was there just a second ago... Cop Watch LA, a police watchdog group, posted the video on YouTube, said organizer Joaquin Cienfuegos. Cienfuegos said the video was shot by a neighbor of Cardenas with a cell phone camera. The neighbor gave it to Cardenas' family, who then gave it to Cop Watch, according to Cienfuegos.
posted on Nov 11, 2006 - View this thread

More to the story? So what are the chances that the whole Jeff Gannon/Jim Guckert thing is about more than partisan media manipulation?
posted on Feb 11, 2005 - View this thread

Do you want to be a writer? "Write as if you were dying. At the same time, assume you write for an audience consisting solely of terminal patients. That is, after all, the case. What would you begin writing if you knew you would die soon?... Every book has an intrinsic impossibility, which its writer discovers as soon as his first excitement dwindles. The problem is structural; it is insoluble; it is why no one can ever write this book. Complex stories, essays and poems have this problem, too -- the prohibitive structural defect the writer wishes he had never noticed. He writes it in spite of that." Luminous and wise writing advice from Annie Dillard, author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, one of the most beautiful books written in the last hundred years (published when Dillard was 29). As a writer myself, I am often asked by younger folk how to become one. Dillard says best what I would tell them.
posted on Jan 10, 2005 - View this thread

Now it's officially a trend: Attacking the privacy of those who invade privacy (bottom of page) by publicizing their information. What's the verb for this going to be? I think "Barrying" should be a contender.
posted on Oct 14, 2003 - View this thread

Fishing for Information? Try Better Bait. [NYT] It's nice to see the NY Times take a stab at helping normal folk become better at searching the web. They point to Gary Price's resourceshelf.com, Greg R. Notess's searchengineshowdown.com and Danny Sullivan's searchenginewatch.com and Tara Calishain's researchbuzz.com.
It's just nice to see a story that's not All About Google for a change. Somewhat related articles: One over at O'Reilly On How To Build Your Own, and one at CNET on Nutch, an open-source web search engine.
Anyone have any favorite search engine tricks to share?
posted on Aug 22, 2003 - View this thread

The Shallowing of American Taste First tastebuds and palates fall to McDonalds, now the eyes, ears, and minds fall to Wal-Mart, according to this NY Times article (free registration required)...

"The growing clout of Wal-Mart and the other big discount chains ? they now often account for more than 50 percent of the sales of a best-selling album, more than 40 percent for a best-selling book, and more than 60 percent for a best-selling DVD -- has bent American popular culture toward the tastes of their relatively traditionalist customers...But with the chains' power has come criticism from authors, musicians and civil liberties groups who argue that the stores are in effect censoring and homogenizing popular culture. The discounters and price clubs typically carry an assortment of fewer than a thousand books, videos and albums, and they are far more ruthless than specialized stores about returning goods if they fail to meet a minimum threshold of weekly sales."

Add in Clear Channel Radio and sanitized text books, and all I can say is that the internet has come along at the time it's needed. With the fingers of big commerce all over our culture, the web can serve to reverse an old mega-trend to "high-touch, high-tech." With Wal-Mart, et al, touching our minds, we need to resort to tech to add some depth and breath to their narrow and shallow offerings.
posted on May 17, 2003 - View this thread

Is Gavin Menzies the Stephen Wolfram of history? That's the question today's New York Times (login: dr_mabuse, pw: mabuse) suggests in a Menzies profile. Menzies has a new book out, 1421, which claims that the Chinese discovered America seven decades before Columbus did. Some people have made similarly precise claims about this planet's developments. Others have seen their amateur claims initially mocked and later proven to be correct. Is Menzies onto something or is he a crank? And how do we place the passionate amateur within the realm of scholarly pursuits?
posted on Jan 5, 2003 - View this thread

Peace Activist Philip Berrigan Dead at 79 Yes, I know, obituaries are depressing. But this man was one of my very few heros. He fought a good fight, but in this age of corporate sponsored and government promoted dimunation of conscience can a single person "bearing witness" to the immoral actions that go on in this world really make a difference? Or is the idea of citizen protest just a quaint vestige of another era? [NYT link]
posted on Dec 7, 2002 - View this thread

The CIA is back in the business of committing assasinations on foreign soil. Meanwhile, the administration still objects to Israel's policy of targeted killings because of its effect on the peace process.
posted on Nov 5, 2002 - View this thread

Department of Homeland Security to be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act and the Whistleblower Protection Act? The last episode of NOW ran a piece on the FOIA which described how back in 1974 President Ford and his staff, which included Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, opposed Congress' strengthening of the FOIA, and Ford tried unsuccessfully to veto it. Now this new exemption looks like the continuation of a 28 year-old feud. Ridge says it is in order to not "draw a road map of critical infrastructure vulnerabilities," but are complete exemptions really necessary for that? The potential for abuse seems quite dangerous. (Some previous discussions of FOIA revelations here and here).
posted on Jul 1, 2002 - View this thread

Government Will Ease Limits on Domestic Spying by F.B.I. (NY Times link) As part of a sweeping effort to transform the F.B.I. into a domestic terrorism prevention agency, Attorney General John Ashcroft has decided to relax restrictions on the bureau's ability to conduct domestic spying in counterterrorism operations, senior government officials said today. Here's the Wash. Post's take on the story.
posted on May 30, 2002 - View this thread

