 | Craig Ferguson on Capitalism and Democracy Ferguson weighs in on the government's proposed Wall street bail out on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson |
 | It Takes a Nation of Millions (2006) to hold us under the conditions of late capitalism. Part of an exhibition held during the 2006 Edinburgh Annuale http://www.annuale.org/ |
 | DISASTROID Video Sampler Platter (www.disastroid.com) Disastroid is hard-driving music for the working stiff who plans on opting out at any minute. As the sludge of late-late capitalism pushes harder on the door of the collective unconscious, threatening to turn us into ANTS who fall in line--get up, go to work, learn about the lives of celebrities on Entertainment Tonight before packing it in for the evening--Disastroid is picking through the vomit of the mainstream looking for the sweet little chunks of pineapple. When Enver Koneya moved up to SF from Santa Cruz a few years back, he and Dave Kearny put together Disastroid (born Deathship Lollipop) to do righteous battle against this wasteland of consumerist apathy--this MACHINE (KILLS YOU, KILLS ME). Chad Tasky is the latest in a string of different drummers for the band... he's still trying to figure out how he got tricked into this whole thing. The music is like the Minutemen puffing blunts with Ice Cube as he's putting the last touches on AmeriKKKa; it's the Police with the tape slowed to Sabbath-heavy proportions, or a lost Nirvana cover of something by the Mahavishnu Orchestra. From the sun-bleached surf punk scene of Santa Cruz to the nightlife of San Francisco, Disastroid wants to burn down the foodcourt in the wall-to-wall strip mall, & call out the baby-kissing politician who's been FIXING THE VOTE. They're working on their second EP & finishing up an LP also. Ladies & gentlemen, give it up! |
 | Basque Subordination It is not just that all this 'ethnic' thing does get to me, really; it is also that then, we still must play the multicultural postmo game to be somehow trendy and 'right on'. No way! Check the clip. Ok: terrific fusion food but not my cup of tea. American kids in traditional Basque rustic cloths together with a pinch of authentic black radical Jamaican reggae salt is definitely not good grazing. The question, obviously, is knowing whether there is something in multiculturalism that goes beyond the Anglo-Saxon set up in which it kind of originated and then could perhaps be useful for other contexts. I'm afraid the answer is 'I don't think so'. What is multiculturalism? For Zizek multiculaturalism defines a specific cultural logic which all too "simply designates the form of subjectivity that corresponds to late capitalism": The ideal form of ideology of (this) global capitalism is multiculturalism, the attitude which, from a kind of empty global position, treats each local culture as the colonizer treats colonized people -- as 'natives' whose mores are to be carefully studied and 'respected'. [...] In other words, multiculturalism is a disavowed, inverted, self-referential form of racism, a 'racism with a distance' -- it 'respects' the Other's identity, conceiving of the other as a self-enclosed 'authentic' community towards which the multiculturalist maintains a distance made possible by his / her privileged universal position. Multiculturalism is a racism [...] from which one is able to appreciate (and depreciate) other particularcultures properly -- multiculturalist respect for the Other's specificity is the very form of asserting one's own superiority" (The Ticklish Subject, 1999, pp. 170-1). And is there a worse racism than that based on (mis)using the supposed culture (mores) of the other as authentic ethnic native with the purpose of dwelling on the 'civic' political fantasy of a violence-free, harmonious society? Consider for instance Basque-Spanish film director Julio Medem's documentary film "La pelota vasca. La piel contra la piedra" [roughly translated as 'Basque ballgames: the skin against the stone'] (click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xV5ffMFBqxo). The fact that a lot of water has gone under the bridge since it was first released in 2003 makes this exercise that bit easier. Medem's position at the time was this: there are two irreconciliable political projects broadly represented by the authoritarian Spanish right-wing, on the one hand, and the Basque extreme radicals or something, on the the other... and here in the middle, the rest of us, i.e.: the majority must stoically endure the intolerant behaviour stemming from both these opposite warring factions. Of course, the situation has changed since, and not slightly. Now you have the human animals who are 'legal', on the one side, and then, on the other side, you have the inhuman beasts who are 'illegal'. Anyway: despite the fact that everybody keeps paying taxes all the same, this is not the issue. This is far too political and we are talking about culture. The issue is the formal procedure that Medem activates in order to frame his documentary film. For me, what strikes as very odd is that in order to visualise the hard confrontational nature of the conflict taking place in the Basqueland he resorts to some universally practiced peasant and fishermen sports; from ball-games, tug-of-war, stone-lifting, wood-chopping and regattas to those that for obvious reasons I like better such as oxen-stone-pulling and, more specially, the many ram fighting shows I have witnessed over my extended travelling experiences in Texas, Nigeria, Canada, Indonesia... and even Irak (see here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaHvUz-Gnyw&feature=related). It seems to me, however, that in order to better represent his topic, a trendy hyphenated, multiculturalist cosmopolitan traveller such as Medem himself should have made direct use of some more specifically Basque games. In order to frame the conflict, that is, I wonder why Medem did not come to re-present some extremely popular and specifically Basque games like, say, chess (tactics and strategy), football (collective and organised nature of the contestants), surf (individual effort) etc: climbing, skiing, golf, tennis... (continued here http://ethnicrhino.wordpress.com/2008/06/08/postmo-mongrels/#more-47) |
