It Is Immoral To Pay An Immoral Debt!

Update: The livestream feed I posted a little while ago seems to be dead for the time being. I cannot get any real info as to what is occurring in LA right now. Perhaps we are dealing with another media blackout?(here's a little info) Please Stand By...meanwhile, why can't we discuss the way Ecuador dealt with it's massive debt. They kicked out the Goldman Sachs overseers and the IMF and did a people's audit and made it public as to what was real debt and what was sheer usury. They then acted accordingly and refused to pay the immoral debt, meanwhile, Ecuadors social sevices networks remained intact! When you think of what is going down with the Teabrains being manipulated by the banks to destroy our social infrastructure and then realize the devastating social consequences of the idea of austerity as applied to ripping us off to pay for the imbecilic irresponsible monetary greed that has destroyed the worlds corporate economy....???


Will the LAPD forcefully try to destroy Occupy LA today? Here is the livestream feed.

Meanwhile, there are over 2 million Brits protesting and on strike today demonstrating against the futility and the utter failure of the concept of making the 99% pay for the inept clumsy policies of  the

 1% Corporacracy. You should really watch the Documentary I posted last night, Debtocracy.

Remember, friends, the easy solution of lazy greedy governments to try to fast fix and steal from us by trying to guilt you into accepting austerity  as the answer, is doomed to failure. Austerity is the fast lane to economic failure and even bigger social problems. Why should you have to pay for the economic idiocy of a government who wasted your money, incurred massive debts in a shell game which only benefitted in a short term financial span, the criminals who played them?

IT IS IMMORAL TO PAY AN IMMORAL DEBT!

The Failure Of Arrogance 1953/2011

Hatred of Britain in Iran has deep roots. Ever since William Knox D’Arcy was granted a concession by the Shah of Persia to search for oil in 1901, the Persians resented the fact that oil profits went only into the coffers of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, the mighty conglomerate that counted among its paid lobbyists young Winston Churchill.

In April 1951, the Majlis (parliament) of Iran under the nationalist Mohammed Mossadeq nationalized the oil industry in Iran, and kicked out the then Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC). Britain’s response was to stage a coup against Mossadeq, and that it finally achieved with the help of the CIA in August 1953.

The AIOC returned to Iran, as a plurality owner (40%) of a new international consortium involving five American companies (40%), Royal Dutch Shell and Compagnie Française des Pétroles (now Total) (20%). The AIOC became the British Petroleum in 1954 when the above picture was taken. The companies continued to operate in Iran until 1979, when the new Islamic regime again nationalized the oil industry without compensation, bringing to an end the BP’s 70-year presence in Iran.

Shortly after the U.S. embassy was seized, and its own embassy was occupied, Britain closed its embassy in Tehran in 1980 — the beginning of the eight-year diplomatic hiatus. In 1986, the relations hit nadir as Iran pointedly nominated Hussein Malouk, who took part in in the 1979 student takeover of the U.S. embassy as Iranian chargé d’affaires in London. HMG refused to accept Mr. Malouk. In 1989, the diplomatic relations resumed briefly before Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa on Anglo-Indian author Salman Rushdie. In the 2000s, the terse diplomatic dance continued. In 2004 and 2007, the Islamic Republic briefly arrested groups of British soldiers for straying into its waters from Iraq. Salman Rushdie’s knighthood and the Green Revolution further exacerbated the relations.

No matter what you might think about the sanctity of diplomatic immunity, it seems that the British  might be demonstrating a deliberate, if not unforgivable in the eyes of the Iranians,  arrogant blindness to the real history of Anglo Iranian relationships of the course of the last century.

more shrooms....

I always wanted a mellotron...

Debtocracy

A Greek documentary that does more to explain the machine that created the world financial crisis and how countries are being bought and sold. It also explains how people can and are fighting back.

The best quote: "It is immoral to pay an immoral debt."

It's Not Over!

