More Obama in Berlin "Inspiration in 360"

Check out his 360 view of the Berlin speech with audio. (click on the pic) Technology is grand.(h/t "this is our time" at Bagnewsnotes.)

The Repubs and the corporate media are already trotting out the cult of personality meme to undermine the imagery of this 200,000+ rally in Germany. Expect the same critique of the big speech at the end of the convention.

There's more...

BREAKING NEWS: U. S. Embassy under siege in Belgrade, capital of Serbia.

Very unnerving news and photos of a mob of several hundred thousand protesters marching, and then summarily overrunning the U.S. embassy in Belgrade—which they are now looting and setting ablaze in protest of the U.S.'s backing Kosovo's declaration of independence this week.

(CNN) -- Violence broke out Thursday as tens of thousands of Serbs protested Kosovo independence and reportedly set fire to the facade of the U.S. embassy in Belgrade, according to news agencies.

Riot police fired tear gas at Serb rioters as protesters wearing masks broke into the embassy.

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said; "We are in contact with the Serbian government to ensure that they devote the appropriate assets to fulfill their international obligations to help protect diplomatic facilities in this case."

The embassy was closed and not staffed, a U.S. official told CNN. The United States was among the first countries to offer official recognition of independent Kosovo.

Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, who earlier addressed the rally, said "Kosovo is Serbia's first name." He called the declaration of independence last Sunday illegal and said will do all he can to get it annulled.

What a lovely second term, eh, President 19%?


Take a pissed crowd of say, 200,000...




Add a standoff-ish U.S. foreign policy and a molotov cocktail or two...




Light vigorously...




And then...dance in the street as embassy furniture is burned...




Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin cracks his knuckles as he laughs his gangster's laugh at the events playing out as he wanted it—Russia and China oppose Kosovo independence—while an ineffective U.S. State Department loads important files on flash drives and books the hell up out of downtown Belgrade.

Annnnnd....to cap things off, a protester climbed the embassy roof and ripped down the American flag.

Bummer that this is occuring so inopportunely—it's probably interrupting our beloved President's nappy-time.

And reports are that Condoleezza Rice is headed to the region to offer her assistance in quelling the unrest.

Which means that the city'll probably be in smoldering ruins by Monday.

Ten. More. Months. Good God.

There's more...

Europe in Decline

While traveling and experiencing the decline of Europe, I am noticing the Euro is deflating all the way up to $1.43 to the Euro. I don't know how much more decline I can afford here. I suppose this is normal, before this decline that Instapundit and his buddies have been predicting for 5 years now, maybe there is a huge wave of financial increases, and currency adjustments.

Anyway, besides getting shafted by having to exchange my dollars for Euros I was noticing at the large outdoor markets there is no jackbooted thug presence, no warnings about watching the skies for terrorists even though we are only a couple hundred miles from where Mohammed Atta didn't meet the Iraqis in Prague.

In fact they let their Muslims walk around free here, willy nilly. I suppose thats one of the signs of the impending decline.

I really am struck by traveling through non-U.S. airports how much more adult and much less 'whoop-whoop warning warning!' the security is, not to mention uniform from country to country. You don't have to take off your shoes in one country and not the next its all the same level and to some degree unobtrusive, actually you don't have to take off your shoes at all.

It strikes me that its like a parallel world, one in which you aren't in danger of being tasered for a minor airport infraction. One where forming the EU was a very smart move and Europe is not in decline. One where Atta never met in Prague with Iraqis. One where public security is not a political tool. You know... reality...

There's more...

German Official: Scientology Should Be Banned

photo Benoit Doppagne AFP/Getty Images

Contends Scientology Violates Human Rights

This week in Germany, Hamburg's Secretary of the Interior, Udu Nagel, plans to ask his counterparts in the 16 other German States, to agree to ban Scientology nation-wide.

Associated Press

The German government considers Scientology a commercial enterprise that takes advantage of vulnerable people. During the summer, it initially refused to allow the producers of a movie starring Scientology member Tom Cruise as Germany's most famous anti-Hitler plotter to film at the site where the hero was executed, although it did not expressly state Scientology as its reason.

If all 16 states agree to the proposal to ban Scientology, German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble would be asked to initiate proceedings against it, Sweden said, confirming a report by Focus magazine.

The report quotes Nagel saying that Scientology pursues "anti-constitutional goals in an aggressively fierce" manner that run counter to human rights and dignity.

