Hooked on a Feeling

From the sublime to the ridiculous - this video is awsum.

Stealing Michael Yon's Photo

From Ad Age:

"The first issue of Shock magazine isn't due on newsstands until May 30, but publisher Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S. is already hearing demands that it recall all issues from circulation. The request comes from a photographer of one of its cover images. Whether that will mean a very rough launch or a welcome bonanza of press attention remains to be seen.

The front cover features a photograph of an American soldier cradling an injured Iraqi girl, a photo taken by Michael Yon, the blogger and former Green Beret who went to Iraq as a freelance journalist. But a posting on Michael Yon: Online Magazine calls the picture's use unauthorized and unwelcome."

From Gawker:

Magazine For Illiterates Can’t Even Rip Off Photos Right

READ MORE: hachette filapacchi, shock

So Shock magazine, Hachette’s attempt to corner the market on readers who find Us Weekly too intellectual, got in a bit of a kerfuffle with Michael Yon, the photographer who took the picture that graces the magazine’s first cover. (The picture of the soldier cradling the Iraqi kid, not the one of Jessica Simpson.)

Seems that Yon didn’t approve the use of the photo, saying in a statement, “I regularly turn down usage requests for this photo — uses that could earn money — because this photo is sacred to me and is representative of the U.S. soldiers I have come to know. It is also representative of the horrors of the enemy we all face.”

Hachette, for its part, claims to have “obtained publishing rights for the image from a reputable photo agency,” and is looking into the matter.

No word yet on who’s responsible for the incredibly hacky headline “War Is Still Hell!”

Assessing Damages:

Hachette Filapacchi is receiving a lot of publicity for pinching this photo. That will have a monetary value, advertising/publicity wise.

Hachette Filapacchi will have advertising space booked for this issue, and will be taking advertising orders this week, based on the raised awareness of their willingness to cheat and steal and shock. That will have a monetary value which is easily assessed by looking at the ads that run.

There is also a monetary value for intellectual infringement, copyright violation as well as negative associations for the Michael Yon brand. This will be harder to assess, but could run very high indeed.

All the money Michael makes from this court case is money that should be collected. The process will be awful, as all court cases are, but I hope he has the strength to carry this one through. An important principle is at stake. The amount should hurt!

And that little girl Farah, murdered by scum wrapped in a shroud of explosives, should not have her image hijacked in order to sell soap powder.

Thank you JS, quite a wake up call for me this morning.

Reuters has a big problem

Something's odd, that's for sure.

"The Reuters IP address 192.165.213.18 has visited LGF 20 times since midnight Pacific, going to either our post about the death threat, or to the front page."

"...Reuters Global Head of Communications Ed Williams told me that the person responsible had been “suspended” pending investigation. The fact that this IP address is still visiting our site does not necessarily mean that Reuters was not telling me the truth. The IP address could be that of a router, being used by more than one employee. However, it’s a fact that almost all the hits are going directly to our post about the threat, and this is certainly cause for suspicion."

Some media attention:

"Reporting the message to his readers, Johnson wrote on his website: "This particular death threat is a bit different from the run of the mill hate mail we get around here, because an IP lookup on the sender reveals that he/she/it was using an account at none other than Reuters News."

Speaking to Ynetnews, Johnson said: "I was surprised to receive a threat from a Reuters IP, but only because it was so careless of this person to use a traceable work account to do it."

He added: "I think it's more than fair to say that Reuters has a big problem."

I've written about Reuters recently. They don't have to worry though, no one reads blogs.

Midconflict with a Hideous Foe

Christopher Hitchens in the Wall Street Journal:

"Always think of it: never speak of it." That was the stoic French injunction during the time when the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine had been lost. This resolution might serve us well at the present time, when we are in midconflict with a hideous foe, and when it is too soon to be thinking of memorials to a war not yet won. This Memorial Day, one might think particularly of those of our fallen who also guarded polling-places, opened schools and clinics, and excavated mass graves. They represent the highest form of the citizen, and every man and woman among them was a volunteer. This plain statement requires no further rhetoric."


A dear female relative said to me: "I can't read your blog. I can't stand your political views."

I know so little about Iraq and Afghanistan.

I find it very hard to imagine what would go on in a rape room, say, or the administration required for a torture room. Did the rapists and torturers get tea and cigarette breaks? Did they wear ear plugs? Did they get cuts on their hands or other parts of their bodies. Was there a first aid kit, with beige band aids and antiseptic cream?

Wouldn't there be an awful mess? Think of all the bodily functions that can go wrong under stress. I've read that the rapists collected up the underpants, trophies what have you, just like the nazis collected up shoes and coats at the concentration camps. Plus ca change.

I wonder, what was it like to have a neighbour's young child strung up on the street lamp on the street where you live. Did a woman like me look out at the dead child's face and remember when that child was tiny, laughing and skipping around as toddlers do.

I feel rage when I think about it. Rage when I think about the subjugation of women in these benighted countries. Do none of these women chop the vegetables and finger the blade and imagine, just for a minute, taking back the night?

Does reading this make my political viewpoint clear?

Cool.

Big Sigh on Memorial Day

November 11th is the day in England. Remembrance Sunday, the nearest Sunday to the eleventh, is a lovely day, full of respect.

John Karry with all the zillions his wife has to spend has only just recently come up with an idea on how to respond to the Swift Boat Veterans' charges of mid 2004!

It's not very convincing using the same argument that Skilling and Lay used when defending Enron's corruption.

