ambivalence

"The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it’s everywhere. The..."

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 20:56:28 -0700

“The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it’s everywhere. The world’s most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.”

- Matt Tiabbi, The Great American Bubble Machine

"Whosoever controls the volume of money in any country is absolute master of all industry and..."

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 17:40:23 -0700

“Whosoever controls the volume of money in any country is absolute master of all industry and commerce… And when you realize that the entire system is very easily controlled, one way or another, by a few powerful men at the top, you will not have to be told how periods of inflation and depression originate.”

- James Garfield, The 2nd U.S. President to be assassinated (via poortaste) (via sunsmudge)

Page 51 - 1. Alien (1979) - Lists - News - IFC.com IFC consider...

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 13:46:00 -0700

Page 51 - 1. Alien (1979) - Lists - News - IFC.com

IFC consider this the best trailer of all time.

“In space, no one can hear you scream.” Definitely one of the best taglines of all time.

[via museum of design zurich _ exhibitions _ program] Perry...

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 13:40:59 -0700

[via museum of design zurich _ exhibitions _ program]

Perry King, Ettore Sottsass, Valentine S, typewriter, Olivetti Spa, Italy, 1969, Photo: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich, Franz Xaver Jaggy © ZHdK

(via cerebralmuseum)

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 12:16:23 -0700

(via cerebralmuseum)

[via Watching Whales Watching Us - NYTimes.com by Charles Siebert] “The suspicion of a...

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 11:25:58 -0700

[via Watching Whales Watching Us - NYTimes.com by Charles Siebert]

“The suspicion of a causal relationship between whale strandings and either seismic tests or the use of new high-tech sonar tracking devices in military-training exercises had been mounting for some time. Similar coincidences had been noted off the coasts of Brazil, the Bahamas, the Galápagos Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Japan, as well as in the waters off Italy and Greece. Necropsies performed on a number of the whales revealed lesions about their brains and ears. The results of the examinations performed on the Canary Islands whales, however, added a whole other, darker dimension to the whale-stranding mystery. In addition to bleeding around the whales’ brains and ears, scientists found lesions in their livers, lungs and kidneys, as well as nitrogen bubbles in their organs and tissue, all classic symptoms of a sickness that scientists had naturally assumed whales would be immune to: the bends.

It might sound like something out of a bad sci-fi film: whales sent into suicidal dashes toward the ocean’s surface to escape the madness-inducing echo chamber that we humans have made of their sound-sensitive habitat. But since the Canary Islands stranding in 2002, similar necropsy results have turned up with a number of beached whales, and the deleterious effects of sonar and other human-generated sounds on ocean ecosystems have been firmly established.”

We are driving whales mad with noise.

Baluchistan: The Western Rebellion

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 09:27:54 -0700

Another Insurgency Gains in Pakistan by Carlotta Gall]

“Although not on the same scale as the Taliban insurgency in the northwest, the conflict in Baluchistan is steadily gaining ground. Politicians and analysts warn that it presents a distracting second front for the authorities, drawing off resources, like helicopters, that the United States provided Pakistan to fight the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

Baluch nationalists and some Pakistani politicians say the Baluch conflict holds the potential to break the country apart — Baluchistan makes up a third of Pakistan’s territory — unless the government urgently deals with years of pent up grievances and stays the hand of the military and security services.

Hundreds, possibly thousands, of Baluch were rounded up in a harsh regime of secret detentions and torture under President Pervez Musharraf, who left office last year. Human rights groups and Baluch activists say those abuses have continued under President Asif Ali Zardari, despite promises to heal tensions.

“It’s pretty volatile,” said Nawab Zulfiqar Ali Magsi, the governor of Baluchistan. “When you try to forcibly pacify people, you will get a reaction.””

Pakistan is going to turn out just as bad as Iraq and Afghanistan: tribal peoples cobbled together into arbitrary chunks of the earth, dubbed countries, and expected to pull together in some way. Instead, they are pulling apart. (See Obama’s Quagmire, and Pakistan and The Future Of The Federation).

Baluchistan has been simmering as a low-grade rebellion since before Pakistan was formed, and which has broken into open separatism many times in the past 50 years.

"No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money."

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:44:25 -0700

“No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.”

- Samuel Johnson

[microwalrus, kenmat, taikichido si7, instrumentation,...

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:30:00 -0700

[microwalrus, kenmat, taikichido

si7, instrumentation, farm4.static.flickr.com] | The Destroyer!

ontheroad: Peach trees in bloom

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:29:01 -0700

ontheroad:

Peach trees in bloom

ontheroad: Paper lanterns

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:28:03 -0700

ontheroad:

Paper lanterns

microwalrus: handa: ontheroad: A quarter

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:25:45 -0700

microwalrus:

handa:

ontheroad:

A quarter

86400: (via lickystickypickyme) So true.

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:21:37 -0700

86400:

(via lickystickypickyme)

So true.

Bill Maher - Democrats are the New Republicans Hilarious and...

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 06:08:22 -0700

Bill Maher - Democrats are the New Republicans

Hilarious and completely dead on. “Obama’s not a socialist… he’s not even a liberal.”

"I’m a Catholic. We’re taught that sex is a dirty, vile, disgusting act that you save for..."

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:53:10 -0700

“I’m a Catholic. We’re taught that sex is a dirty, vile, disgusting act that you save for the one you truly love.”

- Paul Begala

"Democrats have moved to the right, and the right has moved into a mental hospital."

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:52:26 -0700

“Democrats have moved to the right, and the right has moved into a mental hospital.”

- Bill Maher

"We don’t have a left and a right part in this country anymore. We have a center-right party..."

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:51:55 -0700

“We don’t have a left and a right part in this country anymore. We have a center-right party and a crazy party.”

- Bill Maher

Han and Uighurs Battle For Historicity

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:45:52 -0700

[via Rumbles on the Rim of China’s Empire by Edward Wong]

“A history exhibition in the main museum in this regional capital goes one step further. “Xinjiang has been an inalienable part of the territory of China,” it asserts, implying that Beijing or Xian or some other imperial capital has for time immemorial held sway over this land at the crossroads of Asian civilizations.

But many Uighurs, a Turkic race of Muslims that is the largest ethnic group among the 20 million people of Xinjiang, have their own competing historical narrative. In it, the region is cast as the Uighurs’ homeland, and the ethnic Han, who only began arriving in large numbers after the Communist takeover in 1949, are portrayed as colonizers.

Mechanisms typical of colonial control — the migration of Han, who are China’s dominant race, and government policies that support the spread of Han language, culture and economic power — provided tinder, some scholars say, for the conflagration of the past week in Xinjiang.”

These arguments are consistent the world over when contending ethnic groups attempt to use history to support the legitimacy of their claims for controlling some geography. The Serbs consider Kosovo their homeland, the Israelis believe that Israel is ordained to be a Jewish state, and the Georgians and Abhaz argue about whose ancient kings were more ancient.

Whether the Uighurs have 1000 years or 1400 years of history in Xinjiang or not, the Han are definitely marching toward total integration of the area into China.

(via zerokelvin)

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 13:48:20 -0700

(via zerokelvin)

nevver: I’ll Bury My Heart

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 13:47:17 -0700

nevver:

I’ll Bury My Heart