Where are the real victims?

Cutting Clare Short By William Bowles

What I can never escape from is the knowledge that in spite of all the hot air that gets expended and all the ‘breast-beating’ done by conscience-stricken politicians, the Iraqi people are nowhere to be seen in the ‘debate’. They figure not at all whilst the privileged members of the fourth richest country in world ‘debate’ the workings of the imperium.

Bugger me!

Cranmer - Catholic education – Douglas Alexander's bare-faced hypocrisy

It appears that the Secretary of State for International Development met with Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday ‘to thank him for the Church's role in international aid, especially for the earthquake victims in Haiti’. Quite why Douglas Alexander should presume the need to express gratitude to the Pope is unknown, but Cranmer finds it quite incredible that he also thanked His Holiness for the ‘Catholic Church's unique role on the world stage – particularly at the grassroots level delivering health and education service

Yeah, but the real question is, did Alexander thank the Catholic Church for its services to paedophilia and choirboy buggery?

OP in, TP out

Machine To Turn Your Office Paper Into Toilet Paper

Do you think that there is too much paper being wasted in your office? Well, the smart folks over in a Japanese company called Oriental have come up with a machine called White Goat. If you’re wondering what a machine with such a funny name does, it converts your normal paper into toilet paper.

At $100,000 you'd have to be a really big shitter to make this economically viable. Perhaps Tony Blair should get one?
Via J-Walk

I suppose they'll make it illegal too

Ridiculing the obese is the new gay bashing

My son begged me to switch the show off. “It’s too cruel,” he said. But that seemed to be the point of Fat Families. “You make me feel sick,” said the smug presenter as the obese couple looked forlornly at their takeaway supper. Later they were stripped naked — she weeping, he head bowed — while the camera boggled obscenely at their bodies. I hope they were well paid, this good-hearted pair, who clearly loved their kids and each other. What price to be paraded as an object of hatred and disgust.

A public health message? No, this was the All-New Fat & White Minstrel Show. The obese are the last group — should you feel enraged today by a parking penalty or Blair — at which you can vent your fury with legal and social impunity.

Yes, it's nasty. And yes there is no excuse for being offensive to people, no matter what their size. But there is a fundamental difference between homophobic and racist remarks and 'fatist' ones. With very, very few exceptions people are fat because of the lifestyle decisions they have made. It is this obvious and undisguisable manifestation of those decisions which is derided.

Listen up, Murdoch

Subscription result in for Newsday's Paywall Web Site

In late October, Newsday, the Long Island daily that the Dolans bought for $650 million, put its web site, newsday.com, behind a pay wall. The paper was one of the first non-business newspapers to take the plunge by putting up a pay wall, so in media circles it has been followed with interest. Could its fate be a sign of what others, including The New York Times, might expect?

So, three months later, how many people have signed up to pay $5 a week, or $260 a year, to get unfettered access to newsday.com?

The answer: 35 people. As in fewer than three dozen.

It's their home life, stupid.

Children cite family conflict as main cause of unhappiness

Family conflict is the biggest factor in causing unhappiness among children, according to a survey by The Children's Society involving around 7,000 10- to 15-year-olds. The charity asked children how different aspects of their life affected their happiness.

The survey found that seven per cent of children were significantly unhappy. Family arguments were the biggest determining factor, while the structure of families made a negligible impact on children’s sense of wellbeing.

So, the internet isn't killing music after all

How Bands You've Never Heard Of Are Making Tons Of Money On iTunes

A band you've never heard of -- AC/DC cover band AC/db -- made over $32,000 from music sales in November.  How is that possible?
Under the old business model of music sales on physical media, it wouldn't be. For a band to end up with that much money in its pockets after the distributor and record label had taken their cuts, its music would have to have posted gaudy, unmissable sales numbers.

AC/db, on the other hand, just had to do around $45,000 in sales at the iTunes store. After Apple took its 30 cents on the dollar, that left $32,000, of which the band's distributor -- TuneCore -- took nothing at all

Every cloud, (and earthquake) etc, etc.

War in Context - ‘The painful truth: Haiti’s disaster is good for the Jews’

If I came up with a headline claiming the devastation in Haiti is “good for the Jews”, I could reasonably be accused of being anti-Semitic. But it’s not my headline. It comes from this report on a site run by Israel’s popular Hebrew daily, Maariv. Every disaster needs a hero, the report says, and the heroes in Haiti are the Israelis.

The message that Israel is saving Haiti was likewise captured in an editorial cartoon in Yediot Aharonot which shows American soldiers digging for earthquake survivors. A voice from beneath the rubble calls out, “Would you mind checking to see if the Israelis are available?”

Watch out! Erm...that's it!

