Bush Bombs the Baddies: Part III - Iranian Evil
Yes that's right folks, just as you were thinking "Part II - Liberate Iraqi Children" was turning into the longest movie in history, plans are already being made to start shooting the sequel. After lengthy discussions about possible plotlines, the original "They're gonna nuke us all!" plot has recently been put on hold over fears that audiences just simply wouldn't buy it. Luckily talented screenwriters in the Pentagon have quickly drafted a new script, casting the Iranians as the cause of all problems in Iraq. This new angle means the movie can come out much earlier than anticipated, possibly even in time to be this years Xmas blockbuster! The movie stars U.S. and U.K. troops launching "surgical strikes" against Iran's "Revolutionary Guard", who will sometimes be played by themselves, but often filled in for by "extras" who happen to be living nearby. There is currently some confusion as to whether U.K. troops have actually agreed to star in the movie, but this hasn't stopped the Hollywood rumor machine, which is claiming that Gordon Brown has already given the project a big thumbs up!
Fans of the earlier movies will already know that the actual length and outcome of the films is difficult to pin down exactly. So far two possible endings have been suggested. The first is that the Good Guys (us), successfully "strike" the Bad Guys (men with beards) in a "surgical" manner, managing to cripple them militarily without actually injuring or killing anyone. This then leads to peace and harmony in Iraq, impartial elections, and general happiness all round. The second ending, which would be more in keeping with the original two movies, involves the loss of thousands of lives, mostly innocent civilians, a rapid acceleration of anti-western sentiment amongst Muslims worldwide, and the possibility of a third world war. While the first ending has a nice feel to it, it closes off the chance for a sequel, and we know how much the public loves a sequel! So my money is on ending two...
Read more about this and other exciting movie developments in any respectable newspaper!
Friday, October 05, 2007
Friday, July 13, 2007
Email to God
To: God@heaven.com
CC: Michael Fish
Subject: Unnecessary punishment
Dear God,
look, i know we've had our disagreements in the past. I know I've never been to church and I've had sex outside of marriage. I know I occasionally take your name in vain and make fun of your more devoted followers... but really, isn't this taking things a bit far? I mean punish me, fine. Maybe a few warts or a bad hair day. But an entire summer of rain?! dude, that's just taking the piss! I mean for god's sake.. opps, sorry.. for fuck's sake, aren't you supposed to be all forgiving and shit? And what really gets to me is the way that you throw in a couple of sunny days midweek, just to get our hopes up, before pissing all over us Friday through Sunday! Is that fair? Is that benevolent? No! It's just plain mean! So please, get over it, or I am going to become an atheist, and let's face it, if we all become atheists it makes no difference whether you exist or not, no one's gonna give a shit, so there!
yours expectantly,
Billy.
CC: Michael Fish
Subject: Unnecessary punishment
Dear God,
look, i know we've had our disagreements in the past. I know I've never been to church and I've had sex outside of marriage. I know I occasionally take your name in vain and make fun of your more devoted followers... but really, isn't this taking things a bit far? I mean punish me, fine. Maybe a few warts or a bad hair day. But an entire summer of rain?! dude, that's just taking the piss! I mean for god's sake.. opps, sorry.. for fuck's sake, aren't you supposed to be all forgiving and shit? And what really gets to me is the way that you throw in a couple of sunny days midweek, just to get our hopes up, before pissing all over us Friday through Sunday! Is that fair? Is that benevolent? No! It's just plain mean! So please, get over it, or I am going to become an atheist, and let's face it, if we all become atheists it makes no difference whether you exist or not, no one's gonna give a shit, so there!
yours expectantly,
Billy.