The results of a morning hike in the big woods. I literally stumbled upon a place where cepes were in full flagrant delirious display. I think I ended up with almost 4 kilos. The season normally is over at the beginning of November, but it didn't really get going until the middle of November. It should go up until the first real frosts. This is the best bloom of cepe mushrooms here since 2006.

Real Class, Honestly Speaking....

 A gentleman in a nice suit who's disgustedly watching an Occupy LA protest proudly identifies himself as "part of the one percent" and asks, "Have you ever heard of anybody great that's come out of the 99 percent?"

Ooops, It's That Pesky Constitution Again....

 Last week, Kansas teenager Emma Sullivan posted a snarky tweet about the state's governor Sam Brownback, which, naturally, led to Brownback's staffers pressuring her principal to make her apologize on threat of punishment. Apparently, at some point during the holiday weekend, the school district noticed this would violate Sullivan's free speech rights. They've announced that she will not be forced to apologize and will not be punished for her tweet. Sullivan now has more Twitter followers than Governor Sam Brownback. 

Frankly, I was a little asshole teenage loudmouth once and I still am. I got into trouble for the things I said and did, but nobody ever tried to do to me what they tried to do to Emma! In this segment, she more than adequately defends herself! You go girl, I am so proud of you!
UPDATE: Brownback has issued an apology to Emma!

Confiture Beurre Sale

This is what I did today:


 Confiture Caramel au Beurre Salé(translation: Caramel Spread with Salty 
Butter)

Ingredients

• 1.5 cups granulated sugar (300g)
• 1.7 ounces water (50g/approx. 3.5 tablespoons)
• 2 sticks + 1 tablespoon butter (240g), cut into small pieces
• 3/4 teaspoon + a pinch of salt (5g) [If you use salted butter, you may omit this additional salt]
• 6.7 ounces cream (200g), warmed [I used 35% fat cream]

Directions

1. Place the sugar and water in a saucepan, and cook on low heat until it turns golden brown. Do not overmix, or your sugar will crystallize.

2. Add the butter little by little while gently stirring with a wooden spoon. (Be careful! The mixture is very hot; it sizzles and might splatter.)

3. Add the salt, and cook for an additional two minutes.

4. Remove the saucepan from the heat, and add the warmed cream. Mix until well combined.

5. Pour into jars and let cool.  The spread should keep for at least three months in the refrigerator.

6. Keep in the refrigerator so that your confiture has a beautiful, spreadable consistency.

  

One Of The Wonders Of The Natural World

Tina Turner, 1964, she was and still is one of the wonders of the natural world!

One Step Closer To Tahrir Square

Occupy Wall Street protester Brandon Watts lies injured on the ground after clashes with police over the eviction of OWS from Zuccotti Park. Photograph: Allison Joyce/Getty Images

In yesterdays Guardian, Naomi Wolf writes a compelling piece and I think a very important piece explaining the brutal crackdown of the OWS Demonstrations in America. She explains how it is being done, why it is being done and who is responsible and why we all should be outraged and out in the streets.

She concludes her article with this paragraph:

Sadly, Americans this week have come one step closer to being true brothers and sisters of the protesters in Tahrir Square. Like them, our own national leaders, who likely see their own personal wealth under threat from transparency and reform, are now making war upon us.

Rick James - Superfreak download at emp3

Hp OfficeJet 4500 Desktop Public Service Message!

I bought a new imac a little more than a year ago. I am still amazed with the quality of the imac, but when I bought the computer, there was an add on offer for an Hp Office Jet 4500 Desktop Printer/Scanner/Fax. I have owned quite a few printers over the years. I have had a few different Canon and Epsons which gave me years of virtually trouble free service.

I have to say that I have never had a trouble free easy printing experience with the Hp piece of garbage.

