Visual commentary...
This is really really interesting. I would love to know Apple's opinion on the "new advertising campaign." Something tells me they'd not be amused...



Also interesting that commentary on photo-documentation is being photo-documented. I would kill to know who's behind this. Art students would be the logical guess...



Strip, Pix, Burn: iRaq [via Gizmodo via Gawker]
- posted by liz @ 5/20/2004 10:31:00 AM 0 comments

 
Your daily dose of spiritual enlightenment:
A German couple who went to a fertility clinic after eight years of marriage have found out why they are still childless - they weren't having sex.

...A clinic spokesman said: "When we asked them how often they had had sex, they looked blank, and said: "What do you mean?".

"We are not talking retarded people here, but a couple who were brought up in a religious environment who were simply unaware, after eight years of marriage, of the physical requirements necessary to procreate."

Hahaha. Awesome.

Ananova - Childless couple told to try sex [via ultragrrrl]
- posted by liz @ 5/18/2004 09:46:00 AM 0 comments

 
THE BLACK LIST: THREE BEERS, TWO MARTINIS, ONE SHOT...
THE BLACK LIST: THREE BEERS, TWO MARTINIS, ONE SHOT...:

"SHIT ROLLING DOWNHILL: 'Shit rolls downhill' is a universal enough expression that we gladly accept as a fact of life -- but we don't remember it stinking this badly. Photos of the U.S. military torture of Iraqi prisoners continue to provide fodder for the same media outlets who did the Bush administration's bidding in promoting this war, outlets that now act shocked that things like this would go on. Meanwhile, it is only enlisted soldiers with their heads on the chopping block so far. Military contractors who dare upset Big Brother by photographing the coffins of American soldiers warrant immediate dismissal, but contractors who encourage torture and the high-ranking officials who turn a blind eye to it are still safe in their jobs. It's easy to denounce the dumb bumpkins smiling and pointing at their humiliated prisoners. But it's important to remember that our harshest words should be for those responsible for sending them to Iraq in the first place and who ordered them to run a prison without proper training and with little help. George W. Bush is right when he says that the soldiers who tortured Iraqis don't speak for America. They speak for his own outrageous dishonesty and incompetence, and our country's desperate, pleading need for a new President. F -- Matthew Sheahan"
- posted by liz @ 5/17/2004 04:08:00 PM 0 comments

 
An unnerving email...
From: S.B.
To: L.G.
Subject: statement of an evil man

In a statement, President Bush said he had called on the Congress "to pass, and to send to the states for ratification, an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of a man and a woman as husband and wife".

"The need for that amendment is still urgent, and I repeat that call today."


I'm not linking to that though. It's too negative. Read this instead:

MSNBC - Gay couples exchange vows in Massachusetts

It's really happy and positive, except for the part when completely ignorant people are quoted, like this:

Ray McNulty, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Family Institute, one of the leading organizers of opposition to same-sex marriage, criticized some of the protesters, saying there was no need for hateful speech.

"What's going on down there is legal, and as far as I'm concerned, give those people their happiness for the day," McNulty said.

Yeah! Let "those people" have their happiness for the day." All humans, being created equal and all, should be happy for at least one goddamn day, seeing as though this asshole sees that it's "legal, as far as [he's] concerned".

Seriously, I wish that something really uplifting and positive would happen in the world, without some kind of horrible backlash that looms over like a big evil shroud. It's like someone finding the cure for cancer and then a nuclear war is started over who has access to it. It makes me sick.
- posted by liz @ 5/17/2004 03:23:00 PM 0 comments

 
This is hillarious. I'm in a better mood now.
It always makes me happy to be able to laugh at someone who's a giant idiot and deserves to be laughed at. In light of all of the bullshit, this post is pure genious.

