#
The US Supreme Court has decided that evidence can be used in court, even if it's gathered illegally by violating the Fourth Amendment... so long as it's just an accidental violation, not on purpose. My gut reaction is that this is dumber than dumb, that it gives a stamp of approval to violating the Constitution, and that it'll lead to a big increase in
"Our tradition is one of protest and revolt, and it is stultifying to celebrate the rebels of the past while we silence the rebels of the present."
Henry Steele Commager
"accidental" police misconduct and "bad tips" from informants. And not to belabor the obvious, but Chief Justice John Roberts remains a douchebag who should be impeached.
[ Associated Press ]
#
Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist, endorsed terrorism in his column yesterday. It's OK with him to kill large numbers of innocent civilians, "to inflict substantial property damage and collateral casualties", if your goal is to make a political point. Friedman recommends killing random Palestinians and Gazans, in order "to exact enough pain on the civilians". What Friedman's arguing for is exactly the mindset of the terrorist, or in this case the mindset of the Israeli government, which is the same thing. Friedman, the Times' billionaire columnist, should be fired forthwith.
[ New York Times, distilled by Salon ]
#
Theo Lipschitz writes: "The Enron swindle foreshadowed the destruction of America's investment banks, money center banks and brokerages. In fact, the leniency shown by the Bush Regime to the malefactors -- and virtually every major financial institution was invested or implicated, directly or indirectly in
Enron -- was a direct cause of the recent crises, both with real estate, bonds, and stocks. By allowing those who knew about, promoted and knowingly invested in Enron's off balance sheet entities to get away with miniscule financial penalties, these corporations were emboldened to double down. This is the very essence of "moral hazard". And now they're getting off easy AGAIN. ... Continue reading ..."
[ Unknown News ]
#
Susan J. Crawford, who has broad authority over the Guantanamo kangaroo court, has used the word "torture" to describe what "we the people" did to alleged terrorist Mohammed al-Qahtani. And because he was tortured he can't be prosecuted, which is one of the obvious reasons why Jack Bauer justice is stupid. Of course, the White House has always denied using torture -- though the use of torture as an official policy has been flamboyantly obvious for years -- and White House SpokesLiar Dana Perino reiterates the lie again. For those of us who are reasonably aware of the real world, the lies are just tiresome. I do wish the media would pay some attention to the gravity of what it means to live in a nation that tortures, a nation that's been pretending for years not to know that there's torture going on.
[ Associated Press ]
#
In England, it's proposed that public transit riders be required to submit to searches on demand. Sickening, stupid, shameful.
[ Metro (London, UK) ]
#
Bolivia has broken diplomatic ties with Israel over the ongoing Gaza outrage. It's nice to see a smidgen of moral leadership in international affairs.
[ Irish Times ]
#
The Israeli assault on Gaza has now killed 1,000. It's shameful, inexcusable, etc. And amidst all the well-deserved outrage over this, it occurs to me that 1,000 innocent civilians were probably killed in the first few hours of the American "shock and awe" attack on Baghdad in 2003.
[ BBC News ]
#
A new investigative report in Ha'aretz concludes that Israel intentionally scuttled the potential for peace in talks with the late Yasser Arafat in 2000, after Arafat rejected the terms of an Israeli offer at a Camp David meeting. Makes me wistful for a time when the American President was trying to make peace instead of trying to manufacture wars. Anyway, Israel's Military Intelligence fed Israel's leaders the line that the intifada of the time was Arafat's fault, thus publicly undermining Arafat, Fatah, and the Palestinian Authority, so they could then say there was no one to negotiate with, "no partner for peace." Israel responded instead with increased violence, which isn't exactly a big surprise. I didn't wade deep into the details since what's revealed here as big news seemed pretty much self-evident at the time.
[ Ha'aretz (Jerusalem, Israel), distilled by Foreign Policy in Focus ]
#
UnitedHealth Group will pay $50-million to settle a scam that cost its customers untold millions. They claimed that their 80% reimbursement of medical bills was based on "independent research from across the health care industry", when actually their "independent research" was conducted by a subsidiary that intentionally rigged its findings to artificially lower rates. UnitedHealth Group, of course, admits no wrongdoing, even as their criminal wrongdoing is glitteringly obvious. New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo poses like he's done justice, while he's given UnitedHealth Group a hell of a sweetheart deal. None of the money goes to UnitedHealth Group's victims, nobody from UnitedHealth Group is going to prison, and there's no telling how many millions UnitedHealth Group made from their advertised lies, but I'll wager it was a hell of a lot more than $50-million.
[ MSNBC News ]
#
You can't easily find out how much the US government spends on nuclear weapons, because the spending is spread out all over the budget, presumably to keep the total amount vague. Well, the good folks at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace did
the hard work of adding up all the bits and pieces, and their finding is that America spent $52-billion on nuclear weapons and weapons-related programs, in the 2008 fiscal year. That's about $171 for every man, woman, and child in America, and it's substantially more than the $39.5-billion the US spent on international diplomacy and foreign assistance.