Badly designed, the paper feeder itself is a study in fast motion obsolescence. the fragile plastic parts snap at the least bit of trauma...which is usually removing or installing the tray. The loading of ink cartridges is always a night mare. Very bad design and always involve multiple attempts at alignment and reinstallation. Though I registered the product when I bought it, the Hp customer service is virtually non existent. The quality of the printing, when I can get the damn thing to work is inconsistent. I worked in the graphics industry for quite a few years, from design to actually running presses. When something works, it works, when it's a piece of shit, well, it's just a piece of shit.

I hear that Hp makes some decent products, but based on my experience with this waste of wire and plastic, I would never consider buying another piece of technology from them again and I would warn you to think twice before buying anything with their logo on it.

This has been a public service message from thebrainpolice quality control center!

The Hasher's Dillema

A full three years before the American illustrator, Winsor McKay created what has been touted as the first animated film, Gertie The Dinosaur, a Parisian, Emile Cohl created a 700 frame animation called Phantasmagorica. It created a sensation and Cohl, who was born in 1857 went on to make many more little animated films for Gaumont Studios which were shown in the United States.  This curious little film, The Hasher's Dillema was created in 1910.

Kicking And Screaming

Meanwhile, back in France, yesterday saw a truly heated medieval battle in the rural foggy Northwestern countryside outside of Valognes, in Normandy. Hundreds of protestors fought the CRS, tore up rail lines and risked physical harm to spotlight attention on the last shipment of treated nuclear waste going back to Germany. The waste had been processed at the AREVA facility. AREVA is the French Governments Nuclear Energy Corporation which is currently building plants in the United States.

The shipment of treated nuclear waste going back to Germany was poignant because this marks the end of Germany's practice of shipping their nuclear waste to France to be treated. This was highly controversial because the 700 kilometer each way rail trip was a very potentially dangerous land journey that could have resulted in a major disaster if there had ever been a rail accident.

You might ask, that if the practice is being ended, then why the protests? The protests have been ongoing for years. The protests were a major disruption in France and Germany by the militant Green Party Activists as well as GreenPeace. The fact that this was the final shipment by Germany is a major victory for the Green Movement in Europe. This probably hasn't made much of a ripple in the USA.

Crazy European Ecologists on CNN, if it gets reported at all, but but it is the real cause and effect of the efforts of the Greens in Germany and their successful battle to raise awareness that is the real news here.

Germany has officially phased out nuclear energy. Fukushima was the nail in the coffin, but the futuristic and pragmatic move to reconcentrate and refocus Germany's energy production needs had already started years ago.  If you take time to understand and look at what Germany is doing actively to shift it’s energy dependence away from nuclear and fossil fuels, you will see the most progressive and aggressive program on the planet. They are now leading the world in Green Energy created jobs. The system they are creating has grown exponentially in its feasiblity targets. Basically, they are creating a grid that takes electric power from a number of different renewable sources. The grid is a storage system, but the storage of electric power now is not very efficient. So, there is another grid which is a gas storage system. The excess electrical power is being used to generate bio gas from a number of different sources.

 The efficiency of storing the energy as bio gas jumps dramatically to 70%. This gas goes into the nations energy grid and is being used now to generate more power and for industry.

Here is a graphs which shows the exponential shrinking of the predicted time frame for the German project starting with it's theoretical beginning to it's present state of actual existence. Originally when they first conceived the plan, they believed that it would not be possible until 2075. In only a few years, they have closed the gap to a projected 2022 realization date.

This is the future. America is being left in the dust. France is beginning to realize that they are losing out on what will be the energy growth of Europe. Germany is now the worlds leader in Green Energy related job creation. China and California, if considered as a separate Pacific Rim economic unit are in the running. Texas has big wind power industry in the panhandle, but the supplier of the technology is Denmark! 

But why was Germany impelled to make this radical leap forward? Because of the tireless energy of the Green Movement in protesting and militantly educating the public. They raised the awareness and created the conditions for the big leap forward that Germany is taking.

OWS, in its diverse activities has embraced the German Green energy. Learn about the positive activism now being created by the OWS Occupy Rooftops Movement here!

One little step at a time, we will drag the rest of the world, kicking and screaming, into a semblance of a  sane future.

