Atomic’s one handed coders rebrand Fallujah game as Six Hours in My Lai

virtual rapeNMT has obtained screenshots from Atomic Games ‘Six Days in Fallujah,’ traded p2p and remarketed as Six Hours in My Lai. There was no budget to modify the OIF coalition uniforms to resemble the Vietnam GIs, but who’s looking at the clothing? Nostalgic vets will find the rape reenactments unremarkably familar. In reality the mayhem of My Lai and My Khe lasted 28 hours, not six, but industry research indicates that cyber ejaculators rarely have more than a six hour window before a landlady looks in on them.

Gaming studies remain inconclusive about whether virtual sex stimulation augments with cumulative scorekeeping. It will require a scientific leap before computer health levels can fortify a real-world refractory period. Otherwise virtual serial binges cannot build on themselves like the longer pyramid games of Civilization or World Of Warcraft.

okinawa schoolgirl rapeJapanese game publisher Konami, forced by civilian outcry to drop a distribution deal for Atomic’s Fallujah first person shooter, is pleased that the salient gangbang modules will find their way to end-user Marine Corps wannabes. Konami already has a bestselling Raper II title, an Okinawa schoolgirl adventure for American servicemen. Konami’s own one-handed programmers are set to adapt the Atomic code for the Japanese market. The human trafficking of Iraqi orphans into US contractor Army brothels becomes Korean Comfort Women; US combat depravity becomes The Rape of Nanking.

Deprived of being able to cash in on the Fallujah atrocity allure, Atomic Games is looking for sympathy from the Support the Troops crowd. Atomic laid off the soldiers on its staff, issuing this statement:

“We wish to assure the dozens of Marine veterans who have collectively invested hundreds of hours in this project that, while we have been badly wounded, we will fight on. The stories of your brothers’ courage and sacrifice in Fallujah must be shared with the world.”

By historical accounts, are they referring to the virtual sequences between the levels of action which act like silent movie inter-titles to link the running and jumping to a bigger story? Where the plot points are inviolate can be the only teaching moments in an otherwise chose-your-adventure killing spree. Where will there be opportunity for gamers to show courage and sacrifice with only a menu of rape and murder?

Let’s be clear. The Fallujah video game was not about soldiering. It did not mean to replicate the experience of 99.9% of the American soldiers who served in the battle for Fallujah. A first person shooter is not about following orders, falling in, or self-sacrifice. An FPS is about four wheeling a personal path of personal destruction. Atomic’s Six Days in Fallujah was a spring break for Grand Theft Auto sex tourists.

NMT is equally concerned about the lost Fallujah stories which may have been the narrative of the gameplay. The world should hear of the turning back all male refugees, of the White Phosphorous and sniper Free Fire Zones. The lost Fallujah action sequences no doubt exploited the armored vehicles crushing the Iraqi wounded, and the role of the helicopter gunships over the river, Red Bridge and the Fallujah hospital.

Take the ACLU Facebook quiz to see what kind of open book you are

Maybe you don’t fear facing off with an army intelligence interrogator, FBI detective, or secret service agent sitting in a Fusion Center determined to anticipate your next move. But what about a loan officer, insurance adjuster, arbitration negotiator, prospective employer, or plaintiff’s lawyer taking your deposition, who’s armed with your psychological profile made up of your Facebook quiz answers? Your plan to defeat an IRS polygraph by clenching your butt-cheeks is a plan B of olden days. The ACLU has been anticipating these eventualities for you. They’ve devised their own Facebook quiz to illustrate.

The Facebook disclaimer makes clear, between the lines, that when you “allow” an application access to your personal information, the app’s third party can suck up every last detail of your file, “for the quiz to work.” It also grants access to each of your friends’ entire files, each time YOU click “allow.”

Now you may feel like you’ve put everything up on Facebook voluntarily. You can presume your friends did too. And although our info is limited to our friend circles, we probably assume that determined sleuths can extract it all anyway. And that’s certainly true. Even casual idiots can sidle up to glean important details without arousing our suspicions. We presume no insurance company or parole officer is going to preemptively fill their files with happenstance biographical queries, and so we feel safe.

We overlook that the great value of social networks to us, the web of connections, provides the filing tabs by which information aggregators can accumulate their data in a useful, ie. commercial, manner.

Soon we’ll have to worry about underwriters or graduate schools or fiance’s parents dismissing us outright based on our DNA. When that day comes, every marriage will be arranged, and preschools will have sufficient information to accept applicants in utero.

For now the thought of an accessible collation of my Watson-Glaser, Yale-Brown, Myers-Briggs, and which-potted-plant-most-resembles-you tests already hinders my being able to look you in the eye. I am who I want to be, and my 16th Century royaum is shrinking.