[ Secrecy News ]
#
The Federal Communications Commission is
hard at work, investigating moviemaker Darren Aronofsky's playfully flipped finger in Sunday's live telecast of the Golden Globe Awards. Because it's important. To nincompoops.
[ Los Angeles Times ]
#
A federal court has ordered the Bush-Cheney administration to turn over "all personal digital devices -- thumb cards, CDs, DVDs, personal computers, etc. -- " in the quest to recover the millions and millions of emails destroyed by White House officials. Does anyone have any expectation that anyone in the Bush-Cheney administration will comply?
[ Columbia Journalism Review ]
#
Democrats in Tennessee, unlike Democrats in Washington DC, are smart and understand how politics works. They've exploded the Republicans' plans for exploiting their 50-49 advantage in the state house, by engineering the election of a moderate newbie Republican as Speaker, instead of the troglodyte the Republicans wanted.
[ Washington Monthly ]
#
You may have seen a bizarre news item a few weeks ago about a family that wanted their son's name on his birthday cake, but were refused by a supermarket because the kid's name is Adolf Hitler Campbell. Well, now little Adolf Hitler and his sisters Joyce-Lynn
"Princeton economist Alan Blinder recently argued in the NYT for a program of buying back older, more-polluting cars at a premium over their book value. This would get the most-polluting cars off the road (raising average full efficiency) and put some money into the pockets of the people who own them. Most of these car owners will have low and moderate income, so we will be putting cash into the hands of people who need it and will spend it. Blinder calculated that we get 5 million older cars a year off the road for a cost of less than $20 billion a year."
[ Dean Baker ]
"Both [the House and Senate pro-Israel] resolutions "hold Hamas responsible for breaking the cease-fire," despite the fact that there had been scores of minor violations during the months of the cease-fire by both sides and that Israel had launched a major incursion into the Gaza Strip on Nov. 4, 2008, assassinating several Hamas leaders, an action the Israeli press speculated was designed to provoke Hamas into not renewing the cease-fire when it expired the following month. Israel then tightened its siege on Nov. 5, banning even humanitarian aid from coming through. Hamas appeared willing to renew the cease-fire in return for Israel renouncing further such incursions and lifting the siege, but Israel refused."
[ Stephen Zunes ]
Aryan Nation and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie Campbell have been taken from their home by Pennsylvania's Division of Youth and Family Services. The state agency won't say why the kids were removed from their home, but absent further information, the inescapable inference is that state took the children because their parents are Nazis. And that's unsatisfactory, inappropriate, and illegal. Christ, I hate news like this when I have to come down on the Nazis' side, but in a free society the government can't be punishing people for their political beliefs, even if their political beliefs are repugnant.
[ Associated Press ]
#
Here's a slow-starting but eventually quite interesting story about a small town battle that made a local woman into an activist, and the Mayor's attempt to silence and bankrupt her for speaking out.
[ Associated Press ]
#
This is not our normal bailiwick, but I think highly of free-lance reporter Byron Christopher, and he's scored something of a scoop here. He got three-time prison escapist and convicted killer Richard Lee McNair to answer a letter and give him some inside information from his current home, a "supermax" prison in Colorado. McNair says he might be allowed to use a phone in three years.
[ Last Link in the Left ]
#
In the moments immediately after the crash of Republican tech-whiz Michael Connell's plane, authorities were in what's described as a "lock down" mode that kept emergency responders from getting information.
[ At Largely ]
#
I'm pleasantly surprised to learn that it's not yet normal and accepted to receive spam text messages from the company you're paying for text messaging services. AT&T, in this case.
[ New York Times ]
Please send your news tips, comments, and criticisms to <unknownnews at inbox.com>. If that address ever fails, check our contact page for our alternate email addresses.
Based on the totally inadequate news story about a "random" drug search, your outrage is justified. Based on another story I found, there is a lot more to the story than appears at first glance. These drug searches have been going on since at least November. "Records show that seven HISD employees have been arrested on drug charges in just two weeks. Those arrested include six teachers and one custodian." And the arrests were on five campuses.
Incidentally, the latest arrest was for a controlled substance, which includes some but not most prescription drugs. Prescription drugs can make it onto the controlled substance list if they are addictive.
This article says, "At least 18 HISD employees have been arrested and accused of having drugs since July. In December, Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra announced that the district would conduct random parking lot searches. The district has searched more than a third of HISD's employee parking lots."
It's been a few decades since I was in high school. Is this normal for high school these days?
SirJ
My public high school was run by apparent fascists, with cops coming on campus for random locker searches that looked to me like breaking and entry. It was a key moment in my own radicalization... but then again, I never took well to the concept of hall passes. And like your high school memories, mine are from decades ago.
