On Fri, Sep 4, 2009 at 4:12 PM, Ganz, Caryn<
caryn.ganz@rollingstone.com> wrote:
> We haven’t added any additional political and non-music content to our site
> just yet, but thanks for passing along.
>
>
> On 8/30/09 2:46 PM, "Barrett Brown" <
barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi, Caryn-
>
> You mentioned last month that you'll be in need of political pieces as you
> expand your non-music coverage. Let me know if this is the sort of thing
> you're looking for; this particular piece isn't particularly time-dependent
> in case you'd like to use it later on. Article pasted below.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Barrett Brown
> Brooklyn, NY
> 512-560-2302
>
> One Cat, Two Cats, Red Cat, Blue Cat, Oliver North is a Fascist Nut and To
> Hell With Rhyming Anyway
>
> Oliver North is upset <
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=33322> . It
> seems that the Pentagon's increasing reliance on civilian contractors has
> been receiving a minor degree of scrutiny as of late, a development he
> characterizes as involving "threats of inquisitions," which is literally
> true insomuch as that Congress will perhaps make some inquiries into the
> matter. Naturally, North has been adverse to congressional oversight ever
> since Congress forced him to lie about the crimes he had committed in
> service to what he once called the "neat idea" of selling weapons to Iran.
> He is no big fan of the media, either; both, North says, are today motivated
> by some sort of sinister pacifism. "Disparaging and de-funding civilian
> contractors is just one more way of disarming America," he explains in the
> pages of Human Events, itself reportedly the favorite magazine of the
> president who once fired him.
>
> Now, one might point out that objections to private suppliers of men and
> arms are nothing new and have in fact been made by several prominent
> American statesmen who obviously had no desire to see American disarmed, and
> that such a fact would certainly seem to refute the argument that those who
> make such objections are necessarily seeking to disarm America. In fact, I
> was planning to point this out myself - but for some bizarre reason, North
> beats me to it:
>
> In the opening days of World War II, then Sen. Harry Truman became famous
> for threatening to “lock up” civilian contractors for producing sub-par
> munitions, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower ominously warned against the
> threat of a “military-industrial complex.”
>
> So after setting out to establish that those who criticize contractors are
> wacky peace creeps, North cites the Supreme Commander of the Alllied Forces
> in Europe and the fellow who dropped two atom bombs on Japan as having
> criticized contractors. This is a very interesting strategy, akin to
> claiming that all cats are red and then backing up one's assertion by
> pointing out two cats who are blue. But North, who no doubt thinks his
> argument is going very well at this point, suddenly decides that what he's
> actually arguing is that the two blue cats were only somewhat blue and thus
> don't count, but that other, bluer cats may be found today:
>
> However, [the anti-contractor rhetoric of Eisenhower and Truman] is pale by
> comparison to the viscera now being aimed at civilian contractors supporting
> the campaigns in the land between the Tigris and Euphrates and in the shadow
> of the Hindu Kush.
>
> Our colonel does not cite any examples of these mainstream objections which
> he deems so much more critical than Eisenhower's characterization of the
> military-industrial complex as something we must guard against lest "the
> weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes,"
> itself about as critical as critical gets. He doesn't cite any mainstream
> objections of a more critical nature because they don't exist; in order to
> top Eisenhower's warning, a fellow would basically have to claim that
> civilian contractors are secretly assembling a nuclear arsenal with which to
> destroy the world in service to some ancient Sumerian deity. Though he can't
> actually identify any of these terrible things that have been said about our
> nation's apple-cheeked mercenaries, North knows exactly who's been saying
> them.
>
> “Contractor” is the new “dirty word” in the so-called mainstream media - and
> in Washington.
>
> Of course, contractor is also a dirty word among some military men,
> including several I have spoken to over the years, but North's policy has
> always been to portray Washington and the media as being in effeminate
> opposition to members of the armed services, who must always be in agreement
> with himself. At any rate, North claims that the non-existent objections
> that are somehow more serious than Eisenhower's meta-objection are leading
> to some unprecedented and disheartening trends at the Pentagon:
>
> In April, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced plans to hire 30,000
> additional DoD employees to cut the percentage of work being done by
> contractors. The FY 2010 Defense Budget request replaces nearly 14,000
> contractor personnel with government employees - even though the “lifetime
> cost” - counting government benefits and retirement - will more than double
> the expense to American taxpayers.
