The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire!

"Built Green? Nope black! McMansions in RCDs r not green. ELF"- Sign at the Fire

So, I have been in the blogging doldrums but I feel that there is finally something worth bringing me out of it. As of early this morning a fire was set in some rich neighborhoods in Seattle. Authorities are claiming that it was set by ELF "activists." For more info check out Fox News, MSNBC, Local TV, and the Seattle Times. As more comes in, and as I get more time to drink coffee and wake up, I will add some commentary. All I can say now is I loose no tears for multi-million dollar sprawl developments. I hope they all burn down (with no one in them of course).

**update**
Bombs and Shield and Green is the New Red have both posted some info/commentary on the ELF action. I also heard that Fox News (the bastion of good reporting) had an hour long special on "Eco-terrrorism" did anyone see this or know a torrent or site that it is hosted on? I would like to see what they say about it and who they interview.

News: Lakota Free State

I have not had the time to update lately, as I have been busy engaging in debaucheries activity here in Vegas. That and there is not free Internet anywhere in this damned town. To make up for that, I wanted to put up a recent news article that I have not heard too much about in the presses.

Sometime last week, a small group of Lakota Sioux Indians withdrew from all treaties and declared their land an independent autonomous zone. The actor, libertarian politicians, and Indian rights activist Russell Means stated that, "we are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us." The newly free Sioux country plans on printing its own currency, passports, and driver licenses all while remaining tax-free for all who renounce their United States Citizenship for the newly created Sioux Nations.

Though the actions of Russell Means, a libertarian who has ran on the Republican ticket for Vice-President, and the small group of Sioux appears to be more of a media action than an actual threat to US power but it does bring up the importance of Dual Power in radical activism.

Dual Power, is a Leninist phrase that is the revolutionary creation of counter-institutions within a state. The goal of duel power is to provide alternative institutions that undermine the state by questioning the states sovereignty over police and welfare actions. The anarchist federation, Love and Rage, first incorporated dual power into American anarchist politics during the early 1990s. The group, attempted to posit dual power as being the central component of a revolutionary politics; taking from the Zapatista's the lesson that dual power organizing can threaten the state while revolutionaries engage in a protracted war against the state.

What does this mean in relation to the Lakota Sioux? In my opinion, the Sioux action has the potential to invigorate the importance of dual power within the Anarchist milieu for the first time since Love and Rage and also provides the first opportunity, since the height of the AIM movement in the 1970s, to provide the indigenous community of the US with community control. I personally see dual power to be an important part of Anarchist politics as it provides a much-needed space to create revolution spaces and allows for experimentation. As activists we can try different programs and engage in different tactics and see what works. It also allows for us, as a community, to set up community run programs organized to provide mutual aid, all while weakening the dependence of people on the state and empowering people to take their lives into their own hands. I personally, hold very little hope for this action. It is not because the Sioux cannot take care of themselves, it is more along the line that I do not trust Russell Means to provide any radical or revolutionary inspiration for the movement. This, if anything, appears to be a more legitimate and inspirational version of the Patriot Movement throughout the West. I hope that I am wrong and that the newly freed spaces do more for the people who live there and do more for the radical movement in the US more generally, I just do not see that happening. So Sioux nation prove me wrong!

Why the Police are not Your Friend: Part 1

One of the biggest reasons people give for rejecting anarchism is their fear of what will happen in a world without police protecting them. To deal with this issue I want to look into two myths surrounding the police (with more to come later): first, that not all cops are bad, and secondly that they have a dangerous job.

Sometime in the next week or two, I will attempt to dispel two other myths: 1) that the cops are there to protect you and 2) the cops deter crime.

Myth 1: "Not all cops are bad"

The Chicago Tribune today published an expose that looked into the 200+ incidents of police shootings going back for 10 years. The report noted that a person is shot by the police once ever 10 days in Chicago and that in less than 1% of the around 250 incidents the police officers are found at fault. In the other 99ish% the police officers get off, often even before the autopsy is completed and before testimony from witness is recorded. In many instances, the police oversight review board did not even interview one witness nor look at any of the forensic or autopsy reports.

The Chicago Tribune reports also claims that at least 12 of the people killed where shot in the back, often from very close range. In one of this instance Cornelious Ware, was shot to death by 5 plain clothes police officers who claimed they saw him wave a gun. His 15 and 13 year old siblings claimed otherwise. The forensics evidence came back and showed that the gun found at the scene had no blood on it, even though Ware was shot in the hand that was theoretically holding the gun.

