:: blame the extended gestation.... ::

"If I start describing what I want to do, i'll end up not seeing the point in doing it." Blogging on Politics, Music, and culture...

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Blog Archive
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[::..recommended..::]
Foreign Policy in Focus
Zmag
RobertMcchesney.com
Wikipedia: the free encyclopedia
Epistemelinks
Amnesty International USA
CounterPunch
AlterNet
Editor and Publisher
W?ldchen vom Philosophenweg
Political Theory Daily Review
California Insider
ProfessorBainbridge
mizukatze's corner o' stuff & stuff
Monthly Review
Gilmore Girls (you know it!)

:: Tuesday, November 25, 2003 ::

"It hailed in Compton; which is a poem in itself." Eagle

:: Jim Nichols 11/25/2003 08:27:00 PM [+] ::
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"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to
achieve it through not dying."
-- Woody Allen

:: Jim Nichols 11/25/2003 07:12:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Monday, November 24, 2003 ::

Print This: "The big changes in global politics occurred not four months ago but ten years ago, with the collapse of the Soviet Union. That was when many of the central trends evident in global politics today materialized. September 11 has affected those trends to a significant but not overwhelming degree. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/24/2003 11:05:00 PM [+] ::
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Crooked Timber: Those demonstrations: "liberal hawks are asking rhetorically why there were no demonstrations against Saddam Hussein, or against other tyrannies.

(I think that last question is pretty easy to answer: people usually demonstrate because they are angry at their own government (or its associates) rather than at someone else’s. Even anger at yesterday’s bombings in Turkey wouldn’t translate into demonstrations because there would be no point in marching against Al Quaida.)"

:: Jim Nichols 11/24/2003 10:46:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Saturday, November 22, 2003 ::

anarchos.blog-city.com Analytical Anarchism Article Reprint Part I: "Analytical anarchism: Some conceptual foundations "

:: Jim Nichols 11/22/2003 03:58:00 PM [+] ::
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Social Security Myth # 2184 -- There Won't Be Anything For Me

:: Jim Nichols 11/22/2003 03:07:00 PM [+] ::
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The CEPR Fact Check Contest: "You’ve read about it in the papers. You’ve heard it on the news. Now let’s see if you can find it in the world!"

:: Jim Nichols 11/22/2003 03:04:00 PM [+] ::
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Thom York + Howard Zinn interview

:: Jim Nichols 11/22/2003 02:58:00 PM [+] ::
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"The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues." -Rene Descartes

:: Jim Nichols 11/22/2003 01:43:00 PM [+] ::
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I somehow dragged myself over to the Plaza today; its this open air mall in downtown Sacramento which is about 2 feet from my apartment. I thought about going to a movie but I just ended up wandering around some of the shops. I got some coffee, read a few pages from Zarathustra, and then went and bought the second season of Profiler
on DVD and two books, Diary and Sylvia Plath: A Critical Study. It was nice to just get out. Its amazing how much I can shut myself up from the world; it makes you forget how nice it is to be alive when you let all that pent up anger and frustration get the best of you. Now I got me lots o'Ally Walker to watch. Good times...

:: Jim Nichols 11/22/2003 02:32:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Friday, November 21, 2003 ::

Christopher Lydon Interviews... :Online Populism Explained: An Hour with Joe Trippi

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 11:32:00 PM [+] ::
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John & Belle Have A Blog: Less Thrills, the RIAA Way: "But me: I'm bleeding edge cool. I play music on my computer."

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 11:28:00 PM [+] ::
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I'm a complete fraud... I don't think enough people have caught onto that yet.

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 01:15:00 PM [+] ::
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Dollars and Sense: The Magazine of Economic Justice: "Dear Dr. Dollar:
A Republican friend tells me that the huge new tax cuts will actually produce more revenue than the government would have collected before the cut, because once rich beneficiaries invest the money, they will pay taxes on every transaction. He suggested that the increase could be as much as 50% more than the originally scheduled revenues. Is this possible? Judith Walker, New York, N.Y."

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 08:01:00 AM [+] ::
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Good stuff for NYT's linkers....Calpundit: Fight Linkrot!

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 03:07:00 AM [+] ::
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CONSERVATISM AS HERESY

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 03:02:00 AM [+] ::
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Dean for America: Dean Unveils Plan To Reform No Child Left Behind, Improve K-12 Education

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 02:29:00 AM [+] ::
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Fuck yeah...
The Seattle Times: Lt. Gov. Novoselic? Rocker likes how it sounds

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 02:25:00 AM [+] ::
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I still don't own a DOA album but...Yahoo! News - Punk band D.O.A. celebrates 25 years of ranting and raving with CD, book
"'The thing about punk rock is that it's not the revolutionary force that it was for the first five or 10 years of its existence,' he said. 'But a lot of its do-it-yourself attitude is still there. This is why I'm still involved. It appeared to me it was a perfect way to kick the establishment straight in the groin repeatedly. That angle of punk rock is still there.' "

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 02:21:00 AM [+] ::
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Blogcritics.org: Eminem Accused of Using Racial Slurs hehehe... oooppps

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 02:19:00 AM [+] ::
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uggabugga: "More observations on the Medicare drug benefit"

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 02:14:00 AM [+] ::
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Oh I want one!!!

Bicycle Parts from lovelylowrider

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 02:09:00 AM [+] ::
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Thoughts Arguments and Rants: Government and Health

For amusement I was traipsing through the OECD health stats for various countries, and I was stunned by one of the things that springs out of the data - health care systems that are government run or funded tend to be cheaper despite being just as effective in every respect, and more effective in some respects. I'm sure someone somewhere has analysed the data properly, but even a crude analysis suggests the empirical case for having a government run or funded health care system is quite strong.

what is wrong with the world. Who thinks we shouldn't be forced to all get the exact same kind of health care treatment no matter how much we make. I bet once rich people had to put up with the same health care system as homeless people did then health care would actually end up pretty fucking good. Its amazing how people work like that....

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 01:03:00 AM [+] ::
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The Volokh Conspiracy
Polygamous and incestuous marriages: By the way, concerns that the Massachusetts homosexual marriage decision may lead to legalization of adult incestuous marriages and even polygamous marriages seem to me quite plausible. The court says that the parties "do not attack the binary nature of marriage" or "the consanguinity provisions." (See also footnote 34, "Nothing in our opinion today should be construed as relaxing or abrogating the consanguinity or polygamous prohibitions of our marriage laws.") But the court's reasoning seems to apply equally to those, too.

Am I the only one that doesn't care about consensual adults forming whatever kind of relationship they choose no matter how much it screams of psychological issues???

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 12:35:00 AM [+] ::
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14-Year-Old Signs Contract With Major League Soccer

Jesus...

:: Jim Nichols 11/21/2003 12:31:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Thursday, November 20, 2003 ::

Found this...Living In China by way of Crooked Timber.

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 10:05:00 PM [+] ::
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Welcome... seriously.... we're glad you're here..... we even threw you a party we let some of your countrymen come along..... hope you come again..... bye bye....

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 09:56:00 PM [+] ::
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For all the deluded
Just so you can remind all those people who claim they vote republican cause its "good for business" yeah maybe their business if you're mackin on tax cuts but not "good for business" if your talking the healthy of the whole economy which in the end is what the definition of "good for business" is. Economic Scene: Which Party in the White House Means Good Times for Investors?:
"DOES the stock market do better when a Republican is president or when a Democrat is?
The answer is: It's not even close. The stock market does far better under Democrats. "

*Okay yeah I know the stock market isn't everything in a healthy economy I know I know....

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 09:36:00 PM [+] ::
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Had to pass it on

I really liked this weeks punk rock editorial on the epitaph newsletter and I talked to the author and he said I could post it up here for all 7 of my consistently returning readers.
--------------------
THE PUNK ROCK EDITORIAL
(Send submissions to webmonkey@epitaph.com)

Here is another PRE from our resident social-political-cultural pundit, Josh. He’s got a lot to say and I can’t wait to see all of your responses to this one!

“When writers, painters, musicians, filmmakers suspend there judgment and blindly yoke there art to the service of the nation its time for us to sit up and worry.” - Arundhati Roy

I was struck recently by the direction that our pop culture is going. Punk rock used to be dangerous and subversive. It was even underground. Hip-hop used to have some of the same qualities. Hip-hop was swallowed by the mega corporations long ago and now is simply an advertising vehicle for corporations. Most mainstream rappers spend more time touting the various products that they have (cars, jewelry, etc…) than saying anything significant. Don’t let MTV fool you (more on that later) most hip-hop is meaningless.

Punk rock has certainly followed the same pattern. You have bands like Good Charlotte hosting shows on MTV all the while forgetting how mind numbing the network has always been. Long ago bands like the Dead Kennedy’s sang songs like “MTV Get Off The Air” and mainstream culture was generally shunned by the punk rock world.

Now punk is mainstream. It is safe. Hot Topic has managed to package the punk style and sell it at malls. Blatant pop performers like Pink have fashioned themselves and “foul mouthed” and “rebellious.” Rebellious to what? Are any of these mainstream performers saying anything dangerous or rebellious?

The Weavers were more rebellious than any artist around today. Artists like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, and many others risked getting blacklisted (and did) for their beliefs. They actually took risks and said things that actually were subversive. They used art to stand up to power. Wearing goofy makeup and accepting MTV awards while intoxicated is not he least bit risky. Nor is it challenging authority. Nothing on MTV or commercial radio has a hint of substance or genuine, thoughtful dissent.