>
> So, in the midst of two wars and numerous operations elsewhere, the
> Department of Defense hires 30,000 employees who will be entirely
> accountable to the Department of Defense and our nation's rules of
> engagement rather than to Blackwater (which, of course, has now changed its
> name to "Xe" lest it be associated with itself), and suddenly North is
> worried that too much money is being spent on the military. Here's a fun
> little parlor game: try to find an instance besides this in which North has
> expressed concern about excessive military spending. And here's a fun little
> parlor game that you can actually win: Google "Oliver North military
> spending" and click on the first link that comes up, which itself turns out
> to be a Fox News article North wrote just a few months ago
> <
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,489387,00.html> in which he calls on
> the federal government to increase military spending:
>
> But the Obama administration and their supporters on Capitol Hill need to
> understand that when it comes to spending, there are few things government
> can do that has a more immediate, positive effect on jobs and the overall
> the economy than expenditures on national defense.
>
> Good point, Ollie. Perhaps the DoD could hire 30,000 new employees to assist
> with the national defense. It might just be crazy enough to work.
>
> Like any truly mediocre thinker, North does not anticipate the obvious
> counterpoint to his sudden and disingenuous call for fiscal restraint via
> increased mercenary deployment - the counterpoint that price-gouging, late
> deliveries, and shoddy worksmanship on the part of his beloved contractors
> have already cost the American taxpayer billions in wasted dollars, with a
> few of these incidents having resulted in injuries and even deaths among our
> troops. Here is a man who cannot see two steps ahead of his own argument and
> who does not seem to recall things he himself wrote months ago or even just
> a few sentences prior, as if he were a goldfish with thumbs and a keyboard
> and a crack pipe that somehow works underwater.
>
> North is not content to assail the federal government for doing what he
> recently told it to do or to blast the mainstream media for things it hasn't
> actually done - he is also compelled to attack the media for failing to
> report things that it has in fact reported countless times:
>
> Though it’s unlikely to make the lead story in any of the mainstream media,
> contractors are performing tasks that U.S. government entities either cannot
> do - or that cannot be done as economically.
>
> Ready for another parlor game? Google "civilian contractors Iraq" without
> quotes and read the two mainstream news stories that immediately come up.
> The first of these is a CBS report from 2006
> <
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/11/26/cbsnews_investigates/main2209058.shtml>
> in which several contractors are interviewed about the risks they faced in
> Iraq and the injuries that their swell employers have refused to treat. The
> second is a CNN piece from 2004
> <
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/04/01/iraq.contractor/> that explains
> everything North says is unlikely to be explained about the important role
> that contractors can serve in U.S. military operations, and does so without
> a single word of criticism. Spend a few more minutes searching and you'll
> find other stories in the same vein, all written and published within the
> purview of the mainstream media, no doubt by accident.
>
> There are legitimate reasons for the Pentagon to employ civilian contractors
> and outside firms to assist with a variety of tasks both at home and abroad;
> there are also legitimate reasons to call attention to the problems that
> have come up as a result. But there is no legitimate reason to cry
> "dolchstoss" each time serious concerns are voiced by the media, our elected
> representatives, or even members of the military; to deem such objections as
> being motivated by hatred for the armed forces or by a desire to see
> American disarmed, one would have to be an ignorant crypto-fascist like
> Oliver North. That lets Oliver North off the hook, of course.
>
>
>
> On Tue, Aug 11, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Ganz, Caryn <
caryn.ganz@rollingstone.com>
> wrote:
>
> Ah yes, you are correct (about my working with Josh and the spelling).
>
> We recently had a personnel change in the online staff, but it was not
> involving me – I’m sure that was in your mind.
>
>
>
> On 8/11/09 12:08 PM, "Barrett Brown" <
barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi, Caryn-
>
> Thanks for getting back to me; I'll get back to you with some other pitches
> in the near future. For some reason I thought you'd been the online editor
> until recently. Also, I just realized why your name sounded familiar - you
> did the Pixies book with Josh Frank. I assisted him with a few projects back
> in Austin after that came out; terrible speller, but he's good at getting
> interviews.
>
> Anyway, I'll be in touch later on with some queries.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Barrett Brown
> Brooklyn, NY
> 512-560-2302
>
> On Tue, Aug 11, 2009 at 11:42 AM, Ganz, Caryn <
caryn.ganz@rollingstone.com>
> wrote:
>
> Hi Barrett,
>
> I’ve actually been the deputy editor for two years, but it feels like it all
> just started yesterday. Thanks for sending this my way – unfortunately,
> there really isn’t a place on the site where a piece like this would fit
> right now. But in the future we may expand our non-music daily coverage, and
> in that event, something like this would have a home. So while it isn’t
> right for us right now, something along these lines could work in the future
> – confusing, I’m sure. If you have more pitches in the coming months, feel
> free to lob them my way and I’ll let you know if anything works.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Caryn Ganz
> Deputy Editor | RollingStone.com
> 1290 Avenue of the Americas, 2nd Fl.
