If you really care so much, why don’t you just get a picture of the left side of his face?

God hates liers. Just ask Regis, Oops, he's dead. You can't.

From: The Huffington Post [mailto:dailybrief@huffingtonpost.com]
Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2008 8:51 AM
To: walkndude@planetnetopia.com
Subject: McCain Camp Defends Rallies: He Was A POW!

October 12, 2008

McCain Chief Uses POW Card To Defend Rally Rhetoric

Defending the aggressive campaign rhetoric at recent McCain-Palin events against criticisms made by Rep. John Lewis, McCain campaign manager Rick Davis raised John McCain's history as a POW on Sunday.

"Look, Chris, I think we have to take this very seriously," Davis told Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace. "Where was John McCain when George Wallace was spreading his hate and segregationist policies at that time? He was in a Vietnam prison camp serving his country with his civil rights also denied."

The hypocrisy of the enlightened, of the hip, of those who - externally at least - hold admirable, humanitarian values, but behind closed doors, when push comes to shove, prove to be far darker beings. Nick Cohen examined the increasing darkness among this number in his brilliant book What's Left? Having written for the Guardian and the Big Issue respectively, we too have come to realise that it often those who shout loudest about what lovely people they are who have the worst secrets.

Cohen's book was about the political left but also about human nature: 'children afraid of the night/Who have never been happy or good.' Hypocrisy is part of being human. We all indulge in it to some extent. But it's instructive to focus on those who preach moral purity while snapping their moral compass in half.

There's the hypocrisy of the liberal-creative male who professes sensitivity and intellectualism, but who is predatory and misogynist in his attitudes to women. The hypocrisy of the gap-year traveller who comes back from the Chinese dictatorship raving about the spirituality of the natives and like human rights is just a Western idea, you know? These are two types you will encounter often, particularly in your student years and your twenties.

In retrospect, the recent rise of Islamic fundamentalism was a godsend to these men. No more paying lip service to liberal ideals to get laid. No more pretence. Here was a chance to support racist, gynophobic, anti-gay fanatical maniacs, to cheer on murder and oppression, to feel the vicarious thrill of 'contextualising' woman-hatred and genocide and the rhetoric of the apocalypse, and still keep your moral superiority. What amazing luck! What delicious liberation! We are all Hezbollah now!

Yes, there has always been a creepy servility to power inside the hearts of darkness of the status-quo left. Take the Middle East. A huge amount of intellectual energy goes into the defence of Iran's President Ahmadinejad, whose regime executes trade unionists and for whom holocaust denial is official policy. I'll never understand why so much time and effort goes into playing this lunatic down. Oh, when he says Israel 'must be wiped from the page of time' he's talking about the occupation, or he's criticising Israel's tax system. Or something. Never mind that stuff about 'filthy Zionist microbes'. It's a mistranslation. And the nukes? Nothing to see there. All that plutonium is just to power the Revolutionary Guards' digital TVs. Not that we're in favour of civil nuclear programmes. Erm...

On the other side of the coin, we have the most liberal, tolerant and multicultural society in the Middle East - the state of Israel. Its paramedics risk their lives to treat Palestinian children; it welcomes immigrants from Yemen to Latin America; its Supreme Court gives relentless scrutiny to decisions made by the government and action taken by the military. Yet this Amsterdam-style paradise is a pariah state on the pseudo-left map. It is compared routinely to apartheid South Africa and its soldiers to jackbooted Nazis. Its enemies are deified, its journalists are subject to discriminatory boycotts and its very right to exist is challenged daily.

These are issues which are debated constantly in the blogosphere but in their book Not in My Name: A Compendium of Modern Hypocrisy, Julie Burchill and Chas Newkey-Burden bring a fresh perspective to the contortions of contemporary thought. Rational politics only explains so much and the arguments of the age have been crying out for Burchill's more visceral analysis. She has the talent to reduce an apparently intellectual stance down to its base drives. Is it really beyond belief that the inadequate, frustrated, callow misogynists of the Western intelligensia looked upon the sexual apartheids of the Muslim world and thought: 'At last! A society where the bitches know their place!'

It isn't all good - articles such as 'Fat Girl Feminists' are very time-specific and are only going to chime with people who follow fashion as obsessively as Julie Burchill. The authors also misunderstand the old saw that hypocrisy is the compliment vice pays to virtue: it means that hypocrisy is an admission that we would like to be moral but can't; it's the Libertine's Prayer: 'Lord, make me chaste... but not yet.'

