Well this is fucking disappointing.

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/01/31/415821/nations-largest-cancer-charity-caves-to-right-wing-pressure-ends-relationship-with-planned-parenthood/

The moron patrol strikes again.

The Professor strikes again.

Priceless Leykis -

http://www.leykis101.com/the-professors-blog/the-kind-of-chick-that-makes-us-sick

Yay Monsanto! USDA to rubber-sta ... uh .. approve Agent Orange-resistant seed!

http://grist.org/industrial-agriculture/monsantos-new-seeds-could-be-a-tech-dead-end/

... the “exciting” new seeds are simply resistant to more than one kind of pesticide. Rather than resisting Monsanto’s glyphosate-based Roundup alone, they will now also be resistant to Dow AgroScience’s pesticide 2,4-D .


“A new pesticide,“ you say. “How exciting!” Except 2,4-D, despite its catchy name, has been around since World War II. Not only is it one of the most commonly used pesticides in the world, but it came to further prominence in certain circles when it was incorporated as a main ingredient in Agent Orange.

Congrats to Monsanto and Frankenfood!

I offer my condolences to organic food, farmers and the rest of the human race,

My country - what a fucking shame.

http://www.truth-out.org/what-happened-canada/1327935024

Corporate power is global, and resistance to it cannot be restricted by national boundaries. Corporations have no regard for nation-states. They assert their power to exploit the land and the people everywhere. They play worker off of worker and nation off of nation. They control the political elites in Ottawa as they do in London, Paris and Washington. This, I suspect, is why the tactics to crush the Occupy movement around the globe have an eerie similarity—infiltrations, surveillance, the denial of public assembly, physical attempts to eradicate encampments, the use of propaganda and the press to demonize the movement, new draconian laws stripping citizens of basic rights, and increasingly harsh terms of incarceration.

Oh, you wonder why you didn't hear more objective coverage of the XL Pipeline in the American Establishment Media?

Here's why -

http://mediamatters.org/research/201201260005

A damming report to be sure. Of course the damage is already done to the interested segment of American public, as those who tuned in (as opposed to the majority of Americans who are largely tuned out), as they saw and digested what was there, and there was no instant talking point refuting done), but it's better than nothing.

Wow, talk about complicated!

http://sites.google.com/site/ahdnchord/ (h/t to The Beatles Bible)

The guitar chord is an Fadd9 (or as George Harrison stated, " F with a G on top").

Well it's something

Re-election speech or not, we'll see if this actually turns out to be something useful -

http://www.thenation.com/blog/165845/state-union-obama-stands-homeowners

In his State of the Union address last night, President Obama announced an important initiative to address the housing crisis: one that will help affected homeowners while investigating and punishing those who helped create the problem.


A new mortgage crisis unit, made of up state and federal officials, which will look into wrongdoing by banks in the area of real estate lending. The unit will be headed by Eric Schneiderman, the attorney general of New York and a solid advocate for being tough on the banks for their role in the mortgage crisis.

Who knew learning about cooking fried chicken would get your fucked over?

ACTA - SOPA and PIPA on a global level -

Guitar/Amp Channel Switcher?

Someday when I become a successful indulgent musician putting on a live concert, I'll likely have a number of different crunch sounds I'd need set up to perform different songs. Of course each sound will depend on the guitar, and the amp.

I'm not sure if something like what I'm imagining exists, but it'd be nice if there were some sort of guitar/amp channel switcher whereby I can connect multiple guitars to a signal, make the each guitar active only one at a time, and send that active signal to the amp I wish to use.

I should run this again someday and see what happens.

Why?

http://the-mound-of-sound.blogspot.com/2012/01/why-north-americans-dont-get-climate.html

One word: Denial.

Internet blackout to protest SOPA and PIPA potentially becoming law in US.

See why Wikipedia is taking that step here -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative/Learn_more

How to overpower the drumbeat of war?

http://consortiumnews.com/2012/01/12/herding-americans-to-war-with-iran/

If only they can be drowned out with riffs of reason and melodic peace.

Okay, enough with the musical puns.

I learned something today.

The greatest threat to society (and/or humanity, expanding beyond our horizons, improving the quality of life, etc) is institutionalized stupidity. When you see stupid people in positions of authority over others, you know the system or process that put that in place is fucked up.

Why? Because I've found stupid people don't use their authority for any useful purpose. They simply abuse it and others in doing so, and that screws us all.

SOPA/Protect IP Blackout‏

What is SOPA? - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOPA
What is Protect IP? - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PROTECT_IP_Act

Pretty horrid ...  but the real issue is, why haven't we heard a lot about it?

These guys (SaveTheInternet, and FreePress) have the answer.

Fucking establishment media again.

Do something about it - speak up.

Put some color into your life!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colors

I could spend all day reading this - fascinating stuff.

Speaking of ...

... the American Media Establishment and its potential right-wing connections ... here's the New York Times caught pushing right-wing lies in order to fan the flames of war with Iran -

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=4454

What is the American Establishment?

I was wondering about this when I typed this into Google.

In reading this article (http://www.activistpost.com/2011/11/why-is-american-establishment-media.html), I got to thinking about that question.

• Is it just corporations, conglomerates, industry, large, small, and all in-between?
• How about the military apparatuses?
• What about the political officials and institutions controlled?

Perhaps such an established consortium or oligarchy transcends nation-state boundaries ... is it fair then to even use the term 'American'? I can certainly guess at to its larger political affiliations - I suspect it's largely right-wing. But can it be accurately defined; and can said definition be maintained as it changes. To me that's the part of the right-wing that distinguishes itself from calling it just conservative. Conservatism by in-large is about keeping things as they are; i.e. resistant to change. And while there are many elements of conservatism within this establishment, that establishment is constantly growing, ever-shifting in an effort to maintain its interests. So it is in-effect, changing.

What an irony indeed - if verified.

Chromegate?

http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/01/chromegate-google-will-penalize-itself-for-sponsored-posts.php?ref=fpnewsfeed

"However, as Sullivan earlier pointed out, a number of questions and outstanding points remain. Chief among them: Why did Google choose to outsource this Chrome video ad campaign when it has its own in-house video ad service? Also: How did Google not catch that these so-called “garbage” content posts were going up with Google’s stamp of approval around the Web? Why would Google even chance such a campaign when it is running its own effort designed precisely to eliminate such SEO-clutter and low quality, spam content?

We have another matter to bring up: How will the news influence the increasing regulatory heat that Google is facing on Capitol Hill from Senators and the FTC? That heat comes over accusations Google is engaged in anti-competitive practices — namely using its dominant position in the search engine market to promote its other products above competitors. "

Any doubts that Google is the Microsoft of the 2010s?

Oh great, time for us all to be concerned.

Or perhaps it's already too late - the government probably knows how scared we all are by now anyways.

In any case, here's why -

http://www.aclu.org/national-security/president-obama-signs-indefinite-detention-bill-law

2012 - what is the plan?

Yes, 2011 is past. So, looking at last year's postings (189 to be exact) how could I improve on that this year?

My internal goal was to get ~ 3 posts in a week. In that regard, I surpassed that by more than 35.

But really, is that so important?

I mean it's not like I collect any revenue from this sight. Actually it's not like I'm one of those bloggers people flock to really watch and keep their eye on. Frankly I doubt if any US Government agency is really following either.

I guess perhaps, blogging is still a sort-of public personal journal of rants, thoughts, items I find interesting, and so forth.

So for now, let's stick to 3-4 posts a week. We'll see how that goes.