As Robert McChesney (www.robertmcchesney.com) pointed out, everything on MTV is a commercial. The network seems to want viewers to lust for the unattainable. We are never going to live the unbounded material existence of the Rich Girls. We are never going to relive our adolescents like the crew in Jackass. We are never going to have houses like the nouveau riche that host Cribs. Our lives will never be as dramatic and adventurous as the kids on the Real World. In the real - real world, most of the population will work some boring job till the day
they die and all along will struggle to own property and make ends meet.

MTV and the performers that are its agents promote the myth of the American Dream (if you work really hard you can ascend to the wealthy class). What nonsense they spew! Wealth in America is still controlled by the top 1% to 5% of the population and has since its inception (mostly by the same families). As Howard Zinn said, “the United States has developed perhaps the largest middle class. The United States has had enough wealth so it could bribe enough people in the population to create a middle class, which became a useful buffer between the very rich and that part of the population, which could not even rise
into the middle class. So the middle class in the United States has always been enticed by the establishment into thinking it could rise into the upper class and not told it could also descend.” I recently heard Tom Hayden talk about how delusional the masses of Americans really have become. He alluded to the percentage of the population (I can remember the exact number but it was quite large) that actually thinks that they are wealthy or will soon ascend into the top 5% of the income bracket. Wealth envy is reaching epidemic levels in our culture
while class-consciousness is a forgotten idea.

American athletes and performers should be ashamed of propagating this ruse. They flaunt there newly obtained wealth to make the masses drool while filling them with a hidden and pervasive hopelessness. The masses will fantasize about fame and wealth while ignoring the ordinary pleasures of ordinary people. Humility is an absent virtue from these people.

Jello Biafra once asked, “Who is more dangerous to public order a crack addict or a wealth addict?” The recent financial scandals have proven that corporate crime is just as pervasive and as or more harmful than street crime (see “Corporate Crime Acts Like a Thief In The Night” by Lee Drutman on www.citizenworks.org). Thank pop culture and MTV for helping feed this epidemic of wealth envy and addiction.

We are asleep at the wheel, drunk on pop culture. Ignoring the unjust war and occupation in Iraq. Ignoring the fact that we are all in debt up to our necks! The only thing I can advocate at this point is cultural nihilism. We need to start from scratch and let some real voices take the reigns.

Josh Legere
josh_legere@yahoo.com

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 09:25:00 PM [+] ::
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Not that the people have ever mattered but...

Renewable Energy News | Poll Shows Meager Support for Energy Bill: "As congress prepares to vote on a proposed Energy Bill, a majority says Congress should not approve the proposed Energy Bill, a new Zogby poll revealed. More than three of four voters support investments in energy efficiency and renewable energy. A majority of likely voters (55 percent) feel it would be better if Congress did not pass this particular bill, knowing what the legislation contains, according to the poll. Just one in five (21 percent) feels it is very important that Congress pass this bill as soon as possible. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 05:52:00 AM [+] ::
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The New Republic Online: etc.:
" for all their kvetching about George W. Bush's foreign policy, the Democratic establishment isn't proposing anything radically different. Regardless of who's sworn in as president in January of 2005, the country's basic foreign policy doctrine will be to use military force to root out terrorists and some combination of the threat of force and economic carrots and sticks to prevent WMD proliferation."

I don't understand why the hell Dem's aren't out there saying... "look Bush and Co. have screwed this one up from the start, bad intel, aggressive war mongering; but in the end we agree with a lot of what needs to be done. Fix Iraq, you bet your ass and we're the guys who can do it. We're the guys who can bring back the alienated international community, we're the guys who can bring in new blood to replace all these guys with pie on their faces from all the bumbling thats been going on for the past two years.

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 05:19:00 AM [+] ::
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Here you go people...Nick Denton: Wanted: bloggers: "Wanted: bloggers

I'm scouting for editorial talent. Particularly people who can write wittily about travel and furniture. If you have a blog on either subject, or know of a good writer, email me. Rather than me tell you how I'd like to approach the categories, I'd rather hear your ideas: what you think is missing. Correspondence to nick at gawker."

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 04:51:00 AM [+] ::
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His writers did feed him a good one...AP Wire | 11/19/2003 | London's Bush Protests Make Little Impact: "'It was pointed out to me that the last noted American to visit London stayed in a glass box dangling over the Thames,' Bush told an audience of academics in London. 'A few might have been happy to provide similar arrangements for me.'"

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 04:44:00 AM [+] ::
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Saletan makes some good points
It's the Commitment, Stupid - How to sell gay marriage. By William Saletan:
"Marriage is a broadly shared American value. You don't have to support homosexuality to support marriage. A politician can say, 'I'm pro-marriage. The issue isn't whether you're straight or gay. The issue is whether you support marriage."

Liberals need to attack and not retreat.

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 04:30:00 AM [+] ::
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there is some neat shit here... i'm listening to a Michel Foucault Berkeley lecture right now

Fav's laurent: Audio- &Video(fragments) RealAudio/Video

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 03:10:00 AM [+] ::
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Radio archives: "April 17, 2003 Cultural theorist and philosopher Slavoj Zizek on the Iraq war, American imperialism, the role of fantasy in politics, etc."

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 01:15:00 AM [+] ::
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Look at that...
Local H is still kicking around. PopMatters Music Interview | Catching Up With Local H

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 01:09:00 AM [+] ::
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currently spinning on the media player The new Outkast cd...

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 12:42:00 AM [+] ::
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I forwarded this article on the Philippines (Al Qaeda Affiliate Training Indonesians On Philippine Island (washingtonpost.com)) to my dad because he spent a few years there and knows more about the country and its politics/reality than I do. Here were his thoughts:
Yeah, but how do we know that the "police and intelligence sources" are not just trying to get people to believe this so that they can get US assistance to wipe out the "local Muslim separatists," their real target?

Geeze I'm getting really jaded in my old age - but stranger things have turned out to be true and that's really not that far fetched."

:: Jim Nichols 11/20/2003 12:36:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Wednesday, November 19, 2003 ::

Multicentric, multiscalar, multitemporal, multiform, and multicausal process... the complex, emergent product of many different forces operating on many scales. Indeed.

Collapse in Cancun by Doug Henwood:

"The movement that had its coming-out party in Seattle rarely speaks about the economic arrangements it would like to see. It's quick to say 'No!' (a reflex I'm pretty accomplished at myself). It's often quick to invoke language defending national sovereignty and self-reliance when we should really be looking for a more egalitarian and cooperative world, of which trade can be an important part. It's too quick to read international economic relations as part of a general 'race to the bottom' that doesn't really exist. Wages in the United States are higher than when NAFTA took effect, and incomes have also been rising in Western Europe and much of Asia, regions that are deeply involved in world trade. The most troubled part of the world is Africa, a continent that is substantially underrepresented in global trade and capital flows. That's not at all to say that freer trade is always better; it is to say that we need to think and talk more carefully about these things.

Of course, the political and emotional urge behind the "No!" is the desire to protect people and nature from the traumas that typically come with capitalist development. But erecting barriers to trade may be the wrong strategy. Instead of tariffs and import restrictions, which can pit workers in rich countries against those in poorer ones (is it OK to put a Brazilian steelworker out of work to preserve an American job?), why not generous income support and retraining? Why not shift the focus from protecting the job to protecting the worker? "

Beyond Globophobia:
"I won't deny that plant relocations to Mexico have put a sharp squeeze on US employment and earnings, or that the threat of those things has reduced workers' bargaining power. But how much has this contributed to downward mobility and increasing stress? Econometricians say that trade explains about 20-25 percent of the decline in the US real hourly wage during the 1970s and '80s. While not insignificant, that still leaves 75-80 percent to be explained, and the main culprits there are mainly of domestic origin. And why, if globalization was so decisively immiserating, did the real hourly wage rise after 1995, reversing a two-decade slide, even as NAFTA took effect and trade penetration increased?

An important reason that trade doesn't explain more of our economic history since the early 1970s is that 80 percent of us work in services--and a quarter of those in government--which are insulated from international competition. What did "globalization" have to do with Teddy Kennedy and Jimmy Carter's transport deregulation, or with Reagan's firing of the air traffic controllers, or with Clinton's signing of the welfare bill? What does "globalization" have to do with tuition increases at public universities or attacks on affirmative action? While lots of people blame corporate downsizings on globalization, the more powerful influences were Wall Street portfolio managers, who are always demanding higher profits"

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 11:32:00 PM [+] ::
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Hell yeah!!!USATODAY.com - 'Family Guy' may return:

"Family Guy could return with as many as 35 new episodes for January 2005."

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 11:07:00 PM [+] ::
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Who'd have ever thoughtan Anti-Flag video

I'm disappointed they didn't put Bush in the video. I guess politics falls a distant second to having the video actually shown (which is the point of making a video so I'm not one to judge).

"Turncoat... killer... liar... thief..."

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 07:10:00 PM [+] ::
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Mark A. R. Kleiman: "While walking down the street one day, GWB encounters someone who believes in exercising his Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. The next thing he knows, he's at the Pearly Gates, facing St. Peter."

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 08:31:00 AM [+] ::
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For all the homophobes out there, all I can say is... "for the times they are a changing"Boston.com / News / Local / On marriage, simple justice:
"The right to a marriage license is a matter not of morality or of religion or of ethics but of equality under the law. In the end, it was that simple."
I'm just concerned about the backlash, will this be a legal one step forward which will create two steps back?

