From the front, Felix Valloton
57 minutes ago
Friday 18 September 2009
Here we go (again!)
0935 GMT: Catching Our Breath for Questions. The news that Mohammad Khatami was “attacked” and forced away from the rally seems solid (0809 GMT). But did Mehdi Karroubi appear and speak to the marchers (0633 GMT).
And where is Mir Hossein Mousavi?
0930 GMT: Mowj-e-Sabz is now reporting clashes and “violent situation” in Isfahan and clashes and arrests in Tabriz.
0915 GMT: Classic (and Accurate) Quote of Day. It’s from Josh Shahryar, “Get yer cokes and pizzas folks. It’s gonna be a long day.”
0910 GMT:More on Rallies. Al Jazeera is already bumping the President aside for the marches, as their footage indicates there may be more than the “several thousand” we just projected. CNN’s Reza Sayah on Twitter claims, “3-4 kilometre stretch between Vali Asr Square & Laleh Park packed with tens of thousands of opposition supporters”.
0845 GMT: How Big Are the Rallies? Images on Al Jazeera television show masses of people on the move, and Agence France Presse is claiming “tens of thousands” from witnesses.
A source inside Iranian media has told EA that the internal broadcast feed is showing 3000-3500 demonstrators. Based on the reports, we now feel comfortable saying “several thousand” Green Wave supporters are marching, wearing green wristbands, with the largest confirmed rally at the Vali-e Asr intersection, near Tehran University on Enghelab Street.
(We think that the AFP report of “tens of thousands” may include not only Green Wave supporters but also onlookers and some Ahmadinejad supporters who are also present or are on way to Tehran University.)
0833 GMT: Ahmadinejad ends his speech. We’ve got a snap analysis and, from yesterday, Ahmadinejad’s interview with NBC television.
0830 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “We want [Palestinian] refugees to come back and decide their own future. [But the Israelis] have built several scenarios to reduce the dimension of the Iranian people. They are rallying some people in New York. The Iranian nation shall not crush a single grain for these machinations. The Iranian people have declared that they are ready and stands by the values of its Leader. They struggle against tyrants and hold high the flag of freedom and justice and will never set it down.”
0827 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “Messages to nations friendly to this [Israeli, not Iranian, I presume] regime. This regime is nearing its end. Occupation and rape are nearing their end.”
“You shoot a million-dollar missile towards a smaller value building in Gaza. The million-dollar part cannot emerge victorious! This regime has no future. They are building walls along themselves. We advise you: relinquish support for the Zionists. This regime is doomed, do not attach yourself to it. Even if 1000 years would pass, the nations of the region will not acknowledge this regime or recognise it.”
0826 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “The influence of Zionism is permeating everywhere. When they influence, they will never leave. A US professor would tell me that one of them requested to be employed after no appointments were made in the past 5-6 years. He came back to that university a few years later. The faculty was infested with Zionists.”
0824 GMT: EA Correspondent – “Chants inside Tehran Uni exclusively in line with regime. There seems to be no Green presence inside.”
0822 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “Iranian people are the flagbearer of everything good in the world: justice, pureness, peace and friendship. Resistance towards this [Israeli] regime is a national and global duty. The people of Iran will never put this flag down. The only route for salvation is resisting the corrupt Zionist channel in the world. You should know that, due to God’s will, the final victory of the revolutionary people of the world front against Zionism is in our hands.”
0818 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “Some US, European politicians have told us, ‘You can shout against us, don’t shout slogans against these Zionists.’ They will put us under pressure. Big companies in Europe, US cannot do business unless they have Zionist stakeholders.” [Ahmadinejad's get-out clause for Iran's economic difficulties?]
“World shoudl know that Zionism is the best example of racism. They are people that have no respect for anything but their own. Even the US president — should they manage it — they will assassinate him.”
