bluemlein

Another Unknown daVinci Is Unveiled

2011-12-07T18:35:00.003Z

excerpted from the blog alloldmastersdontbelongtothequeen.co.uk:

"We have been following the astounding strides in art examination, particularly the recent expose by Artist Ron Piccirillo that the Mona Lisa is full of rather blurry animalist forms. But of course Leonardo was known for his ramblings en pittura, his virtuoso asides and his adolescentist humour- albeit in a deeply, profoundly futurist way.

In this rarely-mentioned da Vinci painting, Questo è una Pittura Bizzarro, there are concrete allusions to the machine age in the mechanical forms of the background that might lead one to believe that that is all there is; however, this is a painting about immigration. Prof. Georgina Morant, granddaughter of Prof. Dr. George Morant who famously unburied the crystal skull of the Aztecs, noted on close examination that a very clearly non-white woman in a bathing ensemble stands as though astride a porpoise in the centre-right near the edge, while an equally non-white man appears to be snoozing with his lion centre-left near the outer rim.

"Harrrrumph," Prof. Morant said after clearing her throat rather vigorously, "Leonardo meant to imply that the immigration of all manner, indeed, all colour of persons, would, at some future time - though we don't yet know when - emigrate to Canada, the land of multicult - and what could be more alludingly correct than Canada? Why, I have - this is totally speculative of course, I haven't had my tea yet without which I cannot counteract the effect of the Carruades de Lafite - yes, I have seen images of Canadian provinces, a side view of half of Gordon Lightfoot's head, and the tops of the heads of the fifteen thousand minions of Der Leader, bent over their daily slog, which must be reconstituted as benevolences flowing from God Harper. How can it not be Canada?"

Indeed.
-photomanipulation (c)Daisy Morant

Beeeeware the Beeeehive!!!

2011-09-20T22:04:00.006Z

-pretend you're Ferdinand. Just sit and sniff the flowers

Many are the turkeys who are busy revamping FB in time for a splashy announcement at a tech conference this Thursday. This ilk presume to know what it is that you or I want without actually asking us.

Really, the paternalistic attitude is a bit much. This is the 21stC. Are we not supposed to be reaching a consensus on ideas, rather than allowing them to be pushed down our throats - then mumbling our gratitude as we tug our forelocks??? (At least, that is what the computer community has been pouring into our heads for the last decade and a half as they raced desperately toward blanket coverage of the planet. Everyone must get plugged in! instantaneous communication will be the new order of the day, just like that at the basic building block, the cell. Or the bee in the hive.) We are already more than halfway there. And it's been handled cleverly - at least until the great recession sprang upon us.

Everyone happy? no? then you should check your status to see whether your friends have included you in the latest event - check the ticker. What has become the social principal networking site, Facebook appears to be constantly worried about losing market share. Many and often are the changes thus pushed onto the users. Consequently FB is becoming less and less friendly as the company pushes its users toward a pay-as-you-go model. It is not enough to make billions from advertising, there are a few drops left in ye olde lemon, time to squeeze them out! hurry before google does! or myspace!(LOL)

It is not that one is against change; it has never been that. Rather, it is unnecessary change, illogical change, more time-consuming change, change simply for the sake of change, to give the illusion of movement. After all, is this new world not supposed to be one of constant change? constant adaptation? a more ruthless sink-or-swim?

The usual note from those working for FB and every other internet company has a tenor which can only come from being hopped up on 15 cups of lightly roasted java, and usually has the aura of just-enough-sense to make one sound sane.

The idea that there is virtue in being chronically overworked, overstressed, with insufficient resources to combat the incipient cold, the burgeoning conviction that it is all for naught, strikes me as absolutely ridiculous. Not just that, but also so tragically counterproductive. Other applications and other sites have had their moment; some did not change and others changed too much but all of them had this in common with FB - the same rabid attitude that has infected the online world and now spills over into reality.

I am for temperate movement of ideas as well as people, projects, communications. The email composed in anger and sent off in haste has haunted many a sender. Reflection is not supposed to enter into this new, reflexive world. The idea that sometimes an idea does not work even after it has been considered and debated, or tried, seems to have no place in this universe. The inference that things that do not work at lightning speed ought to be obsolete is, in fact, an obsolete idea.

There is value in everything, even the unconsidered afternoon sitting in a field, thinking or simply being. but not in this universe, which is supposed to be profitable everywhere and at all times, with everything superfluous jettisoned as a drag on speed.

Speed, however, can only go so far. Even now Google is falling over itself while one is entering a search term, anxiously shoving into one's face answers projected from one's partial entries.

-yes, this is what you'll get with reindeer urine! ©Ernst Barlach

While researching a title of a woodcut made by the great German expressionist Ernst Barlach I entered "Reitender Urian" - before I had finished, it was anxiously asking me whether I didn't really mean "reindeer urine, you great clomping twit, hopelessly challenged as you are by your fingers, are you certain you don't want to get your brain wired into Google?" No, I did not want reindeer urine, not in fact and not even in scintillating pixels. We appear to have gone into the deep end with all this nonsense. Machinery - whether mechanical or electronic - is meant to serve us, to aid us, to be there as a great resource. Not our master, not our director. We should take ten and think on it.

- everything one needs: oxygen, sunshine, time to think.

unattributed images ©Daisy Morant

OFF WITH THE GLOVES!

2011-08-22T23:23:00.005Z

Oh, how remote the mighty among us! I got a little bit of this when I was doing Public Affairs in the federal government of Canada, where messages were carefully constructed to be as clear and as ambiguous as the occasion demanded. But even there, the messages concerned people who were in their position by the grace of the people, who could voice their displeasure at the next election.

Then there are those who are insulated from the sordid world around them by their vast monetary holdings, like rows upon rows upon rows of Teflon shields that serve their purpose of keeping the protectee lily-white. The rich are different because of this, because protection can be bought so that precious little will adhere. A case in point: the Mayor of New York City, one Michael Bloomberg, net worth $18.1 billion in 2011, the thirteenth richest American.

$18,100, 000,000.00 just for perspective which - as one might imagine - can be fairly skewed from such august heights. Especially in the land of filthy lucre, whose entire goal and purpose appear to be for one to make as much money as possible, by hook or crook. Crooks such as Bernie Madoff really only incited the wrath of the public once his illegal schemes had been unmasked; before that, it seems, everyone loved Bernie.

The Mayor of New York City's web pages state that the Mayor's Alliance has as its admirable goal the elimination of kill shelters - animal shelters that kill their captives if they fail to be adopted in very short order. Even the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals kicked in one million dollars a year and a bit ago - April, 2010. Its news release, however, was very carefully worded: "to end the killing of healthy and treatable cats and dogs" that populate the wretched shelters run by Animal Care and Control.

And here I always thought that a healthy newborn kitten was an admirable creature to protect until it was adopted out to a loving family.

Bet you didn't think that you would ever see a picture such as this:

Yes. This is a healthy mum with her little clutch of kittens. In a cage. A cage so small that she cannot raise her head. So small there is no room for food or water.

A cage, moreover, that sits on the floor with the rest of the garbage. (Photo courtesy of Urgent Part 2, a division of urgentdeathrowdogs.com)

Don't feel too bad about them. They were all euthanized. They are feeling no more pain. And just so you know, this picture has been up on Facebook for many days and nobody from ACC has contradicted the descriptions of the cage, the location, or the cats' health.

I sent the mayor a message about this - as a matter of fact, I have sent a few to him of late, all about the sad state of cats in his fair city. I sent one on 8 August 2011 about a cat whose hind legs were both badly broken and who, according to the ACC report alongside, was of NO CONCERN! but don't worry. He was euthanized.

On 11 August I sent the mayor another message, this one about a badly injured cat who sat, in her pain, with bleeding open wounds. He didn't reply about that one either. But not to worry. The cat was euthanized.

On 17 August I sent another message - this one about the cat and kittens so woefully depicted above. What did Gandhi say? - oh yes, a nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members.

Not so great, are we? WE have invited the cat and the dog into our membership for millennia. We ask them to work for us for nothing more than a corner in a barn or a kennel and some food. Many of us never give the cat or the dog their due, never give them love, care properly for them. Some of us have done atrocious things to them whereas most are simply callous, careless, mentally otherwise occupied. And now that there is a devastating recession that won't go away, we cannot muster the moment's thought about the welfare of our animals - many of us have literally tossed them aside or dropped them off at "shelters" such as those execrable miniature concentration camps in New York.

When one spends one's days killing animals one develops a crust of indifference. One no longer sees the life, the love in their eyes, their mute requests for help, their pleas to retain what we all have and about which we care so little - life.

NYC and ACC have gone too far. Today and yesterday they euthanized a kaboodle of healthy kittens one week old. Needless to say I vented my displeasure to the mayor by way of his page, which is located at:

http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html

Please. If you think that killing healthy week-old kittens is acceptable, of leaving seriously injured animals without care, of processing so many units in the euth. room day after day is wrong, tell the mayor. He wants to know what you think.

And this will not become a discussion about the merits of human beings in tight financial spots versus expensive-to-maintain animals. This is about one thing only: the inhumanity we accept so easily, as long as someone else is doing it where we can't see.

Boxing glove image courtesy of andrewsrobichaud.com

Whither The Book??

2011-08-17T22:59:00.001Z

A group I belong to currently is discussing the perilous state of book publishing, particularly fiction. A week or so ago I put in my two cents' worth, which struck one of the members as "sad, sad, sad".

I countered that it was "realistic, realistic, realistic", which elicited the further comment "A sad but incisive commentary. Any solutions you see on the horizon?"

I am not sure there is a solution. My husband is an artist and for the last three years we have been discussing the situation almost non-stop. We are in the middle of a transition from a verbal to a visual society. The first strands tying together literacy, culture and social standing began to be cut with photography and were greatly accelerated with the onset of movies, which might have remained a novelty except that they acquired sound. Once television was in almost every home we were already more than half-way down the road.

Of course there were still endless gorgeously produced books containing illustrations, following the honourable tradition that began in largely illiterate times. And - sadly - it appears that the only books one will be able to sell will be those that are illustrated, and rare. . . .

illustration (c)Garrick Palmer, from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Folio Society, London 1994. Does one really want it in Kindle for 98 cents???

Where once one bragged that one's children were reading books at age five the emphasis now is on computer literacy, which is entirely different, engages a different part of the brain and is a much more immediate experience. In order to understand the story in a book one first must recognize and understand letters, then words, then concepts. A significant part of society has always had trouble with that. Think of the comparative ease with which they are able to grasp a movie's story!

Many countries have developed multicultural societies, for the ease of which foreigners' comprehension pictographs were developed and standardized internationally. (The International Standards Organization in Switzerland was very busy with this in the Seventies.) Soon people will approach education visually as opposed to verbally. Computer program writing also uses a language, but - again - one that is different enough from English or French etc that it does not compare.

As you can see, the entire thrust of communication has gone away from the verbal precision upon which we prided ourselves to the perhaps sloppier and less articulate, but still understood, visual.

I personally see a contradiction in "eBooks", never mind any technical aspects such as a lack of engagement for someone like me. You can install the sounds of pages turning, you can adjust your screen to simulate lovely acid-free paper, but you can not sever the thought in the front of your mind that if you had a real book in the tub with you it wouldn't even matter if it fell in, for example. The entire experience of reading, with its sensual component, is being declared obsolete.

Do I see any solutions? Sure. Pull the plug. Yes, that will not happen. (As an aside, anyone else struck by the imbecility of wiring the world electronically, finding this new use for electricity everywhere, at the exact moment when we have to be cutting back?)

If I were a publisher I would undoubtedly go bust. There are too many people who can't, won't, or don't want to read, who see it as a mark of societal privilege against which they rebel, who have wholeheartedly accepted the electronic world.

That being said, there still are good stories, complex characters, epic histories and other subjects we have to protect and bring into being, however possible. The chief difference between the visually told stories and the published ones is that the visual brings everything to the viewer's eyes; the book stimulates and invites one to recreate the read word vividly in one's mind.

A Pirate In The World O' Cats

2011-08-07T22:42:00.008Z

All right then, here we have a gigantic social networking site called Facebook that appears to have as members virtually anyone from anywhere - with the possible addition of a few of the Aliens Among Us, who have been observing us as strenuously uninterferingly as The Picard did in that episode in which he was unmasked and worshipped as a god.

You see? one cannot go for a paragraph without mentioning Star Trek or Facebook. Not these days.

Facebook is like an enormous, ever-expanding accordion of information that serves coincidentally as a platform for anything that is permitted. Not a day passes when one doesn't hear of some company's new Facebook page. And you thought it was a dating score site for college students!

What is of great interest is that numerous cat pages have sprung up - Friends of McAbernethy, RIP Fluffy, Puss in the CATskills and so forth. These are very useful in uniting the cat loving community, and are more than efficient in getting out the word when an animal - tho here we speak only of cats - does something startling, like reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in catspeak, stands on its whiskers, or plays the trombone for Obama.

On a more serious level, it is a platform via which it is possible to move people to rescue cats. This frequently works, although it does not yet keep pace with the deluge of cats and kittens that end up in kill shelters and are euthanized. In fact, Facebook is a venue that can facilitate the adoption, by someone in Michigan, of an animal in Florida or beyond.

Then there are pages and pages of helpful members who try to go that extra step,to a site such as chipin.com, where opening an account into which donations can be made is done fast and simply.

It was one such page that caught a lot of attention. A sweet little pink-nosed cat named Willow, with deformed hind legs, had been adopted by an acquaintance named Wendy. Lo and behold, one day a person with the screen name "Parkour Kitty" was found to be selling magnets with Willow's likeness. Never mind that Wendy's copyright was trampled on. When confronted Gina, the woman behind "Parkour Kitty" offered to split the proceeds.

Other cat pages commented, bought magnets, discovered other cats that needed help. And there was Parkour Kitty, in the forefront, this time opening a chipin account for an Australian acquaintance's cat named Chop Chop...

And a few days later there was yet another Parkour Kitty chipin, this one for a cat that truly did steal a lot of hearts, Marta, a sweet, bewildered cat of ancient lineage caught up in the turmoil that rocked Egypt. Marta was put up by the Egyptian Society for Mercy to Animals. But it was Parkour Kitty, that boundless bundle of empathy and love.

Meanwhile the magnets sold, the money rolled in, but not to Wendy, who was beginning to wonder.

And Parkour Kitty found yet another cat in desperate need, this one "belonging to a octogenarian" named Mrs Rebecca. It was a tale guaranteed to tear one's heart to bits: the impoverished Mrs Rebecca owned a pregnant Persian cat named Annabella, who had been hit by an auto, as a result of which she had two broken hind legs, a
dislocated hip, internal bleeding, and the need for bottomless pits of money.

And people donated.

That's the thing about people who love animals - they are sometimes too generous with their love or their money. Having heard many a story of animal abuse, they are too ready to believe horrors without actual proof.

Amid this Niagara of cash Parkour Kitty continued to post updates - the vet didn't know if he could fix her, more money was needed, the kittens were saved, more money was needed, the cat was sort of coming along, more money was needed . . . and, no, Annabella did not want to be seen by anyone in her current condition.

Now, if that last bit did not ring alarm bells, consider that many Facebook members become so enmeshed in catspeak that whole pages require translations, cats' internal monologues are quoted at length, and it sounds humanitarian that one not show a mangled cat, wrapped in dressings, with IV drips -

Reality check: The darling of New York, a rescued three-legged cat named Piper, and Bernice, a cat severely burned by a sociopathic moron in Oshkosh, have done exactly that. Constant updates and in Piper's case a copy of the $5,000 vet bill were posted.

Not so Annabella's information. She must be one vain cat, eh? Mrs. Rebecca's power was turned off by the heartless electric company;

and she had nothing to eat for the next two weeks.

Oh, and amid all these updates, Parkour Kitty's mommy couldn't meet a car payment and the bank was going to take away the car unless the kind wallets on Facebook coughed up another two thousand dollars.

And then, the crisis, followed equally swiftly by its denouement.

Parkour Kitty was unmasked as a recently married graphic designer living in Johnson City, Tennessee, the Australian cat received nothing, Willow received nothing tho Parkour Kitty brazenly suggested that the cheque had been returned by the Post Office, and -

Annabella was not real. Duh!

The internet is a place of scams and follies. Not a day goes by when some other scam artist does not create another sob story, another heart-rending account of some helpless creature in need.

And every time people discover that they have been scammed, the real needy ones - be they kat, kit or kaboodle - are regarded with suspicion or ignored.

Bottom line: trust no-one. Ask questions. and if you are scammed, report, report, report. Perhaps you were swindled out of only a few dollars, but you do not know the extent of the fraud.

The Internet Crime Complaint Centre:

The USPS.

The Canadian Post Office or if you live elsewhere, your postal service headquarters.

Your state/province's Office of the Attorney-General

The scammer's city's police force.

Last, but not least, your credit card company or - if you used it - Paypal.

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

2011-08-07T21:40:00.001Z

This blog has been sadly unattended for too long and Yours Truly has been sitting in the doghouse because of it.

Fortunately there aren't any critters in there with me, as that would not do, the doghouse being a tiny little thing from which anyone not as limber as a ten-year-old gymnast will not be able to escape.

When it comes to blogging - as I have found during my enforced stay in pooch hotel - one has to shred one's former ideas about newspapers, columns, magazine or book pages, and think instead of litle cue cards. The attention span appears to be perceived rather differently online, thus requiring a turn after the first or second paragraph - or so it has been said enough times now that one has taken the hint.

Is a long stretch of text really that intimidating? Not that long ago the Globe and Mail, Canada's Establishment newspaper, was fairly reluctant to use photographs, and its readers were
presented with columns upon columns of text. If you look at the Globe now you will perhaps be shocked by the absence of text. Its Saturday edition appears to have magazeenis envy, with enormous photos splashed across clay-coated stock - on the front page, yet.

Somehow this appears to be meant to appeal to web browsing readers, whose attention span is claimed to be no longer than the open browser window is long.

So it is that this page will be undergoing revisions as Yours Truly learns to keep her left hand from messing with her right hand, and attempts to become at least semi-literate in the electronic world.

The One That Won't Go Away

2010-01-26T20:54:00.004Z

SARAH PALIN: AS BOGUS AS THIS IMAGE

While looking through the pages of some former employers I chanced upon United Press International, across the top of whose pages a huge banner proclaims the question

"Sarah For 2012?"

oops, excuse me. . . I had to take a fast detour my sudden need to vomit took me to the loo but I'm all right now.

What continues to surprise me as I age - sometimes more quickly than I ought to - is that there are people who think this ill-educated person, whose actions appear governed by religious convictions and personal bias, as well as personal enrichment, would be of strong enough character, deep enough education and worldliness, and iron-willed decisiveness, to be a company president, let alone president of the currently most powerful country on the planet. They appear to work themselves into an excited delirium over her - let's hope the RCMP does not misinterpret their actions and taser them.

This person claimed to be a journalist; certainly she emphasized journalism in her college studies. But as a journalist myself I have to say that, to do the job properly, one has to put one's personal biases aside, be unflinching in the face of truth, and stand by one's statements. Which is why - if I were called upon to do so - I would never presume to report on her. There is not much in the person's character or former actions or thoughts that would inspire me. But there is much to challenge.

As an example of her manipulations one can point to the Gravina Island Bridge fiasco.

In 2005, the US Congress passed a spending bill containing an earmark worth nearly half a billion dollars - $442-million - to build two bridges in the state.
The Gravina Island Bridge was to have been longer than the Golden Gate and taller than the Brooklyn Bridge and would have connected fifty residents and Ketchikan International (because it receives flights from Russia) Airport to the mainland. After news reports that it would cost $233-million it was derided as "Bridge to Nowhere".

In the midst of controversy Hurricane Katrina happened. It was suggested to remove the funds and use them instead to rebuild a bridge over Lake Pontchartrain that was destroyed in the hurricane.

The Alaskan senator of the day, Ted Stephens, threatened to quit if the money were reallocated.

Despite the unimaginable deprivation and destruction of Katrina, and the small benefit to an even smaller population, Congress gave the funds to Alaska though the firestorm continued in the media.

The following year, 2006, Palin ran for the governorship with a "build-the-bridge" plank in her platform.

She said she would "not allow the spinmeisters to turn this project ... into something that's so negative."

She was elected, and in September 2007 she cancelled the project in an apparent snit, saying Congress had no interest in accurately portraying the project. And Alaska retained the funds.

Once she was unveiled as vice-presidential candidate Palin claimed that she had always said "thanks, but no thanks, to the bridge".

There are other incidents that show the fluid nature of her recollections, like electricity, always seeking the easiest - for her, the currently most expedient - path.

But that one is sufficient. We won't harp on her other missteps, because everyone, yours truly included, has done stupid things.

If one were to run for high public office, however, one would have to subject oneself to the deepest, closest scrutiny without the resentment she has shown. One should not claim to be penny-wise and array oneself in couturier duds at the expense of one's party committee, claim to have funded it out of one's own pocket, and then not declare it as a taxable income. And one most certainly does not betray one's ignorance before a national audience:

COURIC: Why isn't it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700bn helping middle-class families, who are struggling with healthcare, housing, gas and groceries, allow them to spend more and put more money into the economy instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?

PALIN: That's why I say, I, like every American I'm speaking with, we're ill about this position that we have been put in where it is the tax payers looking to bail out, but ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the healthcare reform that is needed to help shore up our economy, helping tho— it's got to be all about job creation too, shoring up our economy, and putting it back on the right track, so healthcare reform and reducing taxes and reigning in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans. And trade, we've got to see trade as opportunity, not as— competitive— scary thing, but one in five jobs being created in the trade sector today, we've got to look at that as more opportunity. All those things under the umbrella of job creation. This bailout is a part of that.

(Katie Couric of CBS interviewing Palin at the end of September 2008)

While we were rolling around the floor, howling with laughter, commentator Jack Cafferty of CNN was biting in his assessment of Palin. He said if being

"one 72-year-old's heartbeat away from being President of the United States... doesn't scare the hell out of you, it should".
Moreover,
"that was one of the most pathetic pieces of tape I have ever seen from someone aspiring to one of the highest offices in this country".

Nothing that has been seen, heard or read about her since then suggests that she is any wiser or more deeply read, more open or more educated as to the ways of the world. 2012??? Maybe the Mayans had an intimation of her eventual appearance, as their calendar ends then.

Fox has shown its true stripes by hiring her on a multi-year contract as a political commentator. Comedy is not dead, after all.

Our Moral Obligation To Take Haiti In Hand

2010-01-19T21:21:00.003Z

It is time to put aside such comparative frivolities as the travails of Tiger Woods or the machinations of the lobbying around health insurance in the U.S. and address an issue that should concern us all.

Haiti should have been a paradise - a tropical island, full of natural beauty and charm. But Haiti for too many decades has been, for most of its inhabitants, a poisoned fruit. This is inevitable when one per cent of its elite owns half the resources and its late dictator, "Papa Doc" Duvalier, used voodoo and the brutal not-so-secret police, the Tonton Macoute, to keep people in line.

The magnitude 7.0 earthquake that has effectively destroyed Haiti should be seen as some sort of cosmic warning - for the religious, perhaps a smiting by the hand of God. This may sound harsh and heartless, given the unimaginable suffering of the population, particularly the poor, who have neither food nor shelter nor family nor - in far too many cases - the use of all their limbs. Medicins sans frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) is appalled by the number of amputations its surgeons are being required to perform, in many instances without anesthesia, as it is a race against time and gangrene.

Even when supplies have arrived at the still-functioning airport at Port au Prince, now under control of the U.S., there are almost insurmountable obstacles to delivering the supplies where needed. And when the United Nations asked the U.S. to take control of the airport two things happened that are indicative of the problems that lie ahead.

Flights increased from one or perhaps two a day, thanks to American air traffic controllers.

And a great wave of anger rose against the Americans for usurping Haitian controllers, and telling Haitians what to do or not. Riots have broken out and it is safe to say that, if by now it has not yet done so, the country soon will slide into anarchy.

Haiti should be everyone's concern, that is to say, every country's concern, not just in the sense of sending off some aid and - once a seemingly stable rhythm has redeveloped - leaving it to "soldier on". It is how things normally go after a major disaster. But Haiti is not a normal case. There is neither a functioning infrastructure nor an effective social structure. Gangs are undoubtedly going to jockey for position and grow in the aftermath, the elite will use whatever means required to keep a grip on itself, and the poorest of the poor will continue to pay the price.

The country is in such abject condition that the United Nations should step in and appoint an international armed force to keep order and rebuild. But in order to do it properly, the United Nations must leave its blue berets - symbols of peacekeeping - at home. Haiti is not in condition to behave with any normalcy; force will be required in many an instance, and the right to use force, lethal force, when needed, must be given to whoever contributes to UN operation for the rebuilding.

The Canadian Lieutenant-General The Honourable Roméo A. Dallaire - O.C., C.M.M., G.O.C, M.S.C., C.D., (Retired), Senator - suffered great mental anguish when, wearing the blue beret of the UN peacekeeper, he had to sit by and remain immobile while Rwanda became the scene of a bloodbath that has had few equals. As a "peacekeeper" Lt.-Gen. Dallaire could do nothing as eight hundred thousand Hutu and Tutsi individuals were reduced to bleeding lumps of flesh in a frenzy of genocidal hatred. The admirable Dallaire became suicidal; his experience is detailed in his book, Shake Hands with the Devil.

Lt.-Gen. Dallaire's experience should suffice as a warning never again to put soldiers into a position where they must be spectators to such a crime. Soldiers are trained to keep order, to kill if necessary in their duties. The force that is needed to keep order in Haiti, during the many years that its rebuilding will require, also must have the authority to kill, if necessary. One supposes that the major complaints against this idea will come - in Haiti - from those who have most to lose: the gangs, the secret criminal forces, the elite (though they might look favourably upon anyone who will keep the hungry from their stoop.)

This begs the question: Who should lead this force? Anticipating great howls of protest, one nevertheless feels obligated to say that this force should be led by the United States, as it is best able to act, has the greatest access to military and civilian resources, and has never hesitated to make the unpopular decision. In the interest of impeccable behaviour the UN could appoint an overseer, so that there can be no question of US soldiers acting improperly.

(We can all thank Dubya and Dick - if you have been away, ex-president George W. Bush and ex-Vice-President Dick Cheney - for the disdain and hatred that is being levelled at Americans these days. In their wanton, arrogant, criminal disregard for the law, for the truth, they poisoned the well for a very long time to come. Let neither them nor ex-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld have any occasion to travel outside the country, for they will surely be arrested and charged with war crimes. Or so they should.)

The rebuilding of Haiti will require an effort that will take many decades. From reforestation to road building, sewer installation, house building, school building, hospital building, creation of a modern infrastructure and development of a proper educational curriculum that will free all Haitians from the prison of illiteracy and superstition, this effort will have to remain focused. We cannot walk away this time, a few months later, in the supposition that, now that the worst is over, the Haitians can look after their own.

In the past, we built the Great Wall of China, the Pyramids. We sailed around the planet in rickety ships, populated continents, deciphered the Rosetta Stone. We went to the moon, developed superb telescopes and microscopes that show the infinite progression from the very tiny to the truly unimaginably immense. We built railroads, developed tiny computers capable of extremely intricate calculations. We have extended greater rights to animals than the Haitians, and some other poor nations, give their own citizens.

Sometimes we don't remember this, as we are caught up in the amusing or the banal. But we should remember that we all have it within us to focus, to develop new ways of thinking about a problem, to maintain the will to carry it out.

We cannot stand by this time and watch the misery that is Haiti. We have a duty to our fellow man. We must step in.

(c) 2010 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Tiger Had Himself By The Tail. . .

2010-01-13T23:40:00.004Z

There's that old expression, even expressed in that Buck Owens classic, "I've got a tiger by the tail", that suggests bad things will follow that unfortunate situation once one lets go, or it slips from one's grasp.

The recent Tiger Woods debacle certainly shows how one may be mauled when things get out of hand. Tiger Woods has apparently lost his wife and family, his hitherto spotless reputation, his sponsorships, and golf - having removed himself from the tour at the moment. (The last can only be good as nobody could possibly play so focused a game as golf when a zillion negatives and possibilities and insults are twirling through one's brain.)

The latest is General Motors' announcement today that it will no longer provide free Cadillacs to Mr. Woods. One supposes that it took the GM executive a few weeks to conclude that handing over expensive autos to a billionaire, one of which he then crashed into a fire plug, is perhaps not the best use of their product (especially as they no longer can fly their executive jet to his home in order to inspect the damage done).

Gillette was first to bail. Somehow the idea of their golden boy, their clean shaven golden boy, sleeping around with women who are not his wife, must have induced in them a vision of the typical thoughtless, homewrecking bum of the Fifties - hirsute and inimical to razors.

Next came a management consultancy, heard singing "you've got to Accentureate the positive" - which, in their opinion, is no longer possible with him.

As for AT&T, perhaps its management thinks that "ordinary" men - but mostly women - will take it to task for having provided Mr. Woods with the means to arrange his illicit trysts. Heaven forfend that AT&T be sucked into that particular funnel, especially when the cellphone business is so cutthroat.

Gatorade will always claim that the decision to scrub the Tiger Woods flavour antedated his exposure, but we all hear the heavy thud of the eyelid winking as the announcement is made. Sure you did! You decided to scotch a drink whose every bottle prominently displayed his name, because nobody was interested any longer.

Well, then, now that he is constantly in our thoughts and blogs that ought to raise your sales. You think? Revive the brand! you'll make millions.

A recent study by University of California suggests the total economic damages from this unfortunate situation could total $12,000,000,000.00. . . Twelve Billion Dollars. No wonder the American economy is not rebounding as it ought.