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 03:43:00 AM [+] ::
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Why didn't I think to say that? Oh wait I think I did...The Poor Man: Further Notes On The Changing Political Landscape
I've noticed, recently, that people who disagree with me are stupid and dumb. I can't really believe they are as stupid and dumb as they seem, so I think they must be crazy as well.

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 03:24:00 AM [+] ::
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With the quality i've been throwing up lately I'm not quite sure the point of it but...
I just stuck a thing down at the bottom of the site that notes who links to me (I don't know the technical term). Anyways I think its funny that I keep sticking all these things on my site and all they do is remind me that no one is reading. Okay I take that back I have a few readers... maybe this should be positive... I have the freedom to say whatever I want, to work on my craft(sic).

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 03:19:00 AM [+] ::
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New blog I just found t a c i t u s

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 03:12:00 AM [+] ::
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get to work....NewsMax Poll

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 02:38:00 AM [+] ::
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World Briefing: Europe: "TURKEY: DEATH PENALTY ABOLISHED Turkey formally abolished the death penalty, an important step toward European Union membership. Sebnem Arsu (NYT)"

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 02:22:00 AM [+] ::
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Nihilism - Wikipedia: "The term nihilism (from the Latin nihil, meaning 'not anything') was popularized by the Russian novelist Ivan Turgenev in his novel Fathers and Sons (1861), to describe the views of an emerging radical Russian intelligentsia. These consisted primarily of upper-class students who had grown disillusioned with the slow pace of reformism. The primary spokesman for this new philosophy was D. I. Pisarev (1840-1868) who articulated a program of Revolutionary Utilitarianism and advocated violence as a tool for social change. Pisarev was cast as Bazarov in Fathers and Sons much to his own delight; he proudly embraced his new status as a fictional hero and villain.
The word quickly became a catch-all term of derision for younger, more radical generations, and continues in this vein to modern times. It is often used to indicate a group or philosophy the speaker intends to characterize as having no moral sensibility, no belief in truth, beauty, love, or whatever else the speaker and his presumed audience values, and no regard for the current social conventions. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/19/2003 01:53:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Tuesday, November 18, 2003 ::

I went over to Streets of London and had fish and chips and a beer. I didn't accomplish anything, I couldn't even hear my jukebox selection.

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 10:48:00 PM [+] ::
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I don't feel like doing anything. Read... no. Watch tv.... Gilmore Girls is over. Movie.... no money. School work.... I give up. Try to find something to write on.... i'm hungry. Ahhh.... I'm hungry, brilliant. I'm going to eat something now. And maybe throw away this half eaten taco thats sitting on my desk right in front of me.

This is my life is its slowly wasting away...

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 09:07:00 PM [+] ::
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hehehe... Body and Soul: I think we can all agree on that

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 08:39:00 PM [+] ::
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New Scientist (by way of Marginal Revolution):

"People with implicit racial prejudices are left mentally exhausted after interacting with someone from a different race, perhaps because they are trying to quell their feelings."

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 07:35:00 PM [+] ::
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Pentagon Debunks Reports on Osama-Saddam Ties: "Several newspapers and other media outlets had egg on their face Monday after reporting or endorsing a Weekly Standard story revealing new evidence of an 'operational relationship' between Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden.

Several outlets, including the New York Post, The Washington Times and FOX News, ran with the story. There was just one problem: On Saturday, the Pentagon issued a press release stating that 'news reports that the Defense Department recently confirmed new information with respect to contacts between al-Qaida and Iraq ... are inaccurate.'"

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 07:06:00 PM [+] ::
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I Do Not Believe That This Could Be True: Archive Entry From Brad DeLong's Webjournal

"US-based multinationals have been told they will receive compensation from American trade authorities if they cancel contracts in Britain and take jobs home, according to CBI director-general Digby Jones."

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 07:03:00 PM [+] ::
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Check out the Bush poster....
tonypierce.com + busblog

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 06:54:00 PM [+] ::
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Crooked Timber: Democracy by Example:
Needless to say, the spin on the visit — see the same ABC news story — is that Bush is in London to “address” and “confront” those who doubt his policy in Iraq. He’ll just be doing this without, you know, addressing or confronting anyone.

:: Jim Nichols 11/18/2003 06:42:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Monday, November 17, 2003 ::

I love his pictures... I want to put up pictures!!!!tonypierce.com + busblog

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 10:05:00 PM [+] ::
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He's even got his right wing mad (okay at least the right wing I can at least respect--you huggable libertarians you)Joshua Claybourn's Domain: No Party: "over the past three years - essentially since George W. Bush has taken office - conservatism's role in the party has come into question. I've listened and tried to understand the logic put forth by some in the GOP that Bush's brand of politics is the best option available. After a few years contemplating this predicament I've come to the conclusion that that's just not so. Here is a condensed list of complaints.
Fiscal irresponsibility

State's rights and federalism

Racial preferences

No pro-life leadership

Civil liberties

Homeland Security

Counter-productive education bill

Compromised health care

2nd Amendment rights"

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 09:52:00 PM [+] ::
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Republican energy bill contains tax breaks, incentives - Nov. 15, 2003: "Republican lawmakers unveiled Saturday a massive energy bill loaded with $20 billion in tax breaks they said would create U.S. jobs while boosting oil, natural gas, coal and nuclear production. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 09:36:00 PM [+] ::
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I had to pass this on...Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall: November 16, 2003 - November 22, 2003 Archives: "Before they take it down, go to this page on the Fox News website. Then scroll down to the link with Wes Clark's picture and the caption 'Setting the Record Straight.'

It's a six or seven minute clip. But it's worth watching through. The Fox host tries the same old mumbo-jumbo on Clark and Clark goes ballistic and doesn't back down. Good for him.
Late Update: Here's a direct link to the video feed."

Not bad honkey...

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 08:54:00 PM [+] ::
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I don't know enough about the subject but interesting...Slaves to the Marshall Myth: "Of all the myths that persist concerning economic history, the myth that the United States rebuilt Europe and Japan following the Second World War is among the most popular."

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 06:29:00 PM [+] ::
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Which Founding Father Are You?

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 06:10:00 PM [+] ::
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Dean Dean Dean Dean Dean.... (wagging of the finger included)
TAP: Web Feature: Howard's End?. by Michael Tomasky. November 14, 2003.:
"Democratic insiders are in a state about Howard Dean. Their collective professional judgment is that the race for the Democratic presidential nomination is his to lose. Their collective emotional judgment is that sending him up against George W. Bush would be a disaster. So stands the moment's conventional wisdom. "
I'm still stoked that I called this Dean thing way way back. I wish I had blogged it just so I could show off. You'll just have to take my word: I knew Dean would be the guy to beat.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 05:31:00 PM [+] ::
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Food For Thought:Matt Miller Online: "'Never underestimate the self-destructive power of angry hard-core liberals, sir.' "

Personally I could think up some really good attack ads on Bush that MoveOn might want to consider. Then again we are trying to get the unswayed voters... I might be a little standoffish

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 05:29:00 PM [+] ::
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Guardian Unlimited Politics | Comment | Bush and Blair - the betrayal:(by way of TAPPED)

"Bush originally came to Blair determined to go to war in Iraq, but without a strategy. Blair instructed him that the casus belli was Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, urged him to make the case before the UN, and - when the effort to obtain a UN resolution failed - convinced him to revive the Middle East peace process, which the president had abandoned. The road map for peace was the principal concession Blair wrested from him. "
He doesn't seem to show it (or at least not yet); but Blair has to be really second guessing getting into to bed with Bush II.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 05:19:00 PM [+] ::
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Its good to know they still have something to do

MIKE WENDLAND: Paranoia groups find an eager Internet audience:
"Ever wonder what happened to all those Y2K gloom-and-doom sayers? They're still at it, this time with a new cause.

From survivalists to conspiracy theorists to the remnants of the crowd that predicted the end of civilization when the year 2000 arrived, the global war on terror is providing a feeding frenzy of dangers to warn about. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 05:11:00 PM [+] ::
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Well some things will never change...
MIKE WENDLAND: Cyber-bullies make it tough for kids to leave playground:

"Now there are cyber-bullies distressing our kids. " (and our bloggers)

PUT A STOP TO CYBER-BULLYING
(maybe even a pointer or two for you bloggers; you people can get nasty)
Here's a list of steps Glenn Stutzky, a school safety violence specialist, suggests to combat cyber-bullying:
For children:
Do not respond to cyber-bullying messages.
Be careful to whom you give your number or online handle.
Report harassment to school officials and parents.

For parents:
Talk about the subject with your kids.
Supervise their cell phone and Internet usage.
Buy software that records instant messages.

For schools:
Amend anti-bullying policies to include digital bullying.
Educate teachers and students about the seriousness of the problem.
Make sure parents know who to contact at the school about cyber-bullying.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 05:01:00 PM [+] ::
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I found this conference at Columbia Constitutions, Democracy, and the Rule of Law thats online through Crooked Timber. Check it out. I love the web! Maybe someday I can gets me an edjumecation from all this good stuff...

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:57:00 PM [+] ::
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The writers way...tonypierce.com + busblog: "i tried to get motivated by drinking rum right out of the bottle and smoking from a long hunter s thompson cigarette holder, but nothing worked."

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:26:00 PM [+] ::
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When bloggers rule the world...
ONA 2003 Conference and Awards Banquet: "Sullivan said his Web site now has a larger audience than The New Republic. He said bloggers are taking power away from editors and publishers, and that traditional media's way of expressing opinion will be outpaced.

