This was originally posted as a MySpace bulletin by the one and only Sweet Thursday this afternoon, and I like Mr. Cahn's article enough to re-post it here, for your delectation.
Thank you, ST, for originally posting this.
Be seeing you.
----------------- Bulletin Message -----------------
From: Sweet Thursday
Date: Aug 20, 2007 1:34 PM
With the arrest of Elvira Arellano it seems that the focus has been again
not on the real issues(NAFTA, ICE, corporations), but on how illegal immigrants, like her are causing our economy and healthcaresystems to fail (fear fear ). I think David does an awesome job at putting the REAL issues out there!
Peace
August 2, 2007
Refocusing the Immigration Reform Debate
by David Cahn, Community Organizer
Immigration reform died in Congress for a second time this past June and probably won't be approached again on a federal level until we have a new occupant in the Oval Office. Instead of quieting down though, the debate over immigration reform has only intensified and spilled over into cities, counties and states across the nation. The battle over immigration is now down to the local level as Minutemen-type groups are pushing for a variety of anti-immigrant ordinances
While some elected officials and right-wing pundits have distracted people with talk of individual border crossers being the root of our ills, few people have publicly talked about the much larger and actual threat of corporate border crossers. There is a direct connection between companies and jobs moving out of our country and people doing whatever they can to come in. When corporations can travel the world looking for the cheapest labor costs and lowest environmental protections, we all suffer. Those on the left and right, Mexican immigrants and Minutemen, teachers, baristas and truck drivers and everyone in between all suffer. Some want to blame immigrants for problems in our healthcare system, public education or lack of decent paying jobs. It might be easy, but it will not solve anything.
As U.S. citizens we need to learn about the effects of policies like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA and organizations such as the International Monetary fund (IMF) before we think we have any solutions towards "immigration reform." It is these free trade policies that put the rights of corporations and profits above the rights of people and it is these free trade policies, supported by Republicans and Democrats alike that need to be part of any debate on immigration today.
Since the passage of NAFTA in 1994 one of the results has been many U.S. companies moving production to Mexico to take advantage of lower wages and weaker environmental protections. The end result has been the loss of over 3 million U.S. jobs. A telling study in 1999 found that 90% of 400 U.S. plant closings or threatened plant closings occurred during union organizing drives. By 2002, the US Department of Labor had received claims for NAFTA-related unemployment assistance from over 507,000 workers. The Bush Administration's response to this was to simply order the Department of Labor to stop counting, since the job loss figures were an embarrassment as he was trying to get Congress to give him fast track authority to negotiate even stronger free trade agreements such as the Free Trade Area of the America.
Another major result has been U.S. subsidized corn flooding the economy of Mexico, pushing millions of small subsistence farmers and others in Mexico into severe poverty. Former union organizer David Bacon sums up the net result, "No matter how many walls are built on the border, no matter how many troops or National Guardsmen or helicopters patrol it, workers will still cross it looking for a future." U.S. foreign policies and the ways they wreck the economies of other countries have a direct bearing on people being forced to migrate here as a matter of survival.
Once folks do cross that border (or overstay their visas) we are led to believe that somehow attempts at barring migrant families and workers from employment, housing or healthcare are going to solve the socioeconomic problems of our society today. Deporting or denying work to migrant workers does not create a single job for anyone else. If anybody can show me an "illegal alien" who has moved U.S. factories overseas, spent millions of our tax dollars on failing war in Iraq or given major tax breaks to corporations I might give the claims of nativists a little more credence. Until then, this debate needs to focus on the real issues at hand.
Colorado is a great example of the effect of anti-immigrant legislation. Folks in Colorado were so effective on a state level in passing these laws and chasing immigrants away that they have found themselves with a serious work shortage in their fields. This past March the Department of Corrections offered a solution in the form of pilot program contracting prison labor to Colorado farms. Inmates will be paid about 60 cents a day and watched over by prison guards who will also be paid by the farms.
By the year 2050 it is predicted that white people will no longer be the numerical majority in the United States. I am sorry for the distress this might cause a lot of my fellow white citizens, but it is a fact that I do not think can be changed. Fortunately we have a choice: we can start to see some humanity in those we call "illegal aliens" and realize we are impacted by the same economic policies that have forced them to migrate to the U.S. and stand up to protect all of our rights to decent work, housing and education or we can remain divided while more and more U.S. jobs continue to be outsourced, healthcare becomes privatized, and social services continue to be slashed.
Regardless of the legislation to come, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the enforcement-arm of the Department of Homeland Security has promised increased raids, arrests, detention and deportation of migrant workers and families. Since 2003, under the stated goals of Operation Endgame, it has been ICE's goal to "remove all removable aliens" by the year 2012. From Bellingham to New Bedford, Connecticut and everywhere in between the result has been the separation of thousands of families, communities living in fear and countless reports of human rights abuses.
For others, the result is also profit. For example, migrant workers in our area, and really shipped from around the nation, are detained in the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma. The Center is a privatized, 1000 bed facility run by the GEO Group, Inc (recent news about GEO Group operations in other parts of the country). GEO Group is a multinational corporation and in the business of caging undocumented workers and U.S. citizens alike with over 50 facilities in the U.S. alone. While some folks are in a fit over people working in this country without documents, detainees are paid $1 a day for serving food and doing janitorial work within the facility. Immigrant detainees in general are the fastest growing incarcerated population in the U.S. and over half of all detention facilities are privately operated, charging the federal government on average $95 dollars per bed per day. It is no coincidence that our Congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle have been pushing for a new "guest worker" program, as a solution to immigration reform. Though the stated objective of Endgame is clear enough, the hidden agenda of the operation remains officially undeclared — that agenda is to deport the undocumented migrants working in the U.S. and recruit them back as serviceable individuals in a "guest worker" program that will reduce them to a condition of transient labor. Though this might be good for a number of companies, where will this leave the vast majority of U.S. citizens with so many regulated and transient labor in our communities? If we do end up with a guest worker program in the coming years, where are we going to focus our attention to look for a real solution? The people caught in this situation or the people who created it?
Community to Community Development is a women-led, community organization looking for justice in our food system and in all of our communities. We understand that attacks on immigrants in Whatcom County and Washington State are an attack on all of us and we are looking to work with anybody and everybody in finding real solutions to community problems. Through a number of community projects we are trying to build productive and proactive solutions to these issues and many more. Whatever solution comes forward to reform our immigration laws, it must be socially and economically sustainable for everybody. This opinion piece is written as ongoing invitation for constructive dialogue and collaboration in the future. This so-called "immigration reform" debate is not going anywhere anytime soon, and it is important that we refocus it on the real factors at hand. Let me know what you think!
David Cahn is a community organizer with Community to Community Development and a grandson of immigrants. He can be contacted at davidncahn@gmail.com
August 02nd 2007 Posted to Home Page, Press Releases & Announcements, Articles and Editorials, Immigrants in America
notinmycountry.org
20 August 2007
If You Could Only See....
If you could only see Amigo the Cat asleep on my kitchen floor, as I type on the computer, look over every now and again at him, and see beauty and contentment in his recumbent form, you'd know, or at least could see, what simple, utter joy there is in being alive, having enough food in one's belly, and to feel safe.
All this is the essence of being loved, I believe. There may be more, but, for now, as I watch Amigo dream his cat dreams, that is enough for me.
Be seeing you.
All this is the essence of being loved, I believe. There may be more, but, for now, as I watch Amigo dream his cat dreams, that is enough for me.
Be seeing you.
19 August 2007
Japanese TV Commercial 3
Our last Japanese tv ad for to-day, dates from 1987, and is for a brand of milk.
The ad uses a mix of live-action and animation to imply that the beautiful anime girls seen all in a row at various points in the commercial are the ones being milked.
Very strange and rather disturbing ad, really.
Be seeing you.
The ad uses a mix of live-action and animation to imply that the beautiful anime girls seen all in a row at various points in the commercial are the ones being milked.
Very strange and rather disturbing ad, really.
Be seeing you.
Japanese TV Commercial 2
Next in our series on Japanese tv commercials from YouTube is this mid- or late '70's kaiju(Ultraman, and other Japanese monster-fighting superheroes, for those of you unfamiliar with the term kaiju)-influenced vacuum cleaner ad.
In this clip, actually a set of three short clips, we see our heroine turn into an Ultraman-style superheroine, when summoned to deal with a nasty monster attacking a city.
She bests him by using her vacuum cleaning powers, and disposes of it, all in a nice little plastic baggie.
Left this as a comment on a MySpace friend's profile this morning, 'cos I figured she'd get a kick out of seeing a traditionally feminine domestic task turned into a super power, even if only for the purpose of selling a line of vacuum cleaners.
For you kaiju fans, or for those who like interesting novelties, well, enjoy for your own reasons.
Be seeing you.
In this clip, actually a set of three short clips, we see our heroine turn into an Ultraman-style superheroine, when summoned to deal with a nasty monster attacking a city.
She bests him by using her vacuum cleaning powers, and disposes of it, all in a nice little plastic baggie.
Left this as a comment on a MySpace friend's profile this morning, 'cos I figured she'd get a kick out of seeing a traditionally feminine domestic task turned into a super power, even if only for the purpose of selling a line of vacuum cleaners.
For you kaiju fans, or for those who like interesting novelties, well, enjoy for your own reasons.
Be seeing you.
Japanese TV Commercial 1
For your Sunday delectation, here's the first of a trio of Japanese tv commercials I found on YouTube last night.
This one is 1967 vintage, and is for the "Yeh-Yeh" women's apparel line.
One thing that really stands out is the kind of short, page-boy style haircuts worn by both the animated cartoon and live-action models in the commercial, a la Twiggy during that same period.
Be seeing you.
This one is 1967 vintage, and is for the "Yeh-Yeh" women's apparel line.
One thing that really stands out is the kind of short, page-boy style haircuts worn by both the animated cartoon and live-action models in the commercial, a la Twiggy during that same period.
