Dru Blood - I believe in the inherent goodness of all beings: Linky Links Archives

DruBlood

Home
Dramatis Personae
Archives
Contact

Feed the Bleed

Full Bleed Fundraiser

Amazon wish list
Cole’s birthday - 10/24
Monk’s birthday - 12/2
Dru’s birthday - 1/5

Search

Syndicate this site (XML)

Special thanks

adam host
julie template queen
kd general lusciousness
pea guru

Powered byMovable Type 1.5

Some links for you!

July 25, 2008

Here's some stuff I've been reading latelyish...

Crazy Aunt Purl is so sassy! I hadn't thought of how annoying it is for veteran bus driver to be inundated with all of the noobs trying to save a gas dollar:

There are a lot of new people taking the bus and they're very needy, holding open the doors while asking the bus driver convoluted questions, "Do I get off here and transfer to get to X or do I go to there and ride another bus to get to X or will I get lost?" As if the bus driver can answer them and let them know if they'll get lost. I personally can get lost on the way to the breakroom at work, so "lost" is a relative state of being, doubtful a random bus driver can analyze it for every strange passenger. I'm impressed with the drivers, though, they're far more patient than the seasoned riders who are pushing these needy newbies out of the way in a huff and rolling their eyes and making comments.

***

Those silly bus riders! If they were REALLY concerned about the environment, they would invest in a fully electric car from Tesla Motors. Right? Or use all of the gas money they save in...like...I don't know...a gazillion years of bus riding.

***

Maybe someone ought to start researching how to make a vehicle that runs on cow poop!

***

Meanwhile, Treehugger.org has provided me with my New Year's Resolutions for the next 10 years. Probably I should start on them a bit sooner than that...

***

This is intriguing....

***

After spending a weekend with a bunch of teachers and school administrators last week, this article was a good read. I'm happy to say the new principal at the high school I am involved with seems to meet these standards, in theory...let's see how she does in practice.

***

I like this plan, but I think people who DON'T own cars ought to be rewarded, too.

***

Stefanie Nagorka makes Andy Goldsworthy look positively classical! (here's more)

Posted at 2:33 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Link Time!

June 29, 2008

Babies born by Caesarean Sections more prone to asthma.

I loved reading this article about modular homes in all of their flavors...

Encyclopedia Brittanica gets wiki with it.

Looking for a reusable water bottle that won't give you cancer?

I am totally getting this game. hahaha.

I don't think I ever linked this article about the winter soldier testimony on the west coast, but it's amazing to me that this hasn't been more widely reported on. It was especially troubling to see the video footage of the hearings...

Here's a fun site - convert any unit measurement into something more tangible. [via lifehacker]

I recently had to wipe a hard drive due to a crash. This little app would have come in handy...

This book looks interesting...

Posted at 3:01 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Some favorited links...

June 15, 2008

Here's what I've been favoriting these days:

Top 10 Muppet Show clips. via

Michael Pollan comments on the recently-passed farm bill.

Watching this McCain speech made my inner speech critic declare that it will move to Canada at least until this election cycle is over with. If McCain wins, it will be looking to wed a hunky Canuck's inner speech writer to gain citizenship. I hear that's legal there. Any takers?

Word Count Analyzer, analyzes word frequency. :)

This is kind of old news, but I always love Mr. Rowland's perspective.

“Our galaxy isn't as messy as many thought,” says Dame, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. “What we have found is evidence of some balance and order, like the yin and yang of Chinese philosophy.” (source)

The coverage of these hearings was absolutely chilling.

Top 10 Computing energy savers.

Posted at 11:21 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

read this.

April 20, 2008

I don't really have anything to add to this LiP Magazine article, Uh-Obama:

Note, never has a white politician been confronted with questions about his or her ability to transcend race, or specifically, their whiteness. And this is true, even as many white politicians continue to pull almost all of their support from whites, and have almost no luck at convincing people of color to vote for them. In the Democratic primaries this year, Obama has regularly received about half the white vote, while Hillary Clinton has managed to pull down only about one-quarter of the black vote, yet the question has always been whether he could transcend race. The only rational conclusion to which this points is, again, that it is not race per se that needs to be overcome, but blackness. Whiteness is not seen as negative, as something to be conquered or transcended. Indeed, whereas blacks are being asked to rise above their racial identity, for whites, the burden is exactly the opposite: the worst thing for a white person is to fail to live up to the ostensibly high standards set by whiteness; it is to be considered white trash, which is to say, to be viewed as someone who has let down whiteness and fallen short of its pinnacle. For blacks, the worst thing it seems (at least in the minds of whites) is to be seen as black, which is no doubt why so many whites think it's a compliment to say things to black folks like, "I don't even think of you as black," not realizing that the subtext of such a comment is that it's a damned good thing they don't, for if they did, the person so thought of would be up the proverbial creek for sure.

Posted at 5:11 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Random old news from my "favorites"

March 22, 2008

Just a few things I have favorited these past few weeks. I have been out of town and haven't been updating or reading a whole lot of feeds (although I did stay in a hotel room with CABLE(!) so I was actually able to keep up with goings-on.)

Anyway...on to the linky links:

From WePO, via Crooks and Liars - McCain doesn't know who we're fighting in Iraq. Brilliant.

Ding at Bitch, PhD asks some important questions about the mainstream media's (and white America's) fear of an angry black man.

Science Daily had a string of interesting articles last week. First, Does Touch Affect Flavor was a report on how the sense of touch can affect how things taste.

This was amusing to me, because I sincerely do choose my wine based primarily on the design of the label, and anything with a bear or a bird wins out just about every time.

I just love seeing the word "tightwad" used in a scientific capacity. hahaha.

The ideology of consumer technology describes four different ideological mindsets which inform our experience of technological advancements.

I bookmarked this one right before leaving on vacation. The concept of charity organizations who fund vacations for disadvantaged children and adults is intriguing to me. I have always found it extremely valuable to get the Hell out of Dodge for a bit as often as possible. Glad to know there's a pseudo-scientific explanation for that.

