Video Of The Week: Fox And Bones

Somewhere along the lines of five to ten years ago, I took part in a benefit concert for the Mile-End Mission (a homeless shelter) in which all participants agreed to sing political folk songs; most chose to cover Woody Guthrie, Billy Bragg, Bruce Springsteen and Pete Seeger. My friend John "Triangles" Stuart used to hold these every month, each time with a different theme, which usually meant new songs we had to learn.

Fox And Bones sound like they would have attended a show like that one and been turned on by the general themes of "songs of the proletariat", but with an indie rock quality to their sound, a bit more polished.

The Portland, OR couple comprised of co-songwriters Sarah Vitort and Scott Gilmore know how to write a fine song; there's a nice positivity about Better Land that rises the song up like the best songs from acts like The Lumineers, however that takes away from the depth of what one expects from "songs for the people":

The video was co-directed by Chris Bigalke and video animator Zachary Winterton.

Sarah Palin Vs Syria

Ever the genius (and craving media attention), Sarah Palin took to Facebook to voice her opinion about the U.S. possibly taking action in Syria, in a post called Let Allah Sort It Out:

“So we’re bombing Syria because Syria is bombing Syria? And I’m the idiot?”

 Well, Mrs Palin, if you put it that way, then, yes, you truly are.

Which doesn't mean I support a military intervention. At the most, I think the capitol building in Damascus should be destroyed, as well as other key government decision-making places and perhaps a few army buildings. Take away their permanent locations so they have trouble orchestrating dangerous maneuvers against outsiders and mass quantities of their own people.

However, I am against an occupational invasion (as always), and even a single civilian death or the destruction of anyone's home is unacceptable. Let's not forget we're talking about one of the oldest continuously-inhabited cities in the world, home to 2.5 million people.

This particular revolution is (yet another) previously-unseen situation, two years in the making: in the wake of the Arab Spring, millions of Syrians took to the streets in 2011 to protest against the government, which not only stayed in power defying its citizens' will, but effectively ordered its troops to shoot at protesters with live ammunition, even going so far as to go door-to-door to find some and execute them.

What started as a peaceful protest turned into a Civil War in the Fall of 2011, when army defectors started a counter-army (Free Syrian Army) and enlisted volunteers to join their ranks.

In terms of a Revolution, this one was ''going by the book''; ideally, you want to skip the armed conflict, but humans are prone to violence, and not everyone can achieve a ''peace process'' without resorting to guns - for every Slovakia there are dozens of Chechnyas. Even the Chinese went to war to unite; the United States revolted against the British to form several states, then went to war with each other to unite (and eliminate slavery).

But this one took so long to bear its fruits that the inevitable (for the region) happened: ''terrorists'' started helping revolutionaries. So instead of remaining a battle between ''good and evil'', it's ''the enemy of my enemy is my friend''. And while the world watches in horror as the State uses deadlier weapons against its own people every time, pressure is mounting on the U.S. to intervene, as the world's largest military structure.

Except the U.S. has already invaded two countries - one in a disproportionate retaliation, the other without a valid reason other than to depose its leader and take over their economy - in the past decade or so, now have a President who has vowed to not repeat his predecessor's mistakes, and - more importantly - would now be working hand-in-hand with some of their enemies to defeat Bashar al-Assad.

Which puts Barack Obama in a hard place.

Already labeled weak by his opponents, he is now forced to play into the Republicans' hand, who win on all sides: if he forgoes intervention, he's ''soft on terror''; if he decides to act, he's reneging on his promises - and going opposite his Nobel Peace prize - and ''working with the terrorists''. Which is likely just what some forces in the Middle East wanted to test him on. The United States remain the military equivalent of boxing's heavyweight champion - to get him on his knees even by means of an illegal blow is a feat worth bragging about, and to have him withdraw from combat even more so.

What's funny about Sarah Palin is she was probably explained all of this but didn't understand a thing, other than the conclusion: ''you mean to say I can still say the exact opposite of what Obama says, and this time I'd even be right? Bring me a laptop!''

Ironically, one of Obama's most ardent allies on this issue now is John McCain, the man responsible for giving Palin her platform. After toying with the idea of not supporting Obama on this matter, he had this to say this morning:

A rejection of this resolution would be catastrophic, not just for him but for the institution of the presidency and the credibility of the United States.

Ever the politician, he realizes image counts for a lot, particularly when it comes to pretending to have the means to take over the world.

Which is also the reason why everyone else on the planet is against a strike.

The Thing With Egypt

If you're like me, you're probably baffled by the lack of information about what's going on in Egypt, then at the misleading direction the news comes in from one source to another.

