JWL.Freakwitch.net

Osama surrounded?

Be warned that the information comes to us through one unnamed source. But considering that most of our military information comes to us from one source -- the government -- time will be the judge of what is true or not: Two British papers, The Sunday Telegraph and The Sunday Express, reported Osama Bin Laden is surrounded by U.S. Special Forces in an area of land bordering northwest Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The claim is attributed to "a well-placed intelligence source" in Washington, who is quoted as saying: "He [Bin Laden] is boxed in."

The papers say the hostile terrain makes an all-out conventional military assault impossible. The plan to capture him would depend on a "grab-him-and-go" style operation.

"U.S. helicopters already sited on the Afghanistan border will swoop in to extricate him," The Telegraph wrote. It claims Bin Laden and his men "sleep in caves or out in the open. The area is swept by fierce snowstorms howling down from the 10,000 foot-high mountain peaks. Donkeys are the only transport."

The U.S. Special Forces are "absolutely confident" there is no escape for Bin Laden, and are awaiting the order to go in and get him. The timing of that order will ultimately depend on President Bush, the source said. "Capturing Bin Laden will certainly be a huge help for him as he gets ready for the election."

posted by JWL at 10:11 PM | 0 comment(s)

Signs of Spring

"Shhhh. Listen," I said.

"What?" Mo asked.

"It's running water. Look, it's coming from that drain pipe there from that church. All the water on the roof of the church is melting, and it comes down the gutters, into the pipe, and down to the ground."

"Cool!"

"You know what this means, don't you? It's warmer now. Spring is coming. Mama Earth is waking up."

"Awwwwww, yeah!"

It's been a long winter. Very different in character from last year. Last year there was a ton of snow. This year, we didn't get all that much. But, it was a very cold winter. I think it only rose above freezing once in the entire month of January, and it spent way too much time in the single-digits or below zero. But now it's warmer. It's been in the 40s most of the week, and this week it's supposed to go into the 50s.

I can feel spring coming after all. Nature is calling to me again. The warmer weather, whether it be summer here in Maine, or travel to another place, beckons. This is timed with my increased walking as of late; I really want to be outdoors more this year.

posted by JWL at 12:17 PM | 0 comment(s)

hee hee

Be careful what you ask for indeed...

posted by JWL at 4:00 PM | 0 comment(s)

Comments added

posted by JWL at 11:40 AM | 0 comment(s)

The Passion of The Passion of the Christ

It's apparent that many people didn't like the movie. But I have to wonder if they've given it a fair chance. I made a conscious effort to rid myself of preconceived notions before seeing the movie. I try to be a freethinker as much as possible, and rarely if ever heed "the critics" in my movie opinions.

I grew up Catholic, and did my time in Catholic school. I have memories of the nuns describing to me, in awful vivid detail, the images of Christ's "passion" (along with many, I have a problem with the way the word "passion" has been corrupted to mean extreme violence and power-over...but that's another story). In particular, I remember one Sister Vincent Marie telling us, with something disturbingly close to a gleam in her eye, that Roman whips had metal hooks on the end of them, and that when used they would dig into the skin, only to be ripped out again by the overzealous soldiers. I remember her descriptions of dislocated shoulders during crucifixion, and how breaking the legs of the crucified asphyxiated the victims because they could no longer push their chests up with their legs to breathe. These descriptions that I heard as a child in the late 70s could have been of Gibson's movie. Yes, the movie is violent, perhaps unnecessarily so; but on the other hand I almost prefer it to some sanitized, watered-down version of the story. Every "civilization" in history has its brutal side; the Romans were no exception. It seems to me that the movie just portrayed this brutality. And this brutality is nothing new; I heard vivid, graphic descriptions of it in school as a nine-year-old in fourth grade.

Remember, the area in question was under Roman occupation. In order to participate in an army of occupation in an area that doesn't want to be occupied, one must to a certain extent become blind to suffering. And if you are blind to suffering, it becomes easy to fetishize suffering. The Romans weren't nice to the Jews; they beat them with ropes, clubs, and swords to keep them under control. But what army is nice to the rebellious population they are ordered to control? Furthermore, these are not elite Roman soldiers; they are most likely freed slaves or mercenaries hired to do a nasty job nobody particularly wants to do. Look at Pilate's distate for his situation, as the governor of a hostile occupied territory.