I don't think we have any readers under the age of about 20 or so -- they're all busy twittering -- but I would like to know whether the news reflects a peculiar insanity in Houston or whether this kind of un-American horse manure is happening all across the country.
I wonder what CBS would call a REAL family meal budget -- like of $3? Around my parts, a $35 meal would usually involve a pretty big group of members eating out, or preparing a big holiday meal at one of the member homes, like for Thanksgiving or Xmas. I'm talking practically a family reunion style meal here.
The study may be correct. But: The story I heard for most of my life is that when I was an infant I had (supposedly) whooping cough and double pneumonia at the same time. The doctors told my parents (supposedly) they should just take me home. That I would either die or live and be a raving maniac all my life (no snickering PLEASE). According to the family legend, they took me home and my father refusing to heed the doctors advise spent a lot of time rubbing my chest repeatedly with Vicks and credited it with saving my life. ... I still have a jar of VapoRub in the house and am skeptical of the reported study.
Wow -- that's a great story... and I've always loved Vick's VapoRub (and their cough drops too) so that study made me a little sad. Hug and I'm glad you're alive!
H&HH
Oy vey. The US Government is a wholly owned Israeli lobby.
Wig
#
I am almost daily amazed at how murderous, fascist, and just plain mean the political discourse in America has become during the Bush-Cheney administration. Eight years ago, could you even imagine that mainstream pundits would seriously weigh the question of whether or not America should torture prisoners? Whether the US should ignore the Geneva Conventions? Prior to the Bush-Cheney disaster, would you have thought it possible for a well-respected New York Times columnist to plainly, openly argue for terrorism, like Thomas Friedman did yesterday?
Bush and Cheney have unleashed a cancer of the American soul, and the only way to stop the cancer is to remove it -- by prosecuting Bush, Cheney, and their collaborators for the war crimes they have so obviously authorized and ordered.
#
An investigation by the Department of Justice's Inspector General has found that under Bush-Cheney, DoJ had a policy of hiring only ideologically-arch-right Republicans, and that a DoJ official lied in testimony before the Senate. This is news, sure, but the investigation's conclusion has always been obvious, and I remember at least one, possibly two, previous investigations that revealed the DoJ's hiring policy. The politicization of the DoJ has been going on in broad daylight for years and everyone knows it, and here are
"Resistance is feasible even for those who are not heroes by nature, and it is an obligation, I believe."
Noam Chomsky
two more things that everybody knows, or should know: 1) There won't be any consequences, and 2) The career people hired solely on the strength of their Liberty University and Federalist Society credentials will be making key decisions at the DoJ for decades.
[ Washington Post ]
#
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is bragging that he has the President of the United States on a short leash. "I said, 'Get me President Bush on the phone'," Mr. Olmert said in a speech in the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon, according to the Associated Press. "They said he was in the middle of giving a speech in Philadelphia. I said I didn’t care: 'I need to talk to him now'," Mr. Olmert continued. “He got off the podium and spoke to me." After the call, Bush obediently followed Olmert's orders and told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to abstain on a UN resolution that she had helped draft.
[ New York Times, distilled by At Largely ]
#
Meanwhile, the Red Cross says there's nowhere safe to take cover in Gaza, as Israel's killing spree continues, with the full backing and blessing of the United States of America.
[ Democracy Now ]
#
There are only five names on the list of Congresscritters who voted "no" on endorsing Israel's war crimes. Four Democrats and Ron Paul understand the difference between right and wrong. One of the five is Gwen Moore (D-Wisconsin), who represents the south side of Milwaukee, only a hundred miles or so from our home. I'm not very familiar with her, but she's getting at least $20 from me when she runs for re-election, assuming I still have a job.
[ amirsahib.com ]
#
Nobody has any idea what the banks receiving billions in bailout bucks are doing with the money. A hack from Goldman Sachs, where Henry Paulson used to be employed, is in charge, and taking advice from another Goldman Sachs guy. Another top honcho at bailout
central was mentored by the guy who invented the mortgage-backed securities that have backfired to contribute to the swamp. In other words, like virtually every aspect of everything the Bush-Cheney administration has done, it's utter chaos, brought to you by crooks, cronies, and incompetents.
[ TPM Muckraker ]
#
Here's your America in 2009: In a random search of a public school parking lot, a drug-sniffing dog detected two pills in a teacher's car. Of course, no dog can smell two loose pills in a sealed car, so the cops must have opened the car and let the dog inside. And because the teacher couldn't prove she had a prescription for these un-identified pills, she was arrested and faces charges. Where's the Fourth Amendment? "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." The cops involved must be fired, and the dog should be given a good home with a loving family. And while we're building a better world, the reporter should be fired too, just for turning in such a bland report on such an obvious outrage.
[ Houston Chronicle ]
#
The Bush-Cheney administration has quashed a study into medical marijuana. So the sick can continue suffering, puking, and wasting away, while these bastards turn their back on their humanity (and science) one more time.
