Archive for May, 2010
Florida State Senator Watches Dog Video, Topless Women Online During Abortion Debate
The local news in Florida captured an amusing video of Republican Mike Bennett’s activities on the floor of the state Senate: using his government laptop to surf for soft-core porn and cute animal videos. This was during the debate of a controversial abortion bill. Bennett explained that there had been “confusion” when attempting to view an “email about an item being debated on the Senate floor.” From the Sunshine State News:
Recent History, Sander Hicks and a New York Green Party Senate Candidacy
With prognosticators claiming that Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY)’s re-election campaign is full-steam ahead, activist/writer/playwright/Brooklynite Sander Hicks is running for the Senate on a platform of “true transparency,” and economic and leadership policies focused on peace. We had an exchange about immigration, anthrax, the finer points of the alleged 9/11 cover-up, the BP oil spill disaster, the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and — that old, beaten-horse topic for Green Party candidates — in essence, the ambiguity of saying Republicans are worse.
1. On your campaign page, you hold up Cesar Chavez as an example of non-violence. In light of recent events in Arizona and the passage of controversial immigration legislation, how does Mr. Chavez’s opposition to illegal immigration function alongside your personal views of border control? (This is what I’m talking about.)
Is attempting to apply restrictions on human movements through the enforcement of borders ever inherently racist?
Any good labor leader will want to protect against strike-breakers. This is what Chavez was dealing with — illegals were being hired to cross picket lines and scab on the union.
The ideal immigration policy would make it easier to become a citizen. We need to create more jobs in this country so that we’re not at each others’ throats competing for a such a small number of jobs…
Computerized ‘Typo’ Causes Largest Stock Market Plunge Ever
This is really insane, really does make it seems like these traders are just playing with Monopoly money. If only actual working people’s pensions and savings were not tied to this grand casino, we could laugh it off. See the line in bold print below, it’s priceless. Tim Paradis writes on the AP via HuffPo:
A computerized selloff possibly caused by a simple typographical error triggered one of the most turbulent days in Wall Street history Thursday and sent the Dow Jones industrials to a loss of almost 1,000 points, nearly a tenth of their value, in less than half an hour. It was the biggest drop ever during a trading day.
No one was sure what happened, other than automated orders were activated by erroneous trades. One possibilility being investigated was that a trader accidentally placed an order to sell $16 billion, instead of $16 million, worth of futures, and that was enough to trigger sell orders across the market.
The Dow recovered two-thirds of the loss before the closing bell, but that was still the biggest point loss since February of last year. The lightning-fast plummet temporarily knocked normally stable stocks such as Procter & Gamble to a tiny fraction of their former value and sent chills down investors’ spines.
“Today … caused me to fall out of my chair at one point. It felt like we lost control,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Harris Private Bank in Chicago.
Humanity and Beyond
Stacie Adams writes on Smirking Chimp:
A week or two ago the internets were ablaze with the news that not only did famed physicist Stephen Hawking appear to believe in the existence of life on other planets, but he was also of the mind that we should avoid them at all costs, because in his opinion they would be of the face sucking, giant lizard variety.
Many expressed dismay at his sentiment, but it’s really not that fantastic. Hawking’s theory is that if the universe is infinite, it would make sense mathematically for there to be other life forms in existence at various stages of development. His second point really isn’t that bold either. Why do we, in our limited knowledge, assume that advancement entails humanity?
Look at our species. As we advance, are we becoming more or less humane? And look at our history. We happen upon a new land, and what…
Giant Telescope To Be Built In Chilean Desert
Photo: Clinton Steeds (CC)
It has been announced that the world’s largest telescope will be built in the desert of Chile, with the goal of giving us views of outer space the likes of which we’ve never seen. The $1.3-billion European Extremely Large Telescope will take eight years to construct, and it is way better than the telescope you have in your garage. Space.com reports:
The world’s largest optical telescope – to be called, appropriately, the European Extremely Large Telescope – will be built on a mountain in Chile, the observatory’s planners announced Monday.
