Brilliant: The National Money Hole

In The Know: Should The Government Stop Dumping Money Into A Giant Hole?

Shoe thrown at Bush on Iraq visit

This was a bit of a shocker! But is it really a shock?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7782774.stm

See full article from here!

Howling Bells - Into the Chaos

After previously really enjoying their debut album, one of my favourite bands are back with a new single. They are not massive but I recommend buying their first album (or thieving, subject to your conscience)....on a less important note, I met the lead singer when buying a band T shirt over a year ago and she is just as hot as she looks on the video. And it is still one of my favourite T shirts! At the risk of sounding like a sad teenage girl...I'll end it there. http://www.myspace.com/howlingbells for more..

Black Mesa Source

Black Mesa (previously known as Black Mesa: Source) is a third-party total conversion mod for Half-Life 2. The ultimate goal of the mod is to recreate the original Half-Life from the ground up, using the advanced capabilities of the Source engine, the improved graphics quality of Half-Life 2 and enhanced character AI, to create a new and more engrossing in-game world by introducing more varied, complex environments and more challenging, realistic gameplay. Black Mesa will be playable by anyone who owns any Source engine game.

Bible Illuminated

It's the Bible, But not as you know it, Jim.

According to the BBC:

Most people think of the Bible as a densely printed book with no pictures, but a version of the scripture that resembles a glossy coffee table magazine aims to change that. It's part of a wave of radical presentations of the Bible, including a manga version and a Lego gospel. But how do Christians feel about these attempts to spread the word?

It's the kind of magazine you might find in a doctor's waiting room next to Cosmopolitan or Reader's Digest. On the front is a pale face heavy with mascara. A flick through throws up striking images: urban flooding, a Nigerian abattoir, a girl eating noodles, a pooch in a limo.

It's only when and if you get round to reading the text that the incongruity strikes you: "Go and sell all you have and give the money to the poor, and you will have riches in heaven." What kind of problem page is this?

Burma, Special Branch and the Foreign Secretary!

Sorry that the majority of posts seem Political in nature but I thought this worth sharing:

I went to hear David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary speak today during a Questions and Answers session at the Great Hall, Leeds University. On arrival, what struck me was the obvious presence of Special branch with their stereotypical macs and tashes, and an attachment throng of parked Mercedes Benz cars surrounding a Jag (which at the time, left my imagination to wonder if it was bullet proof or not)!?

Anyway, I could not easily resist the opportunity to hear him speak or indeed to ask a question. My question (with the help of Dad) was framed around the recent sentencing of political activists in Burma of up to 65 years in prison. One pro-democracy blogger was given 20 years for his involvement. Please see the following article for more details:
http://advocacy.globalvoicesonline.org/2008/11/11/burmese-blogger-nay-phone-latt-sentenced-to-twenty-years-and-six-months/

My question to the FS was this:

'How seriously is the British Government taking the suppression of political rights for minority ethnic peoples in Burma and what steps has the British Government taken to protest over the sentencing of pro-democracy leaders in Burma for up to sixty-five years?'

His response was a little short of satisfactory. He noted his awareness of the importance of the democratically elected Aung San Suu Kyi who has remained under house arrest for well over a decade. He gave reference to the 'warm feeling' that he felt when in 2006 during the Monk's protests, he was speaking to the British Embassy in Rangoon, over the telephone and how he could hear the clapping of the Monk's as they walked past the Embassy. But in his avoidance of the direct question to what is the British Government doing, he simply pointed to the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon's visit to Rangoon in December (see http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/un_action.html and take action). His limited response is a sign perhaps of it not being on top of Britain's agenda. Not of much use in the twin sense of Burma’s locked up activists but also my dissertation.

All together I feel the Foreign Secretary, collectively gave a good response to most of the questions raised. His knowledge basis for varying topics was impressive. Even to some of the more controversial questions posed on the subjects of: Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, Israel etc. I think he got off lightly but his human side did come out during his response with a touch of humour; seemingly he was perfectly at ease. Perhaps one day he will be a candidate for the Leader of Labour Party?
Watch this space!

Just want to share a clip originally taken from Dispatches which I am using in a presentation on Burma next week:

Mirrors Edge

Obama: The Aftermath - at The Onion

Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are

Goodbye Bush, hello Obama!

Message from Avaaz:

After 8 long years of Bush – finally a fresh start!