Be seeing you.
17 August 2007
Las Vegas Now News-Link: Las Vegas To Run Out Of Water By 2010
From the KLAS Channel 8 Las Vegas news blog, comes this disturbing article on projections by the Southern Nevada Water Authority that the Las Vegas area may run out of water by 2010.
I don't re-post this here(it was originally in an e-mail sent to me by a friend of mine)to panic people, but rather, to get some sort of active discussion going among us here in the Valley as to what to do about the problem.
Then, from there, to work out the best possible way to solve this problem that would be beneficial to the vast majority of people living here.
The link's http://www.lasvegasnow.com/Global/story.asp?s=6943263.
Be seeing you.
I don't re-post this here(it was originally in an e-mail sent to me by a friend of mine)to panic people, but rather, to get some sort of active discussion going among us here in the Valley as to what to do about the problem.
Then, from there, to work out the best possible way to solve this problem that would be beneficial to the vast majority of people living here.
The link's http://www.lasvegasnow.com/Global/story.asp?s=6943263.
Be seeing you.
Vegas After It Rains And Towards Sunset
Decided, 10 minutes or so after posting the Vegas When It Rains pics, to go to the local Albertsons to get some cat food and other knick-knacks.
Also decided to bring my camera along, and see what pictures I could get of some of the various sky effects, and so on.
These are the results.
They aren't entirely in order, as you will see when you take a closer look at the pictures, and it was my intention to post them in order of my having gone to and from the store, which is at the southeast corner of N. Lamb and Bonanza Road in Vegas' north-east.
Nonetheless, here they are, in somewhat muddled order.
BTW, the pics this time out have only had their resolutions halved. No other editing of any sort has been done to them, so you can, for better or for worse, what my eye, and the camera's lens, saw.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
Also decided to bring my camera along, and see what pictures I could get of some of the various sky effects, and so on.
These are the results.
They aren't entirely in order, as you will see when you take a closer look at the pictures, and it was my intention to post them in order of my having gone to and from the store, which is at the southeast corner of N. Lamb and Bonanza Road in Vegas' north-east.
Nonetheless, here they are, in somewhat muddled order.
BTW, the pics this time out have only had their resolutions halved. No other editing of any sort has been done to them, so you can, for better or for worse, what my eye, and the camera's lens, saw.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
My Little Corner Of Vegas When It Rains
The monsoon season here in the Las Vegas Valley began over a month ago, but hadn't taken any pics of what it looks like here, when it rains during that season, until a little while ago, when, after hearing the thunder outside of my place, I decided to come outside and enjoy the rain, which we don't get that much of, that often, here.
The pics were an after-thought,really.
So, this is for those of you out there who may never have seen any pictures of any part of Las Vegas when it rains, and, it's also for those of you who either live here in the Valley, or have lived here, and know the joy that one can feel being in Las Vegas when it rains, especially during the monsoon season.
Unless you have to drive in it, that is.
Some of the pics have had the brightness quotients kicked up a notch, simply because the originals could be quite dark, and, of course, they've been halved in resolution so as to make it easier to up-load to the 'Net.
Other than that, the pics are what they are.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
The pics were an after-thought,really.
So, this is for those of you out there who may never have seen any pictures of any part of Las Vegas when it rains, and, it's also for those of you who either live here in the Valley, or have lived here, and know the joy that one can feel being in Las Vegas when it rains, especially during the monsoon season.
Unless you have to drive in it, that is.
Some of the pics have had the brightness quotients kicked up a notch, simply because the originals could be quite dark, and, of course, they've been halved in resolution so as to make it easier to up-load to the 'Net.
Other than that, the pics are what they are.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
16 August 2007
A Duo Of Disturbing Feline Thyroid Disease Story Links
Read this duo of rather disturbing news stories about the link between a common type of household flame retardant chemicals, polyborminated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs, and increased incidence of thyroid disease in indoor cats, and, though the evidence for it right now is extremely sketchy, possibly human infants and toddlers.
The links are all to stories from Science Daily.com, and were originally adapted from a news release from the American Chemical Society or a United Press International article on the subject, and can be found at respectively, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070815122354.htm, and http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070815122354.htm.
Very disturbing reading for those of you out there, who, like me, either own or love cats.
Be seeing you.
The links are all to stories from Science Daily.com, and were originally adapted from a news release from the American Chemical Society or a United Press International article on the subject, and can be found at respectively, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070815122354.htm, and http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070815122354.htm.
Very disturbing reading for those of you out there, who, like me, either own or love cats.
Be seeing you.
A Sextet Of Truthout.org Stories About Argentine Dirty War Trials
Just got through reading five stories on the Truthout.org site about a trial that's been going on in Buenos Aires, Argentina, of a priest, Christian Von Wenrich, who served as a chaplin to the Buenos Aires Provincial Police Force during the years of the "Dirty War", the period when Argentina was controlled by a right-wing military and civilian junta that kidnapped an estimated 30,000 Argentines suspected of having links to left-wing guerrillas. An estimated 10,000 or so of these "disappeared" were murdered by the Argentine military and police during that time.
While a fair number of the military, police and civilian officials responsible were put on trial and convicted after the Junta's fall in 1983, they were pardoned, along with those then under investigation or already on trial, by Argentine President Carlos Menem in 1990, in order to stem a wave of military uprisings that took place in Argentina in the late '80's, and which used those convictions as a reason for launching them.
Last year, the Argentine Supreme Court declared these pardons to be unconstitutional, and the process of investigating and trying former military, police and civilian officials for their crimes during the Dirty War began again, with the trial briefly described above being one of this new set.
Anyhow, the link to the first story, dated 9th July, 2007, can be found at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/070907H.shtml, the second, dated 13th July, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/071307F.shtml, the third, dated 20th July, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_072007F.shtml, the fourth, dated 24th July, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/072407S.shtml, the fifth, dated 2nd August, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080207H.shtml, and the sixth and last, dated to-day, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/081607S.shtml.
Am also enclosing several links to various sites that are either about or contain articles about the Dirty War, such as the Wikipedia article on it at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirty_War, The Vanished Gallery, which is dedicated to giving out as much information as possible about the vanished, or disappeared, of the Dirty War, and those who carried the Dirty War out, at http://www.yendor.com/vanished/index.html, the English language portion of the Nunca Mas(Never Again)organisation's site at http://www.nuncamas.org/index2.htm(the far more extensively documented Spanish version can be found at http://www.nuncamas.org/), the Argentine Government's official Dirty War Victims Memorial Day web-site(in Spanish)can be found at http://www.24demarzo.gov.ar/, while the Team Nizkor's Los Archivos Del Horror Del Operacion Condor(The Archives of the Horrors of Operation Condor, which was the combined efforts by the militaries of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia to eliminate left-wing guerrillas, politicians, trade unionists, and other opponents from the early '70's through the early '80's, and yep, it's in Spanish)can be found at http://www.derechos.org/nizkor/doc/condor/calloni.html, a Social Science Research Council article, "Old Ideas In New Discourses:" The War Against Terrorism" and Collective Memory In Uruguay and Argentina" by Aldo Marchesi, can be found at http://www.ssrc.org/sept11/essays/marchesi.htm, and a National Security Archives web-page about Henry Kissinger and the Argentine Dirty War can be found at http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB104/index.htm.
That should be about enough to get ya started on this topic.
In closing, there are those who might ask, "What does this have to do with where we are to-day???".
My answer's that in the Dirty War period of Argentine history, left-wing terrorism, real and imagined, was used as an excuse by the Argentine military, its police and civilian allies to impose a military dictatorship that kidnapped thousands of its own citizens, imprisoned, tortured and murdered many of those detainees, maintained secret torture centres and prisons, perverted the Argentine legal system, used their positions to steal property, and even babies and toddlers, from those whom they had arrested and imprisoned, all in an attempt to build a new Argentina, which, "purified" of left-wingers of all stripes, trade unionists, and anyone else who disagreed in the Junta's ideal of a Christian(in this case, Roman Catholic), right-wing controlled military, anti-Communist Argentine state to come after the Dirty War's purges.
In the end, it was the short, disastrous Falklands/Malvinas War with Great Britain, and its immediate aftermath, not a revolt by the Argentine political establishment or people, that brought down the Junta.
The parallels between Dirty War-era Argentina and the current situation in the US are far from exact, but there are enough of them that are similar enough to be eerily disturbing, and well they should be.
So, y'all may want to think on that a bit.
Be seeing you.
While a fair number of the military, police and civilian officials responsible were put on trial and convicted after the Junta's fall in 1983, they were pardoned, along with those then under investigation or already on trial, by Argentine President Carlos Menem in 1990, in order to stem a wave of military uprisings that took place in Argentina in the late '80's, and which used those convictions as a reason for launching them.
Last year, the Argentine Supreme Court declared these pardons to be unconstitutional, and the process of investigating and trying former military, police and civilian officials for their crimes during the Dirty War began again, with the trial briefly described above being one of this new set.
Anyhow, the link to the first story, dated 9th July, 2007, can be found at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/070907H.shtml, the second, dated 13th July, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/071307F.shtml, the third, dated 20th July, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_072007F.shtml, the fourth, dated 24th July, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/072407S.shtml, the fifth, dated 2nd August, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/080207H.shtml, and the sixth and last, dated to-day, at http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/081607S.shtml.
