Thursday, 9 December 2010
Nick Cave has driven his Jaguar into a speed camera and roadside barrier on Hove seafront.
Nick Cave: Great at making dark, disturbed rock music, bad at driving. The BBC reports that Cave crashed his Jaguar into a speed camera and roadside barrier last night in Hove, England. Cave, who lives in the area, was driving his twin 10-year-old sons at the time. Nobody was hurt and no other cars were involved, according to the BBC.The BBC reports that according to Sussex police, no arrests were made, though "inquiries are continuing." But Cave may have pissed off some powerful people: "The camera belongs to the Sussex Safer Roads Partnership, not the police, and the railings belong to the local highway authority."
Also, Nick Cave drives a Jaguar! Ballin'!
Aaron Sorkin: In Her Defense, I'm Sure the Moose Had It Coming
"Unless you've never worn leather shoes, sat upon a leather chair or eaten meat, save your condemnation."
You're right, Sarah, we'll all just go fuck ourselves now.
The snotty quote was posted by Sarah Palin on (like all the great frontier women who've come before her) her Facebook page to respond to the criticism she knew and hoped would be coming after she hunted, killed and carved up a Caribou during a segment of her truly awful reality show, Sarah Palin's Alaska, broadcast on The-Now-Hilariously-Titled Learning Channel.
I eat meat, chicken and fish, have shoes and furniture made of leather, and PETA is not ever going to put me on the cover of their brochure and for these reasons Palin thinks it's hypocritical of me to find what she did heart-stoppingly disgusting. I don't think it is, and here's why.
Like 95% of the people I know, I don't have a visceral (look it up) problem eating meat or wearing a belt. But like absolutely everybody I know, I don't relish the idea of torturing animals. I don't enjoy the fact that they're dead and I certainly don't want to volunteer to be the one to kill them and if I were picked to be the one to kill them in some kind of Lottery-from-Hell, I wouldn't do a little dance of joy while I was slicing the animal apart.
I'm able to make a distinction between you and me without feeling the least bit hypocritical. I don't watch snuff films and you make them. You weren't killing that animal for food or shelter or even fashion, you were killing it for fun. You enjoy killing animals. I can make the distinction between the two of us but I've tried and tried and for the life of me, I can't make a distinction between what you get paid to do and what Michael Vick went to prison for doing. I'm able to make the distinction with no pangs of hypocrisy even though I get happy every time one of you faux-macho shitheads accidentally shoots another one of you in the face.
So I don't think I will save my condemnation, you phony pioneer girl. (I'm in film and television, Cruella, and there was an insert close-up of your manicure while you were roughing it in God's country. I know exactly how many feet off camera your hair and make-up trailer was.)
And you didn't just do it for fun and you didn't just do it for money. That was the first moose ever murdered for political gain. You knew there'd be a protest from PETA and you knew that would be an opportunity to hate on some people, you witless bully. What a uniter you'd be -- bringing the right together with the far right.
(Let me be the first to say that I abused cocaine and was arrested for it in April 2001. I want to be the first to say it so that when Palin's Army of Arrogant Assholes, bereft of any reasonable rebuttal, write it all over the internet tomorrow they will at best be the second.)
I eat meat, there are leather chairs in my office, Sarah Palin is deranged and The Learning Channel should be ashamed of itself.
Shackleton & Strawalde (Juergen Boettcher)
This collaboration with Strawalde (aka Juergen Boettcher) began when, as Shackleton tells it, "... Boettcher turned up at my studio on his 78th birthday and announced that he had a present for us both. Previously I had made him a short mix of my more ambient stuff as he was really enthusiastic about the music after he attended a gig I played organised by his son Lucas. The present turned out to be the film of which you are watching an extract."
Someone's lying
PayPal says it stopped Wikileaks payments on US letter
PJCrowley The U.S. government did not write to PayPal requesting any action regarding #WikiLeaks. Not true.
Wikileaks Cable Shows US Involvement in Swedish Anti-Piracy Efforts
It is no secret that the US Government has been actively involved in copyright enforcement in other countries, including Sweden. After the raid on The Pirate Bay’s servers in 2006, it became clear that the US had threatened to put Sweden on the WTO’s black list if they refused to deal with the Pirate Bay problem.
But that was not the end of the ‘collaboration’ between the US and Sweden on this front.