Yet the book is worth reading for its political essays. You may not agree with Newkey-Burden's take on the Grand March: that 'millions of people took advantage of Britain's freedom and democracy, marching through the streets to ask that the government deprive Iraqi people of those very values'. Loads of people marched because they were afraid civilians would die. The doctrinaire pacifist may be a moron but is not a hypocrite. However, as Newkey-Burden says:

I've never met a single pro-war person who failed to accept the consequences of their argument. Similarly, I've never met a single antiwar person who did accept the consequences of theirs.

Here are some examples of modern hypocrisy that the authors somehow left out.

1) Prolier than thou anti-smoking activists who claimed that the smoking ban was necessary to protect bar staff, when available evidence suggested that smokers were overwhelmingly represented among bar staff, that they were more concerned about pay and union recognition and that bar staff did not want this 'protection', such as it was

2) Northern sentimentalist comedians like Peter/Vernon Kay/Jason Manford who get rich with tired and cliched routines about wedding discos and Bolton families that bear no relation to the reality of what growing up in the North is like; and then fuck off to London and a C4 panel show as soon as the opportunity presents itself

3) Celebrity-haters - people with mortgages and dull nine-to-five jobs who moan about the excesses of hedonistic celebrities. These people are like prisoners on life sentence complaining about the immorality of those who escape from jail. Give them a million pounds and a record deal and they'd be falling out of a limo in Camden too.

Feel free to add more in the comments.

Zenobia makes the point that it's all a question of who has money in Iceland  in this financial débâcle. To read the British press, and hear the media, one would think that the Icelandic Folk are some kind of hereditary enemy of us English. Last night on Channel Four there was some Trustafarian given prime-time telly space to whingeing about her Nana losing loads-a-dosh in an Iceland bank.

I would like to point out the following points about Iceland:

1) It has one of the most brilliant and good-looking populations in the world (see above).

2) Its people are, generally speaking,  left-wing.

3) It stood by Blighty in the Second World War.

Now in Coatesy's reckoning these are strong pluses.

Obviously not for Gordon Brown who is now on a doomed mission to save global capitalism and crush the Icelandic economy.

It is certainly the case that Tribune in recent years has not exactly been the most riveting read. Its soft-left politics have often verged on simple Brownism, especially during the Blair premiership. I can remember some bizarre call upon Brown to "Go to it Gordon!" when he'd won some back-room manoeuvre against Blair, which almost gave the impression that New Labour's second main architect was some kind of closeted Tony Benn who was now ready to present himself to the world. Of course, no such thing happened. But then it is possible to understand this, given it came from a paper which had basically seen its Parliamentary supporters melt into the Kinnockite leadership of the party in the 1980s.

It hadn't been selling well of late: indeed I can think of only one shop in the West Midlands where I even saw it on a regular basis. The Morning Star, The Socialist and Socialist Worker are far more familiar sights to the public in this region. It would certainly need a re-vamp and a reconsideration of its overall political position if it were to continue. But, even for reasons of pure nostalgia, I for one certainly hope it does.

(hat-tip: Red Maria)

Just on the subject of plugging books (done Mike's), here is another must read, Bash the Rich.

Ian is something of a hero of mine: a fellow enemy of ponce David Blunkett.

The history of how Class War came to be, and, notably, the stuff about his Cardiff activities..well, top class. The book is one of the best written, witty, and all-round can't-put-down stuff I've seen in a long time.  My mate Steve, and my matette Sarah, rave about it.

I was interested to read that his dad was a bitter lefty Scot - like mine.

Give my regards to Tom.

Although mind you, in all seriousness I do think it's actually an interesting and important debtate. Contrary to what Stroppy and Dave (both of whom are likely to attend) have written on the subject, I don't see debates like this as a diversion from the class struggle or such like. I think that debates about stances like this one (for those of you who don't know, Sean is defending his - in my view bizarre - stance on a hypothetical Israeli war on Iran) are actually important in terms of clarifying what we as socialists and progressives think about world political questions. If those debates become heated then in my view it's not sectarianism or aggression to do so, but actually a sign that the participants are passionate about their politics. And there's nowt wrong with that.

Mr Denham, don't forget the popcorn!

