May 31, 2004
Amnesty Report Accuses US of Eroding Human Rights
LONDON -- In a strongly worded condemnation of U.S. policy, the human-rights group Amnesty International said Wednesday that the war in Iraq and the fight against terrorism have contributed to the most sustained attack on human rights and international humanitarian law in 50 years.
The organization also criticized groups such as Al Qaeda and said attacks on civilians and institutions such as the International Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations represent a "significant new threat to international justice."
But in its Amnesty International Report 2004, the group said practices such as holding prisoners without charge or trial and the physical abuses of Iraqis that have been reported over the past month have marginalized or destroyed basic principles of international law.
"Governments are losing their moral compass, sacrificing the global values of human rights in a blind pursuit of security," said the group's executive director, Irene Khan.
Responding, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, "The United States of America is a leading advocate of protecting human rights and we will continue to be."
Khan acknowledged that governments have a right to protect their citizens but said policies enacted by the Bush administration have been counterproductive because they encourage other groups to violate human rights and because they divert attention from violations that have long existed in places such as Chechnya, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and Nepal.
"The global security agenda promoted by the U.S. administration is bankrupt of vision and bereft of principle," Khan said. "Violating rights at home, turning a blind eye to abuses abroad and using pre-emptive military force where and when it chooses has damaged justice and freedom and made the world a more dangerous place."
The 339-page report notes the abuses of prisoners at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and alleges violations of prisoner rights elsewhere in Iraq, at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, and in Afghanistan.
Beyond the cases of possible homicide and physical abuse, Khan said that by holding prisoners without charge, trial, access to lawyers or protections of the Geneva Conventions, "governments endanger the rights of those who are innocent and put us all at risk."
#
Cakewalk to Baghdad
Now moms and dads don't worry 'bout
Your soldier boys and girls
We're just sending them cakewalkin'
'Round the world
When the coffins come home and the flag unfurls
Cheer for Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Perle
link to lyrics and song(?) by Country Joe & the Fish
Chicago Alderman Wants to Ban Camera Stalking
CHICAGO -- A Chicago alderman wants to ban what he calls "camera stalking" anywhere in Chicago.
Alderman Edward Burke says his proposal is inspired by the video shadowing of Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Barack Obama.
Obama's Republican opponent -- Jack Ryan -- has sent an employee to follow Obama and videotape him.
Burke says he introduced his ordinance because he's outraged by the situation, which he calls a low point in the democratic process.
But Obama says he doesn't think a law is necessary. He says people in public places are fair game for photographers. And he adds that if someone is being harassed, that person can probably get a restraining order.
entry below w/comment
---Given the illustriously corrupt history of Chicago ward politics its easy to understand why an alderman would sponsor an ordinance restricting camera use.
The people of Iraq will forgive US-led occupying forces for the Abu Ghraib prison scandal
says Brig Gen Mark Kimmitt. It is unknown what the people of Iraq think about this. I'm sort of tempted to think that the denial of, for example, the bombing of what looks like a wedding party, will not impress people. And I'm also tempted to think that "open and honest" are not exactly the words that people have in mind when thinking about an occupation that resulted out of an illegal war, launched through a barrage of lies. But as usual, that general wasn't talking to Iraqis. It was for US domestic consumption.
May 30, 2004
No Crueler Tyrannies
"On the morning of April 30, the day Gerald Amirault was released from Bay State Correctional Facility after 18 years of imprisonment on charges that he had sexually assaulted and tortured children, Middlesex County District Attorney Martha Coakley gave press interviews announcing that the most important thing to keep in mind about this case was that it had been valid, the convictions just; and that the children had told the truth. Some days earlier, the district attorney had also made known her decision not to file a petition seeking to keep Gerald Amirault imprisoned on the grounds that he was a sexually dangerous person. She had come to this decision, she explained, because she had insufficient evidence of such a charge.
...The prospect of entering a Massachusetts courtroom today, with the testimony about magic rooms, bad clowns, animal butchery and the rest, that the original prosecutor, then-District Attorney Scott Harshbarger, offered as evidence against Gerald and his sister and mother in the 1980s, must have been blood-chilling. All things considered, it wasn't surprising that Ms. Coakley should have decided it would be best to tie things up with the standard professions of faith--one last claim that the children had not lied, one final assertion that the Amiraults had been justly convicted--and let it all go."
article BY DOROTHY RABINOWITZ via: News of the Weird
---Could the citizens of America and their duly appointed authorities use the criminal justice system as an instrument of mass hysteria? Don't look too close or you might begin seeing patterns of institutionalized scapegoating. The abuses at Abu Ghraib didn't come out of nowhere.
