Musical News
All the News that's Fit to Sing

AFI George Lucas Tribute

Carrie Fisher's Lament

He made horney boys lust after me all my life
Now I carry an Uzi, a pistol, a knife
I won't let them come near me
I want them to fear me
I won't be a companion or even a wife, cause...

    Everybody goes to bed with Leia
    Everybody goes to bed with Leia
    Everybody goes to bed with Leia
    Then everybody wakes up with me

Who knows if they love me
for what I truly am
Below or above me
It feels like a sham

And I blame George Lucas
For giving me that part
It made me a star
but it's broken my heart

Sing it with me, boys...

    Everybody goes to bed with Leia
    Everybody goes to bed with Leia
    Everybody goes to bed with Leia
    Then everybody wakes up with me

Scientists Isolate "Greed" Glitch in Human DNA

   Scientists in Arkansas have isolated the gene that causes greed, a gene that wasn't previously known to exist.
   "Most people are generous and kind," said professor Charles Osgood at the Arkansas Center for Genetic Research. "They care about their fellow man," he continued, "they wouldn't harm a fly, and it's all part of the human DNA. We're bred to be that way, it's part of our heritage."
   Osgood claims that every once in a while there's a genetic mutation that causes individuals to care about nothing but themselves. "It doesn't make any difference to these mutants how much suffering they cause as long as it's good for them," he explained. "Can you imagine owning a business that personally made you over $100 billion and still refusing to give your employees health care? It isn't natural, to have so much and still let people suffer. And, of course, the poorer the employees, the less likely they are to be able to afford to shop anywhere else, so the Waltons get the money back anyway."
   It was Alice Walton, daughter of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton, who inspired Dr. Osgood to go on his quest. Walton's hairdresser turned out to be vital to the solving of the mystery.
    "So this guy offered me a hundred bucks for a clump of Alice's black roots," said Miles Fromnowhere, owner of the Mein Hair Salon in Bentonville, Arkansas, which houses the headquarters of Wal-Mart.
   Armed with a sample of Walton DNA, Dr. Osgood was able to isolate the scruple gene.
   "There's nothing we can do for poor Alice or any of the living Waltons, who will have to spend the rest of their lives as self-centered monsters," said Osgood, "but thanks to the wonders of gene splicing, future generations of Waltons might actually be able to differentiate between right and wrong."
   Economist Ira Zentit agrees that gene splicing is the only answer. "We've discovered that all those in possession of this errant gene seem to actually believe that money trickles down instead of up, that giving money to rich people helps the economy despite incontrovertible evidence to the contrary," he explained. "Give a poor person some money and they'll spend it on something they need, a pair of socks, a meal. It stays in the economy by being passed around. Give a rich person some money and they throw it in the pile with the rest. They don't spend it immediately because all their needs are already met. It doesn't go back into the economy.  It's clear that short term economic growth is entirely dependent upon giving the poor more money."
   Science now shows that once they've amassed more than $100 billion in personal profits, most people would lift the restriction on their employees to working no more than 28 hours per week so they won't qualify for employee benefits like health or unemployment.
   Zentit considers the Waltons to actually be dangerous to society. John Walton, who is worth more than $20 billion himself, was the largest single individual contributor to Gov. Jeb Bush in the 2002 Florida gubernatorial race. "That's their version of helping the economy," says Zentit, "rich people giving money to other rich people."
   We wrote a letter to Wal-Mart spokesman Noah Veil for his comments on this issue, but it was to no avail.
   "Once your needs are met, you're supposed to leave the rest for everyone else," says the report from the institute. "We're hard wired to be that way. Look at the rest of nature. Once any animal has his fill - he walks away and all the other animals get to pick at it. Ants gather enough food for the colony. Animals are seldom deliberately cruel to other animals. When a lion kills an antelope, he doesn't enjoy watching it die slowly, and he leaves the carcass for the jackals."
    That's where science comes in. Thanks to advances in gene-splicing, the day may come soon when all workers have health care. 