How heavy is twelve billion dollars, in thousand-dollar bills? Quite a heft, one should think, but is it heavier than the fallout from Mr. Woods's inability to keep a grip on himself?

The problem with developing a squeaky-clean image is that it becomes ever more difficult, in this universe, to remain so as one lives and ages.

While one cannot have much sympathy for the man, there are factors that should be considered, particularly if one thinks grooming one's own toddler to be a super athlete, or dancer, or politician, is a wonderful thing.

Eldrick Tont Woods has been welded to a golf club since he was two. His own father, who by all accounts held the blow-torch in an iron fist, made some ridiculous pronouncements to the effect that his son would change world history for the better. And since Eldrick was two, golf has been the steady diet that nourished his warped and emotionally stunted personality.

One cannot develop emotionally and intellectually when a millstone like this is planted around one's neck. When golf (or acting, or baton-twirling) is all one is allowed to think about, when everything one does is in support of the millstone, other aspects of one's life fade into the distance. Friends, being a stupid young child, adolescence, being a somewhat less stupid young man, disappear along with free time and free thought.

We all know that growing up is painful, especially during the middle teenage years. How much more so when one is not allowed to grow up naturally?

The endless skirt-chasing and sleeping around which have hoisted Mr. Woods by his own petard are symptoms of stunted adolescence. If one cannot partake of the banquet when one is hungry it should come as no surprise that, once one is starving, one is liable to gorge and binge at every opportunity.

The adult thing to do, of course, is to seek help in freeing one's psyche from making the sorts of mistakes that are so often made by child stars of all stripes. But child stars generally grow up to be lopsided - with over-developed needs such as attention and praise, and woefully starved needs and aptitudes in interpersonal and intimate relationships.

It would appear that Mr. Woods has lost almost everything that was important to him - his stature, his income, his endorsements, all of which fed his bottomless ego - as well as something he valued rather less, namely his own family. In return he now is in a deracinated limbo, front and centre in everyone's radar, with nothing to do and no one to talk to, no access to his children and the spectacle of an ugly and costly divorce hanging over his head like Damocles's sword. It didn't help that his advisors gave him bad advice, that it was made known that he would try to bribe his wife with a "bonus" of tens of millions of dollars if only she would stay and keep up the pretense, that a streak of cynicism a mile wide seems to be part of his makeup.

Or was the accumulation of all this perfection simply too much?Perhaps some day it will be possible to determine whether Mr. Woods let go of the tail deliberately. In any case it begs the question:

Was it worth it?

(c)2010 bluemlein

his endless walk of shame

2009-11-26T21:24:00.007Z

on october 1, 2009, in the sleepy town of fairfield, connecticut, the fairfield university student newspaper published the ramblings of one chris surette, whose beefy jock-face stares out at the reader, under the title "her walk of shame".

whatever i was doing at the time must have been far more important than the tempest stirred up by this "scandalous" article.

let's understand one thing: the first amendment to the constitution of the US protects the right of anyone (with a few exceptions of which this is not one) to say and publish anything (with a few exceptions of which this is not one). so i am not going to demand that he be reprimanded, or his newspaper be reprimanded or even fairfield university get a slap on the wrist. he has probably come to realize by now that this article was not a very smart one, nor was it a good idea to publish it.

while searching for something entirely unrelated i fell into the "her walk of shame" page a few minutes ago. below you will find the comment which i have left at the site.

let's not forget chris surette.

he wanted fame and got notoriety instead.

* * *

so high school.

first of all one wonders at whom this is aimed - and i speak as someone who has been writing most of her life.

while it mostly addresses the "boys", it throws the odd bit toward the "girls". now, the last time i looked i found that most students at post-secondary institutions were adults or nearly adults, at least chronologically. am i then to assume that the author is addressing the very youngest members of the student body?

let's see.

the "lucky guy" can share this story at the grape - why, it's a pub. the lucky young guy is thus counselled not only to have a bit of rumpy-pumpy with someone he might not wish to invite into his bed when sober, the "girl" (presumably also very young, given that she clearly has not the discrimination to select the more honourable guy from the tools) is advised that the story of her conquest will be shared ad nauseam around the beer-soaked tables of the grape. as it appears that every one of you tools is seriously swilling draft instead of educating himself, that nauseam will come sooner than you think.

and it sounds like underage drinking to me. it's actually inadvisable to support underage drinking in most jurisdictions. i live in a more liberal country than you and still one looks askance at anyone who actively supports or advises breaking the law.

secondly i have a bit of a quibble with your continuity. lucky young stud, you have managed to invite "the swan" to "your place"; when the next morning you might be disillusioned by your partner, it is recommended that you "get out of there".

eureka! this article is aimed at morons! who else would invite a girl to his place, and split the next morning, leaving her in his bed? be careful. the revenge of the dumped might be to squat in the dumper's apartment (and this is real estate terminology, not scatological).

that they are morons, indeed, is proven by the reference to their inability to remember the name of a person that has spent the entire night with them. most everyone i know, including my cat, recalls the name of a visitor, a guest. and my cat has better manners.

as if to underscore the rather low mental abilities of these morons, the writer (whom one will not dignify with his name) now builds up their sexual prowess, their studliness, with such emphatic words and images as "12 deep" and "the pounding". clearly his moronic audience has such poor self-imagery that such crude support is required in order to get it up.

we now get into territory that is clearly anti-feline, because when i read this aloud to my cat, who is a very intelligent young man, he laughed himself sillier than he ever did on catnip. don't "raw dog" it? yeah, okay. but it goes beyond that. who began as a "swan" has clearly, in his estimation, degenerated into first a victim, then a slut, a "stage five clinger", a broad, and a gonorrhea-riddled, heartless "hood rat".

yo, dawg, wrap your tool before one of the cuties grabs the hammer from your hand and brains you with it. because there is something you clearly do not yet know: women stick together. you think you are inflicting a "walk of shame" on your victim?

i'm betting that the walk of shame has been yours, boy, ever since you published this stupid, ridiculous, offensive piece of "*rap".

you live in the united states, which protects your freedom to say whatever you want, to publish whatever drivel drools from your infantile mouth. i wouldn't sanction you, boy. i would give you, your name, and your idiotic, sophomoric twaddle as wide a publication as possible, so that everyone, everywhere, will know what motivates you and what your morals are, though i am sure that your parents by now have disowned you, changed their names and moved to springfield to be near a more upright man, homer simpson.

by the way, you ruthless, shameless tool, thanks for providing your picture. i haven't had this good a laugh in a very long time.

c2009 bluemlein.blogspot.com

What About NObama?

2009-10-10T19:03:00.007Z

Barack Obama may yet regret accepting the Nobel peace prize.

It could not have turned out better, as far as his opponents are concerned, if the Republicans had been able to fasten this millstone around his neck themselves. What will Obama do now, how will he be perceived, when he has to make tough, unpopular decisions about rogue states, nuclear weapons, and the various wars currently draining American resources? How will he be able to persuade his followers that being "rewarded" for his "peace efforts" in compatible with being the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and - if one may borrow an archaic term for a moment - "decider" in all matters military?

Meanwhile, on the medical insurance front, the Democrats appear to be so hungry for a two-term majority that they are allowing themselves to be divided and conquered by the Republicans and the various interested lobbies. Were they not all at death's door, last fall?

Obama is very good, indeed - with words. But he and the Democrats have squandered so much of his goodwill capital and momentum that even as ardent a supporter as Jon Stewart is railing against their inaction.

How can the Nobel be anything but a further hindrance?

He should have accepted the committee's enthusiasm and support, but he would have better served himself, his position and his country if he had graciously declined the award.

Maybe the thumb should have gone in the other direction?

c2009 bluemlein.blogspot.com

WORLD EXCLUSIVE - SCALAMANDRE SOLD

2009-09-04T22:01:00.004Z

September 4, 2009 - Eighty years after its founding Scalamandre, the legendary textile company that some people rank next to God and Mariano Fortuny, has been sold to a man convicted in 2007 of cheque cashing fraud.

Adriana Scalamandre Bitter, only child of company founder Franco Scalamandre and his wife, Flora Baranzelli, sold the company early this summer to Louis Renzo, a principal in C.L.B. Cheque Cashing Inc., which was convicted in April 2007 of Rewarding Official Misconduct in the Second Degree (http://www.banking.state.ny.us/pr070426.htm) He and his co-accused were sentenced to five years' probation. They also are subject to a lifetime ban from involvement, either direct or indirect, in the financial services industry. Together, the defendants paid a total monetary penalty of $4.3 million.

None of the Scalamandre family members have any further association with the company. Mrs. Bitter's son Ward was trained in all aspects of the family business but decided on a different career path, which took him to Morgan Stanley among others. In 2001 he returned to restructure Baranzelli Silk Surplus(http://www.baranzelli.com/history.html) of New York. Originally funded by Scalamandre, but now owned only by Ward Bitter, the company sold Scalamandre's discounted old-stocks and overruns to the public. Many of those fabrics regularly find their way onto eBay, with no distinction being made by the resellers as to their age or status.

Scalamandre had been waging a long and nasty war with eBay, which permitted unscrupulous sellers to sell not only dead stock but outright counterfeit fabric under the Scalamandre name. This blog's previous posts on the Textile Wars (which see) detailed the experiences with several of those sellers. It was only when eBay accepted Scalamandre's right to finger the fakes that a significant dent was made in the counterfeit business; much Scalamandre fabric being sold online, however, continues to be old stock that has been resold several times before being listed.

Baranzelli now sells its own brand of fabrics.

Ward's brothers have also dissociated themselves from the company; their sister is an architect.

Scalamandre has a decades-long reputation as one of the finest textile producers in the world but was blindsided by the economic disaster.

An industry insider, who has previously helped in the prosecution of the counterfeiters - as detailed previously in these pages - told us the brutal economic climate, coupled with the banking industry's refusal to lend money to virtually anybody, took its toll.

He also sent a copy of the email sent out by Scalamandre after the sale (posted below for your reading pleasure); in it there is no suggestion that any major changes are planned. It does, however, include a four-page survey, hosted by surveymonkey.com.

Renzo has no experience in textiles. Following his conviction he bought a promotional products company that puts company logos on a variety of merchandise.

Weeks after he bought Scalamandre, Renzo shut down the trimmings division. He has hired Brian Landow, whose company, LANCO, produces promotional chocolate products. LANCO and Scalamandre are located in Hauppage, Long Island. LANCO has received development money from the Long Island Development Corporation. (http://www.lidc.org/PR0025.htm)

world copyright 2009 bluemlein.blogspot.com

c2009 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Google - huge, fat and arrogant

2009-03-15T21:33:00.003Z

Well, the Nazis at Google are still at it.

My friend has a small business in the art field. Her company name is "last name+art" - such as, for example, "spencerart", and not unreasonably she relies in large measure on email.

So it was some time ago that she tried to register her name as username for a Gmail address - for example, spencerart@gmail.com:

- it was "unavailable".

- it is not being used by anyone.

- it simply is not available to her because someone at Google has some sort of nefarious interest in it.

She has asked several times for an explanation, from the people who run gmail, and she has faxed a letter to Larry Page, one of Google's founders, asking him why his company is withholding her name and what it intends to use it for. She was not expecting an answer from him and so it did not exactly bother her that she got none.

But "the gmail team" are something else.

After receiving no response several times, she wrote:

"I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU PEOPLE INTEND TO DO WITH
MY BUSINESS NAME
--- The Google Team
wrote:

> Hello,
>
> Thank you for your response.
>
> While we appreciate your interest in the
> username "******art," we're
> unable to reveal further information for
> privacy reasons.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> The Google Team"

as far as I can see this arbitrary, high-handed and snot-nosed approach by the Google Nazis requires some explanation, which is not forthcoming as the gmail team appears to have the same arrogant attitude as Louis XIV - his motto may have been l'etat, c'est moi, but theirs clearly is "l'internet, c'est google".

Today, I tried the following:

I entered first and last name, Flora Huntingdon, with the username huntingdonart@gmail.com:

"Get started with Gmail
First name: flora
Last name: huntingdon
Desired Login Name: huntingdonart
Examples: JSmith, John.Smith

huntingdonart is available @gmail.com"

So now tell me why "huntingdonart" should be available, but hers, a legitimate business name, is not.

Do not hold your breath while awaiting an answer. After all, Google is so enormous a business that it can - and does - get away with whatever it perceives as being in its interest - and you, paeon, be damned, even if your name belongs legally to you.

c2009 bluemlein.blogspot.com

MCCAIN - SABOTAGED BY HIS OWN PARTY?

2008-11-07T18:34:00.005Z

Even to an only mildly interested foreigner whose politics are - to the minds of most Americans - stuck to the far left wall, the recent debacle within the Republican Party was puzzling.

That a man of John McCain's calibre should choose, as running mate, an unknown - to him - untested, venal, fourth-rate neophyte hick like Sarah Palin, is too bizarre for comfort. At worst, it indicated a fatal hubris, a cynical political trick to pick up votes from that great, unwashed, amorphous entity known as the "base" (a truly appropriate word in at least two of its meanings). At best, it suggested that the man was getting a bit old and fuzzy thinking had set in.

Now that the extent of the damage to the Grand Old Party is beginning to be revealed it is time to think about this person's "anointing" as a "star" by the very political insiders against which she railed so strenuously.

The Obama phenomenon - that a politician could speak in rational, adult terms, to an audience presumed to be equally rational, equally adult - is something new in politics. Even the revered JFK had bags full of dirty tricks, or rather, his father, who bankrolled his campaign, did.

But Obama, to warm to whom it took us some time, never deviated from his intent to keep the discussion on that narrow path. Time and again there were opportunities to turn into a pit bull - lipstick-wearing or not - to attack his opponents, particularly once Palin entered the arena. But he resisted. Since it is necessary to be attacked so that it may be returned in kind, this sort of refusal to play by the established rules must have been intensely frustrating to the GOP strategists. Their purpose, after all, is to return the party to power, by hook or by crook.

Knowing that there is a significant doorstop in the White House, a drag on their fortunes, not a dead duck so much as an albatross, some of the high muckety-mucks in the party must have realized that they were not going to win.

These people are the same ones that were highly antagonistic to their own candidate. Make no mistake about it, McCain was, and is, deeply distrusted and reviled by a large chunk of the party. The man, after all, had integrity in buckets, the man never hesitated to tar and feather his own, if need be. The man, in other words, did not embrace the concept of standing behind one's party at all costs. And that did not endear him to a number of major GOP players. Oral Roberts, for example, refused to permit him to speak at his university. . . so much for intellectual freedom.

The majority of people are weary of the Republicans. Eight years of Dubya is more than eight years too many. The excesses and criminal activities of the last eight years are now coming home to roost on the Republicans' heads, and they might squat there for a long time. But - hey! perhaps some within the party thought McCain would make a fairly good scapegoat.
He is old, after all, and won't be back in four years, or eight. Hardly universally loved by party members, he could wear a target on his back without taking too many of his clique with him. And, as he is loyal, and a gentleman, he is unlikely to speak out against his own.

So we can look at Palin in another light. Dumb as a stump but photogenic, ignorant but capable or rousing the rabble, she made a convenient anchor. And by the sounds of it, McCain permitted this anchor to be affixed firmly around his ankle without a peep. In one fell swoop the people could be given "hope" by the "star quality" of this "fellow maverick"; after the inevitable defeat McCain could be conveniently blamed for picking her and thus "sealing the party's fate".

Sounds possible. Yes, we know that there is an enormous difference between possible and probable. But it is plausible and it remains a tantalizing possibility.

As for Palin, she is finished. No amount of tutoring, no amount of whitewash, rebranding or reinvention can return her to the supposedly squeaky-clean state in which she was presented to the world. Listening to the prank call by two Quebecois comedians one is struck by the number of opportunities she was given to realize that it was a hoax, opportunities she did not take because she is DUMB AS A STUMP.

One cannot do much with deadwood except to burn it, or ignore it and leave it to all the little critters that will, over time, turn it into something useful. Over a loooong time.

Meanwhile, though, there is something to be said to John McCain:

Time cannot erase the sacrifice you made for your country, nor can it dull the keen edge of the gloss of your honour. But perhaps time can eventually wash the stain of the Palin choice from your name, because of all the available, talented, photogenic, young, intelligent people from which a future leader could have been chosen, hers should have been the last to be considered.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Time To 'Get Real'

2008-11-05T19:39:00.002Z

The historic election of Barack Obama to the presidency of the United States, a mere century and a half after the country
imperfectly and unwillingly shook off the idea that one man could own another, will be seen as a step every bit as significant as that of Neil Armstrong when he set his boot down upon the dead dust of our moon.

Not only significant for the election of a man with black skin, this election also marked the first time a candidate tried to hew to the road of adulthood, respect and reason. Whereas John McCain, out of desperation, yielded to the Rovian thuggery of playing to the lowest common denominator, Obama brushed off more than a few incitements to return the favour in kind.

Perhaps there is yet hope that people from a broad sweep of backgrounds, contexts and ancestries can join together to make common cause against the evils that are capable of tearing apart the fabric of their society.

We all know that the wolf is at the door, accompanied by wolverines and other predators, and we hear the not-so-distant strains of the piper. So we must gather ourselves together and work from our commonalities rather than our differences. Surely anything is preferable to the throat-grabbing, head-bashing anger that rose up in the dying embers of the McCain campaign, that marred his generous and eloquent concession speech. One wonders what might have happened if that one, the real McCain, had continued his electioneering, instead of the one that opened a Pandora's box of antagonisms and dislikes.

Coaxing hope out of the bottom will not be as difficult as it might have been first time around, however, for hope has been one of the keynotes of Obama's campaign. It is something positive and constructive to seize upon as a guide to the complex repairs that must be made to so many aspects of US - and global - business, society and industry, that were let slide in the mirage of the past eight years.

Yes, the US has a historic choice, a man whose skin is black.

Yet one feels that it is also important to note that this black man has no genetic or emotional associations to the desperate struggle that split the country for so many decades; he is not a descendant of slaves, nor of free black Americans, and thus comes to the table - to the presidency - free of any taint or motive from historic grievances, wrongs to avenge, or other unresolved issues.

In a way he is unique - an African American whose route to the table is not through the terror of slavery or the
long fight to overcome prejudice; who can undestand from first-hand experience what it means, yet by virtue of his ancestry has stood, paradoxically, to the side of both black and white American society and in it. Everyone - even those who voted for the Republican party rather than the man - should be prepared to roll up their sleeves and get to work without, for once, thinking about other people's politics, religion, choice of decor or ancestry. The damage done under the mindless watch of the albatross in the White House is severe and pervasive, whether in an illegally founded war upon the wrong country or the wholesale destruction of the financial sector. The next three months cannot pass quickly enough.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Improvin' the Wannabe Decider

2008-10-28T03:48:00.002Z

So the Republican National Committee spent $150,000 on improvements to Sarah Palin?

We knew that some major work was needed but we didn't think it would cost that much.

The RNC must have felt that outfits at JC Penney or Target - surely the type of store likely to be patronized by the 'frugal' governor - were unsuitable, considering that she is runnin' for vice-president.

We have news for the RNC: you can dress her up all you want but you cannot hide the fact that Mrs Palin is dumb as a stump. Not that this is necessarily a negative quality - heaven only knows how many dumb but attractive women are in surprisingly elevated positions as wives, girlfriends, actresses, singers, members of one board or another, but they usually have somethin' that Mrs. Palin does not, namely a pleasin' personality. There have been comparisons to a pit bull - but the canine does not have her nasal whine, which even strenuous coachin' by a former actor cannot completely subdue. We are reminded more forcefully of Bart Simpson's Grampa's false teeth as they are clamped tightly onto a fan blade, sending Bart very nearly into orbit. In that same way Mrs Palin seizes hold of somethin' and refuses to yield, even when the RNC is goin' into a cataplectic fit upon hearin' her lies about Obama "pallin' around with terrorists".

The longer Mrs. Palin is left loose in the public eye, the more she grates, whether she is denyin' that the RNC spent the equivalent of at least a one-bedroom condo on her appearance, or she is tellin' tall tales about the vice president's function in the Senate - "A vice president has a really great job because not only are they there to support the president's agenda, they're there like the team member, the teammate to the president. But also, they're in charge of the United States Senate, so if they want to they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes that will make life better for Brandon and his family and his classroom. And it's a great job and I look forward to havin' that job.”

Admittedly she was talkin' to grade three students but this deep misunderstandin' of the role of the vice president vis-a-vis the Senate - to cast the decidin' vote in times of a tie - also shows how inflated and self-aggrandizin' a view Mrs Palin has of herself. Can she blame it on the Alaskan air? You betcha! Is Alaska not the place where cabbages grow to the size of Volkswagens?

We have previously noted that Mrs Palin is hyper-ambitious. In her own mind, at least, she appears to be well on the road to the White House - whether via the increasingly less likely route of accompanyin' an elderly candidate and prayin' for the unsayable as others pray for rain, or perhaps in 2012, as candidate for the Republican Party. On this point one must hope, in all earnestness and with all sincerity, that the Party will irrevocably scotch that stupid idea if they wish ever to return to significant power. One Decider was more than enough. Mrs Palin may look sexy to a lot of men but to the Party itself she must be an ever heavier, more obvious albatross.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Froggie Did a-Courtin' Go...

2008-10-03T17:42:00.003Z

Watching the debate last night, between would-be vice-presidents Joe Biden and Sarah Palin, we were struck by Palin's relentless glorification of her man, John McCain, and the high-keyed, almost manic manner in which she presented herself. It was more than a contrast to her dull-seeming, ill-informed appearances with CBS's Katie Couric; it was as though she had stepped through a door into another universe and come out as SuperMom.

There is no denying that this woman can cram; there is no denying that she can work a room even from a stage. But the aura of the enterprise had more than a whiff of futility about it. The idea, that someone can go from "hockey mom" to small-time mayor to vice-president in a couple of years and a few short hops is uniqely American and calls to mind - in this instance, at least - the movie "Election" in which Reese Witherspoon exhibits the same relentless drive to get to the top. And it rings alarm bells. All these alarms, as has been expressed in the domestic and international media, concern the possibility that she could become president by default, should McCain die or become incompetent in office.

That she can acquire and regurgitate any number of facts in a short time cannot obscure the fact that a president also requires judgment and tact, must at times keep the cards close to the chest, that at times s/he must dance on knife edge while juggling many balls. And we are not convinced that she is as capable as that. Hollywood aside, the real world is messy, full of loose ends and unsatisfactory conclusions, and even the best-informed, smartest, most sympathetic person can and does make mistakes that can have drastic consequences that don't make themselves felt immediately. And the likelihood of this occurring in a Palin fantasy - we can't bring ourselves to say "Palin presidency", it simply is absurd - is rather higher than an Obama presidency, even if she is livelier and prettier than he is.

In her recent meetings with heads of state, Palin has been guarded and supervised to within an inch of her life, as the saying goes. We would venture to guess that the amount of time she has spent, since being nominated, alone or with just her family, is rather slim. So that the question becomes - who will supervise her if she should by chance be elected?

Ms Palin spent many minutes throwing out cliches that reminded us of The Simpsons, of all people, specifically Montgomery Burns and his railing against the elected officials and "fat cats" whom he will unseat and eject from "the state house". As pointed out numerous times by Joe Biden, McCain, by his quarter-century presence in Washington, D.C., cannot help but be considered in that same group, cannot help but be called to account for his many votes supporting the organizations, corporations and people that Palin dispatched with obvious distaste. In her need/desire/cool calculation that she present herself as being a true outsider, Palin is overlooking the fact that all politics is compromise, and those who would not compromise should not be there. So that her protestations that she would clean up Washington are hollow and outright silly. What will she use, Miz Clean?

As for calling the sub-prime mortgage mess the consequence of "predatory lenders" (repeated several times) that simply shows the simplistic view of someone who does not know, or appreciate, or understand the complexity of the mess that was kick-started by George W. Bush after 9/11, when he told the American people that salvation and protection from terror would come through shopping. The mess highlights a societal problem: casting borrowing as a sinful or shameful activity that a true American would not deign to undertake also creates an environment in which borrowing, and its consequences, are never properly addressed or analyzed or taught. By subsequently cloaking the spending - which surely would have to be underpinned by lending at some point, for almost everyone - in patriotism, Bush set the average American off on the road to perdition. As with the White Rabbit, Americans merrily followed their leader's advice and now find themselves in freefall down the rabbit hole. "Predatory lenders" - a favourite phrase of Palin's - were just one set of many that contributed to the unwellness of the U.S. banking/credit system, as were the media that extolled the savvy and virtues of "managers" who were taking home, in some cases, a million dollars a week. And whose army of tax experts undoubtedly found a number of ways to reduce that dreaded figure, taxable income.

The thought that someone with such simplistic notions - even if she is a quick study - should have the possibility of stepping into the Oval Office as anything but a visitor is enough to give one full-body shivers.

Her constant repetition of the grand numbers of barrels of "gassanoil", at least some of it "clean and green", underscore the fact that this woman, and the party she represents, have their heads in the sand as far as the real crisis in energy supplies goes. One longs for a true debate, one in which the cliched and rehearsed responses are stripped away to reveal what she actually thinks.

Was the debate structured to require or permit the speakers to address the moderator rather than one another? It seemed more a series of interchanges with PBS's Gwen Ifil than an actual debate between two candidates that ought to be considered equal. This structure gave the advantage to Palin, who looked beyond Ifil, beyond the live audience to the viewers at home. She presented herself as a "hockey mom", a wholesome presence full of gosh darns, and gee whizzes, and dropped endings that fairly screamed "I am one of you!" And she cast herself as loyal follower of the chosen candidate to the extent that we thought she would follow Howdy Doody, had he been selected as the party's candidate.

Palin is a big frog in a little pond who, through circumstances, has been transported to the ocean.
We hope that the safety net keeps her from falling into it, as much for the ocean as for the frog.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Shake that Tambourine, Boy, them End Times is a-Comin!

2008-09-22T21:55:00.005Z

One finds it difficult to accept that in the Republic, which advertises itself as the freest place on earth, whose citizens like to think of themselves as the most skeptical of men - a large chunk of the population accepts what it is told, believes that their Glorious Leader does not lie, that everything is honourable and above board. But then these are also the people who used to queue for the most recent installment of Bat Boy, who fawn over image, who lap up awards shows, who believe equally in God, the Almighty Dollar, and Survivor. And that Mrs Palin is capable of fulfilling the duties of her office following the inevitable moment when McCain decides (pardon, Shakespeare) "to die, not to sleep".

It would be interesting to hear from these believers. Do they believe also that the world is only a few thousand years young? That Satan really stalks the land and the only way to fight him is to be obedient, that is, to vote Republican? Was that silliness not swept away by the most recent fresh gust of Reason?

Do these believers not understand the difference between truth and lie?

Truth is that Mrs Palin, as mayor of Wasilla (pop. somewhere between 5,469 and 9,780), hired a lobbyist and travelled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million or $2,760.7361963190184049079754601227 per resident - earmarks that she now attacks so violently she appears to be frothing at the mouth.

Truth is that, in her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, another $1,119.3144422903859843922794167029 per resident, by far the largest per-capita request in the country. Is this, perhaps, what made her stand out to the backroom boys? the audacity of so enormous an amount, for such paucity of beneficiaries? Was she already laying the groundwork for her ascension to power?

Do they accept without question, without verification, that Mrs Palin told the big bad boys in Washington that she didn't want $398 million for a bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport? (In case you are interested, that amounts to $7,960,000 per resident. And why would those fifty residents need an airport?)

Firstly, her hackles went up only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "Bridge to Nowhere".

Secondly, she now has ensconced herself in the lap of the Big Bad Boys, has sold out whatever integrity she might have had, has named her price to Lucifer - or whichever Devil is on duty at the moment.

Yes! - and these people probably also are the ones who believe that we are in The End Times. wooowoooowoooo!

Let's put it plainly, folks:

if this is End Times, then you need look no farther to find the forces of evil than >D'oh< bya, Cheney, Halliburton Co., Rove, Abu Ghraib, Abramoff, Cunningham, DeLay, Foggo, Foley, Gonzales, Griles, Kerik, Libby, the National Security Agency, Renzi, Tobias, Wolfowitz. Better yet, you can follow your mousetracks on a page laid out visually - http://www.slate.com/id/2165783 - or you can just read about it at http://www.slate.com/id/2165980". Or visit http://www.halliburtonwatch.org, which chronicles all the known misdeeds of the corporation that is tied so intimately to the (vice) president.

This is where Satan and the gang hang out, these are their evil deeds, and if you are old enough to remember Seven Days In May, or the Manchurian Candidate, or any number of similar fictions, this is why you can weep:

* because the Forces of Evil have sold out your country;

* they have put greed and profit ahead of the dignity and respect that should be every person's right;

* have been destroying the legal, moral, ethical foundations that made the US a truly different place, once;

* have lied nakedly to friend and foe alike, in the service of Mammon and of power;

* have readily taken your children - your future - and sent them to Iraq to fight a war predicated on a mountain of lies. (Lest you think we know not our Bible, ask yourselves how appropriate this quotation is: "What have you done? Listen! Your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground.")

To that infamous list you can add two more who would sell out not just their own souls but those of everyone they can hoodwink into voting for them.

If you believe that you are in the End Times you should consider that these two are, themselves, part of that cabal that has been running the U.S. into the ground.

If you do not, you are probably already much likelier to vote for Barack Obama, who is, after all, an imperfect being, a man, but one who does not have ties to the above.

Even if "End Times" is the farthest, most obscure thought in your head, you can be sure that this election is much more important than many recent ones. It is as much a contest between Reason and Stupidity, Honour and Dishobour, Sobriety and Venality, as it is between left vs. right, Democrat vs. Republican, et vs. cetera.

