dreadful dreams

Barak Obama is a secret Muslim

paperboy — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:08:14 +0000

"Barack Obama is a secret muslim," perhaps the most pervasive meme this campaign season. There’s this picture of him in his onion head hat, there’s the incessant e-mail chains about how he was OMG TRAINED IN A MADRASSA, his middle name is Hussein, and, of course, he’s brown. There are a lot of reasons that "Obama is a secret muslim" line is so difficult to scrub out of the mass consciousness. On the basest level, it appeals to latent xenophobia as well as the myth of the "sleeper cell," that wonderful post-9/11 idea that the "Muslim next door" could, in fact, be a terrorist agent waiting for the right moment to flip. Together, these two concepts bind the "secret muslim" label quite strongly (see: sleeper cells).

Of course, at this stage, with less than three months until the election, the only people who believe that "Barack Obama is a secret Muslim" would not have voted for him anyway. Think the archetypal redneck that votes against his root economic interests because of carefully calibrated anti-liberal fear mongering.

And yet, the "secret Muslim" meme tells us a lot more about our country than it does about its half-black Democratic standard bearer. Barack Obama elicits a kind of subconscious fear that someone like, say, Jesse Jackson doesn’t. As alien, as different, as "other" as Jesse Jackson may be to the typical white man, at the end of the day Jesse Jackson has a well defined and well observed, if not well understood, role in American society; he is an ‘integral’ part in the race narrative in America. Barack Obama is different. His father is a Kenyan herdsman, an other’s other. His parents met at a Russian language class at the height of the Cold War. Mrs. Obama had a thing for ‘colored’ men; her second husband and B-Dot’s step-father was an Indonesian at a time when interracial marriage was still largely taboo and an interracial kiss on Star Trek involving body snatchers could be the apex of controversy.

So Barack Obama would be the first President in many generations to have at least one parent who was not "American." And yet, from Punahou to Harvard to Washington politics, Barack Obama has outperformed his more American peers. On some level, this threatens the American idea of American superiority. At a time when the American brand name is tarnished and America has hit a ‘rough patch,’ it could be even more deflating to see that for relief the country turns to someone with such foreign roots to fix it. And look at how loved he is overseas, more to make Americans uncomfortable. Barack Obama brings out discomfort in the mass consciousness because he is a personification of the forces of globalization that have transformed our world in the last 60 years; his far-flung origins (Hawai’i via Kenya and Kansas, two years in Indonesia) serve to remind Americans that the America (and the world) of the 20th century has been relegated to the dustbin of history. The 21st century is a different time place; USA cannot SMASH at will its enemies and two oceans are no longer a sufficient barrier from the rest of the world. Barack Obama piles on to this: the image of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant can no longer be neatly grafted onto America as its "archetype," and, of course, the youth have taken over. So Barack Obama is not a Secret Muslim, and no rational educated person thinks so anymore, but the idea persists because he is just so different from what we expect of our leaders, be they white or black, from the mainstream or the margins, and as the great open-ended signifiers he has become the globalization and ‘change’ that we are only now realizing has already completely engulfed our reality. Rejecting B-Dot won’t turn back the clock on that process, but embracing him may make the remainder of the transition smoother.

In Flag City USA, False Obama Rumors Are Flying, WashingtonPost.com
Obama the ‘Magic Negro’, LATimes.com

Happy Canada Day!

alexei — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:01:37 +0000

Volcanoes could produce 25% of US energy

alexei — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 05:00:42 +0000

According to Karl Gawell, executive director of the Geothermal Energy Association (GEA), "High prices and climate change are definitely creating a renaissance in geothermal interest, particularly on a state and local level." So, to further geothermal research, Alaska’s Division of Oil and Gas plans to lease out its Mount Spurr (a 2 mile tall, snowcapped volcano near Anchorage, which erupted in 1992 covering much of the city in ash) to energy companies who would search for ways to harness the mountain’s power. A wise move on both parts, as geothermal projects are eligible for numerous tax benefits, with many already in effect in most Western States and on the coast between Texas and Florida. Gawell: "If we really want to go all out for it, we could easily achieve a substantial amount, 20, 25 per cent of US energy needs within a few decades. We’re limited more by public policy than the resource - the resource is enormous." Though mentioned recently by Sen. Barack Obama, geothermal energy has had little play in the alternative energy debate. Nonetheless, the GEA estmates that by 2010, the number of countries producing geothermal energy will double to 46.

