot more grooves over the years - how to feel and enjoy them. But at first I found I could express something, or at least have fun, with my really limited means. When I made something, even something crude, I could momentarily discredit the feeling that if I couldn’t match the classical model, then I was less of a musician.
What the movement was actually doing was letting more people know that culture was, and is, HERE, and you slobs, you hoi polloi, are over HERE. We want you all to look at it, and listen to it, but don’t even think you could ever make it, or that your feeble efforts are anywhere close to these Himalayan peaks we have on display.
There are some classical musical works that I can groove with - but, for example, Bach, Mozart and Beethoven I never could get, and I don’t feel any the worse for it. There’s plenty left to love and enjoy. This whole rant, I guess, derives a little from the fact that I resent the implication, and sometime - feeling, that I’m less of a musician and even a person for not appreciating those works. It’s not true!
Ditto with visual art and literature - some of the classics I love deeply, but like many people, there are many Great Works of Literature that lie unfinished on my shelves, and thank God for that, as I was probably doing something more interesting instead… maybe reading something more inspiring, or even trying to write something myself.
It’s true that sometimes the newest thing on the block is 500 years old - and sometimes the way forward is through the past - but not exclusively! And we don’t have to stay there. It’s more important to encourage creativity than to imply that good work can only be made by professionals - your betters.
Hoving, however, did ride a bike, so he can’t be all bad. In fact, his stint as Parks Commissioner before his Met years was incredibly fruitful - and he was offered the job with no prior experience (so much for letting experts tell us what to do!). He closed Central Park to cars on weekends and established over 100 pocket parks around the city, using vacant lots and weird, unused parcels of real estate.
The Taliban's deadly plan
What will it take for Afghanistan to become the central issue for U.S. voters, a logical goal for a Taliban eager to drive U.S. forces out of the country?
The gun battle took place in the aptly named Pashtunistan Square, the name of which is a tribute to the rugged Pashtun borderlands that have seen Afghanistan's heaviest fighting. The great conceit of the war in Afghanistan has been that while terrorism is endemic in contested regions in the south and east of the country, its largest cities are fundamentally secure. Indeed, securing and extending the island of security around the country's biggest cities is a linchpin of General Stanley McChrystal's counterinsurgency strategy. Now, as the Taliban continues to learn and evolve in response to intensified military and diplomatic pressure from U.S. forces, the cities are the target of a particularly brutal form of psychological warfare.In a sense, what we're seeing is the Taliban's answer to the Tet Offensive, when the Viet Cong and North Vietnam launched a coordinated attack on all of South Vietnam's administrative centers during what was supposed to have been a two-day cease fire marking the country's New Year celebrations. Though South Vietnamese and American forces achieved a stunning tactical victory in the counterattack, the communist forces achieved their central goal of weakening the resolve of their opponents and demonstrating that they would not simply melt away. One has to assume that this attack is just the first of many, and that the Taliban's goal is to steadily raise the tempo of violence between now and the midterm elections in the U.S.
Perversely, the attack was prompted by the Afghan government's efforts to reach out to the Taliban, from the rank-and-file members that allied forces have been wooing for years now to Hamid Karzai's somewhat quixotic effort to extend an olive branch to Mullah Omar, an architect of the Taliban's rise and an intimate associate of Osama bin Laden. And what better to say "thanks but no thanks" than to bring the fight within a few yards of where President Karzai sleeps.
The most encouraging news, if you can call it that, from Monday's attack is that Afghan forces managed to contain and repel it without the direct involvement of U.S. forces. Part of the Taliban's strength is the nationalist legitimacy it derives from fighting the occupation, and the painfully slow strengthening of Afghanistan's security forces is crucial to achieving lasting success.
One question that remains unanswered is whether Karzai's outreach effort has struck a nerve. Though very few Taliban militants have switched sides so far, it is at least possible that the leadership is rattled and eager to demonstrate that the Taliban and not the government holds the upper hand. President Obama's surge strategy is underway, and the U.S. effort won't reach full strength for months. Whether or not the U.S. achieves its wider strategic aims, flooding heavily contested provinces with Marines will lead to the deaths of many Taliban fighters and there is a clear logic to indulging in a bravado-enhancing terror campaign before that happens. Senior U.S. officials, led by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who is now touring South Asia, has poured cold water on the outreach effort, gently suggesting that Afghan and U.S. forces will have to inflict serious damage on the Taliban before they start negotiating.
