Olbermann’s Special Comment on the Libby “Pardon”
Tag Archives: current events
i used to be a superhero
- Wow, this guy is a real life superhero. I know that I would have just stayed on the subway platform and winced.
- For a laugh, you might want to read the exchange between the guys at attrition.org (who host an awesome data loss feed) and Todd Shriber, a [former] Congressional aide trying to hire the hax0rs to change his GPA.
- Two-faced calf born in Virginia. “Genetically, this is one of my better calves.”
- Jean-Christian Bourcart – “collateral“: He projects photographs of mutilated and dead Iraqis on American houses, supermarkets, churches, and parking lots. “I found the images on the web. Some American soldiers post their own pictures on a website. They would show a cut leg with the caption: “where’s da rest of my shit?†Or a blown up head with the caption: “need a hair cut†.
I could not help thinking of those images as some kind of restless ghosts that endlessly wander in the intermediate level of the web. I took care of them like a embalmer would; downloading, revamping, printing, rephotographiing, then projecting them as if I was looking for a place where they would rest in peace and at the same time haunt those who pretend not to know what was going on.”
Yesterday was great. Emily got me a GPS for Christmas, so we went geocaching. Basically, people hide a container with random things in it and put the coordinates on geocaching.com. It’s like a treasure hunt! Got stumped on the first one (it’s in the UAB mini park, somewhere…) but found the second one easily, and took a mix tape (as in, cassette!). How awesome is that? I’m totally stealing that idea. The third cache we tried was up at Vulcan Park but it was too busy ti get to, so we went on Vulcan Trail and found one there. It took *forever* to find – somehow I managed to turn geocaching into a contact sport by trying to scamble up the side of Red Mountain and tumbling down a bit of it instead – but finding the cache (even though there wasn’t really anything cool in it) was well worth the red clay on my jeans.
It was near sundown when we decided to stop, so we came back to the apartment and I made dinner. Then we went to a movie (a *real* movie, too, not the dollar theater variety!) and saw “Pursuit of Happyness”. It’s a feel-good story to top all feel-good stories, and even though it does not give any sort of accurate portrayal of any homeless shelter I have ever heard about it was still worth the 7 bucks. Plus – and this is a little known secret – I absolutely love Will Smith.
Took Em to work early this morning and have been playing with the cats and browsing the web. Need to head to the store and hope to have time to curl up with a book for a while before fnb this afternoon. Ah, this is the life for sure.
treading water.
From The Chicago Reader Blogs:
On Saturday the Sun-Times ran a small item about a man who had set himself on fire during rush hour Friday morning near the Ohio Street exit on the Kennedy. His identity has still not been officially determined, but members of the local jazz and improvised music community say they are certain it was Malachi Ritscher, a longtime supporter of the scene.
[...]
Buried on Ritscher’s web site Chicago Rash Audio Potential, a compendium of invaluable show postings, artwork, and photography, are a suicide note and an obituary. Both indicate that he was deeply troubled by the war in Iraq and pinpoint it as a motive for suicide [...] Ritscher was a familiar face at antiwar protests, and he was arrested more than once for his involvement, including this time this past May. A note found at the scene of the immolation reportedly read “Thou Shalt Not Kill.”
This news bit has effected me deeply in ways I can’t quite comprehend. I’ve become absolutely complacent about national and state politics, deciding instead to focus my mediocre efforts on projects where I can effect change directly. I’ve given up on American society to make any sort of rational decisions about their leaders, and I’ve given up on American leaders making any sort of beneficial decisions for the populace. Even in this day after the election, this day of joy for Democrats And Other Good Hearted Individuals, I’m still cynical that anything beneficial and/or meaningful and/or different will arise out of this change in power. The destruction of Iraq, the destruction of the environment, the destruction of the things and people I take for granted, all of it affects me. Depresses me. Makes me irritable and hopeless. I have to tread water for a while until I catch the next wave.
There’s a scene in Waking Life where the main character is walking down the street and runs into a guy who rants about society a little bit and then says “I feel that the time has come to project my own inadequacies and dissatisfactions into the sociopolitical and scientific schemes. Let my own lack of a voice be heard!”. Then he sits down on a street corner and lights himself on fire.
I’ve always thought – that is me. One day I will be old and people will listen to me even less than they do now and I will have lived my life. Then, I will choose the time and fashion of my death and that will be my statement. I read Ritscher’s “mission statement”, and I think – that is me. I’m just not old yet.
halloween indeed
Here’s a snapshot of the ONLY trick-or-treaters I’ve ever seen in the neighborhood in the past five years I’ve lived in this apartment. Don’t they look spooky? Oooooh, spooky. Like having the FBI show up at your door after you post a WAKEUPYOUGUYSTHETERRORISTSHAVEALREADYWONALERT boarding pass generator online.
boxed in
don’t get me wrong – i had a good time last night – but i don’t think i like being an adult and having conversations limited to death and taxes and things to do. i’d rather stay a dreamer who dreams of taking freight trains on my next vacation, an idealist who isn’t afraid of quitting my job and moving across the country. there’s a certain pretensiousness that comes along with drinking martini’s that doesn’t lend itself to thinking outside the box.
don’t get me wrong – it’s not that i don’t *care* about death and taxes and todo lists – it’s just that i think there is so much more to talk about.
i just finished reading the jungle by upton sinclair, and highly recommend that each and every one of you start reading it today. the whole story was heartbreaking – the story of a naive immigrant family who came to america in search of the american dream – and who were beaten and starved and maimed and killed and raped and pillaged along the way. i know that the conditions of the factories have improved since the early 1900′s, but i wonder about the conditions of today’s immigrants who are chasing that same american dream all of our ancestors chased.
what makes someone illegal? webster’s says “not according to or authorized by law”. i say – no person can be illegal. we are all illegal. the law is only as good as what you make it, and the fact is that “illegal immigrants” are more engrained into the functioning of our society than i am. my job can be outsourced; what i do is not especially important or groundbreaking and i’m pretty sure the world could live without another grumpy IT worker. but physical labor, the kind of hard work that most baby boomers (or any generation since) have never seen, that sort of labor cannot be outsourced to a penny paid worker living in another country answering phones with an accent and calling himself george.
the law is only as relevant as you let it be.
long overdue update
have lots to say about today’s primary election but i need to go to bed. here’s the quick rundown.pros:
* roy moore (right wing “ten commandments” judge) was defeated in the republican primary.
* so was larry darby (athiest activist and recently outed white supremicist with two half chinese children…no i’m not making that up…and he ran on the democratic ticket.)
cons:
* amendment one (a AL constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage) was also defeated. not that i expected any differently, but it is frustrating to me when the biggest issue of the campaign was outlawing gay marriage (in a state where there is no chance of it being legalized ANYWAY)…instead of any sort of discussion about all the other crap that is going on in the world.
oh, to surround myself with people who can at least explain their beliefs.
—
“Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power
to make you commit injustices.”
–Voltaire
prophecy
–