This is not the first time Scientology has run into trouble at the national level.

In Belgium, Scientology has been recommended for prosecution.

ABC News

The Church of Scientology has been branded a criminal organization by a Belgian prosecutor, who has recommended it stands trial for fraud and extortion.

His investigation concluded that the church's Europe office, based in Brussels, and its Belgian missions, conducted unlawful practices in medicine, violated privacy laws and used illegal business contracts.

A spokeswoman at the Federal Prosecutors Office, said: "They also face charges of being ... a criminal organization."

Investigators have spent a decade trying to determine how far Scientology went in recruiting converts after numerous complaints were filed with police by former members claiming they had been the victims of intimidation and extortion.

There is history going back decades of practices condemned in U.S. courts.

Scientology's "Attack the Attacker" policy has been known to have a chilling effect on publishing negative articles about them. I personally know someone who was attacked by these folks. (A Federal Judge agreed.)

Why then, am I putting it up? It's news.

Comment away.

NO calling anyone a cult. Belgium is trying to take Scientology to trial for being a criminal organization; that's different from being a cult, which has a very specific technical meaning. Seriously -- we're not going there; the legal liability is too great.

Otherwise, have fun. (But play nice.)

There's more...

The Genius of Django Reinhardt

Part 1


Part 2


Part 3


Part 4


Part 5


One of the preeminent Jazz greats, Django Reinhardt helped invent jazz guitar. A two-fingered disabled European guitar player helped invent -- some say invented -- American jazz guitar.

How 'bout them apples?

And as Lurch puts it over at Main and Central

All you young rock whippersnappers take note that it’s possible to get a good sound without a 200 Db amp.

Django Reinhardt - Jazz Musician - 1910-1953

Video from the DVD "The Genius of Django Reinhardt"

There's more...

iPhone Horror Story, Take 17

Overseas Data Roaming Charges $3,000-$4,800

People traveling overseas with their iPhones are being hit with enormous unexpected charges from AT&T, Apple's exclusive service provider.

The iPhone constantly checks back and forth for data. Has an email come in? Is there any voice mail waiting? Is there anything out there you've asked for I need transfer?

All this data transmission takes place in the background transparently and if you're overseas and haven't either:

a) turned off data roaming,

b) an AT&T unlimited global data plan, a $24.99-a-month option which

c) Apple/AT&T customers wouldn't know to do or sign up for respectively

then you're pretty much hosed. And by "pretty much hosed" I mean you're screwed:

Chicago Tribune

Jay Levy and his family took their iPhones on a Mediterranean cruise. Now the Hewlett Harbor entrepreneur feels as if he got taken for a ride, receiving a 54-page monthly bill of nearly $4,800 from AT&T Wireless.

While Levy, his wife and his daughter were enjoying the trip, and even while they were sleeping, their three iPhones were racking up a bill for data charges. The iPhone regularly updates e-mail, even while it's off, so that all the messages will be available when the user turns it on.

"They have periodic updates on their data files, and they translate into megabucks," Levy said. "This is akin to your bank having automatic access to your ATM machine and is siphoning money out during all times of the day and night without your knowledge."

Herbert Kliegerman, 68, a real-estate agent from the Bronx, said he incurred $2,000 while visiting Mexico. He filed a lawsuit seeking class-action status in New York State Supreme Court last week, alleging that Apple did not properly disclose the international roaming charges.

AT&T Wireless offered to refund $1,500 to Kliegerman, but he said that's not good enough. "I want a full refund," he said.

Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris said the company adequately discloses the potential charges on the Web site and when the phone is activated.

The 6,707-word terms and conditions document on the AT&T Web site says: "Substantial charges may be incurred if phone is taken out of the U.S. even if no services are intentionally used."

Kliegerman said said most people don't read the lengthy terms and conditions. Furthermore, the rate plans listed on the site indicate "unlimited data (Email/Web)," without an asterisk. He said that's misleading.

Kliegerman's lawyer, Randall S. Newman of Manhattan, said about 15 people from around the country have called him complaining of international roaming charges and the inability to unlock the phone to use it with another carrier.

Apple hasn't yet released the iPhone abroad. Levy said he didn't expect data transfer charges internationally because he believed the data network in Europe wasn't compatible with the iPhone. The Levys brought their phones with them for voice calls.