0814 GMT: EA Correspondent – “Ahmadinejad still going on in same terms about Israel.”
0809 GMT: Parleman News claims confirmation of reports, which we have been followed, that former President Mohammad Khatami was “attacked” and forced to leave the Qods Day rally. The newspaper claims this was done at the behest of the son of the editor of Kayhan newspaper, Hossein Shariatmadari.
0807 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “All the bits and pieces of Israel’s regime are against humanity. All of the components of Israel’s government and regime have no faith against faiths of the world.”
0802 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “We should have 72 countries in Europe. Even Russia has to be dismembered if every nation is to go independent.” [Hmm....Can't see Moscow being too pleased about this.]
0800 GMT: Ahmadinejad – “The Europeans are supporting the crimes of the Zionists and are creating anti-Jewish sentiment to further the Israeli crowds. All are for domination on the world.
“We have to give rights to Indian redskins [Native Americans]. They had culture and heritage. You have encroached on them and killed millions.” [Nice touch. Ahmadinejad stands alongside the first victims of "American imperialism".]
0755 GMT: Running summary of Ahmadinejad speech: “Holocaust once again. He is asking on why research on the Holocaust has been impeded. Palestine most important problem of the world. Iraq. Afghanistan, Sudan being trampled, all due to Zionists. All imperialism due to Zionists.
Why don’t you allow the main reason of the Palestinian plight to be analysed?”
0745 GMT: President Ahmadinejad starting his speech introducing Friday Prayers.
0740 GMT: Excuse of Day (So Far). Iranian state TV says, “Unfortunately we can’t covered Qods Days rallies with helicopter because security forces have prevented us.”
0730 GMT: Reports coming in of preparation for Friday Prayers in Tehran. Government figures such as Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki in crowd, President Ahmadinejad arriving.
0715 GMT: EA correspondent confirms following Twitter claim, “Iranian State TV broadcasting the protests without sound and saying people are chanting for Palestine”. He adds, “Footage is very sanitised.”
0710 GMT: Counter-claim. Well-placed source in Iranian media tells EA correspondent that “few hundred” have gathered in Tehran squares. No mention of Karroubi or Khatami amongst protestors. Source says this is from “internal (and thus unseen) broadcast feeds”, not what is actually being aired on State TV.
0705 GMT: Reported chanting of “Long Live Montazeri!! Viva Sane’i” (praising two Grand Ayatollahs who have criticised the Government) at Karim-Khan Bridge.
0700 GMT: Reports that tear gas has been used in 7 Tir Square to disperse crowds.
0633 GMT: And The Plan Rolls Out. Mehdi Karroubi is speaking in 7 Tir Square, shouting “Death to Oppression!”. Mohammad Khatami is also reported to be present.
0630 GMT: Reports of clashes in Isfahan’s Enghelab Square.
If the plan laid out by Mehdi Karroubi’s office yesterday is being followed, he should be marching to and possibly arriving in 7 Tir Square now.
0615 GMT: An Important Caution. We are being very careful about reports of numbers and intensity of protests. While those passing information are well-intentioned, the claims are always prone to exaggeration or distortion as they are passed along.
That said, there are signs that these will be the largest gatherings since June. One report from a source in Tehran: “There’s too many people [at 7 Tir Square]. The [security] forces are just watching in awe.”
0610 GMT: Unconfirmed reports that marchers gathering in Qom.
CNN, after days ignoring Iran, has now decided this is a Very Important Story, previewing Ahmadinejad’s speech with “Tense in Tehran” and “High Alert”.
0555 GMT: Reports from numerous sources of chanting from protestors, including “God is Great”, “Yah Hossein! Mir Hossein!”, and “Death to the Dictator”. Also people are gathering under Karim Khan Bridge chanting “No Gaza, No Lebanon — My Life for Iran”.
0535 GMT: Mowj-e-Sabz, the website of the Green movement, is filled with reports of Revolutionary Guard warnings. Thursday’s statements are reported as “IRGC Preparing for Bloodbath“, and then there is this claim: “According to an informed source, the security forces, based on prior plans, intend to arrest Mir-Hossein Moussavi and Mehdi Karroubi following the Quds Day Marches.”"
