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What is patriotism? Why is this war going ahead? One of a few questions being thrown around on War Debate, albeit not factual or profound. The site looks fairly new so you can post there to keep all the war jabber off MeFi.
posted by h0ney at 11:56 PM PST - 18 comments

NeoConservatism in a Nutshell! Lately I've been researching the NeoConservative movement and stumbled upon this European website which is by far the best overview I have encountered. Be sure to read the end called The Dangers for Europe. Here is a little tidbit - "What ought to be of concern to Europeans is the fact that Americans are being indoctinated into beliefs which many Europeans (particularly those who are old enough to remember the 1920's and 1930's) would characterise as extremely dangerous.... A country considers itself at war against an ill-defined foreign enemy who threaten its way of life. To protect itself against this enemy, civil liberties are abrogated, arrest and detention without trial are introduced and the state creates a secret police which can spy on citizens and foreigners alike. The state allies itself with big business to protect its way of life and promote national security. Public opinion is manipulated so that dissent from the "national purpose" becomes socially unacceptable. Those are the conditions which Europeans will recognise as the precursors of fascism. "
posted by thedailygrowl at 11:48 PM PST - 22 comments

"I prefer not to work in Canada. I prefer to work in my own country...There are better actors down here. That's why they have to import so many actors for their Canadian productions."

Oscar winner Robert Duvall claimed Canadians don't make good actors following a Kevin Costner "runaway production" made in Calgary. He should know, having worked with Canadians and been involved with Canadian projects in the past (maybe he's secretly Canadian!). Could he have been referring to these folks? Or does he just lack the patience to coach Canadian's to speak American (NY Times reg. req'd)? Hopefully it's all just be an allergic reaction to tacky-female-cheese-pop-muzik...
posted by boost ventilator at 9:33 PM PST - 17 comments

DEA fails White House budget review. (PDF) Busy raiding the homes of disabled medical marijuana users, the DEA has been, in the words of the White House Office of Management and Budget, "unable to demonstrate its progress in reducing the availability of illegal drugs in the U.S." [via MPP]
posted by botono9 at 6:18 PM PST - 7 comments

powell flip flop [via rc3] on top of citing flimsy, plagiarized, out of date reports as evidence against iraq. powell cant make up his mind if osama is in cahoots with iraq. osamas statement appears to show support for the iraqi people -yet labels "Saddam's Baath party as "infidels." " are powell and the administration grasping at straws?
posted by specialk420 at 4:49 PM PST - 57 comments

It's not just for bullets anymore! previously discussed on MeFi here, I would like to reconsider "Depleted Uranium" (DU) in terms of its non-military uses. As ballast in the Columbia, the pieces of which were scattered across our country, for instance? Also in the ballast of many commercial airplanes, helicopters and ships. Should we really be using this stuff so lightly? I mean, just because it's twice as heavy as lead does that counterbalance the incredibly damaging long-term (half-life = how many billion years?) effects of DU burning and becoming a wind-borne inhalant? (Gulf Syndrome) To paraphrase Seinfeld, what's the deal with DU?
posted by zekinskia at 4:20 PM PST - 27 comments

"Hello, my name is Scott." He's Scott, he's 22, and he's worn a nametag for the past 833 days. Why? So that people will feel more inclined to talk to him. To break down social barriers. Surprisingly, it has worked. I'm sure many of us try to be friendly to strangers, but in some cultures these days you're almost sure to be rebuffed or ignored. That's how it is here in the UK. Are people open and friendly in your part of the world without needing gimmicks like a nametag?
posted by wackybrit at 4:06 PM PST - 39 comments

The Gallery of Regrettable Food: "Frizzle slices of cooked ham in hot butter, adding 1 1/2 teaspoons of drained prepared horseradish to each 2 tablespoons of butter or margarine. Add cheese." Advertisements, Strange recipes from "the golden age of butter", and just plain weird stuff. Also, I think this guy used to do my tech support. with thanks to Television Without Pity and cakeman
posted by anastasiav at 3:13 PM PST - 13 comments

The Best Food You Never Had: Reading Jake Adam York's juicy essay on the art of the barbecue, I was once again sadly reminded I've never had the pleasure of tasting real, Southern U.S. open-pit barbecue. I have no idea whether it's better in Texas, Kansas, Louisiana, Alabama, Kentucky or Georgia; whether pork is better than beef; smoked is tastier than plain... Then I realized there are quite a number of other delicious foods (like fresh abalone sashimi; Alaskan king crab cooked live; a clam-bake on the beach; real wasabi; smoked sablefish; fresh unsalted caviar; an oyster Po'Boy...) I've never tried. It's an interesting gastronomic category: something you've read about and heard about and probably drooled over, that you just know you'd love if only you had a chance to try it! So forgive my curiosity: what's the best food you've never had? [Main link via Arts and Letters Daily]
posted by MiguelCardoso at 2:40 PM PST - 95 comments

"There was one streaming radio site that I loved, but it's fallen on hard times." Back in June 2001, MeFi members discussed their favorite on-line radio broadcasts. Since then, the CARP ruling meant hard times for a lot of Internet broadcasts. Out of all the stations listed in the original thread, which ones have survived? Find out inside.
posted by webmutant at 12:54 PM PST - 41 comments