An Algerian defendant tells a court of his transformation from an irreligious drug dealer on the streets of Germany to an Afghanistan-trained militant, and the psychic journey of some young Muslim slackers in England to become fighters for Al-Qaeda (NYT).
posted on Apr 24, 2002 - View this thread

Is President Bush Gay? (Answer: No, but he says "fabulous" a lot.) Is Billy Joel washed up? (NYT required) (Answer: Sounds like it.) Is Star Wars Episode Two any good? (Answer: Yes, beyond your wildest dreams.)
posted on Mar 18, 2002 - View this thread

Senator Hollings makes the case for a special council to look into the Enron affair. (NY Times link). San Antonio columnist Jan Jarboe Russell argues for the same. Here's a Guardian article on the situation.
posted on Feb 9, 2002 - View this thread

Small World Research Project After all the work we've done training newbies not to use the Internet for their chain letters (via this New York Times article)
posted on Dec 20, 2001 - View this thread

"What is your name? Do you have a claim against me? Does anyone have a claim against me? I demand, or request, that the order of the court be released to me immediately." (NYT link) 12 Michigan (natch) nutcases shout the same four questions over and over during their fraud, conspiracy, and tax evasion trial. Seems they believe the four questions shield them from government authority. They also believe the U.S. Constitution was invalidated when FDR took us off the gold standard, and the federal government has no power over them. I wonder if they'll come to feel differently after a few years in the federal penitentiary?
posted on Dec 13, 2001 - View this thread

NYTimes blacklisting? "All the writers are co-plaintiffs in a well-known class-action lawsuit by the Authors Guild and the National Writers Union against the Times over electronic rights and royalties disputes." The case reached the Supreme Court. NYTimes published an article 25 Sep about the accusation though its now a "pay-per-view" article. Response to NYT from one the plaintiffs here (slow server). Freelancers had expressed fear this would happen.
posted on Oct 3, 2001 - View this thread

Bernie for mayor! Kramer For Mayor! NY has a lot of choices for mayor.
posted on Aug 28, 2001 - View this thread

Staten Island postal people prevent posting of posterior postcards. Um, I mean, they wouldn't allow postcards of guys' butts to be sent. The cards were advertising short films to be shown at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. (NYT. Login: imaguest; password: imaguest)
posted on Jul 27, 2001 - View this thread

AMTRAK still off-track (NY Times link) Even before living in France I loved trains. So it pains to read that AMTRAK is stillheading towards its last run. Do you progressive, SUV-hating Mefi people have any thoughts on how AMTRAK might get its act together (or whether it's all SUV-futile)?
posted on Jul 25, 2001 - View this thread

Like smartertimes, but dumber - dumbertimes.com is kind of like the Onion of small independent sites that provide daily criticism of the New York Times.
posted on May 8, 2001 - View this thread

He gives a whole new meaning to the word "Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy." NY Times
posted on May 1, 2001 - View this thread

The ACLU wants to protect your privacy from government electronic surveillance programs like Echelon and Carnivore. Their full page ad in today's NYT claims 4th amendment rights are being violated by the US government, which is overstepping their bounds, and nearly free of up-to-date laws. Is it to late or can anything be done to protect civilian electronic communication?
posted on Apr 15, 2001 - View this thread

A Clarification -- Dave Eggers wants to expose the process, "By reprinting your correspondence to me I hope to illuminate the journalist's mind: how a writer starts by telling me he is a fan of my work, supports my company's endeavors, etc, then writes a snippety little thing full of sneering and suspicion." so he's posted ALL of the email correspondance he had with david kirkpatrick before this unflattering piece was printed... and after.
    "I think it's important that our exchange be published. It's the only remedy commensurate with the impact you enjoyed with your original piece. I want your friends and family to see it, and to say 'David, ew.'"
    Meanspirited all around, but can you blame him?
posted on Feb 22, 2001 - View this thread

William Safire in the NY Times: "...to attribute racism to Ashcroft, who appointed more black judges than any Missouri governor and whose wife is revered for her years of teaching at mostly black Howard University, is to admit the bankruptcy of his opposition."
posted on Jan 18, 2001 - View this thread

What the Bertelsmann-Napster deal means.
"Hank Barry, chief executive of Napster, has suggested a monthly fee of about $4.95 might be appropriate, but he stressed that fees had not been set." (NYT article; grow up.)
posted on Nov 1, 2000 - View this thread

Rocket firing gunships vs. rock throwers? Am I the only one who finds this stuff a bit disturbing? If it was any country other than Israel, wouldn't there be a completely different slant to the news stories?
posted on Oct 3, 2000 - View this thread

NYTimes.com asks for feedback on its new home page
The New York Times on the Web previewed a new design for its popular home page today. The page widens the content areas to over 750 pixels, up from around 500. The page now presents special feature teasers, and links to NYT's hideously unpopular Internet "knowledge network" venture, Abuzz.com, along the enlarged right-hand margin. No word was given as to whether the site would abandon its free registration requirement. "Surfers" may register their opinions about the new design at newhomepage@nytimes.com
posted on Oct 3, 2000 - View this thread