Every single characteristic that made the United States a great and generous place, an idea that was capable of burning down the barricades of stupidity, prejudice, ignorance, bigotry, hatred and animosity, is at risk of being destroyed. If you cannot force yourself up off the sofa to vote this November you may be asking yourself, in the new year, how you could have missed all the signs and portents.

It's End Times, all right, End of Republican Times.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

HEATHER, WEATHERIN' THE PALIN* RAGE

2008-09-22T21:41:00.005Z

*quick now - what's red white and blue? ohnonononono, guys, we aren't talking about the Stars and Stripes. We're talking about the newly acquired "star" candidate of the Republican Party, Red as in neck, White as in Pal(e)in and Blue as in why isn't everyone voting Democrat!?

Our compatriot and fellow journalist Heather Mallick, surely one of the better writers that the Globe and Mail let go, in a fit of someone's pique, recently wrote a column about the Republican Convention. (Read it, it 's engaging and entertaining - http://www.heathermallick.ca/cbc.ca-columns/a-mighty-wind-blows-through-republican-convention.html) In it she cited yet another terrific columnist, John Doyle, who called Mrs Palin an Alaska hillbilly, and that, along with a number of other statements, appears to have ignited a "firestorm" on the right, who seem always to have their panties in knots about something(http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/080920/world/us_cda_palin). Someone named Greta Van Susteren repeatedly called her a pig - well, she is on Fox News, what else should one expect? Fox prides itself on being the deliberately dumbest, most ignorant, most prejudiced television entity around and it is all about money.

And the ignorami commented with such stupidities as "Canada is made up of small towns and many if not most trace their ancestry back to their 'redneck cousin' and they still have relatives here in the U.S." - dream on, bozo, Canada is a cosmopolitan country made up of virtually every nationality on the planet. We too have our rednecks, who currently are gearing up to vote for one Stephen Harper, who is probably your wet dream boy.

And calling us morons - why, that shows that your vocabulary has reached a grade four level. Keep up the improvements and you ought to be getting out of grade school in time for retirement.

Way to go Heather, we are standing right with you.

The U.S., we are told, is the home of the brave, and still - let's hope - the land of free speech. So let's examine Mrs Palin a little bit more.

Mrs Palin is a type, all right, a power-hungry, I'll-smack-you-upside-the-head-if-you-don't-behave type of mom, a hockey mom all right but the kind whose great loud mouth is used to drown out other hockey moms. One who cloaks her desire to run everyone's life with the piety of religious belief. We have known her many a time in our years of being a different type of mom. One can sense her coming before one even has her in view.

One sees it in the glint in her eyes as she is traipsing across the U.S., a country conveniently shell-shocked by last week's self-immolation of Wall Street. It is nakedly obvious that she smells power. One can hear the wheels grinding, the calculation - every day he gets a day older and a step closer to the grave
>chortle< and then!

and then, ladies and gentlemen, we truly will have an ignorant person, small-minded in the extreme, beholden to some of the darkest, slimiest powers behind the shaky throne upon which she is thrust, and with her finger too damn close to the button for our comfort.

Mrs Palin will be debating Democratic vice-presidential candidate Joe Biden but this has come about only after the Republican Party held out for a tightened debate format, one that will consist primarily of yes-no questions that require nothing of her but that she remember which is which.

One supposes that it is actually fruitless, perhaps even stupid, to assume that she might have some coherent thoughts that have not been put into her head by one of the boys still sniffing "eau de W" on his nose.

And yet one can't have just the presidential candidates debating, especially not in a year when the Reaper is in the precinct. One hears him rattling around occasionally, when McCain has one of his blank moments, reminiscent of Keats's "drowsy numbness", in which he looks entirely lost - the same look Aunt Violet had shortly before she decamped entirely to Neverland. McCain's hiding behind his obviously fresher memories of forty years ago, his aimless, doddering aura, also recall Baudelaire - "Où coule au lieu de sang l'eau verte du Léthé" - where [in whose body] flows, instead of blood, the green water of Lethe - Lethe being the Greek personification of forgetfulness, oblivion. Before we leave him there, let's all remember that Lethe is the root of our word "lethal". Anyone need a definition of that?

It is curious that simply being a Republican is not in itself lethal this election year, given the corruption, lies, and gallop toward totalitarianism of the Bush years. It's old news that the election of 2000 was stolen, the Democratic candidate of 2004 was deliberately sabotaged, the dismantling of rights guaranteed by the Constitution continues at breakneck speed, and it's startling that none of these evinces even a yawn from the broad populace. Perhaps they, too, have dipped their oars into the waters of Lethe.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Stephen Harper The Brrrrrrrrrrittle Without The Peanuts

2008-09-19T19:07:00.008Z

I've just had a look at a blog by our local Member of Parliament, who beat the Liberal incumbent last time around by 246 votes. This should have told him that the last Canadian election was a protest vote against a party that had been in power for a very long time and which was being racked by a scandal or three (note to self: find a government that has had no scandals -LOL. . . LMAO!!!) - but he chose to read it a different way. He took his election to mean that he had been elected for being himself - not bloody likely - and that as one of the Chosen, diligently blowing hard in Ottawa, he must let the people know it - time after time after time after time. . .yea, even unto eternity.

So he flooded local mailboxes with flyers purportedly outlining the government's work for which we should be grateful, but which were, in fact, political advertising.

Ordinarily one would say out, out, damned ad! and throw the thing into the recycle bin.

Except for the little matter of free franking privileges that are one of the often misused perks of our MPs. Boy! were they misused or what? In the first months we tossed at least a half dozen flyers, notably four in one week, but then we began to readdress them to the Prime Minister's Office, with choice comments for his perusal. As if . . .

. . . hmmmm. While it is highly unlikely that Stephen Harper reads every piece of mail coming to his office, he is known to micromanage his government's operation. As a matter of fact his most recent feat, calling an election more than a year before the new fixed date for elections - which he himself engineered via a bill that his minions voted for - amounted to the same pouty sour grapes of a five- or six-year-old saying "I'm taking my ball home" because the others weren't playing his way. Harper tried to blame it on the other parties, but fact remains that he claims he can't govern with the minority he had and so we must elect again. Wake up, Steve - there will be much egg on your face when another minority takes up the reins. But this is a digression - we sent the junk mail to the PMO, each and every time we got another advert.

Soon there was a small item in a local newspaper which took the local MP to task for abusing his free franking privileges - proof that we weren't the only ones ticked off by this petty criminal behaviour.

What? You think labelling it "petty criminal behaviour" is excessive? Not according to the Tory playbook. The party of Stephen Harper is one seeking to criminalize every transgression, no matter how minor, and to exact stiffer penalties so that the criminal is "justly" punished. So, yes, our local MP was stealing postage for flyers that had no relevance to any government work, but much to his ongoing self-advertisements.

What? You think this is a bit too rigid? There's the rub - the Prime Minister of Canada is himself too rigid, too inflexible, vastly unimaginative, and for one who has - at the very least - aligned himself with the religious right he has yet to pay a lot of attention to the teachings of one Jesus who counselled forgiving the transgressions of others as a way to be a better person.

But then, the religious right is not about Christianity, it's about fire and brimstone and revenge and getting the God of Old to do their dirty work when someone irks them. (Even the MP in question adheres to the religious right.) And Harper simply won't bend, because he can't bend, because he lacks imagination and humanity.

This is not too harsh. Harper - like Duh-bya - is rigid to the point of brittleness. He may have a far better, more polished intellect than the leader of the free world, but he is not any more able to imagine other possibilities. (We think he might be this way because he had a bad experience at then-notoriously snobbish Richview Collegiate, teen years and high school being major factors in the formation of one's adult personality.) And this rigidity causes him to micromanage not just the government but also his campaign. This election is not about parties, it is all about HIM - Stephen Harper. Everywhere one looks there is Harper, heart and soul and corpus of the Conservative Party of Canada.

WOULD YOU TRUST THIS MAN?

We don't see anyone except Harper, cozying up to the fireplace, philosophizing and ruminating - and possibly chewing his cud once the camera moves away. He thinks, perhaps, that he is showing his softer, warmer side, his human side. But he is simply showing - again - that he has only one. He is a nearly two-dimensional being like those in Edwin Abbott's great book, Flatland (except that it might, in Harper's case, be subtitled A Non-Romance in One Dimension). And this assault of Harper-style "hominess", which makes one feel about as warm and fuzzy as a cobra might, is showing also that, emperor or not, he has no clothes. It highlights that Harper's machinations are trite and predictable, that he will get others to do his dirty work - insulting and mocking people for their ethnicity, moral values, unfortunate ingestion of a food-borne poison - even as the ads connect "Harper" with "warmth" and that he will jettison his subordinates if publicity threatens to swamp his boat.

Harper is unlikely to permit further mass mailings of pouf pieces, unless originated by himself. Our local MP - who resumed flooding our mailboxes with irrelevant bits of paper a short while later - should remember that. We don't have a lot of hope on that point as he strikes us as terribly naive and jejune. Perhaps he will be re-elected. But he still will serve at Harper's pleasure. Hm - "Harper" and "pleasure" in the same thought? not bloody likely.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

The Time Has Come, The Walrus Said, To Talk of Many Things . . .

2008-09-10T14:52:00.004Z

I watched the Republican plebes throw themselves wholeheartedly behind a woman about whom they know nothing, who has a very thin, questionable record, who - given her presidential running mate's age and medical condition - has a realistic chance of becoming president by default. That in itself is cause to make one worry.

And I watched John McCain's acceptance speech. The man was an automaton, his "smile" a grimace that came on and flashed off on cue, if a bit tardy.

I do not agree with the facile, superficial commentators who wrote or spouted testosterone-soaked, gushing, positive appraisals of Sarah Palin. I do not agree with the editorialists who painted McCain as a marvellous old trooper dipping into the fount of honour and gilding himself with his well-advertised heroism.

This election is not about Vietnam, McCain's role in it, or even his continued references to it. People forget this very easily as someone like "hockey mom" is trotted out as a diversion, just as the heroics of 40 years ago are a diversion. And it would appear that the Democrats are flailing mightily as they are falling, for they appear to have forgotten what this election is about. In that sense the Palin diversion, and the "old soldier getting his turn at the trough" are working better than expected, I'm sure.

This election is about the usurpation of power from the people of the US and from the Congress, first of all; about the arrogation of power by Bush and Cheney from the Congress and the judiciary; about the callous disregard for rights, truth, a country's integrity, honour and ethos. And the callous disregard of the rights of foreign citizens such as Maher Arar, who, technically, were never on American soil.

It is about the fundamental dishonesty of the leaders of that government, REPUBLICANS, ALL, who pile high the lies and innuendoes justifying what can never be justified - the intrusion into, and intervention in, the affairs of a sovereign state, thereby setting horrendous precedents which will some day be used against the US.

It is about the "leaders" of that government plundering the treasury to enrich private corporations, while simultaneously exempting the rich from their share - which is measly enough, especially once their accountants and lawyers squirrel away most of the remaining income, so that you have the ludicrous situation of multimillionaires paying little or no tax.

It is about the "leader of the free world", by his actions, inactions, stupidities and arrogance squandering most of the goodwill that the entire planet felt toward the US in the aftermath of 9/11.

It is about the subsequent disillusionment and suspicion of not just the US but its friends and neighbours - never mind more cynical elements - that permits the continued existence of the firm belief that 9/11 was stage-managed by the government - well, what are people to think when Cheney was "directing" events from the bunker while Bush sat empty-eyed, enraptured by the story of the little goat, for more than three minutes after he had been told of the attack?

It is about the REPUBLICANS' favourite mantra - deregulation/small-to-no government/get-it-while-you-can - leading to a financial crisis so dangerous that it might yet swamp our collective boat, in which the government has had to step in to rescue companies that rapaciously and cold-bloodedly lied, stole, manipulated financial information, duped investors. Companies that are "too big to be allowed to fail" because of the damage that would ensue.

It is about the millions of Americans for whom "home" will have a very different, bitter meaning, and for whom "house" will be a dream too far.

It is about the thousands of people who still live in fetid trailers in mosquito-infested, waterlogged parking lots, unable to return home.

It is about the fact that the number of people without health care now equals one and one half times the population of CANADA.

IT SHOULD BE ABOUT WAYS TO PREVENT THE COUNTRY FROM SELF-DESTRUCTING. It should be about finding the best complement of people who are capable of working together to rein in the many wild steeds that are about to pull the country to bits. It should be about the candidates presenting ideas and assurances about the present, and the future, so that the electorate might have a sense that there is a future to look to.

It should be about reassuring the world that the US is a country of laws, of ethics, of morals, that gives a fair chance to those who risk everything, that has compassion and assistance for those who need it. And it should be about electing someone who is not only reasonably healthy, but is mentally agile enough, and physically strong enough, to undertake this most challenging work and see it through to the conclusion of the upcoming term.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

THE TEXTILE WARS: ON TO COURT!!!

2008-07-03T17:35:00.007Z

Occasionally something happens that is gratifying beyond one's wildest dreams. Readers who have had an eyeful of the textile wars know that this entire fracas originated in a fraudulent sale over eBay of 20 yards of "Scalamandre" velvet, such substandard stuff it did not deserve the label "velvet", let alone Scalamandre. As in the disturbances that wash outward when you drop a big stone into a pond, the ripples of this particular purchase are making waves, still.

Never mind Paypal for the moment, let's just give them a light slap for now - their turn will come. eBay, on the other hand, persists in trying to be a rapacious monster that devours everything in its path.

Case in point: anyone who wishes to sell to Australia or to the United Kingdom, from North America, must accept the purchase price via Paypal. Meaning that Paypal (and therefore eBay, which owns Paypal) gets a cut for handling the transaction, and another cut because sellers who use Paypal must accept credit card purchases, from which Paypal helps itself to another slice.

That's a lot of musts and cuts. Stay tuned.

Meanwhile, speaking of cuts, this blog revealed in May that Junior Wollstein - the Divalicious, poor misguided one - Chris Wollstein had created a site called Fabriccut.com, and was trading on the long-established name and site of Fabricut.com, a legitimate company selling legitimate, properly identified fabrics.

Added 29/7/08: Well, it was not Junior this time but Senior - Ed Wollstein, owner of Boca Bargoons.

This blogger sent an email to Fabricut.com, asking for a formal comment from the company. Meanwhile, an industry insider, who has been absolutely priceless to us in the tracking down of fakes and fakers, also reported the website to the company, with the result that we have this little gem pop up on a search (We never did get a comment from Fabricut even after two requests.):

Fabricut, Inc. v. Belyeu et al
Plaintiff: Fabricut, Inc.
Defendant: James Belyeu and Ed Wollstein

Case Number: 4:2008cv00286
Filed: May 15, 2008

Court: Oklahoma Northern District Court
Office: Trademark Office [ Court Info ]
County: Tulsa
Presiding Judge: Judge Gregory K Frizzell
Referring Judge: Magistrate Judge Sam A Joyner

Nature of Suit: Intellectual Property - Trademark
Cause: Federal Question
Jurisdiction: Federal Question
Jury Demanded By: 15:1125 Trademark Infringement (Lanham Act)

Now you might ask yourself why Chris Wollstein's name does not appear here. As The Divalicious informed us, in this instance he kept his nose clean. But note this: The Divalicious has gone into full guerrilla mode, carrying on business as "Guerrilla Enterprise Developments", and this entity is also named in the lawsuiut. Strangely, one James S. Belyeu is nominal frontman for the Divalicious Guerrilla, who has taken to posting personal emails between himself and his father on his blog. They really are too puerile and boring for us even to put in a link.

The trademark infringement suit is poetic justice. One wonders how far gone the Divalicious actually is, to think that in this electronic time he can try to undercut a legitimate business by stealing their name.

And so we come full circle: stealing names is not a great idea. And a French court thought so, too. Earlier this week is levied a fat little penalty against eBay: 40 million Euros must be paid by eBay to LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SA because eBay permitted the sale of fake French luxury goods. eBay - as readers of this blog also know - is always claiming that it only acts in the capacity of a "classified ad department" of a newspaper.

We've worked at enough newspapers to know that no ad department operates this way, no ad department also takes a cut of the selling price. That is what auction houses do and eBay - whether they like it or not - eBay is an electronic auction house that has been lax in the way it polices sellers.

One look at the site any day at all should persuade even the dimmest bulb at eBay's management that there can't possibly be that much authentic merchandise around - Tiffany, which sued eBay in the U.S. earlier this year and which still is waiting for a ruling, did some searches and found that ninetyfive percent of all "Tiffany" being sold was fake. The money is in selling the fakes - nobody is going to sell fake Walmart merchandise. So it is entirely possible that an enormous amount of the so-called "luxury" merchandise is simply fake.

eBay had the nerve to claim that Tiffany perhaps didn't do enough policing - we, eBay claimed proudly, spend twenty million dollars per year on policing. That isn't a whole lot of money for the size of the operation.

It is possible but usually worthless to report possibly fake auctions to eBay, which conveniently leaves no room for a person to elaborate on what might be fake. A recent sweep through eBay - advertising "Look what you can get for a dollar" - found dozens of fake "gold" rings with fake "gemstones" and fake "diamonds" and though they were reported they were not pulled, not one. If it were possible to say "the diamond is not a diamond because one can look through it to the fake gold of the setting", perhaps then eBay's "police" would take action. But the people they hire seem to be selected for their ability to follow a script and nothing more.

We are not going to diss the people working for eBay who after all need a job. It's the management of the company that needs to change, so that fake diamonds, fake Louis Vuitton, fake Tiffany, fake Scalamandre and such will be weeded out. And the likes of the Divalicious Guerrilla Chris Wollstein will not have another platform on which to put the foundations of his questionable empire.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Textile Wars chapter nine: BEDTIME READING for the "Divalicious"

2008-06-11T21:18:00.003Z

Are there any words sweeter than:

"Not a registered user"??????????

Not when it comes to the eBay buyers who were skinned by
the seller known as "buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome", who has been the subject of a couple of earlier posts on the Textile Wars.

But let's let the feedback do the talking.

These are comments left by disillusioned buyers. One has to wonder about a comment about the nice packaging, when the feedback concerns a textile, no?)

*again sorry item not available. sold too cheap????????????????

*very disappointed that seller said she no longer had the item-

*tried to contact the seller to complete transaction. totally unresponsive

*left repeated msg to have seller contact me.. totally unresponsive.

*gorgeous fabric but long delay in delivery and poor communications

*1 mo shipping...no communication....Fabric ok for price.

*medium upholstery weight is inaccurate

*Emailed 5+ times and never received an answer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*MY WORST EBAY EXPERIENCE EVER. NEVER REC'D FABRIC, TERRIBLE COMMUNICATION.

*No shipped; finally money refunded; currently relisted higher price

*Not shipped for 3 weeks; not available and money refunded

*Item never shipped, even after several requests. 30+ days later refunded $.

*has not arrived

*haven't received fabric.....clue?

*Fabric not the same as pictured. Seller didn't answer back re: authenticity.

*Great fabric--but took 6 weeks and a complaint to receive.TIMES ELEVEN

*lesson learned here;SHOP WITH THE PROFESSIONALS THAT HAVE ALL POSITIVE FEEDBACK

*most ebay shops are fantastic,NOT THIS ONE,ITEMS NOT RECIEVED,NO REPLY , NO REFUND

*never recieved item,wont answer my emails,wont refund money,NEVER AGAIN,VERYBAD

*Fabric (and backing) is grey and not black as indicated (according to sample)

*Good packaging. Thanks

*Gorgeous fabric but dirty and horrible flaws throughout. I got 2 useable yds. Follow-up by buyer:
Description did NOT mention imperfections, got nasty feedback for truthfulness

*Two weeks after win, Seller apologized-item not in stock. Refunded pmt.

*Scalamandre confirmed this is not their velvet fabric. TIMES NINE

and another one:

*Confirmed this is Not Scalamandre fabric.

*Nice quality - but inside yardage was damaged.

*Much of this fabric was so stained it was unusable! EBAY NIGHTMARE!!!

*Much of this fabric was so stained it was unusable! EBAY NIGHTMARE!!!

*NEVER seen fabric this BAD!!! UNUSABLE, entirely stained - seller won't respond

This is a sample of Adiact Gaitan's response to someone who had the temerity to complain that she had been sold FAKE FABRIC:

*Donghia states "this is not Dhongia fabric" Buyer: president92 Dec-15-07 22:14
Reply by buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome (Dec-16-07 12:26):

Learn how to spell

(Someone complained recently about this: that a seller who said in her listings that feedback would be given as payment was received had anger issues. Hmmmmmmmmmm.
She can't have had dealings with any of the lot who are associated with the Divalicious Chris Wollstein and crew, whose front is Design Diva and who have begun to run afoul of the law in various states and places.

(We wonder whether Mr Wollstein has any filial feelings for his father who is also in textiles and who might - might - get palpitations at least, if he knew what his Diva of a son is doing.

(This unsavoury crew - which included LonghornTextiles - kicked off eBay a few months ago after vigorous complaints, see Textile Wars below - did not file feedback until the buyer had left his or her comments which, if in any way negative, triggered vituperations of the most graceless, insulting and slanderous kind.)

Also caught in the crunch: michellesfabrix. Also previously dealt with in Textile Wars posts.

Little by little we will get rid of the slime that festers in corners of eBay where the crooks have an advantage over the honest buyer. Keep those bits of info coming.

HAPPY READING TO YOU ALL

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Sex, Lies, Videotape . . .

2008-06-10T17:32:00.004Z

A judge in Toronto has permitted the release to the media of a tape on which Paul Bernardo, convicted of two murders and numerous sexual assaults (as the Scarborough Rapist) is interviewed regarding the disappearance of University of Toronto student Elizabeth Bain in June 1990.

Bain's body was never found; her boyfriend Robert Baltovich was tried several times before the crown threw up its hands in exasperation and told the court they had no evidence with which to go forward. On April 22, 2008, he was acquitted. (The events are much more convoluted but easy to find.)

One of Baltovich's points all along was that the police should have looked at Paul Bernardo, who was in full rapist mode in 1990 and soon would turn to killing, at the instigation of his then-wife, Karla Homolka.

Homolka manipulated everyone who came in contact with her, told lies about her involvement, signed a deal with prosecutors which should have been revoked on the grounds that she withheld crucial material evidence - the existence of a number of videotapes documenting not just Bernardo's activities, but her own.

Then there were the kneeprints of a small person, on the backs of the two victims.

Then there was the attack on Homolka which signalled the end of their enterprise - an attack so brutal one would think it must have had a terrible trigger. Could it have been that - as Bernardo has steadfastly maintained - he came home with pizza for his second live sex toy, only to discover that his wife, out of jealousy, had strangled her rival - again???

Homolka served twelve years, did not take parole and thus was not monitored by anyone once she was freed, had a baby and moved with her new partner to the Antilles. And is laughing all the way to the beach, I'm sure.

Bernardo, meanwhile, as a "dangerous offender", is locked up 23 hours of the day. This enforced inactivity is probably as effective as castration; he sits and watches TV in a cell that is about the size of a walk-in closet in the typical lower middle class tract house.

Two years ago Bernardo sent a letter to the Attorney General of Ontario in which he detailed further crimes that he had committed. There was mention of rapes, but no murders. Then, exactly one year ago, he was interviewed in connection with Elizabeth Bain.

Much of Bernardo's anger - there was plenty in the transcript, already released, much of it justified - revolves around this point:

After he wrote the 2006 letter, police decided that he committed two of the crimes but that, when he recounted the other assaults, he was lying.

It now is recorded in his file that he is, among all hisother defects, a liar.

Which, as he rightly pointed out, can and will be used to bolster whichever opinion the authorities may wish to use in the future, if - when - they decide to try him again.

Are you of the persuasion that it is acceptable to release videotaped interviews of people who are not subsequently charged with a crime - let alone tried?

Then put yourself into that place.

Human beings, being the open-minded, thoughtful creatures that we are, will look at an interview tape and decide - that guy's twitching, he did it - or - she's so cute! she can't possibly have knifed someone to death.

Videotaped interviews are exceedingly prejudicial at the best of times apart from which they don't necessarily achieve anything.

Judge David McCombs's ruling is wrong - I don't believe society is well served by the public's being able to see any videotaped interview with anyone brought in for questioning - particularly if that person is not then charged with any crime. We are, after all, admonished constantly to regard everyone as innocent until proven otherwise.

I won't be surprised when this case reaches the Supreme Court of Canada. This ruling opens the door to all sorts of misuse and unintended consequences.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Look Out! Nationalist on the Rampage . . . in Canada

2008-05-22T04:37:00.005Z

In Ottawa, the niggling, penny-pinching, mean-spirited Conservative government is approaching a National Portrait Gallery in its own inimitable way: it wants the gallery to be housed somewhere - not Ottawa - in a building that is not a gallery. A space in an office tower would be nice, they say. Those who steer the party in power - i.e. the Harper Gang - are pompous, self-important, uncouth Philistines who don't understand art and will never make an effort to do so, who look upon artists of all disciplines as some sort of failed businesspersons, some sort of failed human beings, some sort of freeloaders.

They are the ones who cannot conceive of the value of sitting and just thinking.

They are the ones who want to quantify and monetarize every action and who believe that nothing is worthwhile if it does not have financial value. They think the Holy Grail is business and that the saints among us are the business people.

Let us forget for a moment that some business people are not artistically minded - how can they be, you say, they are business oriented. Being an artist is to travel a very different track, indeed. True. But many business geniuses like the late Ken Thomson do have an appreciation for art, develop connoisseurship, realize that the human being needs not just sport, not just business, not just politics, but also art. All art, that flows from creative expression be it dance, music, sculpture, painting or any of another good handful of disciplines.

And what is this nonsense about locating the National Portrait Gallery anywhere other than in the capital of the country??? What about

the National Portrait Gallery? it's in London
Scottish National Portrait Gallery? Edinburgh
the National Portrait Gallery? Canberra
the National Portrait Gallery? Washington, D.C. . . . does anyone see a pattern here?

Canada does have an online Portrait Gallery of sorts, courtesy of Library and Archives Canada, but you will note that 1) the word "National" is omitted (bad word according to the PCs - and that does include the politically correct) and 2) it sends out travelling exhibitions to far-flung corners of the Canadian empire, er . . . the Canadian landscape.

"The gallery's collection of portraits is currently housed out of public view in a climate-controlled Gatineau, Que., building operated by the national archives," according to a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation report that quoted an assessment that keeping the gallery in Ottawa would save $2.5-million per year. (http://www.cbc.ca/canada/ottawa/story/2008/01/07/ot-portrait-gallery-080107.html)

Hey Steve! Hey, Harper, you there in the ever-more-boring suits and with the beginnings of a venal, suspicious look about you, did you actually pay attention to that report? One wonders whether this insistence on locating our country's National Portrait Gallery somehwere else -Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary or Vancouver, I bet, to mollify the electorate out there who are always carping that the rest of Canada does not give a damn about them - has anything to do with scratching one another's backs, greasing one another's palms, or some such anatomical tit-for-tat (Sgt Fordy, take note! -- see column below: ROBERT PICKTON - Scapegoat) Personally I don't care if you want to locate the gallery in Pile-O-Bones, Manitoba, but then don't call it "National". For those of you government types who missed English classes because you were too busy in the political club or Junior Toastmasters, here's what it means:

"owned or maintained for the public by the national government"

and wouldn't you know it, the national government of Canada happens to be located in Ottawa.

Yours Truly worked for a number of years in the bureaucracy, in Ottawa, Fortress of Darkness. Yours Truly could - but won't - tell you things about tax spending that would make the enamel slide right off your teeth. Yours Truly tried unsuccessfully to fight the inertia that brings stupidity to any bureaucracy - and failed. But in all that time Yours Truly never once disagreed with the idea that the "National" institutions - National Arts Centre, National museums etc - should remain in the national capital. Ottawa even has its own government entity, the National Capital Region, that jealously guards the make-up of businesses along its various streets of prominence.

Well, Yours Truly also put forth this idea over 20 years ago, and stands by it:

Move the Capital to WINNIPEG.

All sorts of people have expressed the opinion, over the decades, that Members of Parliament are in it largely for the money and the prestige and not to be true servants of the public. Moving the capital, lock-stock-and-barrel, to one of the more godforsken locations in the country, albeit virtually smack in its middle, would weed out the self-interested from the altruistic. Anyone who voluntarily got him- or herself elected or appointed or hired to work in Winnipeg would be understood to be going there for the love of all things Canadian, not Mammon. And nobody from any of our three coasts could complain that the national government was playing favourites to the centre (read the behemoth Greater Toronto) because, being smack in the middle, equidistant from the perimeter, would inform the national debate and spending and ministers' travels etc. etc. etc. We could acquire a new national anthem - by the Weakerthans - "I Hate Winnipeg.
And then you could move all cultural and military and other institutions to Winnipeg and still correctly call them National this and National that.

But back to the National Portrait Gallery of Canada in Ottawa.

I want someone from the political party in power, which is trying at this moment to demolish the country, which cheapens and makes small everything it touches, which is too cowed and too weak-assed to tell their glorious micromanaging leader to back off because he is being an ignorant putz, to leave an answer to this article that rationally and logically convinces the readers of this page, and Yours Truly, of a compelling reason to de-nationalize our national institutions.

It ought to make for a laugh or two.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Doughnut Brained Snobs Down to the Last Reporter

2008-05-17T07:59:00.003Z

A Fleet Street publisher once offered me a job, which, not fitting into the scheme of things, I did not take but the idea of which was always tinged with gold.

