exterminate the critics of torture

Senator Durbin speculates that if one were to hear of what goes on at Gitmo, one would have believed in happier times that these things took place at the most notorious internment camps of the previoius century and he is called a piece of excrement by right-wing superpatriots. Read the full story and debate at Orcinus.

Now that the Right has twisted this speculate analogy to mean "All US soldiers are Nazis," there are death threats flying around against Durbin.

In the comments, many said that Durbin's remarks are unhelpful. Unhelpful to whom I would like to ask.

On the Northwest flight back to the US, I watched parts of Vin Diesel's "The Pacifier" in which he plays a special opps soldier assigned to babysite a family of adorable blond children, and realized that the worship of the military flourishes unbounded in this country, for not only can Diesel drive a hummer and take out enemy under the cover of night, he can also change diapers and deal with teenage crises with one flex of his giant biceps. But that is not the most disturbing thing about this movie. The most disturbing thing is that the musical loving teenage son (read gay) who Diesel directs in the school production of The Sound of Music plays the Nazi sympathizing boyfriend of the Von Trapp daughter and none of this is mentioned. We just learn that it is all right to like musicals because Diesel can direct them better that the (bad gay) music teacher.

Something has snapped in this country. When the military and its practices are immune from criticism and seen to be all powerful, then militarism has triumphed.

Michael Kimmelman takes Venice

It would be too simple and a bit hysterical to say simply that Michael Kimmelman is a racist: his glibly wielded critical wand has so many other significant deficiencies, but in his latest effort at “covering” the Venice Biennale, Kimmelman mentions that he is disappointed by the Chinese pavilion, but does not include a single name of a Chinese artist. Although he proposes that this Biennale is all about an international perspective and the global village, it is apparent that while Kimmelman may have travelled from New York, he has never left the art world. He listens to the “buzz” on Venetian streets only to find those views confirmed by his own views. So instead of calling him a racist, or anti-Chinese (which would simply inflame nationalist tendencies already on the rise) let us just say that Kimmelman is a sloppy journalist with little editorial oversight. Thanks again New York Times for setting the bar so low: and once again, I have to ask, if the Times covers art in this manner how in God’s name can we trust them to cover issues about which one knows much less, such as the war in Iraq or Tom Delay’s malfeasance?

Back in the USA

Back in the US (in Brooklyn) and here are some first impressions, including self-critique:

1. Northwest Airlines sucks and it has the crankiest service crossing the Pacific. Is this because I have been completely immersed in the hyperconsumerist social order of Taiwan, which makes US airlines look like East German state monopolies?

2. The paranoia of airport security does not serve security interests. Why? Because they had to X-Ray Leo's giant stuffed baby alligator twice because it wasn't photographed correctly the first time. Not only is this a waste of time, I think that doing it "by the book" actually causes airport security employees to lose all initiative and intuition. Following the rules replaces "thinking on your feet." To remain alert, airport security should be able to use their intelligence -- blue baby alligators carried by four year olds should be X-rayed only once. But perhaps I am out of touch with the threat posed by these plush toys.

3. Yes, people are much bigger on this side of the Pacific. I feel downright slim. (Is weight relative?)

More to come soon -

And just as a footnote, the No to the European Constitution looks remarkably like a populist revolt against Europe's rulers, but the revolt spans left and right and has enormous reactionary potential.

Wired News should hire some real editors

In a piece that I was considering for this blog, Wired News reports on a group that is creating a pro-Evolution website. But the poorly written notice does a disservice to that cause, by turning off anyone who might otherwise be interested in such news: "National Academies has unveiled a new section of its website" [...] "the National Academies has long supported the position" - As if you have to trade grammar for science. Well, all I'm saying is: Wired News should hire some real editors who know about verbs, nouns, numbers, and basic grammar.

