"What's happening is something completely new in the history of the hemisphere. Since the Spanish conquest the countries of Latin America have been pretty much separated from one another and oriented toward the imperial power....

For the first time, they are beginning to integrate and in quite a few different ways... Now they want to control their own resources. In fact, many don't even want their resources developed. Many don't see any particular point in having their culture and lifestyle destroyed so that people can sit in traffic jams in New York.

Furthermore, they are beginning to throw out the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In the past, the US could prevent unwelcome developments such as independence in Latin America, by violence; supporting military coups, subversion, invasion and so on. That doesn't work so well any more. The last time they tried in 2002 in Venezuela, the US had to back down because of enormous protests from Latin America, and of course the coup was overthrown from within. That's very new...

The IMF is essentially the US Treasury Department. It is the economic weapon that's alongside the military weapon for maintaining control. That's being dismantled.

All of this is happening against the background of very substantial popular movements, which, to the extent that they existed in the past, were crushed by violence, state terror, Operation Condor, one monstrosity after another. That weapon is no longer available..."

Noam Chomsky on the Hopeful Signs Across Latin America

"Democracy means that when there's a knock at the door at 4 am, it's probably the milkman." -- Winston Churchill

"You don't know your man. I will tell you plainly, you're warming a viper in your bosom."

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"Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote." --Ben Franklin

(Image by Signe Wilkinson)

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt
--Umberto Eco

"There can hardly be stranger wares in the world than books: printed by people who do not understand them; sold by people who do not understand them; bound, reviewed and read by people who do not understand them; and now even written by people who do not understand them"

"If it were true what in the end would be gained? Nothing but another truth. Is this such a mighty advantage? We have enough old truths still to digest, and even these we would be quite unable to endure if we did not sometimes flavor them with lies."

"A handful of soldiers is always better than a mouthful of arguments."

"The great rule: If the little bit you have is nothing special in itself, at least find a way of saying it that is a little bit special."

"It is no great art to say something briefly when, like Tacitus, one has something to say; when one has nothing to say, however, and none the less writes a whole book and makes truth ... into a liar — that I call an achievement"

"We do not think good metaphors are anything very important, but I think that a good metaphor is something even the police should keep an eye on."

"If you are going to build something in the air it is always better to build castles than houses of cards."

"Why are young widows in mourning so beautiful? (Look into it.)"

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

"For Dan Halbert, the road to Tycho began in college--when Lissa Lenz asked to borrow his computer. Hers had broken down, and unless she could borrow another, she would fail her midterm project. There was no one she dared ask, except Dan.

This put Dan in a dilemma. He had to help her--but if he lent her his computer, she might read his books. Aside from the fact that you could go to prison for many years for letting someone else read your books, the very idea shocked him at first. Like everyone, he had been taught since elementary school that sharing books was nasty and wrong--something that only pirates would do..."

The Right to Read by Richard Stallman

Pavel Filonov

6000 intriguing people you want to meet online before you die
Ok, well, maybe more like 20... but it's a start.

The great appear great in our eyes
Only because we are kneeling.
Let us rise!

--Loustalot, 1789

Motto of the day:

Lege, lege, lege, labora, ora, et relege

An old alchemist maxim translated as:

Read, read, read, work, take, and reread.

"I have received, Sir, your new book against the human race; for which I thank you... No one has ever used so much intelligence to try to render us Beasts. When one reads your works, it stirs a desire to walk on all fours."

Voltaire upon receiving the Discourse on Inequality from Rousseau

116 houseboats in Amsterdam

Word of the day:

sinecure: A position or office that requires little or no work but provides a salary.

Is Zen Buddhism?