Enigk Update #105482
Mr. Enigk has decided to make up not going to New Haven by releasing his forthcoming solo album World Waits on my birthday. There was an interesting review (a picture of a magazine clipping) linked to from http://www.lewishollow.com/, Enigk's website.
Also, Space Empires V, after it's 1600th postponment, is going to be released in late October. This means (since all things release on Tuesdays by law of the universe) that it could very well be released on October 17 (My birthday).
All very nice.
Before You Exercise Your First Amendment Rights Again...
Know that you can get toasted like your TV dinner last night. What the article fails to mention is what the microwaves do to you. They call it "non-lethal," which technically it is (mostly), but the truth is a bit more complex.
The article talks about how the idea is to use such devices on Americans first before being used overseas because of diplomatic problems. The fact that diplomatic problems could arise from use of a device should make one question what it is that the device does exactly. It is still being tested, but it is interesting to notice certain things about how it was tested (section: "Testing"). The participants, who were exposed to beams that caused "intolerable pain" within five seconds of contact with the skin, were not allowed to wear glasses or contacts for fear of eye damage (magnification) and could not wear any clothes with buttons, zippers, etc. that would create spots where the microwaves could concentrate and cause a fire to start. So when they get used for "crowd control," they're going to ask everyone to remove their glasses/contacts/zippers/buttons? Not likely. The whole problem with such devices being used for crowd control is missed. One's right to protest is effectively revoked when you will be tortured if you attempt to do so. And the framing of its usage as only against "unruly crowds" is a facade. In Seattle, according to authorities, the entire crowd was "unruly" though actually violent behavior was perpetrated by only a tiny minority. The end result is that they can fry an entire crowd because there were a couple of twats in their midst. I'll be looking forward to feeling like I'm on fire next time I take part in a march.
Book Review: Orwell's Homage To Catalonia
George Orwell is best known for writing 1984 and Animal Farm. However, he also was one of the very small group of political commentators who were willing to put their words into action. He went to Spain in December 1936, arriving in Barcelona as a journalist, but quickly signed up with a local militia (P.O.U.M., a small left-wing communist party allied with the anarchist F.A.I. and the associated C.N.T. union). Actually, I'm going to quit with the narration now. It's probably been done a thousand times. Here, read this for the summary.
What I really wanted to do was talk about what an excellent book this is. I know that lavishing praise on something is generally not a good way to go about reviewing something, so I'll try to minimize such things. However, the book serves as an excellent read on the situation in the war, which was very poorly (and inaccurately) reported by the international press. In fact, Orwell states that one of his reasons for writing the book was to counter some of the myths that had taken hold in the West with regards to factionalism in the Republican forces. Little of the more scholarly literature on the war deals in any depth with the extent of control of the Anarchists in Catalonia and what sort of collectivizing they were able to achieve. This is part of what is so interesting about the book. Orwell was amazed at the proletarian atmosphere in Barcelona when he arrived, and what he saw both in the rear and at the front (the military operated on a more-or-less egalitarian system, with all ranks treated with equal respect, pay, rations, etc.) convinced him that, for once in the long history of "people's revolutions" the people were for once actually in power.
Of course, such things could not last. The communists and liberals in the government wanted the revolution not only to be brought to a halt, but to be reversed, so they could gain the support of the Spanish bourgeoisie and convince the Western countries that Spain was not a country that would threaten their colonial ambitions and their oppression of their own working class. In effect, the communists wanted Spain to be another bourgeois democracy, following the Soviet Union's line that world revolution must wait (of course, the Soviet government by this time had no interest in revolution, they being the ruling class themselves). The anarchists on the other hand wanted the revolution to go forward, believing there was no point in fighting Franco and fascism if the worker would go back to being the drudge of the rich at the end of it. Initially, Orwell was indifferent to the political arguments (he had come to fight fascism, not to fight for any specific ideology), but by the time of the Barcelona street fighting he had come around to believing that the anarchists were right and the government was moving towards a fascistic stance themselves.