Happy Darwin Day! Darwin Day is February 12th, the date of birth of Charles Darwin in the year 1809, at Shrewsbury, England. On this date, and throughout the month, people from all over the world are honoring the life, work and influence of Charles Darwin with events and activities which celebrate humanity and the science in our lives. While you're celebrating you may want to see who has won awards in his name or perhaps buy a sticker or see if there's a darwinday event near you
posted by bitdamaged at 12:40 PM PST - 15 comments

If you jonesed for a beta capsule as a kid, and crossed your hands to zap monsters with the specium ray while playing outside, then this site is for you. Shoowatchi!
posted by ursus_comiter at 12:36 PM PST - 15 comments

The Traitor List. From the straw man while-u-wait department. Remove known sociopaths like Zacarias Moussaoui and Patch Adams from the mix and you get a pretty good list of celebrity activists, with a few politicians for good measure. Anyway, is this site a joke or not? Should actors stay out of politics? And is there something unAmerican about posting images in the right aspect ratio?
posted by condour75 at 11:26 AM PST - 38 comments

Thailand launches national "Bust-Boosting" campaign - "In an almost surreal scene, rows of women in shorts and T-shirts massaged and squeezed their breasts in front of the crowd of officials, media and onlookers on a busy Bangkok street....The health ministry said the idea was to show Thai women that there was another, more natural way, of boosting their breast size than plastic surgery. ...Cosmetic surgery is an extremely popular and lucrative business in Thailand....Bangkok is renowned for its inexpensive, but not always reliable, plastic surgeons." (via BBC) Here's a history of the slogan "We must, we must, we must increase our bust"
posted by troutfishing at 10:11 AM PST - 13 comments

Adopt A Bison. There are several handsome candidates for adoption at the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Oklahoma. Elsewhere, the 51 tribes of the InterTribal Bison Cooperative seek to restore the tatanka to their lands and way of life. And in North Dakota, the falling human population is creating more room for the bison to return to. Perhaps the time is right to restore the Great Plains.
posted by homunculus at 10:02 AM PST - 20 comments

Not all the pioneers who pushed west across the U.S. could afford a covered wagon. Between 1846 and 1869, some 300,000 people - mostly Mormons - pulled their belongings in handcarts over 1,000 miles over the Mormon Trail from Nauvoo, Illinois to Salt Lake City (and not everyone made it). Reenacting the trek has become popular – very popular.
posted by gottabefunky at 9:52 AM PST - 10 comments

How to survive any RPG - a 'one size fits all' guide to Role Playing Games. As anyone who has played the Final Fantasy series knows, RPGs are full of cliches. In my opinion, the best RPG I ever played was Chrono Trigger, (its referred two quite a bit in those two lists) and modern game such as Neverwinter Nights don't seem to hold my attention. Perhaps the way forward is to cross genres, mixing RPG with other games, such as First Person Shooters and Real Time Strategies.
posted by Orange Goblin at 9:19 AM PST - 36 comments

"American Idol" Star Bounced. Evan Marriott's brief career as an underwear model wasn't a problem. And "Joe Millionaire" contestant Sarah Kozer's starring role in dozens of bondage and fetish films also was of no concern to Fox Television. But the network has bounced an "American Idol" contestant because she once posed nude for an Internet porn site. Is this setting a double standard?
posted by Macboy at 8:29 AM PST - 56 comments

I Hate Music is a page devoted to scathing commentary on popular music and the musicians who make it. The author let's loose such gems as: Face it, every single note of music ever committed to paper, vinyl, CD, zeroes and ones sucks harder than Linda Lovelace in a sucking competition with a black hole. There is absolutely nothing going for music. It just plain sucks. (found here) Don't miss out on the very comprehensive archives.
posted by ashbury at 6:19 AM PST - 23 comments

Homeless Quints. When a white American has quints in America, companies fall all over themselves to provide money, goods, and services for this "miracle." When a dark-skinned Nigerian has quints in America, though, a somewhat harder time is in store. Citizenship concerns aside, the lack of humanitarian concern here is staggering.
posted by FormlessOne at 6:15 AM PST - 26 comments

                                   Labors Of Love
Here are some handmade pages, personal and corporate, on American Vernacular Music and more:

First, here's Long Time Coming, with three separate shrines to Dock Boggs, Pretty Boy Floyd and Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers, worthy subjects all. I have no idea what the Eyeneer Records revenue model is or was but their American Music Archive, (Latest Update - August 20, 1999), albeit spotty, is still a must stop and see with pages on Charley Patton, Sleepy John Estes and Lucille Bogan, for example, and that's just the blues section. It's a very promising sounding site--and it's too bad they never finished it, but, on the other hand, thank god,they have not yet pulled the plug. Lea Gilmore's It's A Girl Thang's Historical Profiles has it goin' on with Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Big Maybelle and Georgia White for examples. Catherine Yronwode, of course, is a name well known here, as is her wondrous Lucky Mojo, cornucopica that it is. There, among much riches, is the extensive and authoritative Blues Lyrics and Hoodoo --but that's Not All ! »→ »→ »→
posted by y2karl at 1:56 AM PST - 21 comments

Doing some research on the submarine Thresher,I found a song written by Phil Ochs about the tragedy. I don't think it hit the charts like Gordon Lightfoots' song regarding the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. It then occurred to me that there probably will not be a song about the space shuttle Columbia. Why not?
posted by JohnR at 12:09 AM PST - 17 comments