> New York, NY 10104 | 212.484.4359
>
>
>
>
>
> On 8/11/09 3:40 AM, "Barrett Brown" <
barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi, Caryn-
>
> I understand that you're now deputy editor at Rolling Stone, and I wanted to
> check to see if you'd be interested in a piece I just wrote, perhaps for the
> website. I currently serve as a contributor to Vanity Fair, The Huffington
> Post, Skeptic, and The Onion, and my other work has appeared in dozens of
> publications including National Lampoon, McSweeney's, American Atheist, and
>
nerve.com <
http://nerve.com> <
http://nerve.com> <
http://nerve.com/> . My
> first book Flock of Dodos: Behind Modern Creationism, Intelligent Design,
> and the Easter Bunny was released in 2007 (with a back-cover blurb from Matt
> Taibbi, among others); my second is set for publication next year. I also
> serve as director of communications for Enlighten the Vote (formerly known
> as GAMPAC), a political action committee dedicated to advancing the
> Establishment Clause as well as providing support to atheist candidates for
> public office. I've appeared on Fox News and other, more reasonable outlets.
>
>
>
> The article in question is pasted below; it's an allegedly humorous
> narrative of my experiences with posing as a devout Muslim on the internet.
> Let me know if this interests you or if you might like to receive other
> queries from me in the future.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Barrett Brown
> Brooklyn, NY
> 512-560-2302
>
> Confessions of a Phony YouTube Muslim
>
>
> It was never my intention to be an atheist. For one thing, atheism is
> impolite; intentionally or not, denying society's gods is a reproach to
> society itself. The wise man economizes his reproachfulness.
>
> Worse, atheism is boring. An atheist can dream of space elevators that
> would allow us to mine the moon and self-replicating nanobots that could
> till the soil in places where food would not have grown previously, but so
> can a Christian, and Wiccans can have nightmares about such things.
> Meanwhile, the Christian also awaits Christ, the Muslim awaits the Mahdi,
> and the Jew awaits the Messiah which hopefully does not turn out to be
> Christ or the Mahdi.
>
> So I decided to take a vacation from atheism. But eating acid at the
> Vatican was out of the question for a number of reasons, largely financial.
> Actually becoming religious would be difficult and somewhat problematic
> insomuch as that I serve as director of communications for a pro-atheist
> political action committee. So I simply created an alter-ego for myself; I
> became a devout Muslim going by the name of Ali Desu Hussein. And then I got
> on the internet.
>
> My intention was to argue with Christians as a Muslim. This is harder
> than it sounds. Mostly, I got myself banned from Christian message boards
> immediately after posting the following:
>
> In the name of the Prophet, peace be upon him-
>
> I have come to bring you the truth of Islam, the religion of peace. Surely
> does the world itself cry out to you in testimony of this truth, but just as
> surely do its cries fall on deaf ears. Surely does the breath of Allah move
> over the waters, and just as surely does the Christian believe this to be
> the breath of Jesus, when, after all, it was Allah, as noted above. Surely
> surely surely.
>
>
> But I wanted to have a dialogue, not simply to immediately convert others
> to Islam by way of such theological magic bullets as the message above. So I
> set up a YouTube account for my Muslim Mr. Hyde.
>
> YouTube, like the internet at large, is what the Holy Land would have
> been like during the Crusades if everyone in the Holy Land had too much free
> time on their hands. Groups once relatively isolated from each other now
> mingle freely, if unproductively. Evangelicals of a certain sort post
> damning animated narratives of Mormon theology which, sadly, are largely
> accurate; <
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFZ1jVO3-OE> Muslims of a certain
> sort post clips of talking lions who are apparently Muslims themselves
> <
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnRQvuwpWSE> ; Jews of a certain sort post
> videos of other Jews speaking at great length about something which I'm not
> entirely clear on because it is boring and I turned it off
> <
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gApYRDKCw0&feature=PlayList&p=92C78EA08E3A4B07&index=8>
> .