The whole book is told in the style of humor that is a hallmark of Orwell's writing. His descriptions of life in the trenches are infused with genuine humor, such as his remark that pacifists should take pictures of the lice that are an unavoidable part of war and print them in pamphlets to discourage recruitment. Even events that were surely frightening at the time (such as when he was taking a picture of a machine-gun crew and they accidentally opened fire on him) are retold in a humorous manner.
Beyond the value of Homage To Catalonia as a eyewitness account of the Catalonian collectivisation and Barcelona fighting, it is simply a very interesting book. Orwell's description of trench life/warfare is quite absorbing, and his discussion of the changes in life behind the front as the war went are especially interesting in light of the atmosphere in which he entered the country.
Here at the end I just want to point out that we have in Orwell something that you never see anymore: an ideologue who is willing to actually fight for what he believes in, far removed from your punk-rock anarchists and draft-dodging warmongers who flee at the first threat to their comfort and well-being. Make no mistake, Spain was a warzone, as much as any other. Thousands of foreigners and hundreds of thousands of Spaniards died in the war. The fascists were not lenient in any way with prisoners, and many foreigners were executed by them. Orwell himself caught a sniper's bullet in the neck and was lucky to survive. Even as I sit here praising him for his willingness to fight for his convictions, it is an honest question whether I would be willing to do the same.
Mexican Election Fraud
Despite evidence of systematic fraud throughout the Mexican voting system, the electoral commission decided to uphold the results of the election that gave the conservative Calderon a 233,000-vote advantage over left-center Obrador out of 41.6 million cast. The electoral commission refused to perform a full recount because it is illegal to open the sealed ballot boxes, though I have to question the purpose of keeping the boxes if you can't look at them after the initial count. Regardless, they recounted 9% of the ballots, and after the annulment of hundreds of thousands of votes for errors, Calderon had lost 7,000 votes. Despite the concern that the discovery of such an enormous number of errors would prompt in the average observer (which it didn't seem to among the commission), there are more systematic problems than vote counts.
Vincente Fox, the current President of Mexico, and Lopez Obrador have a poor history. Fox tried to oust Obrador while he was mayor of Mexico City, and succeeded for a while until massive street demonstrations forced Fox to accept Obrador's position. This obviously does not bode well for partiality in the election, and Fox put his full support behind Calderon, helping to make personal attacks against Obrador (in one he claimed that Obrador would become the puppet of Hugo Chavez if elected). Not only is this bad for fair elections, its also technically illegal in Mexican elections, but the commission couldn't be bothered to say anymore than that it "probably" had a strong impact on the elections.
Though the electoral commission is technically independent of the government, they still are government employees in the pay of the current administration. For them to sit here and act as if they are entirely neutral in such affairs is absurd. The electoral system relies so heavily on the "independence" of this commission and refuses to administer any reasonable objective precautions, like, for instance, conducting a full recount.
What it boils down to in the end is just another example of conservatives in power subtly bending the rules to stay in power, keeping out the poor and declaring that they are defending the system against "radicals" and "disrupters." It is good to see that the people of Mexico will not be fooled by such behavior and are preparing to continue to oppose the government and the electoral commission's decision. Sadly, all anti-governmental activities always end the same way; Already in Oaxaca the government is preparing to "restore order" using the military, and such action against the much larger protests in Mexico City will certainly occur soon.
Track Review: "Circlewave"
Track 12 on Squarepusher's Ultravisitor.
The reason why I'm reviewing a single track as opposed to an album is because this track is amazingly well put together, and, more importantly, I don't own Ultravisitor. The reason I chose this track specifically is because it progresses amazingly. The first minute and a half is general drum-chaos, with little beat or order. The first stage wraps up by the drums slowing down and then they are joined by a keyboard in a series of 1/4-note beats, setting the stage for a generally organized progression for the next three minutes. By the time the second bassline comes in, the order begins to descend into general chaos once more. The drums start to flail and lose order, and soon the instruments are "missing" the marks. A cacophony of various noises grows along with the time-chaos, culminating in the sudden ending. It could be described as philosophical if one wanted, but I'm not about to do something so elitist.
Obviously, hearing the song would clarify what is being said above.