I'm perplexed at how willingly Americans believe that government is corrupt; that it takes their hard earned dollars through taxes to fund lord-knows-what crazy, inefficient, immoral, pork-barrel projects and agencies. Yet when it comes to the police, courts and the military, none of that skepticism (hatred) or libertarian-fashioned monetary concern applies. (Except for the pot smokers.) As I wrote once before, state & local governments can barely keep the schools ('for the children!') open and have a more difficult time keeping their ever increasing family members off government payrolls. However when it comes to the arrest, trial and conviction of 'criminals', government employees, otherwise known as police, DA's & judges are above reproach, all "Solomon's", models of inspired judicial power and fairness?
Fun in the Great Outdoors/ Fun With Photoshop
Short Duration Natural Event
---Because of the flooded quarry, absence of wind, insomnia and whoever left the gate open, I was able to take this photo. There was about ten minutes where things looked interesting, before the sun and wind did their usual two-step on this lake. I can't tell you or show you what was so interesting, but I knew when it was over.
Are there many 'indeterminate short duration natural events' like this? Should I be paying more attention? How would I do that?
--Here's the photo above filtered a few different basic ways:
#1/ #2/ #3/ #4
Speed-Box Cam
NUERBURGRING, Germany (Reuters) - Formula One cars could be outpaced by a television camera at the start of Sunday's European Grand Prix.
``It's the fastest camera the world has ever seen,'' said Willy Knupp, coordinator for production and race communication at Germany's top-rated RTL network.
``The camera can accelerate even faster than the cars at the start and so the trick will be throttling the camera speed so that it moves forward at the same pace as the cars.
The camera will run on rails parallel to the track for the first 328 yards of Sunday's race, accelerating from zero to 60 mph in 2.4 seconds.
RTL said the camera can hit a top speed of 88 mph and is confident it will give viewers an unprecedented bird's eye view of the start.
`The other hard part will be slowing the camera down again so it doesn't fly off the end of its track,'' Knupp added. ``We've got a hydraulic brake and are practicing bringing down the speed gradually.''
Weighing about 12 pounds, the ``box-cam'' will also follow cars entering and exiting the pit lane.
item thanks, jason.
---My yo-yo-cam is still in it's concept stage.
Pat Tillman Killed by Friendly Fire
Tillman walked away from a $3.6 million NFL contract to join the Army after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Previous military statements suggested he was killed April 22 under enemy fire.
When Tillman was awarded the Silver Star, the Army said he was killed after his platoon was split into two sections for what officials called a ground assault convoy. Tillman was in charge of the lead group.
His group was safely out of the area when the trailing group came under mortar and small arms fire, according to the Army, and he ordered them to return.
"Through the firing, Tillman's voice was heard issuing fire commands to take the fight to the enemy on the dominating high ground," the award announcement said. "Only after his team engaged the well-armed enemy did it appear their fires diminished.
"As a result of his leadership and his team's efforts, the platoon trail section was able to maneuver through the ambush to positions of safety without a single casualty," the announcement said.
An Afghan military official told the AP on Saturday that Tillman died because of a "misunderstanding" when two mixed groups of American and Afghan soldiers began firing wildly in the confusion following an explosion.
story
---The Afghan official's statement suggests there's was no enemy present at all? That a single mortar round or an explosion of some sort (a mine going off by itself?) caused the two groups to fire on each other? Or that the mortar round/explosion caused the second group (the one closer to the noise) to open fire and Tillman, hearing an explosion followed by small arms fire, (do Afghans still prefer Russian weapons? Do Russian weapons sound different than GI?) thinking there was an ambush, went back with his group and they in turn were mistaken for the enemy? Perhaps if Tillman exercised less leadership...? This announcement doesn't mean Tillman's any less dead but it does make Rall's cartoon (here) a bit more poignant.
May 29, 2004
Crowds
Before the beginning of great brilliance, there must be chaos. Before a brilliant person begins something great, they must look foolish in the crowd. --From the I Ching
Backlash Greets Rules Allowing Pesticides, Drugs in Organic Farming
With a weakening of the standards, ''consumers and farmers could lose confidence in the USDA label,'' said Pam Riesgraf, who owns a 60-cow organic dairy farm in Jordan, Minn,
story
---"Organic" does not mean pesticide and/or drug free. While "Pesticide Free" does not mean drug free. How simple can it be? I wonder if there is a USDA certified classification for "Pesticide Free"? How about "Pesticide & Drug Free"? Steroid Free?
Roeper Does Gore
"There was a time when the final gatekeepers of news content were the editors of newspapers and the news directors at television stations. They'd decide what was fit for public consumption.