>
>
> Then, there is the infinite debate over the infinite. Now was my chance
> to truly play the role of the believer, to walk a mile in the shoes of
> someone sitting at their computer in bare feet. I didn't have a camera, but
> this was probably for the best insomuch as that I would have had to pick up
> a lot of empty beer bottles and move them out of the way, and I'd just
> recently gotten them all organized the way I like them. But visuals are
> unnecessary anyway; aside from videos and video responses, YouTube
> theologians also ply their ancient trade by way of old-fashioned text, which
> was sufficient for their predecessors, particularly when coupled with the
> sword.
>
> If I was to do the work of Allah on as grand a scale as I was planning,
> allies would be needed. Luckily, I came across TheFollower72, a fellow
> Muslim who appeared to be quite active in his own social network
> proselytizing insomuch as that his user page was heavy on comments left by
> others. But all was not well, it seemed. One exuberant YouTuber had posted
> the message, "Go Christianity!!!" Clearly, my new friend was under virtual
> siege. And there seemed to be treachery afoot even from our own alleged
> brethren; one user calling himself AyatollahKhomeini123 had left the
> following warning: "Please block and delete the user who is going around by
> the name of bakhtash. He is an evil munafiq akhee, and a shahan shahi
> royalist pig who has disguised himself as a Moslem but in reality he is a
> back stabber who be-friends with you making you thinik he is a moslem and
> then stabs you by revealing his own true identity as an anti Islam. Down
> with bakhtash. Allah o Akbar. Khomeini Rahbar." But the plot thickened;
> bakhtash himself had left this similar warning: "Please block and delete the
> users and comments that are only negative against Islam and or are
> hypocritical!, the false user 'AyatollahKhomeini123' is a munafiq akhee, he
> is a shahan shahi royalist pig whom in this account does a lot of bad
> things!"
>
> It was now clear that I could not trust even my alleged coreligionists;
> any one of them could be a royalist pig or even a false Muslim. I would have
> to be a false Muslim on my own. I resolved to face this task with all the
> bravery of a talking lion.
>
> My next move was to contact the YouTube account of the Worldwide Church
> of God, a Christian sect founded by Herbert Armstrong, himself one of the
> most prominent prophets of the mid-20th century. I left a friendly message
> and got a similarly friendly response: "Greetings Friends! Praise the Lord
> Brethren and may God Bless the United States of America!" So far, so good.
> But then another, more traditional Christian intervened lest I eventually be
> converted to Lord Bretherenism or what have you. "Bro, the Worldwide Church
> of God is a dangerous cult," he explained. "This Herbert guy you are
> speaking to talks to the dead do not listen to him." This didn't bother me;
> if I was actually speaking with "this Herbert guy," then I, too, talk to the
> dead insomuch as that Herbert Armstrong died in 1986; it would be
> hypocritical of me to think less of him for doing the same thing. Also, I'd
> already made cruel fun of Armstrong in an article I'd written concerning the
> history of Evangelical prophecy, so it would have been awkward to speak with
> him further anyway, dead or not.
>
> Moving on, I now approached the resident atheists, posting a couple of
> comments on their videos to the effect that Islam is the way and the light
> and whatnot. This turned out to be a mistake; atheists can be very, uh,
> prolific. One non-believer left three long messages on my user page in quick
> succession, each filled with grandiloquent denunciations of the one true
> faith. "We are apostates of Islam," wrote a user named CrissyFrog. "We
> denounce Islam as a false doctrine of hate and terror... We strive to bring
> the Muslims into the fold of humanity. Eradicate Islam so our people can be
> liberated, so they can prosper and break away from the pillory of Islam...
> Quran is replete with scientific heresies, historic blunders, mathematical
> mistakes, logical absurdities, grammatical errors and ethical fallacies. It
> is badly compiled and it contradicts itself. There is nothing intelligent in
> this book let alone miraculous."
>
> I quickly became bored, having accidentally encountered my own opinion.
> But then it occurred to me that the ultimate cyber-novelty was still to be
> had - I would allow myself to be converted from Islam to Christianity.
> Covertly, I began interviewing candidates, finally deciding upon a fellow
> going by the handle of ps35ffi. The exchange went as follows:
>
> ps35ffi: Who was Jesus? What does the Koran say about him? That he was a
> prophet? What does the Koran say about it's prophets?
>
> AliDesuHussein: Qur'an says many things about the prophets my friend, but
> most important to know is that Muhammed (peace be upon him) is final
> prophet:
>
> 1. Allah
> 2. ???
> 3. Prophet!
>
> [Note: The Reader may recognize that bit as having been derived from an old
> South Park episode. