i am back. have a documentary. conflict of loyalty

Conflict of Loyalty - 20 Dec 09 - Part 1

A look at the questions of loyalty and identity facing Israel's 100,000-strong Druze community.

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the american war machine

What to watch for in 2010:An American world of war

We, of course, think of ourselves as something like the peaceable kingdom. After all, the shock of September 11, 2001 was that "war" came to "the homeland," a mighty blow delivered against the very symbols of our economic, military, and—had Flight 93 not gone down in a field in Pennsylvania—political power.

Since that day, however, war has been a stranger in our land. ...


Although our country delivers war regularly to distant lands in the name of our "safety," we don't really consider ourselves at war(despite the endless talk of "supporting our troops"), and the money that has simply poured into Pentagon coffers, and then into weaponry and conflicts is, with rare exceptions, never linked to economic distress in this country. And yet, if we are no nation of warriors, from the point of view of the rest of the world we are certainly the planet's foremost war-makers. If money talks, then war may be what we care most about as a society and fund above all else, with the least possible discussion or debate.

In fact, according to military expert William Hartung, the Pentagon budget has risen in every year of the new century, an unprecedented run in our history. We dominate the global arms trade, monopolizing almost 70% of the arms business in 2008, with Italy coming in a vanishingly distant second. We put more money into the funding of war, our armed forces, and the weaponry of war than the next 25 countries combined (and that's without even including Iraq and Afghan war costs). We garrison the planet in a way no empire or nation in history has ever done. And we plan for the future, for "the next war"—on the ground, on the seas, and in space—in a way that is surely unique. If our two major wars of the twenty-first century in Iraq and Afghanistan are any measure, we also get less bang for our buck than any nation in recent history.

So, let's pause a moment as the New Year begins and take stock of ourselves as what we truly are: the preeminent war-making machine on planet Earth. Let's peer into the future, and consider just what the American way of war might have in store for us in 2010. Here are 10 questions, the answers to which might offer reasonable hints as to just how much U.S. war efforts are likely to intensify in the Greater Middle East, as well as Central and South Asia, in the year to come.




1. How busted will the largest defense budget in history be in 2010?

Strange, isn't it, that the debate about hundreds of billions of dollars in health-care costs in Congress can last almost a year, filled with turmoil and daily headlines, while a $636 billion defense budget can pass in a few days, as it did in late December, essentially without discussion and with nary a headline in sight? And in case you think that $636 billion is an honest figure, think again—and not just because funding for the U.S. nuclear arsenal and actual "homeland defense," among other things most countries would chalk up as military costs, wasn't included.

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I saw Sherlock Holmes

And I loved it! But I was promised nakkid! Sherlock Holmes. And I did not get nekkid! Sherlock Holmes. I was cheated!!!!! Anyway. The film score was gorgeous:

Discombobulate

And the slash content was absolutely aky high, to my unmitigated delight. I suppose by that idiot's lights, I am a unicorn or something *eyeroll*. Of of course there is this idiot too. *more eyerolling* Anyway, my only other complaint is that Downey spoke too damn quickly, so I missed some of what he said. Other than that...go see it! (Um. Please bear in mind that is an action film. It ain't your Conan Doyle book. See it for what it is.)

hope and upon further reading, exploitation, in detriot EDITED

detroit as a site for large scale post urban farming


EDIT: I'd like to thank the readers for pointing out the flaws and problems that underlie Mr. Hantz' plans to urban farm on a large scale in Detroit. It is, indeed a predator. But I would also like to highlight this article, which I think is pretty good, minus the passing Hantz praise.


food among the ruins there is a lot of highlighting of the work of POC farmers and environmentalists here. People whom, experience teaches, are very likely to be directly in the line of fire of Mr. Hantz and his investors. *sigh*


also: Detroit's 'Quiet Revolution'