The photos that were considered too tasteless, too shocking, too graphic, too intrusive, too salacious? We showed them to one another, in the newsroom, or in somebody's office. Like cops and emergency room nurses, journalists like to think they can handle stuff that would cause the average "civilian" to get sick or pass out.
Go to rotten.com, and you'll find "photographs and news about violent fatalities, murder, suicide and bizarre events."
Go to celebritymorgue.com for "autopsy and death scene photographs of several celebrities."
Go to cadaver.org to peruse a collection of "vintage, decapitated and medical corpse photographs."
There's a site, I kid you not, called "Send Me Your Wound." You send them -- well, you get it.
Another site is like a Letterman bit gone mad: "Meat or Accident." Visitors guess whether they're looking at "an edible meat product or a violent accident victim."
article
Torture in the USA: Cops Accused of Torture May Take Fifth
(Attorney Flint) Taylor... devised 25 questions for Burge and Sgt. John Byrne, who is also accused in (former Death Row inmate Aaron) Patterson's lawsuit. The questions pointedly ask whether they took part in or supervised interrogation tactics such as earcupping, kicking or beating suspects with a flashlight, threatening them with guns or placing bags over their heads. The questions pertain to Patterson and at least 15 others suspects.
Taylor also on Wednesday questioned whether the city should represent Burge in criminal proceedings. Even though Burge was fired, Chicago is required to pay the legal bill in civil cases in which employees are accused of wrongdoing in the act of their jobs...
story / remarks
Wartime Wireless Worries Pentagon
"...the Pentagon is telling commanders in the field to strictly monitor the use of consumer wireless technology through Directive 8100.2...(which) tells all soldiers, contractors and visitors to Defense Department facilities that they can only carry wireless devices that conform to the military's security standards. These specify that the devices use strong authentication and encryption technologies whenever possible. In addition, the devices cannot be used for storing or transmitting classified information. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz signed it in April after two years of internal debate.
(Department of Defense spokesman Lt. Col. Ken) McClellan said commanders in the field haven't been told to use the directive to stamp out the use of the gadgets in Iraq. Instead, the directive is "general guidance" passed "along to the theater commanders, and they decide how to implement it in their own commands." ..
story via/archived Politech
---Contrary to popular belief, Rumsfeld & the DOD are not banning camera phones in the military. Theatre commanders will decide how to implement the "general guidance" of this new directive. The liberal media would have us think that since Abu Ghraib's 'bad apples', soldiers everywhere in Iraq are forbidden from using cameras. Can you appreciate the difference?
Can you also see that in the future taking photos and/or using wireless devices that don't conform to military security standards may, depending on theatre commanders directives', be tantamount to spying? It's interesting how legitimate security concerns become a means to stop the free flow of information.
It can't get any more pathetic than this
This is priceless: Christopher Hitchens, useful idiot of the Bushies, defends Ahmad Chalabi, the guy who duped the US into war and who might have spied for Iran. Maybe some of his critics are right who noted that Christopher Hitchens might have had way too much alcohol.
May 28, 2004
Follow Torture Trail at Abu Ghraib
"The actual interrogators accused of encouraging U.S. troops to abuse Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib jail were working for at least one company with extensive military and commercial contacts with Israel. The head of an American company whose personnel are implicated in the Iraqi tortures, it now turns out, attended an "anti-terror" training camp in Israel and, earlier this year, was presented with an award by Shaul Mofaz, the right-wing Israeli defense minister.
According to J.P. London's company, CACI International, the visit of London -- sponsored by an Israeli lobby group and including U.S. congressmen and other defense contractors -- was "to promote opportunities for strategic partnerships and joint ventures between U.S. and Israeli defense and homeland security agencies."
The Pentagon and the occupation powers in Iraq insist that only U.S. citizens have been allowed to question prisoners in Abu Ghraib but this takes no account of Americans who may also hold double citizenship...
article by Robert Fisk
---As time passes Iraq looks more & more like "America's Own Private Israel", a gift from the neocons, oil men and the Christian right to the Pentagon, government contractors and legislators' stock portfolios. A gift that won't stop giving in our lifetimes.
Can bin Laden Save Bush?
"If you believe that bin Laden would like to sweep Bush from power, then you would have to wonder if an act of violence on U.S. soil would produce that. However if you are concerned that Baghdad is bin Laden's trap for Bush, then you might wonder if another attack on U.S. soil might better serve bin Laden's interest. It would, in greater likelihood, keep Bush in power and the U.S. Army in Baghdad. If that, in fact, is what bin Laden wants, then this could be a very dangerous summer indeed."
article by Marc Ash
Base Station Data
----Here at Spitting Image I've collected many news stories on sensors. I'm hoping sensor technology will show us new ways to appreciate our surroundings, document natural events of which we have little if any comprehension and create exciting representations (images!) of phenomena yet to be measured or discovered. ('Pictures ' of occurrences we can't even imagine!)