Antiwar COS -report from the front line

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009COLO. SPRINGS- Well, that wasn’t so hard. Our message was warmly received by soldiers who shook our hand in the staging area, and afterward we were thanked by others for what we are trying to do. Antagonism came from the crowd, but not as fiercely as we’d braced ourselves for. Eight years of horror has taken the edge off the “these colors don’t run” mentality. Hence the military imperative for parades like these. Our antiwar presence was all the more important to show the soldiers that some at home are fighting to rescue them. The rest of the attendees were giving them a “welcome home” as they did in 2004, and will keep doing only to redeploy them. The soldiers need to see more real support: a determination to stop these wars.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009

Compatriots of ours were circulating along the sidewalk with this flier:

We ask that you consider the costs of war
as you take part in this celebration.

War kills people. War hurts people.
War kills animals. War destroys things.
War devastates the environment.

This parade is a propaganda exercise
promoted by those who profit from war.

The money spent on war could go to
making friends instead of enemies.
Many of us are mourning today not celebrating.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
Note the “American Furniture Warehouse” is the most prominent part of that “thank you” handout.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
This woman was trying to drown us out with cat whistles, until I took her picture.

More of our HEALTH CARE NOT WARFARE contingent stood further south on the corner, just out of frame.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
Also not pictured:
LET’S NOT WORSHIP WAR, and U.S. OUT OF AFGHANISTAN,
and my banner backdrops WAR NO MORE and PEACE NOW.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
A young group made threats and tried to crowd us out, until the police intervened.

We were most appreciative of the officers’ prompt interventions, although one officer’s method was hardly comforting. He told one young lady, in a voice for us to overhear: “I know. If it were my choice I’d rip them from the sidewalk, but they have a right to be here.” We took that more as an expression of sympathy than an attempt to intimidate us.

Colorado Springs Tejon Street Parade August 29, 2009
Five officers all told, protected us, from leaping unto the parade route.

Coloradans4Peace condemn COS parade

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: COLORADANS-FOR-PEACE CONDEMNS COLORADO SPRINGS PRO-WAR PARADE.
 
–And why not? The rationales for the Iran and Afghanistan wars have been repudiated by the Obama administration. What place has this city to celebrate them? The wars have been declared illegal by international magistrates. How then can Americans presume to cheer their soldiers’ actions? Regardless the jingoism of the Colorado Springs community, to idealize militarism, while thousands of innocent civilians suffer under its boot every day, is unconscionable. A bigoted majority of Lamborn voters want to lynch a certain black man, should we give them a permit?

The antiwar message directed to whom?

Cindy Sheehan may be glamping again. This time it’s Martha’s Vineyard, where Sheehan is prepared to lay siege to another presidential vacation. Which certainly highlights what’s become undeniable about Barack Obama. He heralds no change. And I’m not prepared to hope the effectiveness of petitioning our leaders has changed either. Bush answered to no one, Obama won’t even dance with them who thought they elected him. The antiwar message has no one’s ear. Let’s put it to the American people.

Who’s empowered our military commanders to direct their war crimes? We. Who’s encouraging our soldiers to execute their assigned tasks? We.

We “support the troops, not the war.” It’s the distinction between manslaughter and premeditated murder. In practice, we fully support the war effort. Of greater horror, by wishing to see the fighting wrapped up properly, we are prepared to condone the gravest brutality.

The war machine has coopted the word “peace.” The soldiers are “peacekeepers” after all. Peace has come to denote “world peace” actually, the Utopian spiritual quest. Like eternal salvation, world peace is paid lipservice, no one is so unreasonable as to expect its fulfillment.

In this life anyway, which defines the religious American’s aversion to participatory antiwar efforts.

I still am warmed when I see a peace symbol unexpectedly. They have become more ubiquitous, haven’t they? Now I see peace stickers on cash registers where cigarettes are sold.

We’re all for peace. It’s what America is doing abroad, via the Peace Corps or The Corps, pacification.

Treesit halts W. Va mountaintop removal

W-Va Treesitters Nick Stocks and Laura SteepletonMountain Justice activists Laura Steepleton and Nick Stocks continue to occupy trees adjacent Massey Energy’s West Virginia coal mine, preventing further blasting of the Edwight mountaintop removal site. Assistants at the base of the trees were arrested for trespassing, but called back, expected to help the police communicate with the sitters.
Earth First! spokesman Mike Roselle has been visited by State troopers, demanding he command the Coal River Valley treesitters to climb down. Check Climate Ground Zero for updates, where you can leave messages of encouragement.

From Climate Ground Zero:

This is the thirteenth in a series of non-violent direct actions and protests that have brought together Coal River Valley residents, NASA climate scientist James Hansen, students, underground miners, military veterans, concerned citizens and environmentalists from across the nation with the goal of ending mountaintop removal. This is the third protest in two weeks to focus attention on the WV Department of Environmental Protection and their embattled Secretary, Randy Huffman. It also follows days after the leak of DEP biologist Doug Wood’s memo on the scale of environmental degradation caused by mountaintop removal, directly contradicting Huffman’s statements at a senate hearing last June.