Heather Corrina, as usual, delivers a poignant peep into her life as a reproductive services counselor. I'm thankful she's able to find a way to disclose the stories she does without compromising the identiies of her clients. To me, posts like these are why blogs are so powerful in terms of bringing people to an understanding of issues from an intensely personal perspective.

And, with that, I think I'm going to step away from the computer for a bit and see what sorts of life I can observe on this lazy Saturday. I hope you all are well...Take care.

Posted at 4:37 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Random links from random places v. 022708

February 27, 2008

In spite of the fact that I still think people aren't fully understanding the notion of re-training (a post I will have to get to later...and it's not that I disagree that it's a Bad Thing for people to be forced to learn new skills for new jobs due to globalization...but rather I think people who have not had any amount of training on new technologies and have established careers might need to have training available to them at low cost JUST IN CASE they want or need to change careers and find that the harsh reality is that they will have to learn to deal with new technology in a way they aren't currently being asked to) this article [via Crooks and Liars]goes a long way towards explaining why I miss Edwards and fervently hope Obama (uh, if he's the nominee) chooses him as his running mate:

Edwards took a huge swing at corporate lobbyists by singling out the NAFTA-like Chapter 11 rights. As I explained (and Public Citizen has a much more detailed explanation): Let's say a company doing business in a country that has a party to one of these so-called "free trade" agreements believes a law violates rights or protections the company has under the trade deal. The company can take its case before a trade tribunal, which can, then, rule that a law--say an environmental law or labor--is illegal under the so-called "free trade" regime and award tax-payer dollars to corporations. And this tribunal operates behind closed doors, with no public input or scrutiny and none of the basic due process or transparency one would expect in open courts.
Edwards' position was really important. These Chapter 11 rights are one of the most odious provisions of so-called "free trade" deals. They allow companies to undercut our democracy--laws that are passed by the people we elect can be overridden by an unaccountable, unelected tribunal. Edwards stood up and, effectively, said he would not sign trade deals with these undemocratic provisions.

Neither Sen. Clinton or Obama have made that specific pledge. Too many people think that globalization is just a slogan to mouth without looking at the rules that are governing trade. The fact is: globalization is nothing new. We've traded ever since humans walked on the earth. We need to stop being enthralled by the slogan "globalization" and think about how we set up rules that govern those trading relationships.

My friend Harold sent me this link about evolutionary "propaganda." Although, I don't know...after reading these bios, I kind of feel like the ministry is a hoax...what do you think?

"Diamond" Jack Holgroth is a Game Theoretician who currently teaches a course in Advanced Game Theory for Theologians at Fellowship University. He served our country during the Cold War as a Game Theory Tactician for the Department of Defense and single-handedly developed an elegant solution to the "Fisherman's Quandary", a game theory problem that was crucial to the winning of the arms race and that was famously intractable - until Diamond Jack came along. Jack also enjoys vexillology and can signal Bible passages from memory in fluent semaphore.

(although, secretly, I would like to see Bible passages recited in semaphore. hahahaha. That's freaking BRILLIANT.)

ACK! there is all sorts of brilliance on this site. My friend Chris just messaged me and encouraged me to mouse over the baby on this page. EEEEK! If you click on him a lot, he cries! I made baby Jesus cry!

Anyway, on to more serious items...or item, as I am running out of time...this Alternet article about how well Obama plays the media game is interesting to me:

The media can also veto candidates, as in the case of John Edwards. He was not by definition a "marginal" candidate: a U.S. senator and vice-presidential candidate in the last election, at various junctures he polled better against potential Republican contenders than the other Democratic candidates. He led his rivals in introducing a serious health care plan, and arguably transformed the contest in his appeal to the Democratic base on that and other issues.
But the media rejected Edwards, by a combination of ignoring him and subjecting him to much more negative reporting than the other major contenders. The same was true in 2004 for Howard Dean, who rallied the Democratic base but found himself with five or six times as many negative articles in the media than his major democratic primary opponents.

[...]

On the other hand, Obama knew how to define his candidacy within the limits of the media's constraints and still have a mass appeal. From the beginning of his campaign he mostly avoided challenging powerful interests, and talked about "getting all sides to the table" and overcoming "decades of bitter partisanship." The media and punditocracy lap this stuff up like honey. At the same time he was able to tap into the voters' deep desire for change, with inspirational speeches, transcendental narratives, and celebrity-studded videos.

Posted at 10:06 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Random links from random places...

February 19, 2008

The Luscious Librarian demyths sex. My favorite is:

5. It’s better when it’s all night long. What? Don’t work harder, work smarter. If both of you can get done in 20 minutes, instead of 2 hours good for you. Crossing the finish line feels just as good for the sprinter as it does for the cross country runner, and I bet you the sprinter still has energy to run another race or wash a load of laundry in the same day.

Perhaps it's the ADD side of me, or maybe it's just because I am supermom...but unless you are super awesome and change things up an awful lot, after an hour or so of sex, I'll be totally checking my watch and thinking about what ELSE I should be doing.

***

Seemingly on a totally different note (but perhaps indicative of how my brain works and WHY I am so distractable) re-nest provides step-by-step instructions for creating an indoor one-pot herb garden. [via lifehacker, which I am sure if it was a person would have my full attention for as long as he needed.]

***

And if you are feeling stupid today, at least you know you are never as stupid as the man who is allegedly in charge of our country (but kind of after 8 years of stupid, these jokes about how stupid he is are getting really sad...and he's only getting more stupid.)

You see, it's not the war. The war is HELPFUL to the economy. The economy is actually fucked because we built too many houses...

Bush: Yeah, because we’re buying equipment, and people are working. I think this economy is down because we built too many houses (Curry: hmmmmm) and the economy is adjusting. On the other hand we’re just about to kick out 157 billion dollars to our taxpayers……what would have been had we abandoned Iraq when times were tough and let those soldiers die in vain..

You see...it's not that he's DUMB. It's that he has TOO MANY brain cells. Who can get anything done with all those brain cells running around thinking things?

And I still think all republicans are probably DREADFUL in bed.

***

What the fuck is going on in Kosovo?