I Feel So Much Safer Now

The copyright cops are stopping bakeries from putting Thomas the Tank Engine and Nemo the fish on birthday cakes.. Autopsy results show they should have let Terri Schiavo die fifteen years ago.

    "The U.S. Delegation to Codex has just issued a formal written statement to the Codex Alimentarius Commission that the United States, during the July 4-9, 2005, meeting in Rome, will support compulsory rules created by this international organization directly overruling U.S. law regarding access to vitamins.
    "The U.S. law that is about to be vanquished is the Dietary Supplement, Health and Education Act of 1994. Codex is a joint venture between the United Nations World Health Organization and Food and Agriculture Organization. (WHO/FAO) The World Trade Organization (WTO) has already stated that it will enforce Codex guidelines as the world standard for trade in dietary supplements. This will mean that gradually, pill-by-pill, our access to the dietary supplements we depend on will disappear."
- Dr. Carolyn Dean: Kiss Your Vitamins Goodbye! -

Stupid Answers of the Week

Last week's question...

I wish to be canonized. Won't you make up a miracle you can blame on me and tell the Catholic Church about it?

Dear Dis, 
Careful there - the one smart thing the Catholics did was that in order to be a saint, the first qualification is that you have to be dead! The reason for this is obvious; saints are a royal pain in the ass to live with! Also note that The True Church, as well as it's many sects, have spent centuries canonizing hordes of people they had no intention of making saints, just dead! Besides, if you do get to be a saint, they'll chop you into bits, stick each bit in a reliquary, and sell them to churches that want to be named St. Whatsis, so their parishioners can come kiss it and thus, in the name of Christian Sharing, cast their various germs and viruses upon the sea of humanity, with you as their vector. How's that for a legacy? Just think this saint thing through. Your faithful reader,
- Jed Closson 

I didn't have enough money to buy Christmas presents for all my friends. I forwarded Disinfotainment Today to all on my address book because it contained fascinating political news. I forgot it was also the issue containing the thread stating God likes watching monkeys fucking. Miraculously I could afford to buy Christmas presents for my friend.
- Locke

Though in very high desperation, I am also very delighted to be writing this mail to you, which I believe you would keep between you and I to avoid a situation where I would be sought after.
- Captain Anumou Yahk, a very trusted aid of late GNASINGMA EYADEMA; former president of Togo, who died in office on his way to London for medical attention. -

Stupid Question of the Week

If George W. Bush is impeached, Dick Cheney will become president. Please explain why this is a good idea.

Send your answers here. 

Help, I've Superglued My Fingers to my Nose!

Obscure Download of the Week

Okay, if you want the word "asshole" redefined for the rest of your life, I'm afraid I must insist you listen to Paul Anka's backstage tirade. "That's just the fuckin' way it is." (From Noisetank, and the whole site is worth exploring.)

Chart of the Week

John Conyers is nothing like George W. Bush

Action                                                             Conyers               Bush

For the war but against the reasoning         Yes                       No
For the war and for the reasoning                No                        Yes

That Pesky Old Constitution

"Republicans have officially started the campaign to amend the Constitution by repealing the 22nd Amendment - the one that confines the President to two terms. If the Republicans hold their current strength, or increase it, in the 2006 Congressional elections, expect this measure to pass allowing Bush to remain President... 
- Bush For Life? - GOP Intros Bill To Amend Constitution -

    "JOINT RESOLUTION: Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to repeal the 22nd amendment to the Constitution.
    "Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years after the date of its submission for ratification.
- Article - `The twenty-second article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is repealed. -

Coming Soon on eBay

Michael Jackson is demanding the return of pictures of his penis now that his courtroom drama is over. Jackson is terrified prosecutor Tom Sneddon will leak the photographs out of spite. Sneddon asked Jackson's first accuser Jordy Chandler to draw a picture of the 46-year-old's genitals in 1993, because Chandler claimed the singer had a unique blemish on his member.

