Shoe News; You Can Now See Al Jazeera Live On Your Computer

December 22nd, 2008 - by: danny

NEWS OF “THE SHOE”

Die Welt is reporting that a Turkish shoe factory’s had 300,000 orders for the same type of thick soled slip-on shoes that were thrown. They want to call it the “Bush.”

AP: Iraqi judge says shoe-throwing reporter was beaten

Al-Zeidi has been in custody since the Sunday attack and hasn’t been seen since by relatives or a lawyer.

One of his brothers, Uday, alleged Friday that the isolation indicates he was abused.

“Until now, neither an attorney nor anyone from his family has seen him and this is clear evidence that Muntadhar was under intense torture,” he said at a demonstration by about 20 family members just outside the Green Zone. “The investigation process is now under way in mysterious circumstances.”

In the West Bank village of Bilin, Palestinians hurled shoes rather than the usual rocks at Israeli soldiers in the weekly Friday protest against the Israeli separation barrier, which slices through their fields.

And the head of a large West Bank family offered one of its eligible females as a bride for al-Zeidi. Ahmad Salim Judeh, 75, said his 500-member clan had raised $30,000 for al-Zeidi’s legal defense.

NYT: Say Whatever You Want, but No Throwing Shoes

We don’t need any fare increases and we don’t need our transit system ravaged either,” said Mr. Steve Millies, who said he was an Amtrak signal-tower operator and a member of the Bail Out the People Campaign, a group that has stood up for victims of the economic crisis. He called for the subway and bus fare to be reduced to $1, to help unemployed New Yorkers.

Then, referring to the authority’s chief executive, who was sitting about 15 feet away, he said: “Where is Elliot Sander?” He stooped, slipped off one of his shoes and shouted, “You made $300,000 last year.”

Immediately, authority police officers swarmed him and pushed him out of the room. He was clutching his shoe, a black, thick-soled oxford, in his hand….

“I wanted to show the sole of the shoe as a sign of contempt for someone who makes so much money and yet wants to raise fares on the disabled,” he said. He said that the authority’s plans to more than double the $2 fare for disabled passengers who use the Access-a-Ride service particularly incensed him. He said the gesture was planned with Muntader al-Zaidi, the Iraqi shoe-thrower, in mind.”

TheRoot.com: Taming of the Shoe

If the Iraqi justice system worked anything like ours, Muntader al Zaidi, reporter for the Al-Baghdadiya network and erstwhile thrower of hard-soled dress shoes at President George W. Bush, would get a two-year sentence on a minimum-security federal work farm and early release after 180 days for good behavior. Book deals, an exclusive interview on Hannity’s America and marriage proposals from Lebanese pop starlets would ensue. He might even get to attend the dedication of the Bush 43 presidential library. So, what we need in this situation is someone in the Iraqi Ministry of Justice with a feel for the big picture, who can get us a win-win. Quickly…

MEDIA WRAP UP

AL JAZEERA NOW MORE EASILY AVAILABLE IN THE US

No, still not heavily controlled commercial cable but on the web. Aaron Barnhart explains in the Kansas City Star:

So how much longer is it really going to matter that Al Jazeera English is not available on American cable systems?

You may know I’ve written about this, a few times, in the past. Thanks to a new live-streaming program, however, it is now possible to watch the Qatar-based news channel with the decidedly non-Western-powers P.O.V. 24/7 on your computer.

For the past two years much of AJE’s content has been posted to YouTube. But that only meant a fraction of its thousands of hours of live and taped programming each year was viewable in the U.S. (except of course, for the Pentagon and Burlington, Vt., and Toledo, Ohio, the handful of cable systems that carry AJE).

Today, however, I downloaded a new program called LiveStation that carries a number of poorly-distributed English-language news channels live — let me say that in boldface: live — on its special program.

NEW YORK TIMES GOES BLOG – PRESS RELEASE:

NEW YORK The New York Times is planning to launch a new “Instant Op-Ed” next month that will allow the paper’s Web site to post immediate expert viewpoints on breaking news, according to Editorial Page Editor Andrew Rosenthal.

“Our Op-Ed now is very rapid response, but it is at the most the next day,” said Rosenthal. “We are looking at a way to take advantage of the expandability of the Internet, the back and forth of it and the instantaneous nature of the Internet.”

JEFF JARVIS: COULD THE LA TIMES CLOSE THE PAPER?

David Westphal reports an important and historic crossing of the Rubicon for a major newspaper, recounting a discussion with LA Times editor Russ Stanton at USC: “Stanton said the Times’ Web site revenue now exceeds its editorial payroll costs.”