From Andi's blog:

"Mr. Kerry and his defenders say that they did not have the extensive archival material, and that it was too complicated to gather in the rapid pace of a campaign. He was caught off guard, he says; he had been prepared to defend his antiwar activism, but he did not believe that anyone would challenge the facts behind his military awards. "We should have put more money behind it," Mr. Kerry says now. "I take responsibility for it; it was my mistake. They spent something like $30 million, and we didn't. That's just a terrible imbalance when somebody's lying about you."

I've only just seen the documentary 'Enron: the smartest guys in the room' - surely someone with a brain in the Kairey camp has seen it too and said "please don't go there".

Andi's words of advice:

"Kerry signed the SF-180 in 2005, but I don't believe that he released his records to the public. Perhaps that would be the best solution to this he said/he said."

See why I'm always saying how ladylike Andi is. Release the records dude or get over it. Sometimes things are that simple.

Fo'Shizzle

"Every summer we can rent a cottage on the Isle of Wight if it's not too dear."

Sorry, wrong pop star.

I know I'm just a wigger, but this cracks me up:

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/flash/schfiftyfive.html

And this is not for the faint hearted:

http://www.groupxarab.com/

"Learn the language, learn how to spell" indeed.

Then there's Norm's great response to "Why Euston?"...

"I walk down to the tube station and I say to the guy in the ticket window 'Euston, please'. He spots the t-shirt as I'm saying that, and I spot him spotting it, and we smile at one another. 'Why Euston?' he asks. I reject the idea of explaining the reason. 'Why not?' I answer. 'Yeah, why not?' he agrees. When I get to Euston, several of the people working there who notice the thing seem tickled. 'Hey, Euston!' they say."

Thanks Liz, I'm down with it (I think).

Corrupt? You Be the Judge

The publishers Hachette Filipacchi have used a photograph on the front cover of Shocked magazine without paying for it or asking permission.

Why is this ok?

Copyright infringement is a serious matter.

Hachette Filipacchi is the world's largest magazine publisher.

I hope Michael Yon wins millions.

Jeff Weintraub

Norm profiles an interesting guy. Here are some of the bits that jumped out and grabbed me by the throat:

"Why do you blog? > I sometimes like to think that, at its best, the blogosphere is the closest equivalent we have to the old eighteenth century Republic of Letters. (Whether this is an optimistic or a pessimistic observation is another matter.) It's a way of carrying on extended conversations and debates in an age when few of us write the kinds of letters, pamphlets or polemical essays they used to write so fluently in the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries."

"Do you have any prejudices you're willing to acknowledge? > When people mention some fashionable terms or ideas in the course of making an argument, such as 'orientalism' or 'rational choice' or 'essentialism', I confess that I sometimes have to make an effort not to simply shut off further consideration and just dismiss the rest of what they're saying. I try to remind myself that not all arguments which include these catch-phrases are necessarily absurd or fraudulent, and some may even be worth taking seriously."

Fancy mentioning Christopher Hitchens and Juan Cole as favourite blogs!

Halo Effect

There's an article at Advertising Age about psychology and marketing. It mentions the halo effect. Here's the definition:

Halo effect: The tendency to be biased in the estimation or rating of an individual with respect to a certain characteristic by some quite irrelevant impression or estimate (good or bad) of the same individual. It is a frequent source of error in employing rating scale and other procedures.
- from The Penguin Dictionary of Psychology

What is great about the study of psychology is all the intellectual labels that can be applied to our every day instincts.

When you're not quite sure:

Ambiguous: Capable of two interpretations

Ambivalence: Emotional attitude towards an individual involving the alternation of the opposite feeling attitudes of love and hate.

There are no right on wrong answers when it comes to judging people, we're all just too complex, but we develop certain attitudes to make judging easier.

When I first moved to England it puzzled me how long it took to make good friends. Months and months, half a year, years! That's probably because no one could figure me out - just a nerd from the midwest who'd go back to the States shortly. I'm still here and the euphoria I feel when I spend time with some of the friends I've known for lo these twenty years is incredible. So yes, 'Blink' all you want to, but don't beat yourself up about taking time to make a judgement, even Malcolm Gladwell talks about the dangers of snap judgements that don't ever get below the surface (p76).

Oliver Stone movie trailer

This movie trailer made me cry.

Because, you know, I'm still not over September Eleventh.

That's the day I woke up.

A Clever Journalist

How cool is this:

"Four paedophiles who were caught after a local newspaper reporter answered an obscene graffiti advert on a train toilet door have been handed lengthy jail terms.

Ruth Lumley, 26, noticed graffiti urging girls between eight and 13 to text a mobile phone number while she was travelling home from work.

Posing as an 11-year-old girl, Miss Lumley who worked on the Chichester Observer in West Sussex at the time, replied to the advert and was sent a series of increasingly sexually explicit messages from a pay-as-you-go mobile phone.

She alerted police and prompted a complex 10-month nationwide investigation that uncovered "horrific" child abuse on eight victims and led detectives to Trevor Haddock, 55, Ian Jones, 43, John Farmer, 68, and Derek Moody, 43.

The four men pleaded guilty to a range of sex offences at Hove Crown Court earlier this month and have now been given jail terms ranging from eight years to life."

Engagement

One of the problems with market research is there are no definitive answers to the question "how do I sell more products?". The number of times I've done a research project knowing the client wants one answer, one silver bullet, something like "change the typeface to green and every business objective will be achieved".

Research is a tool, just like a lipstick brush or a measuring tape.

My dad had a saying "a poor workman blames his tools" which always bugs me when I'm using a really lousy tool. I think "dad, actually there are some tools that make it hard to do a good job" - if he were still alive I'd call him on that.

Research can be inspiring and should boost your confidence. All too often it's used when people are fearful and insecure and don't actually appreciate the process. Recipe for disaster.

I've been reading about the latest Starch research on degree of engagement with press ads.