According to an unreleased US Embassy cable in possession of Swedish Television, the US pressure on Sweden to deal with file-sharing issues continued in the years that followed. In the cable, which dates back to 2008, the US Embassy presented a list of six items that they wanted to see addressed, all related to online copyright infringement.
A year later, five of these six items were indeed turned into action, including the appointment of more copyright police and prosecutors, backed up by educational anti-piracy campaigns. Of course, the Pirate Bay wasn’t left unmentioned in this cable either.
The cable writer mentions that it was hard for the Embassy to get openly involved in piracy related issues, because most of the press coverage was unfavorable towards the copyright industry.
“After the raid on The Pirate Bay on May 31, 2006, the issue of internet piracy was fiercely debated in Sweden. Press coverage was largely, and still is, unfavorable to the positions taken by the rights-holders and the United States Government,” the cable reads.
“The Pirate Bay raid was portrayed as the Government of Sweden caving in to United States Government pressure. This delicate situation made it difficult, if not counter-productive, for the Embassy to play a public role in IPR issues,” it adds.
In a response to the revelations, Minister of Justice Beatrice Ask denied that Sweden ever responded to pressure from the US Government. She hinted that the cable writer was making these remarks just to get a better payday.
Former Pirate Bay spokesman Peter Sunde was surprised about the leaked cable, although the fact that the US put pressure on the Swedish Government was not that new to him.
“We all knew for a long while that the US was behind the raid and pressured Sweden, but that they’re still doing it was news to us,” Peter Sunde told TorrentFreak. “And that the Minster of Justice just says that the cable writer is lying ‘to get a higher salary’ shows that she doesn’t even care if her government is corrupt.”
The cable in question has not been published by Wikileaks yet, but is expected to be released in the near future. This, and other cables, are likely to add more insight into the backroom deals related to file-sharing and copyright issues.
Ernesto @'Torrent Freak'
Wednesday, 8 December 2010
Cage Against the Machine - '4.33' (Mr. Scruff Remix)
When I was asked to remix the re-recording of John Cage's '4.33', it was suggested that the remix be 4.33 of ambient noise from of my life at a given time. That, however, seemed to be more of a cover version that a remix. I received the request on Friday 26th November, whilst soundchecking for my DJ set at Leamington Assembly. I had already set up 2 ambient mics for recording the crowd noise at my gig, so I secretly recorded a short period of time just before the gig started, the 'calm before the storm' if you will, when the crew were running around, doing final checks & tidying up. That was my cover version. Then I sequenced & manipulated the bits of conversation, air conditioner hum, clonks, bangs, mumbles & other background noise to make this remix. Thanks to the featured 'musicians' from my tour crew & the venue!
For more info on the 'Cage Against The Machine' Xmas no.1 campaign, check the Facebook page.. http://www.facebook.com/cageagainstthemachine?v=wall#!/cageagainstthemachine?v=info
(Thanx ANCB!)
NaomiAKlein Defending #wikileaks is not the same as defending rape and anyone who can't see the difference is a complete moron.
How the rape claims against Julian Assange sparked an information war
Julian Assange in Stockholm in August 2010, before he was accused of rape. Photograph: Scanpix Sweden/Reuters
Since Julian Assange was first accused of sex crimes against two Swedish women in August, his defenders have asserted his innocence and dismissed the allegations as malicious, or trumped up, or part of a politically driven conspiracy.
To his powerful critics, however, the rape charges have become elided with what they consider his other crimes, including accusations of espionage, for which a number of US political figures have already called for his execution.
But if the WikiLeaks controversy has seemed ferocious in its intensity to date, the fact that Assange is tonight in custody as an accused rapist means that the political, technological and moral culture wars that have been skirmishing for months around the website have reached a new pitch of vitriol, in which conspiracy theories, slander and misogyny have become every bit as central to the debate as high-minded principles of justice or freedom of information.
Certainly there are some, not only in the Australian's legal team, who argue that a rape accusation based on the details of the allegations in the public domain – some of them placed there by the women themselves – would be highly unlikely to come to court in this country. Others counter, however, that even those who support Assange or the principle of free speech must let the law decide on serious criminal accusations.