UPDATE: DAY FIVE
A flyover of the treesit and adjacent decapitated mount. Audio is radio interview of Massey Energy director explaining that land ownership means you can do whatever you want to it.

Some screen grabs from the video.
Laura Steepleton at Pettry Bottom Treesit

Nick Stocks at Pettry Bottom Treesit

Aerial overview of Pettry Bottom, Massey Operation, and Steepleton-Stocks Treesit

Flyover view of treesit banners preventing blasting at Massey Edwight Mine

Treachery on the Springs City Council!

COLORADO SPRINGS- I have to admit dropping my guard on the TABOR issue yesterday after 5 out of 4 council members pledged on Monday to vote in favor of putting reform on the November ballot. Private citizens who testified before the council went home satisfied that the city had heeded their words. No such luck. On Tuesday when the official vote was taken, two of the members changed their vote to NO. Council woman Jan Martin and Mayor Lionel Rivera decided to reverse what they’d told the public they’d do.

I was most surprised to see Mayor Rivera presiding with his usual pomp. Alive and well. From local editorials I got the distinct impression the disgraced mayor was no longer even showing his face. Apparently being caught serving moneyed interests, does not shame our local bureaucrats. They’re in the pocket of developers, they know it and we know it. Putting it in print doesn’t inform anyone I guess.

Lamborn’s NO HEALTHCARE teabaggers want to hear from YOU

According to CSAction, snively congressman Doug Lamborn has sent out 70,000 mailers, billed to the taxpayer, to disseminate the insurance biz wingnut falsehoods about health care reform. He’s hoping to reconstitute a teabagger assembly at a public meeting on Thursday evening, August 27, at the Valley Hi Golf Course on Colorado Springs’ Southeast side. Get there early with YOUR message. 5PM, Chelton and Airport. The anti-tax teabaggers hate standing next to signs that don’t represent them, so think of some slogans that do. How about: DO UNTO OTHERS, or
FAITH HOPE CHARITY, or “as you did to the least of My brethren,
you did it to Me.” -Matt 25:40

CSAction has posted talking points and updates. Here are Mark’s arguments:

Representative Doug Lamborn has just sent out an estimated 70,000 mailers “prepared, published and mailed at taxpayer expense” that are full of LIES and disinformation about the healthcare reform bills. It’s only estimated to be 70,000 because, when asked about the total number mailed, LAMEborn’s Communications Director Catherine Mortensen, “I have the figures, but I don’t have the authority to give them to you.”

Actually they don’t have the authority to withhold that information because it’s public record, given that this pack of LIES was “prepared, published and mailed at taxpayer expense.”

The mailer says “114 million could lose their current health care coverage under the bill”. This is a LIE!

This absurd figure comes from “The Impact of the House Health Reform Legislation Coverage and Provider Incomes,” by the Lewin Group. The Lewin Group is a “research” and management consulting (lobbyist) firm owned entirely by the second largest health insurer in the nation, UnitedHealth Group.

Furthermore, the “research” does NOT show 114 million LOOSING healthcare but CHANGING insurers, AND an additional 9.4 million being insured that are not now. It’s a total guess as to how many would change over to the public plan, if offered. The 114 million was a figure the Lewin Group published in June, which they revised DOWN to 88.1 million in July, so it’s not even their most current LIE.

The Congressional Budget Office came to a different conclusion, saying that enrollment in the House Democrats’ proposed public plan would total 11 million to 12 million people.

The Lewin Group is part of Ingenix, a wholly-owned UnitedHealth subsidiary that was accused by the New York attorney general and the American Medical Association of helping insurers shift medical expenses to consumers by distributing skewed data. Ingenix supplied UnitedHealth and other insurers with data that allegedly understated the “reasonable and customary” doctor fees that insurers use to determine how much they will reimburse consumers for out-of-network care.

In January, United Health agreed to a $350 million settlement with the AMA, and a $50 million settlement with the New York attorney general, covering conduct going back as far as 1994, when they were distributing skewed information to fight President Clinton’s healthcare reforms.

Next LIE in this mailer: “4.7 million jobs that could be lost as a result of tax hikes on small businesses”.

This absurd figure comes from an op-ed piece written by House minority leader John Boehner, who admitted to distributing bribes from Big Tobacco on the floor of the House. He says got the figures according to the methodology developed by Christina Romer, the chair of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Obama administration. She NEVER said such a thing, and he obviously he doesn’t understand her methodology.

What did she really say?

“The current healthcare system does not work well for small businesses.”

“They pay about 18% more for comparable coverage than a big firm, and that puts them at a competitive disadvantage.”

“Healthcare reform is ABSOLUTELY aimed at easing those burdens.”

“The plan has a tax credit for small businesses.”

Watch her entire statement here.