Am also enclosing several links to various sites that are either about or contain articles about the Dirty War, such as the Wikipedia article on it at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirty_War, The Vanished Gallery, which is dedicated to giving out as much information as possible about the vanished, or disappeared, of the Dirty War, and those who carried the Dirty War out, at http://www.yendor.com/vanished/index.html, the English language portion of the Nunca Mas(Never Again)organisation's site at http://www.nuncamas.org/index2.htm(the far more extensively documented Spanish version can be found at http://www.nuncamas.org/), the Argentine Government's official Dirty War Victims Memorial Day web-site(in Spanish)can be found at http://www.24demarzo.gov.ar/, while the Team Nizkor's Los Archivos Del Horror Del Operacion Condor(The Archives of the Horrors of Operation Condor, which was the combined efforts by the militaries of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia to eliminate left-wing guerrillas, politicians, trade unionists, and other opponents from the early '70's through the early '80's, and yep, it's in Spanish)can be found at http://www.derechos.org/nizkor/doc/condor/calloni.html, a Social Science Research Council article, "Old Ideas In New Discourses:" The War Against Terrorism" and Collective Memory In Uruguay and Argentina" by Aldo Marchesi, can be found at http://www.ssrc.org/sept11/essays/marchesi.htm, and a National Security Archives web-page about Henry Kissinger and the Argentine Dirty War can be found at http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB104/index.htm.
That should be about enough to get ya started on this topic.
In closing, there are those who might ask, "What does this have to do with where we are to-day???".
My answer's that in the Dirty War period of Argentine history, left-wing terrorism, real and imagined, was used as an excuse by the Argentine military, its police and civilian allies to impose a military dictatorship that kidnapped thousands of its own citizens, imprisoned, tortured and murdered many of those detainees, maintained secret torture centres and prisons, perverted the Argentine legal system, used their positions to steal property, and even babies and toddlers, from those whom they had arrested and imprisoned, all in an attempt to build a new Argentina, which, "purified" of left-wingers of all stripes, trade unionists, and anyone else who disagreed in the Junta's ideal of a Christian(in this case, Roman Catholic), right-wing controlled military, anti-Communist Argentine state to come after the Dirty War's purges.
In the end, it was the short, disastrous Falklands/Malvinas War with Great Britain, and its immediate aftermath, not a revolt by the Argentine political establishment or people, that brought down the Junta.
The parallels between Dirty War-era Argentina and the current situation in the US are far from exact, but there are enough of them that are similar enough to be eerily disturbing, and well they should be.
So, y'all may want to think on that a bit.
Be seeing you.
MoveOn Count The Cost Demo and Press Conference
As part of a national campaign by the greater MoveOn. org organisation, the local branch here held a demo and press conference at the Federal Building in down-town Las Vegas, starting at around 9:30 AM this morning.
Didn't take a count of those attending, but my guesstimate is around a dozen to two dozen people, Yours Truly included, were present, as was only, alas, one represenative of the mainstream media, a young cameraman for our local NBC affiliate, who can be seen in the last four pics of the series displayed below.
He told me, as he was leaving, that he'd heard about the press conference only when he reached the station, and was told to turn right around and cover the event.
As far as I know, there were no other high- or medium-priced media reporters at the event, which is pretty sad, I think.
Just goes to show ya where much of the Las Vegas Valley's media establishment's editors, etc, have their heads lodged, eh????
Anyhow, thanks to April for kindly giving me a ride to and from the press conference, and for putting up with my sorry act.
Enough blather. Go look at the pics, and see for yourselves.
Be seeing you.
Didn't take a count of those attending, but my guesstimate is around a dozen to two dozen people, Yours Truly included, were present, as was only, alas, one represenative of the mainstream media, a young cameraman for our local NBC affiliate, who can be seen in the last four pics of the series displayed below.
He told me, as he was leaving, that he'd heard about the press conference only when he reached the station, and was told to turn right around and cover the event.
As far as I know, there were no other high- or medium-priced media reporters at the event, which is pretty sad, I think.
Just goes to show ya where much of the Las Vegas Valley's media establishment's editors, etc, have their heads lodged, eh????
Anyhow, thanks to April for kindly giving me a ride to and from the press conference, and for putting up with my sorry act.
Enough blather. Go look at the pics, and see for yourselves.
Be seeing you.
15 August 2007
A Surprise Message From US Senator Jon C. Porter
Got this message from Sen. Jon C. Porter two days ago at my Hotmail account, and I pass it onto you.
Won't reveal the nature of the surprise in the text below here, but will say that, considering just how pro-Administration Porter's generally been in his time in office, the sentiments on display here raised my eye-brows, to say the least.
Be seeing you.
August 13, 2007
Mr. Donald Rilea
457 N. Lamb, Unit F
Las Vegas, NV 89110-3376
Dear Donald:
Thank you for contacting me regarding the dismissal of eight U.S. Attorneys, including Nevada's U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden. I appreciate hearing from you on this serious matter.
As you may know, political appointees, including U.S. Attorneys, serve at the pleasure of the President. In 1993, President Clinton asked all 93 U.S. Attorneys to resign when he became President, and he asked several more to resign throughout his Presidency. Recently, 8 U.S. Attorneys were asked to resign from the Department of Justice.
After hearing testimony from Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, I believe the Department of Justice has egregiously mishandled the firing of the eight attorney generals in question. Attorney General Gonzales has become a distraction and, as a result, has lost the confidence of the American people.
Attorney General Gonzales must step down for his actions in dismissing exemplary public servants like Daniel Bogden, who fought for the residents of Nevada for 5 years.
Should you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me.
Sincerely,
Jon C. Porter
Member of Congress
JCP/sm
PS: Please sign up for my e-newsletter at http://www.house.gov/porter/.
Confirmation 1194271
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Won't reveal the nature of the surprise in the text below here, but will say that, considering just how pro-Administration Porter's generally been in his time in office, the sentiments on display here raised my eye-brows, to say the least.
Be seeing you.
August 13, 2007
Mr. Donald Rilea
457 N. Lamb, Unit F
Las Vegas, NV 89110-3376
Dear Donald:
Thank you for contacting me regarding the dismissal of eight U.S. Attorneys, including Nevada's U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden. I appreciate hearing from you on this serious matter.
As you may know, political appointees, including U.S. Attorneys, serve at the pleasure of the President. In 1993, President Clinton asked all 93 U.S. Attorneys to resign when he became President, and he asked several more to resign throughout his Presidency. Recently, 8 U.S. Attorneys were asked to resign from the Department of Justice.
After hearing testimony from Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, I believe the Department of Justice has egregiously mishandled the firing of the eight attorney generals in question. Attorney General Gonzales has become a distraction and, as a result, has lost the confidence of the American people.
Attorney General Gonzales must step down for his actions in dismissing exemplary public servants like Daniel Bogden, who fought for the residents of Nevada for 5 years.
Should you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me.
Sincerely,
Jon C. Porter
Member of Congress
JCP/sm
PS: Please sign up for my e-newsletter at http://www.house.gov/porter/.
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Message From Nevada Democratic Veterans and Military Families' Caucus
Got this e-mail message two days ago from the Nevada Democratic Veterans and Military Families Caucus, and thought I might as well pass this on to my Las Vegas area friends to see, and, if possible, so they could participate in this.
Yep, am opposed to the Iraq War, the Bush Administration and its supporters, but, in my opinion, there's no reason to take out one's anger with those who make the policies on those who are its mere instruments.
Anyway, check this out, and decide for yourselves.
Be seeing you.
HELP END THIS INJUSTICE & ACTUALLY Support the Troops
Who: Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families, Local Las Vegas Unions, Concerned Americans
What: Care Package Building (w/refreshments)
Where: Plumbers & Pipefitters Local 525 Union Hall
760 N. Lamb Blvd.
Las Vegas, NV 89110
When: Saturday August 25th 2007, 1 pm- 4 pm
Our troops' first stop after being injured in Iraq is a military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. Unfortunately our government does not provide a way for every soldier, marine, airman, and sailor to contact loved ones after being injured. As a result our troops depend on donations to the Landstuhl Military Chaplain's to call home.
This is unacceptable and an unforgivable outrage. We must provide the support to our troops that our government is unable to provide. The main thing we want everyone to bring is phone cards for our troops. This way they can call their family after they are injured in Iraq. We are also asking for items such as beef jerky, batteries, razors, old & new magazines, misc. toiletries, cds, dvds, books, and other comfort items.
Financial donations will help with the postage to send these items to our troops.
If you can not come, or your organization can not attend, a donation of $200 or more dollars would be appreciated to help take care of postage.
Last time we did an event like this the postage went into the thousands.
Please send donations to:
Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families Caucus: 1210 S. Valley View Ste. 114, Las Vegas NV 89102, or donate online at http://www.nvdemocraticvets.com
Please join the Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families Caucus and Plumbers & Pipefitters Local 525 as we do something to help the troops who need our support.
Please RSVP to info@nvdemocraticvets.com
Yep, am opposed to the Iraq War, the Bush Administration and its supporters, but, in my opinion, there's no reason to take out one's anger with those who make the policies on those who are its mere instruments.
Anyway, check this out, and decide for yourselves.
Be seeing you.
HELP END THIS INJUSTICE & ACTUALLY Support the Troops
Who: Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families, Local Las Vegas Unions, Concerned Americans
What: Care Package Building (w/refreshments)
Where: Plumbers & Pipefitters Local 525 Union Hall
760 N. Lamb Blvd.
Las Vegas, NV 89110
When: Saturday August 25th 2007, 1 pm- 4 pm
Our troops' first stop after being injured in Iraq is a military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany. Unfortunately our government does not provide a way for every soldier, marine, airman, and sailor to contact loved ones after being injured. As a result our troops depend on donations to the Landstuhl Military Chaplain's to call home.
This is unacceptable and an unforgivable outrage. We must provide the support to our troops that our government is unable to provide. The main thing we want everyone to bring is phone cards for our troops. This way they can call their family after they are injured in Iraq. We are also asking for items such as beef jerky, batteries, razors, old & new magazines, misc. toiletries, cds, dvds, books, and other comfort items.
Financial donations will help with the postage to send these items to our troops.
If you can not come, or your organization can not attend, a donation of $200 or more dollars would be appreciated to help take care of postage.
Last time we did an event like this the postage went into the thousands.
Please send donations to:
Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families Caucus: 1210 S. Valley View Ste. 114, Las Vegas NV 89102, or donate online at http://www.nvdemocraticvets.com
Please join the Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families Caucus and Plumbers & Pipefitters Local 525 as we do something to help the troops who need our support.