[ Marijuana Policy Project ]
#
Meanwhile, it looks like pot prohibition has ruined a 17-year-old's life, but that's not unusual. We're wasting thousands of lives with this anti-freedom hysteria every year.
[ Springfield (Missouri) News-Leader ]
#
The editor of the L.A. Times says that his paper is now making enough money with its on-line operation to pay the entire payroll cost for publishing the paper, both on paper and on-line. There are plenty of ifs ands and buts in the depth of the article, but I had no idea there was that much money in on-line news publishing, and it suggests that there might be a future for the ad-driven corporate press. Which is good news, to my thinking, at least until there's a better prospect for collecting and presenting the news in America without corporate involvement.
[ The Guardian (London, UK) ]
#
A study enacted by 49 state attorney generals finds that all the endless hype about the dangers of sexual predators using the internet to lure and victimize children has been
exaggerated, and there really aren't that many pervs looking for kiddie sex at Facebook after all. But there's money in the "internet is scary" industry, so the hype about the horrors ain't about to seriously subside.
[ McClatchy Newspapers ]
#
The Protect Marriage Coalition, a group of right-wing ideologues who provided key funding for Proposition 8 in California, is now suing to have the names of its financial backers kept secret.
[ Raw Story ]
#
VP Dick Cheney says he was "always aggravated" that the New York Times won the Pulitzer Prize for uncovering his administration's illegal wiretapping of Americans. I'm always happy to see Cheney aggravated, but let's not forget -- like The Hill seems to -- that the Times sat on the story for more than a year, at the request of the Bush-Cheney administration. They had the news nailed down well before the 2004 election (which, as you might recall, was close) but they didn't publish the news until December 2005. Ask me why I don't have much respect for the Pulitzer Prizes.
[ The Hill ]
#
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) says that as President-to-be Obama gets cold feet about investigating the Bush-Cheney administration's crimes, he'll mount his own investigation. House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Michigan) is mumbling something along the same lines, but history suggests that Conyers' word is worth less than nothing. Whitehouse, on the other hand, is a moderate Democrat who's often wrong on the issues but has occasionally demonstrated some integrity, so I'm typing this with my fingers crossed.
[ National Public Radio, distilled by ThinkProgess ]
#
"The world's exaggerated willingness to forgive Israel is liable to crack this time. ... The public, moral and judicial test will be applied to the three Israeli statesmen who sent the Israel Defense Forces to war against a helpless population, one that did not even have a place to take refuge, in maybe the only war in history against a strip of land enclosed by a fence." [ Gideon Levy ]
#
"Going into Afghanistan, the Bush administration called for a political campaign to reconstruct the country and thereby establish the authority of a stable, democratic Afghan central government. It was understood that the two campaigns -- military and political/economic -- had to go forward together; the success of each depended on the other. But the vision of a reconstructed, peaceful, stable, democratically governed Afghanistan faded fast. Most Afghans now believe that it was nothing but a cover story for the Bush administration's real goal -- to set up permanent bases in Afghanistan and occupy the country forever."
[ Ann Jones ]
#
"Watching Randians at work trying to convince themselves of their essential rightness in the face of the global wreckage pile of evidence to the contrary would be funny were the consequences of their historical muck-up not so devastating and so far-reaching for so many of the ordinary schlubs for whom the Randians have at best a guarded contempt. It all reminds me of a bit of wisdom my granddaddy passed along to me: 'Watch out for ideologues. Ideas are more important to them than people'."
[ David Neiwert ]
#
Barack Obama doesn't want to give up his BlackBerry, so Declan McCullagh, who knows a thing or two about high-tech security, suggests a few rather expensive but "officially blessed as secure" options.
[ CNet News ]
#
Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has sent an email complaining about the coverage of her and her family in the Anchorage Daily News. The editor prints their exchange in its entirety, and it's quite remarkable. What strikes me, though, isn't the applaudible detail of the editor's answers, nor the ongoing train wreck of watching Palin make a fool of herself over and over again. No, what strikes me most is the almost unavoidable inference in Palin's email that she simply doesn't read her state's biggest and most influential paper, the Anchorage Daily News. She asks whether it's true that the paper stated something, then asks again whether it's true that the paper stated something else, repeatedly, giving the impression that she's asking the editor about things she's heard that the newspaper published, not about anything she's actually read in the paper.
[ Anchorage Daily News ]
#
Here's a brief thirteen-year-old interview with Barack and Michelle Obama, wherein she says he's thinking of going into politics. Hell of a fine photo, too.
