1. some saudi prince about the hostage thingy:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5218227/
NBC News translated Abdullah's remarks from Arabic: “Zionism is behind it.
It has become clear now. It has become clear to us. I don’t say, I
mean... It is not 100 percent, but 95 percent that the Zionist hands are behind
what happened."

and this nice response
"According to William Wechsler, former National Security Council member and
co-author of the Council on Foreign Relations report, “They have yet to
arrest or incarcerate anybody publicly. And if you don’t take those
actions then you can’t have deterrence.”"
the first sentence fun because the us hasnt publicly incarcerated any
terrorists. the 2nd sentence fun b/c the way the us has locked people up causes
recruiting, not deterrence.

2.
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=ahY4hRYnKbbw&refer=top_world_news
"Kerry, a four-term U.S. senator from Massachusetts, said the report bolsters
his argument that the war in Iraq was a distraction from the hunt for al-Qaeda.
``This administration took it's eye off the real war on terrorism" Kerry, 60,
said."
i saw a lot of this 'introducing kerry' stuff today - i assume the detail is
sposed to be derogatory??

3. for those of u who thought the 3gorges story was too preposterous
"Beijing - A top Chinese general on Wednesday called the United States "a whore"
for suggesting that Taiwan try to destroy the Three Gorges Dam, while
maintaining that it could never be hit by Taipei's conventional arms."
read the article
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1543471,00.html

4. hats off to the drug industry for framing the ssri problem as a problem for
children. thats some tidy work.

5. i love the ksm pic they keep using. compare that against the jackroche pic
(he's sposed to be out in 3 years but has appealed the severity)
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/11/19/1037697662289.html

7. flashback
"What's his accomplishment? That he's no longer an obnoxious drunk?" Ronald
Reagan Jr. on George W. Bush in 2000.

8. i mentioned the navy deployment the other day - i still dont make anything of
it, but dodgy types are kinda frantic http://rense.com/general53/dcepl.htm

9. heres another recent robreich pice
http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=7706
this time about fox. the interesting interesting is why he would even bother
doing a fox interview - especially hannity. and then complains about his
treatment. anyone who appears on fox is an idiot. by definition. anyone who is
antibush and goes on fox simply does not understand the problem, or is part of
the problem. or something. i dont care how tempting the audience size is. stupid
or complicit - they are the only two possibilities for anyone who subjects
themselves (and their argument) to that. and the only reasons that fox would
have them on as guests are the same two reasons - stupid or complicit. (some
politicians may not have a choice, but they are mostly prolly stupid or
complicit anyway). stupid or complicit. theres no option c.

10. btw - the cheney saddam/alq thing ealier this week was intentional - u can
tell by the follow thru with bush and powell. pre-emptive strike and all that.
we saw the same thing with the attacks on latham - first schenider on denton,
then bushs comments (amongst the tenet announcement debacle) - and despite the
cadmins protestations that 43 was merely answering a question from a (murderck)
journo, and it was 'just a matter of context' - we then saw them roll out
armitage and powell with the same message. none of these things happen by
accident. thats why u prolly hear stories from me first sometimes, and then in
the 'news' in the next day or two, and thats why i try to watch closely, cos
there are pre-emptive plants hither and thither.

11. heres dowds take on the clinton protrait unveiling
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/17/opinion/17DOWD.html i must say, it was all
very odd. and those pix of 42 as red as a beetroot. the higlight for me was when
aaron brown called a photo of bill and his daughter with a 3dick mouth 'the
money shot'. we are gonna get another dose of monicagate. foxtel here is running
a montage ad for Biography channel - where each story melds into the next.
theres a photo of clinton with the audio from the *next* story in the montage -
with some guy saying 'i paid for sex with a cheque' - let me repeat my
observation from yesterday - they actually pay people to do this. its their
specific function. and they have a specific agenda. and they build deniable
plausibility in all the way - which shows how sophisticated the operation is.
every image and every smirk is orchestrated. its for the same reason that i
mentioned aaron brown rolling his eyes at ashcroft the other day - its always a
part of the script, which i why i asked whterh the tide had turned (i dont
really think so). (on the other hand, watching christiana ampour (sp?) reporting
from baghdad about these latest carbombs, she looked like she had a gun pointed
at her in case she said something wrong (i hate the psychoanalysis thing of
course, but it seems that theres massive cognitive dissonance everywhere - if
she was described as a nthkorean reporter, im sure everyone would be taken by
how scared she looks/sounds and how dangerousevil the regime there is)

12. "The Chicago Sun-Times revealed Tuesday that it had significantly overstated
its circulation in recent years, boosting its profits while overcharging
advertisers."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0406160210jun16,1,5590984.story
thats perle and kissinger for you...

13. the italian football team might be taking an early flight home ;-)