Obama's victory brings a chance for the US to finally join with the world community to take on pressing challenges on climate change, human rights, and peace.

After years, even decades of distrust, let's seize this moment of unity, reconciliation and hope to send a message of warm congratulations and invitation to work together to the new President and the American people.

We've built a huge wall near the White House in Washington DC where the number of signatures on our message and personal messages from around the world will grow over the next several hours. We've also asked Obama to personally receive our petition from a group of Avaaz members. Let's get to 1 million signers and messages to Obama! Sign on at the link below and forward this email to others:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/million_messages_to_obama

This is a time for celebration of democracy, but already the sharks are starting to circle – oil companies, war contractors, conservative lobbyists, and the powerful neo-con clique that brought us the war in Iraq are looking for ways to dim the prospects for change. Obama has promised national unity, and these interests will ask a high price for that unity.

Let's act quickly to make sure the people of the world are heard as Obama makes crucial choices in the coming days on how to live up to his campaign promises to secure a strong global treaty on climate change, ban torture and close Guantanamo prison, withdraw carefully from Iraq, and double aid to make global poverty history. Rarely has a US President been more likely to listen to us.

We'll make the point that on most of the pressing issues faced by Obama and the American people – from the financial crisis to climate change -- we need to work together as one world to achieve change

Squatting in Ashley Road

Last Tuesday, 28th October, there was an attempt to evict some squatters from an address in Ashley Road, St Pauls, here in Bristol. The attempt failed but one of the occupants of the house has written an interesting article over at Bristol Indymedia on the hows, whys and wherefores of squatting in the city.

We are a diverse bunch. Most people in the house are in paid work, some are not, probably in similar proportion to an average group of people in St. Paul's. We range in age from 16 to 40. We don't have kids or families with us at the moment, simply because of the pressure from the authorities. How we may be different from others is that we try and solve our problems ourselves, collectively. All of us living at Unity House had previously being living in houses that were socially owned (housing association or council) that had been abandoned then sold off to private developers. This is a trend we see increasingly.

People who trash houses, be they developers, squatters, arsonists, thieves or whatever, are not good people. Me and the people that I live with always attempt to make the space we live in as pleasant as possible, as would any decent person. To see any building derelict or destroyed is sickening to me. We are people who are struggling for collective space. We have had gigs and parties, meetings and film screenings for a range of groups. We were part of the International Days of Action for Autonomous Spaces in April and we will continue to look for and help create vibrant spaces in our communities.

WHAT IS 87 Ashley Rd?

We have been sold a lie; that private ownership and placing poor people on the housing ladder is the solution to the so called housing problem.

Places for People Group are the biggest UK housing association. They also have the highest paid chief executives in the housing sector, (Director salary: £258k in 2007). Housing associations were set up to fill the gap left by Thatcher’s destruction of social housing provision. Legally, they can not make profits, so they make up for this through fat bonus checks for the fat cats. That is taxpayer’s money going to fund extravagant lifestyles (see first link above).

The registered owner of 87 Ashley Road is a separate legal charity based in Preston, called Places for People Individual Support. This charity has never contacted the occupiers of 87 Ashley Rd... More

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Dollars and dominance

BBC Radio 4's Analysis: Dollars and dominance is broadcast on Thursday 23rd October at 20:30 BST and repeated on Sunday 26th October at 21.30 BST

Listened to this as a podcast last week and thought in very interesting. Even got the transcript as its very relevent to an assignment I'm doing in Globalization. You can listen as a podcast or listen on BBC iplayer: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/radio4_aod.shtml?radio4/analysis

I think that today's financial crisis is going to hasten the end of the dollar as the world's reserve currency.

Avinash Persaud

But as this programme discovers, the dollar may no longer remain such a pillar of US power.

Before the crisis its value had been steadily declining. That suited many Americans and their political leaders - a weaker dollar boosted US exports and manufacturing jobs.

But no longer can the powers that be in Washington tell the rest of the world, as a 1970s Treasury Secretary once did, that the dollar is "our currency, but your problem". And the crisis has raised new questions about how far the US can afford its foreign policy commitments and its need to keep the domestic economy afloat.

Rising powers such as China and the Gulf states now have huge reserves in dollars. That makes them, very keen on a strong dollar now.

But if they decided to switch allegiance they could suddenly destabilise the US currency. It's been called a "balance of financial terror" that the US must now live with.

