Tuesday, November 29

Bush and Blair guilty by War Crimes Tribunal and Blair Foundation's petition

The result of what was reported at this post was guilty as charged for former US president George W. Bush and former Prime Minister Toni Blair.
"The accused are found guilty,” read an official media statement from Perdana Global Peace Foundation, organisers of the tribunal.
“War criminals have to be dealt with, convict Bush and Blair as charged. A guilty verdict will serve as a notice to the world that war criminals may run but can never ultimately hide from truth and justice,” the statement read."
Now the Blair Foundation asks us to sign a petition:
BWCF – THE BLAIR WAR CRIMES FOUNDATION
It is necessary to make leaders hesitate before indulging in “the paramount war crime” to quote the judges of Nuremberg, of “unprovoked aggression against a defenceless country”. Unless leaders fear that they might be tried for their war crimes, we will live in an increasingly violent world, where The Geneva Conventions are treated as a joke, the UN is of no account, and death, destruction, torture, and repressive policing are commonplace. At the moment such leaders enjoy more and more trappings of power, and retire with vast sums of money, houses, medals and lucrative contracts. A group of UK Citizens have therefore set up an organisation, “The Blair War Crimes Foundation”, to initially bring one such leader to justice as an example.
John Pilger, David Halpin, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, Ken Loach, Noam Chomsky, Richard Dawkins, Lindsey German, Ben Griffin, Dr Nawal Saadawi, Haifa Zangana, Mark Steel, Dr Kamil Mahdi, Bruce Kent, and other citizens of Spain, Argentine, USA, and UK, support a Blair War Crimes Foundation to seek signatures for a petition to the United Nations General Assembly and the UK Attorney General, to uphold the UN Charter, the Geneva and Hague Conventions, and International Law, and to indict Tony Blair for war crimes.
It is time for justice. The death of one 1.400 millions Iraqis and the pain of those who suffered torture, physical mutilations and many heinous crimes cannot remain unpunished. Do what you can and sign the petition.
It is about time that we, citizens of the world, take help creating a fair world.
Update: December, 2
Please sign the petition and if you're a blogger do a little post about it. It is very important to all of us.
I'll create a little text with the link to the petition so that people can copy and paste at blogs.
We are responsible and we have to demand accountability!

Monday, November 28

Serious discussion at Facebook, or, The power of Social Networks

Seventy people commented not the joke but the real problem this picture raises.
We are discussing at comments:
Balqis left her opinion: "Looks like a good debate. Equal on both sides. :)"
My Facebook guess: ""A" equals seven years of bad luck."
And Mazhah... OMG! She doesn't have a Facebook account.
Missy reveals truth: ""The simplest things are entertaining lol." :)"

Help! I need to change my dog's diet to homemade. Anyone already did that?






I'm feeling stupid and blaming myself for giving nothing more than processed food to my dog as the vet who was her owner told me to do ten and a half years ago. I bought the most expensive and was sure that it was the best I could do for her.
Wrong! She is with a liver problem and this are the scary numbers:


ALT = 282,00 > normal range of 5.00 - 82,00 (UI/L)
Alkaline phosphatase = 704,00 > normal range 20,00 to 150,00 (UI/L)

The ultrasound test is not better and the worse is that she has a severe hepatomegaly (liver gets larger).

She is fine and asymptomatic and is only sleeping more profoundly and for more time. She is not coming quickly as she used to do.
But she is already an old lady so I believe that changes will be happening and it is normal.
I have started to change her diet by adding rice to the processed food and I'm planning to little by little take stop giving her the poison that Royal Canin is producing and we pay crazy amount of money.
I talked to a biologist that lives next to me and she told me that these processed foods are poisons.
I did some research and found some sites.
I just don't know what am I going to give her. I don't wanna go to any vet because I simply don't trust any and had a very bad experience with this one and two others that I described at this post.
I'm giving her a little bit of my own food.
Yesterday I did put the processed food without the rice and she didn't eat. She loves rice, always did and how I wish I had talked to my friend earlier but physicians are those we talk about health, isn't it?
Vets are receiving money to prescribe the processed food just like those human physicians receive from the labs.
I'll search and ask some advises to those who have animals but are smarter than me and give homemade food to their dogs.
I cannot take the $Royal Canin$ cold turkey because she'll have a serious diarrhea and even bleed as it happened once when she was fed with another of these processed food.
If you have any advise I would love to listen.