Lewin Group Vice President John Sheils admits 114 million would NOT lose their employer-sponsored coverage AND they wouldn’t be forced into a government-run health plan. Rather, they would be able to choose between the government plan and other private options, through the exchange, and “they might very well be better off,” he said.

But not all of the firm’s corrupt reports see the light of day. For example, a study for the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association was never released, Sheils said.

“Let’s just say, sometimes studies come out that don’t show exactly what the client wants to see. And in those instances, they have [the] option to bury the study — to not release it, rather,” Sheils said.

CSaction reminds everyone present to be peaceful in word and action and not behave like the industry stooges disrupting town halls and shouting down citizens.

Noblesse Oblige gone with Ted Kennedy

Ted, Robert and JackTed Kennedy, last high-born American public servant, exits stage left. The Kennedy brothers set a fine example of how to account for yourself once you have enough money. Today it’s thought sufficient to follow in Rockerfeller’s footsteps: donate the requisite sums to be called a philanthropist, or occupy high offices to entrench the family riches.

We refer to the Kennedy Family as American Royalty, in reality John, Robert and Theodore were not even well-born. They were ordinary kids when Joseph Kennedy built his empire on bootlegging and racketeering. Even ascended, the Kennedys had nothing on the Vanderbilts and the Astors, nor the Carnegies or Morgans.

The Kennedys were dubbed a pop-honorary monarchy with the reign of JFK of Camelot. It was the shortest of dynasties. Youngest brother Ted’s extended preeminence in the Senate stands perhaps as America’s singular example in modern times of a wealthy scion, in more than just appearances, looking after the interests of the common man.

Now Americans like their nobles in their own image. Self-interested hedonists, who shoot for the moon, save Africa one baby at a time, and screw the lesser-fittest with a wink and a grin.

Lt. Calley finally apologizes for My Lai

antiwar poster by haeberle and brandtLt. William Calley has expressed remorse for the first time for leading the 1968 My Lai Massacre. Although he still maintains he was only following orders. Calley was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role, but President Nixon commuted his punishment to three years of house arrest. Who should have been accountable for the 500 civilians executed in My Lai?

Right-wing KVOR radio goon tries to intimidate city council

Talk radio goonI snapped this photo at Monday’s city council meeting: A stringer for right-wing KVOR radio holds his microphone up to the chamber’s amplification system. Curiously, he only assumed this conspicuous stance when the council members were explaining their votes, and then, ONLY for those anticipated to speak against TABOR and its proponents.

As the councilmen vied to straddle the fence on the issue, this gentleman would slowly stand whenever someone’s reasoning appeared to vacillate against the interests of the anti-tax wingnuts, Local Liberty Action, and teabagger Sean Paige.

The Devil’s Miner

TioAre you looking for a good children’s film, and a film for the whole family to watch? Are you looking for a film where your children can learn about an alternative universe, and one that our American government has helped make? Then check out The Devil’s Miner.
 
Bolivian children labor in the silver mines of Cerro Rico, dating back to the 16th century, where devout Catholic miners sever their ties with God upon entering the mountain.

Swine Flu in Colorado Springs

COLORADO SPRINGS- When the swine flu hits the fan, contrary to all earlier scaremongering, H1N1 is no scatological disaster. I have an example: Without even looking, we know of two confirmed cases of swine flu in Colorado Springs School District 12. You wouldn’t know it to talk to the school, the city, the newspapers, or County Health. Is that odd?

No one in affluent neighborhoods wants TV cameras at their door, to interview surgical-masked family members in a living room covered in plastic.

In households with a doctor in the family, the afflicted is served Tamilflu and no one is the wiser. In others it’s enough to visit the doctor’s office to hear it’s just the flu for God’s sake. Leave the child in bed to recuperate. No need to keep siblings from going to school. Except from the rumors that will spread, there’s no cause for alarm.

We confirmed the stories from D-12 with phone calls, and so can you. Check with who should or should not be alerting you. Do it. Good grief, think of how many other unreported cases must be out there. Our two cases had to come from somewhere!

Hopefully when the Swine Flu vaccine ramps up, you’ll have seen what H1N1 really looks like up close.

Weiss TABOR reform has votes to pass!

larry small john weissCOLORADO SPRINGS- I attended a COS city council meeting today, lured by the prospect that Vice Mayor Larry Small was going to call the CS Independent publisher a liar to his face.

I’m always excited at the prospect of differences of opinion reaching a level of incivility. Do we care about these issues? Or is it all about liking each other, regardless who’s oppressing whom? We gentlemen debaters, after all, are never those affected by the injustices in question.

To the city’s credit, Small made it a point at the very start of the meeting to make a public apology. He and John Weiss shook hands and that was that. What’s more, he cast his vote with Weiss’s proposal, a deciding vote, to put repeal of the city’s TABOR restrictions on the next ballot.

Small is not saying he’s for it, simply considering that it might be germane to consult the voters. Where it stands, the city council members declared their intentions on how they will vote tomorrow, and 5-4, they intend to back the proposal.

