Saturday, May 28, 2011

"This Is Your War on Drugs... Cops dressed like soldiers breaking into private homes, tossing concussion grenades, training their guns on nonviolent citizens, and slaughtering dogs as a matter of procedure." | The Agitator

This Is Your War on Drugs | The Agitator:
"...This isn’t like watching video of a car accident or a natural disaster. This doesn’t have to happen. You’re watching something your government does to your fellow citizens about 150 times per day in this country. If this very literal “drug war” insanity is going to continue to be waged in our name, we ought to make goddamned sure everyone knows exactly what it entails. And this is what it entails. Cops dressed like soldiers breaking into private homes, tossing concussion grenades, training their guns on nonviolent citizens, and slaughtering dogs as a matter of procedure."

Friday, May 27, 2011

Zach Galifianakis - "My Southern accent starts to come out a little when I drink. Like, I'll say y'all or n-----s."

Great interview/article.  Galifianakis is just funny as hell, kind of the 'comedy of inappropriately fucking with people.'  Bonus - from NC, which is a trip.

Zach Galifianakis of 'Hangover Part II' Hates to Be Loved - TIME:
"...they're still very much jokes. The best ones might make you feel guilty for laughing. "Have you seen that show on CBS called The Amazing Race? Is that show about white people?" Or "My Southern accent starts to come out a little when I drink. Like, I'll say y'all or n-----s."

He'll deliver those same jokes whether people laugh or not, whether the audience is young or old, black or white. "A good stand-up, you lead the audience," he says. "You don't kowtow to the audience. Sometimes the audience is wrong. I always think the audience is wrong."

In a YouTube video of a stand-up routine, Galifianakis brings a drunken audience member onstage to berate her — as he often does with audience members — then asks security to remove her. "I hate to do that," he says to the crowd. "But if I didn't do that, that woman was going to be date-raped later. I don't want that to happen. I want to be by myself when I do it." It's a gutsy joke. Because he really is furious at the woman and her rude self-indulgence. And because he's admitting to the awfulness of his feelings. And because he says the word rape.

Threatening to rape audience members is not the fast track to starring in big-budget films..."

Of course - "President Obama Has a Much Different Opinion on the PATRIOT Act Than Did Senator Obama."

What is it about higher office that engenders such blatant and obvious hypocrisy?  Is it that they're lying from the jump or do they always show the new guy, like Bill Hicks* said, that special Dealey Plaza footage from a never seen before angle?

Details here - President Obama Has a Much Different Opinion on the PATRIOT Act Than Did Senator Obama - Hit & Run : Reason Magazine

*The Bill Hicks bit*
"I have this feeling man, 'cause you know, it's just a handful of people who run everything, you know...  that's true, it's provable. It's not...  I'm not a fucking conspiracy nut, it's provable. 
A handful, a very small elite, run and own these corporations, which include the mainstream media. I have this feeling that whoever is elected president...  no matter what you promise on the campaign trail - blah, blah, blah - when you win, you go into this smoke-filled room with the twelve industrialist capitalist scum-fucks who got you in there. 
And you're in this smoky room, and this little film screen comes down...  and a big guy with a cigar goes, "Roll the film." And it's a shot of the Kennedy assassination from an angle you've never seen before...  that looks suspiciously like it's from the grassy knoll. 
And then the screen goes up and the lights come up, and they go to the new president, "Any questions?"
"Er, just what my agenda is."


The Church understands kids - "Italian priest lured teenage boys for sex, paid them with cocaine."

Evil, dysfunctional douchebags.

Tapes show Italian priest lured teenage boys for sex, paid them with cocaine - Boing Boing:
"Investigators examining tapped cellphone conversations between a Moroccan drug dealer and 51-year-old Father Riccardo Seppia found evidence of arranged sexual encounters with young boys, some of whom were paid for sex with cocaine.

"I do not want 16-year-old boys but younger," Seppia is accused of having said on the tapes. "Fourteen-year-olds are O.K. Look for needy boys who have family issues."

