Well, the day is fast approaching when Colin Powell will reveal to the world the secret alliance between the Iraqi leadership and Al Qaeda.
...or maybe not.
Powell to detail al Qaeda travels in Iraq- "But secretary of state will not suggest alliance exists." Hmm...
Powell to Charge Iraq Is Shifting Its Illegal Arms to Foil Inspectors- "Mr. Powell hopes to convince the Security Council that further action is needed to make Iraq comply with orders to eliminate weapons of mass destruction." Looks like a change of plans. No longer with the Bush administration try to win their war on Iraq by a tenuous Saddam-bin Laden connection, but by pointing out that Iraq is hiding their weapons. Which we've all pretty much known since 1992.
Leaked report rejects Iraqi al-Qaeda link- the BBC got its hands on a leaked British intelligence report which claims that there are absolutely no links between Iraq and al Qaeda. What's the opposite of "smoking gun"?
This "Iraq is hiding their weapons so we need to bomb them" strategy is not going to go over very well with the American people. They're not going to get upset about it, and they're certainly not going to see it as a justification for war, unless the fear card is played and played hard ("Saddam Hussein is going to spray your daughter in the face with nerve gas right now and you'll have to watch her writhe in pain till her face explodes and she dies!!! Is that what you want?!?! Is it?!?!?!").
On the other hand, I think that there will be a substantial portion of my American bretheren who will tire of this spectacle and say "let's just attack already." Good ol' America, prisoner of its addiction to entertainment.
[forcefully stolen from Dack]
Lying Media Bastards is both a radio show and website. The show airs Mondays 2-4pm PST on KillRadio.org, and couples excellent music with angry news commentary. And the website, well, you're looking at it. Both projects focus on our media-marinated world, political lies, corporate tyranny, and the folks fighting the good fight against these monsters. All brought to you by Jake Sexton, The Most Beloved Man in America ®. contact: jake+at+lyingmediabastards.com |
Media News |
November 16, 2004Tales of Media WoeSenate May Ram Copyright Bill- one of the most depressing stories of the day that didn't involve death or bombs. It's the music and movie industries' wet dream. It criminalizes peer-to-peer software makers, allows the government to file civil lawsuits on behalf of these media industries, and eliminates fair use. Fair use is the idea that I can use a snippet of a copyrighted work for educational, political, or satirical purposes, without getting permission from the copyright-holder first. And most tellingly, the bill legalizes technology that would automatically skip over "obejctionable content" (i.e. sex and violence) in a DVD, but bans devices that would automatically skip over commericals. This is a blatant, blatant, blatant gift to the movie industry. Fuck the movie industry, fuck the music industry, fuck the Senate. Music industry aims to send in radio cops- the recording industry says that you're not allowed to record songs off the radio, be it real radio or internet radio. And now they're working on preventing you from recording songs off internet radio through a mixture of law and technological repression (although I imagine their techno-fixes will get hacked pretty quickly). The shocking truth about the FCC: Censorship by the tyranny of the few- blogger Jeff Jarvis discovers that the recent $1.2 million FCC fine against a sex scene in Fox's "Married By America" TV show was not levied because hundreds of people wrote the FCC and complained. It was not because 159 people wrote in and complained (which is the FCC's current rationale). No, thanks to Jarvis' FOIA request, we find that only 23 people (of the show's several million viewers) wrote in and complained. On top of that, he finds that 21 of those letters were just copy-and-paste email jobs that some people attached their names to. Jarvis then spins this a bit by saying that "only 3" people actually wrote letters to the FCC, which is misleading but technically true. So somewhere between 3 and 23 angry people can determine what you can't see on television. Good to know. Reuters Union Considers Striking Over Layoffs- will a strike by such a major newswire service impact the rest of the world's media? Pentagon Starts Work On War Internet- the US military is talking about the creation of a global, wireless, satellite-aided computer network for use in battle. I think I saw a movie about this once... Conservative host returns to the air after week suspension for using racial slur- Houston radio talk show host (and somtime Rush Limbaugh substitute) Mark Belling referred to Mexican-Americans as "wetbacks" on his show. He was suspended for a couple of weeks, and then submitted a written apology for the racial slur to a local newspaper. But he seems to be using the slur and its surrounding controversy to boost his conservative cred with his listeners. Stay Tuned for Nudes- Cleveland TV news anchor Sharon Reed aired a story about artist Spencer Tunick, who uses large numbers of naked volunteers in his installations and photographs. The news report will be unique in that it will not blur or black-out the usual naughty bits. The story will air late at night, when it's allegedly okay with the FCC if you broadcast "indecent" material. The author of this article doesn't seem to notice that Reed first claims that this report is a publicity stunt, but then claims it's a protest against FCC repression. I'd like to think it's the latter, but I'm not that much of a sucker. More Media News |
Quotes |
"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of what he was never reasoned into." -Jonathan Swift |
Snapshots |
Damn. That joke would have been much funnier if I'd said "apprentice" instead of "intern". |