Crop Circle of the Week

Satan Doesn't Want You to Know

Ever heard that any salad or sandwich containing mayonnaise wasn't safe for a picnic? Actually, just the opposite is true! Though the most important food safety issue for picnics is to keep hot foods hot and cold foods cold, mayonnaise, an ingredient in many chicken salad recipes, actually helps food from spoiling as quickly. That's because of the acid present in commercial mayonnaise.

Don't Take My Word For It

"What I mean is that I cannot countenance the traditional belief that postulates a natural dichotomy between the objectivity of the scientist and the subjectivity of the writer, as if the former were endowed with a 'freedom' and the latter a 'vocation' equally suitable for spiriting away or sublimating the actual limitations of their situation. What I claim is to live to the full the contradiction of my time, which may well make sarcasm the condition of truth."
- Roland Barthes: Mythologies -

"Fear not the path of truth for lack of people walking on it."
- Arabic Proverb -

"Downing Street Memo...what's that?"
- Bill Clinton on David Letterman -

    "Four decades after the 1965 signing of the National Voting Rights Act, and nearly fourteen decades after 1869 passage of the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States guaranteeing freed slaves the right to vote, millions of Americans and citizens worldwide believe that our electoral process is still vulnerable to manipulation, fraud and theft.
    "We believe the documents in this book form the most complete record so far of what really happened in Ohio and elsewhere immediately before, during and after the election of 2004. Some have been edited to avoid excessive repetition. All are accompanied by citations meant to guide you to original documents in their entirety, as well as to other sources providing a variety of perspectives.
    "Many who are discontent with how this election was conducted now argue for federal standards to apply to all future elections. There are a wide range of additional reforms being proposed on all sides of the political spectrum.
    "But few would disagree with the proposition put forth by Thomas Jefferson that eternal vigilance is the price of freedom. And that free elections demand aggressive, informed, relentless protection."
- Bob Fitrakis, Steve Rosenfeld and Harvey Wasserman: Introduction: Did George W. Bush steal America's 2004 election? -

    "Here's some exciting medical news from the Chinese government: Smoking is great for your health. Cigarettes, according to China's tobacco authorities, are an excellent way to prevent ulcers. They also reduce the risk of Parkinson's disease, relieve schizophrenia, boost your brain cells, speed up your thinking, improve your reactions and increase your working efficiency. And all those warnings about lung cancer? Nonsense. You're more likely to get cancer from cooking smoke than from your cigarette habit. Welcome to the bizarre parallel universe of China's state-owned tobacco monopoly, the world's most successful cigarette-marketing agency. With annual sales of 1.8 trillion cigarettes, the Chinese monopoly is responsible for almost one-third of all cigarettes smoked on the planet today."
- Geoffrey York: In China, cigarettes are a kind of miracle drug -

"I used to do drugs. I still do, but I used to, too."
- Mitch Hedberg -

"States receive federal subsidies to ticket drivers if they or their passengers are not buckled up. Some states, such as Maryland, are so eager that they've equipped their officers with night vision goggles, similar to those used by our servicemen in Iraq. Maryland state troopers bagged 44 drivers traveling unbuckled under the cover of darkness."
- Walter E. Williams: Click it or Ticket -

"Where a government has come into power through some form of popular vote, fraudulent or not, and maintains at least an appearance of constitutional legality, the guerrilla outbreak cannot be promoted, since the possibilities of peaceful struggle have not yet been exhausted."
- Che Guevara -

"There is not any memory with less satisfaction than the memory of some temptation we resisted."
- James Branch Cabell -

"I can't bring myself to say, 'Well, I guess I'll be toddling along.' It isn't that I can't toddle. It's just that I can't guess I'll toddle."
- Robert Benchley -

