Month: July 2006

Lebanese artist/musician/writer Mazen Kerbaj has been blogging from Beirut, posting cartoons and commentary.

It’s sobering reading.

Perhaps most sobering of all — he went up onto his roof and recorded this ambient musical piece….Kerbaj improvising sounds, accompanied by the bombs hitting the city.

He calls it: “Starry Night.”

…and I’ve noticed that our media has gotten their orders. Everyone now refers to “Israel vs. Hezbollah” — no mention at all of the fact that it is Lebanon that is being bombed. Lebanese civilians who are being killed. Lebanese cities which are under attack. No, the whole thing is now “Israel vs. Terrorists.”…..I guess the Lebanese are just in the way.

Bush has just vetoed legislation that would have expanded federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. It was the first veto in the 5 and a half years of the Bush presidency, but Bush did it privately, with press photographers barred from the event.

The majority of Americans support stem cell research, including many Republicans. The Senate is four votes shy of a Veto Override (2/3 majority), so it will probably stand, though.

I would dearly love to see this turn and bite him on the ass, as non-Religious-Lunatic Republicans say “enough is enough,” and cast off the stranglehold that the American Taliban has on their party, but it will most likely be buried under an avalanche of Israel/Lebanon coverage.

John Stewart skewers the media’s coverage of the “brink” of the “crisis” which may or may not be “war” (despite both sides already saying that it is war).

“What does it take for you people to drop the Question Mark?”