 | Consumerism and Globalization another Addiction Jessica Lee in Late Stage Capitalism, hanging out with her friends. Special thanks to macguyvergg for inspiration. She is no longer ALONE. |
 | Spectacle - Eiffel Tower The Eiffel Tower is an example of a spectacle in the late capitalism period. Its use of innovative designs to uphold the heavy iron bars into a tower that broke records for its height and just the sheer possibility of being able to be built made this an event to remembered. |
 | Late Meditation Questions about Mental Imperialism from the Captain Capitalism himself. Enough to keep GOD from cumming in my bed for another two seasons of EYES OUT EYES HAVE BEEN BLOWN TO PIECES. |
 | Terrorist Bill Ayers says: I did Black Hat SEO with Obama! Fired University of Colorado Professor Ward Churchill told the Denver Post that he had worked with SDS and Weather Underground in the late 1960s. Churchill claimed that he taught members of the Weather Underground how to make bombs and fire weapons.[14] However, Weather Underground leaders Bernadine Dohrn and Bill Ayers do not recall Churchill ever participating in that movement. Filmed at the University Colorado-Boulder in December 2006 by Walking Eagle Productions. (Note: Fox's Hannity and Colmes showed this video clip on April 23, 2008 on their show, but never gave me cred |
 | Book of The Month - The Society of The Spectacle Few works of political and cultural theory have been as enduringly provocative as Guy Debord's The Society of the Spectacle. From its publication amid the social upheavals of the 1960s up to the present, the volatile theses of this book have decisively transformed debates on the shape of modernity, capitalism and everyday life in the late twentieth century. Now finally available in a superb English translation approved by the author, Debord's text remains as crucial as ever for understanding the contemporary effects of power, which are increasingly inseparable from the new virtual worlds of our rapidly changing image/information culture. http://www.amazon.com/Society-Spectacle-Guy-Debord/dp/0942299795 |
 | The Jizz Quiz, sponsored by Osco's Drug "The Jizz Quiz," Written and Directed by Deke Nihilson and Sara Guffey, ca 1988. Produced for the Internet by CCCFilms, MMVIII. Starring several usual suspects of the Kansas City punk rock scene, art damage division. Socially or morally redeeming conceit: a relentless critique of late-20C American capitalism, consumer culture, and celebrity worship. Also, a celebration of beer. Dedicated to Forrest Sorrels,R.I.P. |
 | Clinton and McCain = More of the Same America Decides 2008! With the united states of America 2008 election winnowing process well under way, the Puri Media Group present a straightforward analysis of the lead candidates. As we approach the critical 2008 elections, the fundamental similarity between the anointed frontrunners Hillary Clinton and John McCain is revealed. Democrats, and America, cannot afford to screw up again. Bush's blatant, and thus transparent, disregard for the rule of Congress (eg, the Rule of Law) and the people has revealed a common agenda. The World cannot afford a continuation of wanton unregulated slash and burn capitalism. We also cannot afford a continuation of the "Long War" on "Terror"- it's bankrupting America much as the Cold War bankrupted the USSR and led to it's collapse. Democrats, Independents and Republicans need to rally for a new era in Washington politics before it's too late. The divisive polarized politics of the past must be minimized, and Obama has the personality and Leadership to do that. Clinton and McCain represent the bitterly partisan politics of the late 1900s. Obama is a President who can lead America proudly into the 21st Century and start to repair the damage done by George W Bush and his ilk. Obama is by no means perfect, but we don't have the luxury of perfect, and Obama is the one candidate who admits that in politics as in life, "none of our hands are clean." But we need to send a clear message: Unite for Change- let the power brokers that we, the people, still have a voice in our world politic. Music by Bus#56 "More of the Same" (http://www.sonsofrico.com/) Size: 19598918 Length: 03:48 |
 | Effective Forecasting - Assume You Are Wrong Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2008/01/11/Paul_Saffo_Secret_to_Effective_Forecasting Technology forecaster Paul Saffo discusses the importance of questioning one's own assumptions when attempting to predict future events. ----- As part of The Long Now Foundation's Seminars About Long-term Thinking, technology forecaster and strategist Paul Saffo presents Embracing Uncertainty: The Secret to Effective Forecasting. Paul Saffo is a forecaster and strategist with over two decades experience exploring long-term technological change and its practical impact on business and society. Paul is Chairman of the Samsung Science Board, and serves on a variety of other boards and advisory panels, including the Stanford Advisory Council on Science, Technology and Society, and the Long Now Foundation, as well as the boards of several public and pre-public companies located the United States and abroad. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences and has served as an advisor and Forum Fellow to the World Economic Forum, which in the late 1990s named Paul one of its "100 Global Leaders For Tomorrow." Paul's essays have appeared in numerous publications, including Business 2.0, Fortune, The Harvard Business Review, The Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, The New York Times and the Washington Post and Wired. Paul holds degrees from Harvard College, Cambridge University, and Stanford University. IFTF is a 30-year old foundation that provides strategic planning and forecasting services to major corporations and government agencies. Paul currently serves on the Board of the Institute for the Future and the Long Now Foundation. He is also the Chairman of Samsung Science Advisory Board. |
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