'The op-ed column is a dinosaur as a genre,' Sullivan said. 'I think that in the future, newspaper editorial pages will have five bloggers rather than five columnists.'"
You think bloggers will rule the (opinion-editorial) world? I could see it. But I think this is gonna remain mainly true for the intellectual class; the general public will stay tuned to tv.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:15:00 PM [+] ::
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Haven't read anything else... but Wonder Boys kicked ass

The Seattle Times: Arts & Entertainment: Historical 'what-ifs' key to Chabon novel: "Michael Chabon stumbled on the stranger-than-fiction basis for his next novel when he read about a proposal to provide a home in Alaska for Jewish refugees fleeing Hitler. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:07:00 PM [+] ::
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A Marine's Girl:

"A Marine's Girl....Insight on being the girl friend of a Marine in Iraq. Opinions of news items of the day, politics, and relationships."

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 03:21:00 PM [+] ::
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AlterNet: Call Me a Bush-Hater: "Among the more amusing cluckings from the right lately is their appalled discovery that quite a few Americans actually think George W. Bush is a terrible president. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 06:59:00 AM [+] ::
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How often are we gonna see this mentioned on tv this week? My guess would be not often... But food is just as much of a weapon as a bomb strapped to an angry and confused child.

News: "The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is ending its emergency food programme in the West Bank, saying the economic collapse there is the direct result of Israeli military closures and that Israel must live up to its responsibility as the occupying power for the economic needs of the Palestinians."

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 06:17:00 AM [+] ::
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IHT: To lead, U.S. must give up paranoid policies:

"'He who is not with us is against us.'
.
Let's not forget this was a phrase popularized by Lenin when he attacked the social democrats on the grounds that they were anti-Bolshevik and, therefore, 'he who is not with us is against us' and can be disposed of accordingly.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 06:01:00 AM [+] ::
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Lawrence Lessig rocks....
FREE CULTURE: HOW BIG MEDIA USES TECHNOLOGY AND THE LAW TO LOCK DOWN CULTURE AND CONTROL CREATIVITY by Lawrence Lessig:

But whether it takes pages or a few
words, it is the special genius of a common
law system, as ours is, that the law adjusts
to the technologies of the time. And as it
adjusts, it changes. Ideas that were as
solid as rock in one age crumble in another.

Or at least, this is how things happen
when there’s no one powerful on the other
side of the change.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 05:10:00 AM [+] ::
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AnalPhilosopher:
"But what good is a principle if even its most highly motivated practitioners can't live up to it?"

Since there is no meaning or purpose to anything--and therefore no higher order or construct with which one can use for their own life; aren't priniciples that are unattainable (i.e. idealistic and utopian) appropriate for us to use so that we may aim toward improving our lot in our own eyes--if merely for our own psychological peace of mind?

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:49:00 AM [+] ::
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I really really don't like it...

You know, I have all these opinions and I'm so confident in them. All these ideas about how I think the world is and where I think humankind needs to look if they want to find answers. But I don't know how to go about solidifying my views as something more than propaganda and passionate conjecture. I feel almost frozen, afraid to take a step intellectually because I fear it may be the wrong step. Instead of focusing on Schelling and attacking him, i'm afraid Hegel will come back from the grave and accuse me of conducting my philosophical education in public...

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:41:00 AM [+] ::
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Wait a minute...
The Banality of Gary: A Green River Chiller (washingtonpost.com):

"'He suffered from no mental illness that would absolve him of responsibility for these crimes. . . . In five months of interviews, he displayed no empathy for his victims and expressed no genuine remorse. He killed because he wanted to. He killed because he could. He killed to satisfy his evil and unfathomable desires.' "

I'm no expert but doesn't that exemplify some kind of mental illness... a need to "satisfy... evil and unfathomable desires.."??? Not to mention the fact of no remorse which shows some kind of extreme detachment from society.

:: Jim Nichols 11/17/2003 04:17:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Sunday, November 16, 2003 ::

"The education Governor' and other stories to tell the voters...

Cuts in State Budget on the Table, Sources Say:

"Aides to Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger presented him with a series of budget-balancing choices this week that included cuts in higher education and mental health programs, according to informed sources who spoke on the condition that they not be identified."

:: Jim Nichols 11/16/2003 09:48:00 AM [+] ::
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tonypierce.com + busblog:

"I can be gross. the longer you get to know me the more you get to see how gross i can be.

im sure it's quite a thrill."

:: Jim Nichols 11/16/2003 09:35:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Saturday, November 15, 2003 ::

California Insider - $62 billion

And so, if Schwarzenegger is somehow going to balance the budget while cutting the car tax and increasing no other taxes, he must cut $4 billion, or about 5 percent, from this year’s spending (with half the year already gone), and then freeze spending for the following year. But programmed spending, absent any changes in law, is already projected to rise on its own to $87 billion in the fiscal year that begins July 1. So he must cut $14 billion, or 16 percent, from that number. And if he is going to leave untouched school spending dictated by Proposition 98, he must cut his $14 billion from $56 billion, which is the projected spending for the non-education part of the budget. That’s a reduction of 25 percent.

:: Jim Nichols 11/15/2003 08:22:00 PM [+] ::
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"Friendship is not that relationship where all is relaxed but the relationship where one's highest faculties are poised for graceful movement." --Ted Blanton

:: Jim Nichols 11/15/2003 02:03:00 AM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Radical Cheerleaders Rah-Rah in Protest: "They fight bombs with pompoms and kick high for consciousness. The Radical Cheerleaders, a loose network of young, mostly female activists, have put a new face on protest. Using the same moves performed by a high school pep squad, they've heckled for livable wages at an Alabama Taco Bell, chanted anti-war rhymes on Boston Common and marched in the Saskatchewan Pride Parade. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/15/2003 01:11:00 AM [+] ::
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Salon.com News | Burying brutal truths about war: "Burying brutal truths about war
The Toledo Blade exposed a shocking massacre by U.S. troops in Vietnam that was covered up for three decades, but the media has largely ignored the story. Is the press more timid during wartime?"

:: Jim Nichols 11/15/2003 12:52:00 AM [+] ::
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Salon.com News | The great debate, reloaded: "Before the invasion, Hitchens and his fellow hawks either completely failed to acknowledge this risk, or downplayed it as a nonissue. And now that events have forced them to admit that, yes, Houston, we have a problem, they have a simple answer: They're Islamo-fascists. They're the bad guys. They're al-Qaida, they're Saddam. Kill them all and let Allah sort them out. This kind of thinking is attractive to those inclined to unitary answers, satisfyingly visceral responses to terrorist atrocities like 9/11 and grand moral causes. But one need not go as far as the Stalinist left -- the ANSWER crowd is so historically ignorant and morally myopic that they refuse to acknowledge that ousting Saddam was a noble achievement and call those fighting the U.S. in Iraq 'freedom fighters' -- to recognize that simply calling our foes 'terrorists' and lumping them all together as 'Islamo-fascists' is simplistic. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/15/2003 12:31:00 AM [+] ::
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Why not....
Salon.com News | The Democrats' campaign blues:
"'There's been a ratchet toward the antiwar left in Iowa as a result of the Dean surge, but the good news is that a lot of the swing voters and moderates aren't paying attention yet,' said the Progressive Policy Institute's Marshall. 'But the candidates have got to be careful, because you can't say one thing now and then strike a diametrically opposed position next November.' "

Bush did exactly that!! What was South Carolina but one big honkey tonk for Right Wing causes... then appearently everyone plugged their ears and were willing to buy into his reworked (reRoved?) message. To which everyone was all shocked once he was in office because of how conservative he turned out to be. And I'm thinking shit? was anybody listening in South Carolina....

:: Jim Nichols 11/15/2003 12:10:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Friday, November 14, 2003 ::

Salon.com Comics | This Modern World: Chicken Hawk Down

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 11:53:00 PM [+] ::
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W is for What?

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 08:58:00 AM [+] ::
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Chasing Bush - Tracking George W. Bush throughout his UK visit

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 08:48:00 AM [+] ::
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Beautiful
Hit & Run: Doctoring the Numbers

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 08:46:00 AM [+] ::
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Guardian Unlimited Film | Features | 40 best directors

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 08:38:00 AM [+] ::
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The New Yorker: The Critics: Books: "I want to be a poet, and I’m working to turn myself into a seer. . . . It has to do with making your way toward the unknown by a derangement of all the senses. . . "

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 07:43:00 AM [+] ::
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Now i'm really in trouble

I'm starting up a newsletter. I figure it will make me sit down once a week and write something a little more substantial than the common 3/4 line blog with link that I tend to do. I figure it will just be a round-up of some of my favorite articles on the web of late, as well as any random thoughts I might have... cause I do have lots of random thoughts. I promise its only gonna be once a week.

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 06:37:00 AM [+] ::
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Bush, Iraq, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Something just struck me. A lot of Republicans and other pro-Bush folks have been working extra hard of late trying to show that Bush and Co. didn't actually imply that Iraq and their (up to this point non-existent) WMD were an immediate threat to the security of the United States. One catch though... if they didn't lie to us--one could, though I wouldn't, make the argument--"for our own good;" then that just makes the administration seem utterly incompotent. I think its funny that the hawks wanted to be cut loose specifically to prove the superiority of U.S. hegemony; and now our humbling showing of absolute lack of omnipotence is undermining the credibility that we presumably could have claimed (and oh did they ever) that we were just holding in the wings for when it was truly necessary. Secrets out... gigs up... Empires are still Empires.... theres always a "hey we're extended too far button" flashing at some point on the game screen.