Please RSVP to info@nvdemocraticvets.com
14 August 2007
A Tryptich Of Radio-Related Links
A friend of mine sent me these three links this evening.
They're related to how one can set up a non-profit FM station, and get the requisite FCC licence in the process.
The first's from the Democracy Now! web-site, and features Amy Goodman interviewing Libby Reinish, full power co-ordinator for the Prometheus Project, and Ursula Ruedenberg, Pacifica Radio Affiliates' Co-Ordinator and a member of RadioForPeople.org. It's at http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/08/10/142236.
The next one's to the home-page of http://www.getradio.org/, which helps non-profit groups get through the FCC licence application process, and the final one's at http://www.radioforpeople.org/, which is the web-site of RadioForPeople.org, a coalition of non-profit groups and individuals interested in creating alternatives to present-day FM radio.
Between 12th to 19th October, 2007, the FCC will be opening a window for non-profit organisations and community groups to apply for and get a full power non-commercial/educational licence, for the first time in seven years.
Once this time period passes, this window will be closed, perhaps, for many years to come.
So, if you have a non-profit community group or organisation that's interested in setting up a non-profit educational radio station, now's your chance.
Go check out the sites, see what they have to say, then decide if you want to go for it.
If you do, please move with all due speed, as the licences will undoubtedly go fast.
Be seeing you.
They're related to how one can set up a non-profit FM station, and get the requisite FCC licence in the process.
The first's from the Democracy Now! web-site, and features Amy Goodman interviewing Libby Reinish, full power co-ordinator for the Prometheus Project, and Ursula Ruedenberg, Pacifica Radio Affiliates' Co-Ordinator and a member of RadioForPeople.org. It's at http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/08/10/142236.
The next one's to the home-page of http://www.getradio.org/, which helps non-profit groups get through the FCC licence application process, and the final one's at http://www.radioforpeople.org/, which is the web-site of RadioForPeople.org, a coalition of non-profit groups and individuals interested in creating alternatives to present-day FM radio.
Between 12th to 19th October, 2007, the FCC will be opening a window for non-profit organisations and community groups to apply for and get a full power non-commercial/educational licence, for the first time in seven years.
Once this time period passes, this window will be closed, perhaps, for many years to come.
So, if you have a non-profit community group or organisation that's interested in setting up a non-profit educational radio station, now's your chance.
Go check out the sites, see what they have to say, then decide if you want to go for it.
If you do, please move with all due speed, as the licences will undoubtedly go fast.
Be seeing you.
13 August 2007
Story: In Cannibalism We Trust
This is part one of a new action figure-related story I came up with this evening, called "In Cannibalism We Trust", and is part of a general sort of action figure-related story-line that I've been working on in my head since January of this year.
Hope you enjoy it.
Be seeing you.
Once Upon A Time, in a land not too far away, and not very long ago, in fact, the events in this story have yet to happen, but that's beside the point, there was an enormous action figure and doll collection that belonged to a pair of Internet and real estate millionaires, who, unlike many of their contemporaries, had had the good sense to pull out of both markets, while the getting was good.
But, again, that's beside the point, as they both were so enamoured of action figures and dolls that they'd built up one of the world's largest collections of them.
So large was this collection, that it couldn't be stored entirely in the house on the enormous 5000 acre former cattle ranch-turned estate, they'd bought in Riverside, California, in the late '90's, so they created a set of mini-Madurodams, outdoor display dioramas patterned after the original Madurodam in the Netherlands.
Now, little did the pair know, but, then again, most action figure and doll collectors don't know this, that their figures and dolls, when their "organic"(as action figures and dolls call their creators and collectors) keepers weren't looking, came to life, and organized societies, complete in every detail, good, bad and indifferent, of their own, and this collection was no exception.
Indeed, because of the collection's sheer size, the societies, and everything therein, were multiplied a thousand-fold greater than most of their counter-parts in collections elsewhere.
But, for simplicity's sake, we will narrow down these to three major ones, the Centralian Union, which was centred around the main house and the properties immediately east and west of it, the Amalgamated Communities of Pacifica, which stood to the east of Centralia, and Dystopia, which extended from east of Pacifica, and went all the way to the southern end of the property.
Centralia had been controlled by a coalition of various right-wing figures, like the two variants on George W. Bush, the various Adolf Hitler figures, and so on, until a disastrous war with Pacifica, which was politically moderate to left-wing, and included such figure collections as the GI Joe Adventure Team, as well as various Soviet, Vietnamese Communist, and other such figures, in the spring of 2007.
The Centralians, along with some Dystopian allies, had invaded and occupied most of Pacifica for nearly a week, before the Pacificans finally rallied and threw them out.
This resulted in the Centralians deposing their former leaders, but the ones that replaced them had to contend with many problems resulting from the war and the heavy losses they'd taken.
So, all throughout the remainder of 2007 and all of 2008, Centralia was a weak and greatly divided place.
Pacifica recovered fairly quickly from the war, but it still had problems of its own with which to cope, plus those going in the Dystopian lands, which, even before the war, had hardly been known for their peace and harmony.
Dystopia wasn't always called that, nor was it always such a violent place, rent by war, terror and murder, as it was when our story begins.
Before the break between Centralia and Pacifica over political differences in 2004, Dystopia was the newest area of settlement for figures from both parts of the collection who, for one reason or another, either didn't quite fit into their home societies, or who just wanted to carve out something for themselves in those frontier lands.
Both Centralia and Pacifica helped fund, transport and settle many of these figures and dolls in these new lands, and, for a while, it looked like the inhabitants of Terra Nova, as Dystopia was then known, would make quite a success from their efforts.
But, with the Centralian-Pacifican rift, much of the support for those settlements dried up as both Centralia and Pacifica regarded each other with increasing suspicion, and began making preparations to defend themselves from each other.
The Terra Novans, left on their own, began to succumb to various demagogues, and dictatorships of all sorts appeared throughout the territories.
Before long, societies patterned after those like the Oceanian dictatorship in George Orwell's 1984, or feudal despotisms like that of Boss Rudolph in H. G. Wells' Things To Come, or even the semi-anarchic roving bands like those found in the first two Mad Max films, became the dominant forms of society and government in Terra Nova, and, thanks to a Pacifican magazine columnist who visited there in 2005, they, and the whole of Terra Nova, acquired a new name-Dystopia, which caught on like wild-fire in both Centralia and Pacifica, and stuck.
Before long, even Terra Novans who had first resented and resisted the use of Dystopia to describe their homes were using it, and, with it, came a further descent into totalitarianism, chaos, terror and bloodshed.
Before too much time had passed, none of the once peaceful agricultural, communal, trading and industrial settlements that had been established in the Dystopian lands were under the control of their own peoples, as they'd been absorbed by one expanding tyranny or another.
But, these tyrannies were never happy to hold on to what they already had, as there were always compelling, political, economic, and strategic reasons for them to grab more, more, and still ever more territory and people.
And so, they, once they'd made alliances with one new nation or another, would just as quickly turn around, and try to gobble it up like a hungry coyote does a rabbit..
Sometimes, they'd succeed, and absorb their luckless neighbour. Other times, they'd fail, and end up being absorbed themselves.
When the Centralian-Pacifican War of 2007 came along, some of the larger and most ambitious of the Dystopian states, like Oceania, saw their chance to get in on what they believed to be a quick and easy victory by Centralia over Pacifica, and joined the former in their invasion of the latter.
But, their forces, along with those of the Centralians, were violently repulsed, with the bulk of their combatants being killed, wounded or taken prisoner by the Pacificans.
The Pacificans, in turn, attacked the Dystopian lands, like Oceania, and disabled most of what was left of their militaries and police forces.
Without strong military and police forces to prop up their rule, the Oceanians and other Dystopian allies of the Centralians governments soon collapsed, as their peoples rose up and threw them out.
But, instead of the peace, reconstruction and harmony so desired by many Dystopians, more madness, terror, civil war and murder followed, as the various rebels turned on each other, and fought each other over the remaining crumbs of economic and political power left behind by their oppressors.
In those Dystopian states that had not participated in the Centralian-Pacifican War, events hardly ran any better, as these, too, tried expanding onto the territories of their vanquished neighbours, with some succeeding, and others failing, and being destroyed in turn.
Then, there were those Dystopian lands that weren't interested in expanding into the territories of the former Centralian allies, but that wanted to grind their immediate neighbours into a fine powder, so to speak.
It is of a quintet of these that this story's about, and we will find out more about them, perhaps even a bit more than we want to, in our next part, Dear Readers.
Hope you enjoy it.
Be seeing you.
Once Upon A Time, in a land not too far away, and not very long ago, in fact, the events in this story have yet to happen, but that's beside the point, there was an enormous action figure and doll collection that belonged to a pair of Internet and real estate millionaires, who, unlike many of their contemporaries, had had the good sense to pull out of both markets, while the getting was good.
But, again, that's beside the point, as they both were so enamoured of action figures and dolls that they'd built up one of the world's largest collections of them.
So large was this collection, that it couldn't be stored entirely in the house on the enormous 5000 acre former cattle ranch-turned estate, they'd bought in Riverside, California, in the late '90's, so they created a set of mini-Madurodams, outdoor display dioramas patterned after the original Madurodam in the Netherlands.
Now, little did the pair know, but, then again, most action figure and doll collectors don't know this, that their figures and dolls, when their "organic"(as action figures and dolls call their creators and collectors) keepers weren't looking, came to life, and organized societies, complete in every detail, good, bad and indifferent, of their own, and this collection was no exception.
Indeed, because of the collection's sheer size, the societies, and everything therein, were multiplied a thousand-fold greater than most of their counter-parts in collections elsewhere.