I did keep an eye out for anti-Semitism. After seeing the movie, I'm not convinced that the movie is anti-Semitic. There are some Jews portrayed as sadistic, malicious, or downright evil, but the same can be said for nearly every group portrayed in the movie (Jews, Romans, Women, etc). If anything, the movie is anti-non-Christian, which of course as a pagan is something I am concerned about. On the other hand, we must also remember that this film is a portrayal of the fundamental Christian legend, which is also widely regarded as a highly privileged text (ie, "THE word of God"), so of course we should expect the Christian worldview and its adherents to be lifted up above non-Christians. Indeed, there were Jews who were malicious, as well as Jews who were outraged by the whole thing. You can't condemn all Jews for the death of Christ, any more than you can condemn all Germans for the holocaust. Anyone who leaves this movie believing that All Jews Are Evil Because They Killed Christ is just simply not thinking clearly.

I've seen reviews that claim the characters in the film are "cardboard" cutouts. Remember, these characters are among the most familiar in our civilization, so there was "nothing new under the sun" really possible in their portrayal, unless Gibson were to take liberties with the well-known story. I thought Mary, Yeshua's mother, was quite good. The most touching moment of the movie for me (speaking as a parent, and a double-Cancer at that *grin*) is when Mary sees Yeshua fall while carrying the cross, and flashes back to the boy Yeshua who falls and skins his knee. Her maternal instinct takes over, and she wants to comfort the broken, tortured, exhausted Yeshua as she did when he was a wailing child.

Despite the gore, there were some very beautiful, provocative images in the film. One in particular was at the moment of Christ's death. There is a wide shot from above of Golgotha as the clouds darken and the wind picks up. The picture distorts, and we realize we are seeing the reflection of the scene through a raindrop. The drop falls to earth (symbolic of Christ's mortality at that moment), and lands at the foot of the cross. I was immediately reminded, in the symbol of the water drop, of the dawning of the Age of Pisces at the moment of Christ's death. I thought it was a very powerful and evocative symbol.

Another interesting image was that when Christ is erected on the cross, the Magdalene pulls her hood over her head, shroud-like, in a slow, deliberate, and dramatic fashion. This action evoked in me an image of the suppression (or literally, the covering) of women -- and of female Goddess divinity -- that would take full force over the next two millenia. Ironically, another image with the Magdalene is when Christ "rescues" her from the stoning, with the famous "let he who is without sin cast the first stone" line (though this line is not spoken in the film). Christ reaches his hand down to the Magdalene, and lifts her up. There is an interesting subtext here; it suggests that perhaps Christ himself would lift up female divinity (and possibly his consort, according to some lesser-known Christian legends), whereas his subsequent followers would repress the Goddess.

I was on the lookout for other Christian myths and artifacts. Though the Shroud of Turin made an appearance, I was disappointed that the Grail did not.

Also, I find it funny that so many people think Satan is portrayed as a gay male, when in fact the part is played by a woman (Rosalinda Celentano); indeed Satan-the-character seems to be female (despite her androgynous appearance), as at one point she is suckling a bizarre, deformed "baby" as she walks through the crowd.

Some final thoughts: I think the movie is worth seeing, if you are movie fan or if you are interested in a particularly graphic portrayal of the death of the Christ. I don't believe for a minute that Mel Gibson made this movie out of any sense of duty or devotion as a Christian. Obviously, this film will sell a lot of tickets. I wonder if Mel will be donating his considerable profits to his church, a conservative subsect of Roman Catholicism that still says mass in Latin?

And while we're on the subject of Mr. Gibson, he seems to have a thing for pain, dislocated joints, and torture. I'm thinking of so many of his movies -- all the Lethal Weapon movies, the Mad Max movies, and the numerous military movies he's been in, not to mention the three movies he's directed, Passion, Braveheart, and Man Without a Face -- have graphic depictions of violence, pain, and torture.

This film isn't really all that original. Obviously, the story is well known, and the only thing even close to a new spin on it is the graphic violence. So from that perspective, it's kinda been-there, done-that. But it did have its moments. All in all, I urge everyone to decide for themselves; many reviews I have read are quick to condemn the movie, and miss some of the more interesting aspects of it.

posted by JWL at 12:52 PM | 0 comment(s)

the hermeneutic imperative

posted by JWL at 12:40 AM | 0 comment(s)

in training

I really like the new Linux install. Lots of goodies on there that come stock, ready to go. Very cool.

