I cried for three hours, until I fell asleep, after watching it. I wailed like a child, completely out of control. I wanted to smash things and kill people, and right now. It bypassed all of the filters I use to shut out the horror of our reality in order to live as good a life as I can, and to be effective in reducing that horror. I got drunk out of my mind to kill the pain I felt. The next day I awoke shaking, drained and in shock. It took hours for that emotional reaction to clear and for me to get my mind back. And watching that video is still affecting me, at the level of my feelings.

And I took action as a result of my feelings. Immediately. Revolutionary action.

If that was propaganda, it was brilliantly executed. Whether it is or not, it is an excellent argument against any state anywhere and at any time.

That is all. Return to your assigned work allotments.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDCsp1atehU

Neda Soltani

(YouTube video comment by witness)

shery630

June 20, 2009

Place: Karekar Ave., at the corner crossing Khosravi St. and Salehi st. (Tehran)

A young woman who was standing aside with her father watching the protests was shot by a basij member hiding on the rooftop of a civilian house. He had clear shot at the girl and could not miss her. However, he aimed straight her heart. I am a doctor, so I rushed to try to save her. But the impact of the gunshot was so fierce that the bullet had blasted inside the victim’s chest, and she died in less than 2 minutes.

The protests were going on about 1 kilometers away in the main street and some of the protesting crowd were running from tear gass used among them, towards Salehi St.

The film is shot by my friend who was standing beside me.

Please let the world know.

Neda Soltani

From Facebook:

Neda Soltani (1982 – 20th June 2009; age 26–27) was an young Iranian woman whose killing, allegedly by Basij militia during the 2009 Iranian election protests, was captured on video by bystanders. The graphic videos were posted on the Internet, and her name quickly became a rallying cry for the opposition.

Neda means “voice” or “calling” in Persian, and she has been referred to as the “voice of Iran” and “a symbol” of this revolution taking place right now. Ya Neda, Ya Neda…. Ya Neda.

Unable to find the version by The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy (1990?), which was my first exposure to this wonderful work, I present a fine mashup of the original track by Gil Scott-Heron (1970) together with “California über Alles” (1979) by the Dead Kennedys, previously featured at this very blog in its later “We’ve Got a Bigger Problem Now” remake verson.

Scott-Heron’s original lyrics, from his site:

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip,
Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In 4 parts without commercial interruptions.
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon
blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John
Mitchell, General Abrams and Spiro Agnew to eat
hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be brought to you by the
Schaefer Award Theatre and will not star Natalie
Woods and Steve McQueen or Bullwinkle and Julia.
The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal.
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs.
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, because the revolution will not be televised, Brother.

There will be no pictures of you and Willie May
pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run,
or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance.
NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32
or report from 29 districts.
The revolution will not be televised.

There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being
run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process.
There will be no slow motion or still life of Roy
Wilkens strolling through Watts in a Red, Black and
Green liberation jumpsuit that he had been saving
For just the proper occasion.

Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville
Junction will no longer be so damned relevant, and
women will not care if Dick finally gets down with
Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people
will be in the street looking for a brighter day.
The revolution will not be televised.

There will be no highlights on the eleven o’clock
news and no pictures of hairy armed women
liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose.
The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb,
Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom
Jones, Johnny Cash, Englebert Humperdink, or the Rare Earth.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be right back after a message
bbout a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver’s seat.

The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.

Oh, it was just an exercise.

From the comments to “Multinational forces storm Mayport beach for drills“, wherein commenter “tut tut” need not be forgiven for her/his use of the imperial first-person plural:

This is like one of those stories I used to write for my high school newspaper. I’d comment on everything but what the actual news in the the story was. And I’d have my thesaurus next to me to make it seem like I knew more than I actually did.

Why does the author not ask the obvious questions:

What the hell is this troop of military soldiers doing by running war games on our beaches?

Why is it a multinational group to begin with? Are we at war with Peru?  Is Peru at war with us?

Why is it US soldiers and soldiers from several different foreign countries are training to ‘jell’ and why is that ‘good’?

I’m surprised he didn’t write something like ‘The alabaster whiteness of the rugged Major’s teeth shone as fireflies in the aggravated heavens.’

Puff piece that tells me nothing of what I need to know about this curious incident.

SOUTHCOM press release (and Google cache).

I started the site, really, as my own soapbox, primarily intended to be a platform for publicity around my renunciation of US citizenship. Early on I did a lot more writing than I have been lately. Looking back in the archives will show up to 3 posts per day, back in the day, a lot of it reaction to current events. These days my level of engagement with the news has fallen to roughly zero, as it tends to every few years. Now, three posts in a week is a busy time around here. What the future holds is unclear, though I will make one promise: later this year, probably in the summer, there will be a semi-dramatic, fully-anarchist event starring — who else? — me, captured on video and posted here. Stay tuned!