But, for simplicity's sake, we will narrow down these to three major ones, the Centralian Union, which was centred around the main house and the properties immediately east and west of it, the Amalgamated Communities of Pacifica, which stood to the east of Centralia, and Dystopia, which extended from east of Pacifica, and went all the way to the southern end of the property.
Centralia had been controlled by a coalition of various right-wing figures, like the two variants on George W. Bush, the various Adolf Hitler figures, and so on, until a disastrous war with Pacifica, which was politically moderate to left-wing, and included such figure collections as the GI Joe Adventure Team, as well as various Soviet, Vietnamese Communist, and other such figures, in the spring of 2007.
The Centralians, along with some Dystopian allies, had invaded and occupied most of Pacifica for nearly a week, before the Pacificans finally rallied and threw them out.
This resulted in the Centralians deposing their former leaders, but the ones that replaced them had to contend with many problems resulting from the war and the heavy losses they'd taken.
So, all throughout the remainder of 2007 and all of 2008, Centralia was a weak and greatly divided place.
Pacifica recovered fairly quickly from the war, but it still had problems of its own with which to cope, plus those going in the Dystopian lands, which, even before the war, had hardly been known for their peace and harmony.
Dystopia wasn't always called that, nor was it always such a violent place, rent by war, terror and murder, as it was when our story begins.
Before the break between Centralia and Pacifica over political differences in 2004, Dystopia was the newest area of settlement for figures from both parts of the collection who, for one reason or another, either didn't quite fit into their home societies, or who just wanted to carve out something for themselves in those frontier lands.
Both Centralia and Pacifica helped fund, transport and settle many of these figures and dolls in these new lands, and, for a while, it looked like the inhabitants of Terra Nova, as Dystopia was then known, would make quite a success from their efforts.
But, with the Centralian-Pacifican rift, much of the support for those settlements dried up as both Centralia and Pacifica regarded each other with increasing suspicion, and began making preparations to defend themselves from each other.
The Terra Novans, left on their own, began to succumb to various demagogues, and dictatorships of all sorts appeared throughout the territories.
Before long, societies patterned after those like the Oceanian dictatorship in George Orwell's 1984, or feudal despotisms like that of Boss Rudolph in H. G. Wells' Things To Come, or even the semi-anarchic roving bands like those found in the first two Mad Max films, became the dominant forms of society and government in Terra Nova, and, thanks to a Pacifican magazine columnist who visited there in 2005, they, and the whole of Terra Nova, acquired a new name-Dystopia, which caught on like wild-fire in both Centralia and Pacifica, and stuck.
Before long, even Terra Novans who had first resented and resisted the use of Dystopia to describe their homes were using it, and, with it, came a further descent into totalitarianism, chaos, terror and bloodshed.
Before too much time had passed, none of the once peaceful agricultural, communal, trading and industrial settlements that had been established in the Dystopian lands were under the control of their own peoples, as they'd been absorbed by one expanding tyranny or another.
But, these tyrannies were never happy to hold on to what they already had, as there were always compelling, political, economic, and strategic reasons for them to grab more, more, and still ever more territory and people.
And so, they, once they'd made alliances with one new nation or another, would just as quickly turn around, and try to gobble it up like a hungry coyote does a rabbit..
Sometimes, they'd succeed, and absorb their luckless neighbour. Other times, they'd fail, and end up being absorbed themselves.
When the Centralian-Pacifican War of 2007 came along, some of the larger and most ambitious of the Dystopian states, like Oceania, saw their chance to get in on what they believed to be a quick and easy victory by Centralia over Pacifica, and joined the former in their invasion of the latter.
But, their forces, along with those of the Centralians, were violently repulsed, with the bulk of their combatants being killed, wounded or taken prisoner by the Pacificans.
The Pacificans, in turn, attacked the Dystopian lands, like Oceania, and disabled most of what was left of their militaries and police forces.
Without strong military and police forces to prop up their rule, the Oceanians and other Dystopian allies of the Centralians governments soon collapsed, as their peoples rose up and threw them out.
But, instead of the peace, reconstruction and harmony so desired by many Dystopians, more madness, terror, civil war and murder followed, as the various rebels turned on each other, and fought each other over the remaining crumbs of economic and political power left behind by their oppressors.
In those Dystopian states that had not participated in the Centralian-Pacifican War, events hardly ran any better, as these, too, tried expanding onto the territories of their vanquished neighbours, with some succeeding, and others failing, and being destroyed in turn.
Then, there were those Dystopian lands that weren't interested in expanding into the territories of the former Centralian allies, but that wanted to grind their immediate neighbours into a fine powder, so to speak.
It is of a quintet of these that this story's about, and we will find out more about them, perhaps even a bit more than we want to, in our next part, Dear Readers.
Billy Connolly: The Welly Boot Song Video
This is an amateur music video of Billy Connolly's "Welly Boot Song" that I found on YouTube this evening.
It incorporates footage from the "Thomas The Tank Engine" series as an accompaniment to Mr. Connolly's tune.
Am no big fan of "Thomas The Tank Engine", but am of Mr. Connolly's work.
So, sit down, pull off yer Wellies(mind the smell), and have a good chortle or two.
Be seeing you.
It incorporates footage from the "Thomas The Tank Engine" series as an accompaniment to Mr. Connolly's tune.
Am no big fan of "Thomas The Tank Engine", but am of Mr. Connolly's work.
So, sit down, pull off yer Wellies(mind the smell), and have a good chortle or two.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 21
Don't know the date on this clip, which is from a Taiwanese film set during the Sino-Japanese War of 1937-45(am judging by the uniforms worn by the characters in the clip), but suspect that it's probably from either the late '80's or early '90's, judging by the film stock.
Incidentally, the bugle tune being played in the clip is the Nationalist Chinese and Taiwanese flag raising song.
Some of you may also notice that the uniforms, and most especially the helmets, worn by some of the characters are of German design.
That's no accident, as between the early 1930's through about 1945, some units of the Chinese Nationalist army, especially the elite bodyguard troops assigned to protect Chiang Kai-Shek, were German-equipped, and this included the distinctive "coal-scuttle" steel helmets made famous during the First and Second World Wars.
However, given the disparity between various Central Government and Chinese regional armies during that period, some units wore British Mark I, or "soup-plate" helmets, others the old French Adrian 1916 helmets, others still the American Model 1942 "steel pot" helmet, and the vast majority had no steel helmets of any sort at all.
Be seeing you.
Incidentally, the bugle tune being played in the clip is the Nationalist Chinese and Taiwanese flag raising song.
Some of you may also notice that the uniforms, and most especially the helmets, worn by some of the characters are of German design.
That's no accident, as between the early 1930's through about 1945, some units of the Chinese Nationalist army, especially the elite bodyguard troops assigned to protect Chiang Kai-Shek, were German-equipped, and this included the distinctive "coal-scuttle" steel helmets made famous during the First and Second World Wars.
However, given the disparity between various Central Government and Chinese regional armies during that period, some units wore British Mark I, or "soup-plate" helmets, others the old French Adrian 1916 helmets, others still the American Model 1942 "steel pot" helmet, and the vast majority had no steel helmets of any sort at all.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 20
We now head over to the other side of the Taiwan Strait, with this clip from a 1978 Taiwanese combat film, set, judging by its characters' dress, in the mid-or late 1950's.
The film appears to be a kind of trials and tribulations of young soldiers in training, a sub-genre of the combat film which has, with occasional exceptions like "Stripes" in 1981, and "An Officer And A Gentleman" in 1982, pretty much disappeared from American and British cinema.
Be seeing you.
The film appears to be a kind of trials and tribulations of young soldiers in training, a sub-genre of the combat film which has, with occasional exceptions like "Stripes" in 1981, and "An Officer And A Gentleman" in 1982, pretty much disappeared from American and British cinema.
Be seeing you.
12 August 2007
Propaganda In Action 19
Our last clip from "The East Is Red" shows both the actors on-stage and the audience singing "The Internationale" at the film's close.
Be seeing you.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 18
Another clip from "The East Is Red", in which a male narrator describes the horrors of pre-revolutionary Chinese society, while a stylised depiction of it is carried out by the actors and dancers on-stage.
Be seeing you.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 17
This clip is from the climax of the opening part of "The East Is Red".
Be seeing you.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 16
From North Korea, we head back to the People's Republic of China, and the opening title sequence from the 1964 revolutionary opera film, "The East Is Red".
This genre of Chinese film would become the dominant form of Chinese cinema during the Cultural Revolution from 1965-1976.
Be seeing you.
This genre of Chinese film would become the dominant form of Chinese cinema during the Cultural Revolution from 1965-1976.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 15
The following is an omnibus collection of film clips from various North Korean films made between 1964 and 1987, although some of the clips, like the animated cartoon "The Clever Raccoon Dog", might have been made later than those dates.
While only a superficial glimpse into DPRK cinema, this collection gives a fair idea of the various genres and themes to found in it.
Be seeing you.
While only a superficial glimpse into DPRK cinema, this collection gives a fair idea of the various genres and themes to found in it.
Be seeing you.
11 August 2007
Propaganda In Action 13
Another Soviet animated short, "Shooting Range", made in 1979 by V. Tarasov, which is about an unemployed young American in New York City who takes a job in a shooting gallery as a human target.
Extensive use is made of American pop culture icons like the Coca-Cola logo, Mickey Mouse, Thumper the Rabbit, and other Disney characters to make its generally unsuccessful argument about American society and culture.
This film's been divided into two parts, the first part, which is posted below, and the second part, which will be posted in the next blog post.
Be seeing you.
Extensive use is made of American pop culture icons like the Coca-Cola logo, Mickey Mouse, Thumper the Rabbit, and other Disney characters to make its generally unsuccessful argument about American society and culture.
This film's been divided into two parts, the first part, which is posted below, and the second part, which will be posted in the next blog post.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 12
Our next subject is another Soviet animated short from 1983, "Conflict", which follows said conflict between two groups of matches.
Have to say that I think the story and animation in this particular short are extremely well done.