The telescope’s newly chosen home is the Cerro Armazones mountain in the central part of Chile’s Atacama Desert. This location was picked for its optimal weather conditions – the skies are clear overhead about 320 nights a year, according to its European Southern Observatory (ESO) builders.
Construction on the European Extremely Large Telescope is expected to receive a final go-ahead at…
Greek Protesters Urged to Retreat from ‘Abyss’ (Video)
BBC News reports:
Greece is “on the brink of the abyss”, President Karolos Papoulias has warned, after three people died during protests over planned austerity measures. “We are all responsible so that it does not take the step into the void,” the president said in a statement.
It followed a day of violence during which protesters set fire to a bank, killing three employees. Greece’s government has vowed to pursue the spending cuts — a condition of its 110bn euro ($142bn; £95bn) bail-out.
“We are prepared to pay the heavy political cost,” Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou told parliament during Wednesday’s debate on the bill. “We will not take a single step backwards.”
The euro hit a fresh 13-month low against the dollar and European stock markets were also hit, amid concerns over Greek bail-out plans. There are also fears Greece’s debt crisis could spread to other countries.
Now I’m A Chick! Gianni the Gender-Bending Rooster Starts to Lay Eggs, Baffling Scientists
Photo: Muhammad Mahdi Karim (CC)
Via the Daily Mail:
Gianni started life as a red-blooded cockerel and would often wake his Italian owners up crowing on his farm in Tuscany.
But when a fox raided Gianni’s enclosure and killed all of the hens inside, Gianni felt it was time for a change.
Within days the bird was laying eggs and trying to hatch them as he began his new life as a hen.
The sex-change chicken has baffled scientists at the UN’s Farm and Agriculture Organisation, who are now planning to study Gianni’s DNA to see what made him change.
An expert at the centre said: ‘It may be a primitive species survival gene. With all the females gone he could only ensure the future of his line by becoming female.’
Professor Donato Matassino, who will be leading tests on Gianni, said: ‘This rooster-hen will be taken to the laboratories of Consdabi (Consortium for the experimentation and…
British Election Results in Hung Parliament, First Since 1974
What’s the deal here, was the first-ever televised debate to blame for a lack of a majority? Simon Veazey writes in the Epoch Times:
The British election has resulted in a hung parliament, with the Conservative Party gaining the most seats but falling short of the overall majority that would automatically grant them governance.
The apparent meteoric rise of Nick Clegg failed dismally to translate from the opinion polls to the ballot box, with his Liberal Democrat Party increasing its share of the vote by only one per cent, and most likely losing seats.
The election results have not been all declared, with 24 constituencies still to announce results at present. At present the Conservative seat count stands at 299, Labour at 255, and Lib Dems at 54.
However, it is clear from the results that the Conservative Party cannot win the majority needed to automatically claim the right to form a government.
Read More…
Sen. Lieberman Proposes Stripping Terrorists of American Citizenship
Chart: www.lurkertech.com/threat-chart (CC)
Stephanie Condon writes on CBS News:
As some Republicans in Congress continue to criticize the administration for its decision to read Miranda rights to alleged attempted terorrist Faisal Shahzad, independent Sen. Joe Lieberman is proposing a plan to avoid reading those rights to suspects like Shahzad.
The Connecticut senator, who typically votes with Democrats but is hawkish on national security issues, wants to see a new law that would strip people like Shahzad of their citizenship and, subsequently, their Miranda rights.
Lieberman is planning to introduce a bill that would allow the government to revoke the citizenship of an American who joins a foreign terrorist organization, the Hill reports. The proposed legislation would amend current law that strips a person’s citizenship if they fight with a foreign army.