A usually trustworthy source is Al-Jazeera, who had this to say:



An Egyptian friend of mine questions this version, though, saying ''with the eyes of the world watching their every move, there is no way the army would go out of their way to murder opponents in broad daylight, especiall after ridding the country of yet another government who oppressed the people''.

Which is true. And proponents of this view usually point to videos like this one as evidence:



And pretty much the only Western media taking the army's side on a consistent basis is Fox News. Which doesn't help, seeing as they're involved in fiction and propaganda as their major business, and seeing as their always-against-Obama stance inevitably leads to the main comments sections of such videos to look like this (these were actually consecutive, no editing was required):

By being fed incomplete information as news for over a decade, these folks rely on still-incomplete factual omissions in their assessments of Barack Obama's work in this rock-and-a-hard-place situation. As an elected world leader, he has to keep in mind that fallen oppressor President Mohamed Morsi was also an elected official, whose term was merely a year in before the army stepped in. Meaning it seems to have been the Will Of The People that put him in power as, let's not forget, the first democratically-elected leader of Egypt. And evidence shows the crisis he was involved in - power and fuel shortages - were brought on by supporters of the (Hosni Mubarak-led) regime that was overthrown before these elections took place, i.e. the one the Arab Spring had deposed.

And, officially, the U.S. has stopped encouraging armies to perform a Coup. Whether they're in it for the right reasons or not.

As I've shown here, both sides can point to ''evidence'' supporting their cause, and, in most civil cases, those types of situations demand an outside party to weigh the evidence and reach a verdict, which can be appealed twice by either side.

If the Americans admit the Coup was founded, their whole ''exporting Democracy'' thing that Republicans and Fox News were so hell-bent on during the George W. Bush years proves to be wrong on every count, meaning the U.S. can be deemed war criminals. Though it'd be a good thing to put Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld in jail, since the Nuremberg trials, the political leaders aren't the only ones responsible, as each individual partaking in illegal activities has a ''duty to do which is right, even if it defies current Law'' - and that means prosecuting the Generals, most of which are still active in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as all the soldiers. You know, the ''heroes'' we are over-compensating in glory to make up for having desecrated the ones who went to Vietnam and the first attempt to invade Iraq.

Not only is that something that'd be lengthy, it'd stand against everything those who now condemn Obama for standing pat believe in, meaning they'd hate him even more for it. As a wise man by the name of Bartholomew J. Simpson once said: ''damned if you do, damned if you don't''.

The actual truth is, for once, there is no precedent for this - and especially in such a media-savvy and media-weary world. There is no logical or correct way to act, either, because either way, people will die.

Our government, here, when a whole generation tried to start a dialogue that almost created a revolution, told us to let them finish their term (with anywhere from 6 months to 2 years left) and show our displeasure via vote, by ousting them; they were even arrogant enough to hold premature elections, and were voted out, albeit in favour of a minority government.

And having learned from that, the international community should have sent a message to ''hang in there until the term ends, and if you're still unhappy, go another route; if we detect problems at the election, we'll intervene''. It would be unsustainable to have another Haiti (where a revolution almost follows each election) smack-dab at the heart of the Middle East.

What we need, on this side of the Pond, is for the media to do their fucking job and report on both sides equally so we can have a broader picture. This isn't a hurricane a journalist can stand next to, knee-deep in water, telling us it's windy. We don't need to have ground-level reporting an interviews with screaming, terrorized victims of either side.

Instead, disarm fucking drones, mount HD cameras on them, with fine, music-studio quality microphones (good Shure ones go for $100 apiece, it's a very fair price and a news organization might even get a decent bulk discount for purchasing a bunch), and have 25 of them at a time hover above the crowds, some in the middle of it, others a bit far removed, and show us some fucking perspective. Operators could zoom the picture in and out from miles away (even from the States!) and capture exactly who is doing what. I'll bet both sides are equally to blame, with each using half the deaths to advance their own cause.

R.I.P. Vaclav Havel

Vaclav Havel was a poet, playwright, writer and cultural leader in Czechoslovakia; eventually, as a respected and known dissident, he became a political figure as the regime changed. He was the tenth and last President of Czecholslovakia, during which time Slovakia seceded from the Czech Republic - a move he thoroughly opposed - and became, de facto, the first President of the Czech Republic.

He is vastly considered the leader of the Velvet Revolution, which turned Czechoslovakia from a U.S.S.R.-led-and-owned one-party Stalinist state to a multi-party democracy without the use of physical or military violence.

He died today, at age 75, in his sleep. His health had been an issue since the days where he had been imprisoned by the Communist Party for his writings and ideas, which spoke of a Czech identity, freedom and liberty, and the right to independence.