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 06:05:00 AM [+] ::
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"Efficiency is intelligent laziness." -David Dunham

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 05:57:00 AM [+] ::
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Strauss keeps popping up everywhere on my radar screen. To say the least i'm completely intrigued by it all. I just found out that appearently most the theorist in my department a Straussians. Noble lies and perpetual war: Leo Strauss, the neo-cons, and Iraq Danny Postel - openDemocracy, Leo Strauss, the Straussians and American foreign policy Mark Blitz - openDemocracy, Leo Strauss's American Gang, Foreign Policy In Focus | Global Affairs Commentary | The Strong Must Rule the Weak: A Philosopher for an Empire, The Long Reach of Leo Strauss, What Hath Strauss Wrought?, Philosophers and Kings, What was Leo Strauss up to?, "Con Tract" by Laura Rozen

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 05:53:00 AM [+] ::
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BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | China's forgotten Aids victims: "'They are waiting for us to die,' one villager told me. 'Once we are all dead their problem will be solved'. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 05:42:00 AM [+] ::
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Yahoo! News - Boondocks

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 12:26:00 AM [+] ::
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Deal on 9/11 Briefings Lets White House Edit Papers: "The commission investigating the Sept. 11 terror attacks said on Thursday that its deal with the White House for access to highly classified Oval Office intelligence reports would let the White House edit the documents before they were released to the commission's representatives."

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 12:20:00 AM [+] ::
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Now this is 3 in the morning fun.

buddhist - zefrank.com

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 12:14:00 AM [+] ::
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Critical Mass: What you can't say at Emory:

:: Jim Nichols 11/14/2003 12:07:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Thursday, November 13, 2003 ::

Amen

tonypierce.com + busblog: "who am i so worried about?

howard stern has shown that you dont have to give a fuck and you can still rule the world.

rush limbaugh has never given a fuck - other than by selling out to the right when it was trendy to do so - and he now gets to do bottles of pills, go to rehab for a few weeks and then get his old job back and not have to worry about prison, which is mostly filled with guys who got busted cuz of lots of drugs.

the president doesnt give a fuck about what the voters think, or about the UN, or anyone other than him and his people.

and now even the snow doesnt give a fuck where it lands.

so why do i run around caring so much?"

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:59:00 PM [+] ::
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I just started up a guestbook... please sign up. Let me know who's reading me people!!

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:47:00 PM [+] ::
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I guess thats 10 points for the don't fuck with god camp
BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Jesus actor struck by lightning need I say more...

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:34:00 PM [+] ::
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These are cool

Anti-USA Posters East German Anti-American posters

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:33:00 PM [+] ::
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Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall: November 09, 2003 - November 15, 2003 Archives: "The retreat of South Korea and Japan must be added to that of Turkey, which has also pulled back on earlier pledges to supply troops. The winter of 2003-2004 looks to be shaping up as a dark replay of that of the year previous. Only now with a difference. Last year our near total isolation could be floated on tough talk and denigration. It was, after all, theoretical. We had a nominal need for friends. We needed to get a UN resolution. We wanted the Europeans behind us. We wanted support from countries like Turkey and the Arab states. But our need was predicted and probable, not concrete, not immediate. Now it’s really concrete. We are literally begging for assistance and not getting it."

"In this whole unfortunate business, the White House took our preeminence and mistook it for omnipotence or something near to it. And by treating our preeminence as omnipotence they’ve put our preeminence into question."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:20:00 PM [+] ::
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Thats gonna be me in 2,050 years... Guardian Unlimited | Arts news | Play's first staging for 2,050 years except it'll be first showings. And if they can fix my other computer they can have my first play... the one that actually did get produced.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:11:00 PM [+] ::
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I went to see a talk at The SHARE Institute tonight. Tonights speaker was an Economics Professor from American River College (can't find anything online on him). His topic was on giving an overview/introduction to Kenya which is where he is originally from. It always amazes me how little I know about the world--I'm talking, the real world; but at the same time the more I learn the more I really truly want to break through that haze of ignorance. I had a really nice time.

The S.H.A.R.E. Institute for anyone who doesn't know about it, is a small N.G.O. that works on womens issues throughout the globe. They do a number of mini-loans, and education programs. Some recent work has been done in Afghanistan, Yemen, and Nicaragua to mention just a few.

Take a look at the site. Make a small donation if you can.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:00:00 PM [+] ::
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Issues for 2004 #1
Up untill the elections I'm gonna be running my list of what I think the issues will (at least should) be. So here it is:

1. Irag
2. Social Security
3. Judicial appointments
4. abortion

okay... now that I've said that I don't think thats saying much... that was pretty obvious (okay this all seemed cooler in my head tonight on the way home)

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:40:00 PM [+] ::
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Love him or hate him... should be interesting...

A new Dennis Miller show??

Newsday.com - Dennis Miller, Unbalanced: "What everyone does not know particularly well is the 'who.' As is: Who really and truly is this amusing fellow with the hydrochloric acid wit? Liberal or conservative? Democrat or Republican? Funny or serious? But as one of the great moving-target acts in American show business, Miller (who turned 50 last week) is not in an entirely obliging mood on these questions. He is not - he explained emphatically in a recent interview - a journalist, even though he studied to be one in college and his new show putatively deals with the news. He recalls talking to a prospective boss at some newspaper 'who told me he'd pay me by the column inch. He saw a Road Runner column of dust.'"

"The show, he also explains, 'will not be fair and balanced. If I disagree with someone, I can be unfair and unbalanced. ... In America, we're so interested in keeping things balanced that we've lost our minds.'" Amen brother Miller.....

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:24:00 PM [+] ::
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I've found me another one
AnalPhilosopher
Okay this is an excellent blog. Its amazing all the things you can find on the web; intellegent, interesting people... keeps my faith....errr intrigue in the human race.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:01:00 PM [+] ::
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Extremely well put
AnalPhilosopher

Scientists, too, risk losing whatever authority and respect they once had when they enter into public-policy debates. Economists are the worst culprits. Economics aspires to be a science, but many of its practitioners believe that they can and should take normative stands on matters of policy and principle. Where did economists get normative expertise? I’m dumbfounded by the arrogance. Economics will earn respect as a science only when its practitioners cease evaluating. They have a great deal to contribute to public affairs. What they have to contribute is an understanding of how things are, not how they ought to be. Economics is the science of means, not of ends. It issues hypothetical imperatives, not categorical imperatives. It is said that many social-scientists have physics envy. Perhaps they envy the authority of physicists. If so, they should focus on facts, as physicists do. Physics earns its authority the old-fashioned way: by staying above the fray.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 09:50:00 PM [+] ::
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very timely
"The fetters imposed on liberty at home have ever been forged out of
the weapons provided for defence against real, pretended, or imaginary
dangers from abroad." -James Madison

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 05:21:00 PM [+] ::
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i'm such a child... these things are fun to me

My inner child is sixteen years old!

Life's not fair! It's never been fair, but while
adults might just accept that, I know
something's gotta change. And it's gonna
change, just as soon as I become an adult and
get some power of my own.

How Old is Your Inner Child?
brought to you by Quizilla

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 05:18:00 PM [+] ::
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"I do not seek, I find."
-- Pablo Picasso

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 05:15:00 PM [+] ::
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May 8th Rally in Sacramento - www.may8.org

Put Students First!
Not One Dollar Cut From Public Education!

Education Not Incarceration is a group of teachers, parents, students, and community members who are outraged by the current cuts in education funding. We believe that the state budget needs to prioritize education funding, as well as funding for other important social services, over increased spending on prisons.
Why Education Not Incarceration? With the state budget in crisis, legislators and Gov. Gray Davis are looking for spending cuts - the problem is they are looking toward public education and other social services to find their savings. In the meantime, they are looking to increase spending on the state prison system. Rather than looking for alternatives to incarceration for our youth, it appears that the state would be willing to make more drop outs, increase the achievement gap, and create an environment that pushes kids out of schools and onto the streets. Apparently our students are worth more to the state legislature in jails rather than in schools...

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 04:48:00 PM [+] ::
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Sad if true... sad if not true
One of the most powerful things about the web is the fact that it has allowed people to see how easy it is to manufacture truth; how many sides there can be to one story; and so on and so on. I think its really healthy because it makes people ask those scary questions: whats real?; whats true?; how do you know?; who do you believe?

Apperently this women who had an aol online journal died in a car accident and her friend has come on to her journal to tell everyone.

Is it real? Death from a car accident is something so unimaginable you want it to be a hoax. Creating a hoax about something like that is so disgusting that you just want to curl up in a ball and beg for truth, and the existence of a stable objective world, to suddenly appear and make everything okay and understandable for that little voice inside your head. As Buzzmachine notes:
See the discussion in the comments on whether this is legitimate. I hate such discussions. People wondered whether Salam Pax was real even as the bombs were falling on him. People wonder whether this is real. It's an important part of what we do as a community: This is fact-checking the new way. But it's (a) sick if someone made this up and (b) sad that we have to wonder.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 04:34:00 PM [+] ::
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Ashley Highfield, BBC director of new media, live online, Thursday November 13 @ 4pm: "one of the key social trends that we've noticed is, in a fragmenting society, people want to get more involved in their media consumption, want to contribute, sometimes as a substitute for real-world communities."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 04:18:00 PM [+] ::
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Ashley Highfield, BBC director of new media, live online, Thursday November 13 @ 4pm: "One of the biggest shifts in News reporting I think is that the reports do not all have to come from our reporters. Increasingly, our audience can submit articles, views, comments, photos, and even video footage. The big challenge in this world is how to maintain both impartiality and quality in this world of user generated content. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 04:18:00 PM [+] ::
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INTRODUCTION TO NIETZSCHE

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 02:52:00 PM [+] ::
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Since everyone else and their mother are chimeing in

I thought i'd throw my two cents in on how to fix Iraq.