***

Another weird seque...Foodsel is a site that gives you nutritional analysis of the foods you are consuming, as well as providing information about how much you will need to sweat to work it off. [via lifehacker again]

***

Treehugger tracks the semiotics of greenwashing.

***
Oh, and this looks totally yummy...and will be in my soup pot this weekend.

And that...is that.

Posted at 9:39 AM • Comments (1) • TrackBack

Various links

November 5, 2007

BBC News has a feature about Iraqi bloggers that I thought provided an interesting (if disturbing) snapshot of life in Iraq today.

***

Redneck Mother reports on A visit from the homeschool inspector, and illustrates why it's important to know your rights.

***

I happen to have a personal affinity for oysters, so
this article was especially disturbing to me:

If present acidification trends in the world's oceans continue unabated, mussels, oysters and other shellfish could become extinct as early as 2100.

***

Michael Pollan provides clarity on the farm bill issue in Weed It and Reap:

Americans have begun to ask why the farm bill is subsidizing high-fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils at a time when rates of diabetes and obesity among children are soaring, or why the farm bill is underwriting factory farming (with subsidized grain) when feedlot wastes are polluting the countryside and, all too often, the meat supply. For the first time, the public health community has raised its voice in support of overturning farm policies that subsidize precisely the wrong kind of calories (added fat and added sugar), helping to make Twinkies cheaper than carrots and Coca-Cola competitive with water. Also for the first time, the international development community has weighed in on the debate, arguing that subsidized American exports are hobbling cotton farmers in Nigeria and corn farmers in Mexico.

(via Treehugger)

***

And on that note, I'm going to go make some oatmeal. Have a good day!

Posted at 9:07 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Two media posts...

May 4, 2007

Seems to be media day here. No Media Kings is (are?) soon to release a serial low-fi sci-fi movie called Infest Wisely... Mr. Munroe is always scheming fun ways to use media, and is the author of several innovative novels, films, and let's not forget punk points!!! I am just so impressed with all that he does. I'm looking forward to the release of the first 7 episodes!! Yay, Jim!!! (and everyone else who is involved.)

****

I would like to take this moment to personally thank Mr. Harmon Leon for cracking me the fuck up when I accidentally stumbled upon the Lederhosen episode of Blind Date last night.

"Don't worry, this is all a part of a TV show," I say, realizing the two of us (man in cowboy hat, guy in lederhosen, standing by urinal) looks like a Village People video from another dimension. The producer comes back. Lederhosen-APPROVED!
With cameras in place, I jump the gate in front of the restaurant, spring in front of my date like Peter Pan, making my big lederhosen entrance.
"Mien Frau! Ich bin hungry. Let us go dine!"

I was telling my friend Chris that, sadly, what with all of those fucking bizarre Hollywood Insider shows and the freaking weird-ass nightly nose (nose? I mean NEWS. GOD, what is it with me and the bizarre typos?!)...the lederhosen dude was probably the LEAST surreal thing on television last night. Which is probably why I avoid television.

I told J about it...and he had all sorts of information for me...evidently this dude does this a lot. I am going to have to watch the Press yr Luck one. Oh, and here's a video of the blind date:

I will have to watch his entire body of work...

Posted at 10:00 AM • Comments (1) • TrackBack

That there is some mighty fine writing...

January 22, 2007

There are still those days, the ones that never fully awake and keep the world blanketed in a hazy slumber, and on those days I am king. It is my element.

Just...lovely. Go. read it all. Over and over again.

Posted at 9:18 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Oh, and those bellman boys, too.

September 30, 2006

Love them.

Posted at 11:42 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Still in love...

September 30, 2006

After all of these years, I am still shamelessly in love with Jesus' General:

Of course, all of these charges are bogus. Foley can't be a homosexual. He's a Republican after all, and thanks to you, homosexual persecution has become one of the party's main electoral strategies. Only a self-hating psychopath could be both a homosexual and a Republican, and you wouldn't have tried so hard to recruit him to run for the senate if that were the case.

Posted at 11:40 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Solstice

June 13, 2006

Sweet Summer Solstice Balances Life's Bitterness

Humans must always balance the tension between grave public demands and intensely personal preoccupations. There is reading the newspaper, and there is letting the mind go out the window. But the golden twilights of June want attention paid. You remind yourself that this week's display is of ingenious movements of the planet that you otherwise take for granted. Ironically, the solstice is defined not by intimacy, but distance, for now the sun is as far as it gets from the celestial equator. The resulting length of days points to earth's trustworthiness, for the movement away carries the promise of return. When has the dance of earth and sun ever broken that commitment?
And when has astronomy ever done more for the lifting of the spirit? The suspended moments of time's zenith are sacraments of life's goodness. Haste, duty, and the hassles of work have no admittance here. In the coming week, you will remember with love all those with whom you have found your ease in such suspension -- companions of summer. And in recalling such release, you will look for more. Ironically, this is how you deepen your feeling of responsibility for the world. It is the one thing you have learned: to be at peace is the way to prepare to work for peace.

Posted at 10:57 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Jon Stewart on Gay Marriage

June 9, 2006

Posted at 9:45 AM • Comments (2) • TrackBack

Tyger

May 24, 2006

Ms. Dahlia hooked me up with this video this fine morning. I can hear the birds singing outside, and if I close my eyes, I can imagine it coming true.

Posted at 9:03 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

heh. The tapper.

May 23, 2006

Now THIS is cool. Although it does kind of require that you actually have rhythm of some sort.

[link via the bellman]

Posted at 9:01 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Ha!

April 28, 2006

[link via Shaula]

Posted at 9:58 AM • Comments (1) • TrackBack

Zeebah's Blogaversary!

April 27, 2006

4 years! Yay!

Posted at 9:46 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Lazy Sunday Blogrolling

April 16, 2006

I guess it's some sort of holiday or something. Well, OK, I KNOW this because I spent the morning coloring eggs with Coley. Not being a Christian-type...I haven't done this since I was, like 8 or something...but Coley was all into the idea of doing the easter egg hunt at church* today, so color eggs, we must!