0515 GMT: It is now 9:45 a.m. in Tehran. There are reported gatherings in Tehran at 7 Tir, Vanak, and Mirdamak Squares. Uniformed security forces are gathering in Enghelab Square near Tehran University. Claims also of gatherings in Tabriz, Isfahan, and Shiraz.
From ePersian Radio via Twitter source: “Big crowd [latest report of 1000+] in 7 Tir square, most are wearing green, lots of basijis/soldiers.” Another source claims, from ePersian Radio, that Grand Ayatollahs Montazeri and Sane’i have said they will join the rally.
That is what has happened so far today...
@ 'Enduring America'
That is what has happened so far today...
@ 'Enduring America'
'Screwed' by Peter Kuper
(Click to enlarge)This was supposed to run in 'Arthur' in June 2003 but got vetoed by the then publisher!
The Rolling Stones - Sympathy For The Devil
The Rolling Stones in the studio working on the song Sympathy For The Devil. From the film "Sympathy For The Devil/One Plus One", directed by Jean-Luc Godard in 1968.
Performance
Directed by Nicolas Roeg & Donald Cammell (1968).
with James Fox, Mick Jagger, Anita Pallenberg, Michele Breton.
with James Fox, Mick Jagger, Anita Pallenberg, Michele Breton.
Thursday 17 September 2009
Richard Hell on 'Tonight Live' (Australia) 1993
I was at that reading at The Lounge here in Melbourne and my copy of 'Artifact' has Betadine spilt all over it! (Don't ask?)
PS: Jennifer Keyte is bad enough, but thank god Vizard was not presenting the show that night.
PS: Jennifer Keyte is bad enough, but thank god Vizard was not presenting the show that night.
Pot and New York
...The kicker in this is the apparently almost unknown fact that possession of 25 grams, or seven-eighths of an ounce—much more than the few joints that are getting people arrested—is not a crime in New York State and has not been since the passage of the Marijuana Reform Act of 1977, or 32 years ago. (Right here add sound of potheads slapping their foreheads, like, how come they didn’t know that?) There are exceptions, however. If the pot is “burning or open to public view,” then the 25-gram deal is off. It is this provision that has been the basis for the arrest outbreak, many civil libertarians contend. The scenario of what happens on the street, as told to me by several arrestees, is remarkably similar. It goes like this: You’re black, or Spanish, or some white-boy fellow traveler with a cockeyed Bulls cap and falling-down pants. The cops come up to you, usually while you’re in a car, and ask you if you’re doing anything you shouldn’t. You say, “No, officer,” and they say, “You don’t have anything in your pocket you’re not supposed to have, do you, because if you do and I find it, it’ll be a lot worse for you.” It is at that point, because you are young, nervous, possibly simple, and ignorant of the law, you might comply and take the joint you’d been saving out of your pocket. Then, zam: Suddenly, your protection under the Marijuana Reform Act vanishes because the weed is now in “public view.” The handcuffs, the paddy wagon, and the aforementioned court date soon follow.
@ 'New York Magazine'
@ 'New York Magazine'
"ALLAH TREASURES HIS GAY AND TRANSGENDERED CHILDREN, HIS PRECIOUS HOMOSEXUAL CHILDREN. JESUS ADORES HIS GAY CHILDREN AND RESERVES A SACRED PLACE FOR THEM IN THE FOLDS OF HIS CLOTHES. IT IS A SIN TO HURT A GAY OR TRANSGENDERED PERSON. YOU HURT ALLAH WHEN YOU HURT ONE OF THESE MEN OR WOMEN, BOYS OR GIRLS. "
Wednesday 16 September 2009
"ALLAH TREASURES HIS GAY AND TRANSGENDERED CHILDREN, HIS PRECIOUS HOMOSEXUAL CHILDREN. JESUS ADORES HIS GAY CHILDREN AND RESERVES A SACRED PLACE FOR THEM IN THE FOLDS OF HIS CLOTHES. IT IS A SIN TO HURT A GAY OR TRANSGENDERED PERSON. YOU HURT ALLAH WHEN YOU HURT ONE OF THESE MEN OR WOMEN, BOYS OR GIRLS. "
A brief, noisy moment that still reverberates
Richard Hell & James Chance (Photo: Julia Gorton)Review of 'No Wave' byThurston Moore & Byron Coley
By BEN SISARIO
Published: June 12, 2008
@ 'NY Times'
Of all the strange and short-lived periods in the history of experimental music in New York, no wave is perhaps the strangest and shortest-lived.
Centered on a handful of late-1970s downtown groups like Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, DNA and James Chance’s Contortions, it was a cacophonous, confrontational subgenre of punk rock, Dadaist in style and nihilistic in attitude. It began around 1976, and within four years most of the original bands had broken up.
But every weird rock scene — and every era of New York bohemia — eventually gets its coffee-table book moment. This month Abrams Image is publishing “No Wave: Post-Punk. Underground. New York. 1976-1980,” a visual history by Thurston Moore and Byron Coley.
On Friday the book will be celebrated with an exhibition opening at KS Art, at 73 Leonard Street in TriBeCa, and, across the street at the Knitting Factory, the reunion of Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, whose blunt, aggressive songs had instrumentation so minimal that on its records the percussionist was sometimes credited as playing simply “drum.” Lydia Lunch, the former lead singer, is flying from Barcelona to play the show.
In the last year two other books have been published on no wave and overlapping periods of downtowniana: Marc Masters’s “No Wave” (Black Dog) and “New York Noise” (Soul Jazz), a collection of photographs by Paula Court.
“It was a little, blippy scene,” said Mr. Moore, the Sonic Youth guitarist and historian of underground rock. “It came out of the gate finished.”
With crisp black-and-white photographs and interviews with musicians and visual artists, the book is a loving reminiscence of a largely unheard period, as well as a look at a seedy, pre-gentrified Lower East Side. Most groups in the no wave scene — which also included Mars, the Theoretical Girls and the Gynecologists — left behind few recordings, and the compilation album that defined the genre, “No New York,” produced by Brian Eno in 1978, has never been legitimately issued on CD in the United States.
Despite its brief, blippy existence, no wave has had a broad and continued influence on noisy New York bands, from Sonic Youth and Pussy Galore in the 1980s to current groups like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and the Liars. But the original no wavers saw themselves not as part of any rock continuum but a deliberate reaction against such an idea.
“A guitar player like Lydia Lunch was somebody who clearly was not coming out of any kind of tradition,” said Mr. Coley, a veteran rock critic. “She didn’t have a Chuck Berry riff in her.”
The rebelliousness came out in many ways, from song composition — nasty, brutish and short — to the movement’s name, a cynical retort to “new wave,” then emerging as a more palatable variation on punk. The looks were nerdy and androgynous (or, in Ms. Lunch’s case, menacingly oversexed).
The sound reflected the squalor and decay of downtown New York in the late ’70s.
“New York at that moment was bankrupt, poor, dirty, violent, drug-infested, sex-obsessed — delightful,” Ms. Lunch said by phone. “In spite of that we were all laughing, because you laugh or you die. I’ve always been funny. My dark comedy just happens to scare most people.”
Mr. Moore and Mr. Coley’s book emphasizes the major role that women had in the scene. Besides Ms. Lunch, they included Pat Place of the Contortions, Ikue Mori of DNA and Nancy Arlen of Mars, as well as impresario-scenesters like Anya Phillips. Many photographs were taken by women, among them Julia Gorton and Stephanie Chernikowski.
Ms. Gorton, who was a student at the Parsons School of Design in the late ’70s and now teaches there, said that everyone in the no wave circle knew one another. “There were a lot of late nights, a lot of pitchers, a lot of Polaroids,” she said.
The book’s genesis was two years ago when Mr. Moore heard that Abrams, which published “CBGB & OMFUG: Thirty Years From the Home of Underground Rock” in 2005, was considering a book on no wave, with a broad and multidisciplinary approach.
Mr. Moore and Mr. Coley, who said they had been considering a no wave book for years, rushed to the Abrams office to pitch their idea, which would instead have a narrow focus, excluding everything that did not meet their strict definition of no wave.
A restrictive approach to one of the most obscure periods of rock music would seem to limit a book’s audience. But Tamar Brazis, who edited both books, said there was enough interest in the period to justify the “No Wave” book, and that the depth of Mr. Moore and Mr. Coley’s knowledge bowled her over. The CBGB book, she said, has sold nearly 40,000 copies, an impressive figure for an art book, and she added that Abrams has similar expectations for “No Wave.”
Mr. Moore said that only a narrow definition would fit the genre, which was so contrary in its sound and attitude that too much outside context would dilute its impact.
“We liked the absurdity of how small it was,” he said. “We kept our parameters really tight. We needed a cut-off point, and we cut it off as soon as anybody played any semblance of rock ’n’ roll. Any kind of traditional aspect of rock, it’s over.”
Foreword by Lydia Lunch & excerpt
HERE
Foreword by Lydia Lunch & excerpt
HERE
Lil' Bow Wow
Parents, STOP THIS! Stop this now! Your kid is not a dog, get him off the leash. I don’t want to hear that you are too busy to watch your child in public. Your priorities are kid first, remembering milk second. Most of the time it’s the kids on leashes that are ignored by their parents the most. But I guess its okay that little Timmy is throwing Oreos at an employee as long as he is doing it while tied to his monkey backpack leash. JUST STOP IT.@ 'People of Walmart'
Too true!!!
David Hockney: iPriest of Art (Evening Standard 30th April 2009)
Mixed media: David Hockney in his London studio with his iPhone,which has its own mini easel
By Geordie Greig
"Who would ever have thought that the telephone would bring back drawing," says David Hockney, who has been using an iPhone to make some of his new pictures. He has swapped paint for pixels to extend the scope of his ever-changing art.
He has only had an iPhone for four months but is an evangelical convert. Already he has painted flowers, drawn landscapes, played the keyboards on a virtual piano and, of course, spoken incessantly on the phone. His has a screechingly loud police-siren ringtone to compensate for his deafness.
Hockney also loves to use his phone to send by email his latest theories on the history of drawing, using images of Picasso to Rembrandt. "Sometimes I lie in bed and send illustrated art lectures to friends and also my own iPhone paintings. No camera is involved. I like to draw flowers by hand on the iPhone and send them out to friends so they get fresh flowers. And my flowers last! They never die!" His tip on phone-art: "You must stroke the screen very softly," he confides.
His love affair with the iPhone is single-minded. "BlackBerries are for secretaries and clerical workers while the iPhone is used by artistic people," he declares as he touches the tiny screen to show a new picture of irises, made, he declares triumphantly, without using paint, film, ink or pencil. "This is all new territory for art," he says, as he rests his iPhone on its own wooden mini easel on a table in his London studio.
Aged 71, Hockney is momentarily tongued-tied when it comes to describing his new work. "It's absurd to call it digital art. That is like calling a traditional drawing pencil art. What I can tell you is that when I am drawing on a phone or computer, I just know I am making 'drawings in a printing machine.'"
That is the title of an exhibition of his new work which opens today at the Annely Juda gallery in Mayfair. It is of pictures mostly made using a computer, camera and also painting on printouts from them. The show includes landscapes of Yorkshire and portraits of his family and friends. The pictures - a hybrid of old-fashioned draughtsmanship and hi-tech wizardry - are all for sale in limited editions of up to 30 copies.
"I used to think a computer was too slow for a draughtsman. You finished a line and the computer reacted 15 seconds later but things have changed and now you can draw very freely and fast with colour." But while Hockney loves his art wizardry he despairs at the political scene in Britain. "I am annoyed they want to interfere with my life. I am perfectly willing to pay the tax. I do mind them telling me I can't smoke. Parliament is the worst it has ever been. They debate nothing serious."