My good friend would be twirling in his grave if he knew the sorry state in which much British journalism finds itself these days. Case in point:

The eldest grandson of Queen Elizabeth married a Canadian woman named Autumn Kelly, from Pointe Claire, Quebec, on Saturday, May 17.

The British press is always slobbering over the Royals. If you find the body of a British reporter lying in the road, wave a picture of a Royal - any Royal, alive or not - under his nose and if he doesn't stir you know he's dead.

The British press made Diana's life a misery - although that unfortunate woman had more demons than a typical Hollywood movie.

The British press has had a love-hate relationship with the Royal Family ever since they had a direct hand in destroying Princes Margaret's romance with Group Capt. Peter Townsend, though they will never admit it - except for the odd anti-royalist who takes pride in such a feat. To refresh: at the coronation of Elizabeth II, Margaret was seen picking a piece of lint off the Grp-Capt.'s suit. For the emotionally ossified Brits that was tantamount to Monica Lewinsky doing the dirty with President Clinton in public and the emotionally retarded but politically astute Court made Margaret hive off her lover, who then married a Belgian woman who looked exactly like his lost princess.

And now they are at it again. One supposes the British public must be deeply grateful to them for sniffing out the bride's terribly common family(British media scorn Canadian's royal wedding -http://www.canada.com/topics/news/story.html?id=a7f58273-3b4f-46df-96c2-a54ef1e76862). The Kelly family includes >gasp!< a bricklayer who is the bride's twin brother and an uncle who ran a strip bar. It was later converted to a gay bar but the report is unclear as to whether the uncle was responsible. In any case, the Kelly family were depicted as a clan of yahoos who would raise many an aristocratic eyebrow in "a recent brutal Mail on Sunday profile," the article says.

For those of you who don't know that newspaper, this is the sort of article the Mail on Sunday carries:

"Yes, I let her have sex at 14 - but I never thought she'd run off with a 46-year-old grandfather
In her first full interview, the dental nurse mother of missing schoolgirl Lisa Wright says she didn't stop her daughter sleeping with her boyfriends but claims she could never have guessed the consequences".

Another newspaper, unnamed, described her as "an insincere, unsophisticated gold-digger from a 'suburban backwater' "- after, one presumes, having spent considerable time in her company in order to make such an assessment. The 'gold-digger' bit had me in stitches. Mr Phillips works for a living although he has a nice slice of his granny's estate. Mrs Phillips also works. Both made a tidy sum (over $1,000,000) by selling the exclusive access to their wedding to Hello! magazine, a mawkish, drooling, celebrity-addled publication, though one could equally make the point that they wanted to have some sort of public record of their wedding, given that the British press expressed such distaste. (Hello! is owned by Spanish publisher Eduardo Sanchez Junco.)

But over and above that, what has me laughing loudest about the gold-digging and unsophisticatedness of the bride is the odd fact or two from British monarchical history. Richard II was a monster. Anne was a lesbian. Nobody knows what Elizabeth I was other than that a virgin she wasn't. Prinny - the Prince of Wales who became George IV, who married a Catholic and had a family with her - was a pompous, self-absorbed, if jolly, oaf whose profligate ways and gluttony gave him a waistline of 50 inches by the age of 62 and a debt of £630,000 in 1795, equivalent to $31,000,000 today (but worth much, much more because of the cheapness of labour). Unwilling to pay it off, Parliament put him on an allowance. The debt up to 1795 was cleared by 1806 but his debts over the eleven years from 1795 remained.

In 1760, Prinny's father, George III, agreed to surrender the hereditary revenues of the Crown in exchange for a Civil List, to be funded by taxation. It paid for the mail as well as several other expenses; when William IV acceded in 1630, Parliament readjusted the Civil List, leaving the Royal Family as its only charge. The Civil List was supposed to cover the annual expenses of the clan, not be taken as a payment from which savings might be put aside, but that is precisely what Albert did after he married Victoria:

put a little bit here, a few coins there, the odd gold sovereign into the sock, a little pile under the mattress and eventually a nice big fat portfolio stuffed with so many blue chip stocks and high grade investments - including a foundation garment factory - that the Royal Family found itself well-cushioned against any sudden financial shocks - such as the one when the British public finally found a little smear of guts in its arsenal and the Civil List was trimmed down to cover only the nuclear monarchy around the Queen. And that was around the annuus horribilis of 1991. Windsor Castle burned. Pftt! also went the Royal Yacht Britannia and the Royal Flight and the Royal Train. Since then, it seems, the royals have been on a financial diet, though the Queen is able to pocket about $1,000,000 annually from paying staff because she now files an income tax return. But Mr Phillips has never seen a cent of the public's money because his mother, Princess Anne, astutely decided her children were to have no title and to take part in no mind-numbing ceremonies. It's been "turn each penny over twice before you spend it" and "get what you can and keep what you have". So it's hard to see where on that stony little plot Mrs Phillips would do much digging.

As Yogi Berra said: A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

The Scenario That Keeps Me Awake At Night

2008-05-17T05:58:00.001Z

It would appear safe to say that Hillary Clinton is unlikely to get the nomination as the Democratic Party's candidate in the presidential election this fall - leaving the golden boy of the moment, Barack Obama, to carry the can.

If you detect a bit of skepticism here, you are right. Mr Obama is an academic, slow to develop his argument which he carefully constructs, factoring in variables, considering alternatives, the way one's professor would. He is not really a politician - not, to my mind, an effective one. When Dubya threw out the tasteless suggestion that there might be a parallel between Mr Obama and the appeasers of Nazi Germany in 1939 the response was slow and ineffectual. Because Mr Obama does not know how to bite back. He hasn't got the killer instinct; he isn't ruthless enough (doesn't seem particularly ruthless at all, he is almost Canadian in that sense); he probably has no idea where his opponent's jugular is, let alone how to go for it.

This is Politics, and politics is a down and dirty fight. Ms Clinton has it all down pat, especially the part where she'll smile at you as she stabs you in the back. For all you wilting lilies out there, think about this: that's a compliment. That is a very necessary part of being a politician. Years ago there was another President who was far too good - too moral, too kind - for the job. His name was Jimmy Carter. I need to remind you because most of you who admire Mr Obama and despise this sort of trait in Ms Clinton are young and haven't gone around the block enough times yet. Jimmy Carter was savaged. Barack Obama will be savaged in the same way unless he has been hiding the skills of a street fighter from us.

Politics is a dirty, messy game of oneupmanship, posturing, bluffing, threatening and eventually reaching a compromise amid smiles all around and references to "my very good friend" whose guts one loathes. One gets the very distinct impression that this sort of fight is as much beneath Mr Obama's personality and concept of politics as bowling, chowin' down in diners and talking to, rather than down to, the average Joe. Whenever he does try to talk to that segment of voters he is especially stiff and awkward. It goes together with the rest of the picture that is Barack Obama - elitist, academic, with high-minded aspirations to change (what do you think he's going to change? I'll bet he thinks he is going to change the tenor of the debate, the tenor of the convention, the tenor of the presidency and then everyone will rank him with Angelina Jolie as one of the planet's greatest gifts to mankind, ever- at least in her mind). He has a real antipathy, a visceral disdain, for the sort of grab-him-by-the-throat-and-shake-till-dead attitude Ms Pit Bull - I mean Clinton - does so well.

Fast forward to the day after the convention, when the campaign begins in earnest. John McCain has been using most of this time to rest up for what will undoubtedly be a very strenuous campaign. Probably he's been taking EPO, pure oxygen, fetal lamb placenta injections and Maypo. And he's been getting advice from all sorts of backroom types. And if he hasn't been calling in favours he's catching up on his sleep. The Pubs have been getting their man in shape and have been priming him on the questions to ask, the answers to give. And the Dems are doing the same thing. They'll challenge Mr McCain on any number of issues not the least of which is his age - he's old, and his health - the state of which, via his medical records, he will not reveal.

And Mr McCain will harp on one fact, and one fact only:

Since 2001 there has not been another terrorist attack on American soil.

What are the Democrats going to say to this? They will have no comeback, unfortunately for them. What are they going to say, what is Mr Obama going to say, that will be meaningful in the debate? Americans won't care whether this is due to the terrorist threat having been vastly overestimated, or all the terrorists having blown themselves up or the remaining terrorists having chickened out. . . .

In my nightmare this sweeps the Republicans back into the White House: four more years of pork barrelling, luxe emoluments courtesy of the lobbyists, lies; four more years of tax cuts for the rich, program cuts for everyone else, more straws on the breaking backs of the middle class, more disparagement of the poor; four more years of >ugh!< I can barely say it - Cheneyism, Halliburton raking in billions, more complete privatization of the army and its suppliers; four more years of strutting and posturing in the world's barnyard; four more years of bullying other countries because America has the right to tell everyone else how to live, blah blah blah.

So, please, superdelegates, advisors, strategists, mouthpieces and all the rest of you, if Mr Obama definitely is your Man, you had all better work him over so that he is less the person he is now, and more the sort of sharp, calculating politician that you need.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Oregon, Kentucky, Montana, South Dakota

2008-05-15T16:21:00.003Z

From where I sit in Canada the Democratic Party's primary elections in the U.S. don't mean a whole lot - in practical terms - at this time. Down the road, obviously the next president will have some sort of effect on every nation - thus possibly every person - on the planet, direct or indirect.

I don't favour either candidate; I am merely looking at the situation with a neutral perspective.

Hillary Clinton is right in saying that the race is not over; she is right in staying in the race; she is right in demanding that the party seat the "rogue states" Florida and Michigan whose delegates are not currently acknowledged.

She is right, because everyone has not had their say.

In previous contests people were not so concerned that their vote and their voice might not be heard. But the disaster that is the Bush administration, the idiocies, criminal behaviour, stupidities, and patronizing talking down by the gang of thugs that currently runs the White House has got a lot of people's dander up and they want to be heard.

Besides, wasn't it always an American conceit that It Ain't Over Till The Fat Lady Sings?

There may no longer be a fat lady - Kate Smith, R.I.P. - but the conceit remains. Would you like an obviously skewed hockey or football or golf game to be terminated early because the front runner is so far ahead he can't be caught? Right.

The phenomenon that is Barack Obama has obviously caught many off guard and, more importantly, has caught the wave at the right moment - for him - because there is a sea change under way. The societal paradigm is changing, the torch is being passed, etc. etc. Signs are everywhere, from the sudden realization that we have so befouled our nest it is about to disintegrate, gas won't come down again, everything will be more costly, the World War Two generation is dying en masse now, and power in the world is shifting from the New World to the Third World.

So I listened to Mr Obama's speechifying and I can't say that I heard much of substance. His situation, oddly, reminds me of a story I heard, as a child, about an Emperor and his new clothes. So far, however, I have not heard the voice of the child, the one that should stand up and say "But what does he stand for?"

It's not enough to say "Hey! We're here! Yeah! We're all in this together! We're for change!" Change to what? Change for its own sake is meaningless and often destructive. It has to be change to something better, not change as in mere repudiation of the previous (admittedly worst ever) regime and its policies. And the change has to have input from everyone, not just the Harvard crowd, or the Beltway crowd, or the auto workers crowd.

So far Oregon, Kentucky, Montana and South Dakota have not been heard from. What do they think of it all?

I know there are many people who loathe Ms Clinton - and perhaps their reasons are sound. Those are the ones who have been most vociferous about her early exit.

But Ms Clinton has laid out her policies for all to see. She may not have the rabble-rousing glamour of Mr Obama, she may not speak in the rhythmic, stirring manner of a preacher and so may be seen as uncharismatic. But charisma can have its drawbacks and one does not need to look very far. So does the Democratic Party want a candidate with charisma rather than policy? It's up to them, obviously. And they will get what they want.

I have a question for those who want Ms Clinton out of the race now:

why now? why not let the clock run down and let those last four states have their say?

And then you should permit the delegates from Florida and Michigan to cast their votes at the convention. Then you truly will be the party of inclusion.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

CHAPTER EIGHT - It's A Family Affair . . .

2008-05-13T21:35:00.007Z

This made its way into the mailbox on May 11, 2008:

"Hey bluemelin,
Christopher Edwards is a real textile line. We have been selling Christopher Edwards fabrics in our retail stores for the last 10 years and our copyright/trademark on the name has been around just as long. Do a trademark search, you'll find what I'm saying is true. Please clear that up on your blog because it is not accurate.

-Chris Wollstein[sic]"

Mr Wollstein's correction is noted.

Noted also: Mr Wollstein did not identify himself as the Diva. Yet when one checks the recently-begun blog, Divalicious, on the Design Diva website(http://www.designdivafabrics.com/blog/), one finds several mentions of and by "Christopher Edwards". The blog is written in the stereotyped voice of an over-the-top lisping gay designer who just loooooves "fluffilicious" pillows and other such slag. So who is "Christopher Edwards" ?

Here's the odd thing:

"About Design Diva Fabrics
Design Diva Fabrics was started by Christopher Edwards in 2006. He began working in the discount fabric industry at the age of 17, first creating a successful Ebay store before beginning the Design Diva store. The team members at Design Diva come from prestigious organizations in the industry. Their collective experience aids them in searching out the finest materials around the world for discount prices. The company specializes in acquiring unusual fabric, trims and designs" - http://www.newslife.us/industry/apparel-textiles/Design-Diva-Fabrics-Introduces-Patent-Pending-Widget-to-Online-Store/

"Unusual fabric" is right. Design Diva sold a roll of probably Chinese dreck that one wouldn't donate to a dog kennel as Scalamandre. Now that is fraud, don't you think? Picture below. Check it out yourself if you think the assessment is too harsh.

The Reality

Let's look at the finest definition of fraud devised:

"All multifarious means which human ingenuity can devise, and which are resorted to by one individual to get an advantage over another by false suggestions or suppression of the truth. It includes all surprises, tricks, cunning or dissembling, and any unfair way which another is cheated."

Source: Black’s Law Dictionary, 5th ed., by Henry Campbell Black, West Publishing Co., St. Paul, Minnesota, 1979. - courtesy the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants - http://www.aicpa.org/pubs/jofa/oct2004/lawrence.htm

Yup, that's fraud. And the Office of the Attorney General of New Jersey thought so, for which many people are grateful. And some dodos, able to read but not to think, read the preceding chapters of this blog and still don't get it.

Sorry for that digression. Back to "Christopher Edwards".

Is "Christopher Edwards" the person who started Design Diva two years ago??? We don't believe that date for one moment, do you? and we don't believe "Christopher Edwards" exists as a person, with his own, unique, individual DNA.

And is "Christopher Edwards" a textile line Mr Wollstein and his ilk have been selling in their stores "for the last 10 years"? Then what would account for the fact that an internet search shows no mentions of - or references to - "Christopher Edwards" before the beginning of this year, when the pansy-voiced Divalicious blogged breathlessly about "Christopher Edwards" in one of those juvenile C-is-for-Charming, H-is-for-Happily pseudo-greeting card litanies we grew out of - mercifully - years and years and years ago.

And is "Christopher Edwards" not the psedonym under which Mr Wollstein blogs on "Divalicious - the Design Diva's blog"? Either that or "Christopher Edwards" is a multiple personality. Which may account for the seeming fact that his left personality doesn't know what his right is doing.

Ah, but then we found yet some more contradictory information which - to a cynic - might call all sorts of things into question, such as what one should believe. If anything.

On July 30, 2001, Carole Sloan of Home Textiles Today, which according to Reed Business Information is the weekly newspaper of the home textiles industry, and which cites 25,000 visitors per month,(http://www.furnituretodayonline.com/mediakit/httaudience.shtm) had this to say:

" Ed Wolstein[sic], owner of the growing chain of Boca Bargoons specialty fabric stores" moved his operation to Atlanta from Boca Raton. Mr Wolstein was a third-generation upholsterer who grew tired of recovering sofas that had been sat upon so punishingly that the fabric disintegrated (we know that situation.)

"The stores offer a mix of reorderable fabrics from the leading converters and mills 'as well as closeouts and decorators' leftovers from the high-end guys' " Ms Sloan said. (A converter is a firm that buys or handles the greige goods (unfinished fabrics) from mills and contracts them out to finishing plants to have them finished, dyed and/or printed to turn into finished products)- thank you, http://www.infomat.com/guides/converters.html)

"The ratio of reorderable and closeout fabrics is 50/50. "Boca Bargoons is a family affair and has reached down into a fourth generation related to the business. Wolstein said that his brother Paul 'buys fabrics with me' and his daughter, one of four children, works in the Tampa store. " - http://www.hometextilestoday.com/article/CA149757.html

Now, as to the "Christopher Edwards" brand: there is an interesting website that will tell you who owns which brand.

We took the "Christopher Edwards" name to this site, shook it and what do you think fell out:

http://www.findownersearch.com/brand/4113197/:

Brand Name Owner: WOLLSTEIN, CYNTHIA
Address: 17760 Fieldbrook Circle Boca Raton FLORIDA 33496
Description: Fabrics for the manufacture of clothing, upholstery, quilts and curtains

Brands Owned: CHRISTOPHER EDWARDS
TRIMENDLESS

Don't you just love the information age!

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

CHAPTER SEVEN - Meanwhile, In Plano, Texas. . .

2008-05-13T17:36:00.006Z

The eBay seller Buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome, Ms Adiact Gaitan, subject of the previous post (and then some) was quick to reply to the last blog, which by now has acquired a chapter number and might yet become a book.

Seems she has a question about Design Diva:
"From: But[sic] it Before my Husband Comes Home
Date: May 9, 2008 3:50 AM
Subject: [bluemlein] New comment on CHAPTER SIX in the Fabric Wars.
To: [our address]@gmail.com

But it Before my Husband Comes Home has left a new comment on your post "CHAPTER SIX in the Fabric Wars":

"I think Design Diva has a very large amount of authentic designer fabrics. Who has more than them? Why disassociate myself?"

One is almost tempted to call this person "wonderfully naive" except that the sale of counterfeit fabrics - counterfeit anything - isn't wonderful at all. And one might question the use of the descriptor "naive" when applied to an operation of this scale.

Who has more authentic designer fabrics than the scam artist who has been the subject of the previous six posts on fake fabrics being peddled on eBay and the Internet?

For one, an honest, intelligent seller named designerfabrics*rr, who describes in detail what he has and whose product it is, who owns up to lacunae in his knowledge, should there be any, and who is quick to accept corrections and amend his listings. He even cancels listings that have an irremediable mistake.

For another, dabruzzo, who, while small, has more authentic fabrics in her weekly listings than the bloated, self-worshipping, blubbering Design Diva.

And it's interesting to note that Ms Gaitan's assertion is not that "Design Diva has nothing but authentic designer fabrics"; it is that it has "a very large amount" meaning that the remainder of the fabrics, by exclusion, cannot be authentic and therefore must be fake. According to Ms Gaitan.

And Ms Gaitan does not deny that she is associated with Design Diva (she cannot, in any case, as "Design Diva" is as much part of her business address as it was of Quith Daniels, late of New Jersey, who ran afoul of a very determined young lady who decided she was not going to let herself be ripped off by someone who peddles crap and garbage, moreover insulting her intelligence by posting a fake photo and sticking the name Scalamandre on it. He, too, was a Design Diva local bumboy.) Ms Gaitan asks "Why disassociate myself?"

Ms Gaitan, read this, the latest input from our industry source, and think very seriously about the choice you made in hooking your business up with that of a disreputable person whose associate has already been thrown off eBay:

"While Design Diva does have some current, authentic fabrics, he has many more that are out-and-out-fakes -- not to mention cheap, made-in-China copies, and then those which have long been discontinued, and as such, have lost at least 50% of their value. (The discontinued patterns are not identified as such, nor are their values appropriately discounted. In fact, ALL of the retail values of his fabrics are inflated, to make the buyer feel that he or she is getting an even better deal. First rule of retail: Perception is everything.)

"The Diva himself has recently bragged about his assistance in launching another 'questionable' fabric website, entitled FabricCut.com. They offer fabrics from most of the major design houses (and fraudulently use their logos to pull potential buyers in), but the same issue prevails: There are fakes interspersed with the 'real' thing to confuse the customer. And those patterns which have long been discontinued are not identified as such. Fiber content is a guess.

"Retail value is also well over-stated. In short, it's another sham operation. FabricCut wants you to believe they are located in the Atlanta area. Perhaps they are.

". . . The FabricCut domain name was reserved some years ago. It's unfortunate that the 'sharp minds' behind this operation didn't properly do their research: There is a legitimate fabric company with a very similar trademarked name, called Fabricut. We'll see how long the legal department at Fabricut tolerates this nonsense. . . . "

So, Ms Gaitan, after you have read this, what do you think? That you are being sold top quality, authentic, valuable fabrics? Or are you just the Texas version of Quith Daniels - see below if you aren't quite up on his story. Would you be content knowing that the Attorney General of Texas has opened an enquiry into your business operations? That the Internet Crime Complaint Centre might at this very moment be putting your sales under a microscope?

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

CHAPTER SIX in the Fabric Wars

2008-05-08T20:47:00.004Z

Ladies and gentlemen, we have hit a nerve. This particular nerve belongs to Ms Adiact Gaitan, the person who operates on eBay as "Buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome".

In the previous blog, "In case you missed it", we mentioned that Trish Connolly of Scalamandre now polices eBay for infractions on sales of her company's very lovely, valuable textiles by the likes of LonghornTextiles, the front for Design Diva in New Jersey that was run by Quith Daniels. Scroll down, down, down for the whole sorry epic.

Well, in the previous blog we mentioned also that an industry insider, who has been giving us a blow-by-blow account of the textile wars on the Eastern Seaboard, wrote to Ms Gaitan to tell her she was infringing on Scalamandre's copyright and she came up with the classic, thoughtful response:

"Fuck off you moron."

It would appear that somehow this mention came to the attention of Ms Gaitan, who sent us her response.

We have shared these comments with Trish Connolly and the industry insider and we have a few of our own thoughts on the matter. Ms Gaitan's comments are in boldface; her entire missive appears below. We don't believe in selective editing.

"From: Buy It Before My Husband Comes Home
Date: May 5, 2008 5:58 PM
Subject: [bluemlein] New comment on IN CASE YOU MISSED IT. . ..
To: [our address]@gmail.com

Buy It Before My Husband Comes Home has left a new comment on your post "IN CASE YOU MISSED IT. . .":

"Dear bluemlein,
"I just want to clear things up with you. I have more authentic designer fabrics than anyone else on the web besides maybe iluvfabrix, DD, and Discountfabricsusa. That said, I would really appreciate it if you stopped nit picking me because I believe it is unfair given the amount of fabrics I get in and the breadth of different jobbers that they come from. Sometimes there is guesswork involved, but it isn't done diabolically. There is just a little disorganization in our company at the moment that we are trying to deal with. "

Let's see. You run a business that is disorganized to the extent that you cannot get your merchandise information straight? You are blaming it on the jobbers? But still you list your questionable fabrics as "Scalamandre" and others? Some business person you are. Why don't you ask the manufacturers? They would be very happy to tell you whether your fabric was made by them, so that you could properly list and sell it without Ms. Connolly pulling the rug out from under you, and deservedly so.

"I apologize for calling you a moron, I was in a bad mood. My fault. Say nothing more - it's water under the bridge.

"How about giving some accolades to us for going through the extra effort to make sure a listing is 100% accurate? Ms Gaitan, "going through the extra effort" is a normal, day-to-day part of business. That is what other businesses do. And then they do not lose the insertion fees that have to be paid to list the fabric on eBay... basic business, yes? If I knew I could count on you for some kindness or appreciation (or at least acknowledgement of accuracy) then I would be all over my staff making sure that they triple checked everything. Do you need this sort of carrot to make your staff do their work? Seems rather odd to me. Let me quote Ms. Connolly here: "If you are selling something listed as Lee Jofa and it's a fake, you damage not only your reputation but Lee Jofa's." And you should be listening to Ms. Connolly because she has already had a number of your auctions shut down.

Our industry insider tells us you have gotten better. " -- she almost had to -- as the manufacturer's and pattern names are printed on the selvedge. As far as 'wovens' go, i.e., velvets, plain linens, damasks, etc., which most often have no identifying characteristics -- there's still a long way to go. She still makes up fake names and prices for the majority of her fabrics. An example: There's one "swirly" velvet pattern she insists on listing as a "silk" velvet, and still says it's Scalamandre. It's a poly-blend, available through several other channels, EXCEPT Scalamandre, with a retail value of approximately $54 USD. (She states it's worth over $250 per yard.) See eBay Item 270194226246."

Moreover, he tells us that "Many of her 'designer' fabrics have no manufacturer names; others have been assigned the brand name 'Christopher Edwards.' Christopher Edwards is the name Chris Wollstein (aka Design Diva) uses when he posts his own blogs online.[http://www.designdivafabrics.com/blog] There is no 'Christoper Edwards' as far as designer fabric brands go. Christopher Hyland and Christopher Norman, yes; Christopher Edwards, no. I'm assuming it's Mr. Wollstein's first and middle names.

"Of her current 113 listings, 20 reference Scalamandre in some manner. Of these, only 2-products are authentic. One printed fabric, and one woven -- and I believe she got lucky with that one.

"To her credit, some say that 'these fabrics came from a lot of Scalamandre, Kravet, and Pierre Frey ...' " Which, Ms. Gaitan, is okay as it goes but really, if you are intending to sell fine fabrics you have to be specific and truthful and ---

why do I have to tell you this? This is one of the more basic rules of running any business.

Tell us about this one: eBay auction 270205775467.

This fabric is listed with no manufacturer, but you give the brand name: "Canadian Maple" and categorize the fabric as Cross Stitch or Needlepoint. So, tell us more about the "Remarkable Italian Brocade With Majestic Flair 10 yds made by the manufacturer "Canadian Maple": are they in Canada? or are they operating in Italy with that name? and how is it that when one searches that name, up come maple syrup, candies, skateboards, wooden floors, and a soap that looks like a bar of fudge but -- no fabric manufacturer, or mill, or jobber?

Or this one: eBay auction 270224813378. you describe the shape and theme as "Christmas," the product as "Lace," and the brand "Close to My Heart." As our insider says: "Is this someone who's serious about selling fabric?" or are you just making a quick buck? or are you more seriously involved, up to your proverbials in the muck and murk of illicit sales and copyright infringements?
out is making a quick buck.

You close your response with:
"I'm just looking for a more positive relationship with you, in all honesty. Please tell me what it's going to take to achieve this.

This is what you need to do:

Disassociate yourself from Design Diva.

Get an honest supplier.

Verify the name of the manufacturer, chapter and verse. If you cannot, say that you don't know. Nobody will hold that against you.

Make your feedback public. Sellers who have private feedback have a louche, dishonest air about them, as if they don't want anyone else knowing with whom they are dealing in case they wish to compare notes.

"Thanks"

You're welcome. And we look forward to seeing your honest listings, properly identified.

- * - * -

As for our industry insider: "I've been in this business a very long time. I have trade accounts with most of the major design houses, and I know who produces what. And if I'm stumped, I have friends at mills in Italy and France, and many colleagues in the US that can assist in identifying a fabric or trim. Ms Gaitan has absolutely no clue what she's selling."

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

No CFLs For Me

2008-05-08T19:48:00.004Z

A year or so ago there was a huge sale on the compact fluorescent lightbulb that - we are told - is the future.

So what if the light is cold, hard, and gives a greenish-purplish cast to everything?

I stocked up and thought this would save on our hydro bills, I'd be doing our bit for the environment, I'd save money. . .blah blah blah.

I say blah blah blah because I soon discovered some flaws with this thing. And I do not mean that they burst into flame, as documented in various news items. I did not know about that until it was shown on the news recently.

*The light is unpleasant to me as it triggers my auto-immune arthritis. Thanks a lot.

*The socket does not fit my antique light fixtures very well, some not at all. Some of the shades do not fit over the bulb and this includes such diverse shades as blown glass shades, shades that sit on harps, and shades that clip onto the bulb.

*In winter - I live way up north and this winter was extra punitive - the light took forever to shine brightly because the bulb's gases took forever to warm up. My Tempur mattress also took longer than usual to become amenable to easing my arthritis but it is a special case. I will never get rid of it.

I know by now you are labelling me as a complaining Luddite.
We all must make sacrifices, you are saying, and rightly so, but there are sacrifices and then there are stupidities.

*The bulbs are awkwardly top-heavy. One day, one of my lamps swooned onto the floor. It had done this before, and the roundedness of the old incandescent bulb caused it to bounce on the carpet, without breaking. The entire bulb broke.

There were long sharp splinters, the electricity still was on, and I cleaned up the mess, picking the splinters out of the carpet with difficulty.

Six months later I was watching a news item about the bulb's dangers - specifically the previously mentioned fires and, most horrifyingly of all, their mercury content.

"Open the windows and leave the room for fifteen minutes," said the reporter, "wear rubber gloves to pick up the shards and do not vacuum. Put the glass into a lined box and seal it. Take it to a dump site that handles hazardous materials."

Think he was crying wolf?

*"Compact fluorescent lightbulbs contain a minuscule amount of mercury, and you can't safely ignore potential contact with it" - http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=are-compact-fluorescent-lightbulbs-dangerous

*"the bulbs contain small amounts of mercury, a neurotoxin, and the companies and federal government haven't come up with effective ways to get Americans to recycle them." - http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7431198

*"the mercury-containing CFLs. . . .bear disposal warnings on the packaging." - http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55213

WELL this was news to me. The packaging for the first zillion CFLs did not have any warnings or I would not have blithely picked up the shards without airing out the room and covering my nose. The woman profiled in this article got caught in a sort of Kafkaesque house of mirrors and her daughter's bedroom, where a bulb fell out of the lamp while she was installing it, remains off limits. Why? She called the store where she bought the CFLs and "the store warned her not to vacuum the carpet and directed her to call the poison control hotline in Prospect, Maine. Poison control staffers suggested she call the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.