I have some thoughts brewing about Nader announcing his candidacy. But they aren't yet coherent enough even for a blog entry. I feel a bit disconnected this week, mostly because of my crazy schedule.

posted by JWL at 12:26 AM | 0 comment(s)

PCLinuxOS it is then...

So I gave PCLinuxOS another go, and it seems to be working well. It's based on KDE rather than GNOME, which for me is a good thing. So, it's in. I'm writing from my new hard drive install.

I haven't yet tried to salvage any of my data. Much of what I value is gone. Some is recoverable, like the many mp3s and oggs I'll have to re-rip from my CDs. Others aren't, like photographs of my daughter. And my Mozilla bookmarks are gone, too.

I'm trying to take this as a liberating experience somehow. Not sure exactly what I mean by this yet. I'm pretty incoherent just now.

So anyway, if you are a friend wondering why I'm not emailing you, it's probably because I've lost your address. email me so I have your address again.

posted by JWL at 12:40 AM | 0 comment(s)

Hardware Hell

The really sucky part is that my backup CDRW, when I checked it, is BLANK. I had forgotten that when I last installed Fedora, I couldn't make a backup for some reason. And I never tried again. This could mean that ALL of my data is gone. This would, of course, suck hugely. I may have an old backup floating around somewhere; I'll have to dig. :-(

Needless to say, blogging will be light for the next day or three while I get my machine back in order...

posted by JWL at 6:42 PM | 0 comment(s)

Title Change

posted by JWL at 1:53 AM | 0 comment(s)

John Kerry's strategy

Ignoring his rival Democrats, the Massachusetts senator hammered the Bush administration, taking the president to task on the economy, health care, international relations and his military record.

Tonight someone asked me what happened to Dean's campaign. I'm not exactly sure. I think there are several factors at work. Certainly the media have impacted Dean's plummetting campaign. In addition, as I've written before, Dean's campaign peaked too early.

At this point, the "Dean is finished" meme has been hammered home so vigorously and repetitively in the media that everyone believes it. Dean is finished. But he made his mark on the American political landscape. The nature of the dialogue is different because of him. At least John Kerry is openly criticizing George W. Bush.

posted by JWL at 1:15 AM | 0 comment(s)

New Job

It's a seasonal position, but I was told that they end up keeping about 80% of their seasonal help based on scheduling and performance. I should do really well at this job (I learn fast and have all the necessary skills), and the fact that I'm willing to work every weekend should help a lot. So I think this will turn into a permanent position.

The extra cash flow will help, of course. In addition to putting money toward bills, I should be able to start thinking about a new motherboard for the studio computer, some new recording software for the studio computer, and also possibly a linux laptop for myself. When it becomes permanent, I may be able to afford to make car payments for us as well. Time will tell. Let's get some hours in first, and see where things go from there.

posted by JWL at 5:11 PM | 0 comment(s)

Technological 'monoculture' in the mass media

The idea, borrowed from biology, is that Microsoft Corp. has nurtured a software "monoculture" that threatens global computer security. Geer and others believe Microsoft's software is so dangerously pervasive that a virus capable of exploiting even a single flaw in its operating systems could wreak havoc.

I still say the writing is on the wall. The curve of Microsoft's decline is exponential, even though it is early in the process. The next few years will be very difficult for them. Eventually they will have to completely change their business model, though admittedly it will take them a while to go through the billions they are sitting on.

posted by JWL at 8:30 PM | 0 comment(s)

mmmm, coffeeeeeee

There is a local coffee shop/roaster called Coffee By Design that makes the best coffee beans. I like their dark roasted coffees best; in particular, their Organic French Roast is quite good.

Up until now, I have used a french press for brewing coffee. It does yield a quite strong cup, though the maker has complete control over the brewing process (water temperature, concentration of coffee, brewing time, etc.). But today, my wife got me a new brewer, a double-loaded automatic drip kind. Way cool. I'm sipping the first results of it (using CBD's Casco Bay Blend), and it's pretty good. Let's see if I can get used to this method of brewing...

posted by JWL at 3:59 PM | 0 comment(s)

Let's put this "Nader cost Gore the election in 2000" thing to rest once and for all

Professor Lessig,

I am troubled by your buying in to the hype of claiming that "Nader cost Gore the 2000 election." This claim is nonsense by any scientific or analytical standard. While it is true that Nader received thousands of votes in Florida, and that Bush "won" Florida by 537 votes, your claim suffers from compounded causes.

