War On Terror:Ridiculous Hysterics or Rampant Paranoia?
Another possible terrorist attack was thwarted yesterday when singer-actor-comedian Henry Rollins was reported to the Australian National Security hotline for reading a book. Mr. Rollins was reported to Australian authorities by a vigilant fellow passenger to exception to Mr. Rollins reading material.
The book Mr. Rollins was reading before being reported to the thought police was Jihad:The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia by Ahmed Rashid, published by the Yale University Press. Apparently the passenger was afraid that Mr. Rollins might stand up and do one of his confrontational spoken word pieces during the flight, thereby terrorizing fellow passengers.
Mr. Rollins was notified of his nomination by a woman from the Australian Government and sent back a response telling them to "go fuck themselves."
Meanwhile, the Bush administration touted this today as "another terrorist act thwarted by vigilant citizens. This justifies our illegal wiretapping and proves that all people should spy on their neighbor and report such suspicious activities such as reading." The orwellian named Department of Homeland Security also released a list of approved books for all flights in the US including authors Sean Hannity, Bill O' Reilly, Ann Coulter and Michael Savage. Also, a no-bid contract was doled out to a top Republican donor to print Bibles for passengers who wished to read about the Middle East.
38 comments:
Awesome blurb.. I've been a big Rollins fan since his Black Flag days. His writing is stripped down and sharp, and his act is tight and forceful. I've seen him perform many times, and he never ceases to amaze me. From what a couple of my Australian friends say, that country is on the same road we are here in the states. Fear, control, limitations in freedom... a real mess.
((sigh like an adolescent)) Henry Rollins! He can do no wrong.
Why don't you have women in the major shareholders section? Just curious.
Homeland security apparently zapped my last attempt to comment ... so I am reconstructing it ... Your post reminds me of the situation early in the current war of repression in which a college kid was banned from flying for reading, oh my God!, Edward Abbey's Hayduke Lives! When the idiotic become "vigilant" the intelligent suffer. Rory can't help but think of his motto in situatiosns like this: Fiction based Reality. Reality Based Fiction. Anyhoo, here's a link on that earlier Keystone Thought Kop incident:
Morons Ban Student With Edward Abbey Book from Flight
Uh, we DO have women in the major shareholders section (Wadena). If you are a woman interested in purchasing stock in LTN, please contact Lily at human resources and she will be happy to set you up.
The "shareholders" section is a shout out to the people who come here and participate alot,and give feedback... and whose blogs I read at least once a day. If they happen to be men, thats arbitrary, and I have no idea why. I read many female bloggers. I write at another blog under a different name on women's issues and most of the readers there are women! So? In real life, I have always had far more male friends than female. Does this mean anything? Not really. But after a week of hearing about how I don't protect female bloggers from trolls, I have this to say: As a liberated chick, I don't want to be 'protected'!! Protected implies that I am weaker, in need of somebody to intervene on my behalf. The hell with that!Thats not sisterhood, thats insulting my ability to be strong and yell in my OWN defense. I want to learn my own facts and speak for myself and make my own choices. This whole idea of equating insulation with strength is not my way.
Hmmm Wadena is not a female either. Wadena is a cat of unspecified gender.
Actually Kvatch is the CFO with all the expertise on our stock, at Blogshares. Contact Frog. HR just stops Lew from unionizing.
maybe we should start using those book jacket covers like I did back in high school. There were some really great psychadelic ones of all the 60's album (remember them?) covers ... Jimi Hendrix, ahhhh. Made good cover for reading "Black Like Me" which was banned at my high school after the race riots following MLK assasination. D.K.
First of all.....Wadena is a collaborative being--a mix of one spunky/runty neutered female of questionable Abyssinian descent and unquestionable attitude (claiming deity) and one opinionated and otherwise unremarkable human male typist and servant.
As to the book issue.....there is an understandable concern on the part of the programmers that if we do not watch the rectangular programming tube we may tend to think.....thus the reading of books is highly suspect and worrisome.
It all SO makes sense.