1000 fighting styles of Donald Rumsfeld [POE News: None of the news you need - all of the news you want: RE: Heck yes.. caption] [via NewYorkish]
- posted by liz @ 5/14/2004 11:24:00 AM 0 comments

 
Why I'm currently so happy not to have a TV, By LG.
"Fox issued a stunning news release yesterday for a two-hour reality special to air in June called 'Seriously, Dude, I'm Gay' in which, the network said, two heterosexual men will try to convince various people that they are gay. In the news release, Fox described the notion of a straight man 'turning gay overnight' as 'a heterosexual male's worst nightmare.' "

This is sickening. And I'm so glad that the only things on TV these days are idiots "pretending to be gay" and more idiots pretending to run this country. Maybe pop culture and political culture are becoming so intertwined that this whole messy world is really just one big, stupid fucking surreality, brought to us all, courtesy of, oh, I don't know, the FOX network maybe?

My plans for the weekend involve going to bed early and sleeping straight through to Monday. Avoidance therapy. mm.

Fox Puts Foot in Its Mouth, Kicks Self (washingtonpost.com) [via Gawker]
- posted by liz @ 5/14/2004 11:14:00 AM 0 comments

 
This is from May 12, 2004. This is what S.B. does in her free time. I think it's brilliant so here it is, for posterity and all that:
"The quote of the day was the Administration’s response to the execution of Nick Berg, a 26-year old contractor who had gone to Iraq in the hopes of finding a job where he could contribute to the rebuilding of a nation. Scott McClellan spoke on behalf of the President, saying that Mr. Berg’s murder “shows the true nature of the enemies of freedom. They have no regard for the lives of innocent men, women and children. We will pursue those who are responsible and bring them to justice.” Sadly, the crux of this quote has an eerily similar ring to a Bush speech last week on Al-Ariybia television, in which Bush explained that the difference between the former Iraqi human-rights abusing regime and our human-rights abusing regime. That difference was that we were going to hold the perpetrators accountable. We were going to bring our own criminals to justice.

Regard for the lives of innocent men, women and children? Bring them to justice? Nick Berg’s murder was a horrible, disgusting tragedy. And at this point the White House and their judicial and military branchess have truly fallen so far into the depths of injustice that their words of condemnation and sorrow ring hollow.

There is no democratic system of justice happening in Iraq; not in the hands of the United States, the Coalition forces (Great Britain is currently battling their own prisoner abuse scandal), nor has our devastation of that country allowed for a judicial body to arise from within the Iraqi citizenship. Sadly, there is no reason to think that there will be justice in the case of Nicholas Berg. At least not justice the way we are brought up to believe constitutes the American ideal. The inmates in US run prisons in Iraq are “70-90%” innocent according to ICRC statistics. As we have discovered in recent weeks, these same inmates have been shown how the United States deals with detainees who are “innocent until proven guilty.” By stacking them up naked, by attaching them to fake electrodes and by forcing them to stimulate sex acts on each other.

There was no way for the Administration to react to the Berg murder, except to apologize. Again and again and again. I certainly do not place the brutal murder of an American citizen entirely on the shoulders of the White House. I hate the murderers of Nick Berg with my whole heart. I believe that they should be brought to justice. But I’ll be damned if I can figure out which system of justice has the moral authority to do so. The United States has no claim to the “moral high ground” as Senator Lieberman did today. Particularly since our brand of justice within our own country, our own prisons and when dealing with our own citizens, violates the same moral, ethical and democratic rights that we purportedly hold in such high esteem. And for this failing, the Administration needs to apologize. To the family of Nick Berg, to the families of detainees murdered in American-run prisons and to the Iraqi citizens, who we have tried to fool by sending Supreme Court Justices, legal experts and legal pundits, for the purpose of structuring a justice system based on our own.