"The study suggests that ads in high-engagement magazines perform no better than ads in magazines whose readers pay a lot less attention.

That contradicts not just conventional wisdom but the hopes of publishers whose books really grip their readers.

Publishers and media buyers said engagement is more complex than the study acknowledges, but its authors said magazines should welcome the implications.

"When the buzzword of engagement became so big, starting about two years ago, we said, 'Let's really look into this,"' said Philip W. Sawyer, senior VP, Starch Communications Research, which conducted the study -- and which, it should be noted, offers creative-testing services for print ads. "If a magazine wasn't tabbed as a high-engagement publication, it was being discriminated against. Starch has said all along that it's a creative issue. That was our hypothesis." "

You know what? Sometimes it's a creative issue, sometimes the issue is the message being expressed, sometimes it's none of those things. There's no formula but there is intuition plus knowledge.

All of this reminds of that song with the voice over that ends "but trust me on the sunscreen".

Doomed to Repeat it

How bonkers is it to say Democrats are "clean" or "stained" by the recent bribery scandal? The list of wrong doing is pretty even on both sides, always has been.

I'm much more interested in what the DNC are getting up to these days.

From Drudge:

"The Democratic National Committee strongly denies it placed political operatives in the city of New Orleans to work against the reelection efforts of incumbent Democrat Mayor Ray Nagin.

...The DRUDGE REPORT takes chairman Dean and his spokesman at their word."

Less than two weeks ago a Canadian guy repeated the old canard to me: "Americans don't get irony."

Me: "You're right".

Thank You Driver Gig in June

From myspace:

06/04/2006 08:00 AM - The Cricketers
South of the Fairfield, Kingston upon Thames, Surrey, - As part of the Whisper Music nights, We'll be playing in the upstairs hall by candlelight. http://www.whispermusic.com

I'll bet they're not REALLY playing at 8 am on a Sunday, rather 8 pm. It will still be light then, the light evenings are amazing in June.

So if they're playing by candlelight, the curtains will be drawn...

Do you really want to know what I'm thinking?

What I hate:

1. Gross, inappropriate sexist comments like the ones by Alex Pareene at Wonkette, poisoning the blogosphere and giving liberals a bad name. I hope he never writes for Wonkette again. I really hope I never have to read anything he's written ever again in my life, yuck!

2. Young guys who have their mobile phones on and lit up during the main feature at the cinema, including taking calls and chatting to each other. What I don't understand is why they were wearing flowing robes and fez type hats and giggling at all the comments about Mary Magdalene at the Da Vinci Code on Saturday. Why were they so "buzzed" and overtly being provocative? I took a few photos of them and seriously debated texting the terrorist hotline with their photos and seat numbers. Then I realised they weren't there to blow up the Empire Leicester Square, just rude rubes and I thanked God I was born a sophisticated Midwest Episcopalian.

3. People who sit in your seat at art house cinemas. Went to see Enron yesterday and our wonderful pre-assigned seats were already occupied by a couple who were very huffy about being asked to move, saying "there aren't many people here" as if we were supposed to follow their bad example. However, GOOD introduction to one of the themes of the movie - no reason to follow rules and every reason to get other people to go along with your audacity. Picked the wrong girl to try that one on though.

Pelamis Sea

Russell Davies held a competition to rename the North Sea and a French guy working as a planner in London has won - with the name Pelamis Sea.

I'd never heard of the Pelamis wave generator, now I have and it sounds really cool:

"The Pelamis prototype has been operating at the Orkney test centre since August 2004. No major issues of durability or corrosion were found during the staged test programme over the year. The US Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) have given it a positive independent assessment, considering that it's the closest to commercial delivery of current wave energy machines.

...Each Pelamis 'snake' is made of four segments, hinged both horizontally and vertically, to permit sideways and up-and-down movement. Each segment in the P-750 will be similar in size and length to a train carriage. When it's bent and twisted by the waves, pistons force oil through hydraulic chambers connected via valves to give a smoothed flow that drives a dynamo generator.

The Pelamis snake is moored to keep it head-on into the waves. Survivability is vital so the design allows Pelamis to dive through storm waves that are ten times higher than the average waves (100 times more power). Efficiency is quite low, under 10%, but that is not so important when the waves off Atlantic facing coasts carry some 60kW per metre."

Advertising Works

I follow a link to this badly written article from Reuters.

"A simulated suicide bombing will be filmed in downtown Los Angeles this weekend in a campaign by prominent Iraqis who want to dissuade the bombers who have wreaked a devastating toll on their country.

The 60-second edited film, a simulation of a Baghdad marketplace bombing that will kill or injure 200 people, will air on Iraqi TV in six weeks. "

Why isn't this article making it clear that this will be a public information tv commercial? I think it's weird not to be more explicit.

"Los Angeles-based commercial filmmaker 900 Frames will film and produce the staged suicide bombing, showing viewers the time just before, during and after the explosion, in an effort to capture the impact of the act.

A group of scholars, businessmen and activists in Iraq and abroad put up the $1 million in production costs, which includes hiring over 200 mostly local actors."

Nothing about the expected expenditure on air time! I don't know what the cost of spots are on middle eastern tv stations these days but I'd be interested in knowing the projected budget. Spending a million dollars on making the commercial means they expect to spend considerably more on the airtime so why not report it?

Iraqi leaders recently agreed on a national unity government to curb sectarian violence in the country where suicide bombings are an almost daily occurrence. More than 35,000 Iraqi civilians have died since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, hundreds in suicide attacks."

I know the general population doesn't "get" numbers, but I expect more from news sources and that should read thousands or tens of thousands rather than hundreds.

"900 Frames co-founder Drew Plotkin said it was "a tremendous responsibility."

