Mediocre creeps in shiny suits
/ William Bowles: The world is run by sleazy creeps with a license to print money
Have you noticed that whenever we see/hear a corporate boss or government hack open their mouths, they’re invariably no more than mediocre creeps in shiny suits? Either, they’re trying to worm their way out of their role in the latest disaster to befall us or, they’re peddling some twaddle intended to obfiscate, confuse or just plain lie about events and their causes and of course, their role in it.
And it stretches across every sector of business and government, from agriculture to telecoms. Under ‘New Labour’ all kinds of ‘regulatory’ bodies have been created (or they’re revamps of existing ones). But it’s all smoke and mirrors, window-dressed by creepy PR and marketing sleazoids. In reality, these ‘regulatory’ bodies are no more than rubber stamps for Big Business.
Self-determination is not an absolutist principle. The rights of humanity as a whole are preeminent.
/The Tibet Question: Is Self-Determination, as a Principle, Absolute?
Is the principle of self-determination an absolute? As a guiding concept, self-determination is fine, but as an absolute, inviolable principle, self-determination is flawed.
For example, do the resource rich regions of Bolivia have a right to separate from the rest of the state and horde the wealth?3 Is this what self-determination is about? Given that the Bolivians in the provinces of Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando and Tarija are predominantly of European derivation, it would be akin to according preeminent territorial rights to the descendants of colonialists. Is this what self-determination is about?
As a second example, the predominantly French-speaking province of Québec has long flirted with separation from federation with Canada. However, since the sentiment for separation varies by geographical region within Québec, anti-separatists propose a partitioning of the province should separatism ever carry the day in a referendum. Moreover, thoroughly undermining the self-determination aspirations of Québécois (mainly Francophones) is that it is based on the rejection of the self-determination of the Original Peoples of Québec! Is this what self-determination is about?
Hostages
/An Arab Woman Blues - Reflections in a sealed bottle...
Hostages of violence, of greed, of brutality, of dual occupations. Hostages of poverty, disease, unemployment, closed borders and exile... Hostages of sectarianism, chauvinism, corruption... Hostages to embezzlers, gangs, robbers, murderers, sadists, rapists, perverts and killers...
All are guilty.
The charlatan anti-Christ-the Mahdi, the Shiite puppet government, the corrupt Sunni politicians, the Zionist Kurds, the psychopathic dirty Americans, the insane filthy Iranians, the lowly debased Brits, the sold-out sleeping Arabs, the Security firms, the Oil cartels, the West, the East, the International Community, the NGO’s, the Media, the left shits and their shit parties...
All are guilty.
All are trying to make a profit one way or another. Either through fame, interest, money, resources, influence or power and the list is endless. Hostages of a failed state, of a "creative chaos"... Hostages of Silence, of Destruction, of a philosophy of Annihilation. Hostages in a vacuum, in an abyss, in a senseless cycle, a cycle of Madness... Hostages of the futility of Living.
Hostages under the Devil’s claws, under his grip. The Devil has no mission but to destroy. And the Iraqis have been singled out for that purpose. So who is going to have mercy on us, us Iraqis ?
Do you understand what I am saying ? Do you ?
You Evil bastards - the whole lot of you.
-Layla Anwar
Arrogant pisshead
/Paul Staines aka Guido Fawkes
Via Unity
...admitted driving while under the influence and without insurance after being stopped by the police in the small hours of 17 April, driving his wife's Volkswagen fast and swerving across lanes in south London.
He was breathalysed and found to be almost twice the legal limit. Asked by District Judge Timothy Stone whether he had an alcohol problem, Staines said: "Possibly." Sentencing is on 15 May.
It is his fourth alcohol-related offence and second drink-driving reprimand – he was banned for 12 months in 2002 – requiring the judge to consider a jail sentence.
Via Unity
Something to relieve the pain?