"Food is an important part of a balanced diet."
- Fran Lebowitz -

"Pay no attention to what the critics say... Remember, a statue has never been set up in honor of a critic!"
- Jean Sibelius - 

"The wit makes fun of other persons; the satirist makes fun of the world; the humorist makes fun of himself, but in so doing, he identifies himself with people - that is, people everywhere, not for the purpose of taking them apart, but simply revealing their true nature."
- James Thurber -

"What's done to children, they will do to society."
- Karl A. Menninger -

"I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life."
- Rita Rudner -

"I find that a great part of the information I have was acquired by looking up something and finding something else on the way."
- Franklin P. Adams -

"All that is human must retrograde if it does not advance."
- Edward Gibbon -

"I am the spirit that always dissents."
- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe -

    "Why did the Greek words presbytery (the elderly), apostle (envoy or sent one), and deacon (servant) remain un-translated into their Anglicized form? Why was the Greek word presbuteros (older or elderly) translated priest? Why indeed! There is little doubt that these words remained un-translated so the clergy could redefine them, interpreting them with the strongest institutional and hierarchical connotations. Was this mere ignorance, or a means of creating a ruling class of super saints? It is clear to us that down through the years the scriptures have been subjected to papal tampering. There even remains evidence that some of the early manuscripts were altered...
   "We believe in the inspiration and accuracy of the koine Greek texts of the New Testament. However the translations that have followed are not as reliable for a number of reasons, not the least of which is ecclesiastical ambition. Historically, this love letter from God that we call the Bible was shaped into a scepter of power in the hands of popes, kings and would-be kings to further consolidate their power over the masses. Undoubtedly this very ambition has tainted the translations from Jerome onward. This reached new heights at a time when bishops sought the approval of kings to authorize translations that had been purposefully skewed toward their ecclesiastical paradigm."
- George Davis, Michael Clark & Kirk Pearson: The Great Ecclesiastical Conspiracy -

    "A Bush-watcher website identified as TBRNews.org is reporting under the byline of 'domestic intelligence reporter' Brian Harring that the Department of Defense is using a cynical tactic to mislead the public regarding the true death toll for American military personnel in Iraq. Harring claims he has an internal pdf. file from the D.O.D. which establishes that nearly 9000 Americans have died in Operation Iraqi Freedom, but that the official number has been held to 1713 by designating as Iraq deaths only those who perish on Iraqi soil. The remainder, he says, are military personnel who have died en route to Germany or in German hospitals-- casualties of the war, but not listed in the official death toll.
   "If this is true it would explain the apparent statistical discrepancy between dead and wounded. A combat action which produces nearly eight times as many officially wounded-- 13000 plus-- as officially dead...well, it's not the norm. It goes without saying it would also further jolt a public majority already disturbed by the war's 'progress' and eager to see the troops come home."
- Jim Lampley: The Ultimate Deception? -

    "We elect our prosecutors. There are 254 counties in Texas, nearly every one with its own elected district attorney. The way to get elected is to be 'Tuff on Crime.' The way to lose is to be 'Soft on Crime.' In the big cities Houston, Dallas and San Antonio, among the 10 largest in the nation we get the usual plead-out mill: perp's public defender advises him to cop to reduced charges, anything to avoid a trial.
   "But in the small towns and rural areas where heavy crime is rare, a D.A. has to whup on whoever gets caught. Sometime in the '80s, a guy in Lubbock stole 12 frozen turkeys. They were recovered, still frozen. Not only no damage, but no defrost. The guy bought 75 years, which works out to 6.3 years per bird. Don't steal a turkey in Lubbock."
- Molly Ivins: Never Steal a Turkey in Lubbock, and Other Tales of Texas Justice - Racism, 'Tuff on Crime' judges and gutless politicians warp the system -

"Every man has his price. This is not true. But for every man there exists a bait which he cannot resist swallowing."
- Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche -

"I do not believe that a man should be restrained in his daily actions by being afraid of punishment after death or that he should do things only because in this way he will be rewarded after he dies."
- Albert Einstein - 

