Willie: I warned ya! Didn't I warn ya?! That colored chalk was forged by Lucifer himself!

Lisa the Vegetarian

tina wrote:
] And thats why people were clapping. They started to realize
] they weren't offending people, that a lot of people actually
] agreed! You can love your country and still love peace, you
] can question your government without questioning democracy.
] These truths seem so self-evident, but when's the last time
] you heard them being said while bunch of people clapped?

Tina's response to my 9/11 post is worth a read.

RE: Fahrenheit 9/11 in 4 Sentences

I thought this author was trying to hard, but I enjoyed this anyway...

All past scenes. All mummified in vintage yellow police tape, displaying warding epithets in four different languages. They were all the abandoned stages of other players. The disarrayed remnants of a wild performance with abused props still scattered where they had been disposed of.

This time, I figured, it was my own stage, my own script and my own trio of acts.

Somewhere distant, past the imperceptibly sprawling borders of the city. I saw the fragments of an origami Bengal tiger folded by your hands crumble and scatter on an unbound wind, and wished I was there.

fragments of an origami tiger

] It's official: Stewie Griffin's plans for world domination
] shall continue!
]

Sweet!

Eh, or rather...

Alllll Riiiight....

Yahoo! News - Family Guy coming back to the air

Each Robot Chick begins as a hand sculpted original, built by the mad artist himself, Brent Harris. A high quality resin casting is then made and customized for a one-of-a-kind piece of sculpture. Each Robot Chick is numbered and comes with her own hand stamped ID tag. Materials used for customizing include: sheet aluminium, copper wire, springs, rivets, screws, bolts, and old sewing machine parts.

The prices are too high and breasts are too perky, but these are interesting to look at.

Robot Chicks

] Doug Z's Art is a mixture of thought, creativity, spray
] cans and imaginations. His work is unusual, ethereal and
] even mind warping.

One of Rattle's friends does interesting things with krylon...

Doug Z Art Gallery

Here it is, as promised, the video of the last Flipside gig.

I have the feeling that the site is slammed. I was unable to download it for awhile.

(Could someone please recommend a reliable public tracker? I can generate a torrent..)

Sunshine Flipside Last Show

Most cool family tree of electronic (dance) music. Includes sound clips representative of each genre. This is a neat way to explore. You'll find new stuff you didn't know about that you like. Now, can someone please do this for "industrial" so I can at least understand how the genres break down?!

Ishkur's Guide to Electronic (Dance) Music

] No bullshit, no hassle, and no need to pay extortionate
] collector's prices for rare live performances.
]
] Here are the collected bootlegs of Bill Hicks live shows,
] available to download for free in mp3 form. We'll be
] adding to this archive with background information and
] further mp3s we can unearth, but in the meantime these
] files should provide a few further hours of listening
] entertainment for those of you who have already greedily
] devoured all of Bill's commercial recordings. Enjoy.

We need another Bill Hicks. I'm not going to be able to survive this war on terrorism without one.

The download site appears broken (overloaded?) right now, but I'm meme'ing the main page anyway so I remember to check it later. Its probably down because it started getting linked everywhere.. I'm going to give it a few days. Its worth waiting for.

Bill Hicks Bootleg Downloads

Elonka wrote:
] If it's the old "ink roller and paper card" system though,
] then yes, I would find that extremely annoying.

I don't think anyone is under that impression. I haven't heard that. I think people are concerned about the fact that finger prints are being taken, and not the method by which they are taken. This is a privacy issue and not a hassle issue. However, I do see this causing delays at ground border crossings as families will now have to get out of their cars in order to get through the border.

] I don't see that as any more invasive than
] requiring people to display their passport, provide photos of
] themselves, and fill out the usual visa applications.

It is slightly more invasive. It is more invasive in the sense that a fingerprint is taken where one was not taken before. 20 years ago you could live and die as an American citizen without ever having your fingerprint taken. The only reason mine has been taken is because I'm a naturalized citizen. The only people whose fingerprints were fed into NCIC were those who had been arrested. Today in many states you have to have one taken to get a driver's license. Some states have resisted this trend. Now you have to get one taken if you wish to travel internationally, and by other governments!

This is significant only when put in context with other changes that are occuring. This new fingerprint collection also includes a warrant check. Courts have ruled that American citizens are not protected by the 4th Amendment when they are not on US Soil. They have allowed U.S. Customs to perform random drug searches of US travellers returning to the US. If you have the fingerprint gear, why not check everyones fingerprints, and not just those of foreigners? How far away from that step are we? If you can legally run a drug search, you can legally run a warrant check, and if we do that, then if anyone in any federal, state, or local government wants you for any reason it is not possible for you to leave the country. How far away is this? What sort of changes to the law will be required to plug the same system into the airports, so that you go through the same checks everytime you fly? We are already making the arguement that more invasive examination in airports is legal because flying is a privledge. We've already extending anti-terror checks at airports to include checks for some kinds of warrants...

Basically, people are concerned about this not because it is a big problem by itself, but rather the concern you are hearing is some of the frogs noticing that the water just got a little warmer, and wondering if it might get so hot in the future that we'll all start to cook.

RE: Program to fingerprint U.S. visitors starts - Jan. 4, 2004