If the dollar is in decline as a global currency, what of the alternatives? The euro has a global role, but no political leadership to match that of the US. Many expect the Chinese currency to rival or overtake the dollar as the global balance of economic power changes, but that will take time.

It's like the idea of mutually assured deterrence. We hope that everybody becomes respectful of the financial power of the other side, but that such destructive power won't be deployed.

Barry Eichengreen

So in the meantime, we are left with a world in which the dollar plays a more and more controversial and uncertain role - still a key pillar of American power, but a currency over which the rest of the world has more and more control.

Contributors:

Avinash Persaud, Chairman of Intelligence Capital Limited

Barry Eichengreen, Professor of political economy, University of California, Berkeley

Harold James, Professor of History, Princeton University

David Marsh, author "The Euro: The Emerging Global Currency"

Dr Albert Park, Reader in Economics, Oxford University

Jim O'Neill, Head of Global Economic Research at Goldman Sachs

Presenter: Ngaire Woods
Producer: Chris Bowlby
Editor: Hugh Levinson

The Codex Sinaiticus

The BBC Reports:

What is probably the oldest known Bible is being digitised, reuniting its scattered parts for the first time since its discovery 160 years ago. It is markedly different from its modern equivalent. What's left out?

The world's oldest surviving Bible is in bits.

For 1,500 years, the Codex Sinaiticus lay undisturbed in a Sinai monastery, until it was found - or stolen, as the monks say - in 1844 and split between Egypt, Russia, Germany and Britain.

Now these different parts are to be united online and, from next July, anyone, anywhere in the world with internet access will be able to view the complete text and read a translation.

For those who believe the Bible is the inerrant, unaltered word of God, there will be some very uncomfortable questions to answer. It shows there have been thousands of alterations to today's bible.

The Codex, probably the oldest Bible we have, also has books which are missing from the Authorised Version that most Christians are familiar with today - and it does not have crucial verses relating to the Resurrection...

Stone cold facts

This one comes courtesy of Dad:

Richard Bettany died July 19th 1849 aged 75. Here he lies in the graveyard at All Saints Church Dilhorne, Staffordshire. He was born about 1764 . He outlived three wives and at least six children. What was his occupation?

It would appear his first wife Elizabeth died in 1815 aged 38 years. Two of their sons died young but a son Richard must have been born around 1804

His father Richard married again but his second wife’s name is not mentioned on the stone. Did she die in childbirth around 1816 when Elizabeth was born?

Or was Elizabeth, who died in 1838, aged 22 years, a daughter given by his third wife Maria who died 28th August 1846 aged 63 years?

Tragedy clearly struck the family in 1843 when Maria died on the 4th February aged 23 years and her sister Charlotte died on 15th February aged 21 years. What was the cause of death? Richard, was to die aged 40 on 3rd December 1844. A tragic eight years for Richard between 1838 and 1846. Five of his family died and he himself survived until 1849.

Atheism and the Stock Market

Not many people combine these 2 subjects.

Nassim Taleb is a controversial but influential and entertaining intellectual whose views on probability and 'decision-making under uncertainty' are outlined in his best-selling book 'The Black Swan: the Impact of the Highly Improbable'.

In this short clip he derides those skeptics who criticise religion on rational grounds while putting their faith in the stockmarket.

A full version of the lecture which was presented as part of a Long Now Foundation series is available here - but you might want to hunker down for it, it's an hour and half long.

Controversy at the Royal Society

On a more serious note (and in case you missed it) there has been controversy this week at the Royal Society, the oldest scientific society in existence, after an article in the Guardian claims that the Education Director Professor Michael Reis had called for Creationism to be taught in schools. Michael Reis claims he was misrepresented in a subsequent letter to the editor but apparently he has since resigned from his post anyway. Now, Richard Dawkins enters the debate.

On a related theme, Humanists are currently suing the UK's government's exam agency over its decision to prevent a board giving humanism equal status to faiths in a religious education GCSE.

A 'Secret' Eco-Village

The only reason I've posted this is because part of me wants to live here (and have a beard).

For five happy years they enjoyed simple lives in their straw and mud huts.

Generating their own power and growing their own food, they strived for self-sufficiency and thrived in homes that looked more suited to the hobbits from The Lord of the Rings.

Then a survey plane chanced upon the 'lost tribe'... and they were plunged into a decade-long battle with officialdom.