Of course, the police officers where found to be free of all charges and let to go back to work. The civil courts found otherwise, as early this year a Chicago jury sided with the Wares and before the verdict came out the police department gave the family nearly 6 million dollars to keep quiet. The civil court found that the police officers shot and killed Ware and then placed a gun to cover their asses. They originally got off because the oversight board refused to interview people, miss quoted the witnesses (removing the fact that he was unarmed), and refused to look at the autopsy evidence. In addition, the protocol in the Chicago police department is to let the officers meet together before writing an incident report. This allows all the officers to get their stories straight and to fabricate what needs to be fabricated.

What we have here is systemic police misconduct, abuses of power, and departmental cover-ups. It might not be earth shattering information for most people to hear this but it helps dispel the myth that "not all cops are bad." Why is this? Because, this expose shows that there is an institutional framework set-up within the Chicago police department (and ever other major cities) that obfuscates and distorts truth in order to defend police misconduct. This not-so-thin blue line has to go all the way up to the Chief of police and the politicians in the windy city. It also has to include almost the entire police department. It even implicates those theoretical "good cops" who for some reason or another decided to remain silent while hundreds of their fellow cops murdered, raped, and terrorized the mostly black neighborhoods of Chicago. These theoretical good cops, who had to know about the misconduct, could have told the news reporters and made a stand against this gross abuse of power, instead they remained quiet. To quote Edmund Burke (who I rarely quote), "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." In this instance, the "good men" did nothing, and because of it the "bad men" killed well over 200 people. My question is how good could those "good cops" have been? Maybe they where just following orders or did not fully know what was going on? But it seems I have heard that argument before elsewhere…

What also comes out of this story is how horrible a job police oversight boards do. These boards are always just rubber stamps for police decisions. Instead of looking into misconduct and attempting they instead just provide a legal cover-up for the police. The CopWatch program is a much better and more successful way of addressing and stopping police misconduct.

Myth 2: "Cops have a tough and dangerous job"

The other argument in defense of the police is that "they have a tough and dangerous job." This argument is also fallacious. If you look at the statistics there are 676,000 police officers in this country and last year and 147 died on duty (this includes all who died from heart attacks, car accidents, etc). This brings the death rate for police officers to be 21 per 100,000 putting them below carpenters, electricians, coal miners, convenience store workers, and about 30-40 other professions. This number is actually only slightly higher then the death rate in child-birth last year (which was 17 out of 100,000). So if you think the cops have a dangerous job what about the soon to be mothers who are putting their life on the line (nearly as on the line as the police are) in order to have a child? Or the roofer who is always one bad step from killing himself should be allowed the right to kill or maim people.

First post in a while.

It has been a while since I have updated my blog. The last week has been very busy and its not like anything important came out in the news or happened in the world. Hopefully over the weekend, since its Thanksgivings weekend and I should finally have some free time I can catch up on some of the news floating around.

For tonight, I want to write about the new IPCC report that came out a few days ago. I have not had time to read it all, being that its well over 1,000 pages, and I probably never will. What I have found out is…that all our previous contentions about the cataclysmic effects of global climate changer were actually wrong and its actually much, much, worse then we thought.

According to leading scientists global climate change is occurring three times quicker than they had originally speculated. This is directly the result of human CO2 emission increasing three fold from the 1990 figures. The big difference between the 1990s and today is the rise of China and other mal-developing nations and their increasing dependence on the black crude heroin.

What this means is that we, as a species, need to find a way to drastically, and I do mean drastically, reduce our C02 emission stat. The vast majority of American’s will probably place the blame on China and other developing nations, neglecting the fact that the United States has been the leading source of CO2 emissions for around a hundred years and because of this has a responsibility to act. Others will probably look to new shiny technologies to fix the problem. Sort of like Popular Sciences number 1 green technology of the last year, nanosolar. Of course, nanosolar seems like a vast improvement over coal, natural gas, and nuclear power, and it is. But, this is not a long-term solution to any problem. Fixing nanosolar to every building will lower the amount of coal and oil that needs to be burned for electricity but it does nothing to stop our dependence on the automobile (think how far the average tomato travels, that traveling has to create CO2). I am sure that it also has many negative consequences that we are not yet aware of. For one, I am sure that their nano-particle ink has some sever environmental problems in either its extraction phase (it has to come from somewhere, at least until we invent magic) or in the recycling phase (it has to go somewhere as well).

So, for now nanosolar and other technologies might help the situation but they are band-aid solutions that do not address the root source of the problem. That root source is our belief in never ending economic growth and the centralization of government agencies. These are the real things we need to confront. We need to, first off, reject capitalism and move towards a locally produced, sustainable existence, which will necessarily require a radical reduction and/or abolition of government, as we know it. On top of this, we will see the end of major cities (cities are at their very heart unsustainable places to live) and a mass migration from the cities back towards the local village. By rejecting the gospel of growth and radically decentralizing, or abolishing, governmental institutions we can localize our life. This is the only long-term way to even come close to addressing global climate change.