(In Norway) the Glacsweb project is "using "Subglacial Probes" beneath a glacier, communicating to the surface via radio links. They contain various sensors and their position and orientation is sensed by the surface system. This is the first time wireless probes have been put inside glaciers and it involves many challenges. The systems must feed data back to a server in the UK and contend with communication loss, power loss, noise and bad weather!’
The probes are installed in the sedimentary base of the glacier, about 60 metres under the surface through the use of a powerful hot water drill. They record temperature, pressure, speed and movement of the ice, and more importantly of the sediments at its base.
The probes emit signals carrying the data, which are relayed back to a base station on the glacier surface by radio communications, and then transmitted to Southampton by mobile phone..."
press release
Click here to see a graphic representation of data from a sensor network on top of the Briksdalsbreen glacier. Sent by SMS September03 to Feb04 .More graphs
----Not exactly Edward Weston, eh?
Here Comes the Semantic Web?
"Although many skeptics point to the historical failure of Strong Artificial Intelligence and the logical inconsistencies of human consensual reality as reasons why the Semantic Web cannot work, my view is that the Semantic Web is going to be bigger than Google in terms of its ultimate impact on civilization. It will be monstrous. Huge. We cannot even predict what it will be used for...
article w/links
---I lived and worked most of my life with people with cognitive and language disorders. I think I've an idea what interacting with the Semantic Web will be like.
Holidays = Terror Alerts
"New Washington Warnings"
Beginning Saturday, with the World War II Memorial Dedication Ceremony in Washington, the next few months will see several public events that could attract terrorist assaults...
...al-Qaeda is almost ready to attack the United States again.
---Also: [BURIED LEAD ALERT]
"The need for a more effective plan to destroy al-Qaeda was highlighted this week with the release of a report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies, an independent think tank based in London. The IISS reported that, far from destroying or taming the terrorist threat, the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq have swollen the ranks of al-Qaeda.
---Note (especially neo-cons and/or wrestling fans):
Osama bin Laden's group now sees the the United States as its prime target in a DEATH STRUGGLE BETWEEN CIVILIZATIONS, the report says, and has more than 18,000 potential terrorists scattered around the world.
story
---These alerts are different? Different then the ones over Christmas & New Years? Superbowl? Thanksgiving? Notice no one mentions the presidential campaigns and election (which scares me).
---In response to this link, one of the "H's" at Unknown News came up with:
"A new holiday tradition!! Hot dogs, apple pie, fireworks, terror alerts!"
May 27, 2004
TV Show Database/ TV Tome
A browsable database containing basic directory info (premiere date, description, stars, brief history) for hundreds of (American) television programs new and old. Browsing by category is not a good idea since these categories contain only a few of the many entries available if you browse by title.
link via: the resource shelf
---No Lexx, Square Pegs, Coupling or Monarch of the Glen (photos or internal search) but otherwise comprehensive.
TV Tome has a great search feature, some photos, and info on Lexx, Square Pegs, Coupling (UK) and Monarch of the Glen.
DARPA Doubles Cash Payout for 2nd Robot Race
"The first Grand Challenge, held in March, made much more liberal use of the term "challenge" than "grand." Only a handful of the 15 robot vehicles that made it to the starting line in Barstow, California managed to travel more than one mile. The top distance went to the Red Team from Carnegie Mellon University which travelled a whopping 7.4 miles on the back of $3m in equipment..."
story with links
---Jason/Atomgrid offers dollars & 'sense' insight into the challenge. A few days later after doing a little homework he comes back with new numbers and more questions:
"US$2-million for a robot vehicle that can cross 200-miles in 10-hours over rough/random-terrain in all weather? That's a ten-large per mile payoff and, using my own super-secret formula, you need to build the damn thing for US$182K or less. In fact, it's never too early to factor in cost-overruns as you're going to reject about half the shit you assemble half-way through. Oh, and on at least one sub-system you'll fuck it up at three times, minimum. So, you're really building a US$73K prototype, it's just going to cost you US$182K.
However, with the US$73K figure in mind you can now begin window shopping for the various parts to build your prototype. Note that I said "window shopping." You actually have to submit a white paper, which in turn has to be approved, before DARPA will let you enter the race. Until you prove to yourself _on paper_ that you can build the damn thing for US$73K, there's no reason to write the white paper let alone build a _physical_ prototype.