1) More troops (preferably: non U.S.) with a time table of say 10 years (which means Washington is gonna need to do some major grovelling to get other countries to sign on. I mean serious bribery and ass kissing... America wanted this war now its gonna have to pay for it (see ya tax cuts!)) And I think the voting public needs to realize the rest of the world is not gonna want to work with G.W. and Company (another reason to kick 'em out)
2) Getting Iraqi's properly trained to enable a slow transition for protecting the country (meaning by the end the of the 10 years forign troops should be sitting inside barracks outside of the cities doing nothing... hell they should prob. spend the last 4 years never seen and never heard from cause the jobs being done and they aren't needed)
3) more money for legitimate contracts
4) all of this working with (and if possible through) the U.N.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 02:29:00 PM [+] ::
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I keep saying i'm gonna give it a shot... but I haven't yet...

Op-Ed Columnist: Love, Internet Style: "Online dating puts structure back into courtship."

"Most of the sites have programs that link you up with people like yourself. One of the side effects of online dating is that it is bound to accelerate social stratification, as highly educated people become more efficient at finding and marrying one another."

"If you judged by these essays, skinny-dipping with intellectuals is the most popular activity in America." hey, that'd be fun!

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 02:13:00 PM [+] ::
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"I want to pump you up," "clean house," and then hang you out to dry...

This whole state and local politics thing has been new for me. Up until the recall I've never really cared--I know I know local politics are much more important shame on me. Well I'm finally getting into the action. You know knowledge really does keep people out... when you don't know what's going on its hard to get your foot in the door cause you feel overwhelmed and stupid... but once you're in for some reason all that stuff just seems to fade away. Anyways my point was I really think CA voters are in for a ride; this fiasco isn't over yet. The Schwarzenegger campaign was a fraud (okay every campaign is a fraud) and the only people to be irritated at are the voters. When I talk to most people who voted for Schwarzenegger they have all these delusions about him and how he's gonna run government. Well let me let you in on a secret; most the things people hate(ed) about Davis and "insiders" were/are systemic and you'll see all the same shit from anyone in office. Schwarzenegger is already taking in money (what happened to Mr. Clean?) Now take a look at the replacement whose supposed to lead the changes in the budget... funny... she likes all Cali's old tricks--will we get something different? I don't think so... we'll just have to wait and see.

sacbee.com -- Opinion -- Peter Schrag: Circuit-riding budget whiz comes to California: "Arduin gets warm praise from her former bosses, but everywhere she's been some mess gets deferred."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 02:02:00 PM [+] ::
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Hey, we all have to have goals
I'm gonna shoot for 1000 visitors in 2 weeks.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 01:40:00 PM [+] ::
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I know you'll think its stupid but...

I've been in therapy for a little over a year now. Reaching that year mark really made me do a lot of thinking about what the point was; why was I in therapy? I can tell you that it has been both one of the most intellectually draining and intellectually stimulating experiences of my life. In my head recently i've been thinking of ideas about this novel I want to write on what i'd consider utopia; not cause I think you can make utopia but because I think its important to always have something out in front of you to remind you of what could be. Anyways I've realized that I think everyone should be in therapy; maybe not weekly but at least over some consistent time period. And its not because I want to create a whole new market of clients for therapist; the other half of my thoughts on this is that I think everyone should also be trained to participate as a therapist. So you'd have lots of part time therapists running around. It'd really get people to not only look at their own lives more in depth, but also learn how to respectfully participate in another persons endeavors into looking into their life. If we all did a little more introspective work and worked at helping others to do the same, maybe we'd have a different perspective on the world. I'm specifically saying it would be a better one (though i'm inclined to think so); I just think it'd definitely be different.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 01:33:00 PM [+] ::
...

Go figure...
U.S. to Push for Iraqis to Take On Bigger Role, Bush Says: "The United States is developing a plan to 'encourage more Iraqis to assume more responsibility' quickly in governing the country, President Bush said today as the top military commander in Iraq blamed most of the violence there on a desperate band of no more than 5,000."

is it just me or does "encourage more Iraqis to assume more responsibility" have a very pejorative connotation to it... as if Iraqis' were neglecting their jobs and we had to swoop in and save them; instead of the other way around where we run things?

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 01:05:00 PM [+] ::
...

Please look at the man behind the curtain... and not the policys... oh and look at how mean people are to him

Spinsanity - The Republican assault on "political hate speech": "Gillespie originally debuted the term during an appearance with Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sept. 7:

The kind of rhetoric you hear from [Democratic presidential candidates] ... on either side of the aisle, Ronald Reagan never said Jimmy Carter couldn't find countries in his own hemisphere. Walter Mondale never said that President Reagan was a miserable failure. When Bill Clinton ran against President Bush, he didn't compare him to Saddam Hussein or the Taliban. And when Bob Dole ran against President Clinton, he didn't say that he was an absolute phony or a liar. The kind of words we're hearing now from the Democratic candidates go beyond political debate. This is political hate speech."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 12:32:00 PM [+] ::
...

"Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which
I have got a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as
brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations."
-- George Bernard Shaw

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 12:11:00 PM [+] ::
...

bloggy: GOP Love Boat: "GOP Love Boat "

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 12:01:00 PM [+] ::
...

Philosoraptor: "Strangely, we’ve always recognized that it’s bad to be a loutish woman or a sissified man—in fact, we’ve traditionally exaggerated the badness of those things. But to this day some people still think that it’s o.k. to be a loutish man or a sissified woman. It isn’t. Everybody should be at least moderately self-reliant and courageous, and everybody should be at least moderately kind and cooperative."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:15:00 AM [+] ::
...

Happiness in slavery....

Religion Helps Shape Wealth Of Americans, Study Finds: "“Religion is an important factor in wealth accumulation, a factor that hasn’t received a lot of attention,” "

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 11:11:00 AM [+] ::
...

tonypierce.com + busblog: "theres good news and bad news to having more than a dozen readers to your blog. lets start with the bad news.

bad news is, if you find yourself in a moment of sadness and you want to write about that feeling, people will start emailing and commenting with words of advice. which is super nice. dont get me wrong. but sometimes a guy just wants to write about how depressed he is, just to vent.

other bad news comes when the guy's mom reads about how he wants to fling his black helicopter into the side of a mountain. it can be hard to explain to her that what he's writing isnt literal, that its symbolic, dramatic. its not a cry for help. its just representative of wanting the madness to end. it's far from suicidal."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:59:00 AM [+] ::
...

See the scary thing is I really think a lot of people will buy into the administrations oh so sad plight of having to have information analyzed. When will people realize objective anything... be it media, opinion, truth.... is a fraud. Everyone has a side... only fascists want to try to just circumvent the process and not have it out in the marketplace of ideas

It’s Bagh-SPAN: Bremer Bunch Will Broadcast: "The Coalition Provisional Authority running Iraq, created by the Bush administration, dissatisfied with the American television news decisions on covering the conflict, is about to create its own broadcast operation, with the capacity to bypass the networks, live from Iraq, 24 hours a day."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:51:00 AM [+] ::
...

The land of the free...

Radio Ink - The Voice of Radio Revolution: "According to the Illinois Leader, a National Guard soldier based in Rockford, IL, who blasted President Bush on a local radio talk show Friday, may face court martial for her public comments."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:46:00 AM [+] ::
...

remarkable facial hair, but not much of it was what you'd call thrillingly telegenic.
EducationGuardian.co.uk | Arts & Humanities | Stuart Jeffries: How to make philosophers telegenic: "Philosophers have beards, wear glasses and smoke a pipe. So just how would Stuart Jeffries make them - and their ideas - look interesting for his short film?"

"For it is a truth insufficiently acknowledged that television is a fundamentally visual medium, while philosophy lends itself to visual representation about as much as George W Bush lends himself to commendation by the Plain English Campaign."

--------
god philosophers are an odd bunch...

"the history of western philosophy is a televisually untapped mine of great stories. Hegel put the finishing touches to the Phenomenology of Spirit as the Battle of Jena raged outisde the city walls. Wittgenstein wrote the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus while serving in the Austrian army in the first world war. There are stories that cry out to be told: Althusser's home life, Foucault's gay romps, Russell's hetero philandering, Deleuze's death plunge, Gramsci's imprisonment, Hannah Arendt's successful escape from the Gestapo, Walter Benjamin's doomed flight from Nazism across the Pyrenees, royalist Thomas Hobbes' flight to France to avoid the wrath of the Roundheads, Descartes meditating in an oven, the death of Socrates."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:24:00 AM [+] ::
...

St. Petersburg Times Online: Jeb Bush jokes people of San Francisco may be endangered: "'It looks like the people of San Francisco are an endangered species, which may not be a bad thing. That's probably good news for the country.'"

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:23:00 AM [+] ::
...

