Mort: Notes on the decaffeination of Osama bin Laden:::::The ethical implications of celebrating even a monster's demise:::::Are we just as barbaric as the Romans at their worst?:::::Will the wingnuts try to frame this as a hoax?

By Jack Brummet, Unexplained Phenomena Editor

 

 

My friend, Jason Larsen, wonders if the very public and emotional celebration of Osama bin Laden's death shows our barbaric side?  My knee-jerk reaction was--come on, don't be a weenie, Jason.  But in fact, as a student of Roman history, yeah, it spooks me to the core.  Especially because I am one of the ones who, if not enjoying this, are feeling at least relieved, and even more guiltily, very glad it happened on BHO's watch.  My feelings about that are mixed--I've been a skeptic about President Obama's stances on war and gay marriage, and a couple of other issues.  I never thought we should escalate the war the way we have.  But I always thought we should crank up the CIA, Special Forces, and The Spooks in general in our efforts to eviscerate Al Qaeda (including cutting off the snake's head). I don't know if the massive troops deployments helped in this or not, but clearly the intelligence and counter terrorism operations and maybe even Black Ops, did lead us to this moment. Let's just not get carried away and have a jump the shark/Team America celebration about this. 

I wonder what my Buddhist friends (whose hearts I trust) think of this joyous celebration? It is a little unseemly yes, even barbaric--ala Rome--but like I just wrote to Jason, I think I would have been one of the street dancers on April 28, 1945, when Hitler decommissioned himself. Yeah I do feel sorry for his four or five wives and 24 children. I don't feel all that much joy, but a lot of relief. Is it misplaced relief? Or false relief? Probably. But it's something. A big something.

 

One of my Facebook friends wonders if the birther wingnuts will claim this is all cooked up.  Or that we kept his corpse in a freezer to pop out at just the right moment (which numerous "news" sites and bloggers have already postulated).  Trust me, The Company will have a iron-clad chain of evidence detailing the facts and meetings that led up to this, along with DNA, photos and video as it happened--none of which they will release unless their backs are up against the wall...or Julian Assange/Wikileaks gets their hands on it.

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Buddy Holly on the Arthur Murray Dance Party 12/29/57

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Obama Vs. Trump: What a great time for the Correspondent's Dinner. We most enjoyed seeing The Donald cringing under the kleig lights

By Pablo Fanque, National Affairs Editor

It was good to see The Chief tear into The Donald at the correspondent's dinner. Trump was booed and ostracized by the entire crowd, and Seth Meyers administered the coup de grâce. Trump was clearly and most deservedly pained.

illustration by jack brummet

BHO: “Donald Trump is here tonight. Now, I know that he’s taken some flak lately, but no one is prouder to put this birth certificate to rest than The Donald. Now he can get to focusing on the issues that matter. Like, did we fake the moon landing? What really happened at Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?”

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Every intersection on Broadway in 45 seconds: Adam Abada's "NYC Arithmetic"

Adam Abada is an NYC filmmaker and artist.  He shot this 45 second video of every intersection from The Battery up to 220th on Broadway, using a skateboard and Flipcam.  Check out his website here.

NYC Arithmetic from Adam Abada on Vimeo.

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Technical Difficulties: Endeavor shuttle launch postponed. With space music by Lou Reed and David Bowie

 

By Jack Brummet,
Extraterrestrial Affairs Editor

NASA this morning delayed the launch of the space shuttle Endeavour for at least two days because of a technical problem.
 

This is a bit of a sad launch, since it is our last scheduled one.  For the foreseeable future, any astronauts we send up will be hitching a ride with the Russians, or on one of the several private space vehicles soon to be deployed.

In honor of this final launch, a video of my favorite astronaut song -- David Bowie's Space Oddity.

http://youtu.be/uhSYbRiYwTY

And then, there's Lou Reed's great tune Satellite Of Love:

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Alien Lore No. 203 - UFO lightships around Delaware PA, October, 2010

By Mona Goldwater, Visitors Editor


This is a video clip of a massive UFO sighting near Delaware, PA on October 23, 2010.  The video mentions these sightings may be linked the the large wave of sightings around the world in the last year, including Manhattan, El Paso Texas, Washington D.C., Moscow, and Cincinnati, Ohio. . .


Thanks to Jeff Clinton for passing this along.

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Faces No. 205 - Sixteen sketches by Jack Brummet

Sixteen sketches by Jack Brummet - click individual images to enlarge; right click to save or set as your background.

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Donald Trump takes credit for Obama birth certificate release and immediately demands his college grades

By Jack Brummet,
Unexplained Phenomena Editor

This is a quick follow up to Pablo Fanque's post this morning on the birth certificate release and Obama press conference (read it here:  "We do not have time for this kind of silliness": President Obama releases long form birth certificate, Donald Trump takes credit).

Trump, on the stump in New Hampshire, told reporters this morning--after taking credit for the release of President Obama's birth certificate (“Today, I’m very proud of myself because I accomplished something that nobody else has been able to accomplish")--that BHO should now also release his college transcripts!