NY Times

“I can’t imagine AT&T would expect all their customers to be technicians and say, ‘O.K., if I go to use Google maps, how many kilobytes am I transferring?’ ” asked Mr. Stolte, a Web designer who lives in Temecula, Calif.

In July, Aaron Oxley took his iPhone with him to London, Dubai and Bangkok. Mr. Oxley said in an e-mail message that he was aware that there would be international roaming data charges, so he always made sure he was in an area with free Wi-Fi when he used his iPhone to access the Internet. But when Mr. Oxley’s AT&T bill arrived, the data charges totaled $300.

When Mr. Oxley called AT&T, he was told that even though he was using Wi-Fi, there was still a data transfer charge.

Indeed, according to Mr. Smith, the AT&T representative, iPhone owners are not charged for Wi-Fi connections. Mr. Oxley eventually received a full refund for the $300 roaming data charge.

Mr. Dingman said it didn’t occur to him to disable the e-mail feature. AT&T eventually reversed the charges, but only after Mr. Dingman signed up for a $24.99-a-month global data plan.

AT&T is not automatically crediting customers for such charges. Mr. Smith said that each complaint is being evaluated case by case.

Point the first. AT&T has screwed up. The plan advertised in the U.S. is all you can eat data, no asterisk.

Contracts of adhesion are bullshit. You've not negotiated anything, they're completely one sided, and in most cases there's even a line about how they can be changed simply by the issuing company posting a change on their website. That isn't a contract. It's a party in your wallet.

Fortunately the courts are starting to agree, even the Republican judges, since such nonsense flies in the face of their thrown way of thinking about finance. Which is nice, since it violates our thrown way of what's fair and just as well. Good times. But not in every court and most big companies still put in silly boilerplate notices.

Point the second. Customer Service has one purpose and one purpose only. Making sure the customer (actually everyone) says to herself after every interaction: "Wow. They really took care of me."

That's the opposite of what AT&T is doing here. Fools.

They're literally generating a PR disaster by refusing to fix their original fuck up. Bad customer service damaging one of the world's great designs, which hurts the Apple brand.

Point the third. The partnership with AT&T is damaging Apple's brand. Apple handled its own sales initially with the iPod which meant it could handle problems personally. When it screwed up, it fixed it. Just like Steve stepped in last week and gave all early iPhone owners $100 back due to the price cut on the new iPhone. Did he have to? No. But even without everyone all pissed off, it was the right thing to do so Jobs did it. Customer service.

AT&T doesn't grasp customer service from my ass. It used to. I had AT&T long distance precisely because their operators were polite and took care of me better than the other ones. Was worth it to me to pay a touch more. No longer.

In the name of cost-cutting AT&T has sacked being polite and making sure people are taken care of. Now they don't give a damn.

Which is why they haven't fixed this problem and each case is still being evaluated individually. While AT&T sits around with their thumb up their ass, people like me slam them in the press, Apple's brand gets hurt, and people who might have bought an iPhone go buy something else.

I hope that class action take them for a bundle.

In the meantime y'all, if you travel overseas with your iPhone (Canada, Mexico, Alaska, Hawaii?), make sure you sign up for the unlimited global data plan.

There's more...

Administration Leaks Continue

Drum Beats for War, Month 2

The Administration's other house-organ, The Washington Times, is part of a well-orchestrated leak with France to scare the hell of Iran.

Not gonna work. Would we blink if Russia were threatening us?

I don't think so.

Washington Times

After a brief interruption of his New Hampshire vacation to meet President Bush in the family compound at Kenebunkport, Maine, French President Nicolas Sarkozy came away convinced his U.S. counterpart is serious about bombing Iran's secret nuclear facilities. That's the reading as it filtered back to Europe's foreign ministries:

Addressing the annual meeting of France's ambassadors to 188 countries, Mr. Sarkozy said either Iran lives up to its international obligations and relinquishes its nuclear ambitions — or it will be bombed into compliance. Mr. Sarkozy also made it clear he did not agree with the Iranian-bomb-or-bombing-of-Iran position, which reflects the pledge of Mr. Bush to his loyalists, endorsed by Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Sen. Joe Lieberman, Connecticut Independent. But Mr. Sarkozy recognized unless Iran's theocrats stop enriching uranium to weapons-grade levels under inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), we will all be "faced with an alternative that I call catastrophic."