Telegraph | Education | Why children should be equal: "Sticking with justice, I assume we can agree that private schools are unfair, in that they conflict with equality of opportunity. It's unfair that a child's prospects in life should depend on her social background, on her parent's willingness and ability to pay for an education better than others are getting. Principled defences of private schools will, I imagine, concede that , but claim that other values are more important. My mistake is to give fairness, or equality of opportunity, too much weight, or to ignore all the good things that would be sacrificed if we were to pursue it as seriously as I suggest. So let's look at those other good things, and see how much of value would indeed be lost if we were to abolish private schools."

"Freedom of religion, of expression, of sexuality: these are real rights. They protect fundamental human interests - things so important that we all have a duty to respect them even if we'd rather not. Is the freedom to spend your money on an expensive education for your child in that category? No."

"And we shouldn't kid ourselves. With a few honourable exceptions, independent schools are hardly bulwarks of pluralism and variety. The schools in question are typically means by which parents can enable their children better to compete in the game that everybody else is playing. Only rarely are they ways of playing a genuinely different game. "

And then there was an interesting comment on Crookedtimber's blog where I had found the article....

"In America, most of the upper-middle class do not go to private schools. Most move to a really expensive neighborhood with great public schools and send their kids there. The quality of the schools helps to drive up the property values.
The assumption seems to be that “no private school” equals “equality of schooling.” Anyone who has seen the variety of public schools would be under that illusion. Forcing people who live together to school together will merely cut down on people who don’t want to school together from living together. Posted by pathos ·"

Hmmm... shit I don't know what the answer is. Though I do have a big issue with private schools at least in concept.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:08:00 AM [+] ::
...

Got a trial subscription to Oxford English Dictionary. I love it! You can just sit there and read for hours...

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:03:00 AM [+] ::
...

In the cd player

The new Paul Westerberg-- Come feel me tremble

I love it... i've only had a couple of listens and its not as good as Suicaine Gratification--which I think is one of the most brilliant albums ever written--but its really good. I still need to see this guy live

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 10:00:00 AM [+] ::
...

I'm trying my hand at bringing the gospel of Jim to the masses... i'm gonna see if its worth paying 20 bucks a month to advertise. If you wandered in and like what you see drop me a line... the more lines I get the more I will work at making this not just enjoyable for myself but for potential readers.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 09:41:00 AM [+] ::
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They kicked out the good ole' boy...

Yahoo! News - Ten Commandments Judge Removed From Bench

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 09:37:00 AM [+] ::
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Grist Magazine: Environmental news and humor

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 09:34:00 AM [+] ::
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Its funny how science can be "economically inconvenient"

Grist | Muckraker | They blinded me | 12 Nov 2003

In the final days of October, Craig Manson, assistant Interior secretary for fish and wildlife and parks, dealt a "Godfather"-style blow to a team of government biologists that was about to release a final report with flow recommendations for the Missouri River -- a blow that could have a sizable ripple effect on the river itself. The report was to have argued for the need to better mimic the natural flow of the Missouri (releasing more water from hydroelectric dams in the spring and less in the summer) to prevent extinction of the river's endangered sturgeon, tern, and plover populations, and to reduce the risk of future flooding.

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 09:32:00 AM [+] ::
...

this is sad
The Observer | Review | The 100 greatest novels of all time: The list

I don't read enough!
okay lets see....
I once got half way through Count of Monte Cristo
I own wuthering heights (see its right over there on my book shelf)
I own Madame Bovary (rigth below W. Heights)
Alice in Wonderland -- check
The Brothers Karmazov... also sittin on the shelf
The Picture of Dorian Gray... again... shelf... this is embarrassesing (but so is my spelling)
Ulysses... oh yeah sure judge me cause I did my required 3 pages I doubt you understood it anyways
The Great Gatsby.... shelf
Brave New World-- check
The Plague.... shelf
1984..... never finished (isn't that sad)
Catcher in the Rye... Check... though I have to admit it wasn't as great as i'd hoped. I guess I was expecting life changing. I merely got highly entertaining.
Charlotte's Web. I'm gonna say yes... cause i'm almost positive we read it in school (maybe it was just the movie)
On the Road.... some asshole has my copy... I want it back so I can read it again....
To Kill a mockingbird .... school....
okay... so lets see.
Read 6
made the effort (err almost) on 3
own 5 more.
pathetic... pathetic

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 09:13:00 AM [+] ::
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The False Dichotomy Zone

hey I am a raving athiest in league with satan and the a.c.l.u.!

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 08:53:00 AM [+] ::
...

Maybe its just me but Gore seems so much more enjoyable to watch now. He still has that goofy Goreness (which never really botherd me) that everyone always attacks him for; but now a days he seems a little more fired up. Like I said maybe its just me.

Gore hits culture's reliance on television - Wednesday, 11/12/03: "Gore, speaking on ''Media and Democracy'' at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, told attendees that the decline of newspapers as the country's dominant method of communication leaves average Americans without an outlet for scholarly debate.

''Our democracy is suffering in an age when the dominant medium is not accessible to the average person and does not lend itself most readily to the conveyance of complex ideas about self-governance,'' Gore said. ''Instead, it pushes toward a lowest common denominator.''"

"Gore said a remedy to television's dominance may be the Internet, a ''print-based medium that is extremely accessible to the average person.''"

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 08:45:00 AM [+] ::
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What happended to objective 2?
President Addresses the Nation: "Our strategy in Iraq has three objectives: destroying the terrorists, enlisting the support of other nations for a free Iraq and helping Iraqis assume responsibility for their own defense and their own future. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 08:37:00 AM [+] ::
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Nietzsche as Critic and Captive of Enlightenment: "Nietzsche as Critic and Captive of Enlightenment"

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 07:20:00 AM [+] ::
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Now we know why the guys got problems...

Newsday.com - Who's Looking Out for Him?:

" In Levittown, when I was a kid and you were walking down the street and someone said, 'Hey, O'Reilly, you -- liar,' you punched him. It was like, WHAM!' - he smashes his fist into his hand - 'I can't imagine someone calling my father a liar to his face. He would have killed him.'"

poor guys just suffering, lonely, and angry... (reminds me of myself in a way)....

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 07:16:00 AM [+] ::
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The Onion | Mom Finds Out About Blog: "In a turn of events the 30-year-old characterized as 'horrifying,' Kevin Widmar announced Tuesday that his mother Lillian has discovered his weblog.

'Apparently, Mom typed [Widmar's employer] Dean Healthcare into Google along with my name and, lo and behold, PlanetKevin popped up,' Widmar said. 'I'm so fucked.'"

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 07:07:00 AM [+] ::
...

Okay this guy rocks...
tonypierce.com + busblog: "you are so fucked up if you are the one who has to chase them. so fucked up. they want you to be like everyone else. they want you to be like the associated press. im not like anyone, and im definitely not like the associated press."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 06:51:00 AM [+] ::
...

I wonder how we get people to think? (more like this guy preferably... he's pissed)
tonypierce.com + busblog:

"hello.

is this thing on?

seems to me, and im just some jerkoff not really paying much attention, but it seems to me that you let those motherfuckers steal the election, you let them get us into this fucked up war, you let them shove the economy right into their assholes and shit it all over your faces, you let them re-do the gubernatorial election in cali and let a potsmoking groping son of a nazi take over, and now youre letting them control the television too?

are you people high?

and the weirdest thing is, bush has a pretty good chance of getting hired for another four years, not because he deserves it, but because you guys cant get it together."

:: Jim Nichols 11/13/2003 06:46:00 AM [+] ::
...

:: Wednesday, November 12, 2003 ::

Richard Rorty: "'In my utopia, human solidarity would be seen not as a fact to be recognized by clearing away 'prejudice' or burrowing down to previously hidden depths but, rather, as a goal to be achieved. Is it to be achieved not by inquiry but by imagination, the imaginative ability to see strange people as fellow sufferers. Solidarity is not discovered by reflection but created. It is created by increasing our sensitivity to the particular details of the pain and humiliation of other, unfamiliar sorts of people' --Richard Rorty, 'Contingency, Irony and Solidarity'"

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 07:38:00 PM [+] ::
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Prints the chaff: Whitey in the Boondocks

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 05:23:00 AM [+] ::
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"An education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't." --Anatole France

"When a thing has been said and well, have no scruple. Take it and copy it." --Anatole France

and who is Anatole France you say (or was that just me)... well lets see... Anatole France - Biography: hmmm... learn something new and useless everyday.

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 04:18:00 AM [+] ::
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"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction." --E. F. Schumacher

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 04:14:00 AM [+] ::
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Charles Bukowski: "'There are so many,' she said, 'who go by the name of poet. But they have no training, no feeling for their craft. The savages have taken over the castle. There's no workmanship, no care, simply a demand to be accepted. And these new poet all seem to admire one another. It worries me and I've talked about it to a lot of my poet friends. All a young poet seems to think he needs is a typewriter and a few pieces of paper. They aren't prepared, they have had no preparation at all.' (from Hot Water Music, 1995) "

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 04:07:00 AM [+] ::
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Sometimes I feel like I should have known BukowskiDon't "unrinate or defecate in the sink"? Hey, but thats what the women I met in New Orleans told me to do... "use the sink," she said, "toilets broken."

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 04:06:00 AM [+] ::
...

haven't really thought about the fact that I haven't been doing any writing. Thats bad. I should know better, I do know better. I just can think of what to say... or why I would want to say it.

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 03:59:00 AM [+] ::
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Frankly...: At some point:

"At some point

she reaches over,
breaks the tab off his softdrink,
leaving the inner ring intact.
she holds it up squinting through the perfect circle,
"can i make a wish?"
she closes her eyes, squinches up her face....
he leans in and kisses her."

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 03:57:00 AM [+] ::
...