But I do remember growing up as one of the only Asian kids in an all-white suburb of Chicago, and learning very deeply the lessons of being the Other. Even though my family was very fortunate and strong, even though my parents were the hardest working people I knew, and provided my brothers and me with every advantage and comfort they could, while instilling in us an appreciation for hard work, intelligence, reason, compassion, and joy in life, the simple fact was they could not protect me from the consequences of being half-Korean in a culture that had no room and very little tolerance for difference.

School was the place where I learned many, many wonderful things, but it was also where I learned in 4th grade that when four 5th graders beat me until I couldn't stand, and then kicked me as I lay in the snow, calling me "gook", and "nip", and "chink", that the beating was nothing compared to the shame of looking up and seeing a crowd of other kids watch and do nothing to help me. The alienation of that moment was a lesson I will never forget.

It was a lesson to be repeated and reinforced in a thousand ways, which I will not recount here, but thankfully my children have never known one day when they were derided, or ignored, or abused because of their heritage. I truly believed this lesson of my childhood has become weaker over time; that the politics of hatred have faded from the national discourse, and we were truly emerging from the long, angry night.

Until now.

This presidential campaign has been the most exciting political event I have ever seen, and I feel deeply fortunate to have been able to witness it. I was impressed by Obama from the very beginning, and I was even excited by the best candidates from both parties. They offered a clear hope for changing the disastrous course the Bush Administration has taken the country.

I had already decided that Barack Obama was by far the best candidate for president, for reasons other, far better writers than I have expressed, but, despite the closeness of the race, I felt there was little I could add to the conversation. However, since John McCain has chosen to revitalize his campain through demagoguery, anger, and specious, hateful, lies, I now have something to say.

Oliver Wendell Holmes said "A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimension." But I have found that the mind can all too easily relax into familar patterns of thought. America has matured and learned many things, but the lessons of compassion and understanding must be continually learned. I may not have understood the larger political issues of my childhood, but I know what I lived through. America has grown, but as a nation we have learned through great pain that fear, anger, and hate remain powerful forces in the world, both abroad and sadly, as the past few days of Republican campaigning have shown, at home. Out of desperation, McCain is grasping at the darkest elements of our nature, and thereby threatens to erase not only Obama's chance to be President, but decades of national growth towards the idea that we are all created equal.

Through condescending and cynical tactics, McCain and Palin have shamelessly tried to manipulate the "Joe Six-Packs" and the "Hockey Mom's" of the nation, to say that they understand "Main Street" America. But as this speech by former United Mine Workers President Richard Trumka, who is now secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO shows, this only serves to draw a false distinction between the "elite" and the "common", to exacerbate and antagonize, and create divisions.

The tactics of fear and hate must not be allowed to regain their sway. We have a chance to take a brilliant step forward as a nation, and given the current political and financial crises we face, we must call upon our highest ideals, our bravest virtues to meet them. I believe one candidate represents our best hope for leading our continued growth as a nation and a society. Please join me, and help elect Barack Obama as our next President.

He taxes too much. If you vote for him you’ll be homeless. If you vote for the other one, your children will starve. But if you vote for the first guy, they’ll lose all their education and become stupid rejects, begging for day-old scraps behind the ghetto bakery. But the other guy will take your job. And the other one will tax your new raise so you actually come home with $5 less every week. One of them will date your mom. The other will shut down her nursing home. One will have dinner with terrorists at Arby’s while the other just sends him a check at Christmas, even though they don’t celebrate Christmas.

Here’s what I’m saying: There are bigger issues than whose face is on the front page. Every day 6000 kids are killed by mid-term or later abortion. They refuse to allow Bibles in schools, so Christian parents teach home school, allowing their children to learn math and moral values at the same time. While the schools are taking a massive dump when it comes to value and ethics and crime and teaching self-worth, the state of California just outlawed Christians from their God-given right to teach their own kids. Now they have to send them to the cesspool of a school that will teach anti-creation science, thereby infringing on the rights of students to practice their own religion freely (but don’t worry, they won’t attack Muslims, Buddhists, atheists, agnostics, pagans, wiccans, Scientologists, etc. Just the Christians.)