Read all about it.

Debt

This Week at Climate Camp

This week at Climate Camp- Kingsnorth, Kent, UK 3-11 August, 2008

- "political policing of the worst kind"

- Police clash with protesters who refuse to be searched.

- Plane Stupid Protest at Gatwick.

- Food vans are being stopped by the Police.

- Mass Action at Kingsnorth on Saturday

- Protest at RBS HQ

- Protesters target a biofuel depot in Essex.

- Objections to Police in Riot Gear.

- Arthur Scargill Shows up.

- The Medway harbour master has refused permission for a River procession on Saturday.

- Coverage on You Tube

Great Spot from Ollie - Where the Hell is Matt?

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Stoke Croft Documentaries

The community in Stokes Croft, Bristol, has mobilised in the last 12 months, faced with the prospect of redevelopment which threatens it's unique character and atmosphere.

Having lived here in Bristol on and off for 13 years now, I can testify myself to the magical qualities of the area which spring not only from it's rich social history but also the diversity of it's population, and find myself agreeing with the People's Republic of Stokes Croft, who write:

It is precisely because Stokes Croft has been neglected, that people of all backgrounds and circumstance have learned to co-exist in an enclave of tolerance that few from outside this magical area can begin to understand...

PRSC is at the forefront of the movement in the area, and in the first of these 2 video, the founder Chris Chalkley, talks about how it all began and the street art, which has increasinly become a feature of Stoke's Croft.




In the second film below, produced by the Bristol-based video magazine, Five on One, you can see how the community is responding to the threat of closure of some of the Stokes Croft's most iconic venues.



Five on One, have a whole set on films on their You Tube page, including some nice footage from inside the Jamaica Street Art Studios and an extremely feature on Bristol Parkour.

Why was the Cyclone in Burma so Deadly?

The horrendous death toll in Burma suddenly seems a bit more understandable when you see these images from NASA...

National Geographic asks Why was the Cyclone so Deadly?

Forecasters began tracking the cyclone April 28 as it first headed toward India. As projected, the storm took a sharp turn eastward. But it didn't follow the typical cyclone track, which leads to Bangladesh or Myanmar's mountainous northwest.

Instead, the cyclone swept into the low-lying Irrawaddy River Delta in central Myanmar. The result was the worst disaster ever in the impoverished country.

It was the first time such an intense storm is known to have hit the delta, said Jeff Masters, co-founder and director of meteorology at the San Francisco-based Web site Weather Underground.

He called it "one of those once-in-every-500-years kind of things."

"The easterly component of the path is unusual," Masters said. "It tracked right over the most vulnerable part of the country, where most of the people live."

No Limits

Without fins or an exposure suit, William Trubrudge free dives "The Arch" which is situated at a depth of 58 metres in the Blue Hole, Dahab...



As little as 20 years ago scientists were convinced that humans could not survive without special equipment beyond a depth of 50 metres. Now, with the assistance of a recently discovered physiological process called blood shift, so-called "No Limits" free divers plunge to depths of over 200 metres.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-diving

Numberwang!

In case you haven't heard about the game that's sweeping the nation:

The Spy Who Was "Plane Stupid"

My good friend, Graham and the aviation protest group 'Plane Stupid', have been in the news again since uncovering a mole in their midst.

The Mole, apparently, made a number of basic errors including:

• Wearing expensive designer clothes (which he attempted to disguise by wearing a Palestinian scarf to give some environmental credibility)
• Turning up to meetings consistently early
• Demonstrating an unusual eagerness to reap mayhem on British airport infrastructure by suggesting the grandest and most aggressive schemes
• Allowing information on planned activities to be published almost immediately in the press

You can read more at Ecoworldly, and Graham also has an article in The Guardian.

Wipeout HD

For the Wipeout lovers in the family.

Say anything, ask anything, post anything

So I'm allowed to say anything, ask anything, post anything? Am I? This is quite exciting. I don't think my writing skills are nearly as beautiful as you regular composers and neither am i computer technified enough to add video clips and all that but none the less I shall enjoy this.

So here are a few of my thoughts....

Had a lovely weekend. Caleb was really good, which is the main thing. Tom (Bettany) is such a wondeful host that I feel like I've had a little holiday away from the daily, dailyness of all that my life is at the moment. Not that I want to complain about that daily, dailyness - I quite like it actually.