Bill Says Grace

This is a Thanksgiving tradition, Bill Burroughs says grace......
 Thanks for the wild turkey and the Passenger Pigeons, destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts. Thanks for a Continent to despoil and poison — Thanks for Indians to provide a modicum of challenge and danger — Thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin, leaving the carcasses to rot - Thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes — Thanks for the AMERICAN DREAM to vulgarize and falsify until the bare lies shine through — Thanks for the KKK, for n**ger-killing lawmen feeling their notches, for decent church-going women with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces — Thanks for "Kill a Queer for Christ" stickers — Thanks for laboratory AIDS — Thanks for Prohibition and the War Against Drugs — Thanks for a country where nobody is allowed to mind his own business — Thanks for a nation of finks — yes, thanks for all the memories... all right, let's see your arms... you always were a headache and you always were a bore — Thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams.

Your White Trash Moment

It's been a long time since we've had a white trash moment here at thebrainpokice,

 but I just had to share.

Fair Is Fair?

....Uhh, obviously not if you are a Republican.....
Yesterday, Mitt Romney released his first campaign ad, which quotes President Obama saying “if we keep talking about the economy, we’re going to lose.” But those weren’t Obama’s words; he was quoting a strategist for Sen. John McCain in 2008.

In response, the Romney campaign has defended this blatantly dishonest campaign tactic as “not out of bounds.” So, we have to thank ThinkProgress for creating this completely in-bounds “advertisement” quoting Romney, in his own words: 

Can't Keep A Good Meme Down!

The hits just keep on comin...this is collective intelligence and humor in action. Here is a link to an ever expanding gallery of images inspired by the insane image of UC Police Officer Lt. John Pike casually using drastic, psychopathically brutal and life threatening, force on non violent demonstrators. I have a few pieces in here including the version of La Grande Jatte, but the collective humor and ridicule grows incrementally by the minute! I hear Pike has been suspended, but this man needs therapeutic rehabilitation now! I hope his family has enough sense to keep him away from the Thanksgiving Turkey!

USA #1 Pepper Spray!

In todays Scientific American Blog, there is a very interesting discussion
about pepper spray and, what it is and what a dangerous and potentially deadly substance it can be.
As you can see here, on the Scoville chart, American Military Pepper Spray is one of the hottest capsicum 
substances that has been measured. It can easily cause permanent physical damage and  kill.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian Military is pointing to the American Police Suppression of OWS Protests as justification for their brutal repressions against the anti military government protests now happening in  Cairo's Tahrir Square and Alexandria. They've killed over 33 people in the last few days, but USA hasn't killed anyone in America yet...
USA #1 PEPPER SPRAY!

All You Fascists Bound To Lose!

Woody Guthrie 1940!

Perp Walk

 The video is of Linda P.B. Katehi walking to her car after her press conference yesterday after trying to defend the actions of the University of California in the brutal pepper spraying and violence used by the police against non violent demonstrators. A pretty remarkable thing just happened. The press conference, scheduled for 2:00pm between the UC Davis Chancellor and police on campus, did not end at 2:30. Instead, a mass of Occupy Davis students and sympathizers mobilized outside, demanding to have their voice heard. After some initial confusion, UC Chancellor Linda Katehi refused to leave the building, attempting to give the media the impression that the students were somehow holding her hostage. A group of highly organized students formed large gap for the chancellor to leave. They chanted “we are peaceful” and “just walk home,” but nothing changed for several hours. Eventually student representatives convinced the chancellor to leave after telling their fellow students to sit down and lock arms. 