“I think it’s time for us to look at whether we want to amend that law to apply it to American citizens who choose…
Hey Arizona, Don’t Mess With This Mexican: Robert Rodriquez’s Political ‘Machete’ Trailer (Video)
Here’s writer/director Robert Rodriquez’s “special Cinco de Mayo message to Arizona” cut from his upcoming film Machete. Yeah I wouldn’t mess with Danny Trejo, don’t know about you or the folks in Arizona…
Is There A Real-Life Dharma Initiative?
Editor’s note: Congrats to regular disinfo.com contributor klintron on the interview! Henry Hanks writes on CNN’s SciTech Blog:
Much of their research does exist in the real world, leading one to another question: Are there organizations from history that may have inspired the idea of the Dharma Initiative?
Ask many who have pondered that question, and one answer you often hear (aside from Skinner, obviously) is DARPA. DARPA — the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency — is often credited with creating the internet and has researched and developed some pretty advanced stuff, especially in the area of robotics. DARPA even sounds like “Dharma,” but as tempting as it is to draw conclusions about the two, the similarities start and end there (for one thing, Dharma is a private organization).
One person who has thought about this quite a bit is blogger Klint “Klintron” Finley, who has written about the concept of “real-life Dharma initiatives” extensively at Hatch23.com. “I think it stems from various trends and movements from the ’60s and ’70s,” he said. “More specifically, anywhere that two or more of the following intersected: Eastern spirituality, fringe science, defense spending, disturbing psychological research, experiments in utopian/communal living and experiments social control.”
Secret Army Spy Plane May Have Snooped on Times Square Bomber
Really interesting article from Noah Shachtman in Wired:
Investigators were able to track wannabe terrorist Faisal Shahzad through his anonymous, pre-paid cell phone — exactly how, they won’t say. But there was a tantalizing explanation posted — and then quickly yanked — from the website of WCBS TV. “In the end, it was secret Army intelligence planes that did him in. Armed with his cell phone number, they circled the skies over the New York area, intercepting a call to Emirates Airlines reservations, before scrambling to catch him at John F. Kennedy International Airport.”
Jeremy Scahill, relying on a source in U.S. Special Operations, says those planes were likely RC-12s, equipped with a Guardrail Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) system. The planes are designed to pluck all kinds of communications from the air. But from the ground, they could easily be mistaken for an executive aircraft. The RC-12 is based on the Hawker-Beechcraft King Air B200 suit-carrier. And…
Obama Jokes About Killing Jonas Brothers With Predator Drones (Video)
Alex Pareene writes on www.uruknet.info:
“The Jonas Brothers are here; they’re out there somewhere. Sasha and Malia are huge fans. But boys, don’t get any ideas. I have two words for you, ‘predator drones.’ You will never see it coming.”
Hah! It’s funny because predator drone strikes in Pakistan have killed literally hundreds of completely innocent civilians, and now the president is evincing a casual disregard for those lives he is responsible for ending by making a lighthearted joke about killing famous young celebrities for the crime of attempting to sleep with his young daughters. (Really, everything about the joke is inappropriate. That’s why you shouldn’t analyze humor too much.)
But the problem isn’t specifically with the joke itself. It’s a sort of generic joke about the executive’s unconstrained power that any postwar president could’ve delivered. You know, it would’ve been Patriot missiles during the first Gulf War, or jokes about the CIA or Secret Service disappearing people during the Cold War. The problem is with the whole damn scene of the president delivering a stand-up comedy routine, on camera, to the press. The problem with the Bush joke about looking for WMD was that a roomful of journalists chuckled good-naturedly at it. It looks bad for everyone.
The Gulf Coast Oil Spill: An American Chernobyl?
The World Socialist Web Site writes:
With each passing day, the scale of the disaster unleashed by the oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico increases. Somewhere between 5,000 (the official estimate) and 25,000 (the estimate of some scientists) barrels of oil is surging into the Gulf every day.