Two women who say they are victims of serious sex crimes find themselves key players in a very ugly reputational slanging match. Named in court only as Miss A and Miss W, their identities have nonetheless been circulating widely online since very soon after the attacks. And with Assange's arrest, parts of the internet have declared open season on the two women, vowing to enlist an army of tech-savvy research assistants skilled in squirrelling out information that others might wish to keep hidden — described with ill-disguised glee today by one blogger as "the First World Infowar"...
Continue reading
Esther Addley @'The Guardian'
Anon_Operation http://www.mastercard.com/ is DOWN! #ddos #wikileaks Operation:Payback (is a bitch!) #PAYBACK
Briton dies in Australian immigration centre
A 29-year-old Briton died in an Australian immigration centre Wednesday, officials said, with refugee advocates claiming it was a suicide -- the third within as many months.
Immigration officials said the man, detained for a visa breach, was found not breathing in his high-security accommodation block in the western Sydney Villawood centre at 3:20 am and attempts to resuscitate him failed.
"Investigations into the circumstances of this incident are ongoing," an immigration spokesman told AFP.
Refugee activists said they had been told by fellow inmates that the man had taken his own life.
"This is the third death in three months at Villawood. The immigration department cannot explain this away," said Ian Rintoul from the Refugee Action Coalition.
"Something must be done to break the vicious downward spiral that has developed at Villawood."
The immigration official refused to speculate on whether the death was a suicide, saying it was now a police and coroner's investigation and "it would be inappropriate to discuss the matter further."
"The department expresses its sympathy to the family of the deceased man and will fully cooperate with the coroner," he said, adding that counselling would be provided to detainees and staff.
Two other men have died in Villawood since September, with a Fijian national jumping from a roof to his death and an Iraqi reportedly hanging himself in a bathroom.
Tensions are running high in Australia's crowded immigration centres, with rooftop demonstrations, breakouts, hunger strikes and one group even sewing their lips together in protest after the Iraqi's death last month.
Rintoul said the latest death illustrated the problems with Australia's mandatory detention policy for boatpeople and other illegal immigrants.
After experiencing an influx of such arrivals in 2010, mostly from Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, detention centres have been stretched to capacity for months.
"The government's addiction to such an authoritarian and punitive detention regime is literally costing people's lives," Rintoul said.
"How many more lives will it take before the government puts a stop to it?"
NaomiAKlein Few societies have defended their own ignorance as aggressively or as enthusiastically as ours. #Wikileaks #Assange
And...?
Crowd gathers at Assange's son's house
somnideaJournalists showing off their utter incompetence again. http://bit.ly/eP3lfy I graduated and moved out years ago, guys. -.-
So dishonest he scams THE Nigerians!!!
JPBarlow Nigeria, which has an extradition treaty with the U.S., has charged Dick Cheney with bribery. http://bit.ly/ExtraditeDick
The rush to smear Assange's rape accuser
You don't have to be a conspiracy theorist to find the timing of Interpol's warrant for the arrest of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who turned himself in to British authorities today, curious. The charges -- "one count of unlawful coercion, two counts of sexual molestation and one count of rape," according to a statement from Scotland Yard -- were brought against him in Sweden last August, yet he suddenly graduated to "most wanted" status just after releasing over a thousand leaked diplomatic cables in late November? It would be irresponsible of journalists, bloggers and average citizens of countries most eager to plug the gushing WikiLeaks not to wonder if those dots connect.
Still, as the New York Times put it, "there is no public evidence to suggest a connection," which some members of the public seem to find unbearably frustrating. With no specific target for their suspicions and no easy way to find one, folks all over the blogosphere have been settling for the next best thing: making light of the sexual assault charges and smearing one of the alleged victims.
By Sunday, when Keith Olbermann retweeted Bianca Jagger's link to a post about the accuser's supposed CIA ties -- complete with scare quotes around the word "rape" -- a narrative had clearly taken hold: Whatever Assange did, it sure wasn't rape-rape. All he did was fail to wear a rubber! And one woman who claims he assaulted her has serious credibility issues anyway. She threw a party in his honor after the fact and tried to pull down the incriminating tweets. Isn't that proof enough? The only reason the charges got traction is that, in the radical feminist utopia of Sweden under Queen Lisbeth Salander, if a woman doesn't have multiple orgasms during hetero sex, the man can be charged with rape. You didn't know?