[ The New Yorker ]
#
Robert X. Cringely thinks that Facebook's ban on photos of nursing mothers is silly, and of course he's right. He also thinks it'll "very likely backfire", as angry moms exit Facebook entirely, and I'm not so sure he's right about that. Facebook has many millions of users, and I'll be pleasantly surprised if a few dozen thousand angry mothers matter to them at all. [ InfoWorld ]
#
There might be slowdown in those always-amusing Virgin Mary sightings. The Catholic Church's Holy Office of the Inquisition has said the faithful should keep quiet about what they've seen, until the claims are investigated by "psychologists, theologians, priests and exorcists".
[ The Independent (London, UK) ]
Please send your news tips, comments, and criticisms to <unknownnews at inbox.com>. If that address ever fails, check our contact page for our alternate email addresses.
#
I guess I'm not really surprised at Israel's inhumanity toward Gazans and Palestinians. It's a reflection of what seems to be state policy for Israel since that nation was born -- keep squeezing out the non-Jews, keep killing 'em a few and a few hundred at a time, while moving in more Jewish "settlers" and building walls and Israeli-only highways and et cetera. I've lost the link but a few weeks ago I saw a pair of side-by-side time-lapse maps showing Palestine and Gaza over the years, and guess what? Those areas keep shrinking, shrinking, shrinking ...
Heidi Papademetriou
#
Q: So what does the NSA do with all of that highly-sensitive internet
and phone data they're collecting from Americans? A: They give it to Israel.
Maybe this is the secret of American politicians' unconditional love of Israel's Nazism: Israel has a bottomless pit of blackmail material available on virtually every American citizen. And threatens to use it on anyone important who doesn't toe the Israeli line. That actually makes a lot more sense than the idea Israel could simply buy our politicians into such behavior -- for that would surely take more money than they have access to.
Blackmail is complicated. I think the real answer is easier to under- stand: Money. Israel has lots of it, Gaza not so much.
H&HH
If I'd known how to casually capture and save this video to disk, I would have. Simply because I believe the US government will try to take it offline ASAP.
I'm unable to view the video, so I can only reply to the words as typed. As I recall from high school history classes and watching a few movies on the subject, American revolutionaries' strategy was to hide in the woods and pick off British soldiers as they marched by. I wouldn't argue if someone called that terrorism.
Helen & Harry Highwater
#1/15/2009:
Oh yes! It definitely was, as defined not only in the past, but today, in many ways!
Basically if the rich and powerful do it, it's either war, defense, or a 'police action'. If the weak and poor do it, it's terrorism. The latest example is Gaza.
My point was that people like Republican and Israeli leaders sure don't want to admit that truth. Or allow the mass of voters to realize it.
#1/15/2009:
If Mr. Mooneyham wants to pursue his desire for his very own copy of the video before it is taken off the web, he can contact the uploader of the video, jimstach. I believe you have to be a youtube member to make
the contact link work. The youtube video page is here.
YouTube videos are stored in the Temporary Internet Files folder as an FLV file. The file can be copied from there to another folder on Mooneyham's computer and then converted to a more familiar format using an FLV converter or watched directly with an FLV viewer.
The top freeware listed allows a user to browse youtube directly and convert the files from its browser. This would eliminate needing to locate and copy the flv file from the internet cache.
SirJ
#1/18/2009:
I stumbled upon this how to download YouTube videos page by accident. All you do is type or paste the URL of the YouTube
video into the box on the page, click the Download button and you can save the video to
any folder you select. In case Mr. Mooneyham is reading this, the link to the video he
wanted to save is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub4n_ltaRCY.
SirJ
Absolutely excellent, thanks. I always check for invisible dangers on websites that seem so wonderful, and Norton Safe Web says komando.com is clean. And ooh, it looks like YouTube is now allowing downloads itself, on some videos.
Helen & Harry Highwater
#
Where's The Canadian, your regular contributor who usually offers knowledgeable insights into foreign affairs? I'm a little disappointed that we haven't heard much from him since the first days of the latest Israeli assault on its huddled masses of sub-citizens. TC has always has a bit of a blind spot when it comes to Israel, so it would be interesting to see his defense of Israel during the atrocities.
Angry Annie
I assume the Canadian is in Canada, and hope he or she will drop us a note if he/she has something to say. Defending what Israel's doing, though, would be awfully difficult.
It's even worse outside of urbanized areas. We live in a small town, almost a hundred miles from the nearest smallish city with a TV station, and we pull in staticky but watchable reception with a rooftop antenna. We bought our converter box and wired it up and went from receiving seven watchable stations to receiving one. We of course quickly disconnected the converter box and now we're stuck with either spending hundreds of dollars for a new rooftop antenna (roll of the dice -- it might work, might not) or paying $30 a month for satellite or cable, which we've never had because the budget is tight and it isn't worth the money.
The conversion is maybe a good idea, but it's been very stupidly done. Did the cable and satellite operators lobby for the switchover?
Elliot Cook
#1/15/2009:
Elliot Cook might try an antenna amplifier to improve his DTV reception. It's also a roll of the dice, but at under $100 it's less expensive than replacing the antenna.