Be seeing you.
Have to say that I think the story and animation in this particular short are extremely well done.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 11
From the People's Republic of China, it's back to the Soviet Union, with a 1978 animated short called "Firing Range", about a kind of tank that can detect an enemy's physiological impulses and use them against him.
The story also involves a sub-plot about the tank's developer, a doctor whose son was killed in a colonial war, and whose commanding officer is among those witnessing the tank's testing trials.
Be seeing you.
The story also involves a sub-plot about the tank's developer, a doctor whose son was killed in a colonial war, and whose commanding officer is among those witnessing the tank's testing trials.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 10
In contrast to the trailer for "Pork Chop Hill" listed below, we've a clip from the 1956 Chinese Korean War combat film, "Triangle Hill"(Shang Gan Ling), which was based on an incident during the 1952 battle of Triangle Hill during the Korean Conflict, in which a company of Chinese People's Volunteers machine gunners fended off an attack by US infantry.
The most striking things to note in this clip are, 1, the sort of massed, human wave style attack employed by the Americans in here(which, as a commentator to this clip on YouTube, whose father was a US Army second lieutenant during the Battle of Triangle Hill pointed out, didn't happen during the actual battle), and the kind of faceless, in-human, even horde-like quality given the Americans in this excerpt.
This is essentially a simple reversal of the kind of depictions of Chinese and North Korean soldiers often made in American Korean War films of the same period, such as "Pork Chop Hill".
How much of this sort of grossly over-simplified depiction of battle tactics and the enemy seen in these examples is due to the personal beliefs and prejudices of the film-makers themselves, the perceived need of these film-makers to tell these stories in the simplest kind of visual and story-telling short-hands possible, so that audiences will completely understand the goings-on on-screen, pressures, from either film studios or outside political interests, and the general political climates then prevailing in the US and PRC, I don't know.
Only a thorough study of the production circumstances behind each film would yield decisive answers.
But, the results, a kind of jingoistic, flattened-out portrayal of the enemy that essentially denies the enemy's individuality and humanity, can be readily seen, even by the biggest dolt.
That, perhaps, is the worst aspect of propaganda, in that issues and peoples are reduced to one-dimensional cartoons of what and who they are, or were, thus creating a kind of all-purpose bogeyman suitable for use by whatever interested parties that wish to exploit them for their own purposes.
Be seeing you.
The most striking things to note in this clip are, 1, the sort of massed, human wave style attack employed by the Americans in here(which, as a commentator to this clip on YouTube, whose father was a US Army second lieutenant during the Battle of Triangle Hill pointed out, didn't happen during the actual battle), and the kind of faceless, in-human, even horde-like quality given the Americans in this excerpt.
This is essentially a simple reversal of the kind of depictions of Chinese and North Korean soldiers often made in American Korean War films of the same period, such as "Pork Chop Hill".
How much of this sort of grossly over-simplified depiction of battle tactics and the enemy seen in these examples is due to the personal beliefs and prejudices of the film-makers themselves, the perceived need of these film-makers to tell these stories in the simplest kind of visual and story-telling short-hands possible, so that audiences will completely understand the goings-on on-screen, pressures, from either film studios or outside political interests, and the general political climates then prevailing in the US and PRC, I don't know.
Only a thorough study of the production circumstances behind each film would yield decisive answers.
But, the results, a kind of jingoistic, flattened-out portrayal of the enemy that essentially denies the enemy's individuality and humanity, can be readily seen, even by the biggest dolt.
That, perhaps, is the worst aspect of propaganda, in that issues and peoples are reduced to one-dimensional cartoons of what and who they are, or were, thus creating a kind of all-purpose bogeyman suitable for use by whatever interested parties that wish to exploit them for their own purposes.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 9
This is a movie trailer for the 1958 Lewis Milestone Korean War epic, "Pork Chop Hill", starring Gregory Peck, who also co-produced it.
It's the kind of film made about the Korean War prior to Robert Altman's "M.A.S.H.", which was adapted into the long-running tv series of the same name, beginning in 1972, in that its politics are uncompromisingly anti-Communist, and its depictions of the Chinese and North Koreans are, at best, on the unflattering side.
This is something that the tv version of "MASH" tried, a bit too hard, really, to correct, and ended up making the South Korean soldiery among the main nasties as a result.
In fact, one of the less happy legacies of the tv version of "MASH" is that the Koreans ended up as usually either victims, comic relief or villains.
Be seeing you.
It's the kind of film made about the Korean War prior to Robert Altman's "M.A.S.H.", which was adapted into the long-running tv series of the same name, beginning in 1972, in that its politics are uncompromisingly anti-Communist, and its depictions of the Chinese and North Koreans are, at best, on the unflattering side.
This is something that the tv version of "MASH" tried, a bit too hard, really, to correct, and ended up making the South Korean soldiery among the main nasties as a result.
In fact, one of the less happy legacies of the tv version of "MASH" is that the Koreans ended up as usually either victims, comic relief or villains.
Be seeing you.
10 August 2007
Propaganda In Action 8
The next entry in the Propaganda In Action series comes from the Soviet Union, and is a 1924 animated short, "Interplanetary Revolution", in which two Red Army aviators fly to Mars to spread the ideals of the Bolshevik Revolution and overthrown the Martian capitalist nasties running the joint.
I don't know if this film was released around the same time as "Aelita", a live-action feature film with essentially the same premise as "Interplanetary Revolution", but it is interesting to see that there were two such experiments with science fiction in the Soviet Union at around the same time period in the mid-1920's.
"Interplanetary Revolution"'s main defects are, of course, the ham-handed propaganda running throughout its imagery and story-line, and, worse to my mind, the wandering story-line that makes it rather hard to follow at times.
Still, even if for no other reason, check this out to see an example of early Soviet science fiction, which is a literary and film genre still relatively unknown in the West.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
I don't know if this film was released around the same time as "Aelita", a live-action feature film with essentially the same premise as "Interplanetary Revolution", but it is interesting to see that there were two such experiments with science fiction in the Soviet Union at around the same time period in the mid-1920's.
"Interplanetary Revolution"'s main defects are, of course, the ham-handed propaganda running throughout its imagery and story-line, and, worse to my mind, the wandering story-line that makes it rather hard to follow at times.
Still, even if for no other reason, check this out to see an example of early Soviet science fiction, which is a literary and film genre still relatively unknown in the West.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
09 August 2007
Classic Japanese Anime: "The Spider and the Tulip"
Our second, and last, piece of classic Japanese anime comes from 1943, and is entitled "The Spider and the Tulip". The plot concerns the attempts by an evil spider, drawn with a stereotypical African-American face, and with a deep baritone-bass voice that calls to mind what a Japanese Paul Robeson would have sounded like, to lure a young ladybug girl into his web.
The spider, however, fails in these attempts, and comes to a sticky end(no pun intended)in a violent rain storm.
The most striking things about "The Spider and the Tulip", aren't the plot nor characters, but the renderings of the vegetation, sky and weather effects in the cartoon, some of which are very well done indeed.
In closing, one thing I should have warned you about in the earlier post, and am doing so here, and that's the lack of English sub-titles for the titles and dialogue in both films.
However, the films are made well enough that I believe one can reasonably follow the action without need of sub-titles.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
The spider, however, fails in these attempts, and comes to a sticky end(no pun intended)in a violent rain storm.
The most striking things about "The Spider and the Tulip", aren't the plot nor characters, but the renderings of the vegetation, sky and weather effects in the cartoon, some of which are very well done indeed.
In closing, one thing I should have warned you about in the earlier post, and am doing so here, and that's the lack of English sub-titles for the titles and dialogue in both films.
However, the films are made well enough that I believe one can reasonably follow the action without need of sub-titles.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
Classic Japanese Anime: "Fox and Raccoon Trick Each Other"
We take a break from the Propaganda In Action series of videos here to show a piece of vintage Japanese anime, entitled UGOKIE-KO-RI-NO-TATEHIKI(Fox and Raccoon Trick Each Other(1933).
This early Japanese sound cartoon, heavily influenced by the style of Max Fleischer's Paramount cartoons, concerns a battle of wits between a fox disguised as a samurai and an Asian raccoon father and son duo at an abandoned temple on a dark night.
Had heard someplace that some of the foundation for what to-day's anime productions, especially in its visual style, had been influenced by Fleischer's cartoons, and this production seems to bear that out.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
This early Japanese sound cartoon, heavily influenced by the style of Max Fleischer's Paramount cartoons, concerns a battle of wits between a fox disguised as a samurai and an Asian raccoon father and son duo at an abandoned temple on a dark night.
Had heard someplace that some of the foundation for what to-day's anime productions, especially in its visual style, had been influenced by Fleischer's cartoons, and this production seems to bear that out.
Enjoy, and be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 7
This final film clip from Nazi Germany is a live-action one, and is the most disturbing of all, as it comes from Fritz Hippler's 1940 "documentary", "Der Ewige Jude"(The Eternal Jew), a thoroughly nasty piece of anti-Semitic propaganda as one is likely to find.
In this clip, a brief history of Jewish settlement and immigration patterns is given, and is compared to that of rats, with, so the documentary states, much the same destructive effects on human society.
Also found here is an assertion that Jews infiltrate their way into their various host societies, and copy the ways and mores of their hosts, all in the interest of eventually taking over those societies(that last part isn't directly stated in this clip, but it's certainly implied).
The "documentary" builds its case for anti-Semitism and anti-Semitic measures both through the distorted use of history and statistics, and through footage of Jews, especially Polish Jews, on the streets of their ghettoes, and dressed up in Western European, middle-class, clothing in a film studio, or wherever that footage was shot.
"Der Ewige Jude" exemplifies the kind of eugenicist-racist form of anti-Semitism, as opposed to the traditional European religious form,that had taken hold in much of Europe and the Americas, beginning in the mid-19th Century, but reaching its zenith in the early and mid-20th Centuries, when this was made.