The fact that the attacks in Afghanistan failed to dislodge Haiti from the headlines raises an intriguing question: What will it take for Afghanistan to become the central issue for U.S. voters, a logical goal for a Taliban eager to drive U.S. forces out of the country? It could be that a slightly more sedate news cycle will do the trick. But as American attention remains tightly focused on the state of the economy, it is possible that Obama's surge strategy will have the political breathing room it needs to succeed. That, alas, might be the only good sign to come out of Monday's grisly attack.
Eeeeew! (c) Bella!
He makes love like a footballer, he dribbles before he shoots!
John Cooper Clarke
Pere Ubu - Song Of The Grocery Police
A song from Pere Ubu's new album "Long Live Père Ubu!". Animation by the Brothers Quay.
See http://www.ubuprojex.net/ll..
See http://www.ubuprojex.net/ll..
(Thanx Gary!)
Art by Chris Earnhart
- Description:
- boring, stupid and lazy. sarcastic, always working on something. tattoo maker, former hand model, artiste, bass player (the gore-gons, deadbolt), international jet setter. had a few drinks. once shook hands with desmond dekker. MySpace
- @'Art is Useless'
Allan - does this mean I can write for you again?
adamficek
On a brighter note, The Melody Maker is coming back only on an online platform, I used to love that mag. 36 minutes ago from web
On a brighter note, The Melody Maker is coming back only on an online platform, I used to love that mag. 36 minutes ago from web
Stupido!
2 minutes ago someone tried to break into our backyard.
I thought it was son #2 but as there was no reply when I shouted "hello" I went outside and heard someone running off down the street...
So message to whoever - please come back...!!!
Kate McGarrigle, death of a matriarch
Sad news today that Kate McGarrigle has passed away, after a battle with cancer. To many music listeners, she’s probably best known as the matriarch of the Wainwright clan. Married for some years to influential American singer-songwriter Loudon Wainwright III, she is the mother of popular contemporary singer-songwriters Rufus Wainwright and Martha Wainwright.
Being head of that dynasty might be enough to earn her a place in popular music history, but Kate was a wonderful musician in her own right, recording 10 albums with her sister Anne McGariggle. The sisters had high, thin voices but they weaved around each other in such tight, flowing harmony that the effect was completely magical and bewitching. Bi-lingual Canadians, their repertoire included traditional folk in English and French, and original songs of their own (which are striking enough to have been recorded by such artists as Linda Rondstadt, Maria Muldaur, Kirsty MacColl, Billy Bragg, Alison Moorer, Emmylou Harris, The Corrs, Annie Sophie Von Otter and Elvis Costello. And even her ex-husband, Loudon).
One Kate And Anna McGarrigle album in particular occupies a special place in my heart (and record collection). ‘Entre Lajeunesse et la sagesse’ was released in 1980, and is better known to (English speaking) admirers as The French Record. My editor used to play it in the offices of Hot Press, where I worked as a 19-year-old graphic designer, and I fell in love with it. I speak only high school French, and I really have no idea what these songs are about, but the album just worked its way into my consciousness and my heart. I still have the office vinyl copy, covered in masking tape, cow gum and letraset. The songs just communicate so much that is beyond language, with simple yet zesty, organic arrangements and voices weaving in and out of each other. It is a record shot through with humour and pathos and a kind of wisdom beyond language, the kind of music that bewitches everyone who hears it, no matter what their taste. You can find it on Spotify here. So give yourself a treat and honour the memory of a great musical artist and, perhaps more significantly, a good mother.
And how do I judge the latter? Well, following a difficult divorce, her gifted children have all taken quite hefty musical pot shots at their father (Martha on ‘Bloody Mother****ing Asshole’ and Rufus on ‘Dinner At Eight’) but have shown nothing but love to their mother. So she must have been doing something right.
I was going to end this with Rest In Peace, but somehow it doesn’t seem appropriate. So how about Rest In Music, Kate.
Girlz With Gunz # 91 (Happy Birthday Magnolia)
"Happy birthday to you...may you live long and prosper!
Love MonaXXX"
Give your Daddy a big kiss from me too!
Give your Daddy a big kiss from me too!