I’ve long been asked by newspaper people – as a challenge – when the web will cover the costs of the newsroom as it exists. I’ve said it won’t, that the scale of the business is just different.

But if what Westphal reports is true – and I confirmed via email that I was reading him correctly (and it does make sense since both edit costs and web revenue run at about 10-15% of newspaper budgets) – then it means the Times could support its newsroom as it stands – after cutbacks aplenty – from the web. That’s momentous.

DEAN BAKER: The Washington Post on auto loan – More Class Hatred in the Washington Post

The Washington Post is very happy that conditions of the auto bailout are forcing the United Auto Workers to make further concessions. They devoted two news articles (one on the front page, the other on the front of the business section) and the lead editorial to the topic.

The front page article carried the headline: “UAW’s Sacrifices Look to Some Like Surrender.” The article included numerous comments touting the pact as a historic defeat for the union.

It also asserted that by eliminating the difference in compensation between union and non-union plants, the bailout “would render moot the union’s fundamental purpose, some industry analysts and labor experts said.” Actually, none of the labor experts cited in this article were identified as saying this.

Labor experts would know that non-union workers can be fired at any time the employer chooses to fire them. By contrast, the union protects workers from arbitrary dismissals. Labor experts know that job security is very important for people who depend on their job for their income, so it is unlikely that any labor expert would have said that there was no reason for a union to exist if it could not produce gains in compensation.

The business section article also touted the impact that the bailout conditions would have on the UAW, as demonstrated most clearly by the headline of the page 3 jump “With bailout, Downsizing Could Hasten the Demise of the UAW.”

The Post editorial, after deploring the fact that bailout money was diverted from Wall Street to the real economy, celebrated the pay cuts that the bailout would impose on UAW workers. For some reason, the Post attaches enormous importance to reducing the pay of auto workers who earn $28 an hour. It shows no comparable concern for reducing the pay of auto industry executives to parity with their foreign competitors. (The top executives at Toyota, Honda, and other successful companies get paid in the neighborhood of $1-2 million a year. Unlike their U.S. counterparts, they don’t get paychecks in the tens of millions of dollars even in the best years.) The Post has also never felt the need to insist on large pay cuts for Wall Street executives even though their banks are now wards of the state.

NAKED CAPITALISM BLOG ON NY TIMES:

Well, what we all suspected has now been made official. From the New York Times:

Mr. Paulson and other senior advisers to Mr. Bush say the administration has responded well to the turmoil, demonstrating flexibility under difficult circumstances. “There is not any playbook,” Mr. Paulson said.

Why am I not surprised to see that what ought to be viewed as a failing is instead spun as a virtue?

I have mixed feelings about the article in which this juicy quote appears, “White House Philosophy Stoked Mortgage Bonfire.” While it does chronicle some of the ways that the Bush “ownership society” vision, which included raising the level of homeownership, it makes the Administration sound like a bunch of hapless innocents, who had good goals but failed to see that the implementation of their objectives left a great deal to be desired.

But in private moments, aides say, the president is looking inward. During a recent ride aboard Marine One, the presidential helicopter, Mr. Bush sounded a reflective note.

“We absolutely wanted to increase homeownership,” Tony Fratto, his deputy press secretary, recalled him saying. “But we never wanted lenders to make bad decisions.”

SITDOWN UNION–UE–ASKS FOR HELP IN CHICAGO

“We said we would not go anywhere until we get justice, and now we have it!” declared Armando Robles, President of United Electrical Workers Union (UE) Local 1110. “The occupation is over.”

Armando’s words signaled a victory for the workers and for working people everywhere. On Dec. 10th, the occupation of the Republic Windows and Doors plant in Chicago ended and workers won eight weeks of severance pay, health care and their vacation pay. We need your continued support to mount a major campaign to reopen the plant.

The UE and Local 1110 have created the Window of Opportunity Fund to re-establish a manufacturing operation at the factory that formerly housed Republic. We are organizing a working group of union leaders, community activists, public officials and economic development experts to initiate worker driven green job creation.

Jobs and job training opportunities created through the Fund will be offered first to former Republic employees. The work of the Fund will also provide advice to workers confronting economic injustice in situations similar to those which gave rise to the sit-in at Republic.

I am writing to ask you to give $20, $30 or more to the Window of Opportunity Fund by going to the web site and clicking on the “Donate” button in the upper right hand corner.

P.S. We are taking the economy into our own hands by creating green jobs with the Window of Opportunity Fund. You can give the gift of green jobs just in time for the holidays. Find out more and donate!

~ IN MEMORIUM ~

Our condolences and respect to Noam Chomsky and family,.