A few points to consider: first, five third-party or independent candidates each received thousands of votes (Nader, Browne, Buchanan, Phillips, Hagelin), well more than 537, yet Nader alone gets the blame for costing Gore the election. The fact is that nearly every election in America has two candidates getting the vast majority of votes, with the non-duopoly candidates fighting for the few remaining scraps dropped from the table. Nader was firmly in this latter camp in 2000.

Second, your claim does not account for the impact Nader had on the political landscape in 2000. How many people who would not otherwise have voted were inspired to go to the polls in 2000? This group of voters undoubtedly includes voters from across the political spectra: progressive/green candidates disillusioned with the two-party system, right-wingers terrified of what Nader -- or Gore, for that matter -- stands for, and also disillusioned democrats who went out to vote because they were afraid that Nader would cost Gore votes. Though specific numbers from 2000 are impossible to come by, it is quite possible that Nader inspired MORE people to vote than the number of votes he received. Sadly, the breakdown of these numbers, of where these votes went, is impossible to know.

Third, Gore's campaign was one of the most poorly run in history. Gore failed to inspire voters, performed terribly at the debates against Bush, and failed to go for the jugular in his campaigns. Gore should have blown Bush out of the water in the debates, but instead he came across as wishy-washy, spineless, and without his own vision. This fact, in my view, was most important as to why the election was even close in the first place.

Fourth, Gore technically did win the election. Bush was in effect appointed by the Supreme Court. But hey, this is America; just because you get the most votes, doesn't mean you win the election.

I agree that it's important that Bush is not reelected this year, and that Nader will, no matter what his decision about running this year, influence the election in 2004. But the fact that Bush is the current occupant of the White House cannot be blamed solely on Nader. There were too many factors at work.

posted by JWL at 9:59 AM | 0 comment(s)

Solar power going mainstream

In one of life's little ironies, solar power is gaining a toehold in the most unlikely of places - the world of SUVs, big-screen TVs, and two-fridge families - the 'burbs. And if it can gain acceptance there, some analysts say, the technology is on the cusp of widespread acceptance.

"Even suburbia is starting to go solar," says Richard Perez, publisher of Home Power magazine, the bible of the home-renewable energy crowd. "Some new houses and subdivisions are being planned this way. It's not really common yet, but its happening."

I've always imagined using solar energy to heat my home. Of course, this presupposes that I become a homeowner, which hasn't happened yet. Because we homeschool our daughter, we're a one-income family for the time being, at least until some of my other projects begin to generate income. But I dream of this quasi-utopian off-the-grid communal living situation, with solar power, yurts, big gardens, etc. etc. The technology for this dream exists now; it's just a question of resources from here on out.

posted by JWL at 1:29 PM | 0 comment(s)

Hard drive space

So what I think I will do is archive most of my Windows data, partition that disk (maybe 7 or 8 gigs for Windows, the rest for Linux), and reinstall Linux to that disk. Then I can take my other hard drive (currently partitioned for Linux) and use it for only storing ogg and mp3 files (this is what most of the drive is now anyway).

So when I reinstall, the question becomes "which Linux"? A month or two ago I installed Fedora Core 1, but the more I use it the less I like it. It's just too slow, and it needs lots of stroking to get everything I want on it. So I guess I'm officially looking for a new Linux distro. I may give Debian another go, or MEPIS, or PCLinuxOS, or Libranet. Not sure... I need to think about this some more.

posted by JWL at 11:09 AM | 0 comment(s)

More on Mozilla/Firefox: 'The Tide Has Turned'

But now, after plenty of (somewhat tumultuous) history in Mozilla, he is saying that The Tide Has Turned. An excerpt:

So much progress has been made, in fact, that today, more than four years since my gloomy outlook was keyed, with unspeakable pleasure I am now in a position to report that this tide has finally turned. The Gecko layout engine seems unbreakable and is reportedly more standards compliant than Internet Explorer. The Firefox browser is fast and stable, and supports the plugins out there that the users want and need, and, for the first time in several years, my wife is actually excited about her Linux desktop again. For the first time since Internet Explorer 3.0 was released, I am seeing people switching browsers in droves.

posted by JWL at 1:21 PM | 0 comment(s)

Speaking of Firefox

My rule of thumb is this: the computer should try to be faster than I am. If I find myself waiting for the computer to do something, then I need to find out what's the bottleneck. My view is this: the bottleneck should always be the human.

The conclusion of the review, by the way:

All told, this browser is an excellent piece of engineering and the Mozilla team must be very satisfied with the work that they are contributing to the internet community. It takes a lot to get me to switch software packages, but after over 2 years I have finally found my new web browser.

posted by JWL at 12:44 AM | 0 comment(s)

"The Counter-Revolution Has Been Televised"

I have seen the past, and it still works.

Politics as usual was working like God's wristwatch in Iowa, where the RNC and various Republican PAC's outspent many of the Democratic candidates on negative TV ads aimed exclusively at Dean. But more damaging, in my opinion, was the remarkably open bias that the traditional media seemed to display against Howard Dean in their presentation of the news itself. I don't watch much television, but what little I've seen in the last month indicated to me that Dean was being systematically slimed.

I witnessed, for example, an astonishing are-you-still-beating-your-wife interview of Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi by CNN's Paula Zahn. Zahn persisted in drilling in on Dean's having said in an NPR interview that the notion the Bush administration had known in advance about 911 in advance was "an interesting theory," refusing, despite Trippi's protests, to read a bit further in the transcript to Dean's unequivocal statement that it was a theory he didn't share.

Dean was taken to severe task for having murmured something on Canadian television four years ago about flaws in the Iowa caucus system. Fox spent an entire day calling him a liar without ever being specific, in my hearing anyway, about what lies he had purportedly told. CNN repeatedly reported that some Iowa voters were referring to Dean volunteers as "Perfect Storm troopers." Indeed, in my extremely random sampling of TV reporting before the Iowa caucuses, I never heard a single reference to Dean that wasn't at least mildly derisive.

posted by JWL at 11:57 AM | 0 comment(s)

Water Vapor Molecules in the Air

On the other hand, I could say that I saw the moon, radiant in the same way that pregnant women are radiant, its round belly shining pure, warm light down upon me like an overpouring of love from the mother. This sentence probably contains less Truth than the previous description. But I would say it has more meaning. Though I hardly claim to be a poet, this description has a chance at evoking some sort of feeling in the reader. It is more memorable, it's not just a recipe of reality.

Why do I talk about this? Tonight I saw a really amazing movie, Tim Burton's Big Fish. This distinction between Truth and Meaning is the central theme of the story. In the movie, Billy Crudup plays Will Bloom, son of Ed Bloom played by Albert Finney (and by Ewan MacGregor in flashbacks). Ed Bloom is storyteller to the extreme; full of charm, a big smile, and a teller of tall tales. As the movie says repeatedly, "he's nothing if not a social man." And in the movie, he's dying.

Will Bloom, on the other hand, is a reporter. He is interested in facts, and grew tired of his father's tall tales. He goes to visit his father and tells him, basically, I don't know you, I just know your amusing little lies. When Will was still a child, he discovered that some of his father's tales were impossible, and lost all trust in his dad. This is the central conflict in the story. Fact vs. story. Teller of tales vs. speaker of Truth. It's a great movie; in the end, it is clear that we are our stories, no matter how we choose to tell them.

It made me cry on a couple of levels. One of them is that my grandfather is currently in the hospital, perhaps for the last time. He's 93 years old and physically very weak; he's also undergoing radiation treatment for skin cancer. A few days ago he had basically a heart attack; he has, in addition to his skin cancer, congestive heart failure and pulmonary edema. When (or if) he is released from the hospital, it is quite likely he will go on to Hospice.

I will always remember my grandfather in stories. One of my favorites: as a child, we used to "go to the lake" where my grandparents had a cottage. There was decent fishing at Boone Lake, actually; I remember fishing for bluegill and largemouth bass primarily, though there were also crappie to be found. Anyway, once I managed to get my fishing line hopelessly tangled into a large ball of monofilament plastic. I did this often; usually my father would untangle the line for me. Well at this moment, dad wasn't around, he must have been off fishing or something. But Grandpa was there, and he went to untangle the line for me. I was in an "annoying kid moment"; I remember saying over and over to my grandfather: "that's not how daddy does it." Grandpa endured this for a few minutes and finally stopped, turned and looked at me half-glaring and half-smiling with his pipe clenched between his teeth, and said four words that utterly shut me up. "Who taught your father?"