Without any name calling.

That said, some pyrotechnics can very easily be a bore. For example, there were grunts from the peanut gallery at this meeting, in particular from ex-editorial page tyrant Sean Paige. The silver-locked loudmouth, now shilling for Local Liberty Action, sat in the back and harrumphed as Weiss gave his reasons for reforming TABOR. Although Paige is no longer with the Gazette, I’ve seen him gesticulating at local Teaparty rallies. Like his Norquesque mentors, the editorial bully is set on strangling the baby in the bathwater.

How satisfying then to see Paige grovel before city council to urge them “not to throw [his TABOR] baby out with the bath water.”

Paige spoke as if “TABOR proponents” need to be consulted in any ongoing discussions about reforming it. Just because those idiots got the law passed, and doomed municipalities to impoverished services, who is to say their voice should have a grandfather clause? Here’s a chance for city council to hear the cries of outrage from Colorado Springs residents who want the damn thing repealed. They want their public services back.

TABOR was an initiative which asserted that a citizen couldn’t trust their representatives with tax dollars. What does it mean to have councilmen say they “believe in TABOR.” They know they shouldn’t be trusted? Did they run for election on that slogan?

Here’s a chance for the city pols to grab the reins. What else are they supposed to be deciding at their jobs?

And they took it, with four dissenting opinions. First, Bernie Herpin, who doesn’t see any reason to rush to address TABOR’s ratchet lunacy.

Another no vote comes from Jerry Heimlicher. The meeting’s highlight was Councilman Jerry Heimlicher’s kiss-fest with Sean Paige. Let Westside voters who rejected Democrat Dave Gardner as an alternative, note what Heimlicher can be very obstinate when he’s decided he’d rather give in to the Teabaggers.

Two more NOs came from Glen and Purvis. Purvis took the chance to compare proponent Richard Skorman’s voice to the sound of a belt sander. He explained how Skorman had interrupted his weekend of fixing his deck.

Tom Gallagher was the councilman who brought the issue for his colleagues to decide. He spoke about how incredulous it was that he was siding with Weiss on an issue, and hesitated greatly to defy his conservative friends. “I live on their side of the playing field.” But he lead the support. With Hente, Small, Martin and Rivera joining him.

Did I say Rivera? Yes.

We all looked at each other in surprise, but there it was, Mayor Lionel Rivera saying he thought it was a capital idea to give the citizens of the city the last word on whether to reform TABOR.

Scott Hente made the day’s most noteworthy remark. He thanked the assembled crowd for having upheld a civil discourse. He was impressed that it was unlike the many town hall meetings he’s been seeing on the news. I took this to be acknowledgment that he recognized the sawdust floor populism emanating from Sean Paige’s back corner.

Red White and Brave Welcome Home

Colorado Springs will be hosting a parade on August 29 to welcome troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Its predecessor was a 2004 victory parade, this one is billed as a Red White and Brave Welcome Home. You might shy from holding an antagonistic banner like “I DON’T WORSHIP WAR,” but imagine a message draped from a balcony along Tejon Ave! WELCOME HOME, NOW STAY HOME or WHAT HAPPENS IN IRAQ, STAYS IN IRAQ or my favorite, addressed to the 50,000-plus expected to attend: WE’RE CELEBRATING THE MURDER OF HOW MANY CIVILIANS?

This isn’t a Veterans’ Day parade right? It’s one thing to be honoring troops. This parade is an appreciation, a “go get’em” to soldiers returned from Iraq to be redeployed to Afghanistan.

This parade is about recruiting more soldiers. It’s to show prospective recruits that the community supports what they do and are thrilled to send them off again to Afghanistan.

Would protesting the event represent any significant population of Colorado Springs? Although the majority of even this city are against the continued conflicts, I’ve no doubt very few dare speak out against the wars.

That’s where to come out in protest of the glorification of militarism is not about a democratic representation. It’s about what’s right. If 99% of Pikes Peak area residents were just fine with blowing unfortunate Afghan and Iraqi children to bits, I would still object to their wanting to hold a public parade to celebrate it. Let the world see that not every last one of us in Colorado Springs gets off on the carnage we’ve been perpetrating for going on eight years.

Michael Moore writes a Capitalism tell-all

denial of human rightsMichael Moore is premiering CAPITALISM, A LOVE STORY at Venice and Toronto. “By spending just a few millions dollars to buy Congress, Wall Street was given billions.” In a scene from the preview, Moore asks Blue Dog Dem Congressman Baron Hill: “How did this collapse happen?”

Said Hill: “I got home on a Friday, everything was just fine; I called back after my plane landed in Indiana and all of a sudden we’ve got this crisis on our hands.”