Friday, June 22, 2007
Ramblings of a fool
Well, yesterday was the summer solstice. The summer solstice is basically the longest day of the year, so that to me suggests it is now midsummer. So, from that data, if we make a few calculations, we arrive to the conclusion that it should be SUNNY! So, given this irrefutable logic, why the fuck is it still cloudy and raining? Yeah yeah, global warming, climate change etc, ok. But all the global warming experts have been gloomily predicting that this will be one of the hottest summers ever! So what gives? Ok, so it rained 2 weeks worth in 2 mins the other day, which is vaguely extreme, but overall the weather has just typically english, i.e. a bit shit. Not shit enough to make you go "wow", just shit enough to make you go "yuk". Ok, moan over. :)
On a brighter note, Tony Blair becomes mortal again round about now. Stripped of his super powers, it is only a matter of time before someone bottles him outside a busy nightclub. Luckily he'll still have private healthcare. Phew! So now Gordon Brown will take power, sweep aside all of the neo-con policies put in place by Blair and lead us into a new era of government that puts people ahead of big business, ultimately creating a.... Oh, hang on, this just in... Brown wants to involve big business in almost every aspect of the running of the country.. Hmm, that doesn't sound like a good idea... So how exactly does Brown differ from Blair? Well, he doesn't smile much, which is a relief. He attempts to catch flies in between sentences by opening his mouth. But like Tony he sounds like he means business. Big business.
But why is that bad? Sounds like a good idea, get businesses involved with running schools, the NHS etc... they can provide more money than the government has, and they'll do it all out of the kindness of their hearts! I guess. Actually no, they'll do everything in their power to make as much profit out of the situation as possible, even if that means patients without doctors, kids without teachers, whatever. They can't help it. It's called the bottom line, and it underpins all large scale corporate business. Shareholders demand profit, you deliver it, end of story. And the beauty of it is, no one has to feel guilty about unethical behaviour, as the corporation exists as an individual in it's own right and can therefore take the rap. It can't go to jail, obviously, as it is just an abstract concept. But it can pay a fine! Mr corporation, you have been found guilty of killing 3000 workers in a chemical explosion in northern India, you are hereby fined $2 million. Ouch! That's gotta hurt! Obviously not quite as much as the indian workers watching their skin burn off in the chemical fire, but it still must smart slightly. Well, not really, no. It's just numbers. They still made more profit in a year than the annual budget of most small countries, so what's a couple of mil? Ya get me?
Did you know that of the 100 richest economies in the world, 51 are Corporations, 49 are countries? So who really holds the power on this planet? I know I dont. Gordon Brown certainly doesn't, or at least chooses not to. All these so called leaders are puppets trying to please big business. Of course there are many levels to decision making, and there are of course still many government workers dilligently running the country and making sure the people's basic needs are met. But for me that's beside the point. The question I always want to ask is: What's the goal? Is it progress, or happiness? If it's "progress", which basically means economic progress of the nation's economy, then I guess we're doing ok. But I don't live in "Britain", I live in "The Universe", and I can't possibly claim any kind of progress for one group of people when it comes at the expense of others.
I've been thinking about money, progress etc lately, and I came up with these ideas. Maybe they are obvious to someone who knows, or maybe they are patently flawed. Please feel free to enlighten me! So I was thinking, what is money? Obviously it doesn't really exist except in a very abstract way. Yes, apparantly there are large piles of gold in bank vaults somewhere, but I've never seen them. So really, money, or wealth, comes down to two main things, the natural resources of this planet, and human labour, which transforms those resources into products, which we consume and trade. Almost everything we produce is perishable, i.e. it doesn't last very long, meaning that we have to produce more. This is very useful for sustaining economies, but pretty shit for sustaining life on this planet. When this process is in full swing, we call it progress. We hand over power to large cororations, who promise us happiness and luxury, only to find that we have given up control over our own lives. Whole populations of people are shunted from place to place to provide the labour for this eternal march of progress, their lives purely incidental in the grand scheme of things. Until finally, one day, we arrive at that fantastic place. The ultimate destination. The goal. Which is.... ummm... what was it again? Oh dear, we forgot, the goal was actually supposed to be happiness, and instead all we did was turn our planet into an uninhabitable rock, devoid of life, ravaged by super storms and covered in warring factions of overly developed apes. Whoops!