/Medic says Army sergeant ordered him to suffocate Iraqi
After an Army medic, John Torres, reported that a bullet-riddled insurgent was going to die, his sergeant, Leonardo Trevino, ordered him to suffocate the Iraqi before fatally shooting the man himself, the medic testified during the sergeant's court-martial. The medic said he was kidding when he suggested suffocating the wounded man, but when ordered to do so, he pretended by lightly holding his hand over the man's mouth. Authorities say Trevino shot the insurgent in the abdomen, a non-fatal wound, before ordering Torres to suffocate him. They allege Trevino then shot the Iraqi in the head and tried to cover up the crime.
Ooh goody. Perhaps they can afford decent cleaners now
/Specialist nurses 'fear for jobs'
Some of the most experienced and highly skilled nurses in the NHS fear for their jobs despite the large surplus in the health service, a survey indicates.
Nurse leaders said it "beggars belief" that nurses were worrying about their jobs in the current climate. The health service is expected to post a large surplus when the accounts for 2007-8 are released later this year. The figure could be as high as £1.8bn.
So that's where that crucifix went
/Pregnant Woman Sees Jesus Image in Ultrasound
When an Ohio woman looked at an ultrasound she expected to see a developing fetus. Instead, she saw what she believes to be an image of Jesus Christ...on the cross.
"As soon as I saw it I was like oh my gosh." "People say maybe my baby is gonna be blessed and maybe it is a good sign," said mother-to-be Sledge. "I don't know, I've done wrong in my life, maybe he's forgiven me early."
Can you hear me, Gordon?
/Reason Magazine - Drug Policy, from Scratch
The ideal drug policy would apply to the currently illegal intoxicants the same distinctions we routinely apply to alcohol: between children and adults, between use and abuse, between abuse that harms only the user and abuse that harms others. Selling drugs to minors should remain illegal. But adults should be free to decide for themselves what goes into their bodies, provided they do not violate anyone else's rights in the process.
It's in the bag
/Jews sans frontieres: Family values Israel style
But it's OK because a) the Israelis weren't aiming at them and b) it was Palestinian explosives which did the damage. Yeah, right.
But it's OK because a) the Israelis weren't aiming at them and b) it was Palestinian explosives which did the damage. Yeah, right.
Remember 2006 and the Palestinian family wiped out on Gaza beach while pickniking? The Israelis claimed that they were killed by mines planted on the beach by militants but a thorough investigation later proved conclusively that they were killed by an Israeli shell fired at the beach from the sea.
Reuters: The Israeli army said aircraft fired at two Palestinian militants near the house who were carrying bags. Based on the size of the resulting explosion, the army said it now believed that those bags were filled with bombs and other explosive devices. "As a result of this big explosion, extensive damage was caused to a house that was near the gunmen and uninvolved civilians were hit," the army said in a statement.
Damn, and you'd just got it working nicely too...
/Jeffrey Zeldman Presents : The vanishing personal site
Our personal sites, once our primary points of online presence, are becoming sock drawers for displaced first-person content. We are witnessing the disappearance of the all-in-one, carefully designed personal site containing professional information, links, and brief bursts of frequently updated content to which others respond via comments. Did I say we are witnessing the traditional personal site’s disappearance? That is inaccurate. We are the ones making our own sites disappear. Obliterating our own readership and page views may not be a bad thing, but let’s be sure we are making conscious choices.
Whoops #792
/How the Iraq War Has Empowered Iran - Brookings Institution
Of the many American illusions and delusions surrounding this war, the Administration's calculations with respect to Iran were among the most wildly off base. Instead of generating a liberal, secular democracy whose reverberations would drive out Iran's clerical oligarchs, the disastrous Bush policies fostered a sectarian Iraq that has helped empower Iranian hardliners. Rather than serving as an anchor for a new era of stability and American preeminence in the Persian Gulf, the new Iraq represents a strategic black hole, bleeding Washington of military resources and political influence while extending Iran's primacy among its neighbors.
