It’s a shitty decision, yes. There’s lots of internet-love and mainstream-hate being directed towards Wikileaks. But before you get all up-in-arms, Amazon have made no comment as to whether they were kicked off for the content hosted on Wikileaks.

First and foremost, Amazon is a privately-owned business. They are not the U.S. government. They do not violate the letter or the spirit of the First Amendment  by stopping their business with Wikileaks. They are free to do business with whomever they want and in this case they exercised their freedom to refuse Wikileaks.

Second, any hosting company would be afraid to host Wikileaks. They are a magnet for subpeonas, DDOS attacks and hacking attempts. It’s like letting Batman live at your house and having him tell everyone where he’s staying. Supervillains are going to destroy your house and then kidnap you and hold you hostage. Batman might save you and pay for the damages but you’re still constantly under threat.

This woman:

• Yells “Heil Hitler” at a Israeli man
• Is wearing an Israel Defense Forces shirt
• Has large men standing by to protect her should her free speech be ill-received
• Makes a crying face when the man starts complaining about a huge hospital bill
• Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the USA is playing in the background

I invite you to provide counterweight to this with a video that makes America seem like it hasn’t lost it’s damn mind.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

– The First Amendment to the United States Constitution

Look here, I ain’t no fancy constitutional lawyer. I have zero background in lawyerin’ so all I’m going to do today is some reading comprehension for you idiots that continue to cry wolf. This amendment is forever being simplified as “freedom of speech” but there’s a lot of important words that appear around the phrase.

Walk with me.

Congress shall make no law…

This part means the United States Congress, those senators and House representatives you see on TV that wear suits and talk too much. It does not mean: some stranger, your boss, a website owner, the media or your mother. I could tie you to a chair with extension cords and gag you with a dirty sock but trust me, nowhere in the police report is it going to say I violated your First Amendment rights.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…

This part is what spurred this post today. Obama’s proposed stimulus money will not go towards schools that allow religious worship. This is not a violation of the First Amendment. You can worship whomever you want but you won’t be paid to do it. It would only be a violation if the government passed a law that said, “Everyone must attend mass on Sundays” or, “No more gods, we have too many,” or, “Don’t tell people that Satan is awesome.”

Before and after the stimulus package, you will still be able to 1) establish a religion and 2) exercise your religion freely.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech…

I covered this already but this means congress can’t make laws to shut you up. That being said, a senator could probably still tell you to shut up. He just can’t make you. He can’t lock you up for having an opposing opinion, he can’t silence you because he doesn’t want to hear what’s being said. But he’s probably free to tell you to shut up.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom… of the press…

This is probably the part of the amendment that’s most difficult for me to grasp. What freedoms does this entail and exactly who are the press? I understand the ideal is prevent government for lying to its people or re-writing history and whatnot. Basically, you want government dissent to always have a mouthpiece; you can’t only give out microphones to those who agree with you. Prevent mass brainwashing and whatnot.

It feels like there’s a lot of room for interpretation here. Thankfully, there’s a Wikipedia article all about Freedom of the press in the United States. It provides this delight Jefferson quote: “No experiment can be more interesting than that we are now trying, and which we trust will end in establishing the fact, that man may be governed by reason and truth. Our first object should therefore be, to leave open to him all avenues of the truth.”

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Simply: “petition” means to “ask”, “redress” means “fix” and “grievance” means “complaint”. You are allowed to ask the government to fix things that you think are not right. That’s cool. It’s like asking your super to fix things. No guarantee what happens once you ask the government for something but the First Amendment ensures that they will never make a law to stop you from bitching about them. This is important for when you grow old and you will want to do nothing but complain.

That’s all folks. Hope you feel as enlightened as I do. Please tell me if I got something wrong. The whole point of this exercise was to learn something new.

