Malaysia P.M. blasts war loving Anglos

“Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said Thursday that the U.S.-led “war on terrorism” has become an excuse for the West to attack Muslims and accused America and its allies of wanting to control the world.

Mahathir said the Sept. 11 attacks allowed “Anglo-Saxon Europeans” — a group he defined as including Americans, Australians and New Zealanders — to return to “violent old ways” of colonialism.”

In unrelated news (yeah, right)

“Israeli news said yesterday that the US Secretary Of State Colin Powell might pay a quick and urgent visit to Syria on the background of pressure by the US defense department to put an end to diplomacy and to direct a military attack against Syria.”

 US Secretary of State Colin Powell signalled this week that the Bush administration intends to press ahead with plans to impose what amounts to a military blockade of North Korea—an action that threatens to plunge North East Asia into war.

 British and American intelligence and special forces have been put on alert for a conflict with Iran within the next 12 months.

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U.S. Charged With War Crimes

The Evidence File. Court case against General Franks in Brussels.

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Wallowing at the trough

“A California state senator who sits on a committee that oversees gambling issues is urging Indian tribes that operate casinos to retain his private consulting group to bolster their image and fend off political attacks from other gambling interests.

Battin, who is paid $99,000 a year as a full-time lawmaker, noted that there is no prohibition against earning outside income and said his enterprise doesn’t compromise his legislative responsibilities.

“If I felt conflicted, I would abstain,” Battin said. “I’m not interested in crossing the line.” <Then what, may I ask, would make you feel conflicted, Senator?>

But his actions in soliciting business from the casino tribes, which have become the state’s largest campaign donors and are affected each year by legislation, drew sharp criticism.

“In my wildest dreams, I can’t imagine it’s true,” said Karen Getman, who recently stepped down as chairwoman of the Fair Political Practices Commission, which oversees state financial disclosure and conflict-of-interest laws. “I am truly speechless. You think you’ve heard everything, but you really haven’t.”

I’m speechless to learn that such behavior isn’t illegal…

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Wheeee….!

I bought a next gen cell phone today, the Nokia 3650. It does a mind-boggling number of things.

There’s a built-in camera, built in video (yes video!) camera, plus two way text messaging. It has full email capabilities can send/receive attachments, and can access IM mail. There’s a nice web browser, the ability to play audio and video files, and a calendar. It’s Bluetooth-enabled, and there’s a speakerphone! It comes with a 200, count ‘em, 200 page manual. While some may run in terror from a manual that large, I am in computer geek heaven!

The Nokia 3650, was used by journalists during the Iraq invasion to record video segments that went on network news. The cool thing is you can take a photo or a video (with audio using the speakerphone), then email it anywhere, or download it later to your PC using Bluetooth or infrared.

To test it out, I took the accompanying picture at the ANSWER office today with my cell phone, then emailed it to myself. It’s not great quality, but certainly acceptable.

This gets even cooler. I can configure this weblog to automatically post email sent to a certain account. So, for example, I could be on the ANSWER float in the Christopher Street West parade on Sunday taking pictures of the crowd - then post the photos and text within seconds on this weblog!

Other possibilities for using this include text messaging. You can send a text message to groups of cell phones. This is a perfect way for, say, the main organizers at a big demo to stay in touch with each other, as voice cell phones are generally useless because of the crowd noise. But text gets through easily and to multiple people at once.

And I’m just starting to figure out what this phone can do. The cost is quite reasonable, $150 with the rebate.

Dan Gillmor on phonecams

“Camera-equipped mobile phones are just starting to invade the United States, after many years in Asian markets and several in Europe. I’ve been speculating about what they mean, but until I used one extensively this week I was somewhat like the proverbial blind person describing an elephant by touch.

Simply put, these devices are going to change the very nature of photography. I can’t begin to tell you all the ways, but I can make several educated guesses.” More

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