Our own system of justice is so broken that it should not be held up as a model for other countries. The ideals and underlying themes of due process, trial by
jury, fairness and impartiality; these can be forever taught...in theory. But the ever-growing number of inconsistencies between our justice system’s words and actions have shown that it is our own country that should revisit these lessons. The abuses documented within our own prisons, at the federal prisons against Arab aliens post-9/11, inmate-on-inmate and guard-on-inmate rape at every detention facility, overcrowding, extended stays on segregation units without a hearing, and inadequate medical and mental health care for inmates, should all be reason to doubt that we hold the “moral high ground.” The exonerations of prisoners by DNA evidence, the corruption and intermingling of politics in our own highest courts, the lack evidence and effective defense in death penalty cases (a form of punishment we continue to use, though most democratic countries have condemned it), the continued execution of mentally ill inmates and potentially innocent, the race-disparity in those who serve higher sentences; all of these should be reason to doubt that we hold the “moral high ground.”

I desperately hope that Nick Berg’s killers are “brought to justice.” Just as I hope that “justice will be served” in the cases of prisoner abuse in US-run prisons in Iraq, Afghanistan and if we ever get there, Guantanamo Bay. I just can’t figure out what system this will be done under, since it doesn’t seem possible under our own."

--S.B. 5/12/04
- posted by liz @ 5/13/2004 03:46:00 PM 0 comments

 
Holy crap, I hate this guy.
So here's a story:

I really really fucking hate the dentist. I'd rather go to the gyno than get my teeth cleaned. Like, seven times in a row at the gyno would be better than one 15 minute tooth/gum scrape/polish. yech. It's a good thing I don't have dental insurance, really. Then I'd have to go more frequently than every 3 years or so. But anyway. The last time I went to that hellhole known as the dentist's office (I thought I had a cavity. It hurt like a bitch. Regardless...), those effing masochists charged me $75.00 for x-rays and then left me sitting in the chair, surrounded by that foul, dentist's office disinfectant-mixed-with-blood smell, with nothing but the radio (turned up entirely too loud for a dentist's office). So obviously the radio is tuned to Rush Limbaugh. Right. Like I said. I hate the dentist. But I hate Rush Limbaugh more.

And I can't belive that I haven't read about this until today. Apparently, I've been under a rock or some shit. Alas. Ignorance is bliss, it appears:

"CALLER: It was like a college fraternity prank that stacked up naked men --

LIMBAUGH: Exactly. Exactly my point! This is no different than what happens at the Skull and Bones initiation and we're going to ruin people's lives over it and we're going to hamper our military effort, and then we are going to really hammer them because they had a good time. You know, these people are being fired at every day. I'm talking about people having a good time, these people, you ever heard of emotional release? You of heard of need to blow some steam off?"

Rush, you heard of [a] need to be an ignorant sonofabitch?

Limbaugh Defends Torture at Abu Ghraib :: there it is . org :: pertinent pointers
- posted by liz @ 5/13/2004 10:20:00 AM 0 comments

 
Rummy quote of the day: Anyone care for a tasty slice of redundancy?
"'More bad things will come out, unquestionably,' he said without being specific. 'And time will settle over this and we'll be able to make an assessment of what the effect has been' on the effort to stabilize Iraq. 'It clearly has not been helpful. It has been unhelpful.'"

Rumsfeld makes surprise visit to Baghdad [via MSNBC]
- posted by liz @ 5/13/2004 09:42:00 AM 0 comments

 
Ah, the joys of living with 3 other people in a tiny little east village apartment.
First of all, it makes the wildlife appear gigantic by comparison! In fact, I mistook a rat for an effing squirrel last night. It was in my kitchen, and it was gross. And Huge. I mean, Huge.

- posted by liz @ 5/11/2004 12:17:00 PM 0 comments

 
MSNBC - Bush says Iraq prison abuse is 'abhorrent'
MSNBC - Bush says Iraq prison abuse is 'abhorrent': "'This completely contradicts with life under the Saddam Hussein regime,' Bush added. 'His trained torturers were never tried. There were no investigations about mistreatment of people. In our case, there will be an investigation and some people will be brought to justice.' "

Oh yeah, good thing, asshole. "Obviously, we still torture people, I mean, let's be real folks! But then we investigate it! Don't you get it?! Don't you see the difference?! We are just like you, but with you know, red tape! It's so easy!"
- posted by liz @ 5/05/2004 12:48:00 PM 0 comments