"The latter sent over a specialist to test the air in her house for mercury levels. While the rest of the house was clear, the area of the accident was contaminated above the level considered safe. The specialist warned Bridges not to clean up the bulb and mercury powder by herself – recommending a local environmental cleanup firm.

"That company estimated the cleanup cost, conservatively, at $2,000. And, no, her homeowners insurance won't cover the damage."

Nobody told me there was a hazard in cleaning up the mercury. I thought there was really not enough mercury in the bulb. Even though I am scientifically minded and certainly not stupid.

After hearing about the manner in which these messes are supposed to be handled I made a decision.

I will not use any more Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs because I value my health above saving three cents on my hydro bill. As for being environmentally conscious, I think it is more responsible not to put these millions and millions of bits of mercury into our dumps where they will break and the mercury will find its way into the groundwater.

You should think about it.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT. . .

2008-05-02T01:07:00.004Z

This is for all of you who have been following the fight against the creeps, rip-off artists and fakers who use eBay as a venue for selling their counterfeit fabrics.

None less than Trish Connolly of Scalamandre, creator of some of the most beautiful fabrics seen by modern man, has lent her weight - and that of her company - to the fight against the swindlers.

You know who you are and you'd better take note: your days are numbered.

Trish posted a message after reading Naming Names, the first in my series of articles about the unfortunate experience of a young lady who thought she was going to do her mother a favour by buying twenty yards of beautiful fabric for the sofa. . .

All you have to do to fill in the blanks is scroll down and look at a picture of the garbage(produced most likely on an off day by a fifth-rate fly-by-night in China or elsewhere that permits this sort of business). Make no mistake: this is a lucrative scam. Especially as eBay continues to claim that they are just bringing together the buyer and the seller - to which I say not so. If eBay functioned like a newspaper ad department they would not be taking a percentage of the profit and they would have no vested interest in keeping the sales going. (That is another fight, one that currently is vexing the judge in Tiffany v. eBay. Let's hope he makes a ruling before he reaches retirement age; one would have to go through the whole process again.)

Now, some of you may be tired after a heavy day working with computers so - rather than making you scroll down in the hunt for the comment - let's make it easy for you.

This is Trish Connolly:

"After receiving numerous complaints from our clients and questions from people browsing the internet, Scalamandre has begun reviewing eBay listings daily in order to advise Sellers of incorrect information in their postings. While some of the Sellers correct the information there are several who refuse to do so and ignore messages sent to them. These listings are now being reported to eBay's Verified Rights Ownership department who, after reviewing, remove the listings, notify any current bidders that the item is no longer available and, if the Seller is persistently reported, will revoke the Sellers privileges.

"Scalamandre has a reputation which has been built over many years and will continue to protect.

"Please read our About Me page on eBay.com for information about buying and selling Scalamandre product on eBay at http://members.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=scalamandresilks

"Sincerely,

"Trish Connolly
Scalamandre"

You know who the offending companies are, you have read their names on this blog. And you can use their names to search eBay, where they still list their phony fabric for the unsuspecting.

Those fake sellers are rather unpleasant, as if by biting the air first they would intimidate you and make you run off, whimpering.

Think not?

This is courtesy of a seller from Plano, Texas, who has a "charming" moniker designed to make you think you are helping a shopaholic avoid her husband's retribution by snapping up her expensive mistakes. One of the industry people - mentioned previously - who is fighting this fraud sent her a message stating that she was infringing on Scalamandre's copyright. She wrote back:

Dear t******i,

Fuck off you moron.

- buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome

(Design Diva Fabrics
1855 Central Expressway, Plano, TX 75075
(972) 423-4224)

If you are tired of this, do something about it. Tell the phony sellers you are onto them and they should get lost while the going is good. Tell eBay you want them to enforce their rules.

THERE ARE TWENTY YARDS OF PHONY SCALAMANDRE VELVET WAITING TO BE USED AS EVIDENCE against Design Diva, Quith Daniels, Adiact Gaitan, brooklynexports and all the rest Have a good day!

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

UP YOURS, QUITH DANIELS!!!! Again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-04-02T04:28:00.010Z

We won't brag.

On March 29, 2008, Quith Daniels, aka DESIGN DIVA, perhaps at the urging of the Jersey City Police, or the Internet Crime Complaint Center, or the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General, or Hudson County Consumer Affairs or other consumer complaint departments that got involved, refunded the entire amount - which was not large but which, nonetheless, was a noticeable chunk - to the purchaser of the abominable, despicable, absolutely hideous FAKE Scalamandre velvet he sold as real Scalamandre. (An earlier column, if the reader scrolls down, shows the bait picture of the supposed fabric, as well as a piece of the sorry excuse for a fabric that should have remained in someone's bad dream.)

NEVER GIVE UP, PEOPLE!!!! If someone rips you off, go after them all barrels firing, guns blazing. Scum like that does not deserve to keep your money and nowadays there are many helpful organizations, so go after it/them(?the scum, I mean). There is a group of people in the eastern US whose entire raison d'etre is to rip more people off with fake fabrics. Let's create a counter-organization, one that will tear a strip off their mingy, cowardly, money-grubbing hides, and send them scurrying back into the holes they ought to remain in.

Let's not hear it for eBay or Paypal, though. eBay permitted this creep - and his associates, one of whom works out of Plano, Texas, and has a yard-long name that is supposed to be cute because it suggests ashopaholictryingtounloadthegoodsbeforeyouknowwhocomesback, to operate for months after they were told that LonghornTextiles, aka Quith Daniels aka Design Diva, was a crook. People in the industry told them. Customers told them. Companies told them.

What did eBay do?

It made him a Power Seller.

After the courageous young woman who was duped by the soi-disant Scalamandre complained to eBay, that farcical organization told her to file a complaint, whereupon they emailed the crook several times, then turned around and said "we aren't getting a response" - we could imagine the "waaaah" at the end of that sentence. Shortly before the expiry of the complaint she asked eBay what would happen next, and she took the opportunity to write a tart, terse note outlining his deception.

Ah. But then, only then, did eBay suggest that she could get eBay's help if criminal investigation was in the cards. She thought there was already quite a bit of information, both in this blog and at the various offices to which she had complained, but every bit helps. eBay did eventually kick Quith Daniels off, but not before he had the opportunity to do more damage.

And Paypal? Paypal's efforts were even more anemic, more laughable; they closed the file more than once without telling her and only reopened it the first time after she waited for one hour on a long-distance call to them; the second time they did not bother to let her know that not only was she not getting her money back, they were not going to do anything more than what they had done...which was nearly nothing.

Nor did they do anything the other day, when the money was refunded. Did she receive an email, telling her the money was back? No.

Ah, but they did convert the US to Canadian dollars, even though they did not ask if they could. One supposes they have to keep their oar in, just in case they miss out on a few cents' exchange.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

. . . and now a word for Wlliam Windsor

2008-01-22T06:20:00.002Z

Way to go: a young lout getting it out of his system, and having much fun in the bargain.

Media, gossip columnists, bloggers, photographers and the wedding/souvenir industry of the United Kingdom are
happily following the exploits of the reunited sweethearts Prince William and Kate Middleton. What's your bet that they are hoping for an announcement of an engagement and the possibility of royal pageant overkill this summer to take our collective minds off quotidian realities: mortgage payments, car repairs, zits that come out when one is about to go to a really important event, market crashes and the nagging subtext that somehow we have passed a point of no return as far as the world's climate is concerned?

To which I say to the young man in question: Don't do it.

In capital letters, lit up with Roman candles: wait.

I would say this to anyone who is so young and I have reason on my side. At 25 one is just finishing developing one's personality, one's sense of self, one's interests. I know there is a burning desire for companionship and for sexual intimacy, but when one is in the position of having to select a life partner who truly will be there for one's entire life there are a few caveats to consider.

The position one finds oneself in eventually - as king, as an anachronism - is extremely difficult. One could make the case that it is equivalent to serving a life sentence. Enough people have expressed the sentiment that they would never want that sort of life for one to conclude that being king is not the attractive proposition it may have been centuries - or even fifty years - ago. Moreover the times have changed only so much. The current king-in-waiting may have been given the implied permission - grudgingly - to remarry, but one wonders whether the British, sticklers for tradition and convention that they are, would permit an anointed king to divorce. Because there is a great chance that marriage so soon in one's adult life will fail.

One spends the first seven or so years of one's life completely under the control of Mummy and Daddy who soon are joined by Authority in various guises: schoolmarms, nannies, grandparents, medical professionals - and every one of them expecting something different and every one of them expecting to be obeyed or to be heard. Once it's off to school some of these authority figures are replaced by stand-ins who are joined by yet another group with expectations: friends. So that, by the time one is fifteen, one can barely carry around the rickety edifice of hopes, expectations and demands that has been built onto one's back.

And if you are an anachronism, a prince, there are also the obsolete oriels, dormers, transoms and belvederes and gargoyles contributed by the Firm, the Court, the Establishment, the media, and a trillion sighing pre-teens. That is a heavy load to carry. No wonder fifteen is the worst year. One is too old to take direction, to gain comfort from regular routines and expectations, too young to be considered mature enough to see the world with accuracy and to make independent choices. And then - barely having survived that nightmare - it is off to university. Here one is set adrift among one's peers, with the true freedom that comes from distance from one's family and the possibility that one might have it all.

Particularly if one is rich, good looking, intelligent, funny - all those characteristics that stick all over the tall, dashing frame of one William Windsor. No wonder that female enrolment at St. Andrews University rose dramatically once it had been announced that the prince would attend. No wonder flighty young women finagled the opportunity to parade in a fashion show in partial, provocative deshabillé.

And if one is the aforementioned rich, good looking, intelligent, funny, away-from-home William Windsor, one cannot be expected to pay no attention.

But this is the time, right now - especially if one is William Windsor - to experiment with personas, to test and refine friendships, to stretch one's legs and mind and interest. It is the time to go on pub crawls, behave crudely, find and partake of friendships of varying degree with the opposite sex....so that by the time one is thirty one has that out of one's system.

So that one never will have that moment when one thinks that one has missed out. So that one will have found a partner who does not use emotional threats or coercion to revive a romance that was dying of its own immaturity. That has already happened, once, with the world as witness. So that when one is ready to settle down with a partner one will have had sufficient experience with a range of potential partners to know that this is the one. Because the flame that seems to burn so brightly today may fade into insignificance in five or ten years.

Especially if one would be king of England.

Life expectancy in the West is about 80 years; 55 years will seem like fifty-five eternities with a partner whom one has outgrown.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Up Yours, Quith Daniels!

2008-01-12T23:01:00.002Z

The Reality: This cutting of a supposed Scalamandre velvet so enraged the buyer that she went on an email campaign against the counterfeiters

This is a very short update on the issues contained in NAMING NAMES, parts one and two.

While the Internet Crime Complaint Centre and the Jersey City Police Department have yet to respond in a way that indicates they have read and understand the issue of counterfeit fabric scams on eBay, eBay at least has taken some action.

It is gratifying to see the following appended to the user name "longhorntextiles", which is the name under which "Quith Daniels" defrauded buyers:

eBay My World: longhorntextiles( 123)

No longer a registered user
Member since: Jun-23-07
Location: United States
Views: 536 total

This is for all the bent sellers who claim they are innocent, who claim, like "buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome", that they were hoodwinked by an unnamed crooked seller.

This is for all the companies like iluvfabrix who claim that they never have passed on counterfeit goods, that they never would pass on counterfeit goods, that they are always above board and never have been approached by any industry insiders who have told them, time and again, that they are selling illicit goods.

This is for all the counterfeiters and other scammers and crooks who think that theft is the American Way to do business:

You who close your minds to the truth and keep selling dreck, you creeps and you crooks are like dominoes. The first one has fallen. YOU ARE NEXT.
Hope you sleep well tonight.

AN UPDATE: Someone asked today (27 October 2008) whether fabrics carried by The Diva are not authentic. The Diva himself probably would argue that they are real - real as in actual fabrics - but I doubt that he would go so far as to guarantee the authenticity of every single fabric that finds itself on his website.

If I were a potential buyer, I would send a copy of the listing to Scalamandre - TConnolly@scalamamndre.com - and ask for verification; one could also ask Design Diva, in writing, to guarantee the authenticity - "is it real Scalamandre, is it current Scalamandre, who supplied you this fabric, is it a discontinued pattern, was it a test pattern that never went into production?"

Because there may be some fabrics on The Diva's site that were tests that never caught anyone's fancy and were resold through jobbers; there certainly are fabrics that were made by Scalamandre - about a zillion years ago, therefore having very little value today. Also to remember: Scalamandre does not sell its fabrics to anyone like The Diva. Scalamandre is available only through decorators etc whom they have vetted very carefully. So if The Diva does have real Scalamandre, he would have had to obtain it from another source. This applies equally to other top fabric houses such as Bergamo and Brunschwig & Fils.

And finally: this blog site does not allow the blogger to answer comments that are posted by readers, which is why clarification appears here.

c2008 bluemlein.blogspot.com

NAMING NAMES, continued

2007-12-30T06:08:00.001Z

The saga continues.

Another eBay buyer has been hoodwinked by the abominable Quith Daniels, masquerading as longhorntextiles, purveyor of "fine fabrics". Just in time for Christmas, too!

This is from ashbyfabricdesigns: "THIEF!Have not received item. Requested refund 3 times, seller won't answer emails"

Quit Daniels, if that is his real name, has quit eBay for the moment. Probably is in the process of devising a new fake identity and corresponding eBay seller account. That still leaves buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome and several others who soon will be feeling the hot breath of our anger on their mingy necks.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

NAMING NAMES part 2

2007-12-19T22:21:00.003Z

So-called " 'Camilla Seta' by Scalamandre", a counterfeit Scalamandre fabric on eBay; pay $619.99 plus shipping for the privilege of being ripped off.

Consider this a warning shot across the bow of your soon-to-sink ship, all you counterfeiters of high-end fabrics, you are criminals. You steal money out of people's pockets and sully their good names, as well as those of the companies that make the real fabrics.

This is war.

In the forefront we have those courageous souls who have put negative feedback up on eBay for the purchases with which they were swindled:

* suholknits
* president92
* 6624jillh
* lcountryman10
* frenchsneck
* arappahoo
* itapaquanitatuckahenry

These are the people who were astute enough to notice that they had been swindled, and angry enough to leave feedback that was truthful.

We are certain that there are many people who might leave more truthful feedback except that they are afraid of some sort of repercussions. Perhaps they think some sellers won't let them buy their goods. But we cannot say. All we know is that, of the hundreds of people who have been swindled so far, the above are the only ones who left proper feedback.

This is what was said (fairly mild, most of it):

* "Scalamandre confirmed they NEVER HAVE HAD fabric called
“Camilla Seta” "
* "Scalamandre has confirmed they have no fabric called Solaris"
* "Scalamandre confirmed this is not their velvet fabric."
* "Scalamandre has confirmed this is not their fabric."
* "Scalamandre confirms this is not Scalamandre fabric."
* "NEVER seen fabric this BAD!!! UNUSABLE, entirely stained - seller
won't respond"
* "Much of this fabric was so stained it was unusable! EBAY
NIGHTMARE!!!"
* "Nice quality - but inside yardage was damaged."
* "poor communication, slow shipping. then left revenge negative
rating for me. Sad"
* "I was given bad service-they bribed me to withdraw, then gave me
a negative."
* "YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR"
* "pd. $26 to ship 4yds of fabric less than 15 miles. very poor
communication."
* "he is design diva, CROOKED KNOCKOFF SELLER. GARBAGE FABRIC
s/b KICKED OFF EBAY"
* "Sells COUNTERFEIT FABRIC, Scalamandre says NO fabric called
DUNMARK, not rec'd"
* "Donghia states "this is not Dhongia fabric""

And THIS is what they got in return for their truthfulness:

* "Buyer is threatening, unreasonable, & unfriendly no matter what I
do to appease"

* "Difficult customer that does not understand how to conduct herself
on eBay"

* "Impossible to please this customer."

* "You are a troubled soul."

* "Offered full refund plus cost of shipping still left neg feedback" (did
he not think the customer might be angry at being ripped off?)

* "A negative experience with this transaction."

* "Buyer has very little sense of value." ah, irony!

* "Learn how to spell"

* "iluvfabrix.com sold me this and others claiming they were
Scalamandre Fabrics."

This statement was made by buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome in a dispute on eBay: While checking on the authenticity of some supposed Scalamandre fabric, the buyer asked for an opinion on some trim she had just bought from "buyit..etcetera" and was told in no uncertain terms that the trim was not Scalamandre, not high quality and not worth more than a few dollars per yard. She did not pay.
The seller, "buyit..etcetera" filed an unpaid item complaint and the buyer said that she would pay for the trim as soon as the seller could provide proof that it was Scalamandre, chapter and verse.

"Hi," the seller posted on 28-Nov-07 at 14:44:47 EST:
"I bought this from iluvfabrix.com and they advised me that it was Scalamandre. What I will do is to go ahead and send a message to cancel the transaction. Thanks."

A thorough check of the feedback for michellesfabrix and iluvfabrix, both of which are operated on eBay for or by Michelle Tennen and/or her husband Lanny Tennen, showed no sale and no feedback. Thinking that perhaps the fakes had been bought from their website, we asked iluvfabrix whether they had had any dealings or had had any negative feedback. This is their reply, signed by Susan:

"We do not sell anything to them
They are in the process of getting kicked off ebay and they are operating under about 10 different names
The fabrics are all fakes. They just had a new seller name pop up today and we have gotten several letters from clients who have gotten seriously ripped off by them
All our fabrics, www.iluvfabrix.com are bought directly from the mills and are authentic
If you have found something on ebay feel free to email us the item number and we will be happy to check it for you so you don't get taken."

A reasonable response setting out answers to reasonable questions. Or is it? An industry insider, who is working with Scalamandre to rid the marketplace of this ring of thieves, told us otherwise. It appears that iluvfabrix sold some fabric as Scalamandre "that they said has been recently shown in the magazine Architectural Digest." Well, Scalamandre confirmed that the fabric absolutely was not Scalamandre. The insider then asked, which issue? and was told that "its supplier didn't tell them which issue, although it had appeared "more than once, and in Elle Decor as well." " Okay then. To paraphrase the popular slogan that is such a motivating factor with the counterfeiters:

Show us the merchandise!

So there we are. One can never be too careful.

One of the hallmarks of this ring of counterfeiters on eBay, as already noted, is their aggressiveness and their insulting, sneering ways. buyit..etcetera and brooklynexports were bad enough. So we asked one of the people, who was seriously duped, about the sellers and she wrote back:

"Which one????

Buyitbefore, Brooklyn Exports, Longhorn Textiles or Diva designs[Design Diva]… I have run into them all!!!!

Longhorn Textiles or [Design Diva] is the worst… scammer big time. I am in the process of getting my money back from the other two.

All of them should be run off EBAY. EBay and PayPal make me just sick… their justice is non-existent." (More on that later)

For aggression, there was no topping the so-called "Quith Daniels" who sold fake fabrics on eBay as longhorntextiles.
We have included the entire exchange. Check on eBay if you wish:

"This Customer Makes Me Wish They Didn't Sell Computers to Just Anyone Nowadays!
Buyer: suholknits ( 48) Oct-18-07 12:08
Reply by suholknits (Oct-21-07 19:26):
They are angry that I left a true, but negative comment for them. Very sad.
Follow-up by longhorntextiles (Oct-22-07 16:05):
Please seek counseling for your obvious emotional problems."

* * *

"Could Not Be Worse! Please Leave eBay Forever!
Buyer: suholknits ( 48) Oct-18-07 12:07
Reply by suholknits (Oct-21-07 19:28):
I paid them immediately, and was a very good customer. Why the negative?
Follow-up by longhorntextiles (Oct-23-07 23:38):
Because you are mentally unsound."

* * *

"Terrible Customer! Don't Bother With This One!
Buyer: suholknits ( 48) Oct-18-07 12:06
Reply by suholknits (Oct-21-07 19:29):
don't give these people a true feedback or they will do this to you!
Follow-up by longhorntextiles (Oct-23-07 23:36):
You are a beacon of misery for the entire human race. I feel so sorry for you."

* * *

"Buyer is disgraceful. Do NOT do business with this woman. Very unknowledgable Buyer: arappahoo ( 198) Dec-12-07 10:54
Reply by arappahoo (Dec-12-07 11:58):
ask me for picture of dreck he sold as scalamandre; scalamandre co also has seen"

He had no reply to that and appears to have left eBay for now, or for good. That still leaves others. While one must always be cautious when buying, especially online, one really has to wonder:

WHERE IS EBAY IN THIS???

eBay is good at one thing only, making money for eBay and its shareholders. The money is not made from buyers, but from a cut of the sellers' ad insertion and a percentage of the final value of the sale. There is no incentive for eBay to kick any seller off its site. As long as they pay up, eBay doesn't give a damn. But if you try to sell something with an occasional ad, be prepared to receive a bill - a current bill - which starts off with "ACCOUNT OVERDUE". One supposes they want to ensure that the seller not only pays up, but is suitably cowed and won't wait a day next time.

WE WOULD LIKE TO KNOW:

* Where are the company's shareholders and analysts on this? Should they not know the abysmal attitude this company has toward half its users? There soon will be a decision in the lawsuit Tiffany vs. eBay. . . perhaps not in favour of eBay. The analysts are waiting with bated breath, but in the meantime are they aware of these shenanigans? Or do they not care, because those users are the non-productive ones and don't count?

Well, add these two companies to the undesirables list: not only is it almost impossible to get eBay to act on these crooks, they make it virtually impossible to get one's money back. And Paypal behaves in the same sorry way. Did we tell you that Paypal is an eBay company?

Yes. Greed is good, eh? Let us just leave all these counterfeiting criminals to sell their dross and garbage on eBay in peace. God knows eBay will not act, nor will Paypal. So all these crooks are safe in the knowledge that, if their scam should be discovered, they can always just register under another name. And continue to rip people off. Who will throw them off? not eBay, unless seriously harassed. And who will make them pay back the money? not Paypal.

Here is a better idea: instead of throwing cash at these sellers of garbage masquerading as beautiful fabric, give the money to a panhandler. It will make him or her happy, even if only for a little while. And it is more productive than dealing with all of the above.

Note: http://www.ic3.gov/, The Internet Crime Complaint Centre, is a good place to start if you have been swindled.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

NAMING NAMES

2007-12-13T19:44:00.003Z

The Promise

They linger on one's tongue like exquisite chocolates, richly pooling their luxurious connotations, the more for us to enjoy: the sorts of names that seem to have flown from the pages of the haute decor magazines: "Tella Damask," "Cooper," "Silvia," "Basilica," "Palisades," "Meghan Tapestry," "Sumai," "Corrago Crest", "Giardino del Fiore" and "Giardino Squisito" -- that supposedly wholesales for $789 per yard.

These are some of the supposed names of fabrics by one of the top luxury fabric houses on the planet - the legendary Scalamandre, that weaves fabrics for the White House and palaces and mansions on the Federal Register of Historic Houses - not to mention the environs of the very rich and very exclusive. Many of these fabrics supposedly are out of production. The Scalamandre website - www.scalamandre.com - shows ads for other fabrics, in their current line, that carry somewhat similar names, all meant to invoke a richness of luxury and an extravagance of detail one cannot find at the nearest Fabricland, or Fabric Discounts or WalMart. These names spin an aura, a mystery, of which many of us wish to partake, despite our slender wherewithal. So that we scour every sale place looking for a bargain, a small patch of Scalamandre to call our own. Who does not give at least some consideration to the "Exquisite Garden" ("Giardino Squisito") that may, according to the seller, wholesale for $789 per yard, but which might - just might - really be found in the recesses of a workshop once belonging to a designer of "the trade"?

But every last one of these names is fake.

Every last one of these names turns to ashes in one's mouth upon the realization that what we have been told, what we have, in good faith, believed, what we have bought, complete with that secret thrill that comes with a bargain, is a fraud. A purposive deception meant to enrich someone on the shady side of the law.

In a nearby basement at this moment is a roll wrapped in opaque plastic - appropriately standing in the corner, its shameful contents awaiting disposal.

Upstairs is a sofa that is hidden under a large folk weaving, because its fabric has outlived its usefulness and shows separation everywhere: the arms, the seat cushions, the corners. Perversely the back of the sofa is pristine - like the backs of most sofas, which only display themselves but never act in any official capacity.

The idea was to recover the sofa, which is pleasantly overstuffed and very well-built; it was originally covered in linen - lovely to look at, cool in summer, but fragile beneath the assault of bottoms and feet and cats, and books temporarily stacked there.

And it's a fairly large sofa, which caused a disconnect between getting the fabrics one would love to be able to use and the fabrics one ends up using of necessity - usually having to do with one's anorexic wallet.

Ah, but there is the online 'community' that trades among its many members, one buying from a neighbour and selling it across the water. Round and round this commerce goes, in a largely unregulated environment, with corresponding numbers of fakes bought and sold with merry abandon.

At the moment a lawsuit has been concluded in New York City; the judge has heard both sides; in due course he will render his verdict. The suit is Tiffany vs. eBay, and should be noted by anyone who ever sold or bought or intends to do so, on line. In it, Tiffany claims that eBay, making large profits from the sale of bogus Tiffany items, has a degree of responsibility in the sale of the fakes.

Because eBay, being so enormous, so ephemeral, so removed from the transaction - except for its collection of fees - is the perfect venue for theft: theft of a company's good name, theft from people who believe they are buying an authentic merchandise that turns out to be bogus.

And now we come to the roll. Of fabric. In the basement.

The owners were trying to decide on colour schemes for quite some time, but, neither being The Decider, flip-flopped like incompetent politicians from one to the next: brown and blue - oh, no, that won't go with the carpet. Black and white - um, the white won't stay white after the black cat sits on it. Purple and -; gold and - ; Pink and - ; um, um, um . . . and it hadn't been even decided which type of weave should be used - brocade? hard-wearing tweed? Union cloth?

What of brilliant, glowing, luscious, scarlet red. . . . cut. . . . velvet - a brilliant cloth, with the appearance of dotted Swiss fabric, all its little squares so carefully cut - ? ? ?

The listing said the magic word: Scalamandre. Sca-la-mandre. Aaah. Rich, thick, with a hint of the mysterious. Possessed of an accent - of a flair - that no length of time in the New World could diminish. Scalamandre is enormously expensive, painfully exclusive. It produces remarkable fabrics from the ethereal to the practical-but-stylish. Ordinarily one would not expect to be able to afford much - nay, any - of Scalamandre's output. Moreover it required always the intercession of a designer - a priest-like figure - to bring together man and magic.

But there is slippage is the U.S. economy, caused by the mortgage debacle: people are losing their homes, their businesses, people have bills to pay and excess inventory and the usual trajectory in such a case is down, down, down. Moreover in 2007 Scalamandre moved out of New York City hard on the heels of a major sale of everything from cases showing the life cycle of the silk moth to the exquisite, intricate damasks and liseres that were so expensive a trial yard would forever be their only record. So it shouldn't be surprising if one might be able to find a bargain - oh, please, as we live and breathe fabrics, let us find a bargain! - which soon revealed itself in the aforementioned rich, red, velvet. Brilliant as the robes of a cardinal - just what is needed to cheer up a dour, west-facing living room whose light is dimmed by an enormous maple. It certainly glowed with the inner light that comes from linen. The over-all effect was that of a red fruit or berry perfectly ripe and ready to engulf one with its taste. That scarlet was the deep pool of a Burmese ruby, certainly a match for the brilliant, silk-like interior of the poppy. And Scalamandre velvets have a certain no-nonsense ability to withstand wear.

In retrospect one should have been a little leery when the seller, whose eBay name is longhorntextiles, and who claimed to answer to 'Quith Daniels', offered to sell 100 yards, fast:

" have plenty of yardage. Maybe up to 100 yards. Would that work for you? Yes it is a nice red color. Would you like to work out a fixed price for what I have left?"

If one had had space and some extra money put by, it might have appeared to be one's fate to buy the fabric and resell it, at profit, to one's neighbours. The reply to this tempting email said that there wasn't a lot of money to spare for such things.

Undaunted, Mr. Daniels tried again:

"For 100 yards, what would be the best price you can afford, as maybe we could work out a deal?"

Hm. It seemed odd that he was in such a hurry to ditch so much Scalamandre, but . . . the economy must be worse than assumed. One would have to be satisfied with trying for the 20 yards, not the whole one hundred.

So they bid on the glorious velvet. And won. And paid. Then one of them also bid on - and won - the seller's "Dunmark" - supposedly lavish handwoven Scalamandre. It never arrived, despite Mr. Daniels's claim that he sent it off. Which would only have caused more irritation.

Scalamandre, you see, does not have a handwoven, lavish textile, named Dunmark.
Hmmm. Someone has an active imagination. But we cannot tell who. Yet.

Twenty-six days later Mr. Daniels wrote to ask what had happened to his money - he was still waiting for it, he said. In retrospect it begs the question: was this part of a scam to see whether a forgetful person, being told they still owed money, might rush to pay without first checking? Or was it a legitimate lapse? He seemed contrite when shown how and when the money had been sent to him; he assured his customer that the fabric soon would arrive.

Something arrived - but we don't know what. All of us clustered around it and shook our heads. Some of us asked - in internet parlance - WTF is it??? To this day none of us knows what - or where - it originated. Surely not China, for the Chinese consider a brilliant red to be a most auspicious colour. They would never dishonour it in this way. Would they?

