Ian Hunter, 15 Oct 2011, Tarrytown Music Hall, Tarrytown NY

Saturday Gigs

All The Young Dudes

GOP Rep Calls CNN Show a ‘Joke’ on Live TV After ‘Ridiculous’ Question

Rep. Connie Mack (R-Fla.) took Piers Morgan to task on his show Monday after the CNN host accused the congressman of “stabbing [House Speaker John Boehner] in the back” for voting against the debt deal.

The interview kicked off with Morgan asking Mack whether he could presume the congressman “would have been quite happy for your country to go into catastrophic default” because he voted no.

“Well then, you would have presumed wrong, obviously,” Mack said.

The two debated the merits of the deal and the economists who supported it, with Morgan asking at one point, “I‘m sure you’ve heard of Paul Krugman, for example. He won a Nobel Prize for economics.”

A few minutes later, Morgan asked Mack if he could also presume Mack wanted Boehner (R-Ohio) to resign the speakership “given he’s authorized this terrible deal?”

“Of course I don’t believe that,” Mack said. “I think the speaker has done as good a job as he can given the circumstances….It’s not something that I supported, but that’s what happens here in Washington, D.C. all the time.”

“If he’s done such a great job, why did you stab him in the back?” Morgan asked.

“I didn’t stab him in the back. Come on, don’t be ridiculous with stuff like that. Now you’re just making your show a joke,” Mack replied.

“Really, why is that?” Morgan asked.

“For saying things like that, Piers. Come on,” Mack said.

Morgan challenged Mack’s comment before repeating the back-stabbing remark again about Mack’s no vote on the deal: “You are stabbing him in the back, metaphorically. Not really, you’re not doing it with a knife, but effectively, that‘s what you’re doing.”

Muslim Sharia Law In Australia

Cheerleader Aspirant Felled by Flu Shot

Dystonia is a neurological condition that has afflicted at least this one person who was training to be a professional cheerleader.

Obama to Fox News Ed Henry: ‘I didn’t know you were the spokesman for Mitt Romney’

FNC’s Chief White House Correspondent Ed Henry got the first question at today’s joint news conference between Pres. Obama and Lee Myung-Bak, President of South Korea. Henry asked the president about the alleged Iranian terror plot, and used a quote from GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney who had criticized Obama’s leadership.

Obama responded with, “I didn’t know you were the spokesman for Mitt Romney.”

In an interview later with Megyn Kelly, Henry explains, “I was trying to put it in the broader context of not just Mitt Romney, but there are a lot of Republicans out there who would charge that this president leads from behind.”

“He decided not to engage with Mitt Romeny,” said Henry. “Instead, he decided to go after me a little bit.”

Experts say Obama certificate not scan of original document

2 new reports cast further doubt on image White House released

‘KNOCK IT OFF!‘ SEE BILL O’REILLY’S WILD INTERVIEW WITH TAVIS SMILEY & CORNEL WEST

INDOCTRINATION? DEBATE CONTINUES OVER ISLAMIC CARTOON & COMIC BOOK SERIES

Islamic Superheroes

Obama Promotes Islam: WHAM! BAM! ISLAM! Trailer

The Heroes of Tomorrow?

Ninety-nine mystical Noor Stones carry all that is left of the wisdom and knowledge of the lost civilization of Baghdad. The Noor Stones lie scattered across the globe-now little more than a legend. However one man has made it his life's mission to seek out what was once lost. His name is Dr. Ramzi Razem and he has searched long and hard for the missing stones, to no avail. His luck is about to change...

DETROIT (The Blaze/AP) — Comic book fans might call it a great origin story: In the aftermath of 9/11, a Muslim man creates a comic book series, “The 99,” inspired by the principles of his faith. It builds a global audience and investors contribute millions for it to continue and expand.

Despite this intriguing story, critics have dismissed the project as mere indoctrination (last year, the Blaze covered the debate surrounding the comic book series).

In two vastly different cultures, Naif Al-Mutawa’s tale has hit a few roadblocks: Censorship from Saudi Arabia, home to the main Muslim holy sites; in the United States, a struggle to build an audience in a post-9/11 world where suspicion and scrutiny of all things Islamic is certainly present.

“That’s one of the things that was most disappointing to me in the beginning,” Al-Mutawa said on a recent visit to Detroit. “You have two birthplaces: You have the birthplace of Islam, which initially rejected it (and) the birthplace of democracy and tolerance, this country, that I’m now facing resistance in – the two natural places for this product.”