News of the Week Part 1: Who is at fault for the recent Oil Spill?

A recent oil spill off the coast of California (note: there was also an oil spill in the Black Sea Sunday that is probably more damaging then this one in California), according to government authorities, appears to be the result of human error. Of course, in this case the authorities pin the fault on the captain and not the suicidal desire for oil. Its amazing how "accidents" like this and the Exxon Valdez are seen as huge environmental catastrophes while the oil leaking out of pipelines and gas tanks throughout the world, and the catastrophic co2 pollution that results from the burning of oil, is seen as essential for our current human existence. This even though the every day actions of industrial society is significantly more damaging then any oil spill or chemical leak. If you ask me, the error is that we have created an economy that requires oil. With this lust for oil we get - global climate change, lose of biodiversity, and increased rates of cancer and obesity, ect. If you ask me it is not worth it. At least it is becoming increasingly clear that the era of oil is nearing its end.

News of the Week Part 3: The Research Lab at the End of the Universe

In the next issue of Nature there is going to be study discussing the ways in which smell triggers fear. In this study, Hitoshi Sakano, a neuroscientist at the University of Tokyo, genetically engineered mice to not have "olfactory neurons in their dorsal epithelium." Thus the mice did not fear leopard urine though they smelt it. They found that the mice could be taught to fear a certain smell (I do not want to know how they taught them this) showing the ways in which certain scents and emotions are intimately tied together both genetically and learned.

This study also shows the controlling power of genetic research. These mice are able to have certain fears removed at a genetic level. This is a sign of the next stage of domestication; genetically removing certain traits that are not beneficial for domestic animals such as fear, rage, depression, ect. This story made me think of Douglas Adams Restaurant at the End of the Universe and the genetically engineered cattle that not only wanted you to eat them but also expressed it vocally. How long is it before we have little white mouse expressing their desire to catch cancer and bunnies that love burning chemicals in their eyes?

News of the Week Part 2: Signs of the coming apocalypse?

If things do not change and rain does not fall, or rivers are not diverted, the industries and people of Georgia will be without potable water. As of October 19th the city of Atlanta had only a 90 days supply of water and they had yet to think of any back up plan to address the issue. The Gov. of Georgia, Sonny Purdue (R) has pinned all his hopes on 1) forcing water conservation and 2) finding a way to stop water drainage from the lakes and rivers of Georgia. It appears that the governor is sick and tired of those no good neighboring states of Florida and Alabama getting all the water.

Of course, these half-brained attempts are not nearly enough. At least one person in Georgia realizes the problem: "It's amazing that things have come to this," said Ray Weidman, owner of an Atlanta landscaper business. "Everybody knew the growth was coming. We haven't had a plan for all the people coming here?" Yep, the problem for Georgia is they have had increased growth, increased development, and increased agro-business all with no attempt to conserve or preserve what few water sources the state has. in fact, the biggest source of drinking water, Lake Lanier is already less than three months from being dry.

To be fair to Georgia this not a problem that only they are facing. Many cities, and regions, throughout the United States and the world are coming to realize that water is not an infinite resource. One can only assume that as weather patterns become more erratic and temperatures increase that droughts will only increase throughout the world (as will floods). The cosmic irony of all this is that as water sources in George, and Western United States (Southern California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico) are all drying up the ocean waters will probably rise (and in fact about 1/10th of the worlds population will either be flooded or refugees or about 643 million people) and other areas will be under constant barrage from hurricanes and rainstorm.

News of the Week Part 1: Dr. Zaius what is your opinion?

From the New York Times Science Section- It seems that researchers at Yale's Psychological Studies department have written a paper discussing the ability of capuchin monkeys to rationalize their decisions. In their study they found that the monkeys rationalized choices in a way similar to 4 year-olds. Of course when the Yale researchers had to choose between stating that "monkeys and children have 'richer motivational complexity' than we realize" or that the scientific "ways of dealing with cognitive dissonance are 'mechanistically simpler than previously thought" they of course choose the later. It appears that the scientists refused to accept that monkeys are more complex and "human-like" then they currently think and instead just lowered the value of rationalizing. Obviously it cannot be that important if monkeys, underdeveloped children, and amnesiacs can do it. No matter what they claim, this does question how separate and unique humans are from other animals. If rationalizing and cognitive dissonance isn't what makes humans "unique" and "superior" to other animals what does?

Poor SUVs

It appears that vandals have targeted SUVs in a suburb of Las Vegas. Around 40 of the SUVs had windows damaged. Of course, the local authorities fear the worst and have contacted homeland security and the FBI in fear that this might be "eco-terrorism." Lets get this straight. So if I vandalize an SUV because I am concerned with climate change I am a terrorist. If I do it because I hate yuppies I a vandal.