I just found this site and these the list of side effects of one of the ingredients of Dog's Processed Food:

"Although you won't see it on the label, since it is often added at the rendering plant and not by the manufacturer, ethoxyquin (EQ) is used to preserve most dry dog food. EQ is the most powerful of all preservatives and may be the most toxic.

Rendering plant workers that have been exposed to it denoted side effects similar to those of Agent Orange:

* A dramatic rise in liver or kidney damage
* Cancerous skin lesions
* Hair loss
* Blindness
* Leukemia
* Fetal abnormalities
* Chronic diarrhea

In animals, EQ has been linked to:

* Immune deficiency syndrome
* Spleen, stomach, and liver cancers
* And a host of allergies
Stop feeding your dog or cat with poison. Don't do what I did.
This is another great article:

"“We are seeing disease conditions in animals that we did not see years ago. Many of these may be traced to nutrition as the source…” Don E. Lundholm, DVM
Dr. Kollath, of the Karolinska Hospital in Stockholm, headed a study done on animals. When young animals were fed cooked and processed foods they initially appeared to be healthy. However, as the animals reached adulthood, they began to age more quickly than normal and also developed chronic degenerative disease symptoms. (...)" (emphasis added)
Update: January, 2, 2012
I noticed that the first link has some items to sell. I didn't buy them and do no intend to and used this link because of the list of the diseases. I was nervous and didn't check if there were advertisements.
I don't buy any food to my dog now. It is all homemade.

Sunday, November 27

Turnpike road definition













This is for those who don't have English as mother tongue or don't live in America or UK.
I had to look for the term "turnpike road" because of the post below since Jane Austen's character says that it was one of the advantages of the "nice old-fashioned place" she describes.
Wikipedia:
"A toll road (also tollway, turnpike, toll highway, or express toll route) is a privately or publicly built road for which a driver pays a toll (a fee) for use. Structures for which tolls are charged include toll bridges and toll tunnels. Non-toll roads are financed using other sources of revenue, most typically fuel tax or general tax funds."
The painting ia a painting of Carl Rakeman that depicts:
"The privately built Philadelphia and Lancaster Turnpike Road was the first important turnpike and the first long-distance broken-stone and gravel surface built in America according to formal plans and specifications. The road's construction marked the beginning of organized road improvement after the long period of economic confusion following the American Revolution." (...)The Spread Eagle Tavern is shown as it appeared in 1795.
Source; here.
Now we know!
I hope more turnpike roads appear in the book to make me feel proud I have a fully understanding of what it's meaning. Usually we pretend we already knew it when we are in our twenties and, from time to time, this artifice is necessary if the person we are talking to is very full of themselves and put in disbelief those who are bold enough to say: "I don't know what it is."

Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility

"Delaford is a nice place I can tell you; exactly what I call a nice, old-fashioned place, full of comforts, quite shut in with great garden-walls that are covered with fruit-trees, and such a mulberry-tree in the corner. Then there is a dovecote, some delightful fish-ponds, and a very pretty canal, and everything, in short, that one could wish for; and moreover it's close to the church and only a quarter of a mile from the turnpike road." Sense and Sensibility
I wonder what would be her description of "nice old-fashioned place" if she lived today. What about yours?

Saturday, November 26

Keep it fresh to please Google algorithms











Worried about number of hits, links and Google algorithms...
I just found this tip from Kevin Ryan but... NO!
I publish without having any idea if it will make more numbers or not.
I don't understand how this blog got some unexpected number results and have no idea what topic my next post will approach.
I'm terrible with numbers and the only relation I have with marketing is hating advertisements especially when watching something I like at the TV.
The thing became so insane lately that I'm not watching some channels anymore.
Unfortunately one of them is the channel of "The Big Bang Theory": five minutes of advertisements. Can you believe that? I blocked the channel. Advertisements make so much noise that if you don't pay attention you can start getting irritated without knowing the reason.
I muted the TV once and people calmed down.
I digressed. The post is about pleasing Google and this is the tip:

"It's not about freshness as much as it is the appearance of freshness. One of the core goals of search results has always been to provide timely information but not even Google's founders could have predicted the insanely high frequency that would be required to keep it "fresh.""
I laughed a lot when read it because I cannot stand the numerous times they publish, broadcast or analyze the same news, picture or event with this "fresh" artifice. For me it doesn't work. But it seems to work for the vast majority.
Open some mainstream media sites and the lesson is everywhere.
Funny that I fount the paragraph Kevin Ryan wrote in another site copied and pasted the next day of Kevin's post. The author didn't learn how to make it fresh.
Keep it fresh and stupid. If someone or a group of people works to be on the top of the pages using this rule we are in a very bad situation.
I believe it is not only algorithms that matters. Mainstream media first and the rest... well I really have no idea how they choose but if the way Google deals with these algorithms needs 500 changes a year it seems that other issues are behind these numbers.
I'm guessing. I really don't know anything and I'll check now what "algorithms" really are.
But remember: Keep is fresh!
If you're asking why I end up writing about it: I was searching for what happened to a directory and came across with Kevin's post. When I read the paragraph I quoted I felt like doing it.
I hope Google take into consideration that I'm doing a post about the algorithms in a very fresh way. It will be on top!

Update:
Scroll-down this post a little slowly with your eyes in the picture and you'll see it rolling. Just found it out.
How fresh it is!?

Wordless Saturday on the true owners of the world

Thursday, November 24

Dirty Fucking Hippies were Right! transcription and song

This video appeared and nobody knows who did the rant, the edition, the melody... nothing. Still it tells some truth. Worthy listening since...
"Peace is never discussed. Peace has somehow become a pejorative..." The Big Pharma and their fake concern wit health selling medicines that kill...
Update:
I just found the transcription at Daily Kos:
But something puzzles me. How can a revolution forgets to manifest culturally? Is it possible to revolutionize talking about economy, politics and ranting but without creating not even a tiny symbol that communicates what is the desire of people?
This song(?) is the result of the lack of a anti-establishment culture in US and in the whole world.
A song that raises the issues enumerating them but incapable of reaching hearts and minds and with no cultural print.
Appealing to the hippies was the way out but I doubt that people is willing not to wash their hair or behave the old hippie way and it is sad that this soapbox song refers to them the way they are called by those who hate their message.
Again it seems that creativity is way out of reach and without it, without art, literature, music, and all the "humanities" a crucial part of human beings vanishes.
When the imagination is not exercised, exited, and capable of creating, analyzing, and criticizing it is easier to control the thoughts and desires of the population, not people because they don't see people, they see numbers.
Fighting for education that is not financed and dictate by the corporations is also part of this revolution.
The alleged counter-establishment group "Anonymous" took a mask from a movie.
Have you noticed that in this movie, "V de Vendetta", there are books, paintings, sculptures, a whole iconography of the weapons that revolutionaries use to express their ideas?
"Bullets don't kill an ideal."
Take a good look at the black and white photography above and tell us what you see.
________________________________
The Dirty Fucking Hippies were Right!
"Flag planting on Iwo Jima. Tug-of-war with dollar sign. Headline: U.S. economy worsens. Chart heading sharply down “Class Is Now in Recession”.
“There’s a black granite wall in Washington DC that bears 58,260 names on it. All of those whose names that are carved on that wall are dead. For what? Freedom?.
“If this country had listened when kids were screaming to stop that slaughter, that wall would have been one hell of a lot shorter.
“Yet we as a nation still wage wars of choice. Wars encouraged by plutocrats who never have to fight them.
“Peace is never discussed. Peace has somehow become a perjorative.
“Peace is no perjorative. Peace is essential to the survival of the human race. And those who advocate for war are a dangerous and fearful group who should be marginalized and disavowed.
“War is always the last choice. The dirty fucking hippies … were right.
“Now the oceans have been rising. The polar ice is melting at alarming rates. The climate is changing in irreversible ways. Our survival as a species on this planet is on a precipice.
“The science on this is clear. Humans are now in trouble. Because of our reckless stewardship of what we dominated, we have polluted this fragile jewel that hangs in space – our only home.
“We’ve elected sociopath after sociopath for the last 30 years, to every level of government. – many of them slaves to corporate parasites that gorge themselves at the public trough, while the most vulnerable people in our society – the sick, the young, and the elderly – go wanting.
“The food we buy is contaminated. The toys we give our children as presents for Christmas are tainted with poisons. The water we drink is rife with carcinogens. The fish in our seas, lakes and rivers are so full of mercury that it’s only recommended that we eat them once per week.
“We have now come face to face with our own extinction.
“I hate to say ‘I told you so,’ but the dirty fucking hippies … were right.
“Billions of dollars of profits are being snitched up at the expense and suffering of our neighbors by the jackals that comprise our pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies. Both of which pipe their diagnostic wisdom and their fake concern right into our homes via TV and radio commercials.
“These legal drug dealers now sell their wares with impunity. And the insurance gamblers perform a slick game of three-card monte right in our living rooms.
“Most of these drugs have a list of caveats that would make even the most dishonest used car salesman blush. And the insurance hustlers change the rules of the game just when it’s time to pay up – profiting from the suffering and pain and others, profiting from human frailty.
“Universal healthcare? ‘It’s too expensive,’ we’re told. Gasbags talking heads on TV and radio have been complicit in this deception, while being handsomely compensated for their assistance.
“I’ll say it again: the dirty fucking hippies … were right.
“Big box discount stores descend upon small towns in America like alien ships, filled with cheap products bought at low prices from countries that pay their workers slave wages. Plutocrats love this business model!
“Mom and Pop shops can’t compete with prices set by these huge corporate parasites and, to no one’s surprise, many small businesses in these tiny hamlets fail, leaving small towns filled with empty storefronts and even, in some cases, forcing these same small business operators to go to work for the very people that ruined their livelihoods.
“Small-town America is subsequently decimated by this invasion. Often helpless in stopping it.
“Wall Street has cannibalized itself. Still hungry, feeling the pangs of their greed, they’ve now come to the government for their daily meal. And still, without a hint of irony, a spokesman for this ravenous tribe mounts his soapbox and has the temerity to rail against the ‘evils of Socialism’.
“Turns out the Socialism is for them. The Capitalism is for us.
“Abbie Hoffman once baited these banksters by throwing cash onto the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. To no one’s astonishment, they demonstrated their insatiable greed. The gluttons couldn’t help themselves – they stopped trading, got on their knees, and swept up the free loot.
“Wall Street should have been reined in long ago.
“I’ll say it again: The dirty fucking hippies … were right!”