...He is said to have boasted in the recorded cellphone conversations that local shopping malls were the best place to pick up boys for sex."

Thursday, May 26, 2011

"Gunny Hitler" - about the funniest damn thing I've seen all day.

The Rapture would've been awesome, actually.

"Support Your Troops."

Understanding Immigration.

I laughed. Because I'm basically not a good person, apparently.

"Drones" Trailer = quirky, funny.

New "Green Lantern" trailer is fairly geektastic.

C'mon Japan, WTF? - "Prosecutors Taught That Yakuza & Foreigners Have No Rights."

More at the link, of course.

Public Prosecutors Were Taught That Yakuza & Foreigners Have No Rights | Japan Probe:
"Stunning revelation from former prosecutor on the real situation of initial training...

The chief prosecutor in the Saga City Agricultural Co-op case, infamous for use of false charges, spoke at a symposium held in Tokyo on May 23, 2011. He gave a stunningly candid account of the reality of training for new employees. He disclosed that in his past experience, “We were taught that yakuza and foreigners have no rights.” and “Prosecutors are instructed to make up a confession on their own and then make the suspect sign it.” Further, he gave a chilling account of how under this warped training system, “While being trained in this way, I came to sort of agree that these kinds of things were only natural.”"

"We are in fact hyperdimentional objects of some sort which cast a shadow into matter." - Terence McKenna

Another fantastic McKenna talk at the Psychedelic Salon: Podcast 267 – “Exploring the Abyss”:
"“We are not primarily biology with mind emerging as a kind of iridescence, a kind of epiphenomenon at the higher levels of organization of biology. We are in fact hyperdimentional objects of some sort which cast a shadow into matter. And the shadow in matter is the body.”"

Heh - "Patriotism is everywhere thought to be a virtue rather than a mental disorder. I don’t get it..."

“The only intelligent way to discuss politics is on all fours.” - Timothy Leary

Much more at the link...

Fred On Everything:
"...If I told the Rotarians or an American Legion hall that “John is a patriot,” all would approve greatly of John. If I told them that patriotism was nothing more than the loyalty to each other of dogs in a pack, they would lynch me. Patriotism, they believe, is a Good Thing.

Of course the Japanese pilots who attacked Pearl Harbor were patriots, as were the German soldiers who murdered millions in the Second World War. The men who brought down the towers in New York were patriots, though of a religious sort. Do we admire their patriotism?

Of course not. When we say “John is a patriot,” we mean “John is a reliable member of our dog pack,” nothing more. The pack instinct seems more ancient, and certainly stronger, than morality or any form of human decency. Thus, once the pack—citizenry, I meant to say—have been properly roused to a pitch of patriotism, they will, under cover of the most diaphanous pretexts, rape Nanking, bomb Hiroshima, kill the Jews or, if they are Jews, Palestinians. We are animals of the pack. We don’t admire patriotism. We admire loyalty to ourselves...

...The military calls the pack instinct “unit cohesion,” and fosters it to the point that soldiers often have more loyalty to the military than to the national pack. Thus it is easy to get them to fire on their own citizens. It has not happened in the United States since perhaps Kent State, but in the past the soldiery were often used to kill striking workers. All you have to do is to get the troops to think of the murderees as another group.

If you talk to patriots, particularly to the military variety, they will usually be outraged at having their morality questioned. Here we encounter moral compartmentation, very much a characteristic of the pack. If you have several dogs, as we do, you will note that they are friendly and affectionate with the family and tussle playfully among themselves—but bark furiously at strangers and, unless they are very domesticated, will attack unknown dogs cooperatively and kill them.

Similarly the colonel next door will be honest, won’t kick your cat or steal your silverware. Sshould some natural disaster occur, work strenuously to save lives, at the risk of his own if need be. Yet he will consciencelessly cluster-bomb downtown Baghdad, and pride himself on having done so. A different pack, you see. It is all right to attack strange dogs..."