Europe's oldest civilisation

An extensive network of monuments discovered by archeologists indicates that Europe's oldest civilisation turns out to be 7000 years old - i.e. predating Stonehenge and the Pyramids by two millennia.

governmental Windows piracy

A deal with Microsoft aims at ending the piracy of Windows on thousands of Indonesian government computers, as the BBC reports - but the passive voice typical of news-speak does not make it clear whether Indonesia will pay $1 per affected computer to Microsoft, or whether they receive a dollar for each of their up to 50,000 computers running counterfeit Windows.

soviets take over DC train system

shot on the MARC commuter train between baltimore and washington, dc, this picture is evidence that totalitarian soviets are in fact taking over already in the US.

Lost Manga Superhero and Stray Dog

As seen on the streets of Taipei: stray dogs are a problem here. Dogs are loved, but they are abandoned without much thought as well. But who would throw out a Manga Superhero? Especially one so scantily clad? OK, he hasn't washed in a few days, and maybe the drug habit is a problem, but have a heart!

One of the strangest moments however was when I was sitting across from a conservative Chinese professor who said that Taiwan needed a more rational attitude towards pets. This was after I told him that there weren't so many stray dogs in the US. I think he had a moment of what the Australians call "cultural cringe." Let's pass a law encouraging a more rational attitude toward pet ownership seemed to be what he was suggesting.

Forget about Roach Motels, here is the Roach Coach

Roboroach courtesy of Garnet Hertz takes a different look at the notion of "hybridity." Simple, elegant: why can't technology learn from that greatest of survivors, the roach?

Europe's problems, covered by America

Read Yglesias on the US media coverage of the European constitution.

It's an important critique. But the other thing that needs to be said is that the neolibs like Friedman who carped that lazy Europeans need to take a reality check and adapt to the inevitability of Asia's capitalist work ethic are just plain wrong, and dangerously wrong about the meaning of the French and Dutch "no!"

Moreon this later.

Introducing Engadget China

Hot on the heels of my post about the gadget heaven that is Taiwan, one of my favorite bookmarks crosses the Pacific - introducing Engadget China.

Made in Taiwan

Not that anyone needs Wired to figure out that Taiwan is leading the way (after all, few economies are led by a top-down governmental initiative to transform into a "digital cultural island"...), but this article on gadgets is worth a gander: Cool Stuff, Made in Taiwan.

The problem with Mr Chen

By way of a friend from down under: The problem with Mr Chen is that he is going to test Australia's and any other democracy's mettle for that matter. Who can resist the giant RENMINBI and those cuddly pandas??? Maybe Australia and the US should just give up on their commitment to democracy and just support neoliberalism and free trade. But since they haven't quite yet, situations like this are going to put our commitment to protecting "enduring" freedom to the test.

Australia kisses up to China

Why is Chen Yonglin accusing Australia?

Because after he requested asylum, the Australians not only turned him down, they tipped off the Chinese consulate.

I didn't know he had been a Tiananmen activist who had been "re-educated." I suppose the re-education didn't completely take.

If it was a heft contest, Red Staters would win too!

West Virginia calls on CDC to investigate obesity. The American reportage on the epidemic of obesity afflicting the US neglects an unsavory fact that the Guardian points out. West Virginia, Alabama and Mississippi are the fattest AND poorest states in the nation. I'd like to get the red state blue state analysis on the epidemic of obesity and propose that where the people of the US have the least access to thoughtful and diverse journalism, so do they have no choice but to eat bad, fattening food. Subsisting on a diet of USA Today, Fox News, curly fries, super-sized soft drinks and jumbotronic burgers, they are being killed by industrial strength pablum and fat. Why would they want to exercise when any activity at all is discouraged by the military/industrial complex? And although in the 80s and 90s, cultural studies scholars were amazed by the ways in which Heartland consumers rebelled and transgressed, they didn't notice that these selfsame folks were eating themselves into a state of diabetic stupor. And the more unsatisfying the meal, the more you eat.

I would actually like to propose SERIOUSLY that the CDC study the connection between watching Fox News and obesity. There is a thing that might be called obesity of the mind encouraged by Murdoch and his ilk because the less you can move from the couch, the better.