This is from an open letter to Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi (a name to remember) from Prof Nathan Brown, UC Davis:                                                                                                                                When students covered their eyes with their clothing, police forced open their mouths and pepper-sprayed down their throats. Several of these students were hospitalized. Others are seriously injured. One of them, forty-five minutes after being pepper-sprayed down his throat, was still coughing up blood 
Here's a link to a compelling eye witness account by a victim of the pepper spray attack!
  Torture. There's no other word for this behavior. 
You can talk about one cop, or provocation (if they can find it), or cop behavior, but that's small-bore analysis. 
This is the Bush–Obama torture regime come home. When a nation tortures, forgives torture, justifies torture, glories in torture — it corrupts itself from the core. This nation, my nation, is rotting from the core. 
No defender of torture will be able to take a clean position on this incident. Watch them. They'll twist themselves into knots with their too-bad's and their yes-but's and their "Sorry Mrs White, I know that cruelty was meant for other people; we'll do better next time." 
Did I say Torture? Add Sadism. The purpose of torture is to give pleasure to the torturer. The rest is just the cover story. 
Who's the torturer? The man with his hand on the pepper-spray gun. The one who put a sadist on the front line. The one who, from his couch, wants cops to deliver "Second Amendment justice" to all those he leads himself to hate. And the one who cheers on as "Justice" Jack Bauer separates the testicles of another of America's many enemies.Yes, the delight they took in torture watching the "fictional" 24 is the true black heart of America. 

The most influential legal thinker in the development of modern American interrogation policy is not a behavioral psychologist, international lawyer or counterinsurgency expert. Reading both Jane Mayer's stunning "The Dark Side," and Philippe Sands's "Torture Team," it quickly becomes plain that the prime mover of American interrogation doctrine is none other than the star of Fox television's "24," Jack Bauer.

Torture and sadism. This is America's black heart, America's Bush–Obama torture policy come home. 
 Only the torture-free will make sense when they speak. Less than two months ago, it seemed shocking when one NYPD officer cavalierly walked up to a group of female protestors and pepper-sprayed them in the eyes. The UC Davis pepper-sprayer doesn't slink away, as his NYPD counterpart did, but in every other way this is more coldly brutal. And by the way, when did we accept the idea that local police forces would always dress up in riot gear that used to be associated with storm troopers and dystopian sci-fi movies?
In case you haven't seen the videos, and if you have, they haven't been shown enough.
 Remember, this is not Syria, this is not Tahreer Square, this is not a group of unruly Palestinians being disciplined by the Israeli Occupation Forces, This is America!

CEPES!

This is a truly strange year. Here is a photo of my cepe hunt in progress. I came home with almost 4 kilos!
Yesterday, my neighbor said that he had heard they were coming up, but the usual season should have ended
last month, and it was pitiful. Tomorrow, me and the doggie will be up and out at sunrise...
Perhaps tomorrow I will give you the recipe for Pintaude aux cepes. Tonight, though, the menu is set.
My wife is making tartiflette!

2011.09.30

A wide field meteor camera at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center recorded this spectacular meteor breaking up in Earth's atmosphere on Sept. 30, 2011,8:37 p.m. EDT. Also visible is a star-like object moving slowly toward the upper middle of the field of view -- the upper stage of the Zenit booster that launched the Russian Cosmos 2219 intelligence satellite back in 1992. Orbiting 500 miles above Earth, this empty rocket body can get bright enough to be seen with the unaided eye.

Bella Ciao

Yes, I am abject fan of the great Moldavian band, Zdob si Zdub. They have a new cd out called Basta Mafia, which will be released in the USA and which I will review when I can get some good graphics. I already have an advance pre release version downloaded on my itune program. Here they are a few years ago on Moldavian TV doing the classic passionate socialist anthem, Bella Ciao.

How Can You Know Your Rights If In Fact You Have None?

Since the beginning of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories in 1967, over 650,000 Palestinians have been detained by Israel. This forms approximately 20% of the total Palestinian population in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT). As the majority of those detained are male, the number of Palestinians detained forms approximately 40% of the total male Palestinian population in the OPT.

The location of prisons within Israel and the transfer of detainees to locations within the occupying power’s territory are illegal under international law and constitute a war crime. The Fourth Geneva Convention explicitly states that “Protected persons accused of offences shall be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted they shall serve their sentences therein” (Article 47). There are only two military detention centers and one military detention camp located within the OPT.