Wednesday, November 23

British Empire's map in 1898 by McVitie and Price

Wow! It has not been that long ago, still what a difference 113 years make and, ironically, how history repeats itself.
For detailed information of the British Empire look at this map.

The Four Dogs

Thirteenth of the The Four Dogs series.
Disclaimer: the presence of more than four dogs in "The Four Dogs series" does not imply any endorsement of the owner of this blog of those dogs who appeared as supporting actors.

Tuesday, November 22

Should citizens of the world help ICC find a prosecutor to be the successor of Luis Moreno-Ocampo?

ICC is a mockery of laws, jurisprudence and dignity.
Luis Moreno Ocampo term will expire in June, 2012 and the ICC is asking for people to candidate or nominate:
"Interested candidates or those wishing to recommend the names (of prosecutors) of qualified individuals are requested to contact the Search Committee through the Secretariat of the Assembly of States Parties:
Secretariat of the Assembly of States Parties
International Criminal Court
Maanweg 174
2516 AB The Hague
The Netherlands
Fax: +31 70 515 8376
Email: rene.holbach@icc-cpi.int"
With the legacy that Luis Moreno-Ocampo left and the work of the ICC that did nothing since 2002 when it was created no serious candidate will be willing to occupy this place.
But there are plenty of hypocrites to do this job.
If there was any decency left this court should end or at least explain why their budgets are so high for so little work.
David Morrison reported the hypocrisy of referring Libya to the ICC.
Joshua Rosenberg, in 2008, has demonstrated why he thinks Luis Moreno-Ocampo should resign.
Many citizens of the world are expressing in social networks of in comments in sites that ICC is another US weapon of character destruction.
Again: ICC does not have jurisdiction over Libya, still, ICC has indicted Seif al-Islam of crimes against humanity.
If this is a serious institution we are the world became a hospice and they forgot to send the memo to it's inhabitants.
A new prosecutor? To do what? Pretend they are working on African countries? To propagate that someone is morally condemned?
Who will be Ocampo's successor? Would you nominate anybody? If yes, don't forget to follow the ICC's rules.
ICC is a mockery of international laws and jurisprudence. It is a joke that will cost €117.73 million in 2012 as exposed here.