Below, watch Al-Mutawa discuss “The 99” during a TED talk last year:



Al-Mutawa’s reputation in the Middle East and elsewhere has grown since the 2006 debut of “The 99,” as well as its rollout into animation. The series is named for the 99 qualities the Quran attributes to God: strength, courage, wisdom and mercy among them.

The comic book spawned a TV series and 26 half-hour episodes of the 3-D animated version of the “The 99” have been sold to broadcasters. They are expected to be released early next year in more than 50 countries, and a second season is in production.




Al-Mutawa, a U.S.-educated psychologist from Kuwait, has been promoting “Wham! Bam! Islam!“ a PBS documentary that tells the story of ”The 99″ from an idea hatched during a cab ride to its raising of $40 million in three calls for investors. The promotional push is supporting the animated series, the vehicle by which his company hopes to turn a profit.

“The 99” grew out of his childhood love of Batman, Superman and their superhero brethren, along with a desire to provide role models for his five young sons.

“Basically, `The 99′ is based on Quranic archetypes, the same way that Batman and Superman are based on Judeo-Christian and Biblical archetypes. And just like Batman and Superman are secular story lines, so too are `The 99,’” he said.

“It seemed to me that the only people using mass media when it came to things to do with religion – at least my religion – were people who were doing very destructive things. So the question was how do I challenge that in a way that’s secular yet cannot be dismissed as Western?”

Critics on both sides of the religious and cultural divide see subversion in Al-Mutawa’s superheroes. Some hardline Muslims say the series subverts their faith by embodying the attributes in human characters, while a few non-Muslim American critics have labeled it sneaky Islamic indoctrination.

Al-Mutawa said it took investment by an Islamic investment bank to make his series “halal,” or acceptable to Saudi officials. The nation’s government-run broadcaster has since bought the rights to the animated series. So has The Hub cable network in the U.S. – though the latter has indefinitely postponed airing it after some critical columns and blog posts.

“One of the comments on the blogs that ended up delaying us was someone who warned that we can’t let the Muslims brainwash our children like the Mexicans did with `Dora the Explorer,’” Al-Mutawa said. Religious News Service has more:

“Be prepared for the latest exercise in Muslim propaganda,” warned Adrian Morgan, editor at Family Security Matters, a conservative website, in a column last year. “Are we going to see ass-kicking Christian superhero nuns, called Faith, Hope and Charity, whooping sinner’s butts and sending Satan into hell? It is doubtful.”
A few weeks later, New York Post columnist Andrea Peyser griped that “Wonder Woman-style cleavage has been banned from the ladies,” in “The 99,” and “male and female characters are never alone together.”
Still, he’s measuring broader acceptance in other ways. Al-Mutawa worked with DC Comics last year on a six-issue crossover that teamed “The 99” with The Justice League of America.

“They start out with distrust between the two teams of superheroes – Superman punches one of my guys early on,” Al-Mutawa said. “And then they figure out during the arc that it’s the bad guys causing the distrust.”

Robin Wright, author of “Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion Across the Islamic World,” said Al-Mutawa has “been way ahead of the curve in figuring out how you challenge extremism and how you create alternative role models to Osama bin Laden or Hassan Nasrallah (Hezbollah’s leader) for kids and adults.”

Muslim characters are rare in U.S. comic books but there have been some inroads.

Marvel Comics has Dust, a young Afghan woman whose mutant ability to manipulate sand and dust has been part of the popular X-Men books.

“I don’t view a Muslim superhero as avant garde,” Marvel editor-in-chief Axel Alonso said. “Muslims comprise approximately 23 percent of the world’s population, and we like our comics to reflect the world in its diversity.”

Dust wears a robe and veil to observe Muslim hijab, or modest dress. Another character, M, is a woman of Algerian descent who only recently revealed her faith in the pages of “X-Factor.” Like millions of other Muslim women in the real world, she “does not observe hijab, and often dresses quite provocatively,” Alonso said.

Other characters have not been so accepted. In late 2010, DC Comics introduced Nightrunner, a young Muslim hero of Algerian descent raised in Paris. He’s part of the global network of crime fighters set up by Batman alter-ego Bruce Wayne. Conservative bloggers decried the move, noting that instead of tapping a native French person, they opted for a minority.