When the plastic wrap was peeled away what stood in the basement was a roll of very flimsy, poor-quality cotton with minimal pile. That was bad enough. What was worst, however, was this: the colour, which resembled the underside of an old blood clot. Not if we were the last Scalamandre on earth, long separated from all knowledge of yarns, and dyes, and textiles, and this the last piece of fabric, could we possibly think that this might have been made by the Scalamandre company. The fabric clearly was not Scalamandre. A complaint was initiated. It was shunted to Paypal, who assured the buyer told that her money would be refunded. Well, thank heavens for that.

And now the saga begins to be really interesting.

In our collective anger we began to look at all eBay ads for Scalamandre and found quite a few that appeared to have shoddy or shady merchandise: something didn't look right, the description was ambiguous, the picture seemed not to match the description. . . . lo and behold! a buying guide came up. If this had been seen sooner everyone would have retreated from the sale, no question. What was found, also, was the same picture, of the same - nonexistent? - Scalamandre fabric, but for a (supposedly) different seller who has the rather quaint name suggesting you "buy it before my husband comes home". This one is based in Plano, Texas. The picture was easy to finger as both copies had a small round object on its lower right diagonal fabric fold. The second seller's description was hardly different from that of the first seller. The first seller's name. longhorntextiles, had conjured up a Texan sitting in a warehouse full of high-end fabrics requiring rapid dispersal; this other seller's name, buyitbeforemyhusbandcomeshome, suggested a woman, a bit of a shopaholic who has overspent and now must liquidate in order to avoid further trouble. If she was a shopaholic, she was also duped - she claimed. But there is rather a lot of evidence to suggest that far from being duped, this seller also is a part of the ring that exists to swindle people out of their hard-earned money - people who would like a bit of beauty in their homes.

The buying guide was brutal in its description of sellers of fake merchandise. There were fabrics we had seen that appeared to be so fine, so lavishly made, that they could not possibly come from anyone but - ? Ah, we forget the third world, home of everything required by and for commerce these days, whether it is needed in fact or not. We forget that in some parts of the world labour and the rudimentary infrastructure are so cheap that, even if the resulting fabric were peddled for $2.00 per yard, profit would be made.

The buying guide struck out at the sellers' giving their bogus fabrics all those delicious names at the beginning of this article.

Who has not drooled over the appearance of some of these fabrics! One of the companies selling these questionable materials presented quite the contortions. The name clearly suggested an anxious-to-sell female - yet another instance of manipulating perception. It belonged, however, to a company that was owned by a company with yet another name, both professing to love textiles. One gets the feeling that what they loved had more to do with money than the actual fabrics. It carried a large banner headline on its eBay Canada page, proclaiming "You can always call us for more information at 416 555 7584" that's rather deft, making the Canadian eBay buyer think that the fabric shop had a Toronto area code, that its principals were, perhaps, Canadian, that they might be honest and upright, toiling away in a warehouse in the Toronto garment district.

Another seller had changed his name several times - and would continue to do so, until eBay comes to its senses and ejects everyone who defrauds and misrepresents what they are selling. There is the thought - bruited about by analysts in the business world - that Tiffany's success would radically alter the way eBay does its business, the manner in which one is permitted to advertise one's wares. Which would be good.

The Paypal verdict came in: the file was closed. No refund would be given. The purchaser, having had two items to pay for, had found that Payola's Byzantine links did not work, and had sent an "echeck" instead. The system did not recognize it as an eBay sale. Now, we have bought on eBay, and we have tried using Paypal, and we have encountered the miserable stupidities that might drive one to attack the monitor with a baseball bat after being led into a dead end. We sympathize.

So the purchaser again reported to eBay that the item was significantly different from what was sold.

What happened?

eBay:

a) promptly ordered the seller to refund the money
b) promptly kicked the seller off its site
c) promptly told the purchaser it would consider the case
d) sat on its collective large ass and twiddled its thumbs

actually none of these. eBay did not order the seller to refund anything. It did not kick out the seller {even though, several years ago, it had turned out a seller of fake 'peridots' and 'topaz' made of beer bottle glass). It did not communicate with the buyer. It did not even do nothing: eBay essentially told the buyer that it was their tough luck, they were not going to take action against the seller, and (in a similar case) stressed that the buyer had better pay up, even if everyone knew that the merchandise was unmasked as FAKE.

The purchaser in the meantime had been in contact with Scalamandre; they told her that the counterfeiting of textiles is big and serious business and that they are pursuing an especially notorious seller, DESIGN DIVA. When the purchaser sent them a copy of the invoice, their jaws literally dropped because

Quith Daniels IS Design Diva.

Now some may wish to dispute this. However, when the invoice was examined the following jumped out:

In place of the purchaser's telephone number, Quith Daniels had entered 201-424-7775; it should have had an Ontario number, the number of the unlucky recipient of the bloody stuff. Why would he have his number in that place? . . .why, to fool someone, of course.

Wondering what this was all about we did a quick check via the reverse lookup for the white pages. It showed this:

(201) 424-7775 is Unpublished or Unavailable
(201) 424-7775
Type: Cell Phone
Provider: Verizon Wireless

Location: Jersey City, NJ

which is where, at 838 Grand Street, Jersey City, 07304, Quith Daniels hangs out, according to his address on the invoice.

This is an apartment building. The textiles presumably are located elsewhere before being sent out to the usually unknowing victims. 838 Grand Street once housed an honourable man, LAURENCE E. DOWNS, a Corporal, 76th Artillery, Battery F of the United States Regulars at Camp Shelby, Hattiesburg, Mississippi. A man on Jersey City's World War I Roll of Honour. That the address now is associated with someone sending out COUNTERFEIT FABRIC is disturbing and insulting to the man's memory. It is also disturbing and insulting to all the people who, in the interest of having a well-functioning society, hew to the law, dot their 'i's and cross their 't's. It is the tip of an internet fraud iceberg that threatens the ship of commerce because it removes the one ingredient from a transaction without which it must never be: trust.

addendum, 1 May 2008: Trish Connolly of Scalamandre has added her comment to this item - click on the link to read it.

The Reality

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

To The Black Flower Conrad Doth Proceed . . .*

2007-12-11T04:57:00.000Z

*The black flower of civilized society, prison." Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

Judge Amy St. Eve sentenced Canada's favourite pomposity to 6.5 years in federal penitentiary on Monday, Dec. 10, 2007. It had been rumoured that His Lardship Conrad Black would give a 5,000-word statement in the Chicago courtroom that saw his trial and conviction, earlier this year, for having defrauded Hollinger International shareholders during his reign - oops - tenure as chairman of the board.

He must pay a fine of $125,000 within the next 90 days and must forfeit $6.1-million which - presumably - will be doled out to the shareholders.

Any thoughts he might have had about Christmas in Toronto are swift-vanishing fantasies. He may not travel other than to or from Chicago and his heavily mortgaged Palm Beach, Fla., estate. This particular oceanfront villa carries so large a mortgage that Mr. Black actually defaulted on the payments in June 2006; its ownership has been reported as being divided among Mr. and Mrs. Black and his children, leaving him with only a partial interest in it. In fact, the family corporation Conrad Black Capital Corp. is the legal owner of the estate.

Without telling Canadian tax officials, and despite telling prosecutors he was sole owner, this "honourable", "upstanding" person transferred a fifty-percent interest to his wife, Babs Amiel. The Canadian tax authorities, who didn't notice that his pants were on fire at the time, have a $14.4 million lien against the family corporation and thus against the estate. And since the default, the mortgage interest has shot up to 26 percent. Tsk tsk. We've heard of the inflationary interest escalation of sub-prime mortgages but was this the best he could do???

The Justice Department had threatened to seize the $38-million property but was defanged by the judge. That wasn't wind you heard on Monday, that was His Lardship's sigh of relief at the removal of one of the shackles. So it must give him small comfort to know that he will likely be spending Christmas in those still heavily indebted surroundings in the sun. Who knows? Perhaps Horatio Caine might drop by. Miami does have that louche air of self-delusion about it.

Ah, but, like the earnest little squirrel he so often resembles, he undoubtedly has little stashes of money here and there - and then there is always that brooch that was too lavish for Babs (too lavish? then she is just a little plebe after all). That should fetch a pretty penny, what with gold swirling around the $800/ounce mark and antiques being highly saleable these days and diamonds being everyone's best friend, as ever.

The judge may have done everything fairly and by the book but she is a Republican and that suggests a bias toward The Ruling Class which is shown by the fact that
His Lardship has twelve weeks in which to order his affairs before he must report for prison, and that His Lardship is, perhaps, being sent to a prison that could hardly be called "hardcore". Judge St. John ordered him to report to a Florida prison that is no longer operational (the Eglin Air Force Base prison complex now houses the quaintly termed Airman's Attic, which helps young airmen's families establish themselves) but which would have had a holiday-camp atmosphere, what with all the resident white collar criminals and ex-politicos. It was the prison originally dubbed "Club Fed" but its expenses for its pleasant life-style were its undoing.

Instead, his lawyers asked for - and got - a reservation at Camp Coleman . . .I mean, " Coleman Federal Correctional Complex in central Florida, a sprawling prison located three hours from his Palm Beach home known for its good food, respectful guards and cramped quarters," according to the National Impostor - the conservative newspaper founded by Black and thus eternally grateful to "Daddy".

It will be like "Upperp" Canada College all over again: bunk beds in a dormitory, cafeterias, healthy exercise in the fresh air. Do they have a camp song? His Blackness probably could contribute a huffy baritone to the choir.

He might squawk "no fair" a few times if the Bureau of Prisons sends him elsewhere. Though the judge may recommend, it is the bureau that places the prisoner. Do you get the feeling that that particular bureau tends to stomp down those heads that project above the herd? It might be extremely difficult for him, but perhaps this is a time for silence. Undoubtedly the lawyers - whose total fee for defending not just His Blackness but also his co-defendants has been pegged as high as $198-million (if they count the cappucinos, no doubt) - are urging circumspection.

The spanner in the works is that His Blackness is considered a "deportable alien" by the bureau. The bureau has spoken: no deportable aliens are allowed in any of the cushy prison camps - which in some cases have no perimeter fencing. So that whatever he gets for Christmas for having been naughty might be a surprise, after all.

ROBERT PICKTON - SCAPEGOAT

2007-12-10T06:12:00.000Z

The onetime pig farmer in British Columbia who has been in jail since 2002 in connection with the murders of six of more than 60 Vancouver prostitutes, missing since the late 1970s, was declared guilty of second-degree murder on Sunday, Dec. 9, 2007, by a jury composed of men and women. This came several days after Mr. Justice James Williams called the jury back into the courtroom to advise them of an error he had made in his instructions to the jury;
Judge Williams said "the jury could convict Mr. Pickton if they find that Crown prosecutors have proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Pickton shot the women 'or was otherwise an active participant' in the killings. The revised wording meant that the jury would not be required to find that Mr. Pickton actually pulled the trigger." Robert Matas and Rod Mickleburgh, Globe and Mail, December 7, 2007 (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071207.wpickton1207/BNStory/National)

Undoubtedly this enabled the jury to agree that Mr. Pickton, 58, was sufficiently responsible that he could be convicted especially as no one else has been charged in these murders. But, as Adrian Brooks, one of Mr. Pickton's lawyers, noted, "the appearance of a fair trial for Mr. Pickton 'evaporates in these circumstances. It (the judge's revision) is without precedence, and it must certainly not occur here.' " (Matas/Mickleburgh)

Well, this undoubtedly will, and should, be part of the basis for an appeal. The Pickton case is wrong from any number of angles, no matter how one views the verdict.

The verdict will perhaps satisfy a number of people - the families of the victims, who would have preferred he be found guilty of first degree murder; the families of twenty more victims whose deaths are to be addressed by the next trial, slated for January 17, 2008. And those other people who had a hand in the brutal crimes that were ignored for years by local police because prostitutes were not considered human, nor their disappearances and possible deaths worthy of the police's time.

It is too much to hope that the police will continue to dig as avidly as the manner in which they approached the pig farm, to haul to justice all those others who had a hand in these shameful events. Let's see: there are the bikers, who are heavily invested in the drug and prostitution trade; there are prominent people who availed themselves of those services; there are hangers-on who attended the numerous parties and other events that made the farm such a fun place to go to . . . and then there is his brother David.

This is not to say that Robert Pickton is blameless in these events. He has been there, intimately connected to some of the victims by way of their mingled DNA in various places. Of course, the DNA does not have to have been left at the same time as the murders. Perhaps he was on the property when one or more women were killed, perhaps he was assigned the role of 'cleanup man'. The truth is by no means out. It seems that the women were killed on or near the property and the butchering facility was used to dispose of their bodies. But having heard contradictory evidence from 128 witnesses and having watched 20 hours of videotaped interrogation one still does not really know what went on. Mr. Pickton was involved. But one would hesitate to name him as the one and only agent of this decades-long swath of destruction. "The Crown's case included dubious witnesses, a wealth of uncertain DNA evidence and the lack of a so-called "smoking gun" directly linking Mr. Pickton to the killings." Robert Matas and Rod Mickleburgh, Globe and Mail, December 9, 2007 ( http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071209.wpickverd129/BNStory/National/home)

As such the case is a highly warped interpretation of the events that made this the poisonous wound that it still is. But this case also holds the distorted mirror up to us as fellow human beings and shows us for the appearance-obsessed people that we are.

Robert Pickton makes a perfect poster boy as a murderer. He is of low intellect, greasy, dirty looking, inarticulate, possessed of a peculiar sense of humour, oftentimes a braggart, and a pushover of a man who let his brother take over his entire property, eventually displacing the pigs with automobile carcases and other trash. Proof that Robert Pickton is an undesirable lies in the fact that he has no spouse, no girlfriend. He must be so unpleasant that nobody wants to be around him, the unspoken reasoning goes. All in all, Robert Pickton looks like a person who would commit all the crimes enumerated in court; moreover, he looks like the sort of 'degenerate' who would put a dildo onto the end of a gun and use it. From the moment Robert Pickton breathed the air of Media World he was lost, undone by his appearance.

The police no doubt are patting themselves on the back. This case has represented a giant step toward regaining the respectability they lost over the years in which even anxious people from other provinces called them for help - which was not forthcoming - in locating their missing daughters, mothers, sisters, nieces, friends. They can hold their heads high again. They have done their job, and done it oh so well. Hopefully this will go a long way also to wallpapering over the Robert Dziekanski fiasco.

Oh, didn't we tell you? The police in this instance are the shining men and women in red serge, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. The RCMP. And they have such a great and glorious reputation to uphold.

Yup. They were doing great things. Such as when they kept Mr. Pickton, without food or water, in interrogation for eleven hours, when they did not advise him of his right to counsel, when they believed that he had done everything to which he appeared to be confessing. They seem not once to have considered the possibility that Mr. Pickton was lying, elaborating, fantasizing, enlarging upon events that he had heard or witnessed. They were not the least bit skeptical. They appear not to have played Devil's Advocate for a moment. They seem to have accepted everything without question but with the great sigh of relief to which they thought they were entitled.

Robert Pickton apparently has - over the years - told people such things as that:

-he lived in a chicken coop at age two.

-he was offered a job as a male model in his twenties.

-he was three years old in 1968.

It was learned at trial that Mr. Pickton failed grade two and was put in a Special Class; he left school at 16; his share of his mother's estate was placed in trust; his brother David and sister looked after him - and while this information was being discussed, Mr. Pickton sat in the prisoner's box and gave no sign of being affected by the disclosure by RCMP Staff Sergeant Bill Fordy. Sgt Fordy also elaborated on a list of 'odd expressions' used by Mr. Pickton during the interrogation which included: 'I'm mind baffling,' 'tit for tat,' and 'my mom's gonna shine' while talking about the sun coming up. 'Yes, Mr. Pickton had some sayings that I would characterize as uncommon,' " Sgt. Fordy was quoted as saying by Neal Hall and Lori Culbert of the Vancouver Sun on February 1, 2007. (http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/features/pickton/story.html?id=4a0df50b-2805-475d-b130-bc7cb407a6f5&k=96454)

Well, Sgt. Fordy, we use that expression "tit for tat" - nothing unusual in it. Its current form dates from the mid-1500s. Perhaps it is not widely used in B.C. As for the others, they do suggest someone with not only a limited vocabulary but also a fundamental misunderstanding of the meaning of words. The reporters noted furthermore that Mr. Pickton "gave nonsensical answers to some of Fordy's questions, such as saying, 'I worked hard,' when asked who he respected most in the world and asking 'what does that word out?' when he didn't understand a word used by Fordy." And " Pickton told a story about when he was three years old in 1968 -- but noted his client was born in 1949. 'Isn't he just off the wall here?' Ritchie asked Fordy." (Neal Hall and Lori Culbert)

Another RCMP officer who interviewed Mr. Pickton after Sgt Fordy "portrayed the accused killer as having the 'upper hand' and 'stickhandling' his way through the officer's questions." (Hall/Culbert)

Now, this particular officer headed the investigation and he perceived Mr. Pickton as someone giving him and his subordinates a run for the money? Is there some proof here of the old saw that people are kicked upstairs to find their level of incompetence? Surely that cannot have been the proper interpretation of the accused's abilities. Let us be charitable and say that Insp. Adam saw and heard what he wanted and hoped to see and hear, because the alternative is the possibility that Insp. Adam does not have any skill at sizing up people.

And as for Sgt. Fordy: he admitted lying to Mr. Pickton, lying quite a bit, as a matter of fact, "at various times during the interview, including when he suggested to the accused killer that police used satellites to track activity at Pickton's farm before his arrest in 2002." and - in a quote worthy of Kafka himself "he pretended to be sincere with Pickton by telling him that he wouldn't lie to him, which itself was a lie." (Hall/Culbert) The sergeant also seems to have been able to decide that Mr. Pickton, yawning a dozen times during the videotaped interrogation, must have been bored. "At no time did I think he was tired." (Hall/Culbert)

We wonder also about the following excerpts from news reports:

"RCMP Insp. Don Adam said police also received confidential information that men were involved in "blood sport" at the Pickton farm that involved killing women."- reported by David Carrigg , CanWest News Service, on January 30, 2007 (http://www.canada.com/topics/entertainment/story.html?id=bb59ed12-99a8-4c2b-9900-5c6de9bf8d58&k=78041) This story had made the rounds earlier in the decade(s) while insufficient attention was being paid by police.

". . . although the self-described 'pig man' is the only one charged, three other people were arrested on suspicion of murder in the missing-women case, but never charged. Pat Casanova bought pigs from Pickton, which the two slaughtered and butchered together. Casanova testified that he used prostitutes, even in Pickton's bed. This is a man skilled with knife and saw, who spent a great deal of time in the slaughterhouse, and had access to the workshop freezers. He was arrested in January 2003 on suspicion of killing 15 women, including five of the six for which Pickton is now standing trial.

"Mr. Casanova testified 'he never murdered anyone at Pickton's farm nor saw anyone harmed there.' Moreover, 'he never saw any human remains at the farm where police found bones and body parts from six missing women.' He said he did not kill any women, 'never saw any human remains nor did he help dispose of remains.' Prosecutor Darril Prevett "asked Casanova why he was arrested in the missing women case, then rephrased the question to ask him if he was arrested. Casanova said he spent five or six hours in custody and never answered the question of why." - the Canadian Press, June 4, 2007(http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070604/bc_pickton_070604?s_name=&no_ads=)

"Also arrested but never charged was Dinah Taylor, Pickton's friend. According to witness testimony, Taylor brought drug-addicted women to Pickton, and lived for a time in Pickton's trailer. Her DNA was found on a pair of handcuffs in a workshop, and on lipstick from Pickton's trailer that also bore DNA from [one of the victims] Brenda Wolfe.[Dinah Taylor fled to Ontario before police tracked her down at the reserve where she was staying with her family.]

Dinah Taylor "lived for 18 months in a trailer with Pickton on his Port Coquitlam pig farm where police continue to recover human remains," according to Suzanne Fournier of The Province in an article November 21, 2002. Taylor, she said, "resisted full co-operation with her handlers from the missing women's task force." (http://www.missingpeople.net/police_coddling_key_pickton_witness.htm)

"Gina Houston, who testified about a Feb. 20, 2002 conversation with Pickton" reported Matt Kieltyka, said that Pickton was despondent, "said 'I did not kill Mona,' or anyone else" and claimed that the killer had been Dinah Taylor. Houston, a mother of three, who is currently battling cancer, 'said she was able to calm him down and got him to stop thinking about suicide'; two days later he was arrested." - (Matt Kieltyka)(http://www.24hrspodcast.com/pickton/node/272

"The third person picked up was Lynn Ellingsen, but after a brief investigation she was not charged."
" (Ethan Baron in the Vancouver Province June 24, 2007 -http://www.canada.com/theprovince/features/pickton/story.html?id=18a2cf54-16e4-42e7-ad29-5125212f5eea&k=80345)

RCMP Insp. Don Adam, who spearheaded the Pickton investigation, said "police arrested Lynn Ellingsen and during the ensuing interview her lawyer suggested an immunity agreement be signed." (Carigg, op. cit.) I don't know about you, but if I had been Insp. Adam I would have asked myself - ''hmmm, now why would she want immunity if she hasn't done anything wrong?' but then I am only a person who thinks, carefully.

Lynn Ellingsen testified against Pickton at length, and very dramatically. She saw a body of a woman, hanging from a meat hook, which Mr. Pickton was butchering, she said. An observer, who had known Ellingsen, said this of her testifying in court:

"I don't know about you, but I wasn't taken by the sobs of key Crown witness Lynn Ellingsen today in court. I watched her closely as I used to when I'd sit back and observe people to stay safe Downtown Eastside.
"I watched Lynn Ellingston as she was just about to come into the court room, she was laughing until she got to the door where her smile turned upside down into a frown. I felt as though what she saw didn't affect her as much as she let on.

"I'm not being cold; I'm being realistic when I say I think the tears in court was all an act. As an observer I learned about people's characteristics et cetera-I had to in my line of work and the environment I hung out in. I question why she never went to the police right away after seeing the body hanging in the slaughterhouse." Citizen Correspondent Pauline VanKoll (http://www.orato.com/node/2851?page=1)

Now that's something I would like to know as well. On what basis were the three - Casanova, Taylor and Ellingsen - arrested? and then not charged? It would seem that a police authority should have grounds before they arrest someone, and if there are no grounds to charge a person, then presumably those grounds also should have been an insufficient basis for an arrest. Ooops. I forgot. This is a well-known police tactic designed to get the arrestees to spill their beans.

There is an enormous gap in this story, and it is this:

WHO KILLED THE WOMEN? That Mr. Robert Pickton, a stunted, ineffectual, unintelligent and poorly educated person who seems also to have few 'people skills' was able to orchestrate a decades-long killing spree all by himself is ludicrous. It beggars belief. The truth is out there - as a TV show shot in picturesque B.C. used to say - so let us find it.
It is necesary not only for the sake of the women who were murdered, but also for the mental and emotional health of our entire society.

Sereena Abotsway, 29
Marnie Frey, 23
Andrea Joesbury, 22
Georgina Papin, 34
Mona Wilson, 26
Brenda Wolfe, 30

The RCMP's "Excited Delirium", Propaganda and Bad Editing

2007-11-25T05:59:00.001Z

As if recent pseudo-explanations, justifications and rationalizations of Robert Dziekanski's death Oct. 14, 2007, weren't bad enough, we have another installment from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, this one of stupidity, venality and outright idiocy. And this time they are abetted by a couple of reporters from The Globe and Mail who really ought to know better.

The Polish immigrant's story is known and discussed around the world, thanks to the presence of mind of a young Canadian and, in part, to the levelling influence of the Internet.

Initial news reports were sparse: a man had died after having been tasered by RCMP who had been called in due to the man's violent misbehaviour. And that might have been the end of the story, had it not been for Paul Pritchard, a 25-year-old British Columbia teacher.

He happened to be in the segregated immigration area of Vancouver International Airport when Mr. Dziekanski began to behave in a way that - had he been a boy - would have been termed "naughty". Angry, irritable, perhaps hungry and thirsty - for this last story of his life had begun the previous morning at 3 a.m., half a world away - Mr. Dziekanski moved tables and chairs into spots that continually tripped the automatic sensors for a set of doors. This had been going on for some time and the airport's security people - about whom not enough has been said so far - called in the RCMP for assistance. Mr. Pritchard had his camera at hand. He recorded the events, gave the camera to the RCMP afterward as evidence, then required the services of a lawyer to get it back from the force, which clearly dreaded the moment the contents were made public.

Mr. Pritchard's film clearly showed that, while backing away from four muscular, undoubtedly well-trained RCMP officers, while not fleeing, not attacking, not threatening them, not even yelling or screaming or just being loud, Mr. Dziekanski was tasered at least twice, after which he died. (There have been reports that as many as four shots were administered; one or more of the seven inquiries that are under way will presumably establish the facts.) Mr. Dziekanski's last moments are brutal, heart-rending. They should make us collectively ashamed that such horrible violence can be administered in response to so little provocation.

Which brings us to the next chapter. The RCMP is still at it, still trying to wallpaper over this tragic misjudgment, still trying to present itself as the arbiter of the circumstances under which its officers should use that vile and disgusting instrument.

Its policy, we are told, is to use the taser on a victim who is in a state of "excited delirium".

No, that isn't an editing error, that white space above; it is meant to give the reader the time to fathom the depth of the idiocy at work here.

The RCMP, a police force, decides to diagnose a non-existent medical condition in someone who is seen for perhaps as few as thirty seconds, as justification for temporarily electrocuting the person. Temporarily, that is, unless the person dies, as is the case with too many of these unfortunate souls. (Since Mr. Dziekansi's death, two more Canadian men have died after being tasered.)

My doctor, who went to medical school, who went through the rigours of interning at a major metropolitan hospital, who continues to upgrade his medical education, would never make such a snap diagnosis. Not of anything, except a really, really bad cold. Maybe.

And my doctor, like the entire medical establishment, has never heard of such a condition - at least, not from any medically trained diagnostician.

It is a catchy phrase meant to create sympathy for the police while causing fear in the average person, to whom "excited delirium" sounds dangerous and threatening.

But there is no reason why seasoned, well-educated, highly trained journalists should swallow such a load of manure without question or complaint, then regurgitate it for their readers.

Which brings us to the next chapter: The Globe and Mail, Canadian pretender to the New York Times's mighty though wobbly throne, carried a story on its front page on November 24, 2007, about the RCMP's justification for tasering people.
The article, bylined Jessica Leeder and Caroline Alphonso, uses the non-medical term, "excited delirium", cites quotes by non-medical persons, and repeats it thirteen times over the course of less than half a page, not once putting it in quotation marks, which is where it should be, if it were used at all.

Thirteen times is about eleven times too many. It should be used once, in quotation marks, at the beginning of the article, and - if it were used again - once more, in quotation marks, alongside a clear and definitive refutation by a medical expert. The article is a sterling illustration of propaganda and how it works, because it takes a lie and repeats it in rapid succession so many times as to ensure that the term and all its connotations lodge in one's conscious mind and stay there, so that the next time one hears about a tasered person one immediately thinks - "he must have been in an excited delirium" - or "thank heavens the RCMP was able to crush his excited delirium with a few short sharp shots of the taser, or he would have climbed the CN tower in his excited delirium and caught and eaten the small planes buzzing him in hopes of shooting him with guns, like King Kong." That sort of repetition has proven useful in other times, in other places, and should be suspected whenever - and however - it comes up. It is used routinely in entertainment and in gossip as well as in the more sordid business of politics. It has no place in a newspaper.

It also should not be rolling off the tongue of any flak for any police force. If a police force is going to use medical criteria in judging whether to apply a taser medical professionals need to be present to aid in that determination.

What?

You say that it would be impractical? Prohibitively costly?

Well then stop tasering people. Whatever did you do before this great gift was bestowed upon society?

* * *

The Taser International company has just the most adorable banner ad on its website. It shows a stern, determined Santa Claus (probably heading for excited delirium, as his eyes are fixed and possibly dilated, and his cheeks very flushed) holding a parchment prominently proclaiming NAUGHTY; the caption reads "What does Santa bring you when YOU have been GOOD but the WORLD is getting BAD? Now Shipping" Isn't it darling?

Our Hands Drenched In His Blood

2007-11-15T06:45:00.003Z

At this moment I am ashamed to be a Canadian.

We Canadians pride ourselves on being a peaceable people. We look with horror at the actions of countries whose souls seem possessed of bloodlust. We pat ourselves on our collective backs for being respectful and law-abiding. We make a big to-do about our welcoming, inclusive nature. Immigrants from anywhere at all may come to ur land and be welcomed with open arms. And if they wish, they may remain forever with one foot in the new country and the other in the old. We feel really good about that, trumpeting our achievement. Except for the little problem with the Quebecois, we say, we have done the near-impossible; if you wish to see a true Babelesque society, come to Canada, we make it work. We do not think of ourselves as being just a bit obsequious, which we are, of trying very strenuously always to be good, which we do, to stay on the right side of the law, which we will usually try to do even if it kills us. And we don't like pain.

It is, therefore, more than a little bit painful to watch the sad last moments of Robert Dziekanski of Pieszyce, Poland. Mr. Dziekanski's mother lives in Kamloops, in the interior of Beautiful British Columbia, as it is known in tourist parlance, an almost four-hour drive to Vancouver.