In Big Fish, Will Bloom finally realizes that though his father exaggerated some of the details of his stories for effect, the essence of the stories was usually accurate. The Chinese Singing Twins weren't actually siamese twins; the giant wasn't 20 feet tall but 7 and a half. More importantly, Will Bloom realizes that our stories are our lives, and that we can only relate to other people through the stories.

It makes me wish I had listened to more of my grandfather's stories.

posted by JWL at 1:46 AM | 0 comment(s)

1.1 million Free software developers

posted by JWL at 1:27 PM | 0 comment(s)

Mozilla Firefox

Also, the Mozilla Thunderbird email client released version 0.5 today.

Both of these programs, just to clarify, are previews of the next-generation of Mozilla. The developers took regular Mozilla 1.5 (which has everything, the browser, email, etc. wrapped up in one program) and split it into its component parts. I believe that when Firefox and Thunderbird (and possibly nVu) are at version 1.0, they'll together be packaged as Mozilla 2.0. But I'm not sure. They may just keep them separate.

Anyway, both of these programs look really sweet. I want to install them asap, but I'm having a disk space issue on my /usr partition at the moment. :-(

posted by JWL at 1:22 PM | 0 comment(s)

Thank Dean?

You were around a year ago -- you remember how hopeless it seemed, how many people were saying that Bush could not be beaten. You were looking into Canadian real estate, and Howard Dean was deciding to run for president. See what I'm saying?

Now people believe that Bush can be beaten. His popularity rating has dipped below 50 percent for the first time since the election (when it was also below 50 percent but, hey, let's not go there again). Now people are voting for John Kerry on the interesting thesis that he has the best chance of beating Bush. Imagine that.

And Kerry probably will beat Bush. The pattern of the election could well be that of Clinton's victory in '92, though I wonder about the "Ross Perot" factor. If one can argue that Nader cost Gore the election in '00 (this is nonsense, by the way), then one can also argue that Perot cost Bush the election in '92. I remember at the time, I didn't think it possible that Clinton could win. Then Perot came and took more than 10% of the vote, as I recall, many of whom "would have voted for Bush."

But even if Kerry wins, even if he is re-elected for a second term, and some semblance of sane sameness is restored to the American government, what of the future? Bush has done so much in 3 years to damage the working class and the poor and the environment and he's done so much to benefit the energy industry, the corporate elite, and the power establishment. How bad will the next Republican president after Kerry look?

Scary to contemplate.

This is why someone like Kucinich is so important. But in this election, he's the "token progressive." He's not even as progressive as he should be, yet he represents the stance so far to the left that it's "not electable."

The political spectrum in this country is so narrow and right-shifted. I've intuited this for a long time, but Eric Alterman's (of Altercation fame) book What Liberal Media? is articulating this problem eloquently and elegantly for me.

posted by JWL at 1:21 AM | 0 comment(s)

Thank you, Janet Jackson's breast

posted by JWL at 12:06 AM | 0 comment(s)

KDE 3.2 in the Big News

Available in 42 languages and partially translated into an additional 32, KDE 3.2 is the result of a year-long, global development effort that included processing 2,000 feature requests and 10,000 bug reports into the new version.

KDE counts its global user base in the millions. It is the default user interface for Linux-based operating systems Ark Linux, Conectiva, Knoppix, Lindows, Lycoris, Mandrake Linux, SuSE Linux, TurboLinux and Xandros and is available as an option with Debian, Free/Open/NetBSD, Gentoo, Libranet, Red Hat (Nasdaq: RHAT - news) Linux, Slackware and Solaris.

posted by JWL at 1:44 AM | 0 comment(s)

Forbes: "Microsoft should be worried"

Firebird is available for a free download from Mozilla and is currently at version 0.7, which means it has not quite reached the point of being a fully stable product. Eventually Firebird will become the default Mozilla browser, although that won't happen before it reaches version 1.5. But it's certainly worth a try if you're finding Explorer getting old. If, in its unfinished state, Firebird is this good, perhaps Microsoft should be worried.

Mozilla (Firebird and Thunderbird and Nvu and ... get the point? Mozilla is extensible) is going to come out of nowhere and win the browser wars once and for all. It should dominate well into the next decade. It's growing in usability at an exponential rate; each new release gets better and better. Already it's better than IE. The final nail in IE's coffin will come when all of the plugins work seamlessly with it. It should be easy to install, with a standard Fedora or Debian package for all the useful Mozilla plugins. Here's hoping.