"He that is kind is free, though he is a slave; he that is evil is a slave, though he be a king."
- Saint Augustine of Hippo -

"A man's respect for law and order exists in precise relationship to the size of his paycheck."
- Adam Clayton Powell Jr.: Keep the Faith, Baby! -

"You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection."
- Buddha -

"Editor: a person employed by a newspaper, whose business it is to separate the wheat from the chaff, and to see that the chaff is printed."
- Elbert Hubbard -

"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow man, and I hate people like that!"
- Tom Lehrer -

"I thank fate for having made me born poor. Poverty taught me the true value of the gifts useful to life."
- Anatole France -

"Everybody likes a kidder, but nobody lends him money."
- Arthur Miller -

"When we are unable to find tranquillity within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere."
- Francois de La Rochefoucauld -

    "January 2001: From the moment he took office, Bush made noises about 'finishing the job his father started.' (Time Magazine)
    "George Bush's former treasury secretary Paul O'Neill asserts that Bush took office in January 2001 fully intending to invade Iraq and desperate to find an excuse for pre-emptive war against Saddam Hussein. 'From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go,' O'Neill said. 'For me, the notion of pre-emption, that the US has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do, is a really huge leap.' (Sunday Herald)
    "Testifying at his Senate confirmation hearing former General Colin Powell, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the Gulf War, said 'Bush wanted to re-energize the sanctions regime and increase support to Iraqi groups trying to overthrow Hussein.' Powell also said 'Hussein, is not going to be around in a few years time.' (Air Force Magazine Online)
    "Vice President Dick Cheney, who was defense secretary during the war against Iraq, has also suggested a Bush administration might 'have to take military action to forcibly remove Saddam from power,' as has current Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. (Cato Institute)"
- Larisa Alexandrovna and Muriel Kane: The Path of War Timeline -

"I have wondered specifically about the Supreme Court in the case of Bush v. Gore where, astonishingly, I believe that the majority - five out of nine justices - were engaged in an evil act. And I wonder how that could happen without Satan hanging around."
- M. Scott Peck quoted in Exorcist Suggests that Demon Possession In the Supreme Court Put Bush in White House by John J. Miller -

"We're seeing unfold a contemporary example of the age-old ambition of power and ideology to squelch and punish journalists who tell the stories that make princes and priests uncomfortable... One reason I'm in hot water is because my colleagues and I at NOW didn't play by the conventional rules of Beltway journalism. Those rules divide the world into Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, and allow journalists to pretend they have done their job if, instead of reporting the truth behind the news, they merely give each side an opportunity to spin the news."
- Bill Moyers -

"The success of the Christian Right in dismantling all existing institutions and re-shaping them to their exact specifications depends on the ability of its leaders to provoke an exalted state of outraged-tinged euphoria within its rank and file members - the Hannitized hordes who feel a raw emotional need to feel part of an enterprise engaged in exercising supreme power over a despised enemy. This can only be achieved by the full cooperation of the media, who fear their own irrelevance in a highly volatile political atmosphere even more than those who create these conditions in the first place."
- Leilla Matsui and Stella La Chance: Christ Inc. - Faith-Based Fascism -

     "Lets recap: Mark Felt told Woodward that all the intelligence agencies were involved in a covert project that was incredible, or fantastic, as Woodward later put it. Felt said the Watergate cover-up had little to do with Watergate, more to do with protecting the covert project.
    "Why does Woodward think that when we learn that Deep Throat was an FBI chief, well begin to discern the nature of that incredible covert project? Apparently, the covert project was so large and controversial that it impinged on Felts role in law enforcement."
- Thien Vehl: Mark Felt Hinted at Exotic Anti-gravity Project? -