So I'm wondering why Jake wants Alex to have God parents - or the secular version at least? What does it mean? What will they do? I'm don't really get God parents either, so this really surprises me.

My next thought/question again goes to you Jake. Its something I've been pondering on for a little while and perhaps if I had had the opportunity would have been brave enough to ask you in person... will you tell me about your experiences that led you to decide to become a Christian when you were a little boy. I'm sure I can remember you practising your testimony for when you got baptised and you saying something about being on the toilet? And will you tell me, when it was, how it was, that you decided that you actually weren't one really. I feel like it's never been talked about, why is that? is it because I've just not asked or is it a bit of a taboo subject?

Introducing... Alexander Cornelius Bettany

Born: 17th February, 2008. 8lb 4oz. All Joy.

The President and the Basilica

The world's largest Christian church has 7,000 individually air-conditioned seats, standing-room for 11,000 in a surrounding 3ha marble plaza, and enough room for 100,000 more – 300,000 at a squeeze – beyond that.

Yet the chances of even the 7,000 seats ever all being occupied at one time are about nil, because rather than finding this church in one of the great cities of the world, you'll discover it in a community of just 120,000 people in the middle of the jungled hills, arid plains and farmlands of Africa's Ivory Coast...

...Modelled largely along the lines of St Peter's in Rome that took 109 years to build, the Yamoussoukro Basilica cost USD$300m and took 1,500 largely-Ivorians just three years to construct...

From the excitingly named 'Epoch Times'.

Indiana Jones and the Teaser Trailer

Yahoo! has a bigger version. Great Stuff.

Christians? Burma? Rambo?

One for you here, Dad - from the BBC

Veteran star Sylvester Stallone and his biceps are back on the big screen for the fourth Rambo film, which sees the 61-year-old don khakis to play the action hero one last time.

He may be a good deal older and craggier than when he first starred as Vietnam veteran John Rambo, but this did not deter Stallone from plunging himself deep into the treacherous jungles of south-east Asia, where the film is set.

The movie, which was released in the US in January, has had mixed reviews, with Variety singling out its "unusually high body count" for criticism.

In the film, Rambo has become a pacifist recluse in Thailand who reluctantly helps guide a group of Christian missionaries to Burma by river.

When he hears of their capture by the Burmese army in the thick of a civil war, he steps in to help.

I'm sure the message here is spiritual but just for good measure, here's the trailer.

Word of the day

Iconoclasm: what a great word. It just sounds so impressive, it just rolls off the tongue like machine gun fire. I just learned what it means...

Iconoclasm: The action or spirit of an iconoclast.

Which begs an obvious question...

Iconoclast: A breaker or destroyer of images, esp. those set up for religious veneration. A person who attacks cherished beliefs, traditional institutions, etc., as being based on error or superstition.

Let's all try to use this fine word at least once today. Here's a ready made example of a way it can be used which I just stole from a film review, feel free to copy it yourself if the mood takes you...

"Lars Von Triers' new film, 'The Boss Of It All' is his most accessible, and least iconoclastic, in ages".

Or you could tell your mates down the pub that you're thinking about becoming an iconoclast. Ask their opinion on whether they think it's a good idea or not.

(It's probably best not to entertain any seriously iconoclastic ideas though - at least don't vocalise them like Lars Von Trier regularly does, because it might upset mum and dad)


Irreverance and iconoclasm in action: Lars Von Trier on the set of his film "The Idiots" (2000)

Chubby Chuckler

Not likely to set alight the internet with this post but let's face it, you've gotta embrace the baby love that's doing the rounds at the moment - it's more infectious than the Winter Vomiting Virus. This is bound to bring a smile to the face of even the most hardened cynics. Tom, you're clearly a very gifted comic.

Louis Theroux and the Survivalists

Spotted at BoingBoing - You can also see Louis Theroux and the:
Neo-Nazis , Westboro Baptist Church , Black Supremacists , Swingers, Body Builders, UFO Hunters, Apertheid Diehards in South Africa, Thai Brides, Gangsta' Rappers, Hypnotists, Televangelists, Wrestlers, Enlightenment, San Quentin State Prison.

Kaki King - Goby

Irresistable

This reminds me of a joke:

Question: How many ears does Mr Spock have?

Answer: 3. A left ear, a right ear and a final front ear.