"This is about saving lives," he said. "If we do our job right, it is quite possible this could be the way to stop suicide bombing."

Do Coffee Granules have feelings?

Great post over at Normblog, quoting a book review by Gerard Alexander. The book? Le Livre Noir de Saddam Hussein by Rebecca Weisser. You only need basic French to understand that the translation is "The Black Book of Saddam Hussein".

Whatever could she be writing about? How he loved puppies and changed nappies uncomplainingly?

This bit jumped out at me:

"The soft bigotry here is not of low expectations but of no expectations. This suggests that only Westerners have moral agency."
Norm also writes about the current fatigue in the blogosphere - I've noticed it, you've noticed it, everyone I like who blogs seems to have run out of steam a little bit.

Here's my take on it.

1. My own case - I'm happy these days, really blindingly happy some days. It's kind of enervating though. I can sit happily staring off into space and running happy mental videos over and over.

2. I'm rather complacent since attending the Milblog Conference. Some amazing people are out there, writing well and passionately about the things I care about. They beat me hands down for knowledge and writing ability.

3. The really dumb people just keep doing dumb things and it's gotten boring. Ok this sounds really funny but even the media only hung out for half an hour.

4. I think if you are grumpy and fresh to a subject you have a lot of energy for writing.

When I first started studying Michael Collins, it was subversive and anti-establishment to do so. The Dublin archives were poorly indexed and you could find little treasures without much effort. So many of the best books on the subject were out of print.

Now the only book that is still out of print is the volume of the Treaty Talks - Debate on the Treaty Between Great Britain and Ireland signed in London on the 6th December 1921.

My beaten up, stained copy cost £125/$225 seven years ago. The most dramatic aspect of the treaty talks in my book? No one complained about partition. That's probably why the Irish Government bookstore hasn't republished it, although they did republish the minutes of the proscribed Dail meetings of 1919 to 1921. I've got a pristine copy of that from five years ago.

I started my blog last June - wow, it's been a year now. Did it to let off steam and would leap out of bed in the morning to write what I was thinking or run home from an evening out to write up my thoughts. Blog as lover, or obsession, anyway, probably healthy to get it all out, right?

So here I am, experiencing the lighter side of life, laughing at ridiculous things all the time, filled with 'the joys of spring'.

If the poets are right about that, isn't 'gather ye rosebuds' also relevant too? So I'm off, stormy weather today but ""hope springs eternal" as some would say.

BritDoc 2006

This sounds interesting:

Britdoc 2006. Funded by Channel 4’s British Documentary Film Foundation and Nokia, and set to arrive in Oxford in the last week of July, this festival promises to capture the international non-fiction Zeitgeist as well as reignite home-grown passions for feature documentary making.

Stephen Colbert channels David Brent

John Griffiths calls from the M4. "What did you think of Colbert's speech?". I admit to not having watched it.

He directs me to Russell's post about presentations, "click on the second link and it takes you to a site that has it".

At the site, a blog called presentation zen, I find the post on Colbert but you know, I've been down this road before. Instead I click on the comments and find this gem:

Um, Garr? You don't expect to spur some kind of objective discussion on humor and satire, do you?

I don't think anyone here (including me) can speak to this subject without their political bias interfering. So what you will get is two groups of comments by two groups of commenters: Moonbats & Rethuglicans.

Being solidly in the latter camp, I just gotta say it: "Truthiness to power"? Please. Tell Colbert to speak similarly to Chavez or Zarqawi, and I'll salute his big, brass testicles. Going far beyond roasting to trashing the president at the Correspondents' Dinner requires nothing more profound than a lack of manners.

Thanks John.

Baghdad ER

hmmm, over at Toni's blog, I learn about an hbo documentary, Baghdad ER.

From the hbo documentary website:

The documentary offers a taste of daily life in the thick of war, including exclusive frontline rescue footage of the 54th Medical Company Air Ambulance Team, and dangerous missions of soldiers patrolling "IED Alley," also known as "Route Irish," the most dangerous road in the world. IEDs (improvised explosive devices) are homemade bombs, which are the leading cause of injuries and death in Iraq. Sometimes graphic in its depiction of combat-related wounds, BAGHDAD ER is an emotional, devastating and honest account of modern-day war.

Uh oh, "honest account of modern-day war" - let me guess, it's not moonbeams, fairy tales and daisy picking?

When I attended the Milblog conference last month, I stood outside Walter Reed with a ton of other people on the Friday night in torrential rain. No raincoat, umbrella or hat, just a quickly sodden NY Daily News for cover. A baseball cap was plunked on my head by a manly, very young guy and we got chatting. He was a recovering soldier from the hospital who came out to see who was supporting the troops and also to walk down the road and have a laugh at the Code Pink plonkers.

"What's wrong with you, you seem perfectly healthy to me!" Just occasionally I make really really stupid comments. He explained his substantial injuries and said "if you watch me I don't walk well at all." I didn't get his name but he was lovely and dear and walked just fine.

His First Car will be a Toyota Corolla

Charming story via Drudge about some young teenagers in LA who film exotic sports cars that they spot driving around Beverly Hills and the west side.

"For the Dobrofskys, the most striking thing about their sons' pursuit is how few people seem concerned when they see a group of boys running down the street with cameras in hand.Some passersby seem to write them off as paparazzi chasing a starlet.

And for the most part, the exotic-car owners seem more flattered than annoyed by the attention."It's like an endorsement of their purchase in a way," Neal said.

The crew now has footage of hundreds of exotic automobiles — some parked at a meter, others peeling out on a city street. After each excursion, they return to Spyder's bedroom — which is covered in posters of professional basketball and baseball players — and edit their moving images and maybe add a song over it by a group like Limp Bizkit.