"The ribbons say 'Support the Troops,' not 'I Support the Troops.' Isn't it odd that the message being communicated is a directive and not a declarative? It's a command to random strangers to do something and not a statement that the individual displaying the ribbon has actually done something. These are the same people who think a tax cut during war time is fiscally smart and probably wouldn't cross the street to piss on a man on fire. As long as the focus is on telling others what they should be doing, there's no need for personal sacrifice? The ones that have 'made in China' printed on them are the bestest!!"
- Subtle Nuance -

"I have seen the impact of this new poison [Depleted Uranium] when I visited wards for young children in Iraq. Amidst the overwhelming horrors of the bombings and the starvation caused by sanctions, the doctors at first did not notice the huge rise in the numbers of childhood cancers, such as leukemia, Hodgkin's disease and lymphomas ... The United States and Britain used so much DU in weapons during the Gulf War that 350 tons of residue permeate the ground and water, and will contaminate the entire region for generations." 
- Ramsey Clark, former U.S. Attorney General -

    "A report released June 9 by the FBI's Office of the Inspector General raises new questions about the role of the US government in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The internal FBI study provides several important revelations about how US intelligence agencies ignored and even suppressed warnings in the period leading up to the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that killed nearly 3,000 people.
    "Press accounts published within hours of the reports release gave a very distorted picture of the document, which runs to more than 400 pages. No follow-up reports, based on a thorough study of the text, have yet appeared in the mass media."
- Patrick Martin: FBI inspector general's report: more evidence of government complicity in 9/11 attacks -

    "While left-wing bloggers tried to play up the memo and the right wing bloggers heaped scorn on their opponents, it failed to warrant much mention in the American mainstream media.
    "'While the European media have covered the memo extensively, it has received scant attention by the mainstream media in America,' wrote Terry Neal of the Washington Post this week.
    "As blogger Juan Cole points out, the Times published the story on 1 May, and the first story in the Washington Post didn't appear until 13 May.
    "And it was only last week during a joint press conference with Tony Blair that President Bush was asked and answered a question about the memo."
- Kevin Anderson: Bloggers' 'victory' over Iraq war memos -

"I have this incredible dream that one day, one minute, the whole world, at the same time, will decide it's time for peace and love. So I just do my part. And I think that's all you can do. I'm not telling anyone else what to do. I do this, and that's the end of my story."
- Ringo Starr -

"I write to express my profound disappointment with Dana Milbank's June 17 report, 'Democrats Play House to Rally Against the War,' which purports to describe a Democratic hearing I chaired in the Capitol yesterday. In sum, the piece cherry-picks some facts, manufactures others out of whole cloth, and does a disservice to some 30 members of Congress [not to mention the unprecedented 561,000 American citizens who signed the petition] who persevered under difficult circumstances, not of our own making, to examine a very serious subject: whether the American people were deliberately misled in the lead up to war."
- Congressman John Conyers -

"More than 1,200 military personnel who received the anthrax vaccine before going to Iraq have developed serious illnesses, according to an Army report released last month, though local military officials contend the shots still are safe and necessary."
- Jeff Donaldson: 1,200 Who Had Anthrax Vaccine Now 'Seriously' Ill -

    "Mr. Ingram admitted to the Labour MP Harry Cohen in a private letter obtained by The Independent that he had inadvertently misled Parliament because he had been misinformed by the US. 'The US confirmed to my officials that they had not used MK77s in Iraq at any time and this was the basis of my response to you,' he told Mr Cohen. 'I regret to say that I have since discovered that this is not the case and must now correct the position.'
   "Mr. Ingram said 30 MK77 firebombs were used by the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force in the invasion of Iraq between 31 March and 2 April 2003. They were used against military targets 'away from civilian targets', he said. This avoids breaching the 1980 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW), which permits their use only against military targets."
- Colin Brown: US lied to Britain over use of napalm in Iraq war -