How to upload .gif animated to blogspot

At "Settings" go to the "Basic" tag and check "Updated editor" when an image .gif animated (those images that moves) is being uploaded.
If the "Old Editor is checked the image will freeze in only one picture and will not work.
It is easy as that and still it took me years to solve it. I hope it helps.

Monday, November 21

Quotes and catchy phrases from sitcoms you might know





"I'm doing a workshop on multiple personalities and it
is taking me forever to fill the name tags."
Niles Crane

"These pretzels are making me thirsty."
Cosmo Kramer
"We were on a break!"
Ross Geller

"Newman!" or "Hello Newman!"
Jerry Seinfeld

"It's a warm summer evening in ancient Greece ..."
Sheldon
That is all for today. If you have any you remember leave it so I can add to the next posts.

Michael Caine sings Colonel Bogey March

Left: Michael Caine painted by Rembrandt. And there we go with two parodies to start the week. Click at the right image. It is 23 seconds long.

Lennon's mystery of "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite" debunked

Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite
John Lennon

For the benefit of Mr. Kite
There will be a show tonight on trampoline
The Hendersons will all be there
Late of Pablo Fanques Fair-what a scene
Over men and horses hoops and garters
Lastly through a hogshead of real fire!
In this way Mr. K. will challenge the world!
The celebrated Mr. K.
Performs his feat on Saturday at Bishopsgate
The Hendersons will dance and sing
As Mr. Kite flys through the ring don't be late
Messrs. K and H. assure the public
Their production will be second to none
And of course Henry The Horse dances the waltz!
The band begins at ten to six
When Mr. K. performs his tricks without a sound
And Mr. H. will demonstrate
Ten summersets he'll undertake on solid ground
Having been some days in preparation
A splendid time is guaranteed for all
And tonight Mr. Kite is topping the bill.
I love this song. This is the story:

"Lennon was inspired to write the song by a 19th century circus poster for Pablo Fanque's Circus Royal that he purchased in an antique shop in on 31 January 1967, while filming the promotional video for "Strawberry Fields Forever" in Sevenoaks, Kent. Lennon said that 

"Everything from the song is from that poster, except the horse wasn't called Henry." (The poster identifies the horse as "Zanthus".) Mr. Kite is believed to be William Kite, who worked for Pablo Fanque from 1843 to 1845." Wikipedia.

Sunday, November 20

One motif and two media: The Art of Sarah Wimperis

I have been following Sarah's work for a long time and always felt like sharing one of her works.
She just finished the oil version, right picture, of a friend's room in Edinburgh.
The same motif is at the left done with watercolor.
These is what she says at her blog The Red Shoes:
About the oil, left picture:
"Another painting of my dear friends room. I enjoy working in a different media*(sic) with the same subject and it certainly focuses the decisions that you have to make throughout a painting. I love the result, its a sumptuous room and the oils bring a real richness to the colours."
About the watercolor version, right picture:
"I am posting this up now for several reasons, firstly, I think it is finished. I have been working on it over the past couple of weeks and I find that putting things up on my blog helps me to see if there are any bits I want to change or carry on with. Its a bit like viewing your painting in a mirror, it helps to see it clearly." " This work here is big, and some of his are big, it is a difficult medium to take large and he is a master."
You can now look at the two versions and have an idea of what each technique has of differences. This kind of paintings, there are many of them at the web even selling their work for low prices, is the academic version with a touch of impressionism usually inspired by Matisse but never Cezanne and they are soulless. Few artists are capable of mastering this technique imprinting a mark of their own in the canvas just like in the academic art.

Most Important News of 2011: Bush and Blair war crimes hearing by Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal


The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal started its hearing against former US president George Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair in the Malaysian federal capital.
This is the first time that war crimes charges are heard against the two former heads of states in compliance with due legal process.
The Kuala Lumpur War Commission said both Bush and Blair had participated in the formulation of executive orders and directives to exclude the applicability of all international conventions and laws.