Monday, May 23, 2011

The real reason the Rapture didn't happen. Oooooh yeah!

"Final Wonder Woman Costume Shot w/Adrianne Palicki" - I still think this would've been cool to watch.


Pic via - Full Final Wonder Woman Costume Shot With Adrianne Palicki - Bleeding Cool Comic Book, Movies and TV News and Rumors

State sanctioned robbery under color or authority - more asset forfeiture bullshit.

Highway Robbery | The Agitator:
"...I found academic papers noting incidents in which cops would find a stash house, but wouldn’t bust the place until all or most of the drugs had been sold. There’s no return on a house full of dope. There’s plenty of return on a house full of cash.

And of course all of that is really beside the point. The more fundamental problem, here: This is just state-sanctioned robbery by another name."

Hategasm - "Catholic Church Officially Blames Hippies for Their Child Abuse Scandals."

More hate-inducing, bile-creating info at the link.

Catholic Church Officially Blames Hippies for Their Child Abuse Scandals | Disinformation:
"Blame the flower children. That seems to be the chief conclusion of a new report about the Roman Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal. The study, undertaken by John Jay College of Criminal Justice (PDF) at the request of America’s Catholic bishops, links the spike in child abuse by priests in the 1960s and ’70s to “the importance given to young people and popular culture” — along with the emergence of the feminist movement, a “singles culture” and a growing acceptance of homosexuality. It also cites crime, drugs, an increase in premarital sexual behavior and divorce..."

"This is what religion encourages: fear based on imaginary terrors."

More at the link.

While Harold Camping sits safe with his millions… : Pharyngula:
"…the fear he fosters spreads around the world.
This woman, fearful of the end of the world, took a boxcutter to the throats of her two daughters, and then sliced her own throat. This is what religion encourages: fear based on imaginary terrors..."

Cooking/Food Log.

For the Mrs - some prepackaged Indian fare, a big batch of guacamole, almond coated fried chicken, plus some of the standards.

...the Hershey's doesn't count as a 'cheat' because it's no-sugar dark chocolate.  A rare find in Liberia.  Mixed most of it w/my nuts/trail mix snack, but downed a few on their own.

,
Free day/day and a half.  Dipped into the newly acquired duty-free alcohol, picked up a Hawaiian pizza - which is titled "American Pizza" at the local, go figure.  Plus, not pictured, from a dining out - rice, bread, cake, ice cream & chips.

Sunday, May 22, 2011

My love/hate relationship with Hawaii Five-0.

I despise the trite "cops breaking the law and violating civil liberties to serve justice" cliche, but goddamn do I love seeing the visuals from Oahu.  The four years I lived there rank among the best ever.  And while not the best job I've ever had - still the JET Programme - it was the best place I've lived.  Miss the islands... and if I turn off my brain, the actors are good and really get after their characters and chew some scenery, and I can dig on the show.

Last hour of Smallville was excellent/Michael Rosenbaum still the best thing about the show.

In ten years there was way too much Dawson's Creek angst & Emo Clark, but that last hour was genius.  And Michael Rosenbaum's Luthor is still the best part of the show.
 

Understanding Music.

Training.

Shadowboxing - Bas Rutten MMA Workout - 4x2m rounds/1x3m round - boxing
P90X D42 - Yoga - Tony Horton One-on-One 'Patience Hummingbird' - Abs
5/21 - P90X D41 - Plyometrics
5/20 - P90X D40 - Legs & Back
5/19 - P90X D39 - KenpoX - Abs
5/18 - P90X D38 - Back & Biceps
5/17 - P90X D37 - Abs - Rest/Free
Shadowboxing - Bas Rutten MMA Workout - 5x2m rounds - boxing
Dislocates/chest pulls
Stretches - hang/squat/spinal arch
5/16 - P90X D36 - Chest/Shoulder/Triceps

I tend to do the workouts for P90X out of the order recommended, but complete all the required workouts for the week. Also, I sub a different Beachbody Yoga wkout for YogaX, because that's still beyond my ability.