It also, like its kin below, helped lay the ideological ground-work for the German public's acceptance of anti-Semitism as state policy, and, eventually for the deportations and destruction of much of European Jewry in the death camps of Poland.
What this clip has in common with all of the clips displayed here, besides being made in the same time period, is the use of visual, aural and spoken rhetoric, combined with exaggerated and deliberately distorted interpretations of history, to make its case for a set of policies and actions that, if plainly stated, would be indefensible in the extreme.
Propaganda, no matter who makes and issues it, is dangerous to any even relatively free society, because of its use of deliberate distortions,half-truths, partial truths, and outright lies, to sell a particular product, service, ideology, or course of policy and action.
Whether overt, as the examples shown here thus far are, or insidious, propaganda seeks to influence public debate and courses of action based on that debate by steering the former into a direction that will benefit one person or group at the expense of others, and get the latter to cheerfully support whatever actions that person or group takes, no matter what the consequences.
Propaganda is a form of elaborate con-job, in which not just one person, or a small group of people, but a society, or set of societies as a whole, are the marks, just ripe for being taken to the cleaners.
In the case of Nazi Germany, its people weren't only taken to the cleaners, they were driven to the poor-house and then some.
That's why, especially in a country at war, as we are now, it's important to get one's information from a variety of sources, so as to at least have some basis of comparing the information that one gets from one or another source.
Otherwise, it's just too easy to be conned.
Be seeing you.
In this clip, a brief history of Jewish settlement and immigration patterns is given, and is compared to that of rats, with, so the documentary states, much the same destructive effects on human society.
Also found here is an assertion that Jews infiltrate their way into their various host societies, and copy the ways and mores of their hosts, all in the interest of eventually taking over those societies(that last part isn't directly stated in this clip, but it's certainly implied).
The "documentary" builds its case for anti-Semitism and anti-Semitic measures both through the distorted use of history and statistics, and through footage of Jews, especially Polish Jews, on the streets of their ghettoes, and dressed up in Western European, middle-class, clothing in a film studio, or wherever that footage was shot.
"Der Ewige Jude" exemplifies the kind of eugenicist-racist form of anti-Semitism, as opposed to the traditional European religious form,that had taken hold in much of Europe and the Americas, beginning in the mid-19th Century, but reaching its zenith in the early and mid-20th Centuries, when this was made.
It also, like its kin below, helped lay the ideological ground-work for the German public's acceptance of anti-Semitism as state policy, and, eventually for the deportations and destruction of much of European Jewry in the death camps of Poland.
What this clip has in common with all of the clips displayed here, besides being made in the same time period, is the use of visual, aural and spoken rhetoric, combined with exaggerated and deliberately distorted interpretations of history, to make its case for a set of policies and actions that, if plainly stated, would be indefensible in the extreme.
Propaganda, no matter who makes and issues it, is dangerous to any even relatively free society, because of its use of deliberate distortions,half-truths, partial truths, and outright lies, to sell a particular product, service, ideology, or course of policy and action.
Whether overt, as the examples shown here thus far are, or insidious, propaganda seeks to influence public debate and courses of action based on that debate by steering the former into a direction that will benefit one person or group at the expense of others, and get the latter to cheerfully support whatever actions that person or group takes, no matter what the consequences.
Propaganda is a form of elaborate con-job, in which not just one person, or a small group of people, but a society, or set of societies as a whole, are the marks, just ripe for being taken to the cleaners.
In the case of Nazi Germany, its people weren't only taken to the cleaners, they were driven to the poor-house and then some.
That's why, especially in a country at war, as we are now, it's important to get one's information from a variety of sources, so as to at least have some basis of comparing the information that one gets from one or another source.
Otherwise, it's just too easy to be conned.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 6
Again, from Nazi Germany, comes this anti-Semitic cartoon, "Das Guldende Baumchen", and, alas, I know not the date when it was made or who made it.
This cartoon, if I recall correctly, mixes colour cartoon footage with black-and-white "documentary" footage of "Jewish" urban decadence to make its point that the Jews are the disruptors of the "natural" order of life, as represented by the forest in the animated segments.
Warning: this video contains anti-Semitic visual and spoken rhetoric, so, those of you who may be strongly affected by it, are kindly warned not to view it.
Also, simply because this cartoon, as well as the one below it, and any others posted here, have been posted by me, it doesn't mean that I endorse the Nazi point of view on Jews, or anything else.
Have posted this here, in the hopes that, by seeing what kind of shit those bastards were using to sell their world-view to the German, and to a far lesser extent, the world's, public, one can better understand exactly WHY it became so easy for the Nazis to get the majority of Germans to go along with their policies and actions, including the Holocaust.
Also, by contrasting these examples of Nazi propaganda with American propaganda from the same period, one can also see the similarities and differences between the two cultures and their propaganda styles.
In the end, this series' purpose is to slightly better educate those of you out there seeing this to begin to critically analyse and evaluate the visual, aural and spoken rhetoric that one sees and hears every day, and to be able to accept or reject that rhetoric based on what it says and doesn't say.
Be seeing you.
This cartoon, if I recall correctly, mixes colour cartoon footage with black-and-white "documentary" footage of "Jewish" urban decadence to make its point that the Jews are the disruptors of the "natural" order of life, as represented by the forest in the animated segments.
Warning: this video contains anti-Semitic visual and spoken rhetoric, so, those of you who may be strongly affected by it, are kindly warned not to view it.
Also, simply because this cartoon, as well as the one below it, and any others posted here, have been posted by me, it doesn't mean that I endorse the Nazi point of view on Jews, or anything else.
Have posted this here, in the hopes that, by seeing what kind of shit those bastards were using to sell their world-view to the German, and to a far lesser extent, the world's, public, one can better understand exactly WHY it became so easy for the Nazis to get the majority of Germans to go along with their policies and actions, including the Holocaust.
Also, by contrasting these examples of Nazi propaganda with American propaganda from the same period, one can also see the similarities and differences between the two cultures and their propaganda styles.
In the end, this series' purpose is to slightly better educate those of you out there seeing this to begin to critically analyse and evaluate the visual, aural and spoken rhetoric that one sees and hears every day, and to be able to accept or reject that rhetoric based on what it says and doesn't say.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 5
From the other side of the Atlantic, and the opposite side of World War Two, comes this 1940 German cartoon, "Der Stoerenfried", directed by Hans Held, and excerpted in the German documentary, "Hitler Traum Von Micky Maus".
The funny thing about "Der Stoerenfried" to me is how much of the basic plot is similar to those of Warner Bros., Paramount and other American studios' cartoons around the same period, and their depictions of war, as well.
The most striking feature of it for me isn't visual, but aural, when, in one scene, a wasp, echoing both in behaviour and sound, that of a Stuka dive-bomber, dive-bombs the hapless fox, who is the villain of this cartoon.
The sound used is taken from the horn of a Stuka, which was built right into the plane's nose, and gained in volume as the plane dove towards its target, thus scaring the Hell out of anyone on the ground in the target's general vicinity.
It was a nasty bit of psychological warfare, but, at least for the first two years of World War Two, it worked rather well.
Both the cartoon and documentary in which it's excerpted are in German, with no English sub-titles, alas.
However, I think you should be able to get the general gist of the cartoon's plot from the action on-screen.
Be seeing you.
The funny thing about "Der Stoerenfried" to me is how much of the basic plot is similar to those of Warner Bros., Paramount and other American studios' cartoons around the same period, and their depictions of war, as well.
The most striking feature of it for me isn't visual, but aural, when, in one scene, a wasp, echoing both in behaviour and sound, that of a Stuka dive-bomber, dive-bombs the hapless fox, who is the villain of this cartoon.
The sound used is taken from the horn of a Stuka, which was built right into the plane's nose, and gained in volume as the plane dove towards its target, thus scaring the Hell out of anyone on the ground in the target's general vicinity.
It was a nasty bit of psychological warfare, but, at least for the first two years of World War Two, it worked rather well.
Both the cartoon and documentary in which it's excerpted are in German, with no English sub-titles, alas.
However, I think you should be able to get the general gist of the cartoon's plot from the action on-screen.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 4
From Walt Disney Studios and RKO Radio Pictures comes this very famous 1942 Donald Duck cartoon, "Der Fuhrer's Face", in which the tune of the same name made its debut.
However, musically, lyrically and in performance, there are some considerable differences between the version on offer in the cartoon, and Spike Jones and His City Slickers' recording of it, as you will hear.
In the cartoon, Donald has a nightmare that he's trapped in Nazi Germany, and subjected to the mind- and spirit-killing routine of a German worker, while bombarded with all sorts of bombastic propaganda encouraging him to love the Fuhrer and so on.
Caricatures of Mussolini and Hirohito show up here, as per usual for World War Two propaganda cartoons, as does Goering, as the leader of a tin-horn brass band, and the cartoon's overall thrust is to depict Germany as a shortage-wracked despotism.
I believe that this cartoon, like the others below, came out in either 1942 or '43.
Germany of that period was indeed a despotism, but shortage-wracked???? No, it wasn't.
In fact, rationing and the switch to a total war economy really only began in Germany after the fall of Stalingrad in February, 1943, and was never entirely implemented, due to both the Nazi regime's and German people's memories of the kinds of material shortages that had taken place there during the First World War.
If anything, the Nazis were very fearful of a period of prolonged rationing and shortages, because those had been instrumental in the general disaffection of the German populace by the end of the First World War, and may have contributed to the revolt against the Kaiser's government, and his abdication shortly thereafter.
There's a similar playing of fast-and-loose with history in "The Ducktators", where Mussolini, whose regime emerged first in Italy in 1922, well before Hitler was even a nationally known figure in Germany, much less its leader, is portrayed as jumping on Hitler's band-waggon and being his stooge.
But, one shouldn't expect much in the way of accuracy from cartoons, especially those with propaganda points of their own to sell, yeah???
Be seeing you.
