"In His Own Words"

Barack Obama wrote a book called "In His Own Words."

After his plagiarism troubles, there's a joke in there somewhere.

News - Civil Liberties In UK On Decline

We lived in the UK for a year and were quite disturbed that even in the tiny town of St Andrews, we couldn't go anywhere except possibly the middle of a field without being on one if not several CCTV cameras.

We were a law biding visa holder but being on a surveillance camera all the time tends to make one feel like a criminal or at least like an undesirable.

Now, there is serious talk in Britain about possible "compulsory DNA testing of the entire population and all visitors to the UK."

This article looks at arguments from both sides. We are very decidedly anti Big Brother and very anti the overwhelming bureaucracy in place in Britain as it is. We very much hope that our beloved Brits will shout down these new policies and prospective changes with the righteous vigor they deserve.

We would be super sad if we couldn't visit our favorite country again because of a clash of ideals regarding civil rights.

We would cry, but we would rather forgo ever seeing the bonnie banks of Loch Lomond again than be DNA tested for the privilege.

News Update - PM Abe Denied WWII Forced Prostitution

We posted about the departure of Japan's Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, a while back but we just read that among the many other scandals of his time in office he denied Japan's role in forcing as many as 200,000 women in China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Korea and the Philippines, into prostitution for the Japanese military. These "Comfort Women" are widely recognized by historians and the Japanese government has apologized for the WWII practice in the past.

While the Japanese government apologized in 1993 for its role in trafficking women during the war, it has refused to provide government compensation to victims. In June, the US House Foreign Affairs Committee passed a resolution aimed at urging Japan to take responsibility in "a clear and unequivocal manner for its Imperial Armed Forces’ coercion of young women into sexual slavery."

This is big, folks. This is like if today the German president denied there was a Holocaust. "Comfort women" aren't just a rumor; their existence is an extremely well documented fact.

Like many things of this nature, it is believed he denied it because to this day the Japanese government has refused to pay these women - its victims - reparations. (The same thing is still kind of happening with the German government and the Romani or 'Gypsy' survivors of concentration camps from WWII.)

PS. The image above is from the Wikipedia article on the subject.

News - Student Tasered For Questioning John Kerry

Bringing back strong memories of this incident, John Kerry has released a statement about the University of Florida student who was tasered for vigorously questioning Kerry during a speech at the university on Tuesday.

Police used excessive force on the unarmed 21-year-old man who was heard to yell, "Don't tase me, bro!"

Most of the audience sat still and watched as police tasered him and dragged him from the room. We would have thought liberal college students would have yelled or protested the use of excessive force the way students in the library at UCLA did when a student who'd forgotten his library card was tasered by campus po-po there.

We are in fact, very concerned that they did absolutely nothing. In fact, many members of the audience aplauded when the man was carried away by the police and were laughing as he was tasered. One woman in our posted video called the man "an idiot" - how sad to think that we're viewed as idiots when we try to change our world.

The guy was asking a lot of questions even heckling Kerry, but he was not violent and he was exercising his right to free speech - something that is often made a joke out of (like the guy at our school who wanted to post homemade porn on CCTV that was piped into patients at the local hospital,) but when freedom of speech regarding political opinion is violently repressed like this we freak and rightfully so.

John Kerry was heavily criticized on MSNBC's Tucker and elsewhere online today for his lack of outrage on the student's behalf and on the behalf of free speech. We aren't surprised - this is a man who has committed war crimes. Like a little taser action is going to bother him?

Kerry was heard to ask the officers to let him answer the student's question; we think totally knew how bad this was going to look for him.

The student has yet to release a statement.

Click here to watch the disturbing video of the incident. Six officers were on one guy. Amazing.

PS. Did you know John Kerry is from one of those dynasty families that are what's wrong with the world? Again, we're so naive but it was total news to us. "His first cousin Brice Lalonde, a future Socialist and Green Party leader in France...ran for president of France in 1981." We are so sick of familial nepotism. And not just in Hollywood and in politics - it's everywhere!

