I released AltSci3D Manga Director 4.19 today. This is no minor release, it's like a 1.0. It has all the features I need to do JF, so celebrations around. Or wait, I need to actually do the last two frigging pages of JF Scene 1 before we can really celebrate. It'll happen, I tell ya. I think I told you already, but I found something on the internet that blew away my perception on what kind of quality in JF I should be looking for. It was absolutely amazing. I won't link to it because the page said not to. If you really want the link, e-mail me. But I really want to do some major things with JF. I want to double the resolution, brighten the colors, space it out a lot more (bigger boxes, more pages), and use emotions if possible.

But enough of that, you come here for the blog aspect, right? I've been listening to Indymedia Radio for a while and I like what I hear. First of all, there's a public forum every twelve hours with testimony from protestors who have been harrassed, intimidated, and arrested by police unjustly. It's powerful testimony and an actual public servant is listening to each person. I got to hear the comments made by local free radio to the FCC about media consolidation. I'm all for legalizing consolidation _IF_ they stop prosecuting all pirate microradio. If real competition were made between real free media and the corporate consolidated media, the true winner would be the one that is better. Then the first amendment would be preserved. There's the possibility of initial struggle for control, but that's to be expected in truely free world.

Bush used anarchy in it's incorrect form the other day stating that swift action needs to be taken to ensure that anarchy does not prevail in Iraq (something like that). He gave that as a justification for US troops shooting looters on sight. Note how the protection of property is valued higher than life. That is called fucked priority. Don't get me wrong, I like property myself. In fact, I think that property is worth defending. But not with lethal force. Then you say: But these looters are stealing! These looters currently have no food, water, or electricity, you're damn right they're stealing whatever they can. You would be too, you moron. There's a military occupying your entire country and you're starving. Anyone who tries to stop you will be shot by the military 'on accident'. That's not anarchy, it's called panic.

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Anarchy involves voluntary cooperation for mutual benefit without compulsion, violence, or arbitrary authority. It's quite simply put: no government. My friend Josh and I discussed this last night to long length. He had the same boring (I hate to say that his repetitive argument style is quite lame) as he did five years ago. It goes like this: "My friends and I have guns, so we can rob every store." Sadly, it doesn't work like that. In anarchy, people work together usually for profit, often for mutual benefit without profit. Anarchy happens in totalitarian regimes, facist police states, and even in America, too. But it happens much more often in places where there's no one to benefit from corruption and violence inherit in government.

An interesting article on Common Dreams* explained how a police officer invaded a school and took a photograph of a student assignment which showed Bush with duct tape over his mouth. The police officer claimed he did it as a concerned citizen (yet used his badge to force his way in at 1:30 AM) to take "a stand on what happens in that classroom as a resident and a voter and a taxpayer in the community." This is quite absurd, since if I tried to take such a stand on the current school system's lack of a proper education (namely every subject from history and English to math and science), I would be promptly arrested. It's funny how the police officer took a picture of the student's artwork expressing his/her opinion. Should the student be expelled or arrested for his/her "anti-American agenda"? Let me think...

Okay, now that I've demonized those who are clearly wrong, let's see the two sided idea that I like so much. Seeing that students were not compelled to write anti-war or pro-war statements, there's absolutely no reason to criticize the teacher. I actually would have been much more interested on the written part of the assignment which would tell us what the students were actually thinking about. If all students wrote pro-war statements, I would perhaps be interested in what bullshit they had been fed. What I commend the teacher for is to encourage these students to think for themselves and come up with creative solutions to the challenges that their country and world face. His comments on the noteboard were lame (he specifically called the president an 'idiot king'), but no worse than the "commie Jane" bull that most pro-war people label anti-war protestors. They are protected under the First Amendment, I'm sure you will find. The main argument that the residents are claiming is that he "proselytize his leftwing political rhetoric and anti-establishment rhetoric." In his class, it is pretty clear that he has not abused his position as educator to further his agenda. If he actually did, it would be a violation which should result in his being warned and threatened with removal. I would expect the same for a teacher who taught that the atomic bombs dropped on the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the only possible end to WW2. The fact is that it is debated among scholars and all people to this day. Of course, in America, we don't learn what happened in WW2 or Vietnam, Korea, the Phillipines, the Spanish-American War, Iraq, Kosovo, or anything like that. They end the social studies series in high school with: "There were these Native Americans who lived in tee-pees and huts and they got sick and fought wars with America and now they live happily on reservations selling fireworks and cigarettes." It's an absolute shame to think that students don't get a decent history lesson in 13 years of school. They usually bypass it all unless they go to college and they usually don't get any clue there, either. To sum it up, I'd like to ask a question of these residents: Would it please you to have a teacher teaching your students about a positive war of liberation? Be my guest.

* Yes, I am fully aware that Common Dreams is a very liberal media source. Forget your conspiracy theories about CNN and NBC plotting socialism, CD makes quite clear that they are as liberal as they can get. They are Faux News' anti-thesis. I find them to be a good source to laugh at whenever I read fascist propaganda on Fox News. I like to keep my news sources diverse because you never know where you'll find something written that has a pinch of truth among a pack of lies. If you're getting one news source (I count all television as one news source, btw) and you think it's balanced, I got news for you: you're being lied to. A good source for news, I've recently found is: ushistory.org

"I had seen enough of the miseries of war, to wish it might never more have existence in the world, and that some other mode might be found out to settle the differences that should occasionally arise in the neighbourhood of nations." -- Tom Paine "Rights of Man" ten years after the American Revolution.

"That there are men in all countries who get their living by war, and by keeping up the quarrels of Nations, is as shocking as it is true; but when those who are concerned in the government of a country, make it their study to sow discord and cultivate prejudices between Nations, it becomes the more unpardonable." -- Tom Paine "Rights of Man"

"To reason with governments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected. There ought not now to exist any doubt that the peoples of France, England, and America, enlightened and enlightening each other, shall henceforth be able, not merely to give the world an example of good government, but by their united influence enforce its practice."

"If universal peace, civilisation, and commerce are ever to be the happy lot of man, it cannot be accomplished but by a revolution in the system of governments. All the monarchical governments are military. War is their trade, plunder and revenue their objects. While such governments continue, peace has not the absolute security of a day."

"The danger to which the success of revolutions is most exposed is that of attempting them before the principles on which they proceed, and the advantages to result from them, are sufficiently seen and understood."

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