As an Australian, I was never really taught about MLK, the civil rights movement, or any American history at all besides a brief note about their departure from British rule. I’ve heard the words, “I Have a Dream,” referenced in random places but never understood the remarkable events that inspired it, the bitter struggle to get there and the subsequent violence that both preceded and followed it.

As a kid, I remember installing Microsoft Encarta, a digital encyclopedia that was competing against several others in this new age of CD distribution and multimedia. I remember that while the vast spans of text were practical, they weren’t particularly interesting compared to the animations, videos and sound clips. It’s where I learned how a nuclear chain reactions worked, DNA sequences, the moon landing, and the first paragraph of Dr. King’s speech. Being so young at the time, I had no idea what the complicated rhetoric meant or its historical importance.

Even now as a full-grown adult, I don’t think I could ever understand what it means. Not having lived it, breathed it, nor ever believed such injustice could exist in a country such as this one; I can’t understand.

A few years ago, on a sleepy Sunday afternoon, I was alone at home doing absolutely nothing. Flipping on the television, I found a documentary on the civil rights movement as led by Dr. King. I saw footage of Washington’s empty streets before it turned into the extraordinary gathering around the Lincoln memorial. The strength and faith to trust in democracy and peaceful protest. It helped me understand a lot more about the context of the speech; it demonstrated the complicated issue of race in this country and, most of all, it showed that America is a country that fights to march towards greater and more equal civil rights despite what the popular opinion of the time will be.

Lots of Obama + baby images over at tsawinter’s flickr.

Ok ladies and gentlemen, you’ve had enough time to figure out if you are going to have an Obama baby. If you haven’t peed on a stick and you are a college student, African American, non-working-class white, secret Muslim, socialist or any other contrived voting demographic, then perhaps you should check.

Think long and hard about an appropriate middle name for your child. “Hussein” may be ok depending on your cultural background and your motivations but Hitler as a middle name is probably a dick move.

Over the course of this election campaign, some pretty awful things were said. The thought bounced around my head while I listened to McCain’s concession speech and Obama’s acceptance speech. They were very gracious and sporting about the outcome of the election and they offered a very different sentiment than the ones in their attack ads. If you ever believed any of the attack ads, it can be difficult to reconcile the two disparate ideas.

I am guilty of buying into the negative hype and even reselling that special brand of schoolyard taunting that cuts deep. The kind of ugly shit that sick minds dream up in order to inflict as much hurt and pain as possible. Both campaigns showed some restraint and integrity but there was always someone on the attack, whether it was a low-level staffer, a regular attack dog, some crazy cable news anchor or a candidate gone rogue.

The ugliest yet comes from the freshly-defeated McCain camp that’s happy to air all sorts of crap about Sarah Palin. Let’s not forget who was supposed to have vetted her. The high ground would be to fire whomever thought she’d make a good Vice President and get over it. It’s as if the banks came on TV and started talking shit about all the poor people that can’t pay off their houses.

Finally, as if we needed a new reason to stop watching Fox News, Bill O’Reilly had the nerve to suggest that the Katie Couric interview was delivered in a snarky and sexist way by the liberal media. In that same breath, he discusses the juicy allegations of Palin’s shopping, wearing a towel and throwing “tantrums”. Evidently, he’s nailed the art of being incendiary because nothing annoys me more than an angry hypocrite.

The results are in and I’ve been proven to be… cynical. All the talk of the voter suppression and disenfranchisement that occurred in previous elections was unnecessary because Obama has won the presidency with hugely strong numbers. Not to say that the voting process can’t be improved but the last thing America needs is another election in limbo.

I am still very concerned about California’s Prop 8. The latest numbers show the Yes vote has a small lead at 51.9% (Yes means gay marriage is banned). It looks like America is still not ready for this.

Photo from the front page of BBC News. No apparent photographer credit.

It’s an incredible time to live in America. A new milestone in the ongoing history and conversation of race. A return to making politics about dealing with real, national problems. A powerful injection of enthusiasm for the democracy. I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that American voters picked the better candidate and the best man won.