We all know that the new airline security procedures are silly. Baggage screeners taking away pocket knives, nail clippers and box cutters is window-dressing and doesn't improve airline security, even after 9/11.
People who think otherwise don't understand what allowed the terrorists to take over four planes two years ago. It wasn't a small knife. It wasn't a box cutter. The critical weapon that the terrorists had was surprise. With surprise they could have taken the planes over with their bare hands. Without surprise they couldn't have taken the planes over, even if they had guns.
And surprise has been confiscated on all flights since 9/11. It doesn't matter what weapons any potential new hijackers have; the passengers will no longer allow them to take over airplanes. I don't believe that airplane hijacking is a thing of the past, but when the next plane gets taken over it will be because a group of hijackers figured out a clever new weapon that we haven't thought of, and not because they snuck some small pointy objects through security, or even if they were reading the Koran during their flight.
Sorry to the cat, I didn't realize you were neutered, or part of a collective. Who knew cats couldn't type? (or use a computer?)
Just another clueless CEO I guess.
(But a much appreciated CEO) My cat shuns collectives, she is an antisocial anarchist cat that spits on me. She listens to RIOT CATZZZZZZ music on her nano. And she wears Doc Martens, special ordered for her ass kickin feet.
Thing is, does the gender of a blogger really matter? I tend to think its about our words, and that nobody really cares if I am a female- how shallow would it be to consider my gender when I post on torture, or the media, or politics, or war? Get real. I don't know if "No Blood For Hubris" is a female or male, but its a damn good blog! It doesn't matter, is all I'm trying to say.
Hey, what about Tom Clancy?
I don't know, but I was reading somewhere that Tom Clancy could give the terrorists ideas for attacks against US.
Who the hell did you read that from? Not that punk-ass Neil Shakespeare again...
I don't know, but I was reading somewhere that Tom Clancy could give the terrorists ideas for attacks against US.
You mean, "did give ideas,". Flying planes into buildings was from a Clancy novel if I remember correctly. That said...back on track.
Good for HR! The Aussies are starting to head down the same route that England, currently the most surveilled western democracy, has already travelled.
Thumbs up to this post!
The whole subject of authors brought an interesting example to mind. (Yes, I will bring this back to the topic at hand, but you'll have to be patient with me!)
Does the name Salman Rushdie ring a bell?
In many ways I think Mister Rushdie would make an excellent poster boy for the situation at hand. Rushdie of course is the highly regarded author who currently has a bounty on his head, compliments of the late Ayatollah Khomeini. (Do the words "SATANIC VERSES" mean anything to you?
The only reason I have mentioned this is because in sharp contract to the Bush Regime and that foolish, foolish individual on the airplaine, Mister Rushdie is actually providing a better example for daily living than Bush and his cowardly, followers.
Shortly after the Ayatollah placed a price on Rushdie's head, the author went into seclusion and surrounded himself with security. But after two years the author realized that this was no way to live and he now takes a few precautions and travels in the open with little regard for his personal safety.
Foolish? Careless? Reckless?
Not necessarily. Indeed, some might say brave. Or better yet...
NORMAL
This my friends, is called LIVING. And it is not what the Bush Administration wants for any of us.
Does anyone remember that wonderful Republican line from the 2000 elections, when the GOP said of Al Gore, "we will hear nothing but fear itself?" This of course was a perversion of Franklin Roosevelt's classic line "we have nothing to fear but fear itself." Well, let's look at how the cowards and manipulators in the Bush Administration have behaved since 911.
After 911 Bush told us to be observant, go shopping, and go about our every day lives Would that he actually meant it. Sadly, the Regime in Washington learned early on that hate and fear are motivating emotions, and since that time they have missed no opportunity to expolit both, the dark side of the human psyche and the tragedy that was 911.
Prior to 911 the Christian Right, which claimed to distrust the power of the federal government, also assured us that there was a Jesus in Heaven and that all we had to do to get there was to lose our grip on reality and join their expanding cult,
But that was BEFORE 911.