What I did not expect when I joined the blogosphere was to become so much more engaged as a libertarian and anarchist. I did not expect to meet, make the acquaintance and even become friends with so many worthwhile, interesting people. This, truly, is a greater reward than I ever imagined. Thanks to all of you!!!

Significantly, nostate.com became (barely) self-funding in March 2009.

Some statistics, aggregating a year’s worth of data from Google Analytics and other data sources:

Unique visits: 64,381
Pageviews: 103,868
Visitors: 52,749
RSS subscribers: at least 120, counting only those using web-based readers

Top 5 countries, by number of visits:
United States: 45,149
Canada: 4,436
United Kingdom: 3,981
Slovakia: 1,334
Germany: 998

Top content, view count and top referrers thereto:

US government announces new logo: 24,288 (StumbleUpon)
The clown suit defense, and the excuses of symbols: 8,424 (StumbleUpon)
A declaration of separation: 4,141 (whatreallyhappened.com, davidicke.com)
I surrendered my US passport today: 3,872 (reddit, Digg, StumbleUpon)
The penalty is always death: 2,488 (StumbleUpon)
Press release: 2,267 (various)
Fuck the troops!: 2,034 (various)
An anarchist’s declaration: 1,911 (various)
Free Janine! And all political prisoners!: 1,878 (reddit)
Lèse majesté: 1,755 (StumbleUpon)

What if Christmas didn’t come this year?
And no one paid for Christmas cheer?
Who would cry the biggest tear,
The child or the store?

Why do brides wear virgin white?
Most do not deserve that right.
But to choose a color of their delight
Would surely bring on the frowns.

To defy the laws of tradition
Is a crusade only of the brave.

Suppose the taxman, he comes to town,
And you don’t lay your money down.
Yet Mr. Jones he killed Mr. Brown the other day.
Well I wonder… who’s gonna go to hell?

To defy the laws of tradition
Is a crusade only of the brave.

To defy the laws of tradition
Is a crusade only of the brave.

To defy the laws of tradition
Is a crusade only of the brave.

And that’s Web 3.0. Papers, please.

From The Telegraph:

One in five teens engage in ‘tech sex’

One in five teenagers say they have sent naked or partially-clothed images of themselves to someone by email or mobile phone, according to a poll in America.

Even more important now than then. You know that’s true, both because I said so and because I’m older than you are.

I’m looking forward, sadly, to a day when YouTube — and that is to say, Google — caves to pressure from some group or another to take this video and all other versions of this song off the intertube forever. Perhaps then people will wake the fuck up. Save your copy to encrypted storage today!

Last call for alcohol.
Last call for your freedom of speech.
Drink up. Happy hour is now enforced by law.
Don’t forget our house special, it’s called a Trickie Dickie Screwdriver.
It’s got one part Jack Daniels, two parts purple Kool-Aid,
and a jigger of formaldehyde
from the jar with Hitler’s brain in it we got in the back.
Happy trails to you. Happy trails to you.

I am Emperor Ronald Reagan
Born again with fascist cravings
Still, you made me president

Human rights will soon go ‘way
I am now your Shah today
Now I command all of you
Now you’re going to pray in school
I’ll make sure they’re Christian too

California Uber alles
Uber alles California

Ku Klux Klan will control you
Still you think it’s natural
Nigger knockin’ for the master race
Still you wear the happy face

You closed your eyes, can’t happen here
Alexander Haig is near
Vietnam won’t come back you say
Join the army or you will pay

California Uber alles
Uber alles California

Yeah, that’s it. Just relax.
Have another drink, few more pretzels, little more MSG.
Turn on those Dallas Cowboys on your TV.
Lock your doors. Close your mind.
It’s time for the two-minute warning.

Welcome to 1984
Are you ready for the third world war?!?
You too will meet the secret police
They’ll draft you and they’ll jail your niece

You’ll go quietly to boot camp
They’ll shoot you dead, make you a man
Don’t you worry, it’s for a cause
Feeding global corporations’ claws

Die on our brand new poison gas
El Salvador or Afghanistan
Making money for President Reagan
And all the friends of President Reagan

California Uber alles
Uber alles California

You’d think there are limits and ways to break people out of insanity and things they’ve gotten used to being normal because of everything they’ve been through, but if even your own crying child can’t do it, what can?

Unfortunately, when it comes to the evils we’ve been indoctrinated with and inured to — be it by parents, religion, society, culture or states — breaking out of insanity is something that precious few of us manage to do.