They had been sending the clips to car-spotting websites, but they've been keeping their work for themselves of late for their own website."

I got a bit nostalgic for the Souplantation as I read the story. But the Prada shop in Florence is nicer that the one on North Rodeo.

John Griffiths starts blogging - finally!

Three people inspired me to blog, John Griffiths is one of them. He started a website called "planning above and beyond" five years ago and I remember thinking how incredibly brave - and foolish - he was to do so.

Now I'm a believer.

And John is "properly" blogging, started a few weeks ago.

Welcome to the blogging universe John. You know it was inevitable!

The Good news is no one watches CNN

CNN has very low audience figures - you can check cynopsis.com - it's a long standing trend.

I have no idea why US airports show CNN but I have learned to tune out all the ambient noise when travelling.

So CNN sneaks in and broadcasts footage of the president warming up before his speech. Please tell me again how CNN isn't at all biassed, because I love laughing.

I only have time to read Drudge in the morning. Takes a minute or two and tells you what you REALLY need to know.

Poor Brand Recall

There's an interesting survey, conducted by Bolt Media, reported by Ad Age, that says only 25% of American 12 to 34 year olds:

"...can name all four major broadcast networks: ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox.

The finding comes via an online poll conducted by Bolt Media, a 10-year-old Web site that six weeks ago relaunched itself as a place for users to upload videos and photos. About 400 members responded to the questions, including one that asked how respondents spent their free time.

The most popular activity? That would be surfing the Internet, which 84% said they did during their idle periods. Hanging out with friends came in second at 76%, watching movies third at 71% and TV viewing fourth at 69%. The five most-watched TV networks were Fox, Comedy Central, ABC, MTV and Cartoon Network."

What, no one claimed to play computer games? This is a very odd survey.

Clinton's High Approval Ratings

Three weeks ago I was in DC and walked a million miles around the centre of town.

I stopped to look at the White House but didn't think deeply about the interesting occupants.

I didn't spend much time imagining the early April evening in 1865 when Abraham Lincoln stepped out onto the lawn of his home and chatted vigorously with the joyous crowd milling around. They would have been full of happiness at the end of the civil war as well as enlivened by the soft spring air and lighter evenings. He would have been enjoying the last Sunday night of his life.

Lincoln was shot dead at the theatre a few short blocks away on Good Friday the 14th April. The basement museum of the Ford Theatre has the pistol used, not much bigger that an ipod.

No, all I could think was "so that's where Clinton got up to no good with Monica".

Clinton had very high approval ratings, especially in 1998!

Here's a little list of the uniqueness of ex-President Clinton (thanks Liz):

- The only president ever impeached on grounds of personal malfeasance
- Most number of convictions and guilty pleas by friends and associates
- Most number of cabinet officials to come under criminal investigation
- Most number of witnesses to flee country or refuse to testify
- Most number of witnesses to die suddenly
- First president sued for sexual harassment.
- First president accused of rape.
- First first lady to come under criminal investigation
- Largest criminal plea agreement in an illegal campaign contribution case
- First president to establish a legal defense fund.
- First president to be held in contempt of court
- Greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions
- Greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions from abroad
- First president disbarred from the US Supreme Court and a state court

No you shouldn't have

Emily, one of the funniest bloggers around is slightly, ahem, miffed about the movie Munich.

"I knew I shouldn't have watched Munich, but I just did."

"...Munich is not a film about events, but false ideals. It asks what I consider to be all the wrong questions while refusing to assign evil, no matter how blatant it may be. It implies that fighting against those that would destroy us because our tradition offends their own only makes our enemies more determined, largely suggesting that we should let those who believe Jews should be driven into the sea and Israel wiped off the map roll right over us because they're mad about history that noone can change."

Her whole riff is really interesting and of course, there are some very funny bits, especially her ironic use of the word fuck.

Terrorists Jailed for 12 Years Each

Excellent news in the Times this morning.

Unfortunately, the article must have been written too quickly to use precise language.

THREE animal rights extremists were jailed for twelve years each yesterday for waging a six-year hate campaign that included the desecration of a grandmother’s grave.

They took the body and left the jaw bone behind!

Jon Ablewhite, John Smith and Kerry Whitburn admitted their leading roles in intimidating and attacking the owners of Darley Oaks guinea-pig farm in Staffordshire only two weeks before they were due to stand trial.

Intimidating? Threatening! Stalking and Terrorising! These guys are the animals.

I know it's kind of contrary of me, but if guys like these are against animal testing, I'm for it.

"...blackmail the family...Mayo was caught on closed circuit television buying a petrol can that was used to make an explosive device left at the home of Mr Hall’s daughter...Documentation stolen in a burglary at the farm in 1999 was found in Ablewhite’s home and his computer had an image of Miss Hall’s home...A manual typewriter, stencil, handwriting linked with abusive letters and photocopies of an anatomy book showing a skull with its jawbone removed, were found at Whitburn’s house...Hundreds of letters were sent to victims including the Halls’ cleaner, May Hudson, threatening to dig up her recently deceased husband...When Mr Hall’s mother died, a card was sent saying: “One down, seven to go.”

Let's be very clear what we're dealing with here:

Letters offered to reveal where the body was (of the jawbone-less grandmother's body) if trading stopped, but the location was not revealed even when the farm closed in January.

Surprised? Of course not, it was never about animal testing.

The police bill for protecting the farm and surrounding community and investigating the threats and attacks reached more than £3 million.