Youth is beauty, money is beauty, hell beauty is beauty sometimes...

Its 3:30... to sleep or not sleep? Does it matter. I have a paper due last week, the professor was cool about it. I just haven't been able to get myself to sit down and write it. I haven't been able to get myself to sit down and do anything. I feel rather lazy and pretty much a waste of space right now; not that the space could possibly be better used--I can be quite spunky at times (....good thing?).

So now i'm just sitting here chilling out, listening to Ani ("So here I am, publicly morphing into some kinda Fortune 500-young-entrepreneur-from-hell, and all along I thought I was just a folksinger !") di and wondering what my life is supposed to amount to. its Okay cause it doesn't have to add up to a hill of beans, making mountains out of molehills is a long forgotten hobby and life is definitely a molehill looking for a mole.

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 03:50:00 AM [+] ::
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Why Not? How to Use Everyday Ingenuity to Solve Problems Big and Small

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 03:32:00 AM [+] ::
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"The difference between the philosopher and the ordinary person is one of degree, not of kind. His impulses are the same, but ordered differently. No matter how rational he is, he is still a rational animal: a sexual one, for instance, and a social one. His curiosity is more fully developed than theirs, but unless his other faculties are at least as well developed as theirs, this one trait does not make him better than they are." --Karl Jahn

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 01:59:00 AM [+] ::
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pedantocracy: "A system of government by pedants; a governing body of pedants."

:: Jim Nichols 11/12/2003 01:53:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Tuesday, November 11, 2003 ::

"When we turn our attention to our own minds, we are faced with trying to understand an unimaginable advanced technology. We can't possibly know (let alone keep track of) the tremendous number of mechanical influences on our behavior because we inhabit an extraordinarily complicated machine. So we develop a shorthand, a belief in the causal efficay of our conscious thoughts. We believe in the magic of our own causal agency." --The Illusion of Conscious Will

I don't know who I am, I don't know where i'm going, and I don't know where to start to answer any of these questions.

:: Jim Nichols 11/11/2003 11:58:00 PM [+] ::
...

I've been stuck in a free fall for the past month or two. I don't know where its leading, but I need to start trying to write it out of me instead of letting it just sit inside and eat away at my life. So i'm going to do my best to jot it all down here. I kept saying I was gonna sit down and write some dramatic essay on whats been going on in my head... what i'm trying to figure out and put together. But i've been so scattered and unable to concentrate. So what the hell i'm just gonna go at it in small fragments... which is kind of fitting because in the end thats how we come to see and understand the world--in small fragments.

:: Jim Nichols 11/11/2003 11:50:00 PM [+] ::
...

Two weeks ago I slept through it, this week I read through it (new chomsky); I keep missing the Gilmore Girls!!! But its okay, I have some good news that will make up for it. Apperently they're finally going to release season one on DVD.

:: Jim Nichols 11/11/2003 11:29:00 PM [+] ::
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I bring good things

I've gotten my friend Tonja to start up a blog: mizukatze's corner o' stuff & stuff

So keep an eye out for it. The beauty about the net is that its completely about merit. She's someone I could see acquiring a big audience fast.

Now I just got to get John, Eagle, Jessica, Evan, Matt, Mike and Aaron (though aaron is busy running a presidential campaign)... then it'll be good times on the web.

:: Jim Nichols 11/11/2003 11:19:00 PM [+] ::
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Ahhhhhhh!!!!

I finally figured out how to blockquote. I may get good at this yet; too bad I can't read up on how to write well.

:: Jim Nichols 11/11/2003 11:08:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Sunday, November 09, 2003 ::

"Delusions of grandeur make me feel a lot better about myself." -- Jane Wagner

:: Jim Nichols 11/09/2003 05:00:00 AM [+] ::
...

Matthew Yglesias: "It seems to me that folks on the right have an unhealthy obsession with the trivial and rarely-successful antics of some relatively small groups of college student agitors. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/09/2003 04:27:00 AM [+] ::
...

:: Saturday, November 08, 2003 ::

Yahoo! News - Boondocks

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 06:36:00 PM [+] ::
...

A must read for everyone

Too Polemical or Too Critical for the Mainstream? Chomsky
on Media-Elite Relations

And now you can find Jim Nichols if you want.
And now you can find Jim Nichols if you want.
And now you can find Jim Nichols if you want.

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 05:34:00 PM [+] ::
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Notebooks FAQ: "The net, in its present infantile condition, gives access, not to the sum of preserved human knowledge, but rather to advertisements, cranks, journalists, and technical reports. "

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 02:58:00 PM [+] ::
...

hmmm... must check him out

Leszek Kolakowski: "Polish philosopher and historian of philosophy. He's one of a very small number of people who is thoroughly conversant with both the analytical and Continental strains of Western philosophy, and knows the history of their (common) ancestors as well."

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 12:00:00 PM [+] ::
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"The only difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is that the Democrats allow the poor to be corrupt, too." --Oscar Levant

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 11:31:00 AM [+] ::
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Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, "Where have I gone wrong?"
Then a voice says to me, "This is going to take more than one night." --Charles M. Schulz

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 11:30:00 AM [+] ::
...

Maybe I should start up a quote blog as well. I'm paranoid now after my computer crashed and I lost all those pages of quotes. Thats why I want everything online... if I'm gonna lose something from now on I want it to be due to the end of the civilization.

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 11:27:00 AM [+] ::
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"My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right?" --Charles M. Schulz

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 11:27:00 AM [+] ::
...

Yep, thats me... always lacking wit
"She had a pretty gift for quotation, which is a serviceable substitute for wit." --W. Somerset Maugham

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 11:24:00 AM [+] ::
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"To read a newspaper is to refrain from reading something worthwhile. The first discipline of education must therefore be to refuse resolutely to feed the mind with canned chatter."
Aleister Crowley

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 11:23:00 AM [+] ::
...

Indeed

corybantic (kor-i-BAN-tik) adjective

Wild; frenzied; uncontrolled.

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 02:03:00 AM [+] ::
...

"As regards intellectual work, it remains a fact, indeed, that great decisions in the realms of thought and momentous discoveries and solutions of problems are only possible to an individual working in solitude."
-Sigmund Freud

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 01:58:00 AM [+] ::
...

Colonel Blimp (KUHR-nl blimp) noun, also Blimp

A pompous reactionary with out-of-date views.

[After Colonel Blimp, a cartoon character created by David Low
(1891-1963).]

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 01:56:00 AM [+] ::
...

PETA: The Meatrix

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 01:35:00 AM [+] ::
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Paris Journal: To Sell Lingerie, Inhibitions, and Much More, Are Falling: "Here in Paris, porno-chic has gone mainstream.

To inaugurate its 28,000-square-foot lingerie shop this week, Galeries Lafayette, the closest thing France has to Bloomingdale's, invited hundreds of guests on Tuesday evening to sip Champagne, stroll down a 'street of temptation' named 'Le Red Hot Boulevard' and examine 80 different brands of 'strings' (the French word for 'thongs'), brassieres, bustiers, corsets, panties and garter belts."

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 01:08:00 AM [+] ::
...

I am going to be moving all news to a new blog in order to better organize and professionalize my blogging. This blog will remain solely for my writing and anything else I happen to want to link to or store. All news articles and op-eds that I merely want to pass along will from now on go on the other blog.

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 12:23:00 AM [+] ::
...

The Yale Herald - Nov 7, 2003 - The real threat to world peace: "Of the 49 major conflicts that have broken out since 1990, light weapons were the only arms used in 46 of them, with only one —the 1991 Gulf War—dominated by heavy conventional weapons."

"Trade in illegal guns is as dangerous as nuclear and chemical proliferation. It is as big a threat to global security as WMD. Small arms and light weapons are the real instruments of war—from the civil wars that rage within countries carrying the label of 'failed state' to the wars police officers wage with criminal networks in countries gripped in vicious cycles of violent crime. The silent victims, irrespective of the nature of the conflict in question, are the millions of innocent civilians killed or maimed by the tools of violence. The World Health Organization's World Report on Violence and Health supports the oft-cited rough estimate of 300,000 annual deaths from small arms in armed conflict. These figures are far higher than the number of people who have perished from the use of weapons of mass destruction since World War II, including in Hiroshima and Nagasaki."

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 12:19:00 AM [+] ::
...

California Insider - Angelides warns again against new debt: "With reports circulating in the Capitol that the Schwarzenegger team might propose adding next year's structural deficit onto the already accumulated debt and floating a massive deficit bond to the voters in March, Treasurer Phil Angelides warns against using borrowing to postpone dealing with the state's fiscal mess. A $20 billion deficit bond, he says, would cost taxpayers $39 billion to retire over 30 years."

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 12:15:00 AM [+] ::
...

CNN.com - Dems, GOP feud over Iraq memo - Nov. 5, 2003: "Angry Republicans accused the Democratic side of playing politics. "

Why do people always accuse the other side of playing politics? Isn't that what politics is about??? I may mock your politics but i'm not gonna be shocked by it and throw a fit, I'm just work my ass off at exposing you for the fraud you are and work on getting others to agree with me and hence act on that agreement--kicking someone out the political way, by voting.

"The memo suggested a strategy to challenge administration claims about its prewar intelligence. " Dear god not that? One would actually be fullfiling the dutys of an investigation. Since if one thought there was a reason to believe the current "truth" of what had occured one would find no reason to investigate....

:: Jim Nichols 11/08/2003 12:05:00 AM [+] ::
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The Weblog Review