Month: March 2009

Friggin HILARIOUS. If you’re a fan of a) the original graphic novel, and b) the Saturday morning cartoons of the 80s, you’re going to laugh your ass off.

Click here, and then click “watch this movie.” (Or click the image, above.)

I hope that I enjoy the movie (tonight! Midnight show!) as much as this.

If you can see this post, it’s because you’re a writer whose ability I respect.

Now that the flattery is out of the way… :)

I’m wanting to put together a writing group. I find that I really appreciate the structure of a writing group, to help me with my output — it’s much harder to shelf something in favor of day-job writing, when I have a writing group deadline to meet. Plus, I get a great deal of inspiration and assistance from the feedback that a group provides.

Due to our varied locations, this would by necessity be an internet-based group. Communications via email (most likely setting up a google group or something similar).

We could, if folks are interested, also perhaps start a public component –like the original Clockwork Storybook efforts by Chris Robeson and Bill Willingham (although without the shared world element), or the current Merry Sisters of Fate with Maggie Stiefvater et. al. A place where we can post excerpts or short exercise works, which would serve as an additional source of feedback, as well as perhaps a bit of fanbase-creation and marketing (remember that sold Lies of Locke Lamora after he had posted bits of it to his blog….every little bit helps!).

Anyway — if you’re interested, let’s talk further. I’m serious about this.

Amidst all of the news about the collapsing economy, Obama’s Department of Justice yesterday released nine documents that contained Bush administration decrees with regard to government power.

Read them.

Over the last eight years, we had a system in place where the American people believed that our laws were governed by the Constitution, and enacted by Congress. The truth, however, was that the Bush administration secretly vested itself with the power to ignore those public laws, to declare them invalid. The above memos, which were active until October of 2008 (and in a few cases early January of this year), set forth a series of secret laws that vested absolute power in the President.

The right to deploy military against targets within the US? Check.

Even if those targets are known to be US citizens? Check.

The Fourth Amendment (guarding against unreasonable searches and seizures)? Here’s a direct quite from one of the memos (“Authority for Use of Military Force to Combat Terrorist Activities Within the U.S.”): “The Fourth Amendment does not apply to domestic military operations designed to deter and prevent terrorist attacks.”

The First Amendment (freedom of speech, and of the press)? Same memo, another quote: “First Amendment speech and press rights may be subordinated to the need to wage war successfully.”

There’s more, and it’s chilling. The Constitution was effectively suspended from late 2001 until January of this year — and this is just the stuff that they’ve released to the public. These memos formed the official policy of the American government — and this policy was kept secret from Congress (who were denied access to these very memos), and from the American people. We were governed by secret laws, people.

Back when this stuff was happening, those of us who were shouting to the rafters about the Bush power-grab were dismissed as “tin-foil-hat conspiracy theorists”, “Left-wing moonbats,” and “the Blame America First crowd.” Now, we’re being told that the only people who want the crimes investigated, exposed and prosecuted are nothing more than vengeful liberals looking to settle scores. Even Obama is saying that we “need to look forward, not backward.”

Bullshit. We had a dictatorship in this country for the better part of a decade. There needs to be accountability for this, otherwise it will happen again.