Friday, September 29, 2006

Iron Man cast

Oddly enough, Robert Downey Jr will play Tony Stark aka Iron Man in the upcoming film.

How do you think they will translate Iron Man's often very non-metal looking armor from the book?

Deliver Us From Evil

A new documentary about clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church (with groovin' music from Johnny Cash).

TRAILER

Monday, September 25, 2006

Straight-Edge: the movie

The film, "Straight Edge" has started shooting in Fiji.
The film has NOTHING to do with Straight-Edge HC.
whew!

'Mony money

Word on the street is that Revelation Records, Rivalry Records, DeathWish Inc, and BridgeNine Records all want to sign everyone's favorite Bay Area chaos-pushers, Ceremony.

Saturday, September 23, 2006

East Bay car theft map



(thanx Mel)

BNE SF

CNN ran a piece on 'BNE' outta SF and Mayor Newsome is offering $2500 for his capture.

Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Chavez vs The Devil


"Yesterday, the devil came here. Right here. Right here. And it smells of sulfur still today"

Yesterday, ladies and gentlemen, from this rostrum, the president of the United States, the gentleman to whom I refer as the devil, came here, talking as if he owned the world. Truly. As the owner of the world."

Yes, you can call us extremists, but we are rising up against the empire, against the model of domination."

I think I have some inkling of what the peoples of the south, the oppressed people think. They would say, "Yankee imperialist, go home."

We have to strengthen ourselves, our will to do battle, our awareness. We have to build a new and better world."

Monday, September 18, 2006

Banksy, poverty, and a painted elephant


In Banksy's AMAZING new show in LA, amongst all his work is a live painted pink elephant named Tai.

Like all of Banksy's work, this installation deals with social issues such as poverty, celebrity, militarism, etc.

I think his work effectively gets a message across... although it is a bit ironic in the midst of such a star-studded art exhibit located in the belly of the celebrity beast.

Cards handed out at the opening read: "There's an elephant in the room. There's a problem we never talk about." The statement went on to say that many people live below the poverty line.
His use of a live elephant has created a lot of attention; but has it drawn attention to poverty?
The use of 'shock' is a trite reactionary tool.

Critics has rightfully blasted Banksy for using a live elephant. However, I see this as a slippery position for if liberals and animal rights/liberation activists line up against Banksy, they are potentially positioning themselves against Banksy's fight against poverty. They may also be further alienating themselves into obscurity.

Sunday, September 17, 2006

$FPD: Homeland $ecurity

SFPD got $3.3million from the Dept of Homeland Security to pay for police overtime.

On 3/23/03 (when USA invaded Iraq), SFPD arrested nearly 2,000 people.
Overtime costs covered by Homeland Security nearly reached $800,000.

On other days payment ranged from $5,000 to $500,000.
This includes events described as "anti-war demonstrations", "alternative bicycle event", and "Global Exchange Protest of Fox News."
Motorcycle pigs earn up to $80/hr!

The catch is that to obtain federal antiterror funding, the city must first spend its own money.
So the more you spend, the more you can get!

Then-mayor Willie Brown really wanted that terror money. He said at the time, "Terrorists could use the demonstrations as a 'cover' to get near bridges or targeted buildings..."

Saturday, September 16, 2006

Tamil Hyphy


M.I.A. is working on her new music with Timbaland which is sure to blow the fuck up.
She has also got down with Hyphy!

On her MySpace page, she checks "Vans", offers a remix of Nump's "Grapes", and lists D1 of The Pharmaceuticals in her top friends.
___

In other Hyphy news, DJ Shadow's 'The Outsider' was just released.
SF Weekly has good interview with Shadow where he talks about taking Hyphy (and a bunch of Yay Area cats) to Europe on his own dime.

Toussaint film

Danny Glover will make his directorial debut on the film "Toussaint."
The film will star Wesley Snipes, Don Cheadle, & Angela Bassett and is about the successful Haitian slave revolt and Toussaint L'Ouverture.

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Texas Is The Reason to reunite

Another reunion show.
This time, Texas Is The Reason 11/25 in NY.

Tuesday, September 12, 2006

SHAC sentencing

Run a website or advocate change- go to prison.

Three animal-welfare activists whose Web site led to the harassment of employees of Huntingdon Life Sciences; a company that tests products on animals, were sentenced to between four and six years in federal prison.

The three sentenced on Tuesday include the president of SHAC, Kevin Kjonaas of Minnesota; campaign coordinator Lauren Gazzola, of Connecticut; and Web site manager Jacob Conroy, of California.
(Yep! A web site manager!)

The defendants were not accused of directly making threats or carrying out vandalism. Instead, they were charged with animal enterprise terrorism, stalking and other offenses.

They also were ordered to pay a total of $1 million in restitution to the company.

The lesson here is obvious.
If you are effective at inflicting monetary "damage" to a company, you will be imprisoned.

Wednesday, September 06, 2006

SNITCH: "vegan matt"

fuckin snitch:

He was sentenced to 6 months after pleading guilty to ELF arson and pointing a finger at Connor Cash as a "ringleader."

Here is his MySpace page!

Bangladesh: getting what you want

In Bangladesh, police agreed to abide by the 6 major demands set by environmental protestors after rioting and a general strike.

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Fascists & fairies

A teaser trailer for Pan's Labyrinth is online.