Under Israeli military regulations, a Palestinian can be detained for up to 12 days without the Israeli military informing the detainee of the reason for his/her arrest and without being brought before a judge. Between April and June 2002, this period of time was increased to 18 days by Israeli Military Order 1500. Following or during the 12 days of detention, a detainee is sent to an interrogation center, charged with an offense, given an administrative detention order, or released.

A Palestinian detainee can be interrogated for a total period of 180 days, during which he/she can also be denied lawyer visits for a period of 90 days. During the interrogation period, a detainee is often subjected to some form of torture ranging in extremity, whether physical or psychological. The use of practices that constitute torture during interrogation has been legalized within the Israeli judicial system and permitted in individual cases in which the GSS deems a detainee a threat to state security or a ‘ticking bomb’. In some instances, detainees have died while in custody as a result of torture. Confessions extracted through torture are admissible in Israeli court.The ISA interrogation system includes seven key aspects which harm, to varying degrees, the dignity and bodily integrity of the detainees. This injury is intensified considering the combined exercise of these aspects during the interrogation period which, for the witnesses in the sample, lasted an average of 35 days:

• Isolation from the outside world - prohibition on meetings between detainees and their attorneys; 
• The use of the conditions of imprisonment as a means of psychological pressure - holding in solitary confinement and in putrid, stifling cells; 
• The use of conditions of imprisonment as a means for weakening the body - preventing physical activity, sleep disturbance, inadequate food supply; 
• Shackling in the ” shabah ” position - painful binding of the detainee’s hands and feet to a chair; 
• Cursing and humiliation - cursing, strip searches, shouting, spitting etc.; 
• Threats and intimidation - including the threat of physical torture, arrest of family members, etc.; 
• The use of informants, ” ‘asafir ” to extract information - this method is not harmful, as such, but its efficacy largely depends on the ill-treatment of detainees immediately preceding its implementation.

Under military regulations in force in the OPT, a child over the age of 16 is considered an adult, contrary to the defined age of a child as under 18 in the Convention of the Rights of the Child, to which Israel is a signatory. In practice, Palestinian children may be charged and sentenced in military courts beginning at the age of 12.

• Between the ages of 12-14, children can be sentenced for offences for a period of up to six months – meaning that a child accused of throwing a stone can be sent to prison for six months; 
• After the age of 14, Palestinian children are tried as adults, in violation of international law; 
• There are no juvenile courts and children are often held and serve their sentences in cells with criminal prisoners and are often not separated from adults, also in violation of international law.

Administrative detention is indefinitely renewable under military regulations. A detainee may be given an administrative detention order for a period of between 1 – 6 months, after which the order may be renewed. Administrative detention is based on secret evidence brought forward during military tribunals, to which neither the detainee nor his/her lawyer have access to. One of the longest Palestinian administrative detainees remained in custody for over 8 years, without ever being charged.

Prison conditions in Israeli military detention camps are inhumane. Detainees are held in overcrowded prison tents that are often threadbare and do not provide for adequate shelter against extreme weather. Prisoners are not provided adequate food rations, neither in quantity nor quality, nor provided with clean clothes or adequate cleaning supplies. Many of the detainees currently being held in military detention camps were injured during their arrests and have not been provided the necessary medical attention, like those who suffer from chronic illnesses.

KNOW YOUR RIGHTS!

A great song by one of the Greatest most passionate bands of all time, The Fuckin' Clash!

Know Your Rights...
This is a public service announcement With guitar.  
Know your rights all three of them Number 1 You have the right not to be killed Murder is a CRIME! Unless it was done by a Policeman or aristocrat Know your rights And Number 2 You have the right to food money Providing of course you Don't mind a little Investigation, humiliation And if you cross your fingers Rehabilitation Know your rights These are your rights Wang Know these rights Number 3 You have the right to free Speech as long as you're not Dumb enough to actually try it. Know your rights These are your rights All three of 'em It has been suggested In some quarters that this is not enough! Well.............................. Get off the streets Get off the streets Run You don't have a home to go to Smush Finally then I will read you your rights You have the right to remain silent You are warned that anything you say Can and will be taken down And used as evidence against you Listen to this Run

FEEL THE BURN!