Setting a Good Example in 1593

I found a link at Chapomatic to an interesting article:

"Modernizing the Muslim world. The following is an edited transcript of Bernard Lewis's talk at the Grano lecture series last Tuesday on the role of women in the Middle East. "

Here are a few highlights:

"I would like to begin with two quotations from the very rich Muslim literature commenting on these changes. My first comes from 1593. This is recorded by an imperial historiographer. A new English ambassador arrived in Istanbul sent by Queen Elizabeth. The first thing the historiographer commented on was the ship on which the ambassador arrived. He writes with obvious bewilderment, "This is a ship that travels thousands of miles and carries 83 guns, besides other weapons." English ships were built for the Atlantic, and they are therefore bigger, stronger and more manoeuvrable than the Mediterranean ships of the Muslim world. "



His other point is even more astonishing, and he says with palpable bewilderment, "This ambassador comes from a country which is ruled by a woman who rules her inherited realm with complete power." He doesn't draw any inferences from that, nor did anyone else for some time to come.













There was an article in the Sunday Times magazine this past Sunday 7 May 2006 with a list of statistics, not provided in the internet article so I'll have to type them out.

Muslim Factfile - from Annual Population Survey 2004 ONS, 2001 Census, ONS, Annual School Census 2004, ONS - although most recent, some of these statistics will have been effected by September 11th and last year's July tube bombings on the 7th.

Housing and Households:
- Muslim and Buddist Households are the least likely to be homeowners
- Muslim households are the most likely to be living in social rented accommodation - rented from a council or housing association (American version: projects)
- 32% of Muslim households were living in overcrowded accommodation in 2001

Education:
- In 2004 a third (33%) of Muslims of working age in Great Britain had no qualifications - the highest proportion of any group (I'd love to see this broken out by male/female)
- Muslims and Sikhs born in the UK are more likely than those born elsewhere to have a degree or equivalent qualification

Employment:
- In 2004, Muslims had the highest male-unemployment rate in Great Britain at 13%, about three times the rate for Christian men (4%)
...among older men of working age, Muslims also tended to have the highest levels of inactivity, largely owing to ill health
- The unemployment rate for Muslim women in 2004 at 18% was about four times the rate for Christian and Jewish women (4% in each case)
- In 2004, nearly 7 in 10 (70%!!) Muslim women of working age were economically inactive, compared with 4 in 10 women of working age in other groups

Health and Disability
- Muslims in Great Britain has the highest rates of reported ill health in 2001 (figure not given)
- Muslims also had the highest rates of disability
- Almost a quarter of Muslim females (24%) had a disability, as did 1 in 5 Muslim males (21%)

There are about 2 million Muslims in Great Britain, or just a tiny minority of 3% but it is interesting to see the details broken out like this. Wonder why the Sunday Times didn't include this page of the magazine in its on-line version?

Drowning in Willful Stupidity

"Sigh. These people aren't just in denial, they are drowning in the deepest, darkest part of de-ocean of willful and spiteful stupidity."

Dr. Sanity IS the voice of reason.

I'm boggling over the latest story of failing classroom standards.

An elementary school teacher who takes the piss out of the US president in front of class (and that's not a requirement in the employment contract so do the parents get a refund for the length of time teaching wasn't going on? just asking!) later explains to one of the little kids (who probably looked ascance) that it was their "First Amendment right to say they don't like Bush".

???

First amendment rights don't apply 24/7. What if you're at a classical music concert and this particular fairly odd teacher wanders in during the quiet, moving bit and comes over all "I need to tell everyone in this auditorium right now that I don't like Bush".

First amendment rights don't apply when the commentary coming out is inappropriate. Will this elementary school teacher deem it necessary to tell these little kids about their sex life in explicit detail one lazy, rainy afternoon? God, I hope not.

You know, clever and irritated friend who shall remain nameless, I read your email and words jumped out...civility, respect and I think -

and BULLYING.

The Bush hating crowd are intolerant of dissenting views which, ok, demonstrates a lack of intellectual ability sure, but also is vehement and violent and smacks of bullying. Bullying should not be allowed in the classroom.

Especially if the bully is the bloody teacher!

I'm so so tired of intolerant, fascist Bush haters and I'm glad the US newspapers and tv news programmes that disseminate their brand of rubbish are hemorrhaging readership and audience.

And that slight increase (0.5%) in readership for the NYTimes over the past 6 months - I don't believe it covers paid circulation at all! Just saying, after all it's my First Amendment right.

Household Hints

Bounce is the brand name of those scented laundry sheets you put in the dryer with wet laundry. I think it's called Bounce in England too but I'm not sure as I don't buy things like that here. I buy Snuggle when I'm home. I've got boxes and boxes of Snuggle.

Toni, a great girl I met at the milblog conference in DC, has a post that explains just how useful that product can be:

"Postal service sent out a Message to all letter carriers to put a sheet of Bounce in their uniform Pockets to keep yellow-jackets away. Use them all the time when playing baseball and soccer. I use it when I am working outside. It really works. The yellow jackets just veer around you. All this time you've just been putting Bounce in the dryer! It Will chase ants away when you lay a sheet near them. It also repels mice."

She lists 20 other uses. I knew about tv screens and suitcases but didn't know about sneakers and showers. We don't really have bug problems in London. I don't have screens on my windows and they're open wide from May to October. Occasionally a wasp gets in but it's easily waved out again. Still, I'll try this at home, see if it really does repel bees and mosquitos.

Final note: Toni was the voice of reason in the Spy Museum shop and kept me from buying some very silly bags and pens. However, I do wish I'd got the stamp that said "this document does not exist" - I don't know what I'd use it for but thinking about it cracks me up.

WKPA - Smart Move

According to Ad Age, Warren Kremer Paino Advertising, or WKPA, has dropped its lawsuit against Lance Dutson.

An Immigrant from New York

Sometimes newspapers you would never read have great writing. The internet solves that.