Some stations are not broadcasting at full power, so it is possible he might pick up a couple of stations when the conversion date arrives.
SirJ
I've been looking at this one, but we're probably not doing anything until after the stitch (power and frequency changes might solve our problems) and we're definitely not spending anywhere near this much money without a guarantee that'll give us our money back if it doesn't help.
Helen & Harry Highwater
#1/16/2009:
That antenna got good reviews. It is fairly large for an indoor antenna, a little over 2' long.
Antennaweb.org has an excellent antenna selection guide. The part I found the most useful was the listing of the various channels you can receive and the precise compass direction to point the antenna to receive that channel. The questionnaire looks like it asks for too much info, but the only required field is the zip code. I gave it my street address as well.
The antenna guide will indicate whether an amplifier will help your reception. For example, this is recommended for me and it says I need a pre-amp. Pre-amps wouldn't be useful with indoor antennas. Another link I visited warned against Radio Shack pre-amps. The pre-amp is supposed to be mounted as close to the antenna as possible so it amplifies only the antenna signal and does not amplify any interference which the antenna lead might pick up. The antenna lead will act as a crude antenna. Using coax wire cuts down on the ability to pick up interference dramatically but doesn't eliminate it. Because the antenna lead will be pointed in various directions as it travels down from the antenna to the TV, it will be a non-directional antenna much more susceptible to picking up interference than the antenna itself. So its best to put the pre-amp as close to the antenna as possible. I threw the part about the pre-amp in this message so it will help Elliot Cook and others, because it isn't applicable to your case.
SirJ
You've been maybe more helpful to me than you think. I intend to spend some time loitering at antennaweb.org this weekend.
#
The American economy isn't sinking quickly enough, so visitors to the US from Australia, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and 31 other nations will now be required to register in advance with the Department of Homeland Security. The idea is that DHS will pretend to do a security check on all these visitors. The reality is that tourism and business trips to America will continue to decline, as "I'm going to America" sounds more and more like "I'm going to be strip-searched".
[ CNet News ]
#
It doesn't matter that Bernie Madoff gave away a million dollars worth of his stolen fortune over Christmas. He still stays out of jail on bail. (Of course, the whole Madoff mess doesn't amount to much more than a distraction -- it's petty cash compared to what the Bush-Cheney administration has stolen by "spending" unimaginable billions of dollars without any realistic oversight, first in Iraq, then in the bailout swindle.)
[ Washington Post ]
#
Thanks to Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), the Smithsonian Institution won't be officially pretending that "the attacks on September 11, 2001 ... led to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq."
[ Los Angeles Times ]
#
Israeli election officials are trying to block Arabs from running for political office. Ha'aretz thinks this will be struck down by the Israeli Supreme Court, but still, it's a breathtaking attempt at political suppression by an alleged democracy.
[ Ha'aretz (Jerusalem, Israel) ]
#
James Tobin, the Maine Republican dirty-trickster who had Democrats' phones jammed to reduce turnout in the 2002 election, has been acquitted on appeal. He still faces federal charges for lying to investigators.
[ Bangor Daily News ]
#
It's been thirteen days since a Bay Are Rapid Transit (BART) cop named Johannes Mehserle shot and killed a black man. There's video of the killing, and the victim was handcuffed, face down, when Mehserle shot him in the back. Thirteen days later, there have been protests and meetings and the cop has quit -- but he hasn't even been arrested.
[ San Francisco Chronicle ]
#
Do you think that American police have the right to browse through whatever data's in your cell phone, blackberry, or other hand-held electronic devices? Cops in Savannah, Georgia are claiming that right in court.
[ CNet News ]
#
This guy's experience with cops is, I think, fairly typical of what happens when police interact with innocent "little people" -- people without huge piles of money or clout. "So a cop with a bullhorn ordered us to drop our bags, raise our hands and walk slowly towards him. We didn't argue. It was obvious we
hadn't robbed the place or anything, and when we reached him another officer came over, lazily padded us down and told us to sit in
#
"US economic growth has been strongest when our taxes have been high. During World War II, then under Truman, Eisenhower, and Kennedy, our upper marginal tax rates were between 88-92%. Read those numbers again. They are astonishingly high. Those were our strongest growth years. ... Tax hikes usually correspond to higher government spending. Government spends money on things that the private sector does not spend money on: physical infrastructure, social infrastructure, market infrastructure, and defense. These are the things that create a world in which doing business is possible. The worse those things are, the worse business is. The better they are, the better business is."
[ Larry Beinhart ]
the back of the car." It's utterly obvious to me that the author is white, because when police interact with people who have negative clout -- black people, gays outside of a crown, etc. -- the treatment is often much worse than the polite patting-down these kids got.
[ Bad Attitudes ]
#
What's the penalty when a drunk driver kills someone in a wreck, then flees the scene of the accident? Sixteen days in jail, if the druunk driver is a millionaire.