Tuesday 19 January 2010
JEEEBUS...
Coded References to New Testament Bible passages about Jesus Christ are inscribed on high-powered rifle sights provided to the United States military by a Michigan company, an ABC News investigation has found.
U.S. military rules specifically prohibit the proselytizing of any religion in Iraq or Afghanistan and were drawn up in order to prevent criticism that the U.S. was embarked on a religious "Crusade" in its war against al Qaeda and Iraqi insurgents.
Chris Carter says:
chris_carter_
so Eno wouldn't admit he liked Abba in the 70s. I never had a problem admitting that myself - check out my badge on cover of Heathen Earth 7:32 AM Jan 18th from Twitterrific
Eno says:
Sacred Dub podcasts (The music & projects of Bill Laswell)
Now up to episode 62.
These podcasts use the music of Bill Laswell as a starting point and go off in all directions from there.
These podcasts use the music of Bill Laswell as a starting point and go off in all directions from there.
Well worth your listening time as I am sure you will discover some new sounds.
Cruise ships still find a Haitian berth
Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines faced a difficult decision over whether to dock as per itinerary at Labadee Beach, Haiti after last week's tragic quake. Photograph: Daniel Morel/AP
Sixty miles from Haiti's devastated earthquake zone, luxury liners dock at private beaches where passengers enjoy jetski rides, parasailing and rum cocktails delivered to their hammocks.
The 4,370-berth Independence of the Seas, owned by Royal Caribbean International, disembarked at the heavily guarded resort of Labadee on the north coast on Friday; a second cruise ship, the 3,100-passenger Navigator of the Seas is due to dock.
The Florida cruise company leases a picturesque wooded peninsula and its five pristine beaches from the government for passengers to "cut loose" with watersports, barbecues, and shopping for trinkets at a craft market before returning on board before dusk. Safety is guaranteed by armed guards at the gate.
The decision to go ahead with the visit has divided passengers. The ships carry some food aid, and the cruise line has pledged to donate all proceeds from the visit to help stricken Haitians. But many passengers will stay aboard when they dock; one said he was "sickened".
"I just can't see myself sunning on the beach, playing in the water, eating a barbecue, and enjoying a cocktail while [in Port-au-Prince] there are tens of thousands of dead people being piled up on the streets, with the survivors stunned and looking for food and water," one passenger wrote on the Cruise Critic internet forum.
"It was hard enough to sit and eat a picnic lunch at Labadee before the quake, knowing how many Haitians were starving," said another. "I can't imagine having to choke down a burger there now.''
Some booked on ships scheduled to stop at Labadee are afraid that desperate people might breach the resort's 12ft high fences to get food and drink, but others seemed determined to enjoy their holiday."I'll be there on Tuesday and I plan on enjoying my zip line excursion as well as the time on the beach," said one.
The company said the question of whether to "deliver a vacation experience so close to the epicentre of an earthquake" had been subject to considerable internal debate before it decided to include Haiti in its itineraries for the coming weeks.
"In the end, Labadee is critical to Haiti's recovery; hundreds of people rely on Labadee for their livelihood," said John Weis, vice-president. "In our conversations with the UN special envoy of the government of Haiti, Leslie Voltaire, he notes that Haiti will benefit from the revenues that are generated from each call …
"We also have tremendous opportunities to use our ships as transport vessels for relief supplies and personnel to Haiti. Simply put, we cannot abandon Haiti now that they need us most."
"Friday's call in Labadee went well," said Royal Caribbean. "Everything was open, as usual. The guests were very happy to hear that 100% of the proceeds from the call at Labadee would be donated to the relief effort."
Forty pallets of rice, beans, powdered milk, water, and canned foods were delivered on Friday, and a further 80 are due and 16 on two subsequent ships. When supplies arrive in Labadee, they are distributed by Food for the Poor, a longtime partner of Royal Caribbean in Haiti.
Royal Caribbean has also pledged $1m to the relief effort and will spend part of that helping 200 Haitian crew members.
The company recently spent $55m updating Labadee. It employs 230 Haitians and the firm estimates 300 more benefit from the market. The development has been regarded as a beacon of private investment in Haiti; Bill Clinton visited in October. Some Haitians have decried the leasing of the peninsula as effective privatisation of part of the republic's coastline.
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