I just had a personal best kinda day....

About Last Night, Monty

Monty Bloomberg scoffed at his press conference after brutally breaking up the OWS Zuccotti Protest that no one would show up for yesterdays 2 month anniversary. In his dreams.

Thousands of people were there of all ages and walks of life. They retook Brooklyn Bridge in a march of lights! My friend Enzo watched the march from Union Square down Broadway back to Zuccotti Park and ran out of his house to join it!

OWS! BIGGER BADDER AND BETTER THAN EVER!

These videos are of the great light show, with the new 99% Bat Signal on the iconic Verizon Building. 

Meet The Feebles

A clip from Peter Jackson's 1989 film, Meet The Feebles.

The film was suppressed by The Jim Henson organization because well, frankly, it gave Muppets a very bad name...drugs, perversity, sex and bad taste and quite a few really great musical numbers.

Maybe someday it will be re released...because it was absolutely brilliant. This is the Nam Flashback sequence.

We Gonna Party Like It's 1964!

In the last Republican debate, Michelle Bachmann attacked Lyndon Johnson's Great Society programs saying, "What I would do is look at the programs Lyndon Johnson gave us with the Great Society, and they'd be gone."

Rick Perry faced down the Red Chinese Menace, saying the "the Communist Chinese Government will end up on the trash heap of history."

And Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum all took  us back to the days of "Duck and Cover" nuclear defense drills, with Santorum (sorry, I find it hard to write Santorum with out breaking into fits of hysterical giggling) expressing the fear that, "the next explosion we hear in Iran is a nuclear one."
Perhaps the correct response for the Democrats should be to trot out Lyndon Johnson's 1964 campaign ad against Barry Goldwater. Love it or hate it, it worked pretty good for LBJ back then. 

And as long as the conservative corporacracy is intent on turning the clock back on social evolution 50 years, let's listen to what Mario Savio had to say, on the steps of the Berkeley University of California Campus that are named for him today. The same place peaceful demonstrators were brutalized last Wednesday night for trying to exercise their right to Free Speech today, almost 50 years later:

If that's how they wanna play, then we can show them that we can play that game and do it better. Because we've learned and evolved over the last 50 years and obviously, "they" haven't.

Wall Street November 17, 2011...

globalrevolution on livestream.com. Broadcast Live Free

For the record, this is the present, 2011.

Swimming To Bangkok

Bangkok is still under water. The rising tide seems to have stopped 200 feet from my nephews house for the time being. He is trying to find creative culinary uses for sardines..His emails are amazing stories of how the Thais live gracefully and peacefully with this disaster. Here's a picture of cat with an improvised life vest made of plastic water bottles. For a really interesting and enlightening view into how the Thais are creatively dealing with the ongoing flood check out this Tumblr photo blog!

Conspiracy Against The Constitution

This audio link from todays Takeawy radio program contains a BBC interview from Monday with Oakland Mayor Jean Quan which almost casually provides the smoking gun to prove an anti constitutional law conspiracy.

The Quan interview starts at the 5:30 mark.

She mentions that she was on a conference call with 18 other mayors and city governments 

discussing how to deal with the situation shortly before a wave of police raids broke up Occupy encampments across the country.

Mayor Quan then rambles about how she “spoke with protestors in my city” who professed an interest in “separating from anarchists,” implying that her police action was helping this somehow.

Interestingly, Quan then essentially advocates that occupiers move to private spaces, and specifically cites Zuccotti Park as an example:

In New York City, it’s interesting that the Wall Street movement is actually on a private park, so they’re not, again, in the public domain, and they’re not infringing on the public’s right to use a public park.

