BunkBlog

According to CNet, music labels are trying to dampen CD burning yet again. So far, this has never worked. Every method of copy protection fails. This is especially true of audio CDs, because you have to be able to *hear* them for it to make any sense to buy them. Since anything you can hear can be copied, any copy protection of audio (or video) is doomed to failure.

I would think this would be obvious, but apparently it’s not to the music and movie industries, who think fighting with and suing their customers is a good business idea.

Bush Honors U.S. Military Dead from War on Terror

Is this the first time he’s been at the cemetary since the war in Iraq began? He’s gone to such lengths to avoid anyone else seeing the caskets, it is a valid query, no? More than 200 American men and women died in the past two months; compared to the 138 who died during the “actual combat” phase. One wonders what this is, if not combat.

As a side note, the Reuters wire article uses the phrase “Bush, who avoided combat in Vietnam.” I guess the media isn’t going to let that one go, no matter how much the President wants them to.

Thanks to ThrowingStarDNA on Livejournal for this article:
Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012

An excerpt:

bq. What made this all the more disheartening was the wretched performance of our forces in the Second Gulf War.[73] Consumed with ancillary and nontraditional missions, the military neglected its fundamental raison d’etre. As the Supreme Court succinctly put it more than a half century ago, the “primary business of armies and navies [is] to fight or be ready to fight wars should the occasion arise.”[74] When Iranian armies started pouring into the lower Gulf states in 2010, the US armed forces were ready to do anything but fight.

Preoccupation with humanitarian duties, narcotics interdiction, and all the rest of the peripheral missions left the military unfit to engage an authentic military opponent.

According to a CNN story, “Sanchez said he put the prison under the command of a military intelligence brigade in November to improve the facility’s defenses after a series of mortar attacks in late 2003.”

Um, Military Intelligence is not a combat force. MI is combat support, so if you wanted to improve the defenses of a facility, you’d maybe use folks with heavy weapons, not MI geeks with M16s? It’s getting kind of deep around here.

These are fantastic. Imagine the joy you will experience when the gel loosens on these babies…
Strapless Bikinis

Proving that the U.S. doesn’t hold a candle to the Mideast extremist for insane behavior, video shows beheading of American captive in Iraq.

bq. “We tell you the pride of all Muslim men and women in Abu Ghraib and other jails is worth blood and souls.”

Now, let me get this straight. Pride is worth lives? Pride is a feeling, which can be regained. Life, once removed, rarely returns to the body. To justify the beheading of a man whose only crime was trying to repair communications equipment is grotesque.

And the betting on how quickly Zarqawi is killed while evading capture can now resume.

In a conversation with my mom this weekend (Hi mom), we were discussing the concept of holding Bush or Rumsfeld directly responsible for the actions of every single person who worked for them. Obviously, there is a level of abstraction in any sufficiently large organization, and it is unreasonable to assume that Bush or Rummy knew anything at all about the crimes at Abu Ghraib. That does *not* mean, however, that they are not responsible for those actions.

Truman made famous the phrase, “The Buck Stops Here” as a symbol of the enormous responsibility placed on his shoulders. The President is responsible for everything that is done in his name. And every official action of a military servicemember is done in the name of the President.

The enlistment oath I took four times:

I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Notice, soldiers defend the Constitution first and foremost. Second, notice that they obey the orders of the President. Now, the actions of these people in Iraq are violating all kinds of laws and treaties, but some of them (weakminded as they were) had been led to believe that they were acting legally, as required by the interrogation teams that had been placed over them. This does not excuse their actions in the slightest, but they thought it was acceptable.

And, the President finding out about the Abu Ghraib from the news is absurd. If he didn’t know about these actions before then, he should have. If he is being shielded by Rumsfeld, Rumsfeld should be fired for exposing the President to such an extreme breach of ethics and honesty.

More than anything, though, the President needs to stop trying to pass that buck to everyone but himself. He is the President. His people did something awful. It’s his responsibility, whether it’s his fault or not.

Illuminating blacked-out words in redacted (edited/declassified) documents is actually possible with computers today.