But the victory in the browser wars is just the beginning. I predict a similar fate for OpenOffice.org over MS Office and for desktop Linux in general. It's a matter of both momentum and the laws governing exponential curves.

posted by JWL at 1:27 AM | 0 comment(s)

Janet's Tit, Outrage, Janet's Tit, missing WMDs, Janet's Tit, record concentrations of wealth and power, Janet's Tit, Iraq, Abortion, Janet's Tit

Many of The Powers That Be use these faux-moral issues as smokescreens. If they (in this case, "they" means Michael Powell and others) can focus on this stupid little meaningless event, it means they don't have to focus on the real issues facing this country. They're too busy being outraged by Janet's tit to spend any neuron power on the Bush regime's lies and destruction, the fact that the global economy has concentrated more wealth to fewer people than ever before, etc. etc.

In an article in this month's The Progressive magazine, Bernie Sanders writes:

So how do the rightwingers get elected if they have nothing to say about the most important issues facing the American people? That is the central question of modern American politics. And the answer is that they work day and night to divide the American people against each other so that they end up voting against their own best interests. That is what the Republican Party is all about.

They tell white workers their jobs are being lost not because corporate America is downsizing and moving to China, but because black workers are taking their jobs--because of affirmative action. White against black.

If you turn on talk radio, what you will hear, in an almost compulsive way, is a hatred of women. And they're telling working class guys, you used to have some power. You used to be the breadwinner. But now there are women running companies, women in politics, women making more money than you. Men against women.

And they're turning straight people against gay people. The homosexuals are taking over the schools! Gay marriage is destroying the country! Straights against gays.

And if you're not for a war in Iraq waged on the dubious and illegal doctrine of "preemptive war," you're somehow unpatriotic. And those of us who were born in America are supposed to hate immigrants. And those of us who practice religion in one way, or believe in the separation of church and state, are supposed to be anti-religious, and trying to destroy Christianity in America--and we get divided up on that. And on and on it goes.

The Republican leadership does all of this in an incredibly cynical, poll-driven way, because they know when you lay out their program about the most important economic issues facing America, it ends up that they are representing the interests of 2 percent of the population. You can't win an election with the support of 2 percent. So they divide us, and the result is that tens of millions of working people vote against their own interests.

America is still very much a Puritan culture, at least on the surface. How else can one explain the remarkable attention given to a breast, which I remind the reader that each of us has, being shown on television? Furthermore, this faux-Puritanical outrage being expressed over it is nothing more than political manipulation, designed to distract the masses from the real issues.

posted by JWL at 1:47 PM | 0 comment(s)

new case, RIAA vs. reality

"Let me say what I think your problem is. You can use these harsh terms, but you are dealing with something new, and the question is, does the statutory monopoly that Congress has given you reach out to that something new. And that's a very debatable question. You don't solve it by calling it 'theft.' You have to show why this court should extend a statutory monopoly to cover the new thing. That's your problem. Address that if you would. And curtail the use of abusive language."

posted by JWL at 1:03 PM | 0 comment(s)

Interesting Juxtaposition

Many have said that enough is enough taking[sic] about Linux. How Linux is great. Why Linux rulz and Micro$oft sucks, blah blah blah. I will promise you that this article is going to be something different.

This reveals one thing to me: that there are a large number of people sick and tired of rah-Linux, fuck-Microsoft rants (I'm guilty of this on many occasions). These people tend to be pragmatists; they just want software that works, and are happy as long as things are running well.

But there are also a lot of people who are utterly fed up with Microsoft. For these people: check out open-source alternatives. I've already written about Mozilla here, and I've written about OpenOffice in the past. Linux is worthy of attention, too.

The question of "I just want what works" is, in my view, incomplete, now that Free software "just works" in most cases. In other words, there are different options within the set of "what works." So a choice still needs to be made. In order to embrace freedom, a computer user must be willing to break inertia. This is a commitment on some level. Personal Computing can be done and done well with Free software. It makes little sense to me to give up the freedom included in Free software in order to "go with the flow" and use what "everyone" uses.

(This argument, about what "everyone" uses, reminds me of the Heideggerian "They" -- which are everywhere but nowhere; "they" is everyone, but no one in particular -- he outlines in Being and Time. I'll have to think about this connection some more...)

posted by JWL at 11:32 PM | 0 comment(s)

Freakwitchery

This means I need to resume the learning curve of drum programming, since I will be the de facto producer for the Freakwitch sessions in our studio. Ah well. Progress will be slow at first as I tackle the learning curve, but it's good work, work I've wanted to master for a long time now. The only remaining question is whether I go for natural-sounding acoustic drums, or some bizarre loops that aren't trying to emulate a drum kit. I suspect we'll have some of each.

