Under the Bush administration, the federal government has aggressively used a well-established tool of public relations: the prepackaged, ready-to-serve news report that major corporations have long distributed to TV stations to pitch everything from headache remedies to auto insurance. In all, at least 20 different federal agencies, including the Defense Department and the Census Bureau, have made and distributed hundreds of television news segments in the past four years, records and interviews show. Many were subsequently broadcast on local stations across the country without any acknowledgement of the government's role in their production.
The Church report said that "none of the pictured abuses at Abu Ghraib bear any resemblance to approved policies at any level, in any theater." Admiral Church and his investigators must have missed the pictures of prisoners in hoods, forced into stress positions and threatened by dogs. All of those techniques were approved at one time or another by military officials, including Mr. Rumsfeld. Of course, no known Pentagon policy orders the sexual humiliation of prisoners. But that has happened so pervasively that it clearly was not just the perverted antics of one night shift in one cellblock at Abu Ghraib.
extreme ornithology: Mark Obmascik investigates the world of extreme bird watchers--enthusiasts who compete in the 365-day birdwatching marathon--in his new book The Big Year: A Tale of Man, Nature, and Fowl Obsession.
skeptic's annotated bible
a pretty amazing short "film" by michal levy.
(15 min. to load over my dial-up)
(15 min. to load over my dial-up)
There is a new works on paper show - Brice Marden, Al Taylor and Terry Winters at Nolan/Eckman. March 5 - April 9 2005. Their website is here.
560 B'way, worth a look-see, in my humble opinion.
Amazing 360 degree panorama of Toronto:
This is a composite of downtown Toronto, Centre Island and lake Ontario, put together from photos taken from the CN Tower skypod, 443 m above the ground.
Three rows of 18 photos (54 photos total) were used in the composite. Final processing was about 8 hours on a P3/1GHz/1GB.
Motorcycle Mayhem, a new (to me at least) one from My New Filing Technique is Unstopable.
Frank Luntz lists 14 words Republicans are not to say.
"No, man," I told him, "I hate those things, all that paper and those rubber bands. But I like you. I don't need to read it. Just tell me a little about it and I'll give you the blurb."
It was one of my best: "a howl of laughter from the abyss of horror, a comic nightmare from the sick, troubled sleep of this century's desolate end." And it appeared directly above Cubby's blurb.
-n tosches
It was one of my best: "a howl of laughter from the abyss of horror, a comic nightmare from the sick, troubled sleep of this century's desolate end." And it appeared directly above Cubby's blurb.
-n tosches
file under: iPod, reverse engineering
Robotwisdom is back. Riothero is back.
Sadly, neither lemonyellow nor sevencrabrangoon are back although the above blasts from the past did make me check.
Sadly, neither lemonyellow nor sevencrabrangoon are back although the above blasts from the past did make me check.
superfriends do office space
"Am I boring you?" Dr. Gene Scott RIP. I don't want to think how many hours I spent watching this dude on late night TV in the 80s.
gannongate : its worse than you think
the dubya tapes
Now would be a really good time for me to revitalize the Syria page, but work precludes it. The US is going to use the assasination as an excuse to bash Syria, whether or not they are behind it. At this point, with an unpredictable tyrant in charge, it's hard to predict what the US will do.
brian lehrer wrestling with the lack of meaning issue / spoiler : ultimately he's seduced by the uplifting experience
NY mag : quiet! genius at work
NY mag : quiet! genius at work
more on another public spectacle coming our way.