Top 10 Westerns, if you ask the French

rio bravo directed by Howard Hawks
 
Are you a fan of the American Western? How do you think your taste might match a survey of French film critics? Though we mock their high regard for Jerry Lewis, let’s allow that France has a film history that predates ours, and a legacy of critical journals beyond the reach of our Hollywood shills. Besides which, the golden age of the movie western lies well between the brothers Lumiére and the Nouvelle Vague. Perusing John Cawelti’s The Six-Gun Mystique published in 1976, I found a list of the TOP TEN GREATEST WESTERNS. Think any of your favorites made the list?

Your odds improve because ties were listed as individual ranks, so the entire top ten comprises almost 100 titles. The survey excludes works made after the early seventies obviously.

Joan Crawford stars in Johnny GuitarTOP TEN WESTERNS

1. Johnny Guitar — Nicholas Ray

2. Rio Bravo — Howard Hawks

3. The Big Sky — Howard Hawks, w. AB Guthrie

4. (tie)
The Naked Spur — Anthony Mann
Rancho Notorious — Fritz Lang
Man Without a Star — King Vidor

5. (tie)
My Darling Clementine — John Ford
The Left-Handed Gun — Arthur Penn, w. Gore Vidal
The Searchers –John Ford
Ride the High County — Sam Peckenpah

6. (tie)
Silver Lode — Allan Dwan
Red River — Howard Hawks
Duel in the Sun — King Vidor
The Hanging Tree — Delmer Daves
Run of the Arrow — Sam Fuller
Seven Men From Now — Budd Boetticher

7. (tie)
The Last Hunt — Richard Brooks
The Far Country — Anthony Mann
Colorado Territory — Raoul Walsh
Wagonmaster –John Ford
The Unforgiven — John Huston
Man of the West — Anthony Mann
Heller in Pink Tights — George Cukor, w. Louis L’Amour

8. (tie)
Man From Laramie — Anthony Mann
The Plainsman — Cecil B. DeMille
Western Union — Fritz Lang
Winchester 73 — Anthony Mann
Warlock — Edward Dmytryk
They Died with their Boots On — Raoul Walsh
The Last Frontier — Anthony Mann
The Last Wagon — Delmer Daves
River of No Return — Otto Preminger

9. (tie)
Stagecoach — John Ford, w. Ernest Haycock
The Outlaw — Howard Hughes, w. Ben Hecht
Billy the Kid — King Vidor
Comanche Station — Budd Boetticher
The Wonderful Country — Robert Parrish, w. Tom Lea
Wichita — Jacques Tourneur
3:10 to Yuma — Delmer Daves, w. Elmore Leonard
The Magnificent Seven — John Sturges, w. Akira Kurosawa
Gunfight at the OK Corral — John Sturges, w. Leon Uris
Tennessee’s Partner — Allan Dwan, w. Bret Harte

10. (Another 45 titles, including)
Shane — George Stevens
The Misfits — John Huston, w. Arthur Miller
Major Dundee — Sam Peckinpah
One Eyed Jacks — Marlon Brando
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre — John Huston, w. B. Traven
The Gold Rush — Charlie Chaplin
Go West — Buster Keaton
Fort Bravo — John Sturges

I’m a good old rebel

Excepting that the South fought for slavery and rural feudalism, their nostalgia is libertarian. Is that the enduring emotional charge behind flying the Confederate flag? Hoyt Axton recorded I’m a Good Old Rebel as being a “song of the Civil War,” but the spirit is decidedly Post.

I’m a Good Old Rebel
 
Oh, I’m a good old rebel, now that’s just what I am.
For this here land of freedom I do not give a damn.
I’m glad I fought against it, I only wish we’d won.
I ain’t asked any pardon for anything I’ve done.
 
I hates the Yankee nation and eveythin’ they do.
I hates the Declaration of Independence too.
I hates the glorious union, ’tis dripping with our blood.
I hates the striped banner, I fought it all I could.
 
I rode with Robert E. Lee for three years there about.
Got wounded in four places and I starved at Point Lookout.
I caught the rheumatism a campin’ in the snow,
But I killed a chance of Yankees, and I’d like to kill some more.
 
Three hundred thousand Yankees is stiff in Southern dust.
We got three hundred thousand before they conquered us.
They died of Southern fever and Southern steel and shot.
I wished it was three million, instead of what we got.
 
I can’t take up my musket and fight ’em down no more,
But I ain’t a-goin’ to love them now, that is certain sure.
I won’t be reconstructed, I’m better now than them.
And for that carpetbagger, I don’t give a damn.
 
Oh, I’m a good old rebel, now that’s just what I am
And for this Yankee nation I do no give a damn.
I’m glad I fought against her, I only wish we’d won.
I ain’t asked any pardon for anything I’ve done.

There is no License to Kill

“Licensed to Kill” was an Ian Fleming invention. His friend Richard Meinertzhagen dropped Fleming’s phrase for guests to infer he was a secret agent. RM’s routine of arriving at diner parties with a smoking gun reinforced whispers that he had been the inspiration for James Bond. Meinertzhagen turned out to be a flake, but the authority to play god is still coveted by espionage idolators. Federal statutes prohibit identifying covert CIA operatives, regardless what they’ve done. Is that the same thing? A mythical supra legem indemnity? Sorry Virginia, nemo est.