Harness volcanoe power, energy experts say, Telegraph.Co.Uk

Lego my freedom!

alexei — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 04:35:40 +0000

Tiananmen Square, June 5, 1989

Classics in Lego, Flickr.com
Mike Stimpson’s prints, RedBubble.com

Cryptozoology museum in danger from IRS

alexei — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 04:08:07 +0000

The International Cryptozoology in Portland, Maine, is in dire straits following an IRS lawsuit, and needs $15,000 in donations to move to a new location. Loren Coleman, the curator of the museum and author on numerous books on the study of ‘hidden’ animals, says the case began as a challenge of "the reality of cryptozoology as an occupation," which in turn called the validity of the museum into question. According to Code 183 of the IRS, cryptozoology is a hobby, so the museum needs more income to support itelf. Coleman argued that combined with publications, and the visibility of the museum on the internet, he lived above poverty level, but since the museum is a separate entity, that didn’t fly, loosing him an appeal. It is a little strange that cryptozoology does not merit more consideration as a science. Every day new species are discovered, widening our understanding of evolutionary diversity. Considering some of the species already discovered, like the egg-laying venomous mammal the duck-billed platypus, a unicorn or Big Foot no longer seem that exotic. Further, a history of hidden animals may lend clues to animals already extrinct, as well as those we have not ‘officially confirmed’ yet. On a curious note, when Magellan returned from his journey, having for the first time seen a rhinocerous, he declared that he found unicorns, but that they look somewhat different from how people imagined them. If nothing else, a cryptozoology museum is a unique place preserving preserving both our earlier understanding of the animal kingdom and our creative imagination thereof, which is often all science ever is.

Save The Museum, Cryptomundo.com

Ryohei Hase, Drown in the empty dried-up room (waterboarding?)

alexei — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 09:16:53 +0000

RyoheiHase.com

Counterinsurgency manual leaked, PsyOps

alexei — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 07:19:43 +0000

Wikileaks, has recently released the sensitive but unclassified US Special Forces counterinsurgency manual FM 31-20-3, which outlines tactics to be used in the suppression of rebellions and guerilla movements worldwide. Official Special Forces policy, the document promotes pervasive surveillance, censorship, warrantless searches, imprisonment without charges, hiding human rights violations from the media, and particularly psychological operations (PsyOps) to facilitate population and resource control.

But it was the recent death in Afghanistan of UK’s Corporal Sarah Bryant, a member of the Psychological Operations Group, a tri-service PsyOps support service to the British Armed Forces, which really brought PsyOps to the news foreground. The key role of PsyOps is Target Audience Analysis (TAA), similar to US military’s human terrain system, or for that matter, market research. It is the systematic study of people’s attitudes to map the military psychological environment, identifying weaknesses, and using them to base lines of persuasion. The key to its success is ‘maneuverism’, that is, striking suddenly and unpredictably at weak spots, instead of trying to overwhelm by sheer force. Armies recruit human scientists (a mixture of psychologist, sociologist, anthropologist, economist) for their PsyOps branches. The US Army is forbidden from carrying out such operations within the country, but the FBI and police seem to be excluded from this ban, as PsyOps tactics were used in the 1993 Waco Siege.

US Special Forces counterinsurgency manual FM 31-20-3, Wikileaks.org
‘I love her now and always’ - husband’s tribute to Sarah Bryant, first female soldier killed in Afghanistan,TimesOnline.Co.Uk
15 (UK) Psychological Operations Group Annual Report 2007/08, PsyWar.org
PsyWar.org

Amusementality sister-blog

alexei — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 08:13:15 +0000

DD now has a splinter blog, Amusementality, an entertainment blog, which will cover tv, music, anime, art and sexy stuff that I can’t post on this here respectable publication. Go there now, go there repeatedly, and if you’re interested in becoming a contributing author, drop me a comment.

amusementality.wordpress.com

Internet addiction a metal disorder

alexei — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 07:52:27 +0000

According to a new study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, internet addiction is a common disorder that should be included in Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders V (DSM-V). The disorder consists of excessive gaming, sexual preoccupations, excessive email/text messaging, and variants typically include 1) a loss of sense of time and neglect of basic drives, 2) internet withdrawal when a computer is not available, 3) a tolerance, which leads to a search for better equipment, faster connection, and more hours of use, and 4) negative repercussions, including lying, fatigue and social isolation. This comes after a series of studies published in South Korea, which had 10 cardiopulmonary deaths in internet cafes, as well as a game-related murder. According to government estimates from 2006, 210,000 South Korean children 6-19, 2,1% of the population are addicted and require treatment, with 80% deemed to need medication, and 20-24% requiring hospitalization. So if you spend more than 23 hours/week on the internets, you may have a problem. Seek help immediately! And I don’t mean on Google!!

Issues for DSM-V: Internet Addiction, PsychiatryOnline.org

Miuki’s experimental photography

alexei — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 00:00:12 +0000

Caroline’s Dreams: The Other Family

Miuki, Photosight.ru