Interesting, the government stopped using Courier in its documents recently because it’s ugly compared to Arial or Times New Roman. But, because Courier is a monospace font, it is actually harder to decipher with the method listed in the article. So, the government has made it easier to pierce the veil of secrecy they put around redacted documents. Fantastic.

Great post about Abu Ghraib.

“The various detention facilities operated by the 800th MP Brigade have routinely held persons brought to them by Other Government Agencies (OGAs) without accounting for them, knowing their identities, or even the reason for their detention. The Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center (JIDC) at Abu Ghraib called these detainees “ghost detainees.”

On at least one occasion, the 320th MP Battalion at Abu Ghraib held a handful of “ghost detainees” (6-8) for OGAs that they moved around within the facility to hide them from a visiting International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) survey team. This maneuver was deceptive, contrary to Army Doctrine, and in violation of international law.”

There are more photos and video from Abu Ghraib prison. They’re worse.

U.S. military officials told NBC News that the unreleased images showed U.S. soldiers severely beating an Iraqi prisoner nearly to death, having sex with a female Iraqi female prisoner and “acting inappropriately with a dead body.” The officials said there was also a videotape, apparently shot by U.S. personnel, showing Iraqi guards raping young boys.

This image found through the joy of random LJ image-hunting. Woohoo!

Stolen shamelessly from Pouk23, I give you the Holy Armor of God, on Bush.

Oh, the hypocrisy. Oh, the irony. Oh, the absurdity.

What is truly sad is this woman represents a large and important bloc of swing voters this fall. God help us all.

Bush and Cheney answer all questions

My favorite quote about the secret, not transcribed, unrecorded, closed-door session:

Bush said it was important for him and Cheney to appear together so that commission members could “see our body language… how we work together.”

I believe “body language” in this case is Dick pulling Dubya’s strings to make him talk, but I could be wrong.

According to the Associated Press, among the weaponry currently arrayed around Fallujah is an AC-130 gunship.

bq. The side-firing weapons array consists of one 25mm GAU-12 Gatling gun (firing 1,800 rounds per minute), one 40mm L60 Bofors cannon (with a selectable firing rate of single shot or 120 rounds per minute) and one 105mm M-102 Howitzer cannon (firing 6 to 10 rounds per minute).

Yeah, don’t you think that may be overkill?

Michigan Preparing to Let Doctors Refuse to Treat Gays

The bill allows health care workers to refuse service to anyone on moral, ethical or religious grounds.

Wouldn’t refusing to treat anyone be against the basic tenet of medical ethics? Just sayin’.

Here’s a quick summary of where your family’s taxes go. What’s impressive is that $4690 per household more is spent than is taken in. So, if you have one child, add that to his tax burden as he ages.

This is also the most federal spending per household since WW2. It’s a good thing we have those conservative Republicans in power, keeping government small, isn’t it?

From the inimitable TDJ, we have this wonderful news item: Performers Whip Easter Bunny At Church Play.

This whole Passion Play revival is getting a little too surreal.

Watch Condoleeza Rice tapdance! Hear the amazingly convoluted double-speak! See the commissioners smirk! Ah, the joys of a public circus.

Stupid Iraqis

If you wanted the U.S. to leave your country, you should really stop shooting at us. Maybe that would have worked under Clinton or Bush I, but we’ve got a new cowboy in town. Think of the Sean Connery quote from the Untouchables, “If he sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue.” That’s the new modus operandi of the U.S., ok? Get it straight and stop getting yourselves (and our soldiers) killed. Geez.

Girl Banned From Prom For Smoking Away From School

Here’s a girl, 18 years old, who smokes. Now, smoking is stupid but it’s not criminal. She doesn’t smoke at school, she smokes elsewhere. This, however, somehow affects her eligibility for extracurricular activities. Huh?

Proving once again that public schools are counterexamples to the democratic freedoms and principles this country was founded on. Sure, we have to limit some freedoms in schools. We don’t want the kids to yell and scream and shoot firearms while conducting various religious rituals. But, c’mon! How does this girl doing something legal and not immoral while nowhere near school affect her schoolwork in any way? Stupid rules.