Anyway, I'm going to spend the day surfing the internet, cleaning the house, making wonton soup, fiddling with last.fm (because I am fucking HOOKED) and maybe kicking Monk's ASS at Mario Kart Double Dash. Mwahahahaha. Oh, and fuck blogrolling! I just cleared out my one huge blogroll, and I'm not regathering blogs to link to. So, if I have never linked to you in the past, please let me know and if I think you are swell, I will add you to my shiny new fresh blogrolley thingy.

Here are the fruits of my linky labor:

Regarding the Lacrosse rape trial, Blac(k)ademic poses the question:

It is very disturbing that this case has become reminiscent of the O.J. trial where black "truth" is positioned in opposition to white "truth." If this were a team of men of color and another woman of color, would the media have given it this much attention? Would other bloggers have given it this much attention? No. Of course notâ€“although I would hope otherwise, but that is the reality of this situation.

***

Weiss on Wall Street:

"It is the nature of financial journalism to glorify the powerful and the wealthy," Weiss said. "That's true in all journalism to a great extent. ... It has to the do with the pressures of the job, the pressures of advertising, although they are never spoken of as such. It is the nature of covering a beat where there are a lot of wealthy people. You tend to be hagiographic. Fear of lawsuits has increasingly become an issue. It discourages tough reporting. It has become a background issue. It's never spoken of. No one ever comes out and says -- we are afraid of lawsuits. It is never spoken. It is always in the distance. It's background noise. It's part of the culture."

***

RJ attempts to gleen some sort of logic from the "pro-life" movement:

Let's break that down Aristotle-style:
1. Abortion is murdering a child
2. Abortion is OK if you were raped
3. Therefore, murdering a child is OK if you were raped.

You got a problem with this? Huh? You got even the slightest moral scruple about killing children because of their parentage? Then you have three choices:

Give up and admit that abortion is not murder, Or
Write a letter to the editor explaining how it's just fine and dandy for first cousins to pull an Andrea Yates on their 8 year-old offspring, OR
Admit proudly to the world that you think 12 year-old rape victims should be forced to bear their attackers' children.

Good luck with that, RJ. My mom always gave me good advice with regard to dealing with the mentally ill - don't try to understand them, it will only end up driving YOU crazy, too.

***

I'll be back with more later.

*There needs to be another word for the UU church. Like, maybe chUUrch, or something. I don't want anyone to get the impression that I'm all pious and shit all of a sudden. Yes...I go to church. No, I don't believe in an external god character.

Posted at 9:49 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Another book I need to read

April 7, 2006

An excellent post by Tish about Karen Armstrong's talk, and the Golden Rule:

I listen to friends talk about issues in relationship. It's so often about feeling like the other person doesn't get what they're doing to cause pain. People struggle to find the way to say the thing that will make it all clear and better and surely if you knew how what you do feels to me you wouldn't do it, right? Well. I'm not sure. I mostly think people do the best they can. And sometimes the best they can do is always (or often) going to be hurtful.

I don't think I have anything to add to that at this point, but I'll be thinking about this all day.

Posted at 10:43 AM • Comments (1) • TrackBack

Thank you.

April 4, 2006

One Good Thing

Despite the obviousness of the lesson, it is seemingly not taught or encouraged out in the real world where we all live. As young white men, you sit at the pinnacle of opportunity and privilege. All the power in the world can be yours, but as the old saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility. You may be faced with situations where causing harm is an option. You may be faced with situations where refusing to cause harm may cause you to lose face. You may be faced with a situation where you know you can easily get away with causing harm to another living being. And when the road ends here, my sweet boys, I beg you to remember my words, and the example of Hugh Thompson: It is your duty to protect those who can not protect themselves.

[link via bark/bite]

Posted at 6:55 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Kicking ass. Taking no names.

April 4, 2006

Cheryl has an awesome post about Feminist Alliances up at women's space:

Life has taught me that when we, as women, stand up to ANY institution of male heterosupremacy â€” not just pornography, not just prostitution, not just sadomasochism, ANY: capitalism, racism, classism, the military, war, agribiz, the meat industry, patriarchal medicine, big business, psychology, the institutions of marriage and the family, the pro-life industry, the fashion, beauty and diet industry, heteronormativity, patriarchal religion, in any meaningful way, we are going to suffer for it. We are going to pay for it. Male supremacy will take us out if it can.

I concur wholeheartedly, and, too...I think we need to create spaces where we can call out racist/sexist/heteronormative/etc. behavior without invoking defensiveness. I keep thinking if people would only learn to listen and acknowledge our own imperfection without denying someone else's experience of it, we'd all be better allies.

Posted at 12:43 PM • Comments (3) • TrackBack

Saturday Morning Linkfest

April 1, 2006

It's Saturday AM, and it's probably too early for me to be awake, but I am. And the house is EMPTY, except for me. And...I'm reading blogs and news. Here's what's catching me:

Tiffany links up Rachel on the Duke LaCrosse rape case, and clarifies the origins of the term "wilding":

The cops ask â€œWhat were you doing in the park?â€ The kids â€” who are still working on their code-switching language skills â€” say, â€œâ€We was wilâ€™inâ€™â€ or â€œWe was wilâ€™inâ€™ out.â€
Because adults are effin clueless about youth slang, wilâ€™inâ€™ not only grew a â€˜Dâ€™ and a â€˜G,â€™ but was translated by the (mostly white, all adult) cops and the (mostly white, all adult) media to mean â€œgoing out with the intent to beat and gang rape (white) women.â€ (Shout outs to my social studies teacher for pointing this out to us at the time. We didnâ€™t recognize â€œwilâ€™inâ€™â€ with a â€˜Dâ€™ and a â€˜Gâ€™ in it â€¦ lol.)

I do think, however, that because they were black, and bad and from the hood, we believed that a word for â€œlaying in wait to beat and gang rape (middle-class, white) womenâ€ was a part of the NYC colored kids lexicon.

***

Anarchist=Terrorist?

An FBI counterterrorism official showed the class, at the University of Texas in Austin, 35 slides listing militia, neo-Nazi and Islamist groups. Senior Special Agent Charles Rasner said one slide, labeled "Anarchism," was a federal analyst's list of groups that people intent on terrorism might associate with.
The list included Food Not Bombs, which mainly serves vegetarian food to homeless people, and â€” with a question mark next to it â€” Indymedia, a collective that publishes what it calls radical journalism online. Both groups are among the numerous organizations affiliated with anarchists and anti-globalization protests, where there has been some violence.