PPS. This article on Kerry in CounterPunch is amazing. We think it's a must read.

PPPS. The moral of so many of these lessons is 'Don't go to Florida.'

News - Actor Chris Langham Jailed

One of the biggest heroes in the fight against international child pornography, Operation Ore, has caught yet another celebrity by tracing the credit card numbers used to purchase online images of child sexual abuse.

British actor and comedian, Chris Langham, most noted for his roles in Monty Python's Life of Brian, The Return of the Pink Panther, and ironically multiple episodes of The Muppet Show, has been "sentenced to ten months in jail for downloading 'horrifying' child pornography."

Operation Ore has already cited musicians Gary Glitter and Pete Townsend (of The Who) for accessing similar illegal sites. Gary Glitter is in prison in Vietnam until August 2008 for the sexual abuse of children. Pete Townsend was "entered on the Violent and Sex Offender List for 5 years."

Both Townsend and Langham claimed that they were doing research on the illegal sites. Langham claimed that he was molested as a child. After he was convicted, a woman accused him of having a sexual relationship with her from the time she was 14. Langham admitted to having relations with her when she was 18. Langham is married with two children of his own.

News - Search For Fossett May Solve Other Aviation Disappearances

On September 3rd, American adventurer and record setter, Steve Fossett set out in a single-engine Bellanca Super Decathlon from the Flying M Ranch owned by hotel magnate Barron Hilton. He hasn't been heard from since and experts say that at this point the likelihood of finding him alive is slim.

That doesn't keep hundreds of friends and fans of the famous aviator from Tennessee from searching for him in the steep hills and narrow valleys of the Sierra Nevadas. In conducting the search, six new plane crash sites have been discovered and will be logged and investigated properly after the search for Fossett concludes. It is believed that over 200 of these undocumented sites may exist.

Some families who lost loved ones and never knew what happened for sure now have hope that their final destination may be confirmed.

Fossett, 63, was the first man to fly around the world in a balloon alone and the first solo pilot to circle the globe without refueling. He holds 14 world records in airplane flight, two for ballooning, six in gliders and one in an airship. In addition, he holds 11 records for sailing and one for cross-country skiing. He also has set other records that have since been broken.

Cheers to those helping out by joining the search and even looking at Google Earth to try and find Fossett. We think that if anyone can make it through this it's with the highly trained survival skills and clanging metal balls of Steve Fossett. We're rooting for you, dude.

News - Hope For Youssif

A hopeful update on Youssif, the little boy who was disfigured but miraculously survived when masked men in his home city of Baghdad grabbed him doused him with gasoline and set him on fire.

We are extremely happy to report that he is in the US and has had his first meeting with Dr. Peter Grossman, the plastic surgeon who specializes in treating child burn victims and who will work to reconstruct the burned areas of Youssif's face and body throughout each of the 8 to 10 operations he will undergo.

The operations may begin as soon as next week.

Grossman will cut away scar tissue around his nose and put temporary skin from a cadaver over it. "We're also going to stick a balloon underneath the good skin under his neck and on his face," the doctor said. "The purpose of that is over time we will stretch the good skin, so that in about three months he will be able to go back to surgery, remove the scar tissue and pull up the stretched out good tissues."

"I'm emotionally exhausted," Youssif's dad said. "We went from death to a new life."

We are very proud of and cheering for Youssif, his doctors and his whole family right now as they go forward in this amazing endeavor. In the face of great danger, this family has shown tremendous courage stemming from the one thing that outshines war and violence - love. We support them and will continue to update on Youssif's progress.

PS. To contribute to Youssif's fund, click here.

News - Endangered Species List Grows Dramatically

There was only one species that showed improvement this year scientists said today; the Mauritius echo parakeet moved from critically endangered to the endangered list.

This news comes from the World Conservation Union which released its annual Red List today.