On October 14, 2007, Robert Dziekanski sat on an airplane for many, many hours - his first-ever plane ride; it must have been thrilling, and exciting, and perhaps a tiny bit frightening, to fly for so long over so wide a part of the world, in order to be reunited with his mother, to begin a new life with her. His mother, Zofia Cisowski, must have been equally excited to have her son live with her at last; she had been trying to get him into Canada for years, according to her lawyer, Walter Kosteckyj. So one can understand the fear, the frustration, each must have felt when Mrs. Cisowski had to return to Kamloops after waiting all day at the airport for a forty-year-old man she needed to hold, and take home, so that they could once more be a family.

And what of Mr. Dziekanski's fears and frustrations? He spoke only Polish. Vancouver is an International Airport which means that immigrants go through it; Customs and Immigration, or whatever this government department calls itself these days, is supposed to provide interpreters for immigrants who do not speak English. Well, October 13, 2007, when Mr. Dziekanski arrived, was a Saturday; perhaps the Polish interpreters on call had some sort of emergency and could not be found. We don't know because nobody has yet explained that aspect of this sad story. The fact is that Mr. Dziekanski waited for ten hours in a secure area in Vancouver Airport, waiting for his mother, frustrated because he could not make himself understood, not knowing what was going on or where he was going to go. Or whether he would ever get out of there.

Mr. Dziekanski did not. He caused "such a disturbance" that the RCMP were called. Imagine his fright! He was from an until-recently Communist country with a long history of taking people away for no reason whatever. I would not have been surprised if he had tried to run through their midst, and away from them, as fast as he could run. But Mr. Dziekanski did not run; he did not attack; he did not cause any sort of disturbance when they showed up.

They tasered him.

Twice.

He died.

The official story was that Mr. Dziekanski had become so disturbed he was taking apart the airport - shades of King Kong; that he had had to be tasered - twice - seemed to indicate that he must have been extremely, excessively, threateningly, insanely agitated. And for almost a month that was the official suggestion.

But Truth will out.

This evening on the news we watched the footage of Mr. Dziekanski being 'so uncontrollably violent', footage taken by Paul Pritchard*, 15, who had given his camera to the RCMP for their investigations and which force was refusing to return the items to him until he got a lawyer and he spoke to the media.

Mr. Dziekanski struck me as remarkably composed for someone who had been waiting for ten hours in a confined area in a foreign country who did not know whether something awful had happened to his mother. He muttered angry words, rearranged the furniture in such a manner that the automatic doors remained open, in other words he was being a bit of a nuisance. The airport's security guards must have felt terribly threatened by this 'madman' - meanwhile Sima Ashrafina, who was in that area of the airport, approached Mr. Dziekanski. She knew that he did not speak English and tried several languages, which Mr. Dziekanski did not understand. Clearly Ms. Ashrafina felt much less threatened than the security guards; it makes one wonder what they think they saw. She is shown on Mr. Pritchard's footage; Mr. Dziekanski makes no threatening moves; in fact, he does not roar in outrage, as he was justified to do after such delays and such circumstances.

"I never felt threatened by him," she said through tears after watching the footage. "I'm facing him and there's a glass door and I was signing: 'Just calm down,' and he was . . . quiet. He was asking for help, and I couldn't help him."

Four burly RCMP officers arrive. Mr. Dziekanski appears to turn and move away from them, putting up his hands in frustration. He appears to pick up a stapler on a counter. He is tasered with a 50,000-volt shock, and jittering he drops, screaming in pain. Someone yells "hit him again". He is tasered again. "Police pile on, seeking to restrain him," according to a news report by the Globe and Mail, though it looked more like a burly crowd of football players piling onto the downed one just for the heck of it. There was no need to restrain him. Mr. Dziekanski was not moving any longer. One officer places his knee on Mr. Dziekanski's neck as if he were a wild animal that has been subdued by the brave and mighty hunters.

Mr. Dziekanski goes into medical distress and dies there.

The footage shows officers attending to him; a man in a suit checks for a pulse. Mr. Dziekanski is unresponsive, though it is not possible to tell from the footage whether he is still moving. Perhaps he was dehydrated, or in need of food - we have not been told whether anyone at any time offered him food or drink, and we do not know how tasering a dehydrated person can be different from tasering one whose electrolytes are in perfect balance.

FOUR BURLY, CROWD-CONTROL TRAINED RCMP OFFICERS AND THEY TASERED HIM!

Why the entire country is not in an uproar is criminal. It is precisely because we are too nice and too respectful of authority that we behave at times like sheep. The officers overreacted. They should be disciplined to the full extent of the law. Those in authority who approve the use of the taser should be sent to the morgue, where they can see first-hand what awful disruption the taser wreaks. The taser should be banned. Are we not rank hypocrites that we weep about the state electrocution of convicted criminals by other sovereign countries, but accept without comment the state electrocution by taser of people who have at that point not even been charged with a crime?

The airport security guards should receive more meaningful training so that they do not stand around like dummies, fearing the worst and letting their fears boil over. The immigration crowd should have clearly posted schedules, coordinated with incoming flights, for their interpreters - and don't tell me it is going to be too expensive. If we tell the world that anyone from anywhere is welcome here, and welcome in their own language, then we must assume that a good portion of our immigrant population will not speak English and will require translators. We can never allow this sort of disaster to occur again. We need to ask ourselves why we are so ready to accept authority when authority so often, so clearly, is shown to be wanting. We have to stop bowing down before the mythic Mountie and allow the construction of a more realistic image of the RCMP as a force of men, men who are irregularly constituted, who have irregular training, who do not, all and always, respond in that splendid Mountie-on-his-horse way. Who make mistakes, as we all do. That mythic Mountie does not make mistakes which is why he has to go.

This appalling moment in our history must not be forgotten.

Our apologies to Mrs. Cisowski can never assuage her pain. Yet we must all grieve with her and we must all ask her forgiveness.

addendum: Mr. Dziekanski arrived at the airport at 3:30 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 13. Between the primary Customs post and the secondary checkpoint, he went missing," the Edmonton Journal reported. He did not know what he was supposed to do or where he was supposed to go and sat near the baggage carousel "until about 10:30 p.m., when he finally found his way to the second Customs post. After this second interview with border officers he was cleared to enter Canada, but remained in the secure arrivals area until about 1:15 a.m. on Sunday, when he became agitated," the Journal said.

The Journal also spoke to Michael Lyman, a criminal justice professor at Columbia College in Missouri, who said "appeared to take the path of least resistance by deploying the Taser ... when they could have controlled this gentleman through physical force techniques that would not have been harmful." and to Donald Van Blaricom, former chief of the Bellevue police, who also said any attempt to control Dziekanski physically would have been risky, both for him and for the officers.

"Once you take a person into custody, you want to do so with the least amount of struggle because physical struggle can lead to injury or death."

However, he did suggest the police used the Taser too quickly. "There was no extreme emergency that caused them to move in that fast and take him into custody.", the Journal reported.

It is clear from the events that serious errors in judgment were made by the RCMP. One does not know how that police force is trained in taser use, or the criteria by which they are required to judge whether to use the taser or not. But all that is immaterial. Any person - even a child - could see that Mr. Dziekanski did not need to be treated like cattle on the way to slaughter.

*note: Mr. Pritchard is variously identified as being 15 and 25 years old.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Losing Sleep over the Poppy

2007-10-16T20:52:00.007Z

Well-meaning individuals frequently suggest that the way out of poverty and into modernization for Afghanistan is to legalize and control the sale of Opium poppies (Papaver somniferum) so that the farmers get more money, Western governments get control of the trade and the harvest is channelled into legitimate laboratories that then manufacture standard pain medicines that can be sold to the poor of the world to make their lives easier.

And everyone wins.

There is nothing one would like better than to cut out the illicit drug trade but it will not work.

Before one can even have a rational discussion the topic is shot in the knees. The US wrings its hands and says officially that "they are growing poison". Well, the US grows its own sorts of poisons - tobacco, alcohol - and manufactures several thousand besides - pesticides etc.

Leaving aside the complex world of pesticide poisoning, let's look at those three substances - morphine, alcohol, nicotine.

Morphine and other poppy alkaloids have been used medicinally for thousands of years. When used properly they provide excellent pain relief. In low doses they even act as cough suppressants which can be useful in certain medical situations. Morphine's toxicity is known and every doctor learns how to calculate safe doses for the patient requiring this medicine.

Alcohol, like morphine, has been around for thousands of years and its toxicity is well demonstrated in cases where a person drinks himself literally to death. On October 6, 2007, an 18-year-old freshman pledgie died of acute alcohol poisoning in Texas, merely the last in a line that stretches far back into history. Although alcohol has some other uses - in diluting perfume concentrates, as a disinfectant - its principal use is as a social lubricant.

As that is not a medically necessary use - except perhaps to the few pathologically shy people among us - one has to ask why its use is not restricted or its ingredients ripped out of the soil and burned. We all know the answer to that.

Nicotine, which has been in use for some hundreds of years in a limited way, and more recently has swept the world as a sign of "liberation" (from what? a restrictive society? or was it the most obvious sign of being "cool"?). Nicotine is so highly poisonous that agricultural workers can succumb to acute nicotine toxicity acquired either during tobacco picking or from being dusted with a pesticide using nicotine.

Nonetheless nicotine does have medical uses. Currently it is being studied as a treatment for, among other conditions, ulcerative colitis, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, Tourette's syndrome, attention deficit disorder, spasticity, and sleep apnea.

It remains one of the more highly poisonous substances in use. If you want to see for yourself how toxic this substance is, soak a cigarette butt in a cup of water to which a tiny amount of dish detergent has been added, then spray the unfortunate bugs in your garden who will demonstrate its nature.

So here we have the official position of the US: that two poisons are acceptable to produce (largely by and in the US) but a third (primarily grown in the Third World) is not. Can it possibly have anything to do with the fact that - should poppy production ever be legalized - US interests would not be able to get an acceptable "market share"?

OPIATE MANUFACTURERS

Who makes morphine as a useful, legitimate medicine? It comes in many trade name formulations (manufacturer in brackets):
Kadian (Zeneca); morphine sulfate (various manufacturers); MS Contin (Purdue-Pharma); MSIR (Purdue-Pharma); Oramorph SR (Roxane); RMS (Upsher-Smith); Roxanol (Roxane); Roxanol SR (Roxane).

* In 2006 AstraZeneca was the world's fifth-largest pharmaceutical group.

* In fiscal 2003, Purdue Pharma, a private company, posted sales of $1.7 billion.

* Roxane is a subsidiary of Boehringer Ingelheim Corporation, a member of the Boehringer Ingelheim group of companies, headquartered in Germany. In 2006, Boehringer Ingelheim posted net sales of 10,574 Euros.

* Upsher-Smith is a privately held company that recently had a spot of trouble - in 2003 the Federal Trade Commission ruled that Schering-Plough (another pharmaceutical company) and Upsher-Smith Laboratories illegally agreed to keep generic versions of a heart medicine off the market in 1997 and 1998. While that does not have a thing to do with pain medications it is an example of the sorts of dirty dealings that go on in business.

THE DRUG LORDS

Having said that, it is saddening to note that the above discussion is academic. Not because anyone will change the official US stand on the matter, but because the drug lords - and lords they are, in the mediaeval sense, with their power over the life and limb of their serfs - have more money, more guns, more contacts, more threats and other disincentives, and more friends in the world under the rock they inhabit, than legitimate organizations or even governments can marshal. They are such people as

* Pablo Escobar, in Medellin, Colombia;

* Gilberto Rodriguez-Orejuela and Jose Santacruz-Londono in Cali, Colombia;

* Manuel Noriega, who was a highly paid CIA asset and collaborator, despite knowledge by US drug authorities as early as 1971 that the general was heavily involved in drug trafficking and money laundering;

* Ismael Zambada García whom Mexico's top anti-drug prosecutor, Jose Santiago Vasconcelos, called "drug dealer No. 1".

Then there are the "suspected" drug lords

* Francisco Javier Arellano Félix, whose brother Ramon led the Tijuana cartel and was killed in a gun fight in Mazatlán with Mexican police protecting rival drug traffickers on February 10, 2002;

* Juan Nepomuceno Guerra, who founded the Gulf cartel, based in Matamoros, Mexico, and second only to

* Joaquin Guzman Loera, also known as "El Chapo," who currently directs the Sinaloa cartel;

* Juan José Esparragoza Moreno, also known as El Azul, who ran the Juarez cartel until he was replaced by Ricardo Garcia Urquiza until he was arrested in 2005 - though somebody else undoubtedly is running the show at the moment given that its income has been reported to be about $200 million a week;

* Amado Carrillo Fuentes, who bossed around the aforementioned Juarez cartel until he died from complications of plastic surgery - hmm, haven't we seen that movie somewhere? -

* Jose Manuel Ramos and Brian Wight, identified by Wikipedia as suspected drug lords but with no further information.

That does not begin to lift the lid on Asian connections, European bosses and so on. Does anyone seriously think that these people would allow the legal sale of poppy? India does grow and sell poppies legally, as does Turkey, with enormous restrictions on how much can be grown and what can be harvested - seeds are permitted but capsule incisions are not. (It is the gummy substance that oozes from the capsule which contains the medicinal principles. Poppy seeds are fantastic in strudel or on bagels but are non-narcotic.)

Opium is of great importance to the small farmer because it is harvested before the grain and brings in the money which the peasant needs to meet the expenses of the main harvest. It is obtained in a period when the peasant has little to do and can spend his time on the incision of the poppies and collection of the opium. The average Turkish farmer can't go to the convenience store to get a cash advance on his credit card. So that there is still an incentive to make the cuts in the capsule.

According to the Senlis Council, an international policy think-tank that seriously considers the possibility of legalized poppy trade, among other options, governments don't always hold up their end of a bargain made about the growing of poppies.

In 2006 the council slammed the British government for not keeping to its side of a bargain with Afghan farmers in Helmand province, where the UK counter-narcotics officers promised local farmers $350 for every fifth of a hectare of opium poppies they destroyed, but did not pay.

" 'These farmers kept their side of the deal and eradicated their crops, but the British Government did not keep their word,' said Mohammad Gull, a local representative from the Sharwali District in Helmand who was involved in the initial negotiations with the British representatives. 'In our culture this is very dishonorable and we are very angry.' " (cited on http://www.poppies.org)

This year a bumper crop is about to be harvested in Helmand province, magnifying the problems.

Given all these factors - the hypocritical attitude of the US government and counter-narcotics officers, the antipathy of the pharmaceutical producers, the certain displeasure of the various drug lords, the uncountable bits and bytes of misinformation about the plant and its substance - surely an "Opium Cloud" if ever there was one - and the resultant hysteria especially in the West, which precludes rational debate, it is difficult to see how this could ever come about.

And what has not even been considered is that the Taliban, hated though they may be, managed a 96 per cent reduction of poppy cultivation by 2000. President Hamid Karzai is on record as being committed to the eradication of the poppy in Afghanistan - "We are determined, like hell, to fight the cultivation of poppy, he said." according to the Boston Globe of Aug. 19, 2002, which RAWA - the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan - publishes on its site, http://www.rawa.org.

Perhaps what is behind the Afghan stance pro eradication has every bit as much to do with the opposition against the West's having a permanent "footprint" in the country, as it does with the general antipathy toward what is one of the most beautiful flowers on the planet.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

BELIEVING IS SEEING

2007-10-15T20:38:00.002Z

Twentynine thousand three hundred internet items later it appears that Alexey Tolstokozhev - Russian for Thick Skin - the Russian spammer murdered by Russian hit men, is a fiction.

Does the easy access to the thoughts and rumours and fantasies of all those millions of people we don't know, and whose veracity we can't question, constitute such an onslaught on our credulity that we say uncle and accept everything as fact?

I think anyone with half a brain cell should have been able to mark this one as a hoax from the get-go, given the address of the poster who courageously told us about this underground hero:

www.loonov.com/russian-viagra-and-penis-enlargement-spammer-murdered.htm

yes, that is an address guaranteed to give one confidence in the accuracy of the story.

Instead, bloggers around the world picked up the supposed story and sent it into orbit. I always wonder about people who accept everything at face value, never question anything. Are they the same people who accept that Dubya is telling them the truth? - or that their government is clean, transparent, above board and - in the latest configuration of buzzwords - "open and honest" ? That the world is as it is presented? That no-one ever bends the truth or outright lies? That some storytellers are too impatient to frame their yarns in a manuscript, choosing instead to put it out as fact?

Here's the rub (as I have said in more than one of my books):

This is not one planet, one universe, one "mass consciousness". We are seven billion universes, intersecting, overlapping or as far apart as the ends of our imagination. At times we come together but mostly we are alone, and painfully aware of it. We see everyone and everything from the outside, for how can it be otherwise? And while we may have intimate relationships with our partners, our family or our children, these, too, are transitory and in constant flux. In this isolation from one another we really do want to believe that we can be, and remain, a part of a larger whole. The entirety of politics and society is based upon that premise.

But then we find out that nothing truly is as it seems and even our closest associate, our partner, or our child, may be telling us one truth while omitting another. There is no absolute truth except, perhaps, that of absolute zero, where all things collapse into themselves and we restart with another big bang. It is unpleasant to accept this because it relieves us of the comfortable underpinnings that have served as the foundation for our predecessors, but it is a better way to go through this world. Too many pages of history repeat the finding that following blindly leads to disaster. So we should be skeptical about everything. We should question our leaders; we should question science as rigorously as we question religion, and vice versa. We should remain aware of the possibility that that grandiose story someone is pushing is not quite what it seems.

History is littered with the remains of those who believed too strenuously and did not think to question: the Dutch merchant who sold everything including his house, his company, his cattle and his land, for a tulip bulb, investors in the South Seas company, investors in Ponzi schemes, today's unfortunate believers who fall for scams that relieve them of their money. If it strikes you odd that so many of the examples given have a financial aspect, consider that greed is one of the chief motivators of humanity. Not so interested? Then how about Naziism, communism, every other -ism including Catholicism, Protestantism, Mormons, Mennonites and so on. It is not that they necessarily are bad, or have a negative impact on anyone. But for one to belong - and many people feel the need to belong to some community, and find religion to be a comfort - one has to believe and not to question.

It will no longer get anyone killed as a heretic to say that there is no objective, quantifiable truth in Belief System A or B or YYZ, but it will put oneself into stomach-churning conflict between the desire to belong and the subconscious awareness that what one belongs to is founded on so much smoke and mirrors. In the end, we believe what we want to be true, whether it is in the political sphere or the philosophical; we interpret what we experience through the filter of that belief. In that sense, the case of the fictional Russian spammer fits neatly into this discussion.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

It would seem that the principal reason the fable resonated so loudly with all those bloggers who still wish it were true was that Mr. Thick Skin was murdered because he was spamming. It clicked with everyone who has ever had to delete spam, be it the molasses crawl variety, or the 3,586 copies of the same spammed email overloading your system. Reaction to the news of the hoax ranges from those who weep crocodile tears over the fact that "no real spammer was killed in the making of that blog", to the more intelligent assessment of one Andy Bright, who told www.theregister.co.uk:

"I remember all too well living in the dark ages of journalism, when stories like this would never have seen the light of day.

"Chalk this one up to another victory for the blogging community and another nail in the coffin of those stick-in-the-mud journos that have qualifications, experience, writing skills, and all manner of inconsequential and obsolete expertise."

Mr. Bright has good aim - hit the nail squarely on its head. As a journalist I can tell you that the occasional questionable story did slip through, but in the main the cynical, sometimes sardonic types in the slot or around the desk would have bitten holes into this item the moment it appeared.

Non-believers, every one of us.

BRITNEY REDUX

2007-10-12T22:03:00.001Z

Though I would not have thought it, I find myself once more writing about Britney Spears, about whom the Internet carries more articles than an assortment of celebrities and various assassination theories.

That is to say it is about her tangentially, but more so about comments made about the articles about her on DLISTED.com, a website that began as someone's acidly written blog and bloomed - or is that boomed? - out from there in its explosive gossip from all the corners of the celebrity world.

Hardly a day goes by without at least one story about Britney. And each story has hundreds of comments. It was only by accident that I discovered that people continue to post dozens of new comments even a week or more after the original article. They are, for the most part, derogatory and accusatory in the extreme.

The point has been made many times that the Internet is a great liberator. This is true. But who would have thought that, under the guise of anonymity, the comments would be so vulgar? She is commonly referred to as Shitney or Clitney or Unfitney and virtually no-one has a neutral thing to say about her. As for anything positive, you can completely forget about that.

However, my focus is not on the hatred implicit in these comments, but a comment made about Britney's mother. Specifically this:

"Lynne gave up EVERYTHING to give her daughter [what] she wanted. ...[Britney] does what she wants to do and no one can stop her." (Submitted by DreamyAguileraEyes on October 9, 2007 - 4:19pm.)

A responsible parent does not give his or her child "everything she wanted", a responsible parent sets limits. The child is not born knowing how to behave in the society of others. Behaviour is taught. The child has to learn that one cannot have everything one wants, or do, as the commentator said, " what she wants to do and no one can stop her."

It is clear as day that there is a connection between the actions of a pliable and accommodating parent and a selfish, undisciplined adult tone-deaf to the needs or wishes of others. If her mother really did centre her life around her talented daughter to the extent of giving her everything but the rules and limits for living a successful life, then she is to a large measure to blame for the state of her adult child.

Of course, as an adult one learns hard lessons. One cannot remain selfish and petulant and absolve oneself of the blame for one's actions. One must accept the idea that one is not perfect. That a life of emptiness waits if one continues to push everyone away by awful behaviour. One learns that, in society - whether of one person or a million - one has to bend, to keep one's mouth shut sometimes and to open it at others.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

But even this self-knowledge has to be instilled into one's child - it comes with adolescence when there is a natural refocusing of the child from him- or her-self to others, beyond the family. The knowledge that one is not always going to get exactly what one wants is one of the facts that makes adolescence so painful and irritating. We scream and weep but in the end most of us accept that this is how it needs to be.

Pity the person who is not taught, or does not learn, this life lesson. We have many such examples in the public eye - where many a well-meaning parent has pushed their child. Where their child is beyond their reach. Where it really is too late suddenly to be "concerned" about their behaviour. We watch these damaged adults as they eventually self-destruct, overgrown children to the end. They are the modern-day equivalent of bread and circuses. And, like the Romans of old, we cheer them on. In their macabre immolation they neither want to stop, nor are they capable of it. And we? we hold the torch. We are all responsible.

LIVING IN THE AGE OF STUPIDITY

2007-10-12T03:58:00.003Z

Newscasts this evening led off with the news that, in Canada and the U.S., drug manufacturers were voluntarily removing children's cough syrups from the shelves, in anticipation of a possible government ban on the medicines for children two years of age and under. Nearly 100 million packages of the syrups for children up to age 12 are sold every year in the US alone.

The reason for this move? We are living in the Age of Stupidity, which runs parallel with the Age of Me. Let's see:

- Through a variety of errors, parents have been overdosing their children, killing some and making scores of them ill enough that hospitalization is required.

[Expletive deleted] You will be shocked to know that many people don't know the difference between a teaspoon and a tablespoon. If you are not, you ought to be. A tablespoon is three times as large as a teaspoon. Imagine that you are dosing your child with three times the amount of cough suppressant you should be using. Even an adult can be seriously affected by an overdose of this sort, because the medicine that lets you sleep at night by depressing the cough reflex in your sick family member is the same medicine that depresses your breathing. So - "I thought I was using a teaspoon", i.e. incorrect measuring, is one of the top errors. There is absolutely no reason for this to be so.

- People do not give the appropriate medication to their child.

[Expletive deleted] Perhaps the doctor doesn't return calls, or one can't get hold of him. Too often, people give their child a cough suppressant because of the thought that suppressing all coughing is good.

Ask a pharmacist! If the child has congestion in the chest, that phlegm, when it breaks up, has to be coughed out. That is what coughing is primarily for. Dosing the child with cough suppressant in that case will land the little darling in hospital with pneumonia, because the phlegm inflamed the lungs.

- People double-dose.

[Expletive deleted] Mom gave Junior a dose of cough syrup and a while later Dad, who didn't know, gave Junior another dose. Bad news for Junior! Write down what and when you give your child! The little brat spit out some of the medicine, or closed his mouth at the last moment, or pukied it up - we've got to give him another dose! . . . so speak the parents who do not read or hear what is so clearly stated for most drugs: do not double dose. If you miss a dose, wait! Those drugs that must be taken, even if late, also have the appropriate instruction. Double-dosing is pretty close to the line dividing stupidity from criminality.

- People are rushed.

[Expletive deleted] What is more important, your child's health or arriving at work, or luncheon, or your card game, or the mall, on time? Yes, it can be as trivial as that. One has to realize that giving any
medicine to a child is a serious responsibility that requires attention, thought, and good judgment.

- People are illiterate.

We send more people to school longer than ever and yet seem to have a declining literacy rate. Without getting into the political reasons for that, let's just look at the consequences. Drugs come with instructions. Warnings. Lists of side effects. Drug interactions. They are printed on the bottle labels. They are printed on the carton. They are printed on the insert. And lastly, they are printed on the yard-long sheets every responsible pharmacist now hands you when you get your prescription. And yet people either can not or will not read or pay sufficient attention to the warnings or use the information responsibly.

Let's say that one truly is illiterate, for no fault of one's own. Surely one can ask the pharmacist!
But do people do that? Do they pay attention? Do they remember what was said? One would hope so, since they are giving metabolism- or physiologically-altering substances to small persons who are entirely in their care and control. One would think that that is a job requiring all one's attention.

- People are rushed.

[Expletive deleted] There is that old saying - "if you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen".

Time to adapt it to modern life - "if you are doing so much that you are in a perpetual rush that might result in your overdosing your child, it's time to cut back".

Or, to put it in words everyone can understand -"get your priorities straight".

There will be much boo-hooing about the disappearance of these drugs. I have less than zero sympathy for the weepers. Get a grip. Learn how to properly look after your children. And be thankful you haven't killed or injured someone with a drug overdose.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Catch a Falling Star

2007-10-10T16:57:00.003Z

Britney

She does not need a last name, not with 11,700,000 images retrieved by Google, or 96,100,000 articles. Pushed toward show business since she was a toddler, she starred in a print ad for milk at three and has been chalking up progressively more (now mostly bad) press ever since.

But let us think about the numbers for a moment. Surely all of those 11.7 million images are not unique; let us suppose that we delete all of the duplicate images, the duplicates of different sizes, the non-Britney images on Britney pages, the other nonsense that still cannot be filtered out - given that this technology is in its earliest infancy (a fact we often forget, bowled over as we are by its easy accessibility and giddy carousel of images from the farthest corners of the planet).

Let us suppose that we are left with one-tenth of the total as representing unique images of Britney Spears. Sound reasonable?

That still represents 1.17 million images. Perhaps we will scale it back by an order of magnitude to 117,000 unique images.

What exactly does that represent? It represents, over the years, 117,000 different photos taken and posted of a person of unknown temperament and unknown mental stability, frequently obtained in stressful circumstances. It does not factor in the photos taken by family, friends, fans, that have not been uploaded. In the main this figure probably represents principally the work of paparazzi, most of whom most likely have been paid for their services.

Yes, Britney Spears is a valuable commodity in the still photo market. That is not even scratching the video market, the tabloids, the commercial magazine market, the studio photo releases, the poster market, the disc sales. There are literally hundreds of thousands of hands hanging onto her coat tails. Hundreds of thousands of drinks, dinners, exotic vacations, chic clothes, mortgage payments, gas for the car, all paid for out of the monetary turnover due to Britney - first her fame, but now, sadly, notoriety.

Bloggers of various gossip columns are guaranteed thousands of hits in search of the latest Britney misadventure. And the comments are rancid. She is labelled in terms that can be considered libellous. I seriously doubt that she has ever thought of prostitution in any sense and yet she is consistently termed a 'ho' and various permutations thereof. She is accused - without proof - of snorting, sipping, and otherwise ingesting drugs. She is shown stuffing her face with junk food. Most likely disoriented by the flash of paparazzi cameras, she ran into another vehicle in a parking lot, left without providing insurance information, now stands accused of a hit-and-run incident.

In the true tradition of gossip mongering, the net plays ping-pong with ever more, ever more vicious, unattributed rumours and slanderous accusations. One of the saddest truths about these stories and images is that they represent a self-fulfilling prophecy. The easy availability of drugs - from over-the-counter to hard drugs - means that, at some point, a person under such unrelenting pressure is likely to look to drugs for relief.

Many of these blind items are conveniently released at times that coincide with action in her divorce case. She did not really beat KFed over the head with a frying pan? did she? was there blood? surely it left a rather obvious mark? did she fracture his skull? did he report her to the police? did he get himself checked out by a neurologist? is this supposed, in some way, to account for or excuse his own sleazy behaviour?

Then there is this little gem: "A source told Life&Style Weekly, “Kevin says she hit him several times during their marriage. He’s scared she’ll hit the kids, too.” "

Ah. I know this one -

it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

Thank you Mr Shakespeare. The above quote is cited in one of the most popular gossip sites on the net. Note that "a source" who is unidentified, told one of the innumerable gossip'n'clothes rags (published by Bauer, a lead purveyor of this sort of nonsense)that "Kevin says". Note the layers of deniability here - the source, the magazine, the unattributed citation from KFed (now there is a truly stupid name). Chasing these particular shadows will merely prove that what cannot be forced to be retracted will hurt you badly. Bauer, by the way, publishes such sterling works as In Touch, First, Woman's World, soap opera digests, an astrology magazine and a handful of fan magazines aimed at the pre-pubescent-to-first-kiss market.

Unfortunately Ms Spears continually harms herself, by stepping out badly dressed - sometimes only half-dressed - unkempt, sullen. By behaving in every possible negative way. By appearing to be inebriated, intoxicated, high.