BOSTON GLOBE: Carol Chomsky; at 78; Harvard language professor was wife of Noam Chomsky, MIT linguist

Brilliant and accomplished, Carol Chomsky taught for many years at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and wrote oft-cited articles about how young children learn to read. And yet, she possessed talents that didn’t easily fit on a curriculum vitae.

“She was a pretty remarkable person,” said Judith Chomsky of Philadelphia, who is married to the younger brother of Dr. Chomsky’s husband, Noam. “She was very athletic, and, until she was ill, she was fishing and water skiing and doing things people wouldn’t normally associate with her. She played the accordion. She could fix a car. She was mechanical. I mean, she was the one who fixed everything at the house.”

Through her work in language development and psycholinguistics, Dr. Chomsky also helped young children learn the mechanics of reading, and by doing so gain greater social acceptance in their classrooms. Dr. Chomsky died of cancer yesterday at her Lexington home. She was 78.

King Adviser James Bevel, 72; Incest Sentence Clouded Legacy By Alexander Remington – Washington Post – December 20, 2008

The Rev. James L. Bevel, 72, a fiery top lieutenant of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and a force behind civil rights campaigns of the 1960s whose erratic behavior and conviction on incest charges tarnished his legacy, died in Virginia on Dec. 19 of pancreatic cancer.

Sherrilynn Bevel, a daughter, said he died at her home in Springfield. She said Rev. Bevel, who was freed on bond because of ill health, had been there since Nov. 8.

“Jim Bevel was Martin Luther King’s most influential aide,” said civil rights historian David J. Garrow. He cited Rev. Bevel’s “decisive influence” on the Birmingham “children’s crusade” of 1963 that helped revive the movement, the voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965 and King’s increased outspokenness against the Vietnam War.

Rev. Bevel, an ordained Baptist minister, came to prominence while he was Alabama project coordinator for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, a civil rights organization led by King.

LETTERS

Nydia Leaf writes:

Thank you for your Dissections and ALL GOOD WISHES TO YOU for 2009 and beyond. About the DRC, one of the battles over resources in the Congo relates to Coltan, a mineral composite that is present in every cellphone, computer, etc etc.

Only Australia has more Coltan than the DRC and they are not selling any, so poor Congo has become the battle-ground for this mineral. Some of your readers can probably expand on this. Again, many thanks!

BORROWED FROM EMAIL: Politically Correct Holiday Greeting:

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great (not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country or is the only “AMERICA” in the western hemisphere), and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical disability, religious faith, choice of computer platform, or sexual preference of the wishee.

Legal Disclaimer: By accepting this agreement, you are accepting these terms:

This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.

Sincerely,

(Name withheld for legal, social and cultural considerations.)

And finally, from LBN NEWS:

HOLIDAY SEX: CHRISTMAS SEASON IS PEAK FOR MATING:

‘Tis the season for making whoopee. The Christmas-New Year’s period produces a year-high spike in sexual activity and conceptions in the United States, according to biorhythm researchers and makers of sex-related products.

They attribute the increase to holiday leisure and New Year’s resolutions to have children. New Year’s irresolution fueled by alcohol and partying is another contributing factor.

WITH HUMILITY, AN APOLOGY:

CORRECTION:

Last Friday, I ran some very cool revised corporate logos sent to me from Indonesia by the artist Arahmaiani (whose name I also butchered.) Out of enthusiasm for the work, I didn’t double check.

The artist writes:

“the logos are not created by myself but an anonymous who launched them on a blog (see the web). But it’s not a terrible mistake because they allow individuals to use it. I’m planning to use them on my art and I have asked for some kind of permission through the blog.

Yes this copyright thing actually sucks – there is a case recently of 118 silver jewelry designs from Bali has been claimed by an American designer/businessman as his/her. Poor Balinese local designers they can not do anything about it – you know traditionally there is no such thing like copyright or things need to be patented since design is for community use.”

I will be blogging three days this week and probably be back next week. Comments to Danny Schechter, editor and news dissector: dissector@mediachannel.org

We wish you all holiday greetings and a happy ~~new~~ “news” year. We hope to earn your continuing interest and support. Mediachannel.org needs your help, needs it now. Nuff’ Said.

As you can see from the blog enhanced by the magic of Cherie Welch who gives up sleep for the cause, we are trying to improve our “product” and presentation even as our coffers are depleted. We have been so busy that we haven’t bombarded you with more financial solicitations. Don’t confuse that with a lack of need. You can send checks that are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law made out to The Global Center at 575 8th Avenue, #2200, NY, NY 10018. Mark Mediachannel on the check. And of course you can donate online through Paypal.

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