"In May the Bush economy eked out a paltry 73,000 private sector jobs: 20,000 jobs in construction (primarily for Mexican immigrants), 21,000 jobs in wholesale and retail trade, and 32,500 jobs in health care and social assistance. Local government added 5,000 for a grand total of 78,000. Not a single one of these jobs produces an exportable good or service."
- Paul Craig: The US Labor Force - One Foot In The Third World -

"When I was 17 I read a quote that went something like 'If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right.' It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself, 'If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?' And whenever the answer has been 'no' for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something. Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important thing I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life, because almost everything--all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure--these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart."
- Steve Jobs: Stanford Commencement Address -

    "Historically, the criminalization of drugs was a revenue-producing public policy. It was, 'If we're going to make money off these drugs, we've got to regulate them.' It began as taxation, and then we started moralizing the behavior - attaching moral judgments to the use of drugs, and demonizing the drug users. If we were an honest nation, consistent and with any integrity, we would do the same thing with caffeine, nicotine and alcohol, but we don't.    "While there are restrictions, certainly, on the use of nicotine and alcohol, both of those substances and the behaviors around them are perfectly legal for adults, yet we know that cigarette addiction is the most egregious form of addiction.
   "But we're fundamentally dishonest, and in demonizing illicit drug users, we deny medical attention for those who choose to get off drugs. We under-invest in smart education and prevention programs; we deny IV drug users clean syringes in many, many cities. We deny them methadone when it has been clearly established that that's a healthier alternative to heroin.
   "You have to start with the premise that if tobacco and alcohol, with all of their harms and enormous social and financial costs, are lawful substances, then how can we, in good conscience, deny somebody the right to smoke a joint - or to snort coke or shoot heroin? I don't do those things, but I believe I ought to have a right to do those things.
   "From very early on, we teach children that the people who use drugs are monsters and fiends. Well, excuse me, but they're not. Some of them manage to handle it successfully, and many do not. Many abuse the drugs and wind up very ill psychologically, physiologically, mentally, emotionally. But rather than demonizing them, we ought to be reaching out to help them. If we spent far less money on the supply side of the supply/demand equation, we'd be able to spend much more money on prevention, education, medication and rehabilitation and the like."
- Former Seattle police chief Norm Stamper in Seattle Confidential by Laura Barcella -

"Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creative."
- Charles Mingus -

"Only those who will risk going too far 
Can possibly find out how far one can go.
- T.S. Eliot -

    "Porter Goss, Bush's 'Intelligence Czar' says he knows where Osama bin Laden is, but he's not saying right now. I know where he's hiding. Or should I say I know where Porter Goss thinks he's is hiding. It's hardly a secret when you know how the Bush Cult thinks.
   "Porter Goss thinks bin Laden is hiding in Iran.
   "Why? How do I know this?
   "It's simple. Bush is in the process of putting together an invasion of Iran for the 2006 mid term elections (wag the dog) to distract the people again from the gutting of America by the Corporate/Dominion alliance. So in order to help justify this coming war they will need to put bin Laden in Iran. So that's where he is.
   "The way the intelligence community works in this administration is that the President tells them what he wants reality to be and then they go out and fabricate the story that supports the president's fiction.
   "Porter Goss is under orders from Bush to find bin Laden in Iran, so that's where he will be. By the time next summer rolls around, Osama bin Laden will have been discovered to be secretly in control of Iran and in control of their nuclear arsenal. And like Iraq, we will be required to go to war over it. I feel a draft coming."
- Marc Perkel -

"The state of monarchy is the supremest thing upon earth, for kings are not only God's lieutenants upon earth and set upon God's throne, but even by God himself they are called gods."
- King James -

"Though war may seem a bloody curse
It is a blessing in reverse
When canon roar
Both rich and poor
By danger are united!
(Till every wrong is righted!)Philosophers make evident 
The point that I have cited
'Tis war makes equal - as it were -
The noble and the commoner
Thus war improves relations!"
- Dr. Pangloss in Candide -

Everything Else

I want a Pulitzer Prize (actually just the ten thousand bucks). Won't you nominate me?

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