SRSLY? RLLY?

What a fine fine argument they have against her (/sarcasm)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1C9T7IFCuMQ

(re)Tagging = POSTERBOY

I only now found out about Poster Boy and it seems he was already caught ... or was he?



See him in action

A Strange Alliance in the Forgotten War

In the rhetoric war against Iran, the US constantly finds itself in odd positions. Today it was announced that former Soviet paupers Kyrgyzstan would bail out on it's US base deal. Russia has the US by the balls on this one (they have a base there too). The base has been pretty essential to supplying the Afghan war, the one Obama wants to step up. It's yet another blunder that the Bush administration didn't use the rather large window of opportunity to end the rein of the Taliban and, instead, becoming fanatic about Iraq. But now it's Obama's issue to deal with, and the door to Afghanistan via Kyrgyzstan is closing. Russia, in it's typical post-soviet used car salesman way, wants a political leg and an arm to allow the US a Russian passage to Afghanistan via friendly Uzbek and Kazak airspace. The proverbial arm and leg are said to be sizable concessions in the old NATO apparatus.

What route does that leave to the Taliban front? Pakistan is the most obvious route. But it's a tough position to put a barley stable nuclear (and Pashtun) country in.

The other route is a country that has been a natural enemy to the Sunni Taliban. Iran.
Despite all the saber rattling, it's clear Iran want's to play on the big boys playground. Hell, they have already joined the elite satellite club. Their Russian buddies to the North might not be the only benefactors to this base closure. Sounds far fetched? Anyone care to remember how we got into bed with the Mujaheddin or Saddam in the first place? (or hell, maybe the last time we did with Iran!) Oh yeah, war baby!

UPDATE: Juan Cole nails it;

It is striking that Western anxieties about Iran often depict the regime as "medieval," but what they are really afraid of appears on the contrary to be Iranian modernity.

Insane Clown Posse?

If anyone knows where I can find the Abstinence Clown video, please comment/send to me!

The story on Derek Dye the Abstinence Clown

Bird's many red stage things

Is it just me or is Andrew Bird's gear getting color coordinated?

Check this recent live performance.


...and the big gramophone thingys in the back are by one of my favorite industrial designers out there, Chicago's Ian Schneller aka Specimen Instruments. I've had the hots for his Les Paul meets Martin OOO-S "Flame Top Pippin" for a long time.

Reinventing a Powerful Duo - Monkey!

Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett are moving beyond the toon+multi-media hip-hop/brit-soul infusion of Gorillaz for a new invention. Take a look at their new eastern opera rock: Monkey (it does start to rock some at the 2:20 mark)



It's clearly a project with some Chinese mystic. Check out the interview:

Obama's First Strike

All are attentive to our new president’s effect on policy. Me being particularly interested on foreign policy changes, something that, historically, neither the Democrats nor the Republicans seem to differ much. I like many are looking to Barak to see if he will actually break tradition. Today he made his first address to the public on Al-Arabiya (often seen in the East as the Pro-Western counter weight to Al-Jazeera in Arabic networks). But it was only days ago that the first military strike by an Obama administration was authorized. And so the Obama vision of foreign policy takes shape. Juan Cole wrote up an article in the Salon and I tend to agree with him as I often do. His key point being:

A Gallup poll done last summer found that 45 percent of Pakistanis believe that the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan poses a threat to their country. Of Pakistanis who expressed an opinion on the matter, an overwhelming majority believed that the cooperation between the U.S. and the Pakistani military in the "war on terror" has mainly benefited Washington. If a more muscular American policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan sufficiently angers the Pakistani public, they could start voting for religious parties, delivering a nuclear state into the hands of Muslim fundamentalists.

Salon

Obama's rhetoric during the campaign was hawkish. Many thought it was just a campaign necessity after years of the domestic war on terror mantra and his running against McCain's war machismo. Whatever the case may be, diplomatic failure with Pakistan has more risks than even an Iranian confrontation. It's a precarious start and I hope it improves with action and not just words.

UPDATE: CNN interviews Pakistani Prime Minister

Mind you, this is a leftist party, and one that hopes to maintain ties with the US and the West. In other words, they are generally the good guys here. The threat of them appearing weak to a threatened population is bad for US interests and for secular stability in the region.

"If there are any drone attacks these would be counter-productive... Therefore we ask that if they have credible and actionable information, they share it with our intelligence agencies and we will take action ourselves."
Gilani said that ongoing Pakistani army operations against the militants were backed by the region's local population, but warned that missile attacks jeopardized tribal support for the government and urged President Obama to "respect the sovereignty of Pakistan."

"We are successfully isolating the militants from the local tribes," said Gilani. "But when there is one drone attack then you get them united. There is a lot of anti-American sentiment growing in those areas."

CNN