Frank Miller, whose dark and moody take on Batman in “The Dark Knight Returns” in 1986 energized the character, has taken a different tack in his latest work, “Holy Terror,” which tells the story of The Fixer and his efforts to stamp out Islamic terrorists.

The graphic novel initially took root as a look at Batman’s efforts to fight terrorism, something that grew out of Miller’s experiences of being in New York during 9/11. As he worked on it, it became apparent that it wasn’t suitable for the DC character.

“As I developed it and worked on it, the subject was too serious and the character’s actions were not Batman,” he said.

The book has been criticized as anti-Islamic propaganda, but Miller says that’s not his notion.

“I lived through a time when 3,000 of my neighbors were incinerated for no apparent reason. I lived through the chalky, smoky weeks that followed and through the warplanes flying overhead and realized that, much like my character, The Fixer, I found a mission,” he said.



As for “The 99,” he said has not seen it but welcomes Al-Mutawa’s efforts.

“I come in with my own very pro-Western-they-attacked-my-city-point of view,” Miller said. “If other people have other points of view to bring in, I just welcome it.”

Al-Mutawa called “Holy Terror” par for the historical course for Islam.

“There’s no denying that terrible things have happened in the name of my religion – as they have in the names of most religions, if not all religions,” he said. “As human beings, we’re a little bit lazy. We don’t like to change the schemas in our minds. We like to fit new information into existing schemas. That’s why to some people anything to do with Islam is going to be bad.”

Ultimately violence will be necessary, says Occupy L.A. speaker - Pt2 10/01/2011

Occupy L.A. Speaker: “One of the speakers said the solution is nonviolent movement. No, my friend. I’ll give you two examples: French Revolution, and Indian so-called Revolution.

Gandhi, Gandhi today is, with respect to all of you, Gandhi today is a tumor that the ruling class is using constantly to mislead us. French Revolution made fundamental transformation. But it was bloody.

India, the result of Gandhi, is 600 million people living in maximum poverty.

So, ultimately, the bourgeoisie won’t go without violent means. Revolution! Yes, revolution that is led by the working class.

Long live revolution! Long live socialism!”

Crowd: [Cheers.]

8 Reasons Young Americans Don't Fight Back:

How the US Crushed Youth Resistance

Rising Bank Fees

Nuclear testing

Nuclear testing, 1945-1998

Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto has created a beautiful, undeniably scary time-lapse map of the 2053 nuclear explosions which have taken place between 1945 and 1998, beginning with the Manhattan Project's "Trinity" test near Los Alamos and concluding with Pakistan's nuclear tests in May of 1998. This leaves out North Korea's two alleged nuclear tests in this past decade (the legitimacy of both of which is not 100% clear).

Each nation gets a blip and a flashing dot on the map whenever they detonate a nuclear weapon, with a running tally kept on the top and bottom bars of the screen. Hashimoto, who began the project in 2003, says that he created it with the goal of showing"the fear and folly of nuclear weapons." It starts really slow — if you want to see real action, skip ahead to 1962 or so — but the buildup becomes overwhelming.

TEA PARTY Invades OCCUPY DC- (explicit)

Islamists Occupy Wall Street

Obama Tells Advisers To Fund Stimulus Projects "Without Additional Congressional Authorization"

Obama Tells Advisers To Find How To Approve Stimulus Projects "Without Additional Congressional Authorization"

"Scour this report, identify all those areas in which we can act administratively without additional congressional authorization and just get it done," President Obama said today to a "Jobs Council" meeting.

AG Holder dodges & ignores questions on Fast & Furious

Holder high tails it outta' there after Fast and Furious.

Tea Party vs Occupy Wall Street in pictures

Contrast these two movements here.

U.S. Less Than 3 Years Away From Being Greece

Fmr. Head of Gov’t Accountability Office

Unemployment, Washington Post Chart

Could this time have been different? Ezra Klein, Washington Post

Cameraman Arrested by Suffolk County Police

This was the end of a police chase and the Sgt. doesn't want video coverage from a credentialed member of the press. The photog asks how far to move back but the sgt. says no you can't shoot it at all. Notice the road is open to traffic, there are people without a camera that are standing there and even some kids walk straight through the scene. The photog moves a block away and shoots from the next street over and that's when he's arrested and charged with Obstruction of Governmental Administration....how can you obstruct from a block away.

Caught on Video: News Cameraman Arrested For Filming Police Chase