Terror warning: it’s been raised from daft to perplexing - Rod Liddle

There is something dangerously Orwellian about the government raising an entirely hypothetical, abstract, threat level from “substantial” to “highly likely”; the notion that we are all obliged to fear more, but to have no clue as from where the threat might emanate, or why. No details have been given as to why we are more at risk than we were last week. The whole kit and caboodle seems to say that we are facing greater danger than ever before, but we will not tell you where that danger comes from and nor is there anything you can do about it other than be more “vigilant”.

It simply makes all of our lives more fraught and less pleasant and especially so, I would reckon, if you are a decent Muslim. It does not help us defeat the maniacs; in a sense it simply makes them appear more potent. It may anaesthetise us to more authoritarian measures introduced to protect our security — but other than that, what was the point of the exercise?

If you include non-voters

Ezra Klein - Poll: Massachusetts does not think Scott Brown should obstruct health-care reform

Who the hell cares what non-voters think? They're non-voters. They've opted out of the process, and have chosen to make their opinion about political matters irrelevant. They're too feckless and lazy to bother going into a booth and making a decision about the direction of government. You might as well poll children. Wait - Scratch that. Many children will someday open a newspaper from time to time, get up off their asses and vote.

Polling non-voters is like asking vegetarians which meat they prefer. It's like asking a nun what her favorite sexual position is. It's like asking a tourist for directions.

Via Tim Worstall

What happened to just getting detention?

Saudi schoolgirl sentenced to 90 lashes after assaulting headmistress

A schoolgirl in Saudi Arabia was sentenced to 90 lashes and two months in prison for assaulting her headmistress after a confrontation over a cell phone, sparking an outcry from a government-sponsored rights group.

Saudi Arabia's National Society for Human Rights said it is surprised by the verdict and called for the punishment be reconsidered, according to statement by the group. The verdict was handed down by a court in the eastern province city of Jubail as a punishment for the 13-year-old who allegedly assaulted her headmistress.

Don't expect any 'regime-changing' invasion any time soon. After all, they're our mates, ain't they?

Suffer little children - redux

They've been condemned. Now they must be understood

All very interesting, with comparisons to the Bulger murder in 1993. Thing is, there was no evidence that the two children who murdered poor little James Bulger were psychopaths, but there is compelling evidence that at least one, if not both, of the Edlington torturers is already dangerously pyschopathic.

Good luck with the therapy.

Mmmm, coffee.

Via Aaron

Espresso, Intelligentsia from Department of the 4th Dimension

Fat facts

The myth of an ‘obesity tsunami’ - spiked

Everyone knows The Truth about obesity: we’re getting fatter each year. Our growing girth is termed everything from the ‘pandemic of the twenty-first century’ to an ‘obesity tsunami’. But the evidence is now flooding in from both America and England that obesity is the epidemic that never was.

Two studies produced by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) completely undermine the claims of an obesity epidemic.

How love works

How ( LOVE ) Works (In Pictures)

Geert Wilders goes on trial

The Trial of Geert Wilders

...there is something incredibly dangerous in the precedent that this sets. Regardless of whether or not you agree with Geert's criticisms of Islam, the issue is much larger than that. Blasphemy laws, and religious chills upon freedom of speech need to be put to an end.

Suicided

The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle

As news of the deaths emerged the following day, the camp quickly went into lockdown. The authorities ordered nearly all the reporters at Guantánamo to leave and those en route to turn back. The commander at Guantánamo, Rear Admiral Harry Harris, then declared the deaths “suicides.” In an unusual move, he also used the announcement to attack the dead men. “I believe this was not an act of desperation,” he said, “but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us.”

Reporters accepted the official account, and even lawyers for the prisoners appeared to believe that they had killed themselves. Only the prisoners’ families in Saudi Arabia and Yemen rejected the notion.

Read the full, disturbing story.

Just the job!

Could be worse. At least it's not The Proclaimers

The J-Walk Blog: Solar Bibles In Haiti

As international aid agencies rush food, water and medicine to Haiti's earthquake victims, a US faith-based group is sending Bibles to Haitians in their hour of need. Not just any Bible. These are solar-powered audible Bibles that can broadcast the holy scriptures in Haitian Creole to 300 people at a time. Called the "Proclaimer," the audio Bible delivers "digital quality" and is designed for "poor and illiterate people", the Faith Comes By Hearing group said.

The Green argument

Eco-Insanity Dvorak Uncensored

Gordon Fleming and Shelly Cobb are your typical green California couple. Gordon recycles, reuses, and bikes to work. Shelly raises chickens in their backyard and worries if her sushi is local. They might live in eco-harmony – except Fleming claims Cobb is in a high priestess phase and Cobb counters that Fleming’s hot showers are too long. According to an unrepentant Fleming, “I like to see the water pouring down.”

The New York Times recently reported that they are not alone. Therapists say they are seeing a rise in bickering between couples and family members over how much they should adjust their lives to accommodate environmental issues. Apparently, it is driving some couples eco-insane.

Snappy snaps!

Like moths to a flame – so many cameras in Haiti



"Over here, Ms Chand!" "Smile!"   "Could you turn your head slightly to the left ?"