We (Matt and I) don't want to wait around for anyone. The further along we can push the project on our own, the more people will be attacted to it when the time comes. Forward momentum!

posted by JWL at 11:09 PM | 0 comment(s)

Another Look at Mozilla

Internet Explorer users, tired of the "same old browser", might just start itching for change before Microsoft can deliver the new software. Maybe Mozilla, with its superior speed and standards compliance, will be enough to tempt them to weather the "pain" of download and installation -- a sacrifice that can take as little two minutes, especially as more and more people abandon podunk dial-up connectivity for the wonders of cable modems and DSL.

posted by JWL at 11:36 AM | 0 comment(s)

morality in the media

But anyway, I was reading an article on Common Dreams that pointed out an apparent contradiction in CBS's conception of "morality" and/or "public interest."

First, one must accept that Janet Jackson showing her tit at the SuperBowl halftime show (with help from Justin Timberlake) was planned. There is simply too much evidence for it not to be (JJ's pasty, lights going out immediately, video cutting away immediately). CBS -- or at least someone at CBS -- knew exactly what was going to happen and approved it.

Contrast this with CBS's decision to censor MoveOn.org's ad criticizing Bush. CBS is willing to show a tit, but not an ad criticizing Bush. Ummm, OK.

Now don't get me wrong; in a perfect world, there would be plenty of tits (male and female, in all shapes and sizes) shown on TV, just as there would be plenty of ads criticizing whoever is in power. It just seems strange to me that the female form is considered "offensive" in the knee-jerk reaction to the hubbub.

But note that very few people are talking about the moveon.org/bushin30seconds ads now. We've all been distracted by Janet's tit.

UPDATE: I just saw where Michael Powell, chairman of the FCC, had this to say:

"I am outraged at what I saw during the halftime show of the Super Bowl. Like millions of Americans, my family and I gathered around the television for a celebration. Instead, that celebration was tainted by a classless, crass and deplorable stunt. Our nation's children, parents and citizens deserve better."

posted by JWL at 11:49 PM | 0 comment(s)

On Browsers

Remember, Mozilla is free software and can be downloaded at no cost. If you spend any time at all on the 'net (of course you do, or you wouldn't be reading this), you'd be foolish not to at least try Mozilla.

posted by JWL at 11:43 AM | 0 comment(s)

The New American Century, just like the Old American Century

One thing that caught my eye is her reframing of old imperialist tactics with the word "new." The New American Century, New Imperialism, New Racism, and New Genocide all make appearances. I can't help but think of other "new" modes of imperial oppression, for example, "The New Enclosures" term by Midnight Notes. All of these have one thing in common; the "new" strategy accomplishes the same end, but with less immediate brutality, than the "old" strategy. Roy's use of "New Genocide," for example, is as follows:

New Genocide in this new era of economic interdependence can be facilitated by economic sanctions. New Genocide means creating conditions that lead to mass death without actually going out and killing people. Denis Halliday, who was the UN humanitarian coordinator in Iraq between 1997 and 1998 (after which he resigned in disgust), used the term genocide to describe the sanctions in Iraq.

These New Enclosures ... name the large-scale reorganization of the accumulation process which has been underway since the mid-1970s. The main objective of this process has been to uproot workers from the terrain on which their organizational power has been built, so that, like the African slaves transplanted to the Americas, they are forced to work and fight in a strange environment where the forms of resistance possible at home are no longer available.

Or in the case of the New Enclosures, Empire appears to be "helping" the "refugees" who are fleeing their homeland. There are undoubtedly some refugees who prefer their current lives in a new country to their old lives, but if one examines the refugee situation en masse, it is clear that a huge displacement of workers is occuring, one that capital can exploit for cheap labor.

So the methodology of Empire in expanding is becoming more subtle. It is more difficult, at least on the surface, to find out what's really going on.

There is one other thing I want to mention about Roy's article. At the end, she calls for "globalizing resistance":

What Cancun taught us is that in order to inflict real damage and force radical change, it is vital for local resistance movements to make international alliances. From Cancun we learned the importance of globalizing resistance.

posted by JWL at 12:29 AM | 0 comment(s)