He tries to remain unfazed by what he sees as political and cultural vandalism. "It is appalling that they have spent 30 years discussing plans for education. Any party that has been discussing education for so long is bound to be swindling two generations."
He remains optimistic by making images of "things I consider beautiful. I like things that are pretty. I always have. It is good for your health. I happen to like the way that an iPhone has a sense of the absurd about it and is therefore close to life."
Rainy Night on Bridlington Promenade 2009
Autumn Leaves 2008Tuesday 15 September 2009
The View From Here (Excerpts), 2001 (Hazel Dooney/Girlz With Gunz # 81)
In 2001, when she was just 22, Hazel Dooney was invited to join nine, very well established, middle-aged Australian male artists including John Olsen, Tim Storrier, David Larwill and Robert Jacks on a privately funded artists expedition to central Australia. This unusual journey was the subject of an ABC documentary, The View From Here, excerpted here, directed by Liz Jones and produced by Jenny Day and Liz Jones, and a best-selling coffee table book, William Creek And Beyond. The resulting artworks toured museums and regional galleries all around Australia.
The resulting series of paintings, prints and photography can be viewed at Hazel Dooney's web site here.
The resulting series of paintings, prints and photography can be viewed at Hazel Dooney's web site here.
Can anyone translate this for me?
Karroubi details new evidence of detainee abuse in Iran's prisons.
@ 'NY Times'
@ 'NY Times'
RIP Keith Floyd
Keith Floyd, a flamboyant chef who shared his passion for good food and fine wine with a generation of British television viewers, has died, his ghostwriter said Tuesday. He was 65. James Steen said Floyd died Monday of a heart attack in Bridport, southwest England. He had been suffering from bowel cancer. Born in 1943, Floyd developed an interest in cooking while serving in the British army, trying out his culinary creations in the officers' mess. He later worked in kitchens in Britain and France before opening his own restaurants in Bristol, southwest England, where he was discovered by a television producer. Starting in the 1980s, series like "Floyd on Fish" and "Floyd on France" made him a household name in Britain and were shown around the world. He became famous for his bow tie, ever-present glass of wine and unscripted banter with his cameraman that sometimes tipped over into bickering. Steen said one of Floyd's breakthroughs was to attract men to the world of cooking. "At that time it was thought that if you were a man you couldn't cook," Steen said. "But he said 'I'm a man, I love rugby, I love women, I can cook.'" Floyd paved the way for a generation of TV chefs that includes Nigella Lawson and Jamie Oliver. Oliver said Floyd had been "an inspiration to me and to so many others."Bonus: Audio
The Stranglers - Peaches (1976 Demo)
Make up yr fugn mind Amerikkka
You can't have it both ways you know.Once more here are the definitions of 'Socialism' and 'Fascism'.
They are diametrically opposed to each other.
Take your time read s l o w l y, I know there are a lot of words that you will NOT understand...
but try and get your head around it.
Do these people actually know what they are talking about?
Monday 14 September 2009
Closing the book on the Bush legacy
Thursday's annual Census Bureau report on income, poverty and access to health care-the Bureau's principal report card on the well-being of average Americans-closes the books on the economic record of George W. Bush.It's not a record many Republicans are likely to point to with pride.
On every major measurement, the Census Bureau report shows that the country lost ground during Bush's two terms. While Bush was in office, the median household income declined, poverty increased, childhood poverty increased even more, and the number of Americans without health insurance spiked. By contrast, the country's condition improved on each of those measures during Bill Clinton's two terms, often substantially...
@ 'The Atlantic'
On every major measurement, the Census Bureau report shows that the country lost ground during Bush's two terms. While Bush was in office, the median household income declined, poverty increased, childhood poverty increased even more, and the number of Americans without health insurance spiked. By contrast, the country's condition improved on each of those measures during Bill Clinton's two terms, often substantially...
@ 'The Atlantic'
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