Elizabeth Wagoner said she was one of the few students who objected to the groups' inclusion on the list. "My friends do Indymedia," she said. "My friends aren't terrorists."

Rasner said that he'd never heard of the two groups before and didn't mean to condemn them. But he added that it made sense to worry about violent people emerging from anarchist networks â€” "Any group can have somebody that goes south."

A personal note to the FBI: Keep up the awesome work, guys! However, if you are looking for a good vegetarian meal, I'd be happy to hook you up without, you know, wasting a ton of our resources and taxpayer dollars!

***

(I just realized I haven't had any coffee yet. And I think I really need coffee if I'm going to read the fucking news.)
(and can I just say "Yay for sweet Einstein's bagel guys who end the consumer exchange with "You're AWESOME!")

***

Dude, how many different ways can they find to say "Bush Lied, and, by the way, he's probably actually pretty evil" about this damn war?

The memo also shows that the president and the prime minister acknowledged that no unconventional weapons had been found inside Iraq. Faced with the possibility of not finding any before the planned invasion, Mr. Bush talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire, or assassinating Mr. Hussein.
[...]

Mr. Bush agreed that the two countries should attempt to get a second resolution, but he added that time was running out. "The U.S. would put its full weight behind efforts to get another resolution and would twist arms and even threaten," Mr. Bush was paraphrased in the memo as saying.

The document added, "But he had to say that if we ultimately failed, military action would follow anyway."

And, oh by the way, he's also really fucking stupid:

The memo indicates the two leaders envisioned a quick victory and a transition to a new Iraqi government that would be complicated, but manageable. Mr. Bush predicted that it was "unlikely there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups." Mr. Blair agreed with that assessment.
[...]

Summarizing statements by the president, the memo says: "The air campaign would probably last four days, during which some 1,500 targets would be hit. Great care would be taken to avoid hitting innocent civilians. Bush thought the impact of the air onslaught would ensure the early collapse of Saddam's regime. Given this military timetable, we needed to go for a second resolution as soon as possible. This probably meant after Blix's next report to the Security Council in mid-February."

***

r@d@r links to amp, who links to Brownfemipower, who seems to have deleted her blog and come back (for which I say "Yay! I didn't know about you before, but I will definitely read you now") on the subject of abortion, American Indians, sexism, and (surprise!) racism with regard to access to and need for women's health services.

American Indian women will be impacted, if the law takes effect, in greater numbers than any other group. According to national statistics, American Indian women are sexually assaulted at a rate 3.5 times higher than all other racial groups. That means there are seven rapes per 1,000 American Indian women [that statistic is per year, I presume. â€“Amp].

***

TX Feminist has a powerful post about believing rape victims, and "what she wants to hear."

This is not about what "we want to hear". I, for one, would like to stop hearing, day after day, about how many women are raped, beaten and murdered. I would like to stop hearing women called bitches who deserve it or what were they thinking or this is going to ruin those boys' future.
What I want to hear is that men who are guilty of these acts stop committing them, and men who have knowledge of these acts turn in the men who did it, and men who blame women for the abuse perpetrated upon women by other men, stop blaming us.

***

George has some post-sxsw thoughts here:

The one thing I feel compelled to say is I don't go to SXSW to be anybody's token. I go to meet my friends, make new ones in person and visit a city I learn new things about each time I return. I go so I can have a renewed sense of connection and ownership in the flood of ideas, products, services and partnerships on display. I go so I can talk about what I saw and learned to the super publics to whom I belong and with which I identify. I'm certain that's why Tiffany, Tony, Lynne and Jason go, and each of them knows to their bones that we are not there for our own personal glory and that we have to participate in what's going on in order to make a way for us and those we care about in what's to come.

***

And, last, the anti-war blog links up this video from US soldiers returned from the Iraq war.

Posted at 8:07 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Friday Blogroll roundup

March 24, 2006

Here are some of this week's standout posts from around the blogosphere:

Michelle continues her hilarious coverage of The L Word:

This show has gotten so bad even my dearest darling B is frustrated. B, my love, who adored Queer as Folk for all five seasons. If she turns against a gay show you know we're scraping the bottom of the barrel content wise. If you're asking yourself why I'm so hard on The L Word I'll just say "visions of a dead woman in a waterfall." And if you ask my why I bother watching it if it's so bad then I'll just say shut the hell up because I don't have a good answer. It's like a train wreck I can't look away from. Onward.

Hey...what's wrong with Queer As Folk?

***

I like "I'm not married" better, too. It's no one's business if I'm divorced.

Also, I like the bear.

***

Redneck mother swears off of swearing off of swearing.

***

Belledame likes pussy! Pass it on! And I can't remember if I linked to this awesome post last week, but even if I did, and even if you read it...it bears repeating, and rereading.

Hahah! get it? bears.

Er...I think I need more coffee.

***

Anna hips me to Pomegranate Tea. POMEGRANATE! TEA! I'm all over that shit!

***

Dawn has switched to Drupal.

***

That's it for now...I have to go play war with Coley.

Posted at 9:56 AM • Comments (1) • TrackBack

Really, really cool!

March 20, 2006

[link via uffish]

Posted at 10:51 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Random Links all over the place

March 7, 2006

Like I said, my communicator thingy is broken. So...here are some links:

Stopping the next extinction wave

But overall, extinctions are coming at 100 to 1,000 times the normal background rate, according to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, a vast attempt to audit the Earth's ecological health which was published last year.

It concluded that a third of all amphibians, a fifth of mammals and an eighth of all birds are now threatened with extinction.

It also concluded that although humanity is the cause, humanity will ultimately be among the losers.

The picture of the polar bear reminds me that the marine ecologist who gave the talk last Friday said something to the effect that some species seem to have a tendency to adapt. Polar Bears, for instance, might not become extinct...but they will become more like rats and pigeons which, he added, is not a very dignified existence for a polar bear.