[ New York Daily News ]
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If you need a handy list of Bush-Cheney administration malfeasance and criminality, here's what looks like a fairly thorough resource.
[ publicintegrity.org ]
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Excerpt: I see that our president-to-be has told George Stephanopoulos that: "Everybody's going to have to give. Everybody's going to have to have some skin in the game."
It would appear to be news to Mr. Barack Obama that "ordinary" Americans are already being f*cked to death and screwed 500 ways to Sunday, all to support the ruling class in its inordinate wealth and power. But what the hell: "everybody" is going to be screwed all over again.
Not, however, the ruling class. On that point, you may be absolutely certain. Obama is the perfect embodiment of the ruling class, and he will do their bidding and serve their interests, and no one else's at all. And you will be entirely f*cked over. More. Again. For the rest of your life. ...
My comment: I am now convinced that Barack Obama is the biggest bullsh*t artist in the history of the United States of America. It is time for the rest of us, those opposed to the failing status quo to stand our ground -- to root hog or die. There can righteously be no accomodations made with the war criminals and treasonous bastards who looted the US over the last eight years, and yet Obama plans to do exactly that. Which makes him the equivalent of a Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid, except that he is a charismatic con man who bullsh*tted his way into the presidency with lies about "change" and "hope". As one comment to a blog essay said (Glenn Greenwald at salon.com), "the only change is what Obama said before and after the election."
Excerpt from Floyd: No, what underlies Silber's work (again, as I see it) is a rich, compelling vision of human possibility: the enlightening, ennobling and liberating possibility that life could be different, that greed and cruelty need not rule human affairs, that we have a chance -- at least a chance -- to work toward a more evolved, engaged and compassionate understanding of ourselves, our species and our societies. Yet to see such a vision tarnished and mocked day after day after day after day; to see us hurtling headlong in the opposite direction, into a world ruled ever more brazenly by greed and cruelty, a world reveling in deliberate ignorance and comforting delusion; to see the very concepts of hope and change transmuted into nothing more than blue smoke masking the same old machinations of the same old brutal systems -- it is a galling thing, it rightly provokes outrage, and the most stringent skepticism (called "cynicism" by the comfortable), and a purging scorn. All of this you will also find, in abundance, in Silber's work. But it is the furthest thing from nihilism or contrarism; it is, quite simply -- and most complexly -- what is best in us crying out against what is worst.
Excerpt from Silber selected by Floyd: As I am often compelled to do these days, I must begin with a principle which few seem to grasp, and even fewer are prepared to accept:
Any individual who rises to the national political level is, of necessity and by definition, committed to the authoritarian-corporatist state. The current system will not allow anyone to be elected from either of the two major parties who is determined to dismantle even one part of that system.
This principle applies to Barack Obama with regard to every policy of significance pursued by the United States government... Obama fully accepts and agrees with the US policy in pursuit of American global hegemony, to be maintained by a worldwide empire of bases and foreign intervention (covert or overt, depending on circumstances) and criminal, aggressive war as required.
In many essays, I have analyzed one of the primary delusions that afflicts many Democratic supporters and apologists. I say "afflicts," as if the problem is one forced upon innocent victims who unwillingly succumb to its symptoms. But such a characterization is frequently far too generous, especially when one considers the alacrity and enthusiasm with which prominent liberal and progressive writers and bloggers peddle obvious falsehoods. The specific delusion to which I refer is the utterly unfounded belief that "better" Democrats generally and Obama more particularly, via helpfully unidentified, mysterious, miraculous means, will "transform" the very nature of the United States as a political entity. (Obama, we are told with apparent seriousness, will change "the very nature of politics.") Let it be noted that "hope" of this kind -- hope which disregards history, even very recent history, and which eagerly discards genuinely serious political analysis as "cynical" or "irresponsible" -- is an exceedingly dangerous gateway drug, which may in time lead its users and countless truly innocent victims into a hell on earth beyond our worst imaginings.
... listening to clinton smart power senate conformation,
same policy just make sound nicer
Marc M.
The same foreign policy, made to sound nicer? I'm a little more optimistic than that, about what we're going to see under President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton. It's going to look like the same policy for a while, because the ship of state sails slowly and change is difficult. So the occupation of Iraq will probably extend at least another year or two, and Afghanistan will probably need to blow up in Obama's face before he'll even consider reconsidering. We'll see a lot of blunders and stupid decisions because Hillary Clinton is incapable of new ideas and Obama's reluctant (at least) to try anything that hasn't been tried before. But Obama's mistakes will be smaller than Bush-Cheney's, much more in line with Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter's mistakes. The era of aggressively seeking out new and catastrophic foreign policy mistakes while shouting "Yee-haw" and flipping the world the finger is coming to an end.
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Re the Guns and Butter link, I usually listen to that program, but I skip it when Webster Tarpley is on. He's a nutball.