Monday, September 04, 2006

Hanzi Smatter

Finally, a website dedicated to telling Americans their appropriation of fake Chinese/Japanese is wrong!

Saturday, September 02, 2006

Bebot, sigue!

Oh, The Black Eyed Peas.
Generally, I can't stand em. They represent the glaring condradictions in the pop music industry.

I can remember them coming out and being somewhat interesting hip hop. They seemed to be somewhat progressive. No one was buying it. At the verge of getting dropped by their label and/or breaking up, record company bigwigs suggested adding Fergie to the group.
Fergie the light-skinned, long-haired, fake boobs having sexpot would bring in listeners/consumers.

Now, one only hears/sees BEP with Fergie out front usually talking about her physical atributes or now emulating British dance music.

However, BEP did call the CIA terrorists. They do shout out some progressive things.
So, the ever present question for artists: At what point does reaching a wider audience dilute your message to an ineffectual slogan? Are the jewels found in their music enough to catch the attention of a few key fans? Or is (party) music made by right-on cats better than pop music made by bourgeois mimllionaires?

BEP's newest videos for Bebot Generation1 & 2 have made me start to love the BEP again:



MTV News:




(thanx sergio!)

Friday, September 01, 2006

Leftist Mexico

Leftist Lopez Obrador said he won't recognize the electoral court's decision, and he plans to create a parallel government and rule from the streets.

In solidarity, leftist lawmakers stormed the stage of Congress and prevented President Fox from delivery his last state-of-the-nation address.

Mexico City has been militarized.

flaws in the Josh Wolf case


Flaws:
-The local cops and the federal prosecutors are trying to claim that Wolf isn't really a reporter.
There are all sorts of problems with this argument — the first being that the courts have never formally contested Wolf's journalistic credentials. In fact, the local prosecutors admit in legal briefs that they contacted Washington to seek permission to subpoena Wolf — a process that's required whenever journalists face this sort of legal action.
Under California law, even bloggers enjoy the reporter's privilege.

-The Wolf case should never have gone to the federal level in the first place.
The federal agents from the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) and the FBI didn't choose to investigate the case — the San Francisco cops requested assistance. That in itself was odd: why is an assault on an officer a federal affair?
It federalizes law enforcement around demonstrations.

The SFPD is choosing who will prosecute crimes — based on politics, not the law.

FREE JOSH WOLF!

Zionists in Berkeley and beyond

Berkeley Zionists are blasting the owner/editor, Becky O'Malley, of local paper The Berkeley Daily Planet for running commentary by Kurosh Arianpour.
Arianpour states that the cause of Israel's "racist attitude" is that they consider themselves "Chosen People."

O'Malley said she is being set up and insisted any meeting with the angry Zionists must be in a public forum.
___________________

Norman Finkelstein has a new book, Beyond The Chutzpuh.
He was recently on Democracy Now! where he broke it the fuck down on "anti-semetism" and how the ADL doesn't give a fuck about anti-Jewish sentiment but only supporting a Zionist right-wing ideology.

"Yeah, the ADL came out with a statement that Amnesty International is borderline anti-Semitic, and that's pretty conventional from the ADL, that these organizations are anti-Semitic or then, you know, in other cases, they accuse individuals or organizations of being Holocaust deniers. None of this -- first of all, as I said, it's pretty commonplace in these organizations. The Simon Wiesenthal Center recently issued a statement condemning the United Church of Christ for being not borderline anti-Semitic, but functionally anti-Semitic, because they oppose the wall that Israel is building in the Occupied Territories.

Anyone who's a critic of Israel becomes an anti-Semite. And the truth of the matter is, the real anti-Semites, they don't really care about -- or the real Holocaust deniers, which is their other favorite epithet to hurl at people or expectorate at people who are critical of Israel --

... Abbas is an authentic Holocaust denier. He wrote his doctoral dissertation denying the Nazi Holocaust. He published it as a book in 1982. He said less than a million Jews were killed during World War II. He denied the Nazi gas chambers. Now there you have a real Holocaust denier. You don't have to really probe the meaning of his words. It's pretty straightforward. Well, he's the American favorite now. Everybody loves Mr. Abbas, because he does the American bidding. So they don't care that he's a Holocaust denier.

...Take the case of Ronald Reagan. Nowadays many people are fond of Reagan... Everybody forgets Reagan was the one who went to Bitburg, gave the speech saying that the Nazi soldiers, including the Nazi -- the Waffen-SS, were victims, just like the Jews in the concentration camps. That was his famous statement at Bitburg. The ADL, which claims to be so vigilant about Holocaust denial, the ADL gave him their Torch of Liberty Award.

...Berlusconi, the president of Italy...Former president of Italy, gave this speech praising Mussolini and saying all the charges against Mussolini were false, he was basically a good guy. Three weeks -- three weeks after he gave his speech -- and remember, Mussolini passed the Anti-Semitic Laws, at the end of his regime, sent Jews to their death. Three weeks after he gave his speech, the ADL, Anti-Defamation League, Abraham Foxman, who is now accusing Amnesty of borderline anti-Semitism, they gave him the distinguished Statesman of the Year Award...Why is the ADL giving this guy an award? Well, the answer was simple. Because at that point, he was the only European leader who was very pro -- he was very pro-Israel. They don't care about Holocaust denial. They have no interest in it."

know your enemy: God's little army

"we are at war"