AFTER 911 the so called "Christian Right" wasted little time as it ran to the federal government for protection, essentially reversing its previous stand as it bellowed something to the effect of: "EVIL FEDERAL GOVERNMENT! PLEASE SAVE OUR DISINGENUOUS HIDES SO WE WON'T HAVE TO PUT THIS JESUS RHETORIC TO A TEST!"
And the Bush Regime in Washington was only too happy to comply. What can I say? For people who seem so certain that the'll die and go to a better place for all eternity, the Radical Right Wing Christians seem rather reluctant when it comes to putting their courage where their overactive mouths have been--none of which seems to bother Bush because he has been thriving in a climate of fear. Indeed, he isn't only a suffere; he's a carrier; he spreads it like a political bubonic plague.
When there's a bad news cycle, we have another terrorist alert. If the war is unusually bloody we just go orange again! If someone dares to speak truth to power, he just exploits 911 and victims of that tragedy. If there's a constitutional provision which needs trampling over, he just breeds fear and paranoia, and his obedient supporters will beg, fetch, roll over, and play dead on command.
The only problem with all of this is that while Bush claims he wants to save our lives, no one asks the obvious question.
SAVE OUR LIVES FOR WHAT?
So that we can grovel in fear and terror whenever the Demander and Thief wants to play upon our fears for selfish, political motivations? So that we can go through life afraid, but never quite living life to its fullest? What Bush offers is not living. It is EXISTING, and I refuse to merely exist.
I'm daiabetic. People are amazed when I tell them that They just look at me, and assume that I'm young and healthy, but the truth of the matter is that I have a disease which requires constant monitoring, and if I should ever get too careless or ever find myself in a position where I can't test myself or give myself the required medication I could die. Do I let this mother me?
HELL NO!
I do not let the disaese control my life. I take certain precautions. I exercise; I watch my diet; I give myself the required bloods sugar tests; I take my medication and I take it on time. Fear does not have to be a regular part of my daily routine. Nor do I allow it to do so.
Life is to be lived and that's what I'm doing wiith it. In fact, I fully expect to be around for a long long time, and I intend to be a happy camper in the process. I control the disease and I live a life that is virtually identical to the lives of the non diabetics around me. And if by some chance something goes terribly wrong and I die in my sleep, at least my friends will be able to say that I enjoyed my life, and that's more than some people can say.
Now if Bush would only adopt the same attitude towards terrorism (and life in general) and allow the American people to actually LIVE their lives with a minimum of fear-mongering and outright manipulation.
Living is NOT what the Bush Administration wants for the American people. Never mind the fact that Republicans routinely complain about a dependency on tax-supported social programs; the truth of the matter is that this Administration LOVES the idea of psychological dependency on big government--on Big Brother, on George W. Bush and his very maladjusted inncer circle of goons, cronies, and empire builders.
Bush figured out early on that a FEARFUL population is an OBEDIENT population. Bush likes obedience. There isn't a thing in his psychological profile to suggest that he can tolerate disagreement in any way, shape or form. And to that end he and his puppet masters will do anything and everything possible to keep the American people frightened.
Rushdie has a solution to this. He defies his would be murderers. He refuses to give the terrorists in his life a psychological victory by giving in to their demands. He has decied that life is to be lived to its fullest, not cowering in the shadows worried about what might or might not happen. Unlike some people, Mister Rushdie has actually gotten on with the actual business ofliving.
He is not sitting on an airplane cowering in abject horror over a book which he knows nothing about. And as long as we allow ourselves to be manipulated and exploited by the propaganda masters and fear mongers in Washington we will almost certainly hear more cases about this foolish, foolish indvidual on the airplane who had nothing better to do than shrink in abject terror about a book which he could not understand and probably couldn't read in the first place.
Oh my, I think that article is a fake. I did go to Rollin's website and find an interesting link to an interview he gave the Washington Post.
Henry Rollins is Hitler!
My daughter Brittnee listens to that Henry Rollin guy and his music is like a terror attack. But don't mean he's going to take over a plane with his awful singing. The war on terror is a fake. Bush wants the oil and uses the war for a cover.