Over 200 new species made the frightening list which rates endangered and critically endangered species all over the world.

The makers of the list stressed the importance of recognizing just how small of a representation it is. These numbers are only taken from the world's 41,415 traceable species. There are countless others that are yet undiscovered and as such, untrackable. The widely accepted figure is 15 million different species, total, on Earth.

“The estimate is low; we know it’s low. We’ve only really looked at the tip of the iceberg in terms of species that are out there that are known to science.”

Low though it is, the list names over 16,300 species threatened with extinction.

"One in four mammals, one in eight birds, one third of all amphibians and 70 percent of the world’s assessed plants on the 2007 Red List are in jeopardy, the IUCN added."

Here are a few of those who need help: lowland gorillas threatened by Ebola and poaching (they may only have 12 years left), the Yangtze River dolphin, corals from the Galapagos Islands, the Hawaiian crow (now extinct in the wild), the Goliath frog (the largest frog in the world), the Giant Hispaniolan galliwasp... The list goes on.

News - Perfectly Preserved Maiden Of Incan Sacrifice On Display

"La Doncella" (The Maiden,) this amazingly well-preserved mummy of a 15-year-old Inca girl, was put on display to thousands of museum-goers in Salta, Argentina recently.

She was found along with the corpses of a 6-year-old girl and a 7-year-old boy (not on display) in an "icy pit on Llullaillaco volcano" in 1999. The three human sacrifices are believed to have been "sacrificed more than 500 years ago in a ceremony marking the annual corn harvest."

"Dressed in fine clothes and given corn alcohol to put them to sleep, the victims were then left to die at an elevation of 22,080 feet."

The children, dubbed the "Children of Llullaillaco" were "found at the highest elevation ever discovered for sacrificial victims of the former Inca empire."

We live in a fascinating world.

News - Scientists Burn Water

This one is weird, folks. And exciting. John Kanzius, a scientist who was attempting to "desalinate water with the radio-frequency generator he developed to treat cancer" discovered that by exposing the water to radio frequencies he could weaken its bonds to release the hydrogen, which he could then burn.

Another chemist at Penn State, Rustum Roy, said, "Seeing it burn gives me the chills," after conducting his own experiments.

The discovery has excited scientists with the possibility of using water as fuel.

"Burn 'em all, laddie!"

News - Goodnight For Japan's PM

Shinzo Abe, Japan's youngest postwar prime minister (he's 52,) announced his resignation on Wednesday.
The move apparently surprised not only party members but members of his own Cabinet, "by deciding to resign only days after he pledged to stake his government on the success of legislation to extend Japan's naval mission in the Indian Ocean."

In a televised conference he stated, "I find myself unable to keep my promises — I myself have become an obstacle to fulfilling those promises."

Election defeat, resistance from an opposition leader, and unclarified health problems were all listed as contributing factors in his decision.

Abe's administration has been plagued with scandals and even suicide, after which support for the leader dropped to 30%.

"...Abe's unpopular government had become a liability for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party..."

We were surprised to find out (although we shouldn't have been) that Japan too is beset with imperialistic families who find multiple members of the same immediate family in the Prime Minister's seat generation after generation. In Abe's case, his grandfather was Prime Minister and his father was a foreign minister.

We were either naive or ignorant enough to think that it was just the US' problem.

PS. This just in; he has been hospitalized for exhaustion.

News - Kathy Griffin's Emmy Speech To Be Censored

Comedienne and actress, Kathy Griffin finally won an Emmy for her show My Life on the D-List but the road to the top may have a few more bumps before she makes it.

Her acceptance speech, while amusing many, has outraged some who called it blasphemous and hate-filled.

When accepting her award, Griffin said, "a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus. Fuck you, Jesus! This award is my god now!"

The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences stated Monday that "Kathy Griffin's offensive remarks will not be part of the E! telecast on Saturday night."