Let’s see, what else? Lets talk about gay marriage. I’m all for gays to have the right to choose their lifestyle- its their choice. (Just like my kids schooling used to be.) But I’m not for the whole gay-marriage thing. Sure, they can practice it, but that doesn’t really make it a marriage. I know, I know, they’ve redefined what “marriage” is, but it used to be a union before God between a man and a woman. Since most homosexuals don’t believe in or care for God, they can’t really have a union before Him that He will honor. But, what they hey, they ignored my right to practice my faith (only if it’s from the Christian Bible) by ignoring the 1^st amendment, why not ignore the other principals too.

So who is going to do what to help me out? Am I personally going to benefit from either party being elected? Maybe, but probably not. There aren’t a whole lot of things that are going to actually make a difference in the way I daily live my life. I could be wrong, but here’s how I look at it:

If one side is accused of overtaxing and the other of allowing abortions, I will sacrifice a couple bucks, even a couple hundred, per year to vote for the sanctity of life.

If one side is accused of sending jobs overseas and the other of limiting free speech, I’m probably going to have to go for free speech. There will always be a need for jobs on the US. They may not be the best, but we have too many people not to need a ton of jobs. We also have a lot of politicians going after free speech, even though the ones attacked are the churches and the right. Hmm.

If one side wants to build a thousand mile fence at the borders and the other wants to let gays marry, I will go for the fence. Those guys are great climbers and if they can get in through, over or under a military fence, then they deserve to stay. For those that can’t, they can still come here, but have to go through the legal process. Meanwhile, I stand up for what I believe regarding gay marriage. I’m not anti-gay, but I’m not pro-gay. I’m just ok-gay; they can do their thing, but I don’t want tax dollars going toward something I find immoral.

Bottom line, I can’t do anything about the politicians. But, then again, I will probably never have to answer to them. I will, however, have to answer to God. I will stand before Him and be able to say that I voted for the things and the principles that are on His side, His Law, and His eternal purpose. I will say that I stood up for hundreds of thousands of innocent children and supported their right to life. I will say that I voted against the activity that led to His destroying Sodom and Gomorrah, the activities that He calls an abomination. I will be able to say that I stood up for His Word, His teaching, for the right to exhibit by faith, to speak freely the gospel. I will say, “Jesus, I stood up for you.”

What do you stand for?

While I like how he takes the time to strike down "bi-partisanship," he only does so for when McCain advocates it. I see him trying to fudge Obama as being in the position most relatively aligned with The People, and it would help Zizek seem less hypocritical to explain how he sees "setting aside politics to get stuff done" function in the discourse of either candidate when both are significantly bought up by business interests. Maybe the difference is between how McCain and Republicans in general seem to think the question is "state-intervention or not," while Obama and the Democrats in general seem to be more focused on what Zizek calls "the real dilemma ... what kind of State intervention?"

Of course, then there is the possibility that the Democrats will advocate the wrong kind of intervention and/or for the wrong reason(s). Yes, most Democrats may recognized that "Main Street can’t thrive if Wall Street isn’t doing well," but I don't think we can hand it to them that they fully recognize or demonstrate in their voting records that "what's good for Wall Street isn't necessarily good for Main Street." Alternatively, if the Republicans and conservatives face what Zizek's called "the real dilemma," their response to "what kind of state-intervention?" could be fascism or more State Capitalism. Thinking and talking no longer about the possibility of state-intervention, but state-intervention as such, is what I take Zizek to be advocating when he says "don't just do something, talk," but he should be saying that to the Democrats as much as the Republicans, Obama as much as McCain.

In a similar vein Jodi Dean concludes:

If this is the collapse of neoliberalism, we have to push a positive, affirmative view of state action. But it can't be a kind of apologia for the wrong sort of state action.

I think N. Pepperell has been all over the stakes of this space of critique, too, for over the last week:

All of this needs more analysis than I can provide at present… But one interesting dimension of the current crisis is the rendering manifest of these distinctions in much more popular discussion than we’ve seen for some time, I think… Articulations can have their own hard power - as well as normative force: large-scale public discussion of capitalism - what it is, what it should be - has now opened up on a massive scale. What is articulated now will likely define a space of possibilities for the sorts of actions that lie ready to hand in the decades to come… Opening some potentials… Placing others farther out of reach… This is a time when theorising structural possibilities becomes… unusually impactful… The previous major structural transformation opened an experiential and interpretive gap into which flooded the interpretive systems and policies that have led us here. The question when confronting present and future transformations is how to open the potential for something other - for something that holds onto emancipatory promises that can otherwise be easily drowned out in reactive responses, conditioned by an environment primed to be receptive to ideals of capitalism as an end in itself…

In other words, the dog-eat-dog world of the "[free] marketplace of ideas" has to be re-thought from within very carefully, but what is emerging now out of what Zizek has called the Denkverbot of our "(post-)ideological consensus" is the possibility of thinking again.