Ramones? I'm down with that!
Donkey, you are an ass!
Gubba Gubba hey! Gubba Gubba hey!
Brandon,
Thank you for making the point that FEAR does not make us safe. That was part of my point earlier on the post on Heuristics, that while terrorism is of course a possibility, there are some statistical bases for rational/vs irrational fear. There are no guarantees, only actions to reasonably pursue the best outcomes possible. Friedman wrote in the article linked about propaganda and fear.
Now your analogy with disease and your management, you are doing what you can and that is reasonable. But if you spent eight million dollars on a magic blood sugar crystal and put all your resources into that while eating candy, we would say that is IRRATIONAL but that is what we are doing and the taxpayers pay for it.
"Also, a no-bid contract was doled out to a top Republican donor to print Bibles for passengers who wished to read about the Middle East."
I don't think that's correct . . . UNLESS, they print it in multicolor, highlighting only the passages they approve of while micro-scripting all that annoying 'love each other and the poor' radical hippyism.
Donkey, you are an ass!
Sort of goes without saying.
Way to go henry, back to the black flag days, the aussies can fuck off!
"""Donkey, you are an ass!"""
Now THAT'S calling a spade a shovel.
Ass? Wow! In all my years (many) with the nickname Donkey, I have yet to bear the brunt of such an original and biting verbal attack. Whats next? Jackass? Smartass? Mule-gatawny???
No soup for you!
But to make peace, I will take it back.
Rollins is not Hitler. He cant be, only Hitler was Hitler. My bad.
Are we still playing the "throw out Hitler to bait people" game? I assumed that this was an allusion to the common practice of wontonly calling different people Hitler/Nazi. Very Seinfeld. I assumed that donkey was just being smug. How interesting a development that donkey and rhino are making peace while the peaceniks curse. Crazy bastards.
What can we learn here about why people prone to conflict are not effective toward peace? It seems that testosterone is indeed a universal language after all.-Lurking Pissed Pinko Feminazi Liberal Devil's Advocate
"anonymous"
It was donkey who first threw out the Hitler to bait people game. This is making peace?
I merely responded with an obvious and admittedly awful joke. There was no cursing involved, as ass is an exceptable term for a donkey.
A challenge to peace is admitting that we make assumptions based on the limited information we know. On this, questions are key. Is it possible to talk to a person and focus on commonality? To focus on what each party NEEDS versus what we assume they need, or want? How often do we react to a person we identify as 'other'? And the hostility starts to flow? My family is full of conservative materialistic republicans, then there are the liberal hippies that avoid them when possible. Or taunt them by planting "Mother Jones" in their houses during parties. Or... put Che Guevera pictures on their mirrors...or, Nader magnets...but,I DIGRESS...We all manage to have dinners together, even make some jokes and some concessions. We must evolve past winner/loser, aggressor/victim, etc.
In Lew's defense, I was being a bit of an ass, and if I may...a smart or as anonymous said a smugass. However my intention was not to bait, but to make a point that anonymous stated more eloquently than I possibly could. Back to the name calling...
Henry Rollins is a Liar!
Lily,
At the risk of the wrath of the right...
I actually bought a Che magnet whilst in Cuba a few years back. Although a thug whose politics I disagree with or more accurately the politics of the trend loving Che shirt wearing ABC kids of the lower east side, he was 1/8 Irish so Ill just write it off as the whiskey.
You mean Henry wrote that song ("Liar")about himself? I was informed it was about somebody else.
I sure hope you don't mean my NYU environs, donkey. And I am 1/8 Irish. Will that keep me out of DAR?
i am no fan of mr rollins unless he is playing a no-necked thug in a b-comedy. his 'comedy' routines and lectures are neither funny nor enlightening. yet a 'free' government like australia telling him what he can and cannot read is startling.
I knew that Hank was a fucking Jihadist. HOLY SHIT! Glad they caught that dude before he opened any fucking minds. Scary!
the heretic
What a great site »
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