However, musically, lyrically and in performance, there are some considerable differences between the version on offer in the cartoon, and Spike Jones and His City Slickers' recording of it, as you will hear.
In the cartoon, Donald has a nightmare that he's trapped in Nazi Germany, and subjected to the mind- and spirit-killing routine of a German worker, while bombarded with all sorts of bombastic propaganda encouraging him to love the Fuhrer and so on.
Caricatures of Mussolini and Hirohito show up here, as per usual for World War Two propaganda cartoons, as does Goering, as the leader of a tin-horn brass band, and the cartoon's overall thrust is to depict Germany as a shortage-wracked despotism.
I believe that this cartoon, like the others below, came out in either 1942 or '43.
Germany of that period was indeed a despotism, but shortage-wracked???? No, it wasn't.
In fact, rationing and the switch to a total war economy really only began in Germany after the fall of Stalingrad in February, 1943, and was never entirely implemented, due to both the Nazi regime's and German people's memories of the kinds of material shortages that had taken place there during the First World War.
If anything, the Nazis were very fearful of a period of prolonged rationing and shortages, because those had been instrumental in the general disaffection of the German populace by the end of the First World War, and may have contributed to the revolt against the Kaiser's government, and his abdication shortly thereafter.
There's a similar playing of fast-and-loose with history in "The Ducktators", where Mussolini, whose regime emerged first in Italy in 1922, well before Hitler was even a nationally known figure in Germany, much less its leader, is portrayed as jumping on Hitler's band-waggon and being his stooge.
But, one shouldn't expect much in the way of accuracy from cartoons, especially those with propaganda points of their own to sell, yeah???
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 3
From 20th Century Fox and Terry Toons, comes "The Last Round Up", in which two American soldiers(wearing Model 1917 "soup-plate" helmets, so am willing to guess that this was made in early '42)are blown to Germany, where they proceed to wreak havoc there, and especially with Herr Hitler himself.
Be seeing you.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 2
From the Boys and Girls at Termite Terrace, aka the Warner Bros. Animation Studio, comes this 1942 effort, "The Ducktators", which depict Hitler as a sociopathic duck, Mussolini(in full Eye-Talian stereotype mode)as a dumb goose, and Hirohito(also in full Nip-Jap stereotype mode)as some sort of likewise demented bird, all bent on taking over a farmyard.
The argument used here, and in "Blitz Wolf", is that the efforts at appeasement made by the international community during the 1930's were dismal failures at best, and that force was the only way with which to deal with the Axis powers.
The use of racial and ethnic stereotypes in "The Ducktators"(one Nazified black duck uses full-on stereotypical African-American dialect, and hails from South Germany) is extremely apparent, unlike in "Blitz Wolf", where only Hitler is the target. However, there is a sign by the wise little pig's door in one scene that reads "No Japs(over a crossed out "Dogs")Allowed".
So, even in an otherwise relatively harmless anti-Nazi cartoon, one can see a bit of the general racism that characterised much of American popular culture before and during the Second World War.
Be seeing you.
The argument used here, and in "Blitz Wolf", is that the efforts at appeasement made by the international community during the 1930's were dismal failures at best, and that force was the only way with which to deal with the Axis powers.
The use of racial and ethnic stereotypes in "The Ducktators"(one Nazified black duck uses full-on stereotypical African-American dialect, and hails from South Germany) is extremely apparent, unlike in "Blitz Wolf", where only Hitler is the target. However, there is a sign by the wise little pig's door in one scene that reads "No Japs(over a crossed out "Dogs")Allowed".
So, even in an otherwise relatively harmless anti-Nazi cartoon, one can see a bit of the general racism that characterised much of American popular culture before and during the Second World War.
Be seeing you.
Propaganda In Action 1
Am starting a new series of video clips from YouTube here, which I call "Propaganda In Action", the first of which is a Tex Avery MGM cartoon from 1942, "Blitz Wolf", a re-telling of the Three Little Pigs story, with Hitler as the Big, Bad Wolf.
Be seeing you.
Be seeing you.
08 August 2007
Attention, Radio Freaks!!!!! World Radio Broadcast Links!!!
Tired of your usual radio news, sports, talk, Top 40, Country, Public Radio, whatever, usual fare, Bunky????
Well, here's Unca Donald with the cure for your radio blues, on-line world broadcasting links!!!! Harvested by Yours Truly, so you don't have to!!!!
Let's start off with a broadcast outlet close to home. In fact, it's just north of the border, and that's the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's site, where you can get streaming audio of CBC 1, CBC 2 and CBC 3 programmes 24 hours a day at http://www.cbc.ca/programguide/radio/.
What, still too Yankified for y'all??? Sheesh!!!! Well, let's head on down Venezuela way, and remember to put on your Spanish language cap when ya do. Here's the addy to Radio Nacional de Venezuela, the government of Venezuela's outlet, at http://www.rnv.gov.ve/noticias/.
Then, we take a spastic hop, skip and jump right next door to Venezuela's eastern neighbour, Guyana, and its broadcasting outlet, Voice of Guyana International, at http://www.voiceofguyana.com/.
Next, let's pop on down to Paraguay, in the heart of South America, and bop on over to to Radio Nacional de Paraguay's site, where you can get streaming audio broadcasts of Paraguayan music in Spanish and Guarani, the country's two official languages(Paraguay is the only country in the whole of the Americas which has a native language as one of its official languages)at http://www.rnpy.com/.
How'zabout a quick jolt over to Uruguay's broadcasting outlet, S.O.D.R.E.(Servicio Oficial de Difusion Radiotelevision y Espectaculos-Official Radio and Television News and Entertainment Service)at http://www.sodre.gub.uy/, and then to Argentina's Radio Nacional's site at http://www.radionacional.gov.ar/.
Now, let's take a quick trip to Radio New Zealand International's site at http://www.rnzi.com/index.php, Radio Australia's site at http://www.abc.net.au/ra/, the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation's site at http://www.sibconline.com.sb/, and Radio Singapore International's site at http://www.rsi.sg/.
From South America, across the Pacific, and to Southeast Asia in four quick hops, all in comfort of your own home. Now, show me a travel agency that can give you a better deal than THAT, eh????
We'll stop our trip here, with these last two station links, the Voice of Vietnam at http://www.vovnews.vn/, and Radio Japan at http://www.nhk.or.jp/rj/index_e.html.
I'll be back later with more world broadcast links for you to peruse, but I think this should hold you lot for now.
Whenever possible, I've tried to look for English-language pages where you can click onto English-language broadcasts from these outlets. But, for the ones I've not, either they don't have 'em, or you can find them by looking for a link marked "English", which is usually somewhere along the top portion of the site's home page.
Oh, just in case, these AREN'T enough for ya, ya spoilt brats, here's one last link, and that's to the British Forces Broadcasting Service(the British equivalent to the American Forces Radio and Television Service that broadcasts to American military folks overseas)'s home page at http://www.ssvc.com/bfbs/index.htm.
Got that??? OK, brilliant.
Well, enjoy this lot, and see ya with more whenever I feel like getting 'round to it.
Be seeing you.
Well, here's Unca Donald with the cure for your radio blues, on-line world broadcasting links!!!! Harvested by Yours Truly, so you don't have to!!!!
Let's start off with a broadcast outlet close to home. In fact, it's just north of the border, and that's the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's site, where you can get streaming audio of CBC 1, CBC 2 and CBC 3 programmes 24 hours a day at http://www.cbc.ca/programguide/radio/.
What, still too Yankified for y'all??? Sheesh!!!! Well, let's head on down Venezuela way, and remember to put on your Spanish language cap when ya do. Here's the addy to Radio Nacional de Venezuela, the government of Venezuela's outlet, at http://www.rnv.gov.ve/noticias/.
Then, we take a spastic hop, skip and jump right next door to Venezuela's eastern neighbour, Guyana, and its broadcasting outlet, Voice of Guyana International, at http://www.voiceofguyana.com/.
Next, let's pop on down to Paraguay, in the heart of South America, and bop on over to to Radio Nacional de Paraguay's site, where you can get streaming audio broadcasts of Paraguayan music in Spanish and Guarani, the country's two official languages(Paraguay is the only country in the whole of the Americas which has a native language as one of its official languages)at http://www.rnpy.com/.
How'zabout a quick jolt over to Uruguay's broadcasting outlet, S.O.D.R.E.(Servicio Oficial de Difusion Radiotelevision y Espectaculos-Official Radio and Television News and Entertainment Service)at http://www.sodre.gub.uy/, and then to Argentina's Radio Nacional's site at http://www.radionacional.gov.ar/.
Now, let's take a quick trip to Radio New Zealand International's site at http://www.rnzi.com/index.php, Radio Australia's site at http://www.abc.net.au/ra/, the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation's site at http://www.sibconline.com.sb/, and Radio Singapore International's site at http://www.rsi.sg/.
From South America, across the Pacific, and to Southeast Asia in four quick hops, all in comfort of your own home. Now, show me a travel agency that can give you a better deal than THAT, eh????
We'll stop our trip here, with these last two station links, the Voice of Vietnam at http://www.vovnews.vn/, and Radio Japan at http://www.nhk.or.jp/rj/index_e.html.
I'll be back later with more world broadcast links for you to peruse, but I think this should hold you lot for now.
Whenever possible, I've tried to look for English-language pages where you can click onto English-language broadcasts from these outlets. But, for the ones I've not, either they don't have 'em, or you can find them by looking for a link marked "English", which is usually somewhere along the top portion of the site's home page.
Oh, just in case, these AREN'T enough for ya, ya spoilt brats, here's one last link, and that's to the British Forces Broadcasting Service(the British equivalent to the American Forces Radio and Television Service that broadcasts to American military folks overseas)'s home page at http://www.ssvc.com/bfbs/index.htm.
Got that??? OK, brilliant.
Well, enjoy this lot, and see ya with more whenever I feel like getting 'round to it.
Be seeing you.
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