We can totally take this kind of joke but we recognize that personal priorities account for different levels of offense in different groups. We hope this gets resolved to everyone's satisfaction.

PS. Doesn't she look like Desperate Housewives', Felicity Huffman, here?

"D*&$ In A Box" Wins Emmy

That crazy Andy Samberg, recent and amazingly popular addition to SNL, has teamed up with the likes of Natalie Portman and Tom Hanks to bring viewers musical comic gold. But it was his collaboration with former *NSYNCer Justin Timberlake that won both artists the Emmy for Best Original Music and Lyrics on September 8th. ("Dick in a Box," Above.)

We love Timberlake as a guest on SNL, from this to his stint with Jimmy Fallon as Bee Gees Barry and Robin Gibb.

We're also a huge fan of Andy Samberg and Tom Hank's music video, "Don't Cut My Testicles."
Pure silliness. We love it!

Congrats, boys.

News - Wiccan Teacher Wins Lotto

We're not Wiccan but we totally dig their earth-friendly philosophy. Hence, we were stoked when a Maryland accountant-by-day, Wiccan-teacher-by-night won the lotto recently.

Elwood "Bunky" Bartlett was no Blues Brother when he received his giant check for about $32.6 million. (We apologize for the really campy, somewhat obscure joke.)

He plans to buy a big house with a pool and devote his time to teaching about Wicca. There are still three more winning tickets out there in Texas, New Jersey and Virginia.

News - Cruel Cop Kills K9 Partner

We're not a fan of cops and we love animals. So, when we saw this article about an honorable ociffer of the law who left his canine partner in a sweltering car for over 12 hours on a 109-degree day - our blood boiled.

The dog died after being in the car all day from 9 am to 10 pm, while Sgt. Tom Lovejoy of the Maricopa County Sheriff Department in Phoenix ran errands, napped and went out to dinner with his wife. (She really cut a winner out of the herd.)

The officer has been booked into the county jail for animal cruelty but was released soon after and remains on desk duty at work. He faces up to six months in jail or a $2,500 fine if convicted (but not both.)

We really don't think that's enough. People like this aren't just dumb; they're cruel.

News - Southwest Airlines A Misogynistic Pig

We're totally considering boycotting Southwest Airlines after reading this article about a 23-year-old female passenger who was nearly removed from a flight for wearing what crew members of the airline considered a revealing outfit.

The college student was on a flight from San Diego to Tuscon when she was accosted by flight attendants and told that she needed to buy new less-revealing clothes before getting on a later flight. She had a doctor's appointment to make so she compromised by adjusting her clothing and covering herself with a blanket - and frankly, her outfit looked just fine. (See picture above.)

"She looks like every other college girl in San Diego," said her mother, Michele Ebbert. As a female San Diego college student ourself (we just graduated this June,) we completely agree.

We would also like to point out to Southwest that San Diego has been going through a record heat wave recently - one that has been deadly for some and has everyone in the city wearing as little as possible. We are seriously disturbed by the misogynistic implications of the decision made by Southwest and its employees both initially and its subsequent decision not to apologize to the woman.

We think she has an outstanding case for a lawsuit and at this point almost a moral obligation to fight back against the budget airline.

News - Spielberg May Quit Beijing Olympics

"Does Mr Spielberg really want to go down in history as the Leni Riefenstahl of the Beijing Games?" wrote Mia Farrow in a letter to director, Steven Spielberg, who is currently in bed with the Chinese government over the production of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Them's fighting words and we love it!

Leni Riefenstahl was the "Nazi-backed filmmaker who chronicled the 1936 Olympics in Berlin."

The letter was published in March's issue of the Wall Street Journal and spurred the controversy surrounding the mega star director's collaboration with world superpower and human rights violator, China. Now, Spielberg has indicated that with China's ongoing financial support of Sudan and the providing of weapons that have been used in Darfur (where a genocide is happening right now) he may back out of their partnership.