Before it is over, millions, if not tens of millions of gallons of oil will be washed up on America’s wetlands and shorelines.Eleven workers are already dead in the latest industrial disaster in the American energy industry. Now, the fishing and seafood industry along the Gulf coast may be shut down for years, perhaps even a generation. The destruction of the fragile ecosystems of the region will likely be irreparable.
The disaster implicates one of the world’s largest corporations, British Petroleum, together with partners and subcontractors like Transocean Ltd., operator of the drill rig, and Halliburton, which carried out major operations on the wellhead…
Telepathic Japanese Robots Within 10 Years? (Video)
Via h+ magazine:
Japan has announced a goal of commercial mind-reading devices and helper robots within the next 10 years. “While the U.S. Army actively pursues ‘thought helmets’ that might someday lead to secure mind-to-mind communication between soldiers, the Japanese are going after the consumer
market.”
The “brainwave initiative” involves the government and private sector collaborating on electronics that can be controlled by thought alone. (Several years ago, Hitachi announced the goal of a commercial brain-machine interface by 2011, and they’re already actively pursuing thought-controlled TV.)
Gringo Masks for Mexican Arizonans
A little humor goes a long way to make a good point. Via animalnewyork:
Fight the pale-skin power. In response to Arizona’s new draconian SB 1070 immigration law, Zubi, an independent Hispanic advertising firm with offices in L.A., Dallas, Miami, and Detroit, has launched a microsite, Gringo Mask, to offer “support and dignity to the Hispanic community in the United States.”
President Obama is the Biggest Recipient of BP Cash. (Yes, That BP of Gulf Coast Oil Spill Infamy…)
This doesn’t sound like change I can believe in. Hmm. Glad we have some Washington reporters still actually working at the Politico. Erikia Lovley reports:
While the BP oil geyser pumps millions of gallons of petroleum into the Gulf of Mexico, President Barack Obama and members of Congress may have to answer for the millions in campaign contributions they’ve taken from the oil and gas giant over the years.
BP and its employees have given more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Donations come from a mix of employees and the company’s political action committees — $2.89 million flowed to campaigns from BP-related PACs and about $638,000 came from individuals.
On top of that, the oil giant has spent millions each year on lobbying — including $15.9 million last year alone — as it has tried to influence energy policy.
Times Square Bomb: The Right’s Nuttiest Theory
Was the recent incident in Times Square an attempt to demonize the labor and environmental movements? Mother Jones reports:
Photo: T.L. Miles (CC)
This much we know: A US citizen born in Pakistan has been arrested for allegedly parking a Nissan Pathfinder in Times Square Saturday night, loaded with fertilizer that doesn’t combust, a kid’s alarm clock that likely didn’t tick, several gallons of gas, some propane tanks, and a few M80 firecrackers.
Attorney General Eric Holder has released a statement saying Shahzad was “taken into custody at JFK Airport in New York as he attempted to board a flight to Dubai.” There’s a lot we have yet to learn about what this news means, but it probably rules out one favorite conservative theory about the attempted bombing — that left-wing protesters took advantage of May Day (aka International Workers’ Day) to make a big bang in New York’s neon-soaked seat of capitalism.
Even before the…
Wall Streeters’ Chain Email Reveals They’re Even Worse People Than We Thought
Image: ExiledOnline.com
Think that the financial crash has left investment banking hotshots humbler and wiser? Not likely. The National Review blog The Corner has a defiant email that has been circulating over the last couple days among discontented Wall Streeters. Seriously, these people are as douche-y as you imagined:
We are Wall Street. It’s our job to make money. Whether it’s a commodity, stock, bond, or some hypothetical piece of fake paper, it doesn’t matter.
We would trade baseball cards if it were profitable. I didn’t hear America complaining when the market was roaring to 14,000 and everyone’s 401k doubled every 3 years. Just like gambling, its not a problem until you lose. I’ve never heard of anyone going to Gamblers Anonymous because they won too much in Vegas.
Well now the market crapped out, & even though it has come back somewhat, the government and the average Joes are still looking for a scapegoat. God…