***
P6 has this to say about white guys on the downlow:

I am pleased a popular movie about white guys on the downlow raised the opportunity for its dissemination; because I'm actually pretty sure this information predates that dumbness, I'm a little annoyed (but not surprised) it took a popular movie about white guys on the downlow to get it out there.

***
The Coming Resource Wars

â€œAs famine, disease, and weather-related disasters strike due to abrupt climate change,â€ the Pentagon report notes, â€œmany countriesâ€™ needs will exceed their carrying capacityâ€â€”that is, their ability to provide the minimum requirements for human survival. This â€œwill create a sense of desperation, which is likely to lead to offensive aggressionâ€ against countries with a greater stock of vital resources. â€œImagine eastern European countries, struggling to feed their populations with a falling supply of food, water, and energy, eyeing Russia, whose population is already in decline, for access to its grain, minerals, and energy supply.â€
[...]

Although speculative, these reports make one thing clear: when thinking about the calamitous effects of global climate change, we must emphasize its social and political consequences as much as its purely environmental effects. Drought, flooding and storms can kill us, and surely willâ€”but so will wars among the survivors of these catastrophes over what remains of food, water, and shelter. As Reidâ€™s comments indicate, no society, however affluent, will escape involvement in these forms of conflict.

We can respond to these predictions in one of two ways: by relying on fortifications and military force to provide some degree of advantage in the global struggle over resources, or by taking meaningful steps to reduce the risk of cataclysmic climate change.

No doubt there will be many politicians and punditsâ€”especially in this countryâ€”who will tout the superiority of the military option, emphasizing Americaâ€™s preponderance of strength. By fortifying our borders and sea-shores to keep out unwanted migrants and by fighting around the world for needed oil supplies, it will be argued, we can maintain our privileged standard of living for longer than other countries that are less well endowed with instruments of power. Maybe so. But the grueling, inconclusive war in Iraq and the failed national response to Hurricane Katrina show just how ineffectual such instruments can be when confronted with the harsh realities of an unforgiving world. And as the 2003 Pentagon report reminds us, â€œconstant battles over diminishing resourcesâ€ will â€œfurther reduce [resources] even beyond the climatic effects.â€

I'm kind of wondering if it isn't already too late...but maybe I'm just being cynical because I'm on the rag.

***
Richard quotes Clara Zetkin in anticipation of International (Working) Women's Day on March 8:

As far as the proletarian woman is concerned, it is capitalism's need to exploit and to search incessantly for a cheap labor force that has created the women's question. It is for this reason, too, that the proletarian woman has become enmeshed in the mechanism of the economic life of our period and has been driven into the workshop and to the machines. She went out into the economic life in order to aid her husband in making a living, but the capitalist mode of production transformed her into an unfair competitor. She wanted to bring prosperity to her family, but instead misery descended upon it. The proletarian woman obtained her own employment because she wanted to create a more sunny and pleasant life for her children, but instead she became almost entirely separated from them. She became an equal of the man as a worker; the machine rendered muscular force superfluous and everywhere women's work showed the same results in production as men's work. And since women constitute a cheap labor force and above all a submissive one that only in the rarest of cases dares to kick against the thorns of capitalist exploitation, the capitalists multiply the possibilities of women's work in industry. As a result of all this, the proletarian woman has achieved her independence. But verily, the price was very high and for the moment they have gained very little. If during the Age of the Family, a man had the right (just think of the law of Electoral Bavaria!) to tame his wife occasionally with a whip, capitalism is now taming her with scorpions. In former times, the rule of a man over his wife was ameliorated by their personal relationship. Between an employer and his worker, however, exists only a cash nexus. The proletarian woman has gained her economic independence, but neither as a human being nor as a woman or wife has she had the possibility to develop her individuality. For her task as a wife and a mother, there remain only the breadcrumbs which the capitalist production drops from the table.

(emphasis added by me)
***
When my fat ass isn't setting fires up and down sixth street, it's actually a threat to national security!

SCARBOROUGH: You know, Evan, I don't want to offend anybody here, but I've just got to tell you a story. An undercover FBI agent was sitting around having drinks, telling me that the greatest risk to America's safety was fat women. I said, fat women, what are you talking about? Thinking he was joking.
He said, a lot of these terrorists team up with insecure women. They get married to them, and then their entire family comes in and we can't do a damn thing about it. Does he have a point?

[link via fatshadow]
***
And, wow. Again.

"Unless we do something about it, the magnitude of the dilemma will dwarf 9/11 or any other terrorist attempt," he said during a lecture at the University of South Carolina.

[via big fat blog]

Who knew my fat ass was so fucking controversial?!
***

The war without a name:

The Vietnam War was known as such from very early on. (Of course, it helped that John F. Kennedy was pushing it as his counterinsurgency war of choice against the Soviets.) Similarly, while the war the elder Bush fought against Saddam Hussein in 1991 was dubbed Operation Desert Storm, it quickly became known as the Gulf War. That this war has no name -- and that no one even thinks to comment on it -- has represented a quiet success for the Bush administration.

(For some reason, now I'm singing "This is the war without a name...it just goes on and on my friend...some people started fighting it, not knowing what it was..." Etc. You get the picture.)
***

That's all I got for now.

Posted at 9:03 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

And while we are on the subject of boys and their penises...

March 6, 2006

Go read this post by Twisty. And then "APerson" can talk to me about how I need to view men as people, rather than men.

I think the bumper sticker goes something like "I'll be post-feminist in the post-patriarchy."

And, in this case, "I'll stop thinking about rape, when men stop benefiting from it."

Not nearly as catchy, but you get the fucking picture.

Posted at 1:14 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Garrison Keillor calls for impeachment.

March 3, 2006

Garrison Keillor, folks. What to do when the emperor has no clothes:

Is the law a law or is it a piece of toast?

Posted at 11:30 AM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Microcosm Publishing

February 24, 2006

Last week at Monkeywrench, I found a little book published by Microcosm Publishing. I'm delighted to discover they do many more cool things. I love their bumper stickers!