One gets the sense that this young woman is now aware that she took a wrong turn somewhere - possibly does not even want to be on that particular road. She appears to be in the throes of a depression. And one does not mean the "boo-hoo my life sucks" sort of depression, but a true, deep, clinical depression which is driving the self-destructive behaviour of someone who cannot free herself from the public eye. All those hands are out for the next meal, the bigger house, the new car. The audience does not care whether she self-destructs. The "reporters" (one has to use the word lightly here; "ghouls" is perhaps more apt) are salivating at her every desperate move. Publishers - be they of blogs, magazines, music - are mentally tallying the profits.

It begs the question: whom, among all her family, friends, associates and beyond, can she trust? when the next fear she articulates will bounce around the world in record time?

One wishes that one could give her a prescription for sanity: rest, proper diet and exercise, structure, a guided, reasonable and loving rapprochement with her children, peace.

When she shaved her head she was surely hoping that people would leave her alone, given that she razed one of a woman's chief sexual attributes. But instead she was reclassified as a circus act. Now that her life truly has become a circus, who will stand up and accept responsibility and complicity in the destruction of yet another "star"?

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

WHAT WON'T WE DO FOR OUR FRIENDS?

2007-09-04T18:42:00.002Z

These are words I write with a heavy heart.

I recently lost - nearly, we were at the brink, staring dizzily into the abyss - a workmate.

He got up one morning and couldn't function. Sat there and stared, mumbling the same few words over and over. We quickly rushed him to emergency, where an examination revealed him to be in need of further tests and explorations.

Well, we sweated a lot, and cried a bit over the possible scenarios, and later that day we got the call that he was more than critically ill. He needed a multiple organ transplant.

We worried about the expense - he was not covered by any sort of insurance. We wondered about aftereffects. We worried about memory loss.

But in the end one has to do what one has to do, and we did. They couldn't immediately fix him so it was a bit of a waiting game. We were on tenterhooks. What about this? and would it have an effect on that? and would he ever be the same?

No, he wouldn't. We were assured that he would be "better than new", that he would be more efficient and on the ball - he had been slowing down, had been working with a high temperature, and we hadn't even noticed.

He was in for what seemed like a really really long time, yet we knew that these things can't - shouldn't - be rushed.

Came the day to take him home. We had words with the consultant; he reassured us that everything was fine, would be fine, that our friend didn't need much pampering or rehabilitation to be on top of his game.

We paid. Though it was a lot of money we knew that it was money well spent; after all,what won't we do for our friends? Someone helped me to get him into the car. At home, he was back in familiar surroundings and we let him take it easy for a couple of days before trying anything complex.

We made certain that he would have pleasant, airy surroundings, that nobody would load him up with work immediately.

Well, he really is "better than new"! His daily exam shows nothing out of the ordinary.

He is going to be with us for quite a while yet.

And so we pamper and protect him and monitor his temperature and listen intently to his noises, on guard for the moment the fan might stop working, once more setting the motherboard afire, destroying his chip, melting the capacitor and distorting the blades of the chip fan into the ineffectually curled claws of an arthritic old man.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

CONRAD BLACK -

2007-07-22T04:50:00.002Z

Peter Newman, one of Black's biographers, said: "The Canadian ethic is 'The best thing you can do is a good day's work well done'. That's our Scottish heritage and it's very strong."

"And here's this guy with four mansions - it's very much against Canadian mentality. It's not criminal but its rubs us the wrong way.

Peter Newman is one of Canada's Establishment-celebrity-sniffers - celebrity in his earlier oeuvre consisting almost entirely of business and old-guard types such as Bud McDougald, Conrad Black's ethical father who - in his day - ran Argus Corporation like his personal fief. (As an aside, one wonders whether Black was disappointed in his father, but that is an issue for Black to take up with his shrink.)

Newman chronicled the 'Canadian Establishment' with often sycophantic, green-eyed descriptions of their quiet power and discreetly luxe lifestyles. Both in his books and in his televised commmentaries on Black's recent conviction and bail hearing, Newman exhibited a deplorable schadenfreude. The man just couldn't contain his glee. But this isn't about Newman. It is about Newman's misperception of Canadians' distaste for Black.

Newman cites our 'very strong' Scottish heritage, and claims that Black's ownership of four mansions 'rubs us the wrong way'.

Give it up already, Peter.

This is what Canadians don't like: They don't like venality, dishonour, double-dealing, back-stabbing, theft, or pomposity - including Newman's. They don't like the idea that someone can come along and, under the guise of unfettered ownership, take the surplus out of their pension plan, which is what Black did, years ago, when Dominion Stores was a company under his control and he, high on the McDougaldism of being 'proprietor' thought he had found a nice fat piggybank to call his own.

Canadians don't actually care that Black has four mansions, they care about the illegality involved in obtaining them. They don't care about Barbara's extravagance having no bounds, even if they did laugh themselves silly when that quote made the rounds. But they care very much about boundless extravagance being met - always unsuccessfully, by definition - through financial diversion which will also be boundless.

They don't care for Conrad Black, and haven't, for a long time, because like everyone else, Canadians do not like the puffery and preening that vainglorious parvenu exhibited around the time of his ascension into the lowest ranks of nobility.

He was made only a baron, for heaven's sake.

And styled himself "Baron Black of the Subway Station at Canary Wharf, a Formerly Disreputable Docklands Section of East London".

They didn't like then-Prime Minister Jean Chretien, the little thug - pardon, the little street fighter from Shawinigan who did Pierre Trudeau's dirty work for decades.

But they also didn't like Black the poseur, badmouthing Canada and things Canadian after he had not only made a lot of money out of the country, but also had put quite a few people out of jobs. And had let several proud companies with historic names - principally Dominion and Massey-Ferguson - slide into the slough of despond. They thought, quite rightly, that while Black was entitled to his opinion, he was not being forced to remain in Canada and as it bothered him so terribly to be there, he could just go. Which is what he did.

They didn't like the treatment he meted out to his first wife. Shirley Gail Walters Hishon was an unpretentious person who used at one time to be called Gail; at the time of their marriage, when the couple already had their first son, she was called
Shirley, presumably based on information handed out by Black or his company; but when they had moved to London and Black was feeling the fatal, overrated charm of a real aristocracy he prevailed upon her to change her name to Joanna.

Sad to report, the upper echelons of Toronto society to whom this apparently mattered were reported to have sneered at her
when he should have been their target. Or perhaps they were inarticulate and imprecise in making their derision known. In any event it was a tawdry episode that made virtually everyone except the accommodating Mrs. Black look bad.

But Black had not yet met his fata morgana, one Barbara Amiel whom the aforementioned Peter Newman has previously described in language reserved for Fifties' soft porn. This is not too strong a statement, particularly if one reads any biography, whether by the principal or by other authors. Babs just knows how to use her body to get her what she wants. Let us not forget that she once wrote an article about marrying up, and it wasn't for a humour rag. Let us also point out that the net is awash in articles detailing the apparent retarded state of Black's sexual knowledge and experience when he fell into Babs, er, Barbara's animal aura. He is not the first, and most certainly won't be the last, to set himself on fire with his flaming member. Greater men than Conrad Black have fallen by the wayside in pursuit of the glorious fuck. One supposes that being on fire is all very well, as long as one doesn't inadvertently also burn the house down.

Did Canadians care? Were they upset? Hell no. We are - in that obsolete American phrase relegated to the Outer Edges of the Universe - free, white and 21. That is, we are adult and tolerant and not only don't want to impose our views on others, we are completely apathetic about them. If someone happens to luck into good sex, more power to them.

But we don't like the thought that good sex be rewarded with ill-gotten baubles, whether stolen or acquired with inappropriately obtained funds. This applies equally to Conrad Black and Hells' Angels hangers-on, politicians' girlfriends, sports stars' bimbos, groupies. They all have that faintly cheesy, enamel-curling aura of the louche, the decadent (and no, we don't mean Presidents Choice).

So that Canadians also didn't like the ensuing folie-a-deux. The longer it went on, the more completely these two people seemed to destroy one another. The once-broadminded Babs wrote article after reactionary article; Black seemed infected with virulent megalomania in addition to that other life-long affliction of his, chronic, incurable, unremitting, ever-worsening logorrhea, and with the fatuous egomania of one who has spent too long inside Napoleon's head. (well, Napoleon at least had an excuse, being a little Corsican, but what of His Blackness? did he suffer from the rarefied air of his six-foot height?)

It all had to end - even they must have sensed it - and in the end it was hubris, pure and simple, that nailed his coffin shut tight. Hubris, as expressed in that insufferably disdainful gaze Black directed into the security camera at 10 Toronto Street, while his chauffeur step-n-fetched the boxes of forbidden papers.

That is what Canadians didn't like, Newman, all of that: the arrogant swagger, the almost Pavlovian response to an interdiction - did Black drool as he rose to the challenge set by the injunction? - the suborning of a personal employee to do the actual dirty work. It isn't about the "Scottish heritage" thoughts on work - Black surely put in many very long days. It isn't about the mansions, or uncontrollable hordes would rampage through the Bridle Path. It's about that age-old story of trampling on one's fellows's sensibilities, of daring Providence, and waiting for Providence to swat back.

c2007 bluemlein.blogspot.com

CENSORSHIP DANCE WITH DR. PILL IN THE LAND OF THE FREE AND HOME OF THE BRAVE

2006-11-09T00:54:00.001Z

What an interesting day it's been.

A friend of mine spent a few days watching Dr. Pill with me - in this instance a three-parter about possible sexual abuse of a three-year-old by her biological father during his visiting time. It was heavily hyped. OF COURSE we had to watch it.

There was a lot of outrage spilling over the audience, it was palpable. I mean, how COULD one do such a horrid thing?

Our first observation came at the same time: the girl seemed coached. And she was saying "they" touched her. This begs the question: who was "they"?

Soon we were in the thick of it. We both thought the father was thick as a brick. His sentences were mangled, as was his grammar, his syntax - just some young guy with not much in the way of education or prospects. The mom - turned out to be 20 - the child is three. Aha. Teen romance gone sour.

Perhaps they had to get married and found they had only the child in common. We all know that a child is not enough. They were in a custody battle even now - how long had that been going on??? Hm. What have the news been full of in the past few years? false allegations of sexual abuse used as a way to thwart court orders and cause unnecessary investigations, a hurtful and vile, juvenile behaviour that causes too much pain. Could it be?

We decided it could well be.

Oh-oh! my non-American friend muttered when she heard the word "lie detector". Americans love gadgetry of all sorts - it's part of the national character. Lie detector tests have been thoroughly discredited and are not allowed as evidence - that ought to tell people something. My friend is firmly and very deeply rooted in Old Europe. She looks askance at gadgets. They don't necessarily cooperate and they have been known to malfunction.

But no. Fearless Dr. Pill plowed on with the lie detector test which everyone was adoring like the Holy Grail. Well, the father failed. Could be a million reasons for it, but his failure was paraded as proof of guilt. There could be dozens of people to whom this child is exposed but the one who stood to gain most in terms of custody and/or access was the one labelled as a pedophile on television in front of millions, pilloried, and - as my friend put it - eviscerated. What his life will be like from now on - even assuming that he did do something, which to us was doubtful - we don't want to know.

My friend is great with words. She wrote a commentary, posted it on the Dr Pill message boards - yes, she did - and it appeared - for about half an hour.

Then it vanished into that part of cyberspace that houses endless bits & bytes that have been cast out for whatever reason.

WELL, DR PILL OR NO DR PILL, IT WAS JUST TOO GOOD TO LET FLOAT AWAY.

Read it & ask yourself - could it be that Dr Pill does not like the last paragraph? Hey, if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

PAUSE AND THINK

by mesnilgarnier

The three-episode show about a possible child-molester makes one pause.

One of the cornerstones of Western civilization is the assumption of innocence until proven guilty. In this regard let me point out that lie detector tests are not admissible in most jurisdictions, and for obvious reasons.

The man is clearly not very intelligent, and in his conversations with Dr. McGraw gave indications of not understanding the meanings of some words and/or the meanings of some phrases. Question: did he understand the gravity of the possible outcome? Some of us - this man included - are inarticulate, threatened by the camera and the audience, and put up a poor show when placed under the microscope. Should our possible guilt of some crime be decided by our performance?

There were suggestions that the man's father is a child abuser. This begs the question: was that man ever in the house when the child was there? is it possible that the grandfather is responsible? It should have been asked and was not, leaving a loose end. Moreover, in connection with the child abuser, there was the inference that perhaps Jeremy had been abused, thus playing into one of the great canards of this decade: that the abused becomes abuser. That may be so in occasional instances but it is not an automatic process.

As for the tongue in the child's mouth, let me point out that - whatever the case may be in this day and in your country - in this country (UK) and during my children's youth two decades ago my family often played a game: "feed the birdie" in which you put cake or ice cream on your tongue and the infant/toddler bobs toward you and picks or sucks the food off your tongue. There was not and is not anything remotely sexual about that game. Whether that was a factor in the case at hand, of course, one cannot say.

Another cause for alarm was that the accusations of molestation were previously reported to, investigated, and dismissed by the local Children's Aid Society, which fact was reported in the first segment. One should not overlook the fact that there is a bitter custody battle over the child; from reports far and wide not just in the U.S. but also virtually all other Western countries, abuse/molestation/sexual inappropriateness is a frequently used weapon by one side to discredit the other.

Question: was the Dr Phil show approached in order to make more of a case, one that the society could not ignore? Certainly the public evisceration of this man will force the society to reexamine the situation. Question: if you were guilty of even minor trespasses on the person of your child, would you accept an 'invitation' to appear on the show? I would not and I dare say you would not, either, for you would know that you are up against a juggernaut with access to any number of services you or I could not possibly muster, and it all takes place on live TV.

None of us - including Dr. McGraw - actually knows whether any abuse took place. One should not respond like one of Pavlov's dogs to the presentation of assumptions that are bolstered by conjecture and legally inadmissible 'tests'. There is NO critical thinking going on here, just a lot of rabid, rote reaction.

My final concern is that, with this episode as with others, the Dr. Phil show is becoming the white collar class's Jerry Springer. It's all there except for the bald bouncer - the clever tease of the introduction, the roar of approbation of the audience, the sly confidential talk with the victim, the adversarial nature of the discussion and the orchestrated thumbs-down roar of the crowd. Caligula couldn't have done it better. All that is missing is the loaves of bread.

c2006 bluemlein.blogspot.com

Brrrrrrandon and the Killahs

2006-10-06T23:31:00.001Z

It's like this: every Saturday I am roped in to watch SNL, which does not make me laugh very much as my sense of humour lies comatose is some forgotten European edifice. And my young friend knows this. But she also knows that I have an interest in contemporary music. The top-40 kind. As she was watching the skits - and laughing heartily - I was perusing The New York Times (with me, reading anything is always at least a two-level activity: I am reading whilst at the same time editing whilst also examining the words with critical eye). All of those fun stories from south of the border, about the charming VEEP and the beautiful sticky Rice (yes, Public Radio today referred to various small scandals 'sticking' to Condi) and the weirdo who takes up space in the white house on a hill . . .

Whereupon I heard that trill at the beginning of "When You Were Young" by the Killers -whom I actually like - and I wheeled around in my chair which is coming unglued due to extreme old age and fixed my beady eyes 'pon the toob.

But what a disappointment!

* * * * *

The Killers first lodged themselves in my conscious when I was driving two young persons of great intelligence and beauty (it runs in the family) and became aware of the words

" somebody told me/You had a boyfriend/Who looked like a girlfriend/That I had in February of last year" (copyrighted by them, of course)

which caused me to erupt in merriment and nearly lose control of the motor. Heavens to Murgatroyd! that would never do. In short order I was told the name of the band - seven or eight times, before it actually stuck. Soon another ditty came into my head: Mr. Brightside.

I could really empathize with the lyrics

"I'm coming out of my cage/And I've been doing just fine".

I've had a few episodes of being caged, myself, tho' perhaps not in so dramatic a way. In short order the airwaves became flush with their hits and by station-hopping it was possible to hear them almost non-stop, around the clock. And by searching the net, I became aware of about 29,000 pictures of them - obviously mostly repetitive, do you know anyone who even has 29,000 different poses over the course of one's life? -oh yeah? you wanna start counting?

. . .and that there are about ELEVEN MILLION FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND web pages? featuring such things as
"LI-FMF1
The Killers - Foam Finger
(Yellow with red print)
$ 5.00"

(from their official website) and "The Killers Give Radiohead Some Advice" - I'm sure Radiohead is very grateful to these boys for giving them tips.

Thus, by summer's end I was thoroughly aware that there was a band from Las Vegas named The Killers who had several witty songs out at once and soon would release their next CD.

Whereupon my young friend told me that The Killers would be appearing on SNL. Again, I found solace in the august and stately columns of The New York Times (never forget to capitalize the The, for The New York Times lies upon the august summit of Western civilization). Soon enough out came four neat and tidy young men whose Mummies undoubtedly had washed their hands and faces not five minutes ago, in cute Buster Brown suits of the long-legged variety, and their front man was absolutely adorable in his suit'n'tie'n'eyeliner. Ah, yes. A stab at androgyny. . . or a subversive gesture that said, quietly:

"I'm wearing the suit 'cus I have to, but I'm putting on Mummy's eyeliner 'cuz I WANT TO!"

In either case they were tight, Mr. Flowers's voice was acceptably on key and with some degree of inflection and emphasis, and we loved both songs they did and especially their appearance, particularly with eyeliner. Bring on the dancing boys!

* * * * *

Last week it was deja vu all over again, SNL, NYT, young friend, moi-meme. And the band. With all of this French (deja vu, moi-meme etc etc) I'm thinking - their name wouldn't have gone over very well in France, I mean, who wants to "regardez les Tueurs!"? While that little question was demanding an answer I cast my eyes upon the set and to my horror saw four rather woolly and unkempt youths on a set that appeared meant to be mimicking a saloon - presumably in a saloon named Sam's Town (a nod, no doubt, to Vegas - with CSI's Sam Braun being referenced here) as it might have looked a hundred and fifty or so years ago.

As the song began I couldn't help but notice the thinness of Mr. Flowers's voice, its inability to remain in register, and its uneven volume. Yes, it's my experience that vocal cords are easily traumatized by stress, late nights, stress, travel and stress. So I forgave Mr. Flowers for not having taken proper care of his instrument.

But the shock that befell us was of a different sort: Mr. Flowers was wearing a lumberjack shirt, 'coke bottle'-style glasses, a bit of a hint of a beard, and an overall resemblance to the cheesy perv that rolls up in his grimy car beside the playground, there to slobber and drool.

Why'd you wear that horrid outfit? I would have asked him, had I been there. Don't you know how it makes you appear? To which he might have answered half a dozen different ways, and had me thrown out of their precinct.

You see, what kept him in that unlikeable configuration was not so much the presence of some of the visual bits that we, in our visual mind, can and do put together as one stereotype or another. No, that was not it. What it was - was the absence of the khol rimming his eyes. If he was wearing eyeliner it was not noticeable. He needed the smooshy dark streaks encircling his eyes to speak to his audience, to say

'here sings a man - a man playing a role, the role of a rock star, which demands that he shock and awe us with his costume; that assures us that, even tho' he may look somewhat like an undesirable, he is, in fact, very desirable. That says "the greater the star, the wider the eyeliner".'*

But they were invisible. And, being invisible, also inaudible. What a shame! I had been hoping that The Killers would be around for some years to entertain me with their funny/silly lyrics and their front man's fluid sexuality. Guess I'm out of luck.

You know what this means, don't you?

It's back to deciphering the Toadies' "Possum Lake", a job that shouldn't be done by anyone over 18.

---------------------------------------*******!;-)

*and the inversion of which is apparent in the pinstripes of business and bureaucracy - the higher-up the exec, the thinner the stripes, until they nearly disappear at the top.

c2006 bluemlein.blogspot.com

DICK WOOF'S LOW ODORS

2006-09-28T20:42:00.001Z

There are among us those who think Dick Woof, the tv writer/producer of 1001 Criminal Nights, is some sort of fount of wisdom --a
ack
ack
excuse me while I choke.

The Criminal Intent franchise, with Itchy and Twitchy in the detective seats, at least is thought through relatively well; there are few instances when logic dictates that we blow a raspberry at the set. (The more recent arrivals, Nose and Pose, don't even enter into our considerations.)

And that old chestnut, the original L&O, is getting frayed around the edges. Sam Waterston appears to have neural deficits similar to Parkinson's, or perhaps he is simply stupefied at the number of skirts coming through the revolving door of the ADA's office, and Fred Dalton Thompson is more rabidly right wing than ever. One can almost imagine Fred chowing down with Cheney - not the Cheney who acted in The Shapes of Evil (Joaquin Fr.), but "Vice President Dick Cheney"
aka "Richard B. Cheney"
nickname "The Slim Cheney"
birth name "Richard Bruce Cheney" of whom one thinks Eminem did a song, didn't he? - Will the Real Slim Cheney Please Stand Up?

oh, no, that was somebody else.

In any event, we are barking up the wrong chene here, we're talking about Dick Woof's imaginings. As the original creaks on, too painful to watch, it's the currently-most-popular Special Victims Unit that we want. Ever eager for our fill of blood'n'guts, fluids'n'swabs, we watched episode 2 of this season a few days ago.

A few scents to follow here:

Olivia is gone. What a relief! With her pitbull aggressiveness, her earnest, searching look, her insistence that behind every strand of spider silk there lurks a perp of the nastiest kind, her "I-don't-know-how-to-end-this-shot" head nodding while gazing in stupor into middle distance, she was quite the irritant.

We did not miss her.

As a matter of fact it was a relief not to have to watch her; the show did not miss her, either. Elliot has taken over as chief-Rabid-Dog-on-the-scent. Looking grubbier and more insane than ever, he bears little resemblance to the pleasant young Chris Meloni in the opening credits. (Come to think of it, he also doesn't look a bit like Johnnie Marzzone, the bloated, pompadoured - well, curls-at-the-neck - earring-wearing hood he played in the movie Bound.) He is absolutely manic these days, trying to live up to the demands of an episode which crudely, ham-handedly, juxtaposes the story of his 17-year-old daughter's efforts to become an independent young woman with a boyfriend, with whome she may become intimate, with that of a 17-year-old heiress who has Turner's syndrome, meaning she will look 12 nearly forever.

(See? there's a price for everything. Do you, too, want limitless money even if it means you appear stuck in pre-puberty forever?)

The rants of the parent and grandparent are echoed by the Rants of Elliot. It all ends up in court: where else? this is America, after all, where the streets are paved with lawyers too stupid to have a caseload in this, the most litigous society ever. In this instance the girl is of age, just as Elliot's daughter is of age, no crime has been committed, yet her boyfriend, whom she has chosen, is thirty, and, by inference designated as a pedophile - "duh, he likes this girl who looks like she's twelve, see? And, like, wtf, he likes little girls - young little girls - so he's gotta have a dirty mind, see?" one can almost imagine Johnnie Marzzone spittling over that one, most likely irritated by his own lapse of not providing enough little girls to enough perverts.

The episode has one of the cheesiest endings of any show, ever. The girl and her boyfriend, freed by a court in which reason still prevails, are kissing outside, in the sunlight. A butchy woman - clearly a cop - starts challenging them, badmouthing the boyfriend and twisting him in requisite fashion over the hood of the ever-present car (somebody ought to look into this perps-over-hoods bit; I'm sure it will reveal fascinating wrinkles present in the American psyche, despite America's collective efforts to reduce, recycle and reuse every line, ever. I mean, think about it! no matter what the occasion in drama, comedy, dramedy, procedural, talk show, there is the hood of a car, and draped over it, a perp! Look, Martha! there's another perp! cry the members of the Perp-Watching Society of America, as they jot down another one in their journal: today is day 10 of the new season and already we have logged in 398 perps! And the cars! Oh, the cars!)

As she thus assaults the fella, Elliot flashes his badge at her as she flashes her badge at him. Yup, it's all legit, he assures her as girl and boy (uh...man) trip gaily into the sunset. They swap pleasantries, if their mangled-and-spit-out dialogue can be construed as pleasant, and we, the witless, hapless audience, are clewed in to the fact that this is Elliot's new partner!!!!!!! Wow! Is she tough! She's going to make us forget all about Olivia! ....

never fear. Miss PB will make an appearance in October, the network website informs us, without satisfying our curiosity: how hard did she have to fight to be let back onto the set so soon?

The World of Dick Woof is a dog's breakfast, indeed. It takes from reality and turns it into cheesy, predigested, prepackaged, fast food for the ever-more-stunted minds of the audience without attempt to lighten it with the least bit of humour, insight, or reference to the larger world, the scheme of things, community. It recycles actors, storylines, expressions, emotions, to the point where the audience does not care about any of it. Where the audience is not engaged by the story, or the actors, or the subtext, that ought to wake at least a few people.

The only level on which the show really captures anything is in the grit and noise and smell of New York. Some pretty low odors, those.

c2006 bluemlein.blogspot.com

DR. PILL

2006-04-22T06:30:00.001Z

Occasionally I am sucked into watching the Dr. Phil Show with a young person who gets great delight from it - a sort of sanitized, upscale Jerry Springer show in which, usually, everyone gently swats a paw in the air and hisses "meow" ever so politely, rather than the all-out alley-catfights over the ends of which Jerry pontificates.

So it was earlier this week as we watched a preview of the next day's program in which an Exorcist-like scream was issuing from the mouth of an apparently seriously disturbed young woman.

We got our popcorn and lime-salsa corn chips ready for five o'clock the next day and discovered, to our horror, that the girl - Amanda - was being stalked (by a private eye) and manhandled (by any number of people); her privacy was invaded by her Gorgon of a mother and her older sister - who clearly was anointed by Mommy to do her evil bidding - while she was trying to have a shower, all because she possibly had a cell phone which she used to talk to her boyfriend, not Mom-approved and branded as a "gypsy" by Mom and consequently "too good" for her child and who knows what else.

Here is the problem:

You are sixteen and you are in love; your parents' disapproval of your beloved only confirms that s/he is wonderful and right for you; of course the more you are pulled apart the more tightly you cling to one another. Didn't ANYONE in that family - or Dr. Pill, for that matter, read Romeo and Juliet?

You buy a cell phone - perhaps Romeo and Juliet might not have died if they'd had cell phones - to talk to your beloved. The more Mom pushes, the farther she pushes you into your beloved's corner, until one day you decide - I am going with my beloved to the ends of the earth - and you leave.

Now Mom is as enraged as the Sea Witch in the Little Mermaid. She tells everyone that you must have been "abducted" by "gypsies" who probably will lead you into a life of crime. (It transpires, near the end of the show, that Amanda and her boyfriend, George, have been seeing one another since she was FOURTEEN - just like Juliet, and where has Mom been in those two years? Why let Amanda have a boyfriend at 14 and be so antagonistic two years later? If, as she claimed, the boyfriend and his family were not good enough for her precious daughter, why did she not terminate the relationship sooner?). She transmutes her wrath into a piteous howl that she aims at the Dr. Pill show and - like blind fools - they jump in. Now you are going to be hunted like an animal, caught and bagged, bundled up and shipped back to the zoo that is your place of origin - the mind baulks at the terms "family" and "home", both of which suggest love, harmony, trust and stability, and none of which are in evidence on Dr. Pill's self-congratulatory show-and-tell. You are lied to and emotionally and mentally abused - where are the social workers? Do the authorities think abuse has to be physical in order to do damage?

There is a term in psychiatry/psychology - "scapegoating" - to denote the family member who unwittingly becomes the "cause" of everyone's ills and dissatisfactions, and Amanda is the scapegoat in that family. Nobody tells Mom or the 20-year-old, still-living-at-home sister that YOU DON'T GO INTO THE BATHROOM WHEN SOMEBODY ELSE IS HAVING A SHOWER UNLESS THEY'VE SLIPPED AND SPLIT THEIR HEAD!. The sister is the surrogate for Mommy when Mommy ineffectually goes into the bathroom first and returns empty-handed. The father? Seemed a bit of a cipher, which is always bad, no matter the sex of one's children. Children require strong, moral, sympathetic and kindly role models of both sexes in order to grow into strong, moral, sympathetic and kindly adults who understand the opposite sex and the fact that one can have disagreements or fights in a family but they won't be held against you in aeternam - that is something else that seemed to be lacking in that family.

Of course, there are two reactions to being scapegoated - to wilt and to become defiant - and thankfully Amanda is of the latter persuasion or there would be no hope for her at all. She would graduate from her family with the rank of Prize Doormat, surely an honour beyond words.

This is what Dr. Pill should have done:

1) Not reunite Amanda and her family until he had the TRUTH from both sides, and had had the opportunity to think deeply about the family dynamics.

2) Spoken to George, got a true picture of George, his intentions, his family, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, what it was about George's family that was so much more appealing than her own (one can guess).

3) Had a no-holds-barred counselling session with each family member.

4) Given a cell phone to each family member so that they can communicate with one another from a distance, which is the only way these people seem able to deal with one another without triggering aneurysms.

***_____________________________________________***

A Note About "Minors".

In Amanda's jurisdiction a person is considered a "minor child" until the age of 18.
Many of the more rabid posts on the Dr. Pill website support corporal punishment, withholding of privileges, intrusions into her privacy, as though they are Constitutionally sanctioned and protected rights of the parents.

Here's news for you: A person of 16, 17, 18, may be "minor" but no longer is a "child", and should not be treated as such.

AND You cannot teach a person to be civil, respectful, honest, by lying, cheating and being overbearing tyrants. And if you truly think that as a parent you should be able to lie, cheat and be overbearing in order to impose your will (what it is all about) on them, I feel sorry for your children - there is no hope for you.

c2006 bluemlein.blogspot.com