I see there is now a nologo web site, complete with its own logo, plugging "the book that became part of a movement". Capitalism is so all-encompassing and all-powerful that it can make money by commodifying anti-globalist sentiments. Besides books, there will no doubt soon be a whole line of clothing, furniture and lifestyle accessories, all emblazoned with the appropriate logos and slogans demonstrating the ideals of the owners. Isn't the irony getting a bit thick here?

I watched the Oscars by taping it and watching it in fast forward. The only bad part was when Bjork didn't win for best song. To my amazement, that award went to Vincent Price! To my further amazement, Mr. Price gave what sounded like Kate Hudson's unused acceptance speech, with the usual grovelling "I'd like to thank the members of the Academy" part, as if he was still looking for acting work!

It is becoming scarily obvious that the psychopaths who run the biotech companies have decided that it will be too expensive to do proper tests on the safety of genetically-modified foods, or, even worse, that such tests will reveal that the genetically-modified foods are unsafe for human consumption. They therefore have decided to allow the genetically-modified foods to contaminate the natural strains. This will lead to one of three scenarios: 1) the contaminated strains will have no adverse effect on human health, and the biotech firms will argue that they should be allowed to continue to market the genetically-modified foods; or 2) many people will get sick or die and the biotech firms will claim that the contamination was an act of God and will seek protection in bankruptcy or from legislation; or 3) the contamination will become so common that it will be impossible to find a causal nexus between the particular contamination and the human health problems caused by it (chemical companies have for years been dining off a similar confusion caused by the massive number of man-made chemicals in the environment). The contamination has already begun, and we can't seem to do anything about it.

Isn't a HailStorm a bad thing? Their next product will probably be called something like 'ThePlague'. Truth in advertising is a great thing.

Just how many rogue armies has the CIA put in place in recent years? Taliban and now Kosovar Albanian? I'm waiting for revelations on Chechnya. If the CIA is behind the recent thuggery in Macedonia, Kosovo and Serbia, it may show an extreme political sophistication. A short while ago Serbia was a pariah and there was great sympathy for the Kosovar Albanians. We might very well have seen a Kosovar Albanian state leading eventually to a greater Albania. Now the extremist Albanian fighters have acted so badly that sympathy has turned back to Serbia, and there seems little chance of any new Albanian state.

This is an excellent article on the recent USS Greeneville disaster, and why the hotdogging/joyriding/showing off that they were engaged in for the benefit of the civilians on board should lead to criminal charges.

It is apparently illegal or at least immoral for a mainstream American journalist to mention the disenfranchisement of blacks in Florida, and completely beyond the pale to comment on the illegitimate status of the current inhabitant of the White House. Indeed, even the recount going on in Florida is now being misleadingly reported, as if it would be unpatriotic and perhaps dangerous for the welfare of the country if the truth were to come out. It reminds me of the lies of the Warren Commission, where well-meaning officials managed to convince themselves that the American public couldn't handle the truth, and thus should be deceived for the good of the country.

It is somewhat fitting, given that the U. S. Presidency was determined in the political smoky rooms of Tallahassee by systematically disenfranchising black people, that 50 miles from Tallahassee segregation is still practiced.

Everyone now hates the Taliban for destroying the Buddha statues, I guess because everyone feels a connection with the artistic legacy of the world. The Taliban, however, have been up to no good in many other areas, particularly their abysmal treatment of women and their general medieval view of human rights. As in so many other horrors in the world, we can apparently blame the CIA for the Taliban.

So the 78 year old judge who was forced to resign as Ontario's integrity commissioner has been replaced by an 88 year old judge, who will be called the acting integrity commissioner (presumably until they find a 98 year old judge with enough integrity to do the job on a permanent basis). They must have determined that the youngster wasn't old enough to be sufficiently filled with integrity, but the new guy got himself in some difficulty some years ago when he had to resign from an inquiry concerning Ontario's exploitation of the Dionne quints due to his apparent bias expressed before the inquiry started. Can it be that hard to find an old Ontario judge to whitewash the actions of the government?

Could Dick Cheney be under heart-disease-causing stress due to allegations that he may have broken the law with regard to Halliburton's iffy relationship with Iran? No wonder Bush seems to be urging Congress to lay off the Rich pardon mess. In a dead pool I'd take Cheney over Ronald Reagan anyday.

A 78 year old retired judge, who was Ontario's integrity commissioner, has been forced to resign when it was revealed that he had an unidentified 'friend' write a judgment clearing the Premier of Ontario of wrongdoing in a controversial plan to dump Toronto's garbage in an abandoned mine in Northern Ontario. Presumably he had to resign to protect the Premier from any embarassing connection he might have to the 'friend'. I would have preferred to keep the existing integrity commissioner and appoint a new integrity commissioner for the integrity commissioner!