Posted at 3:44 PM • Comments (0) • TrackBack

Wednesday Morning Linky Love

February 22, 2006

First of all, you need to go read my friend Michael's new blog, The Tiny Revolution. I've been reading it from the beginning, and I haven't linked to it yet because I've been too busy with other stuff. Michael rocks, and I'm totally bummed that I'm not going to be able to see him next month as I had originally planned.

****

Roadmap to more discord and war!

"You know very well that Hamas is a genuine popular movement which has always pursued the objective of recovering the rights of the oppressed Palestinian people; but unfortunately the Americans have never paid any attention to this matter," he said.
"The US decision to stop financial aid shows that they are not seeking to promote democracy in the region, contrary to their claims on the Middle East [road-map] proposal."

What a fucking surprise!

***

Maybe we should take a fucking hint!

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit said it was premature to cut off international aid even if Hamas is at the helm - dashing the Bush administration's hopes for a unified front against the militant Islamic group.
"We should give Hamas time. I'm sure that Hamas will develop, will evolve. We should not prejudge the issue," Mr Gheit said.

Egypt, which receives $2bn (Â£1.1bn) annually in military and economic aid from the US, acts as a mediator in the region.

***

Ms. Pansy links up this fucked up Marriage Contract from Smoking Gun. WTF?

***

So encouraging early marriage and large families (the conservative suggestion) isn't, in and of itself, an adequate response. The conservative argument is that what the report calls "reduced prospects" are really just the trappings of success in a materialistic society. Women should come to terms early with the notion that they will have to make hard choices, and "reduced prospects" are the inevitable price that must be paid for the far more sublime and enduring delights of bearing and raising children. Feminists respond by rejecting what they see as a false dichotomy; only in a society where there are no communal and governmental responsibilities for helping families raise children will women be forced to choose between motherhood and independence.

Thank you. The same argument applies to single motherhood - and the fear of such that traps us in unhealthy or even abusive relationships.

And then, of course, there's Twisty's take. Being a good little article skimmer, I never even considered the implication that women are somehow responsible for repopulating the nation. Next time, I'll blame the patriarchy first!

And zuzu at feministe points out the racist implications of the study.

See, if I read enough blogs, other people will do all of the analytical heavy-lifting for me!

***

RJ drops some more dead-on words about victim blaming and rape. The question I have, too, is why are women's bodies equated with money in all of the examples he gives. I mean, the examples aren't his...but it's curious that we would even entertain the notion that flashing some skin is the equivalent of flashing some cash. Are women's bodies really that much of a commodity that we don't even balk at that comparison?

***
Dude!

Second, even if the deal went through the process perfectly and the laws were followed to a tee, that doesn't mean this debate isn't healthy. Port security needs to be improved, and if Congress is paying attention, it's to all our advantages. And if they change the rules based on concerns about foreign interests (Arab, Chinese, British, whatever) exerting control over our ports, that's certainly within Congress's power, and I don't see how it merits a veto (unless there's a photo somewhere of the President and someone in the UAE holding hands).

[for a roundup of posts on the port issue, see this post and the links contained therein]

***

Uffish has redecorated! It's gorgeous!

***

I think I've been hanging out with too many boys lately, because...yeah...I can see these ads selling lots of Volkswagens.

***

That's all I got. I hope this posts! I've been getting some errors lately.

Posted at 9:30 AM • Comments (2) • TrackBack

(blog)roll yr own - Lazy Saturday Edition

February 4, 2006

I'ma start this little link session with a post by Anarchocyclist, who links up some great perspectives of Hamas, including this gem that points out the failure of democracy in refusing to understand and accept the legitimacy of last week's election results:

Our message to the Israelis is this: we do not fight you because you belong to a certain faith or culture. Jews have lived in the Muslim world for 13 centuries in peace and harmony; they are in our religion "the people of the book" who have a covenant from God and His Messenger Muhammad (peace be upon him) to be respected and protected. Our conflict with you is not religious but political. We have no problem with Jews who have not attacked us - our problem is with those who came to our land, imposed themselves on us by force, destroyed our society and banished our people.

***

President Bush's Words Ring Hollow to Soldiers' Loved Ones

Mr. Bush said Tuesday that there was nothing honorable about retreat. I say there is nothing honorable about waging wars of choice. There is nothing honorable about refusing to admit mistakes and covering up lies. Invading Iraq was wrong; moreover, it was immoral and irresponsible.

Rather than admit that and commit to bringing the troops home now, he calls those who disagree with him defeatists and isolationists. There is a big difference between isolationism and advocating for responsible foreign policy, a difference Mr. Bush does not seem to acknowledge. Refusing to wage unnecessary wars is not isolationism, it is common sense.

Mr. Bush also said military families have made great sacrifices. I do not need the president to remind me of this. Every day for a year, I waited and wondered if my soldier would be the next person to be killed or wounded in a war that should not have begun. Every day, I watched the news in tears and prayed that another family would not have to shoulder the burden of loss. I prayed selfishly, hoping it was not my soldier. Every day, I lived with the knowledge that I could lose the man I love in a war of choice and that his service and sacrifice to this country were being wasted and abused by this administration.

I never needed the president to tell me I had made sacrifices before, and I do not need him to now. His family is safe and sound; he never had those experiences, never made those sacrifices himself and is in no position to console me.

***

The fuck?

Also, diplomats say Egypt made a proposal to include a reference to making the Middle East a nuclear weapon free zone.

This was rejected by the US, which saw it as an attack on Israel's nuclear arsenal.

***

Ampersand has the goods on the latest attempt to make fat people hate themselves. Why? Is it just so so-called "normal" have something to feel superior about?

Two British charity groups, Cancer Research UK and Weight Concern, recently made headlines with a new survey purporting to show that fat people were unaware of health issues and "in denial" about their weight. The poll results, in fact, showed very little difference in knowledge between fat people and what the survey writers called "normal" people; and "in denial" refers to any fat person who is content with their body as it is.

Of course, since I don't hate myself, I am in DENIAL. I love it!

***

YaHWeH Laughing My Ass Off, too!