So anyway, the solution to me seems pretty self evident. We are part of this planet just as much as a frog or a pebble, and as such we need to find a way to fit into it's rather beautifully orchestrated scheme. It's not a resource to be fought over and eventually exhausted, it's a part of us. Without it we are nothing. So lets get over this frantic race for progress, and concentrate on creating a sustainable world community in which ownership of the planet is considered illogical. What's one of the first things you try to teach a child? To share!
Learn more
On a brighter note, Tony Blair becomes mortal again round about now. Stripped of his super powers, it is only a matter of time before someone bottles him outside a busy nightclub. Luckily he'll still have private healthcare. Phew! So now Gordon Brown will take power, sweep aside all of the neo-con policies put in place by Blair and lead us into a new era of government that puts people ahead of big business, ultimately creating a.... Oh, hang on, this just in... Brown wants to involve big business in almost every aspect of the running of the country.. Hmm, that doesn't sound like a good idea... So how exactly does Brown differ from Blair? Well, he doesn't smile much, which is a relief. He attempts to catch flies in between sentences by opening his mouth. But like Tony he sounds like he means business. Big business.
But why is that bad? Sounds like a good idea, get businesses involved with running schools, the NHS etc... they can provide more money than the government has, and they'll do it all out of the kindness of their hearts! I guess. Actually no, they'll do everything in their power to make as much profit out of the situation as possible, even if that means patients without doctors, kids without teachers, whatever. They can't help it. It's called the bottom line, and it underpins all large scale corporate business. Shareholders demand profit, you deliver it, end of story. And the beauty of it is, no one has to feel guilty about unethical behaviour, as the corporation exists as an individual in it's own right and can therefore take the rap. It can't go to jail, obviously, as it is just an abstract concept. But it can pay a fine! Mr corporation, you have been found guilty of killing 3000 workers in a chemical explosion in northern India, you are hereby fined $2 million. Ouch! That's gotta hurt! Obviously not quite as much as the indian workers watching their skin burn off in the chemical fire, but it still must smart slightly. Well, not really, no. It's just numbers. They still made more profit in a year than the annual budget of most small countries, so what's a couple of mil? Ya get me?
Did you know that of the 100 richest economies in the world, 51 are Corporations, 49 are countries? So who really holds the power on this planet? I know I dont. Gordon Brown certainly doesn't, or at least chooses not to. All these so called leaders are puppets trying to please big business. Of course there are many levels to decision making, and there are of course still many government workers dilligently running the country and making sure the people's basic needs are met. But for me that's beside the point. The question I always want to ask is: What's the goal? Is it progress, or happiness? If it's "progress", which basically means economic progress of the nation's economy, then I guess we're doing ok. But I don't live in "Britain", I live in "The Universe", and I can't possibly claim any kind of progress for one group of people when it comes at the expense of others.
I've been thinking about money, progress etc lately, and I came up with these ideas. Maybe they are obvious to someone who knows, or maybe they are patently flawed. Please feel free to enlighten me! So I was thinking, what is money? Obviously it doesn't really exist except in a very abstract way. Yes, apparantly there are large piles of gold in bank vaults somewhere, but I've never seen them. So really, money, or wealth, comes down to two main things, the natural resources of this planet, and human labour, which transforms those resources into products, which we consume and trade. Almost everything we produce is perishable, i.e. it doesn't last very long, meaning that we have to produce more. This is very useful for sustaining economies, but pretty shit for sustaining life on this planet. When this process is in full swing, we call it progress. We hand over power to large cororations, who promise us happiness and luxury, only to find that we have given up control over our own lives. Whole populations of people are shunted from place to place to provide the labour for this eternal march of progress, their lives purely incidental in the grand scheme of things. Until finally, one day, we arrive at that fantastic place. The ultimate destination. The goal. Which is.... ummm... what was it again? Oh dear, we forgot, the goal was actually supposed to be happiness, and instead all we did was turn our planet into an uninhabitable rock, devoid of life, ravaged by super storms and covered in warring factions of overly developed apes. Whoops!