McCain gave a very gracious concession speech. He worked to quell the boos that still followed every mention of Barack Obama and he asked for unity. I think this is only the first step in bridging the rift that the McCain-Palin campaign has encouraged but I cut McCain slack because he did just lose a very long and very expensive race. The fact that he’s still standing tall is testament to how tough this guy is. I really hope his actions from this point forward reflect the sentiment of his speech.

Watching the coverage tonight, I was still completely baffled about how the pundits call it. Pennsylvania was called early for Obama and I just knew that this was it. If McCain couldn’t gain any ground in PA after devoting so much of his resources there, then this election is not going to swing his way. Then Ohio slipped out of his grasp and it was all over. I have no idea how they called Ohio with only 20-something percent reporting but they did and it looks like they were right. Other plesant surprises that I found this morning were: Virginia, Colorado and Florida for Obama and the close race in North Carolina.

President-elect Barack Obama has shaken the cynicism out of a lot of people. From party members to new voters to people that had given up on politics to the political pundits themselves. Now he’s redrawn the lines between blue states and red states and my hope is that he continues to blur these lines and forge ahead with his message of unity and cooperation.

Hand on my heart, I don’t think I’ll ever be this moved by politics ever again. I’m overwhelmed.

CNN has a voter irregularities map. If you’re voting in a state where you think The Man is going to steal your vote away, please write the number down and take it with you to the voting booth. It may take hours to line up and exercise your right as a US citizen so you don’t want to get shut down at the last minute. It would be just like that time you waited in the rain for the bus but the bus never came and when you got home, you felt like crying into a bucket of ice cream.

Nice things about McCain

McCain appeared on SNL recently and did their opening sketch. It reminded me that he’s a genuine guy when he chooses to be. He’s got great delivery and you really get the sense he’s speaking honestly and frankly. I’ve seen him the few times he’s appeared on The Daily Show and I found him to be a very articulate and insightful guest.

His campaign seems to be fueled by lobbying dollars, virgin sacrifices and the souls of innocents and his VP choice probably helped switch Republicans that Obama could never touch but John McCain is probably a nice guy. I would share a beer and a joke with him.

Criticisms of Obama

I’m not completely 100% for Obama. But I like the persona he represents. Hope and Change are exactly what America needs. The right guy at the right place at the right time.

I don’t agree with his stance that marriage is between a man and a woman. Gay marriage should be allowed and gay couples should be afforded the same opportunities to pursue happiness that straight people get. Any different is discrimination. That being said, Obama is firmly against Prop 8 in California. He once taught constitutional law and he knows that a constitution should expand freedoms, not deny them.

I don’t think he knows how to fix this economy. I think it’s too easy to blame the past 8 years for the mess and I think the bailout is, to borrow a phrase, a hatchet when we need a scalpel. You can give money to banks but they are not charities. Even after you nationalize them, they won’t become charities. They will fight to maximize profits for their existing shareholders and they’re just as uninformed and reckless as they were before the crisis. I’m just not clear on Obama’s stance on the economy in general, I know all about the tax cuts but not his philosophy or direction.

What I’ll be doing

I’ll probably be at work, refreshing fivethirtyeight like a madman. Then I’ll leave work at around 3pm (6pm Eastern time) to watch the unfolding coverage. Then it’ll be a bottle of wine and Indecision 2008 Live Special with Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert.

If the polls are to be believed (they aren’t), the election will be called by the time the show starts and it’ll be President-elect Obama. If the collective cynicism is to be believed, it will be a big mess of votes not being counted properly and lawsuits and the supreme court. It’s been such a long road, I’m sure the candidates and their people are feeling the fatigue. I know I certainly am and I’m not even allowed to vote. If we do get tied up in the courts over who gets to be president, it looks like someone is going to step in and say, “We’re tired. Call it, I’m just going to flip a coin.”