I'm not necessarily blaming the media OR the Red States: I just thought that the "obesity epidemic" described here should be addressed in its psychic and political dimensions. Obese are victims here, but victims who identify with their oppressors.

We as a family have taken a few cross country drives now -- and the most marked thing about the rural middle is that there is so little choice of fare outside of multinationally operated fast food chains. The culture of overeating and eating badly is something like English working class pub cultures: it is a mark of authenticity to overeat and conformity to the values of overeating are rewarded by a sense of belonging. Now "lad" culture didn't profit multinationals, but overeating fast food does.

Remember the Future of Tiananmen

I meant to post on this yesterday, but you can read about how Hong Kong remembered the June 3/4 massacre of the student protesters in Tiananmen Square.

I must admit that I met one of the leading protesters in the US right after the massacre and I was not impressed. He had been smuggled out of the country by sympathetic Americans and admitted into the undergraduate class at Yale. Alternating between self-aggrandizement and pathetic immaturity, he may have gone on like some of his cohort to become successful entrepreneurs in the New Economy.

But if the protests were politically underdeveloped, they certainly provided many Chinese with a new sense of the future as a collective enterprise that could be forged through democratization of the country's institutions. That the government decided to put down this kind of social movement just shows that the Communists prefer the management of private dreams of commodity fetishism to anything that might be authentically socialist or collective.

I was in Duty Free with a group of comrades returning to Hong Kong through Melbourne. They had hundreds of dollars of Aussie dollars in cash in their fists as they shopped for and purchased case upon case of South Yarra Reds.

Today, a Chinese diplomat defects in Australia, but comes out of hiding in a rally in remembrance of the Tiananmen Massacre. Mr. Chen said that one of his reasons for defecting was his sense of endangerment after having offered help to practitioners of Falun Gong and "democracy activists."

Why are there so few like Mr. Chen? Well, you could say that tactics of intimidation such kidnapping, imprisonment without trial are remarkably effective at squashing dissent among Chinese, both at home and abroad.

Remember what the future might have been like if the protesters had succeeded in pushing for the political reforms in the Chinese government that would have led to a more open and just society.

Rushdie against "atheism lite"

In the Toronto Star, Salman Rushdie argues against "atheism lite"...

new on lacan.com

Jacques-Alain Miller, Une conversation avec Philippe Sollers
Rex Butler and Scott Stephens, Slavoj Zizek's Third Way

blogging from down under

Melbourne's Federation Square is truly beautiful. The pictures do not do justice to the place, but the bookstore of the National Gallery of Victoria was strangely vacuous, filled withn those glossily beautiful design and architecture books you think you have to buy and little more of real substance.

Across the street was a Christian bookstore called "The Word." I rushed over from a distance thinking, ah here it is, the real bookstore.

And then a second handbookstore down the street with a copious selection of horror and fantasy and sport books. Don't get me wrong, Melbourne is gorgeous: almost every building downtown has integrity of both design and function: but I couldn't even find a newspaper kiosk for many city blocks. Design stores, trendy boutiques, but none of those fantastically overstocked newspaper stands in NYC run by South Asians with everything from Hustler to the Paris Review. I'm only joking : ) actually. I never read either, but really, I've been a bit word starved in this stylin' town!

Sugar Free Tibet (made in China)

BoingBoing points out that these clever Oral Fixation Mints, in their 'Sugar Free Tibet' variety, promise to send 10% of proceeds to 'finding a no-violent solution to the Chinese-Tibetan Conflict' - but they are made in China...

fingering 'Deep Throat'

CNN reports that W Mark Felt, formerly #2 at the FBI, says he was'Deep Throat', and apparently Woodward and Bernstein concur. Felt had denied it in 1999, but a story in Vanity Fair seems to have convinced him to come clean... a novel without a hero? Vanity Fair indeed.

awoke to news from down under

Australia's Megafauna Coexisted With Humans: gigantic three tonne wombat-like creatures, a ferocious marsupial 'lion' and the world's all-time biggest lizard, as this article in Science Daily reports.