So anyway, the solution to me seems pretty self evident. We are part of this planet just as much as a frog or a pebble, and as such we need to find a way to fit into it's rather beautifully orchestrated scheme. It's not a resource to be fought over and eventually exhausted, it's a part of us. Without it we are nothing. So lets get over this frantic race for progress, and concentrate on creating a sustainable world community in which ownership of the planet is considered illogical. What's one of the first things you try to teach a child? To share!
Learn more
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Goddamn Fascists
I've just been "Stumbling" around the internet (if you haven't discovered this yet, check it out) and I came across this definition of Fascism. Reading through the points listed I couldn't help but notice that a certain large and unpopular country just north of Mexico seems to fit almost every point. Incidentally, so does Mexico! Luckily for us Blair is not one to be left behind on these things. But we need another good war to get the flags flying. Support our troops! Tell us lies! Take away out human rights! Hooray for Democracy! Have a read and decide for yourself:
FOURTEEN CHARACTERISTICS OF FASCISM
Dr. Lawrence Britt, a political scientist, wrote an article about fascism which appeared in Free Inquiry magazine, a journal of humanist thought. Dr. Britt studied the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia), and Pinochet (Chile). He found the regimes all had 14 things in common, and he calls these the identifying characteristics of fascism. The article is titled "Fascism Anyone?," and appears in Free Inquiry’s Spring 2003 issue on page 20.
The 14 characteristics are:
1: Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
2: Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to ‘look the other way’ of even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3: Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe; racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists; terrorists, etc.
4: Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
5: Rampant Sexism - The government if fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy.
6: Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or through sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in wartime, is very common.
7: Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivation tool by the government over the masses.
8: Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government’s policies or actions.
9: Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders in power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
10: Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely or are severely suppressed.
11: Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts.
12: Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses, and even forego civil liberties, in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
13: Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions, and who use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability.
14: Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against (or even the assassination of) the opposition candidates, the use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and the manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
Monday, April 23, 2007
A new home
Wow my blog's long. There's bloody loads of it! It's all a bit old now though. But then again, the old bits are the best bits. From when I used to be funny. Those were the days... sigh. Well anyway, despite my current inability to be funny, I have decided to start writing this blog again, although this time under the guise of "The Undercover Hippy" (What a shit name! Who thought of that?!). If you thought you were going to come here and read me talking about what music means to me, and my inspiration for this song or that song, well I'm sorry to dissapoint you, but what I'm going to be talking here is complete drivel. Read some of the archives and you'll start to understand what I mean.
So what's new in the world today? I don't know because I haven't checked. I think the Yahoo news feature on my yahoo mail must be broken, because every day it has the same story about x number of people being killed in a suicide bombing in some country called "Irark" or something. Sort it out Yahoo! No but really, instead of just telling me every day that there's been another car bomb in Baghdad, why not have the headline "Iraq still fucked, today we explore why", or even just have a little counter at the side of the news showing how many people were killed on that particular day due to suicide bombs in Iraq. Then you could devote the headline to understanding events rather than simplifying them.
On a more musical note, I have booked a flight to the UK for may 10th, and when I land I will have 14 days to buy a van, kit it out for living in, get a band together, rehearse, and make my way to the first festival!
Roll on summer! :)
So what's new in the world today? I don't know because I haven't checked. I think the Yahoo news feature on my yahoo mail must be broken, because every day it has the same story about x number of people being killed in a suicide bombing in some country called "Irark" or something. Sort it out Yahoo! No but really, instead of just telling me every day that there's been another car bomb in Baghdad, why not have the headline "Iraq still fucked, today we explore why", or even just have a little counter at the side of the news showing how many people were killed on that particular day due to suicide bombs in Iraq. Then you could devote the headline to understanding events rather than simplifying them.
On a more musical note, I have booked a flight to the UK for may 10th, and when I land I will have 14 days to buy a van, kit it out for living in, get a band together, rehearse, and make my way to the first festival!
Roll on summer! :)
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