Excerpt: Samuel Wurzelbacher of Ohio, aka Joe the Plumber, arrived in Sderot at noon Sunday to show local and foreign reporters how to do it right.
"You should be ashamed of yourself," he told foreign reporters. "You should be patriotic, protect your family and children, not report like you have been doing for the past two weeks since this war has started," he said.
Does this idiot read or listen to the media's drivel?
The Republican party is giving Bush far too much credit (or blame?). Because Bush/Cheney almost definitely would have been much better executives if the Republican-controlled Congress had simply done their own jobs during Bush's first six years, rather than rubber-stamping whatever Bush-Cheney suggested.
Tell a kid to do whatever they want, and they can get awfully -- even dangerously -- wild. The Republican party gave that carte blanche to Bush-Cheney. Now they're crying over the consequences. And those consequences are no more than a slap on the wrist compared to what they should be!
This is about as damning as you can get via illustrated statistics on America's current patchwork healthcare system. Below shows the extra expense of the bureaucracy the US patchwork system requires, compared to a universal healthcare system like Canada's.
Excerpt: Top space brainboxes say that...there is a serious risk of civilisation being brought crashing to its knees by a sudden high-intensity solar radiation storm.
This is a brand new article about the solar flare danger I mentioned earlier, and wrote about (along with other potential disasters) on my own site in early 2003:
I second the motion! If we can't or won't making lying (both by commision and omission) illegal to be presented as news, maybe this is our next best option! (Unfortunately, I suspect some Republican nuts somewhere already have 'america first' trademarked or something.)
Excerpt: After all, what should be more important than proper treatment for our wounded warriors who have patriotically served, even if some of these battles were fought for misguided reasons?
Like the URL says, this website is about "unknown news". We present a brief round-up of reports we think merit more attention, gathered from mainstream, professional journalists, or (rarely) other sources we trust entirely.
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Excerpt: ... the conservative drumbeat over the Fairness Doctrine is much ado about nothing. It's fearmongering -- which may be good for fund-raising. Conservatives claiming that the Obama administration will mean the death of right-wing radio seem to forget this fact: Limbaugh and other conservative talkers thrived during the Clinton years.
Excerpt: Democrats in the US House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers' personal retirement accounts -- including 401(k)s and IRAs -- and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration.
Comment: Relax, this report is just another flat-out lie. The proposal comes from exactly one economist you've never heard of, Teresa Ghilarducci of Notre Dame (not New College, as the article falsely reports). She's one among dozens of economists who briefly testified in low-level Congressional hearings in early October, and she's the only one who made this proposal, and there's been not a peep of interest in the idea from any member of Congress. The claim that Congress is "conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers' personal retirement accounts" is more Republican fearmongering, from the liars who brought you "Obama is pallin' around with terrorists" and "the Democrats will confiscate your guns".
Excerpt: The imagery sure doesn't sell me a soda, which would be the top priority of an ad for Pepsi. Seems much more likely it's someone's idea of an joke. It's a blog post, and it links back to another blog called "Feminist Law Professors" by Ann Bartow, a real law professor who writes an interesting blog, but her source is a blog about advertising, which cites another blog which posts a wide assortment of images and very few words, and where a site-specific search led to all three of Pepsi images. That whole blog seems to be artistic imagery, and much of it's actually quite good, but there's no claim that it's a Pepsi ad, and a quick web search yields nothing as yet to validate any claim that it's a real Pepsi ad.
Excerpt: Three of our readers have sent us this link to this news, but we're not convinced. The author's remark is based not on fact but on long-simmering rumor that Track Palin was prosecuted for vandalism and/or drug dealing, and offered a choice by the judge -- join the Army, or face a jail stint. Problem is, the record is sealed because Track Palin was a minor, so there's no knowing whether it's true.
Excerpt: What customers of what bank in Florida are going to accept Ameros, the fictional currency of the fictional North American Union? At what business can Floridians spend these Ameros?
Excerpt: It wouldn't surprise me at all to learn that Sarah Palin is a racist. She's a Republican in a position of power, so I'd be a little surprised if she wasn't a racist. But before we can put it in the news section on our website, we'd need to hear about her racism from a more reliable source than "Dick & Sharon's LA Progressive" quoting "a waitress" and "an insurance agent" and "Juneau observers" -- a bunch of anonymous Alaskans who may or may not exist.
H&HH
*** *** ***
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Congress of the United States begun and held at the City of New York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine. The Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution expressed a desire in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several states as Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all or any of which articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures to be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the said Constitution. viz: Articles in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress and Ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Amendment II
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Amendment III
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Amendment VI
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
Amendment VII
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
Amendment VIII
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
Of course not. Nobody will know the answers until there's an open and honest investigation.
But anyone courageous enough to think can see that the pertinent questions for any serious "investigation" were never asked, let alone answered, by the official investigators.
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