] "From the greatest of horrors irony is seldom absent,"
] reads the first line of the H.P. Lovecraft story "The
] Shunned House," but chances are Lovecraft, who died in
] 1937, wouldn't have appreciated the irony of his present
] position as American literature's greatest bad writer.

A Salon article on H.P. Lovecraft. Just in time for Valentine's Day!

Salon.com Books | Master of disgust

Once again, JLM and I beat the pack. We talked about "idealogical cola" nearly a decade ago. And I feel so fucking old for saying that. So, if you're thinking of contributing to Al'Q, drink up, its all here. And if you don't think an islamist totalitariansim is a good idea, well, you know, Pepsi is the choice of a new generation. Personally, I prefer Columbia Crest, as its quite smooth and rich but also not totalitarian or even expensive! But thats just me... We welcome all perspectives on MemeStreams. Even fucking Islamists. Because there ought to be dialog. I'm all about dialog. But be warned. I don't even like the Christian Conservatives, so you've got quite a hard sell. Got any swag??!!?

Boing Boing: Ideology-driven colas

] ] Austin City Limits caputres one of the year's biggest
] ] rock 'n' roll reunions as legendary alt-rockers the
] ] Pixies perform. With vintage fire the band takes the
] ] stage to perform their classics filled with brutal noise
] ] and impressionistic lyrics.

Reposting as a reminder. My tivo says this is playing on GPB on the 12th. Check your local listings.

RE: PBS - Austin City Limits - The Pixies Live

] Angry parents, saying their children's privacy rights are
] being violated, have asked the board of the tiny Brittan
] School District to rescind a requirement that all
] students wear badges that monitor their whereabouts on
] campus using radio signals.

MemeStreams user Catonic asked me to post this because Memestreams is blocked at his office, which is, frankly, ironic. I'll bet he gets into his office with an RF-ID key card. Now, granted, I'm sure he doesn't have to swipe if before he enters the bathroom. This isn't the scariest kid tracking technology I've seen, but you'll see more of this.

The biggest problem with these technologies is when they remove control from the user and place it in the hands of the system operator. If these technologies are seen as a way for a person to communicate with other people about their location, as they see fit, then they'll be very powerful. If they are seen as a way for other people to track a person, whether or not that person wants to be tracked, they will fail miserably. The important element is leaving the user in control.

SUTTER COUNTY / Students kept under surveillance at school / Some parents angry over radio device

] MacSkinz Limited Artist Series PodSkinz
]
] Designed by accomplished, well known artists with a
] world-wide following. Each PodSkinz is printed in a
] limited series of 100 per design.
] Numbered 1 through 100 on the inside.

When I first hear about these they had not been made available to the public. You can buy them now...

iPod Skinz Artist Series

Essentially the issue is that you can register domain names using international character sets that look exactly like English, and obtain SSL certificates for them, and it is extremely difficult for the end user to be able to tell that he/she isn’t dealing with the English website. Working example of https://www.paypal.com/ demonstrated.

Shmoo DNS attack

] Andy Bowers over at Slate has hit upon something that has
] been bugging me for a long time: online check-in for
] airplane flights and the ability for anyone to print a
] boarding pass with whatever name they want on the front.

Boing Boing: Slate's Andy Bowers on Airport Security loopholes

] The Reader recounts the experience of photojournalist
] Warren Wimmer's attempts to photograph Anish Kapoor's
] sculpture, Cloud Gate (more commonly known as "the
] Bean"). When Wimmer set up his tripod and camera to shoot
] the sculpture, security guards stopped him, demanding
] that they show him a permit. Wimmer protested, replying
] that it's absurd that one needs to pay for a permit to
] photograph public art in a city-owned park.

WTF? I found this linked on BoingBoing this morning and still can't quite understand how something like this ever happened. Public funds paid for a sculpture to go in a public park that the public can't take photographs of. The procurement officer definitely needs to have his or her pink slip on the way.

Dolemite

New (sub)Urbanism: The Copyrighting of Public Space

bmitchell wrote:
] I'm not sure we should project western ideals and morals upon
] other groups of people. It seems to me that little of this was
] a surprise;

Certainly Bush blessed this outcome before the November election, but I don't think the American people are actually prepared for it despite the paper trail they have laid out.

] certainly there's never been any chance whatsoever
] of a real seperation between religion and the state a la the
] west.

I don't agree. Iraq was a secular state before we showed up.

] The real question is: do we think a nation should have the
] right to elect a government which may have ideals in terms of
] equality (particularly gender equality) that are vastly
] different than ours? If the answer is no, then how can we
] truly say we believe in democracy?

The answer is yes, otherwise we'd be invading South Korea, but we don't respect it, regardless of the cultural explanation that is raised for it. "My culture is different" is no excuse for crime.

Having said that, the matter of an islamist Iraq is far more complex then this. Its not just that women will be worse off then they were before we started, is that Iraq will pose a greater threat to the region then it did when we started. Maybe not now, but fundamentalist states are violent states. It is inevitable.

Freedom is not about Democracy. Freedom is about limits to the power of government. Democracy does not create those limits. Democracies have been know to do terrible things. It could be argued that Iraq was always a democracy. In theory the people could vote against Saddam. It might be argued that Singapore is a Democracy. What is the difference in the U.S.? That we have two parties instead of one? Do we really have an "open" election HERE? Why weren't the Green and Libertarian parties welcome to participate in the presidential debates? What is the real difference between what we do and what they do?

The difference is limits, not voting. Limits are created constitutionally. Things like Freedom of Speech and of Religion. The fact that you really have the right to dissent, and not the power apparatus through which you do so. The later is meaningless without the former. A Religious State can have no constitutional limits, because to limit a religious state is to limit God. A Religious State can have no real right to dissent, as to dissent in a Religious State is to admire the devil.

So yes, I think, if you produce a fundamentalist state in Iraq the result you'll get will be worse then what you had when you started. We don't think fundamentalist "democracies" are the kind of freedom we're looking for.

Of course, freedom and democracy have one thing in common with WMD in that they have very little to do with our reason for invading Iraq. The real question is whether or not Bush can spin this one. I'll bet he figures he can. He went to war with a bullshit explanation, ended up having it thrown in his face, and still managed to get re-election by a population that eats his party's propaganda up like its the new religion. I'll bet he figures he can pull it off a second time, or he figures he'll be out of office before most people in the country figure out what Iraq has really become. I wouldn't bet against him. But 100 years from now people will be spitting his name.

RE: Leading Shiite Clerics Pushing Islamic Constitution in Iraq

House Bill 179 Concerning Evolution

Is it possible to comply with this law? Is there factual scientific evidence inconsistent with or no supporting the theory of evolution? I'm not aware of any. If there is some I'd like to see it. Someone please meme it.

Here's the bill on evolution