But not yet. People continue to die while Mr. Spielberg takes the several coming weeks to make up his mind. We are reminded of a moment in a film about another genocide (Schindler's List) where a powerful man regretted not doing his all to help those in need.

This is a man who has preached to the world - through his film making - about right and wrong. We're calling hypocrite but he still has a chance to make this right. We're thinking that maybe, like many others, Mr. Spielberg only cares about causes where the people affected remind him of himself.

We're behind Ms. Farrow 100% on this one. What's it gonna be, Steve?

PS. Richard Gere has also called for a boycott of the Beijing Olympics, stemming from his support of Tibet and his criticism of the treatment of Tibetans under Chinese rule.

News - Whoopi Defends Defending Michael Vick

Whoopi Goldberg attempted to clarify her highly questionable position on dogfighting and dog fighters like Michael Vick. The comedienne strode headfirst into a hornet's nest on her first day as co-host on The View by saying:

"One of the things I haven't heard anybody say is . . . this is not an unusual thing from where [Vick] comes from. It's like cockfighting -- cockfighting in Puerto Rico. . . . There are certain things that are indicative to certain parts of our country.
"He's from the South," she continued. "From the Deep South. Dogfighting is a lot --"
"How about dog torturing and dog murdering?" interrupted "View" colleague Joy Behar. "Unfortunately, it's part of the thing," Whoopi responded.
"For a lot of people, dogs are sport," Whoopi continued. "So I just thought it was interesting because it seemed like a light went off in [Vick's] head when he realized that this was something that the entire country really didn't appreciate or like."

She went on to refer to the 27-year-old Vick as "a kid" and infer that because it was "part of his cultural upbringing" he should be treated less severely than if a person from New York City had committed the same crime.

We think Ms. Goldberg is treading in dangerous territory when she proposes that different types of people be tried differently for committing the same crime. She needs to take a full step back and think about what she really believes. Her opinion smacks of bias to us.

PS. We'd like to offer this comparison to Ms. Goldberg: Muslims in Germany who kill or beat their wives and daughters have recently gone unpunished by the German judicial system on the basis that it's part of the Muslim cultural tradition to beat and murder female family members. We thought this kind of thinking was a weird German throwback so we are sickened that it's apparently du jour for supposedly educated public figures in the US (like Ms. Goldberg) to treat animals with the same discrimination, and excuse heinous moral crimes because of cultural differences.

News - Child Servitude System In Haiti

The poorest country in the Western hemisphere, Haiti, has come under the gun for condoning a system of child laborers known as restaveks.

These children become domestic servants, often abused and not allowed to attend school, in a variety of ways. Orphaned and runaway children make up part of the restavek community but the vast majority are conscripted by their poor parents, hopeful that the adoptive families who take in their children will pay for their upbringing and school tuition.

"If I had the financial means, I would not give them away," Rodette Clermanceau said.

The London-based organization, Anti Slavery International, has condemned the practice. Look there if you'd like to learn how to help.

We think all the people in the world sitting on gold toilets (there is a surprising number of them) have a responsibility to their fellow citizens of humanity to help in whatever way they can.

News - Einstein's Prediction Manifests Around Neutron Stars

The warping of space-time, an effect predicted by Einstein's Theory of Relativity, has been discovered around the densest observable matter in the universe -- Neutron stars. Wow.

Astronomers from the University of Michigan and NASA say, "the warping shows up as smeared lines of iron gas whipping around the stars..."

They believe this will play a huge role in understanding physics: "This is fundamental physics...There could be exotic kinds of particles or states of matter, such as quark matter, in the centers of neutron stars, but it's impossible to create them in the lab. The only way to find out is to understand neutron stars."

"Neutron stars can pack more than a sun's worth of material into a city-sized sphere. A few cups of neutron-star stuff would outweigh Mount Everest."

We love theoretical physics so much! -- Especially, when they move from theory to fact...'shivers' So awesome.