This include the Geneva Convention, Convention against Torture, Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Charter in relations to the wars launched by the US and Britain in Afghanistan and Iraq.
This hearing comes after two years of investigation by the Commission which heard shocking testimonials from war victims.

One complainant told the commission in 2009 that he was detained for six years in Guantamo Bay on mistaken identity, tortured and subjected to inhumane treatment.
An Iraqi woman prisoner said she was used as a human shield while being transported on a helicopter by being placed near the open doors.

The US and Britain have repeatedly said the so-called war against terror is targeted at terrorists.
The tribunal would adjudicate and evaluate the evidence presented on facts and law and is presided by seven judges from Malaysia and overseas.

This tribunal would decide next Tuesday as to whether or not former US president George Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair committed war crimes. If found guilty the tribunal would lobby their respective governments to moot internal investigations or charge them in the international court." (emphasis added)
Via: PressTv.

One of the reasons holidays are not the best of times

As I said at this post holidays is not only about happiness for many and it can really triggers some deep feelings. For some it can be hell.

Saturday, November 19

ICC International or African Criminal Court?





Situation in the Central African Republic

Jean-Pierre Bemba GomboICC-01/05 -01/08 Case The Prosecutor v. Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo


Situation in Uganda

Joseph Kony, Vincent Otti, Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ongwen ICC-02/04-01/05 Case The Prosecutor v. Joseph Kony, Vincent Otti, Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ongwen

Situation in Darfur, Sudan

Ahmad Muhammad Harun Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-RahmanICC-02/05-01/07 Case The Prosecutor v. Ahmad Muhammad Harun ("Ahmad Harun") and Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman ("Ali Kushayb")

©UN Photo / Stuart PriceICC-02/05-01/09 The Prosecutor v. Omar Hassan Ahmad Al Bashir
ICC-02/05-02/09 The Prosecutor v. Bahar Idriss Abu Garda
ICC-02/05-03/09 The Prosecutor v. Abdallah Banda Abakaer Nourain and Saleh Mohammed Jerbo Jamus
It is amazing that the few cases of the International Criminal Justice are against African men. These are the cases of those who are being prosecuted by ICC in Congo, Uganda and Darfur: Situation in Democratic Republic of the Congo:
C-01/04-01/06

Case The Prosecutor v. Thomas Lubanga Dyilo;
ICC-01/04-01/07
Case The Prosecutor v. Germain Katanga and
Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui; Decision on the Joinder of the Cases against Germain KATANGA and Mathieu NGUDJOLO CHUI;
ICC-01/04-02/06
Case The Prosecutor v. Bosco Ntaganda;
CC-01/04-01/10
Case The Prosecutor v. Callixte Mbarushimana

Now the ICC is craving to have Qaddafi's son Seif al-Islam, that was arrested today, under trial which would explain the proposal of a growth of €14.12 million on the approved Budget for 2011 setting out a request of €117.73 million. One of the reasons


"In particular, additional resources are essential to conduct an effective investigation into crimes committed in Libya and to fund a significant increase in judicial activities (including legal aid). In fact, as set out in section 3 below, the Team is concerned that the Court continues to underfund its activities in a number of areas." (emphasis added)


US is still an observer which reinforces a participation that promotes their interests with the convenience of being above the law since U.S. didn't even sign the Rome statute.
It would be realistic to change from International Criminal Court to African Criminal Court.

Twist-tongue and cartoon for clever men

"A thousand twice three thousand trees.
Six thousand trees there were.
They thought the task through thoroughly though,
and now think thrice they need.
Thrice or twice, the thinkers thought,
through thick and thoughtful thinkings.
Twice or thrice they thought and thought,
a thousand times rethinking.
Twice thought they was quite enough,
Three thought thrice and two thought twice,
The thinking would not cease."

Friday, November 18

9/11 official version poll result and Holidays

I did a poll last September about the credibility of the official version of 9/11 and I have been procrastinating this post and it is already November.
This is the result that was reached in the poll done from 09/06/2011 to 09/14/2011.
We are entering the period of holidays and I think that as this is a period that triggers a lot of feelings, some of them not very happy, it is better to quiet our minds a little and take care of ourselves.
Taking good care or ourselves is very important even to be able to analyze and being able to discuss and try to make a little difference.
I'll approaching topics that are less related to politics for the moment trying to create a peaceful atmosphere so that we can breath despite many events that are surrounding us.

Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman






"Vivian: People put you down enough, you start to believe it.
Edward: I think you… are a very bright, very special woman.
Vivian: The bad stuff is easier to believe. You ever notice that?"


(image: at the opera)

Wordless Friday

Thursday, November 17

The Good Samaritan by Delacroix and Van Gogh



















Right: The Good Samaritan, 1890, by Van Gogh
Left: The Good Samaritan, 1849, by Eugène Delacroix

I have already published some of the Van Gogh paintings that were inspired by other artists and this is
another of these great achievements Vincent left. He also painted after Delacroix here.
It is a great way to see the impressionist changes in the way artists depict space, light and realize that they have other intentions than their predecessors.

The paintings are only forty one years apart. Some might think that Delacroix is more realistic
or more faithful or more anything but art's function is not portraying reality the closest possible and if
it was for that some restrictions would also be necessary to Delacroix.

This is a discussion that has been around since the ancient Greeks and it will be in one post.
Keep tuned. :)


Almost wordless Thursday about Occupy Wall Street

Tuesday, November 15

Duerme negrito: Mercedes Sosa speaks to your soul


"Duerme, Duerme negrito..."
I will not put the whole lyrics in Spanish of this lullaby because Mercedes Sosa has the talent of speaking to our souls when she sings even not understanding the words.
Duerme negrito means "sleep little black boy" and some people has the recollection of their mothers singing this song for them. Mercedes smiles beautifully and showing tenderness every time she says "negrito".
When she finishes singing she says she is going to sing a very sad song called "Ay , este azul" by Pancho Cabral and she says:
"Neruda loved this color as Picasso in his blue phase. I love this color because for me the color of happiness is blue."
You can listen this song here.
Mercedes Sosa fought Argentine dictatorship with her voice but her music was never pamphlets and the high quality of her music will last forever.
At a concert in La Plata in 1979, Sosa was searched and arrested on stage, along with the attending crowd. Their release came about through international intervention. Banned in her own country, she moved to Paris and then to Madrid. Her second husband died in 1978.


Walk on the wild side: Tiger and Turtle on German

Projected by Heike Mutter and Ulrich Genth Tiger and Turtle is a giant "walking-coaster" made of steel and zinc.
Creator Ulrich Genth said:
'"The roller coaster stands for acceleration and high speed of a tiger but the visitor has to explore it step by step like a turtle."
The sculpture is located on Heinrich-Hildebrand-Höhe in the Angerpark and is free for visitors. For more AP/AAP pictures here but I believe we have better walk. What about the loop?

Monday, November 14

Pompeii' frescoes














Left: Sappho (ca. 612 B.C.E), Fresco from Pompeii National Archeological Museum, Naples.
In 74AD, Mount Vesuvius near Naples erupted and covered Pompeii in lava and ash.
Although the disaster devastated the city, killed people and burried everything when the city was excavated in the 18th century and works of arts and buildings were back in life after centuries under the ashes.
The erotic art has some embarassing scenes and we'll see them later.

Sunday, November 13

Police occupies Rocinha in Rio de Janeiro to show the city is ready for the games






Today a demonstration and propaganda is at the media to assure the world that Rio de Janeiro is ready to host soccer's World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016.

Corporations and all of those who will profit from the two events can be at peace but the traffic has changed to other places of the town and it is also everywhere at the city since illegal-drugs are the fifth global source of profits for the richest people of Brazil and of other countries.
The drug-dealers that are in prison and are at the poor part of the cities have a short life and no time to enjoy what they fight.

Everything keeps the same: police and death squads keep killing and illegal-drugs are available in every corner of the town because some middle-class areas have drug-dealers.
What happened today, that is being reported as the "pacification of Rocinha", will last and maybe it will change the slum for it's population is huge.

But nothing changed. Children are still hungry and inhale glue or other cheap drugs to easy the pain.
The makeover is done. Have a nice stay at Rio de Janeiro.
Just make sure not to go to Universities where the police is occupying all campi allegedly to prevent drug-dealing but, inexplicable, is harassing students and teachers that started strikes to fight police occupation.