Edited hightlights:

No, friend. I am from an island off the coast of the U.S. called Manhattan.

I came, like so many before me, for opportunity. The opportunity to be represented by either the United Talent Agency or CAA in my quest to negotiate a deal with NBC for a pilot I have written called, tentatively, "My Nana Was a Stripper."Will I succeed? Who is to say?

I know only that I will work hard and live simply, in the Four Seasons on Doheny, for as long as it takes to get a meeting or until I get in at Shutters.

According to my kick boxing teacher, one should not eat within four hours of going to sleep. So early dinner, as practiced in LA, is the healthiest choice.

Slowly, painfully, I have taught myself your language, your customs, your culture and casual manner of dress — so different from where I am from. Simple things, such as: "Let us meet for dinner at 6:30." In my country we would laugh at you, as this is a very early time to eat.

Junebug

The good: Amy's dear, Ben's gorgeous, the sound was brilliant - quiet and real.
The bad: the characters - (James you've cracked it) "implausible" - the word of the evening

Michelle Malkin profiled by Norm

Here it is, and it's good, too. For "most treasured possession" she lists three:

What is your most treasured possession? > Several. (1) Two kind, brief personal notes from the late journalists Eric Breindel and Michael Kelly, complimenting my newspaper columns. (2) A signed limited edition of milblogger and war photographer Michael Yon's famous photo of US Maj. Mark Bieger cradling a child killed in Iraq by a suicide bomber in May 2005. (3) A beautiful medallion, inscribed 'United in Memory: September 11, 2001' on one side and depicting the Pentagon with a large American flag on the other, given to me by Debra Burlingame, sister of Charles F. 'Chic' Burlingame III, the pilot of American Airlines flight 77, which was crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11.

I've got that photo too. When I showed it at my debating society one night this past February, a few people recoiled as if it had the power to burn them. Which is quite right, that photo has amazing power.

Keeping Alert

Last night I met my beautiful neighbour Natalie at Charing Cross train station. She was a little late but we still made our train.

Natalie: "I was walking through Piccadilly Circus a minute ago and there was a piece of lugguge just sitting there beside an entrance to the tube, all on it's own! and everyone was walking past it, just ignoring it! It wasn't scruffy like the kind homeless people have and there was no one near it and I just couldn't believe that everyone was ignoring it. I called the Terrorist Hotline to report it."

Me: "You have the terrorist hotline programmed into your mobile? So do I!"

Natalie: "Of course I do, I wouldn't want to go through 999."

We attended the 30th birthday party of Jenny, who had wisely chosen a hot sunny evening to have her party on the roof of a house in Greenwich, looking out at the flag bestrewn masts of the Cutty Sark, the Royal Naval College domes, the park grounds and flower beds of Greenwich, the incredible London sky line and the gray military plane that circled Canary Wharf all night.

Programme this into your mobile right now. I've called them a few times. You get a sharp, intelligent person who doesn't have any sneerey "tone" and I'm sure 99% of calls are false alarms.

Terrorist Line - 0800 789321

Killer Quiz

I got three wrong! I think that sucks! Here, you try it.

Movie Statistics

From Cynopsis.com, source: Box Office Mojo, weekend box office estimates:

RV $16.4 million
United 93 $11.6 million - opening weekend
Stick It $11.2 million - opening weekend
Silent Hill $9.3 million
Scary Movie 4 $7.8 million

Details for Friday 28th to Monday 1st ticket sales for movies in the States are here (via Drudge).

UNITED 93 1,795
$3,688,725-- / $2,055$3,688,725 / 1
$4,792,65029.9% / $2,670$8,481,375 / 2
$2,996,985-37.5% / $1,670$11,478,360 / 3
$969,225-67.7% / $540$12,447,585 / 4

RV 3,639
$4,599,523-- / $1,264$4,599,523 / 1
$7,366,48260.2% / $2,024$11,966,005 / 2
$4,448,762-39.6% / $1,223$16,414,767 / 3
$888,385-80% / $244$17,303,152 / 4
3
SILENT HILL 2,932
$2,985,549177.4% / $1,018$27,916,612 / 8
$3,945,45132.2% / $1,346$31,862,063 / 9
$2,405,399-39% / $820$34,267,462 / 10
$744,574-69% / $254$35,012,036 / 11
4
THE SENTINEL 2,851
$2,254,636168.8% / $791$20,195,976 / 8
$3,644,75561.7% / $1,278$23,840,731 / 9
$1,887,817-48.2% / $662$25,728,548 / 10
$524,198-72.2% / $184$26,252,746 / 11
5
SCARY MOVIE 4 3,418
$2,418,660255.2% / $708$72,781,811 / 15
$3,538,94046.3% / $1,035$76,320,751 / 16
$1,847,968-47.8% / $541$78,168,719 / 17
$467,129-74.7% / $137$78,635,848 / 18
6
STICK IT 2,038
$4,103,342-- / $2,013$4,103,342 / 1
$4,442,3348.3% / $2,180$8,545,676 / 2
$2,257,934-49.2% / $1,108$10,803,610 / 3
$462,014-79.5% / $227$11,265,624 / 4


The first figure after the movie title is the number of screens the movie was shown on.

The figure in red is the average amount taken per screen that day.

United 93 beat every other movie shown this weekend, every day, in terms of amount taken per screen.

Ad Agency Sues Blogger

WKPA - drop your suit as fast as you can, fire the lawyers who told you it was a good idea and read 'The Terrible Truth about Lawyers" by Mark McCormack immediately.

A blogger posting his opinions about Maine Tourism advertising is entitled to his opinions, whether he's posting them on the internet, standing on a soap box on a street corner or speaking for five minutes at a free speech society evening.