Many witnesses to the wave of government crackdowns on numerous #occupy encampments have been wondering aloud if the rapid succession was more than a coincidence; Jean Quan’s casual remark seems to clearly imply that it was.

Might it also be more than a coincidence that this succession of police raids started after President Obama left the US for an extended tour of the Pacific Rim?

Mayor Jean Quan of Oakland, CA. She wants to play it every way, but the next interview we want to showcase here is the interview she recently did with CRI, China Radio International, in which she bemoans that she is hamstrung by American Constitutional law and cannot deal efficiently with protest, like China.
Uhh, Mayor Quan, would that be to crush them with tanks, dump the dead in landfills and then forget about them?
Here's an excellent compilation of police crackdowns of  The Occupy Movement across America in today's Guardian.


Those who do not allow peaceful revolution to be possible Make violent Revolution Inevitable- 
John Fitzgerald Kennedy

added bonus: Here is a google map showing cities that are currently facing litigation
 due to police actions against the Occupy Movement. I'd say that if I was a lawyer, wanting to 
get in on the ground floor of a sure fire growth industry...I'd start specializing in handling the thousands of constitutional rights violations and brutality cases that are most certainly
 going to be filed in American cities in the next few months!

You Have No Rights

Watch live streaming video from occupynyc at livestream.com

This is the live stream video being transmitted from Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan as the NYPD tries to clear out the Occupy Wall Street Movement today.
I find it increasingly apparent that the administrations, the media, the corporations  have not begun to understand how radically the Occupy Movement has fundamentally changed the direction of discussion and the way most Americans now view the Corporacracy. Most Americans now identify with the 99% movement.  The so called establishment cannot begin to deal with the movement in any way except trying to physically dismantle the physical manifestation of the protests. The biggest error on their part is to use brutal force. The Occupy Movement Demonstrations did not have to be brutally dismantled. The Movement is in a state of evolution.
They made their point and now the Police in their brutal clumsy manner only emphasize the points with their brutality and exposing in a very open and public manner that the masters they serve care nothing about the rule of law.

confrontation last wednesday in berkeley

Last Wednesday night in Berkeley, CA, a peaceful Occupy protest was brutally suppressed by a police attack on the UC campus. Perhaps the most poignant moment of that incident was the report of a Grad Student, Alex Barnard who was beat by police batons and ended up with cracked ribs. He stated that the most disempowering moment for him was when he was being booked and whenever he asked any questions, he was told "You Have No Rights".
The violence was eloquently protested by the faculty of  Berkely in this open letter/petition.

This is a video taken on Nov 11, 2011 in Dallas of a protestor being pushed off of a ledge by a Dallas Officer. The protestor, Steven Benevides, was booked for assault and the police claim he assaulted them, The video evidence shows quite the opposite. The police claim that they acted in professional manner.

scott olsen earlier this week

One good piece of news is that Scott Olsen, the Marine who was brain damaged when he was hit by a tear gas canister in Oakland in October, is out of the hospital. He has a long way to go to recovery, but this very brave man has stated that he will be back on the front lines protesting with his fellow Vets! Bravo, Mon Vieux!
Olsen and the other Vets and Police who have joined the Occupy Movement have very directly demonstrated to Americans that Occupy is not them, they is us. In Atlanta, the Occupy Movement actually saved a Police Officers home from foreclosure.
We are smarter, smarter and better and evolving as the corporacracy becomes more entrenched in protecting  what they consider their special interests. Nothing worth fighting for or believing in is easy. Nothing magically happens overnight. Each journey is many small steps. Occupy will not go away by simply smashing it.  The dinosaurs howled in terror as the planet changed and they became extinct.
UPDATE! THE DALLAS POLICE OFFICER WHO PUSHED STEVEN BENEVIDES OFF OF THE LEDGE, THEN CLAIMED HE WAS ASSAULTED, WAS SUSPENDED BECAUSE OF THE EVIDENCE IN THE VIDEO ABOVE!