First Dave Motari, now this faceless asshole. Granted, sheep aren’t as cute as puppies and we do eat them, but blowing up living things just to laugh (maniacally) for a minute is … well … it’s fucking LAME! Is the military cranking out these monsters or are they just rotten apples that make you hate the whole breed? Either way, these boys are ba-a-a-aaaad. Sorry, had to.

Clint Eastwood told Spike Lee to “shut his face” recently after Lee made a comment about the lack of black actors in Eastwood’s films. Some of Eastwood’s films include ‘Letters From Iwo Jima’ and ‘Flags Of Our Fathers’ and Lee is noted for directing ‘Malcolm X’, among many others. Lee complained that Eastwood did not include a single black actor in either of his 2006 films listed above.

Eastwood responded by explaining that the African-American troops who were at battle were not part of raising the flag in the famous picture. He said it would just not be accurate if he had included black actors in these films and people would think he lost his mind as a director.

Eastwood then concluded his statements at the Cannes International Film Festival by saying: “A guy like him [Lee] should shut his face.” Eastwood was promoting his new war film at Cannes titled ‘Miracle At St Anna’ about the all-black 92nd Buffalo Division which fought in World War II. Ironic. They’re both still badass in my book.

But you already knew that. Perhaps you also knew that Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney recently put together a little documentary on the famed father of Gonzo Journalism.

It goes without saying, then, that you would want to see a trailer of said documentary. Well, here you go!

While you were looking up Tilda Swinton’s purported love affair with young artist Sandro Kopp…other people were looking up Bill Clinton’s purported love affair with young actress Gina Gershon.

(www.bifa.org.uk)

(bp3.blogger.com)

Great.

There’s a global food crisis that’s affecting hundreds of millions of humans.
Both Zimbabwe and Burma’s governments are not allowing international aid to their war- and natural disaster-ravaged populations.
General Motors is closing plants, and Americans (and Canadians and Mexicans) are losing their jobs.
Sri Lanka is embroiled in civil war and natural disasters.

But by all means continue looking up celebrity gossip.

[The following blog is actually, in reality, a column that was printed in Synthesis Weekly on Tuesday, 5/27. It was written by Bob Howard, who can be reached at madbob@madbob.com]

Hearts and Minds

The Incredible Terrible Saga of Sami al-Hajj: During the first phase of Bush’s “War on Terror,” a host of suspected dissidents were rounded up and sent to the US military’s secretive detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Guantanamo Bay is US territory leased from Cuba; though the Cuban government has never cashed the US checks for that land. The reason a military prison was constructed and harbored in that unlikely location is because attorneys for the Bush administration felt that the legal status of Guantanamo Bay was ambiguous and as such prisoners held there would not be subject to the normal regulations that govern the capture, holding and interrogation of foreign POWs. As a result of this legal ambiguity, Guantanamo has been a haven for incredible abuse of both the prisoners and the legal system in general.

One of the early stated goals in the “War on Terror” was to win the “hearts and minds” of the Afghani, Iraqi, and by extension, the citizens of the whole Middle East. Now, I understand perfectly well that when you go to war there is going to be a lot of what they call “collateral damage” — meaning innocent civilians, women and children will be killed. It is an inevitable consequence of dropping bombs and shooting bullets. Collateral damage is one of those calculated risks. The bad guys are so bad that it behooves us in the long run to blow up civilians to get to them. I don’t agree with the logic, but I understand it.
But every so often another story pops up that makes me shake my head and say, “Really? That’s how we’re going about winning the hearts and minds of the people whose countries we are invading?” I just learned the details of one of these stories. It involves a man named Sami al-Hajj who has spent the last six years at Guantanamo Bay. You might ask what al-Hajj’s crime was? It turns out that he was captured because he was a cameraman for Al Jazeera, the most popular Arab-based news outlet in the world. The US at the time was working under the assumption that Al Jazeera was actually in cahoots with Al Qaeda and they interrogated al-Hajj on dozens of separate occasions in order to try and get him to confess this link. He never would because, according to al-Hajj, there is no link between Al Qaeda and Al Jazeera.

[righteous indignation to follow the jump.] (more…)

This is the most badass, entertaining, captivating thing I’ve seen on the Internet since… porn. That’s right. I said it. Not only is it PG, it’s scientific, and it’s educational. Um, sure, it might be a little cruel, but hey! It’s better than cock fights, dog fights, and bum fights! Here’s a user-submitted video because I don’t have the code to embed the official JBF vids… I highly recommend them, though.