I have posted my opinions of the stock holders of the Tribune Company (LATimes), NYTimes and Auto Trader (UK Guardian/Guardian Media). I was cross for many years about the tax that paid for the BBC (no longer, will write up my change in thinking at another time) so when I read that a blogger is taking an advertising agency to task I say - every single week in Campaign Magazine there are zillions of articles taking advertising agencies to task - after all, there are some awful ads out there.

Here are edited highlights from the Ad Age article:

An ad agency that specialized in travel advertising is suing a Maine-based blogger for defamation after he began to post regularly about the work the agency was doing for its client, the state of Maine.

Maine's tourism advertising is the issue in a battle between blogger Lance Dutton and the Warren Kremer Paino agency.

Warren Kremer Paino Advertising, New York, filed suit April 14 against Lance Dutson for copyright infringement, defamation and trade libel and injurious falsehood. Mr. Dutson, a freelance Web designer who also does Internet advertising, says he became critical of the Maine Office of Tourism in October 2005 when he learned the office had bid for broad search terms that bumped into the interests of his clients. He also argued the Internet-advertising strategy was misguided because he said the office bid on general geographic terms such as the names of cities in Maine. Therefore, potential tourists must already be interested in the state to be led to the state's tourism Web site, he said. 'Pissing away tax money'

According to Mr. Dutson's blog, the tourism office had tried to respond to his concerns. But in February, Mr. Dutson learned of WKPA's involvement and expanded his criticism to the agency, including a reference to it as "some big company in New York with no ties to the state, pissing away tax money." (See more of Mr. Dutson's posts and a copy of the lawsuit at mainewebreport.com.)

Tom McCartin, president of WKPA, is most concerned about Mr. Dutson's public posts because if potential clients search for the agency online, they will likely see Mr. Dutson's critique-filled blog before the agency's own Web site.

"At this point, after seeing this reaction, my hope is that the platform for an open and progressive debate about how Maine acts as a steward toward its most important industry would come to the surface," Mr. Dutson said. The litigation is now getting widespread attention from multiple blogs and The Boston Globe. The Media Bloggers Association has even jumped in with its support of Mr. Dutson. The issue is getting more notoriety because of the suit than the blog could have conjured alone, said Steve Rubel, blogger and senior VP of Edelman's Me2Revolution group. hurting his office's image.

The article includes advice from Steve Rubel on what the WKPA advertising agency should do now. I like the last point "blog back".

Actions Extraordinary

Just lately I've taken in so much information that I'm overwhelmed. I follow the British way - sitting on the fence and waiting. Waiting for my mind to clear and for the most important facts to rise and shake me into action.

The girl responsible for inspiring me to blog has sent me two articles and no note about slacking.

One by a New Yorker who has gone to see the United Flight 93 movie. Here are a few hightlights:

"...I'm not sure anymore about the final count, but I am pretty sure that most families, in the end, got nothing. Their loved ones had all gone into the smoke and the dust that covered the end of the island and blew, mostly, across the river into Brooklyn where I lived. What happened to most of the three thousand killed by the animals on that day? It is simple and ghastly. We breathed them until the rains came and washed clean what would never be clean again."


"...United 93," from the first frame to the last, simply and clearly lets you see what happened high in the air on that day. It is, as the phrase on the poster says, "The plane that did not reach its target." Instead, it reached something unintended and much higher. It became and will remain a legend; an integral part of the tapestry of the American myth from which we all draw what strength remains to us, and, in the future, will surely need to draw upon even more deeply. Like the best of our legends, it arises out of our ordinary people doing extraordinary things.


"...In a film of brief but telling moments, there's one moment towards the end where you see one man reach down and remove his seatbelt. In that moment you can sense that he goes from being a passive victim to a man who has decided to stand up and engage the evil that has taken control of his life; to take the controls back from thugs and the cut-throats and the mumbling fanatics of a wretched and burnt-out god."

"That man, like the firemen who went up the stairs, and his fellow passengers who attacked up the aisle in those last moments, became, in the end, one of the Americans who decided on that day and the days that followed, to stand up. Soon after, that man and all the others on United 93 went into the smoke of that fire in the field.

"United 93" is a simply told, near-documentary look at how that fire in the field came to be. As I said above, the film has no message, but if you -- as I finally did -- choose to go, it will pose you a question: What would you do, an ordinary person in an extraordinary moment when life and death, good and evil, were as clear as the skies over America on September 11? Will you, as so many of our fellow citizens yearn to do these days, stay seated? Or will you stand up?
On one of our days to come, there will be another test. You'd best have an answer prepared."

The second article she's sent me is by Todd Beamer's Dad and appeared in the Wall Street Journal. It's about "The day that our nation was attacked; the day when the war came home--September 11, 2001. The day our son Todd boarded United 93."

"...this film reminds us that this war is personal. This enemy is on a fanatical mission to take away our lives and liberty..."

"...their methods are inhumane and their targets are the innocent and unsuspecting...this enemy does not seek our resources, our land or our materials, but rather to alter our very way of life."

"...Resolve to give thanks and support to those men, women, leaders and commanders who to this day (1,687 DAYS since Sept. 11, 2001) continue the counterattacks on our enemy and in so doing keep us safe and our freedom intact."

It's been more than a week since I attended the first ever military blogger's conference in Washington DC. The group of people I met were inspiring, intelligent and attractive and I've felt calm and - yes - a bit complacent since then. We are in good hands with that lot. But there is still a public relations job to do and bloggers play such an important role in knocking and outing the biased frauds running the left wing media. Although I know I can leave it in much more capable hands, my contribution still has a role to play, if only in adding to the amazing and growing statistics. Rock on.