A ranking Swiss official privately said, "Anyone with a modicum of experience in the Middle East knows that any bombing of Iran would touch off at the very least regional instability and what could be an unmitigated disaster for Western interests."

Leaks about the administration's plan to brand Iran's 125,000-strong Revolutionary Guards a global terrorist organization is widely interpreted as a major step on the escalator to military action.

Hoping to head off a U.S.-Iran military confrontation, European countries are still pinning their hopes on major Iranian concessions at the International Atomic Energy Commission in Vienna. Iran is back to cooperating with IAEA — but only one comma or semicolon at a time. The three European Union countries acting as U.S. surrogates on nuclear matters with Iran, and IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei, detect progress where the U.S. sees only stalling. Iran is still resisting short-notice inspections of sites that are not officially declared nuclear facilities, and where secret nuclear work is believed to be taking place.

Both the Bush administration and Israel are painstakingly fashioning a casus belli with Iran. For Israel, the training and weapons support Iran furnishes Hezbollah in Lebanon (now with more rockets of all kinds than it had before the 2006 war when it fired 4,000 into Israel) and Hamas in Gaza (now equipped with Katyusha rockets and a range of 10.6 miles), coupled with Mr. Ahmadinejad's existential threats against the Jewish state, are sufficient evidence to justify air attacks against Iran's nuclear facilities. And for the White House, there is daily evidence of Iran's Revolutionary Guards meddling in Iraq, from improved explosive devices made in Iran to behind-the-scenes dominance in the affairs of the oil-rich south.

Well?

Hat tip: TPM

There's more...

Breaking: Danish Hold 8 Terror Suspects

photo: AFP

Alleged "Militant Islamics" Plotting "Major" Attack

This is how it's done.

Take your time. Get close. Don't spook them out. Follow the trail backwards. Danish counter-intelligence were all over these guys.

Only when they endangered others -- "We had to move today, also due to safety reasons. They were producing an unstable explosive in an apartment building in a densely populated Copenhagen area." -- were they picked up.

Bloomberg

Police held the men, whose ages are between 19 and 29, in the Copenhagen area today, Jakob Scharf, head of the Security Intelligence Service, told a news conference in the capital.

"With the arrests, we've prevented a major act of terrorism," Scharf said. The suspects are "militant Islamists with international connections including ties to al-Qaeda."

Danish intelligence-gathering efforts and security were stepped up when the Nordic country was singled out as a target by al-Qaeda after the July 7, 2005, London bombings. Today's arrests mark the third time in two years Danish police have detained terrorism suspects.

The men, of Afghani, Pakistani, Somali and Turkish origin, are suspected of having produced "unstable explosives," Scharf said. Police will seek to charge them under Denmark's terrorism law, which can carry a life sentence.

"We have investigated these people for some months," Scharf said. "After having been pushed back, al-Qaeda is now regaining its foothold and is capable of planning and completing terror attacks in the West, including Denmark."

Scharf wouldn't say where police suspect the detainees planned to carry out an attack. Officers raided 11 Copenhagen apartments at 2:00 a.m. local time and found "materials and objects" that were being used to produce explosives.

A year ago, Danish police arrested nine Muslim men in the city of Odense. Prosecutors charged four of the nine with plotting acts of terrorism after finding laboratory equipment, chemicals and explosives in their possession.

Denmark, a country of 5.5 million, brought back its 400 troops from Iraq last month. The country plans to increase to 640 from 440 the number of troops stationed in Afghanistan.

A Danish newspaper in September 2005 published cartoons of the prophet Muhammad that linked Islam to terrorism. Muslim protests, including consumer boycotts and the torching of Danish embassies in Syria and Lebanon, flared after Danish Muslim leaders went to the Middle East to rally support against Denmark for not censuring the newspaper.

Six of the men have Danish citizenship, while two live in Denmark on residence permits, Scharf said.

Yep, all that Security Theater in the airports on foreign nationals makes a lot of sense. Not.

SIX OF THE MEN HAD DANISH CITIZENSHIP. The other two had residence permits. Up till 9/11 the previous greatest act of terrorism on US soil was committed by anti-government militia sympathizers upset about Waco and Ruby Ridge. Both were white males. US Citizens.

Shall we start searching demanding internal passports with chips in them from damn near every US citizen, resident, and alien?

Fear. Good for winning votes. Bad for stopping attacks.

Good work Denmark. Keep it up.

There's more...