Okay, some today are above the law, notable examples being Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Woo, et al. The jury is still out on who will atone for the Bush Co crimes. But should the Neocon exemption cover assassination squads and torturers too?

The US Department of Justice is up in arms -Fox News probably more than anybody- having learned that defense lawyers for terrorist suspects in US custody, have shown their clients photographs of CIA and private contractor interrogators, to learn which of them might have engaged in harsh techniques defined by the rest of the world as torture.

The John Adams Project, run jointly by the ACLU and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, is an effort to document the US torture in Guantanamo and our secret prisons around the globe. The ACLU assures all indignant patriots that asking the detainees to identify their torturers is completely legal.

Researchers for the project have been snapping pictures outside the homes of retired and active, CIA and intelligence industry interrogators. No names have been released except Deuce Martinez, who’d already been outed by the NYT. Martinez was the agent responsible for interrogating Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, although accounts soft-pedal his participation in the harsher techniques.

That’s the pattern of exposes about torture, those named always claim to have left the room. A remarkably similar motif accompanied the account of CIA interrogator John Kiriakou.

Two well-known names were doctors who attended to the tortured, later opening a consulting firm to train CIA interrogators.
Dr. Jim Mitchell and Dr. Bruce Jessen specialized in maximizing harsh interrogation, and making sure the victim didn’t die.

The defense lawyers have circulated the photographs of 60 suspected perpetrators, but have named only Martinez so far. How are torturers and murderers to be brought to justice, if they are not unmasked?

We wanted Odysseus, we got Othello

America needs an Odysseus, obviously, to outwit the Cyclops and put out his eye. Against the all-seeing American health insurance lobby, our politicians are virtually powerless. To overcome this omniscient villainy without an Odysseus, the only hope is to rush the monster all at once — and all at once, put it to the sword. Senators and congressmen may say the industry is too powerful to defy, I do not doubt it. But if all act in unison, the beast’s threats will be its last, and come to naught.

But isn’t that courageous scenario as plausible as hoping Obama could be our Odysseus? Greed is so much more persuasive than cooperation. Pitted against each other, the Senators collect huge bounties from their lobbyists. If they slay the great Insurance dragon, to the jubilant acclaim of their constituents, they gain nothing. A big, collective nothing for their pains.

But it’s a lovely fantasy. Eradicate the damn thing entirely. Exterminate it from root to tentacle. Decapitate the leaders, parade the profiteers before their angry victims, strip their families of their riches, make examples of them all. Put every last of their agents on the unemployment line. Or better, hold truth and reconciliation hearings to let the Little Eichmans face the aggrieved survivors of insurance casualties.

I’d like to see the insurance company employees squirm, in particular those attending the health care town halls, pretending to speak for common citizens, in reality trying to protect their miserable jobs. What if instead they feared for their lives? If we cannot reach their consciences, let us tickle their throats.

If the health care reform debate is going to raise mobs, it should rouse lynch mobs. Call for the blood of the 3rd party criminals, who feather their planes and yachts and mansions with the last breaths of millions.

The media are quibbling about the 46 million uninsured, belittling the number because it’s really only “everyone’s best guess.” What about the rest of us, the uninsured insured, and the under-insured insured. The health insurers take our money, but offer, when a claim must be made, only mediocre coverage, if any at all. Of course only the sick learn they have inadequate coverage.

If you worry the sick do not number enough to sway the American public, be assured the number will only grow bigger. But even if you count only the sick as victims of the insurance crisis, you must consider that the sense of security of the healthy is lost as well.

Until such time that angry Americans can storm the insurance monoliths, because their representatives in DC won’t do it, we hold out hope for a passing Odysseus. Unfortunately what we got was an Othello, against an Iago far too cunning.

Americans want clemency only for their own

How gracious of us! The US is beneficiary of a succession of clemencies shown to American citizens. Iran releases an American propagandist, North Korea forgives two more, Myanmar allows us to extricate a oddly errant citizen. All of them Americans, for which we are thankful, but still indignant and unrepentant. When Scotland elects to release a Libyan prisoner on compassionate grounds, the US president cannot object enough.

Do I compare a terrorist against journalists; someone who’s been incarcerated since 1990, versus 2009; someone extradited based on dubious testimony versus Americans caught red-handed?

When Abdel Basset al-Megrahi returned to a hero’s welcome in Libya, American family members of Lockerbie victims are incensed. The man spent nearly two decades in prison, maintaining his innocence throughout. Al-Megrahi only dropped his appeal when the Scottish court indicated it might grant him clemency. Nevertheless, the usual parade of American terrorism-decriers still want his blood. The families of victims received compensation strong-armed from Libya. They have to believe in al-Megrahi’s guilt or else question their entitlement to the payments.