Go out and vote. Let’s make this a landslide victory for Obama so he’ll accept early in the night and we can all get some sleep. Let’s make this a landslide so we don’t get stuck in the supreme court and allow an even greater divide in America. Don’t forget: your ‘I voted’ sticker will get you a free donut from Krispy Kreme, free coffee from Starbucks and a free sex toy from Babeland.

But I’ve probably lost more readers just because I’m posting less often. I stopped looking at my stats when I stopped posting. I’m going to assume they’re in the gutter anyway. I never had more than 25 regular readers at any given time. Considering class sizes today, the average kindergarten teacher probably has a larger audience.

Anyway, enough navel gazing. I am writing this to tell you that America is a week away from voting for its next president and even though all the polls say Obama is ahead and projected to win more seats, he’s still got an uphill battle. So get out and vote for him.

First, McCain is still on the attack. McCain’s campaign has not elevated the level of the political conversation in America. They have rustled up so much hate, fear and ignorance in their campaign and have sold their integrity to the highest bidder. They’ve become as antithetical to republican principles as they have to democrat ones. The reason true Republicans won’t vote for him is because the campaign no longer represents the interests of the party. John McCain hasn’t gone maverick, he’s gone rogue and he’s certainly not going to start taking the high ground now when thinks he’ll lose.

Second, people are complacent. This American system of optional voting is both enviable and frustrating to me. I think it’s important that, if you give a damn, then you should stand up and be counted. Even if you’re in one of those “gimme” states that are thoroughly Democrat or Republican, it’s important to be counted as a person who cares. Let the politicians know that you are paying attention. My radical proposal would be to make election day a holiday and force every American to fill out a ballot as long as they have to option to vote “Present” like senators do.

Finally, remember when Al Gore lost? Al Gore wasn’t even a secret Arab Muslim communist. He was just a Super Grandpa that invented the internet so we could surf for porn and organize bake sales. I am convinced that in the aftermath of November 4, we’re going to see a whole lot of shit flying about voter suppression, ballot stuffing, hanging chads, and voting machines that are dumber than vending machines. I’m not kidding. You ask for Doritos and I’ll bet you that machine will give you Doritos; I don’t have that kind of faith in voting machines.

DILO Sep 07 – Lipstick by Auntie P

My head is swimming. But I’m going to try to talk about today’s political attacks. And I’ll most likely be wrong because I’m stupid enough to get my news from the internet. I don’t know how journalists write about this crap for a living. No wonder they go crazy. My aim in writing this is not to foster discussion or to draw more attention to a manufactured outrage. I just need to get this crap out of my head. So don’t read this post. Go hug your children instead.

So, Obama criticized the McCain campaign’s policies and politics. He thinks they’re just taking the old ways and calling it something different. “Lipstick on a pig”, he calls it. Now, I know what he meant. But it was a poor choice considering Sarah Palin describing herself as a hockey mom and a pit bull with lipstick. I’d describe this as a “dick move”. You had plenty of chances to use that expression before her speech.

In other news, McCain is happy to paint Obama as some sicko that promotes kindergartners “learning about sex before learning to read”. I haven’t checked my facts but the linked blog post said it was a program to help children identify what kind of touching is and isn’t ok. This would probably rank higher than a dick move.

There’s also the Salon article, titled “What’s the difference between Palin and Muslim fundamentalists? Lipstick.”. Which is, of course, ridiculous. First of all, Palin is a Christian with fundamentalist views. Second, maybe Muslim fundamentalists wear lipstick? We’ll never know. It’s a sensationalist headline, I get it. The article itself seeks to highlight how Palin’s fundamentalist views have influenced her and her actions as governor of Alaska. It just spices it up a little because WOW SHE’S JUST LIKE A CRAZY MUSLIM BUT A CHRISTIAN. And as we all know, America might elect a female president or a black president but they’ll never ever elect a Muslim one.