“The word is, according to what I’ve read, that he was a terrible student when he went to Occidental,” Trump told reporters covering him. “He then gets to Columbia; he then gets to Harvard. … How do you get into Harvard if you're not a good student? Now, maybe that’s right, or maybe it’s wrong. But I don’t know why he doesn’t release his records.”

“Everyone says he was this great student. Well, if he was, that’s great, and if he wasn’t, that’s great,” he said.
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"We do not have time for this kind of silliness": President Obama releases long form birth certificate, Donald Trump takes credit

By Pablo Fanque
National Affairs Editor

The White House released President Obama's long-form birth certificate to the press this morning, and a somewhat pissed-off/frustrated/exasperated President took some time to speak to the assembled pack of reporters.

This may well cool the jets of the press who have joyfully kept fanning the flames of this story.  But, alas, I don't think it will slow down the Birther-Republican-Tea Party.  Yes, most elected officials will drop it now, but the wingnuts will never be happy until BHO is out of office, one way or the other.

It will be interesting to see how Donald Trump handles this new evidence, and whether or not he will keep beating the dead horse (see illustration at the end of this article).  Our money is on The Donald not standing down, and in fact, we think this will lead to him cranking up his flimsy act.  For the moment, he is taking the high road, telling reporters:

“I am really honored, frankly, to have played such a big role in hopefully getting rid of this issue.” - Donald Trump in New Hampshire this morning

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Transcipt of Obama Press Conference:

Hello, everybody. Now let me just comment, first of all, on the fact that I can't get the networks to break in on all kinds of other discussions. I was just back there listening to Chuck. He was saying, "It's amazing that he's not going to be talking about national security."

I would not have the networks breaking in if I was talking about that, Chuck, and you know it.

As many of you have been briefed, we provided additional information today about the site of my birth.

Now, this issue has been going on for two, two and a half years now. I think it started during the campaign. And I have to say that over the last two and a half years I have watched with bemusement, I have been puzzled at the degree to which this thing just kept on going.

We've had every official in Hawaii, Democrat and Republican, every news outlet that has investigated this confirm that, yes, in fact, I was born in Hawaii August 4th, 1961, in Kapiolani Hospital. We've posted the certification that is given by the state of Hawaii on the Internet for everybody to see. People have provided affidavits that they, in fact, have seen this birth certificate.

And yet this thing just keeps on going.

Now, normally, I would not comment on something like this, because, obviously, there's a lot of stuff swirling in the press at any given day and I've got other things to do.

But two weeks ago, when the Republican House had put forward a budget that will have huge consequences potentially to the country, and when I gave a speech about my budget and how I felt that we needed to invest in education and infrastructure and making sure that we had a strong safety net for our seniors even as we were closing the deficit, during that entire week, the dominant news story wasn't about these huge, monumental choices that we're going to have to make as a nation, it was about my birth certificate. And that was true on most of the news outlets that were represented here.

And so I just want to make a larger point here. We've got some enormous challenges out there. There are a lot of folks out there who are still looking for work. Everybody is still suffering under high gas prices. We're going to have to make a series of very difficult decisions about how we invest in our future, but also get a hold of our deficit and our debt -- how do we do that in a balanced way.

And this is going to generate huge and serious debates, important debates. And there are going to be some fierce disagreements. And that's good; that's how democracy is supposed to work.

And I'm confident that the American people and America's political leaders can come together in a bipartisan way and solve these problems. We always have.

But we're not going to be able to do it if we are distracted. We're not going to be able to do it if we spend time vilifying each other.

We're not going to be able to do it if we just make stuff up and pretend that facts are not facts. We're not going to be able to solve our problems if we get distracted by sideshows and carnival barkers.

We live in a serious time right now, and we have the potential to deal with the issues that we confront in a way that will make our kids and our grandkids and our great grandkids proud. And I have every confidence that America in the 21st century is going to be able to come out on top just like we always have. But we're going to have to get serious to do it.

Now, I know that there's going to be a segment of people for which, no matter what we put out, this issue will not be put to rest. But I'm speaking to the vast majority of the American people, as well as to the press.

We do not have time for this kind of silliness. We've got better stuff to do. I've got better stuff to do. We got big problems to solve, and I'm confident we can solve them, but we're going to have to focus on them, not on this.

Thanks very much, everybody.

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The Kids Don't Stand a Chance: a new blog from Wisconsin you should check out

This is a note from my friend Jason Hack in Wisconsin, who is rolling out a new blog with a fellow (ex) teacher.  Check it out here.  He wrote:

"Many teachers (including myself) have been laid-off by our school district. A friend and I have recently decided to chronicle what it is like for a school, its teachers, and its students moving into an unknown future.


"It is meant to inform and entertain. We're going to keep it as lighthearted as is possible. No trashing the district we work for or the union. Rather, we are bringing awareness and insight into what it is to be a teacher during such times and what the effects of the systematic privatization of education will mean for Wisconsin, and the United States.


"Please, pass on the link to this blog to your friends, coworkers, family, strangers or whoever you'd like. We greatly appreciate it."


All the best,


Jason George

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Faces No. 204: Six Sketches

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Poem: The Stink-eye

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