From Imagine Peace:
The World March for Peace and Nonviolence.
Prague November 3, 2009.
Thousands of people have gathered in Pragues Wenceslas Square to participate in the biggest event in the country organized as part of the World March for Peace and Nonviolence: Harlem Gospel & SuperStar singing Imagine. It was the last and the biggest event that concluded a three day stay of members of the World Marchs Base Team in the Czech Republic. More...
Open Thread below...
Hip hop jazz and toasting from Toronto. Who knew? I kid, I kid. Theyre actually very polite.
My Definition Of A Boombastic Jazz Style
I love the fusion of jazz and hip hop. Both are dynamic styles, whose artists make up new rules as they go along. Hip hop looked to jazz for funky hooks, break beats and themes to create tonal beat driven backdrops for rhymes.
In the 60s, a wave of bossa nova and cha-cha raced through the states and this was reflected in old standards being Latinized and in new compositions, based on Latin rhythms.
Soul Bossa Nova by Quincy Jones, was one such composition. Quincy Jones conducted a lineup for the 1962 Big Band Bossa Nova album that featured Soul Bossa Nova, which included Phil Woods, alto sax; Paul Gonsalves, tenor sax; Clark Terry playing trumpet and flugelhorn; Rahsaan Roland Kirk, present on flute and alto flute; Jerome Richardson on flute, alto flute, and woodwinds; Lalo Schifrin on piano (you may have heard some of his other work here); Jim Hall, guitar; Chris White, Bass; Rudy Collins, drums; and Jack Del Rio, Carlos Gomez, and Jose Paula, all contributing to the percussion section.
Ben Stein was axed by the New York Times last year for ethics violations when he appeared in a commercial for a bait and switch credit report scam. The ad claimed that consumers could get a free credit report, but in reality, they had to pay to see the real numbers.
Well, the FTC is now getting into the act and going after similar companies with some catchy commercials intended to emulate those of a popular advertising campaign by a similar bait and switch scam:
AnnualCreditReport.com is the ONLY authorized source to get your free annual credit report under federal law. The Fair Credit Reporting Act guarantees you access to a free credit report from each of the three nationwide reporting agencies Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion every twelve months. The Federal Trade Commission has received complaints from consumers who thought they were ordering their free annual credit report, but instead paid hidden fees or agreed to unwanted services. Dont be fooled by TV ads, email offers, or online search results. Go to the authorized source when you request your free report. Read on...
Ok, so the ad is a little hokey, but the message is clear. I'm all for steering people to better alternatives and pointing out hackery when I can.
Look, we know most of the alleged Al Qaeda detainees are innocent, with far too many of them victims of horrifying tactics like the ones reported in this Raw Story article. Will there ever be justice for them, or will President Obama continue to turn a blind eye to the Bush torture policies? Because with recent reports of a known rendition plane in Birmingham, England, I have to wonder if those policies are still in place:
The CIA relied on intelligence based on torture in prisons in Uzbekistan, a place where widespread torture practices include raping suspects with broken bottles and boiling them alive, says a former British ambassador to the central Asian country.
Craig Murray, the rector of the University of Dundee in Scotland and until 2004 the UK's ambassador to Uzbekistan, said the CIA not only relied on confessions gleaned through extreme torture, it sent terror war suspects to Uzbekistan as part of its extraordinary rendition program.
"I'm talking of people being raped with broken bottles," he said at a lecture late last month that was re-broadcast by the Real News Network. "I'm talking of people having their children tortured in front of them until they sign a confession. I'm talking of people being boiled alive. And the intelligence from these torture sessions was being received by the CIA, and was being passed on."
Human rights groups have long been raising the alarm about the legal system in Uzbekistan. In 2007, Human Rights Watch declared that torture is "endemic" to the country's justice system.
Murray said he only realized after his stint as ambassador that the CIA was sending people to be tortured in Uzbekistan, a country he describes as a "totalitarian" state that has never moved on from its communist era, when it was a part of the Soviet Union.
Suspects in Uzbekistan's gulags "were being told to confess to membership in Al Qaeda. They were told to confess they'd been in training camps in Afghanistan. They were told to confess they had met Osama bin Laden in person. And the CIA intelligence constantly echoed these themes."
"I was absolutely stunned -- it changed my whole world view in an instant -- to be told that London knew [the intelligence] coming from torture, that it was not illegal because our legal advisers had decided that under the United Nations convention against torture, it is not illegal to obtain or use intelligence gained from torture as long as we didn't do the torture ourselves," Murray said.
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AP - A chaplain exhorted hundreds of mourners gathered at a candlelight vigil to not give up hope as Fort Hood and its surrounding community looked to each other for comfort after an Army psychiatrist allegedly went on a deadly shooting spree at the military base.
AFP - US President Barack Obama on Saturday sought to reassure US service men and women in the wake of a deadly shooting rampage in Fort Hood, Texas, saying the tragedy had also displayed "the best of America."
AP - President Barack Obama will meet leaders of Southeast Asian nations, including Myanmar, in a high-level affirmation of Washington's new policy of engaging the military-ruled country despite its dismal human rights record.
AP - He was by turns caring and contentious, a man quick to say "I am blessed" in casual greeting yet one who seemed to stew in discontent that he could not always keep to himself.
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