....LMB: "News-a-roni"....

June 15, 2004

Contractor Immunity a Divisive Issue- the US government wants the new Iraqi government to make all American contractors in Iraq above the law. Happily, it seems like the Iraqi government is resisting this idea.

LA 'on the road to Falluja'?- unfortunately, this article is 80% allegations from a single source-- LA civil rights attorney named Connie Rice-- so I don't know how reliable it all is. But if even half of what she says is true, the situation in the poorer parts of LA are in a terrible state. It sounds as though the police officers patrollng these areas have little training or resources, and therefore respond to the community with violence and repression. Accompanying that, Rice claims that young gang members in the area are actually going out of their way to try to kill cops. Sounds like occupation and insurgency, hence the Falluja reference in the title.

FBI warns of possible ecoterrorism- the term "ecoterrorism" is one of my pet peeves. Frankly, every act called "ecoterrorism" would be more accurately described as "ecovandalism" or "ecosabotage". Terrorists kill; "ecoterrorists" don't. They usually just smash and burn inanimate objects. And yet environmental and animal rights radicals seem to be the main "terrorist" concern in the minds of US law enforcement.

I've got mixed feelings on the issue. Yes, ecovandals are destroying the property of other human beings. But what if they are destroying property that is itself destructive? What if you blew up a factory which was causing massive pollution and damaging people's health? I dunno.

This article is also funny because it shows how police are completely clueless when dealing with activists. The article refers to a "International Day of Action & Solidarity with Jeff 'Free' Luers". "Free" was an ecovandal who set fire to three SUVs. I haven't researched him much, but if the short bit I read on his site is to be believed, his jail sentence does sound a bit on the shady side (he was originally charged with a crime that would carry a one-year sentence, which then ballooned into 23 years. For fires that caused about $40,000 in damage...). Anyhow, it appears that exactly zero acts of violence took place on this day of action, and I can't even find any reports of related vandalism. And one activist message board I checked out brought up the point, that if they had been going to take some kind of illegal action, why would they do it on a day that they knew the cops were on alert? Why not wait till another time?.

Anyhow, it looks like this FBI warning did much more to publicize Free's case and promote the various actions/benefits for him than it did to "stop the violence."

City Braces for Grand Old Party- another article about the chaos that will be accompanying the Republican National Convention in a few months. The same cops who are so clueless about environmental activists are going to have to deal with hundreds of activist organizations and hundreds of thousands of activist individuals. The police will likely respond as they usually do, attempting to derail the protests with light violence, civil rights violations, and unsubstantiated pre-emptive arrests. I feel like I should attend the protests, but I'm honestly scared to. I think that NYC during the RNC is as close to a police state as this middle-class white American is likely to see in his lifetime.

Limbaugh: AIDS "hasn't made that jump to the heterosexual community"- yes, the human filth cannon is now claiming that AIDS is only a problem among American gays and "promiscuous" heterosexual Africans. Last I'd heard, AIDS was the number one cause of death among young African-American men. I guess all young African-American men must be gay, because surely Rush would never talk out of his ass like that.

Travesty of Justice- nice Ashcroft bashing piece by Paul Krugman.

When Ignorance Isn't Bliss- "Straight from the you-can't-make-this-stuff-up file, the five congressional votes that everyone in America should know about."

Garfield: Why we hate the Mouse but not the cartoon copycat- apparently, Garfield was never a comic strip, but an carefully-plotted marketing strategy planned by the cartoonist himself. Oh, and the movie sucks.

Last Comic Scandalous- interesting rumor-heavy story that looks behind the reality TV show "Last Comic Standing." Looks like the thing was unbelievably rigged. The article is white text on a white background, so to read it, you'll have to highlight the text with your mouse.