As of today, even Naomi Wolf -- Naomi Effin' Wolf! -- has taken a public swipe at Assange's accusers, using her status as a "longtime feminist" to underscore the absurdity of "the alleged victims ... using feminist-inspired rhetoric and law to assuage what appears to be personal injured feelings."
Wow. Admittedly, I don't have as much experience being a feminist as Wolf has, but when I see a swarm of people with exactly zero direct access to the facts of a rape case loudly insisting that the accusation has no merit, I usually start to wonder about their credibility. And their sources.
Continue reading
Kate Harding @'War Room'
STD fears sparked case against Julian Assange
Swedish Director of Prosecution Marianne Ny answers questions during a news conference at the police headquarters in Gothenburg December 7, 2010. The sexual misconduct case against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is a personal matter and not connected with his work releasing secret U.S. diplomatic cables, Ny said on Tuesday.
Credit: Reuters/Adam Ihse/Scanpix Sweden
The two Swedish women who accuse WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange of sexual misconduct were at first not seeking to bring charges against him. They just wanted to track him down and persuade him to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases, according to several people in contact with his entourage at the time.
The women went to the police together after they failed to persuade Assange to go to a doctor after separate sexual encounters with him in August, according to these people, who include former close associates of Assange who have since fallen out with him.
The women had trouble finding Assange because he had turned off his cellphone out of concern his enemies might trace him, these sources said.
Assange, who was arrested and held in custody by a British court Tuesday, has both admirers and detractors. His WikiLeaks group publishes secret documents from governments and companies, most recently making public a vast trove of U.S. State Department cables between Washington and embassies abroad that have cast a revealing and sometimes embarrassing eye on the inner workings of U.S. diplomacy.
Assange's elusiveness may have worked against him in the Swedish investigation, which might well have gone nowhere had he taken the women's calls and not left Sweden when police started looking into the allegations.
The Swedish investigation has undergone head-spinning twists and turns. After initially issuing a warrant for Assange's arrest on rape and molestation charges in mid-August, a Swedish prosecutor dropped the rape charge the next day. After this U-turn, it appeared likely that the whole investigation of the 39-year-old Australian computer hacker would be abandoned.
Assange's accusers then hired a lawyer who declared he would press prosecutors not only to keep the investigation going but to reinstate rape charges. The case was soon transferred to one of Sweden's three Directors of Public Prosecutions, Marianne Ny, who indeed decided to reinstate the rape investigation and continue the molestation probe. She ordered that Assange should be subject to official interrogation about the allegations.
After Assange left the country, Swedish authorities issued a European arrest warrant under which Assange could be detained and returned to Sweden. A spokeswoman for Swedish prosecutors affirmed, however, that at the moment Assange is not formally charged in Sweden with any criminal offense, but is only wanted for questioning...
The women went to the police together after they failed to persuade Assange to go to a doctor after separate sexual encounters with him in August, according to these people, who include former close associates of Assange who have since fallen out with him.
The women had trouble finding Assange because he had turned off his cellphone out of concern his enemies might trace him, these sources said.
Assange, who was arrested and held in custody by a British court Tuesday, has both admirers and detractors. His WikiLeaks group publishes secret documents from governments and companies, most recently making public a vast trove of U.S. State Department cables between Washington and embassies abroad that have cast a revealing and sometimes embarrassing eye on the inner workings of U.S. diplomacy.
Assange's elusiveness may have worked against him in the Swedish investigation, which might well have gone nowhere had he taken the women's calls and not left Sweden when police started looking into the allegations.
The Swedish investigation has undergone head-spinning twists and turns. After initially issuing a warrant for Assange's arrest on rape and molestation charges in mid-August, a Swedish prosecutor dropped the rape charge the next day. After this U-turn, it appeared likely that the whole investigation of the 39-year-old Australian computer hacker would be abandoned.
Assange's accusers then hired a lawyer who declared he would press prosecutors not only to keep the investigation going but to reinstate rape charges. The case was soon transferred to one of Sweden's three Directors of Public Prosecutions, Marianne Ny, who indeed decided to reinstate the rape investigation and continue the molestation probe. She ordered that Assange should be subject to official interrogation about the allegations.
After Assange left the country, Swedish authorities issued a European arrest warrant under which Assange could be detained and returned to Sweden. A spokeswoman for Swedish prosecutors affirmed, however, that at the moment Assange is not formally charged in Sweden with any criminal offense, but is only wanted for questioning...
Continue reading
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