Oh, your white paper was approved? Now would be a good time to calculate the amount of time you have between the approval of your white paper and the start of the race. You're ready to start bashing it all together. Put on your safety goggles and sit down at your keyboard. You'll need about a bazillion lines of code for the robot. Does it veer left around the rock or right around the rock? How does it know what a rock is? Are birds rocks?
What about roadkill? Veer left or right around roadkill? Hope you have lots of friends who write code, because you have to complete the first version of your prototype within one-third of the time you have until the race. The other two-thirds of your time will be spent debugging and pulling it out of ditches.
Which is what the whole project is about. Not for someone to build a 20mph robojeep, but to _write the software_ that can operate a 20mph robotjeep.
Anyway if you actually manage to score that US$2-million prize don't spend it all on beer.
++++++++++++
After writing you back about the DARPA Robot Race I dug out the two back issues of Wired and re-read the related articles. US$182K is in range (though at the low end) of what other teams were spending on equipment. The Red Team vehicle was tagged at around $300K in equipment (excluding donated gear).
In thinking further about "your" prototype, a US$7,300 1/10th scale vehicle that could navigate 20-miles on its own would be damn close. Then it's a matter of scaling up (though it's not as simple as cubing everything).
One thing I noticed, other than the robocycle (which failed to qualify), none of the vehicles were capable of righting themselves after a roll. So, you need a shape that allows the vehicle to drive just as well upside-down as right-side up. Plus, this means you have to spend less time worrying about getting the damn thing to "adhere" to hills. Big, solid rubber tires at each end of a rectangle or tube covered in whatever sensor gear. I'm sure you've seen children's remote-controlled cars in similar shapes.
An odd thing, though maybe it's simply a matter that it's not mentioned in the articles or shown in the photographs: No treads. A guy from DARPA in the article points out teams can use any method or mode, the robot just has to be able to make it to the waypoints completely under its own steam. I guess I was surprised, beyond the robocycle, no one tried any radical shapes or modes. There were no multi-legged walkers, rolling balls, articulated tubes, hoverskirts, blimps, etc. (Though, excluding treads, these are all wildly unrealistic and total budget busters.)
The first Wired article went into a fair amount of detail regarding the driving software the various teams were developing. All sorts of sensor information being processed in real time. I'm wondering if you should rely solely on radar (though you also need GPS to "find" the waypoints). Or, maybe it's the wrong kinds of sensors entirely. What about color-information? Is "beige" an important piece of information?
Yeah. I've already given this all way too much thought.
More Nick Berg
The thesis that the Nicholas Berg execution video is a composite made up of two parts - one part being a routine interrogation when Berg had previously been in American custody, and the other part being a faked beheading of the already dead Berg - explains two of the biggest mysteries about the death:
1. Why did the Pentagon lie in saying that Berg was never in American custody?; and
2. Why did the video contain odd incongruous statements by Berg identifying his father and mother?
link/archived at Xymphora.
Search & Destroy
"If you go to the Internet search engine Google, type in “miserable failure,” and click on the “I’m feeling lucky” icon, you will be directed not to an article about “Ishtar” or the 1962 Mets but, rather, to the White House Web site and the official biography of President George W. Bush...
In the days of Boss Tweed, people were encouraged to vote early and often, dead men were placed on the voting rolls, and citizens were paid for their votes. On the Web, companies “cloak,” which means, among other things, that they disguise the real content of their sites, in an attempt to fool Google into thinking that a page is relevant to a search. Deep-pocketed players pay other sites to link to their sites, to foster an illusion of popularity. Some companies set up “link farms”—a host of interconnected Web sites that exist primarily to link to each other. A big company with a major Internet presence, for instance, can buy thousands of domain names, set up Web sites, and effectively create thousands of links out of nothing."
article
---A tip of the New Yorker's dandy's hat to 'google bombing'. Thanks, Devin.
Area 51 Hackers: Sniffing Out Sensors
"The U2 spy plane, the SR-71, the F-117A stealth fighter, all were flight-tested out of the Groom Lake facility," says Steven Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists' Project on Government Secrecy. The myth of Area 51 memorialized in films, T.V. shows and novels is a function of the secrecy that surrounds it...
...last year while roaming the desert outside the Groom Lake base (Chuck) Clark stumbled upon...an electronic device packed in a rugged case and buried in the dirt. Marked "US Government Property," the device turned out to be a wireless transmitter...
...at close range, they could use a handheld frequency counter to pick up the wireless signals given off by the devices as a car passes....
We dug up about 30 or 40 of them on various access roads leading to the base on public land," (Joerg) Arnu says...
When they'd gathered sufficient evidence that the Air Force was bugging the desert, Arnu and Clark revealed the road sensors on Arnu's website, Dreamland Resort, a forum and information site for Area 51 aficionados...