Do Americans know the evidence upon which Abdel Basset al-Megrahi was convicted? Forensic experts found fragments of a shirt thought to have been wrapped around the bomb aboard Pan Am Flight 103. The garment was traced to a small slothing store in Malta, where the clerk identified al-Megrahi months later, from a photograph shown him by US investigators, as the customer who purchased the item.

Al-Megrahi made this statement upon his release:

“I always believed I would come back if justice prevailed … I say in the clearest possible terms, which I hope every person in every land will hear – all of this I have had to endure for something that I did not do,”

Who put the bomb into the suitcase, and who got the suitcase on the plane? How did the suitcase bomb escape detection by airport security? Was the package sneaked past inspectors through a security breach created by US law enforcement, to smuggle heroin across the Atlantic in a sting operation targeting a drug ring?

Al-Megrahi wanted such questions answered, to bring to light his innocence. The great travesty of al-Megrahi’s release is that there will be no further scrutiny. All the international participants, it’s being reported rather candidly, are relieved. The US is bellowing not about the miscarriage of justice, but about letting a non-American off the hook.

Putting Doug Bruce petitions on the run

Pushing tax reduction petitions
WESTSIDE, COLORADO SPRINGS- A signature gatherer pushing Doug Bruce petitions was doing miserably well outside the Uintah King Soopers today, but I was able to interrupt for the quarter hour I could spare. Give him your 15-cents worth when you come for groceries. He’ll run, watch:

As you go in, and when you come out, take a few minutes to intervene as this guy collects signatures to lower municipal taxes. These kind of measures are why the bathrooms remain locked in our city parks, and why the city and county have had to cut back on services. But the signature collectors won’t tell you who’s behind their petitions. Nor have they any answers about the ramifications of their proposed legislation.

Unfortunately this guy is otherwise very good at drawing people in. In the photograph above, note that he has three clipboards distributed, and he’s trying for a fourth, notice two customers have pen in hand.

Ask him if Doug Bruce is behind these petitions. He told me he didn’t know. I knew, so I told him, and I occasioned to help him inform others as he approached westside residents. When the name “Doug Bruce” is mentioned, people smile and steer clear. This guy kept his distance sooner than entertain a discussion. You need only stand by the door to ward him off.

Obviously I couldn’t do that forever. He resumed as soon as I left. When I came back from the car with my camera, he saw me coming, gathered his clipboards and split. Now it was no surprise to me that he wouldn’t want to be documented doing what he was, but an impartial observer might wonder, what was his hurry? This guy took off on a dead run and reconsidered only when he realized I followed straight after and was overtaking him.

petition signature collector
He ran from me so fast I wished I’d recorded the scene in video. Well, next time.

petition signature collector

petition signature collector

petition signature collector

Back to skool week again

back to school againI’ve forgotten: is school the hard-fought birthright that enables men to guard their liberty with an educated vigilance, or is it where the majority become indoctrinated to march in lockstep upon the rest? Inhancing our kids’ nuturing with information they wouldn’t be getting from their parents is beginning to resemble the school inoculations, whether mandatory or coerced. The schools will make fascists of our children or they will kill them.

Company wolves in nonpartisan clothing

Would you believe it? Not My Tribe is “nonpartisan!” We favor neither Republican or Democrat, although current usage presumes you are of course one or the other, it’s just that you’ve agreed not to show bias. Nonpartisan is not “non-aligned.” It does not mean you are neither. Nonpartisan has become more like “nondenominational.” Which means not of a specific religious adherence, but certainly belonging to one of them. And like nondenominational, isn’t it a ruse?

Religious events billing themselves as nondenominational are casting a big net hoping to lure other believers, making the implication that they need to escape their more demarcated sect. They’re after the heathen too, but make no mistake, that doesn’t mean they adjust their platform one iota.

Nonpartisan political groups cast themselves as aligned to neither major party. Laws governing nonprofits forbid party allegiance, but regulations don’t address the socio-political aims of their missions. Just as the term “nonprofit” describes just that entity’s balance sheets. It doesn’t reflect the nonprofit’s goals, from which sponsoring organizations definitely plan to profit.

The insurance company think tanks weighing in against health care reform are all nonpartisan non-profits. You can be a fully-owned research division and because you are neither particularly Republican nor Democrat, you can label yourself not of the fray.

Fox News although shamelessly willing to pervert “fair” and “balanced,” does not have the temerity to call themselves nonpartisan. It would expose the ruse. Propagandist Bill O’Reilly instead hides behind the less inobjective “independent.”

And so Not My Tribe is more accurately independent, because we keep company with neither corporate party, the left or the right.

Obviously are Left, Left, Left, and fully partisan. More akin to namesake Partisans who resisted the Nazi onslaught. Just as the capitalist wolves are corporate partisans in nonpartisan clothing.