This should also win a award. Brilliant photos. It's a sand-storm on the left side I think.

Fact of the Entry: Astronauts get taller as they are in space.

Those of us who are North London echt will grasp this.

But don't it really get on your bleeding tits that Gordon Brown is picking on Iceland (and Birds, famous national dish, Puffin Pie)  to blame for the collapse of international capitalism?

I mean what have them there lot done to him.

My sister visited Iceland. Once.

For the duration, the entire Troll population went into voluntary political exile.

here's a funny article i read about an iphone that was left locked up in a car by it's owner:p it's silly but definitely something fresh and what can you expect from the daily onion anyway?  

enjoy the article:)

10. Spore

09. X3: Terran Conflict

08. Left 4 Dead

07. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King

06. Far Cry 2

05. Pro Evolution Soccer 2009

04. Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway

03. Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3

02. Starcraft 2

01. Fallout 3

Just thought I'd post this latest pensée of the gas-fueled Jim Denham (pictured above).

Re CPGB et al: " Stalinist liars and petty bourgeois poseurs."

Now remind me why most of the left Ioathes the AWL and all of its works?

"Mike's Favourite Marxist Practice."

A must-read in the run-up for the Debate of the Decade:

Zahirah or Diyanah?

I consulted my Grandmother, Father, Eldest Brother, Maternal Aunt and other family members; they seem to paint a picture of a blissful marriage in the near future. I'm ready for it. They have pledged their full support behind me in a relationship with either of the girls, it's the biggest supported pledge or the first support given to me to have a relationship with that very special someone.

I only found out about the promised or so called arranged marriage plans which my late mother made, from my father early last night just after dinner. It's a scary truth that my late mother promised both of the girl's parents that I'll marry either one but it still boils down to one fact; it is God's will. I hope he would help me decide the right one.

I can't fool around or date any other girls anymore, that's a setback but on a positive note.

Q: Would you prefer an arranged marriage or a self-pick partner marriage? Why? Share your views in my comment box. I have to warn that I do not need comments from UN-IMPORTANT AND USELESS people in my lives. God bless you.

I still stand my ground that women who can't cook or do housework are useless, worse still if the husband's lifeskills is far-fetched beyond his own boundary knowing how to cook and do chores. We must remember that food bonds people together and bring them closer together, similarly in a family.

Conservative? Nope. Only idiots would say that. Yes. ID10TS.

Al-Mughtakhairayts, the meaning behind it? Moving with time, surroundings and your capacity. That is the way I think, it other words it is Contemporary. It's not modern but steadfast. I look at what I have and my situation from there an evaluation is made which gives birth to a decision and theory.

As a husband if your wife can cook simple but delicious meals, it's going to be a scored point for you; you'll definitely be a thrift by saving money from eating outside and earn some savings which at the end of the day you would have the joy to spend on something meaningful.

Pilih wanita bukan hanya rupa yang cantik sahaja tetapi pilih yang baik, rupa baik, hati baik, fikiran baik, akhlak baik, tubuh baik, minda baik and otak yang baik. Contohnya se-seorang wanita yang boleh masak, menjaga kamu apabila kamu sakit supaya rumah tangga mu tidak menjadi porak peranda kerana kebodohan dari salah satu daripada kamu suami-isteri.

Your wife must be able to replace you when you're ill or sick, take care of the family and keep everyone in good shape. So that your family and steps outside your door do not turn into a castle made from dried sand which crumbles under the weight.

Back to the topic, too much deviation but it's some good advice for the children of Adam p.b.u.h as a guide to life and picking a wife.

We may not have dated for the past 10 years, but when a child is young that is where you learn about his or her attitude and style. I manage to capture that of Ira and Yana, they're compatible beyond a single doubt.

Attitudes don't change but appearance and fashion styles change, both of them exceed my expectation and are of the same level as each other. I'll take the next 6 months to evaluate on both, ask them out on a date and see who is the worthy one and suitable.

Would update further tonight. See you then.