...last year Clark led a news crew from Las Vegas' KLAS television station into the desert and showed them some of the road sensors.
The following week, according to the station's report, FBI and Air Force agents raided Clark's trailer home in Rachel, and carted off his computer, photographs and records. The next day, Arnu got a call at work from the FBI....
story/ see also: FAS website search results groom lake
---There's something liberating about revealing secrets, isn't there? Maybe it's a fetish of mine, or a symptom of misanthropy. Magic, sleight of hand, misdirection, the art of concealment are ancient crafts practiced by select groups (priests/alchemists/scientists) in some form or another in every culture. Is there likewise a craft, a yoga, a practice of revelation? A formalised discipline that counters the secrecy of the magicians, the elect? Is there an ancient art of exposition? An anti-Trickster? Who trains those who are compelled to reveal, to report on the 'rabbits up the sleeves' or 'the man behind the curtain'? How does anyone learn to see where everyone is directed not to look?
Sleeping With Sensor
Philadelphia, May 25 (Reuters): A motion sensor found on Philadelphia rail tracks that raised concern about possible terrorism was planted by an employee hoping to be warned of approaching bosses while he slept on the job, officials said yesterday.
The commercial motion detector was found on May 5 in a rail yard near Philadelphia’s 30th Street Station and was turned over to the FBI for investigation amid heightened concerns about rail security following the Madrid train bombing.
Despite media speculation that the device could have been part of a plan to attack railways, the FBI said in a statement it was put on the tracks by an employee of the Southeast Pennsylvania Transportation Authority “for his personal use.”
item
Behind the Scenes, US Tightens Grip on Iraq's Future
"As Washington prepares to hand over power, U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer and other officials are quietly building institutions that will give the U.S. powerful levers for influencing nearly every important decision the interim government will make." - story
I wonder whether they'll make Vidkun Quisling an honorary member of their "independent" government.
Images for Courses
(Earth & Environmental Sciences 112)
*
Wesleyan University's Davison Art Center Digital Imaging Initiative "makes images from the collection available for online viewing in conjunction with Wesleyan courses, as well as producing systematic groups of images from the collection". Twenty classes have DAC images collected here. via: consumptive
---Besides offering another context, outside the museum, to view or use these works of art, I liked the idea of collecting images 'for' a specific purpose.
Most of us purchase art as furnishings, furniture by which we attempt to make a statement from (copies of) someone else's (certifiably valued) statement. Can these (popular knock-offs of) images we dutifully choose to display on our walls be collected and viewed also as images for the 'courses' of one's life?
Are there images for alcoholics? young lesbians? old bachelors? divorcees? families? surgeons? stock brokers? cancer survivors? the saved? etc.
Advertisers are aware that certain themes, different concerns, occupy people at different periods of their lives. Must there also be images for sale that reflect these themes? (The Octogenarians Museum?) There has to be posters, photos & paintings that typify each & every demographic.
True most of us purchase images for our homes or apartments, maybe once or twice in a lifetime, but thanks to online collections like the above I wonder what pictures I'll be looking for ten years from now? Twenty years?
May 26, 2004
Point-by-point Guide to our Military's Violations of the Geneva Conventions
"Since the Abu Ghraib prison scandal broke, our government, from the highest officials in Washington to Army prison guards in Baghdad, have used every euphemism they can think of to avoid the word that clearly characterizes what some of our soldiers and civilian contractors have been doing: torture.
Many of us have an idea that it is against the Geneva Convention, but do we actually know what that Treaty says? And what Articles of that Treaty our military is guilty of breaking?
These are a few of the Articles of the Geneva Convention which our military and this Administration have violated, in our name:"
article by Susan Strouss.
---Ironic isn't it? For a nation that has so many people behind bars, and the world's most successful lawyers, there's little public interest in or media discussion about our military's interpretations of the Geneva Conventions. One might think those groups involved with putting copies of the Ten Commandments in public buildings throughout America would vociferously commiserate on these violations of the rule of law also.
12Encyclopedia of Television
"The Encyclopedia of Television includes more than 1,000 original essays from more than 250 contributors and examines specific programs and people, historic moments and trends, major policy disputes and such topics as violence, tabloid television and the quiz show scandal. It also includes histories of major television networks as well as broadcasting systems around the world and is complemented by resource materials, photos and bibliographical information."
link
+
May 25, 2004
FDA Bans Gay Sperm Donors
The new rules are part of an overall push to tighten the screening and testing of potential donors in all areas.
Giving the FDA the flexibility to respond to new diseases could also lead to the exclusion of different nationalities who come from high-risk areas. Examples of such diseases, the FDA says, include Sars and the West Nile virus.
story
---I guess they'll next be banning Chinese and Suburban Midwesterners. (SARS & West Nile Virus)
Prion Alert
Scientists discovered prions in the muscle of a sheep infected with scrapie; experts were very quick to say that this does not necessarily pose any danger to humans who eat lamb, even though scrapie prions are believed to have caused mad cow disease. A prion expert at the National Institutes of Health predicted that "within the next year, somebody will make a big splash by finding it in the muscles of cattle and the beef industry will go crazy." [New York Times] British investigators who studied samples of human biopsies estimated that almost 4,000 Britons could have mad cow disease prions in their tonsils. [New Scientist]
item Harper's Weekly
---I'm not sure what Prions are, Hezbollah or Hamas, but I'm guessing they're soon to be on (or in) everyone's mind (brain), like terrorist organizations?
Jason/ Atomgrid, commented on the above, "...how freaked out do you really want to get? Did you know prions can't be burned?" ...Which got me humming/mumbling Dylan's "Blowing in the Wind".
---Here's the Straight Dope on prions, 2001.
sorry dude, my bad. uhh... are we cool?
Brandon Mayfield, the Portland lawyer the American government said was linked to the Madrid bombings, was set free today with an apology from the FBI. They apparently made a mistake with some fingerprints and then went crazy connecting dots -- his work for an islamic group, suspicious spanish documents which turned out to be his son's language class homework, and a patriot act out of control that assumes the worst before assuming anything else.
Regarding the Torture of Others
Whatever actions this administration undertakes to limit the damage of the widening revelations of the torture of prisoners in Abu Ghraib and elsewhere - trials, courts-martial, dishonorable discharges, resignation of senior military figures and responsible administration officials and substantial compensation to the victims - it is probable that the "torture" word will continue to be banned. To acknowledge that Americans torture their prisoners would contradict everything this administration has invited the public to believe about the virtue of American intentions and America's right, flowing from that virtue, to undertake unilateral action on the world stage.
German soldiers in the Second World War took photographs of the atrocities they were committing in Poland and Russia, but snapshots in which the executioners placed themselves among their victims are exceedingly rare, as may be seen in a book just published, "Photographing the Holocaust," by Janina Struk. If there is something comparable to what these pictures show it would be some of the photographs of black victims of lynching taken between the 1880's and 1930's, which show Americans grinning beneath the naked mutilated body of a black man or woman hanging behind them from a tree. The lynching photographs were souvenirs of a collective action whose participants felt perfectly justified in what they had done. So are the pictures from Abu Ghraib.
Shock and awe were what our military promised the Iraqis. And shock and the awful are what these photographs announce to the world that the Americans have delivered: a pattern of criminal behavior in open contempt of international humanitarian conventions. Soldiers now pose, thumbs up, before the atrocities they commit, and send off the pictures to their buddies. Secrets of private life that, formerly, you would have given nearly anything to conceal, you now clamor to be invited on a television show to reveal. What is illustrated by these photographs is as much the culture of shamelessness as the reigning admiration for unapologetic brutality.
article by Susan Sontag
---Susan Sontag illuminates a dark subject. (Freedom's not for the weak, and/or 95% of humanity.)
Pentagon to Replace Top General in Iraq
Sanchez was ensnared in the prison abuse scandal after The Washington Post reported Sunday that he was present during some interrogations at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad and witnessed some of the mistreatment of Iraqi inmates.
The U.S. military said in a statement Sunday that “this report is false.” It said Sanchez stood by his testimony before congressional committees that he was unaware of the abuses until he ordered an investigation into the allegations in January.
During his testimony, (last week before a Senate committee on the Abu Ghraib scandal), Sanchez took responsibility for the abuse because it happened while he was the commander in Iraq.
story
---Does this mean he won't face charges from lying under oath to Congress? US Denies Sanchez Witnessed Abuse (link below on Spitting Image) He'll still be a 4-Star General, but not this year (as expected)?
CCTV Goes Wi-Fi To Fight Crime
In the UK there is one CCTV camera for every 14 people. If you are in London, you could be caught on camera up to 300 times a day.
But the cameras are expensive, and once you have installed one, and laid all the wires back to base, it is fixed and cannot move.
This means if a crime hotspot moves round the corner, you cannot see it.
Westminster City Council in London have come up with a solution - CCTV cameras without wires, which broadcast their pictures back to base using the council's new wireless network...we provide access to mobile workers that will have laptops of mobiles working with them, or maybe some specialist devices.
"We're also linking into noise monitoring devices or other sensors," he (Tim Hearn of Cisco Systems) said.
article via: eyebeam
---I can never be a spokes-model or spokes-person, but I can be a 'camera'.
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"I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking. Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed."
(Christopher Isherwood from Goodbye to Berlin, 1939)
One Word is Missing in Torture Fray
SAN FRANCSICO -- Millions of words have appeared in the U.S. press since late April about abuse and torture at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. One has been missing...
article by Norman Solomon
Sticky Sensor May Keep Troops Out of Harm's Way
The students devised a projectile with an electronic sensor that can be shot at suspicious objects up to 65 feet away. The sensor sends back its analysis of the targeted object to soldiers using a 450-MHz wireless transmitter.
The goal of the project, funded by Lockheed Martin Corp.'s Missiles and Fire Control group (Orlando, Fla.), "was to help our soldiers detect improvised explosives or even chemical weapons from a distance far enough away so that they would not be hurt," ... A soldier with a laptop computer can monitor the projectile from up to 240 feet away.
press release
Rumsfeld bans camera phones in Iraq
Now here's a good idea how to solve those problems with torture photos: "Mobile phones fitted with digital cameras have been banned in United States Army installations in Iraq on orders from Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld." Why? "Quoting a Pentagon source, the paper said the US Defence Department believes that some of the damning photos of US soldiers abusing Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad were taken with camera phones. 'Digital cameras, camcorders and mobile phones with cameras have been prohibited in military compounds in Iraq,' it said." Now ain't that easy? (story)
May 24, 2004
Punishment & Amusement
Prisoners posed in three of the most infamous photographs of abuse to come out of the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq were not being softened up for interrogation by intelligence officers but instead were being punished for criminal acts or the amusement of their jailers, according to previously secret documents obtained by The Washington Post.
One military police officer said in a sworn statement that civilian and military intelligence officers frequently visited Tier 1A at night, spiriting detainees away for questioning out of sight of the MPs inside a "wood hut" behind the prison building. The documents also offer the first detailed account of how the abuse scandal unraveled.
"The Christian in me says it's wrong, but the corrections officer in me says, 'I love to make a grown man piss himself.' " (Graner, a Pennsylvania prison guard in civilian life, said)
story
---This story includes statements, details, from a few eyewitnesses about the 'leaked' photographs.
Military Takes Action Against Key Witness in Abu Ghraib Abuse Scandal
A witness who told ABCNEWS he believed the military was covering up the extent of abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison was today stripped of his security clearance and told he may face prosecution because his comments were "not in the national interest."
Sgt. Samuel Provance said in addition to his revoked security clearance, he was transferred to a different platoon, and his record was officially "flagged," meaning he cannot be promoted or given any awards or honors.
There's definitely a cover-up," Provance said. "People are either telling themselves or being told to be quiet."
story
---Freedom's not for the weak or conscientious.
Newsmap
"Newsmap is an application that visually reflects the constantly changing landscape of the Google News news aggregator. A treemap visualization algorithm helps display the enormous amount of information gathered by the aggregator. Treemaps are traditionally space-constrained visualizations of information.
Newsmap does not pretend to replace the googlenews aggregator. It's objective is to simply demonstrate visually the relationships between data and the unseen patterns in news media. It is not thought to display an unbiased view of the news, on the contrary it is thought to ironically accentuate the bias of it."
link
Troops immunity talks 'advancing'
Now that's nice: "Demands that coalition troops remain immune from prosecution by Iraqis after the handover of power will be dealt with in the new UN resolution." (story) So that the torturers don't have to worry about any real punishment - apart from the slaps on the wrists they're gonna get (or, in one case, already got). You just gotta love it.
British Censors Ban Nipple in European Election Film
Cinema body rules image of breastfeeding baby 'too sexual'
story
---"No mother & child for us please, we're British".
Soldiers Can No Longer Have Camera Phones in Iraq
The Pentagon reportedly believes that photos of Abu Ghrain prisoners being abused were taken with camera phones. This has led to Rumsfeld banning "Digital cameras, camcorders and cellphones with cameras."
The ban applies to "military compounds in Iraq" but the Pentagon plans a "total ban throughout the US military."
link through Short News
---Freedom's not for the weak or those with instant imaging.
Industry Brief: Signage
Across the United States, three companies, Lamar, Clear Channel, and Viacom dominate outdoor advertising, including billboards, signs on transit and in airports and subways, stadium ads, and many other displays. These companies own over two-thirds of the billboards in the US and around half of all billboards worldwide, according to one estimate. And in some areas, like Florida, they own over 90% of the billboards.
These three companies control over a million signs nationwide...
link
---Ubiquity seems to be getting smaller every year.