I don't want to defend AOL because I don't like AOL. At the same time, this is absurd. Now any use of "I AM" is first and foremost use of "the English translation of YaHWeH, the self-proclaimed name of God"? The Christians are now claiming exclusive rights to the first-person singular present of to be? Are they fucking serious?

bahahahaha! Damnit! I want exclusive rights to the third-person plural past tense of to be!

***

YaHWeH flabbergasted about this:

On a quest to gain greater attention and validation from angry white men with too much free time, CNN has hired racist hypocrite and amateur eugenicist, Bill Bennett, as a commentator. (I guess CNN was still smarting from losing the bidding war for isolationist bigot Pat Buchanan.)
You may recall that this is the same Bill Bennett who made the "aborting all black babies" statement, for which he has yet to apologize. However, my beef is not with this rightwing numbskull, because one should not really have too high expectations for such an idiot in the first place. My real concern is how best to punish CNN and the other mass media lemmings for being, well, . . . CNN.

***

The Fuck? Part 2 (an explanation)

Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, former president and a towering figure in Iranâ€™s 27-year Islamic Republic, made a last-minute appeal to the board of the IAEA not to refer Iran to the UN security council over its nuclear programme.

[via]

***

Welp, my coffee is gone, and I'm in need of some respite here. Time to take myself out on a little date, I think.

Posted at 3:54 PM • Comments (1) • TrackBack

Jan 19 news & blog roundup

January 19, 2006

(because I refuse to use the phrase "blog dump")

Mr Morales has said in the past that one of his priorities will be to seek more rights for Bolivia's indigenous majority.
"Here, the indigenous people will be ministers," he said on Wednesday.

"Someone said that when we Quechuas and Aymaras were in government we'd make a ministry for white people, but we won't discriminate."

[source]

***

"The Voyage" is a nice introduction to the concept of saving face and sparing feelings. But it’s also about navigating a system you don’t need, one that actually slows you down in order for other people to do their jobs. It’s about other people not believing that you can actually accomplish something for yourself, about misguided good intentions and wasted time. It’s about bureaucracy in general and, viewed through my lens, school in particular.

I look back on my own institutional-school career in the honors program at a series of exemplary public schools and I see mostly boredom, bureaucratic hoops that had to be jumped through, and oceans of wasted time. Rules are rules. What you as an indivudal may need or can do is neither here nor there in a system devoted to itself.

[source] (I really need to start posting to the homeschool blog)
***

Scientists believe that new habitats for butterflies are early effects of global climate change -- but that isn't news, by most people's measure. Neither is declining rainfall in the Amazon, or thinner ice in the Arctic. We can't see these changes in our personal lives, and in that sense, they are abstractions. So they don't grab us the way a plane crash would -- even though they may be harbingers of a catastrophe that could, quite literally, alter the fundamentals of life on the planet. And because they're not "news," the environmental changes don't prompt action, at least not in the United States.

[source]
***

Nigeria's government is planning a specific ban on same-sex marriages, with five years in jail for anyone who has a gay wedding or officiates at one.
Information Minister Frank Nweke told the BBC the government was taking the "pre-emptive step" because of developments elsewhere in the world.

[source] (Looks like we're exporting pre-emption and hatred quite well! If we could only charge some sort of tax on that, we'd be set!)
***

The Italian government has announced that it will pull its troops out of Iraq by the end of the year.

[source] ***

Iran is the regional superstate. If ever there were a realpolitik demanding to be "hugged close" it is this one, however distasteful its leader and his centrifuges. If you cannot stop a man buying a gun, the next best bet is to make him your friend, not your enemy.

[source] ***

The official Vatican newspaper published an article this week labeling as "correct" the recent decision by a judge in Pennsylvania that intelligent design should not be taught as a scientific alternative to evolution.
"If the model proposed by Darwin is not considered sufficient, one should search for another," Fiorenzo Facchini, a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Bologna, wrote in the Jan. 16-17 edition of the paper, L'Osservatore Romano.

"But it is not correct from a methodological point of view to stray from the field of science while pretending to do science," he wrote, calling intelligent design unscientific. "It only creates confusion between the scientific plane and those that are philosophical or religious."

[source] [via]
***

and, finally...

If Wal-Mart were a state, it would rank 39th in population, right behind Nebraska -- and that doesn't include the dependents of the company's 1.7 million employees.
This company doesn't negotiate discounted prices from suppliers of everything from panties to popcorn; it mandates them. Wal-Mart makes unions tremble and politicians swoon. It could grab a health-insurance provider by the throat, shake it a few times for effect, then swing the sweetest healthcare coverage deal in the universe.

But why should it, when it can pass its health-insurance costs to taxpayers?

DruBlood

Feed the Bleed

Search

Archives

Categories

Special thanks

Some links for you!

July 25, 2008

Link Time!

June 29, 2008

More favorited links

June 22, 2008

Some favorited links...

June 15, 2008

read this.

April 20, 2008

Random old news from my "favorites"

March 22, 2008

Random links from random places v. 022708

February 27, 2008

Random links from random places...

February 19, 2008

Various links

November 5, 2007

Two media posts...

May 4, 2007

That there is some mighty fine writing...

January 22, 2007

Oh, and those bellman boys, too.

September 30, 2006

Still in love...

September 30, 2006

Solstice

June 13, 2006

Jon Stewart on Gay Marriage

June 9, 2006

Tyger

May 24, 2006

heh. The tapper.

May 23, 2006

Ha!

April 28, 2006

Zeebah's Blogaversary!

April 27, 2006

Lazy Sunday Blogrolling

April 16, 2006

Another book I need to read

April 7, 2006

Thank you.

April 4, 2006

Kicking ass. Taking no names.

April 4, 2006

Saturday Morning Linkfest

April 1, 2006

Friday Blogroll roundup

March 24, 2006

Really, really cool!

March 20, 2006

Random Links all over the place

March 7, 2006

And while we are on the subject of boys and their penises...

March 6, 2006

Garrison Keillor calls for impeachment.

March 3, 2006

Microcosm Publishing

February 24, 2006

Wednesday Morning Linky Love

February 22, 2006

(blog)roll yr own - Lazy Saturday Edition

February 4, 2006

Jan 19 news & blog roundup

January 19, 2006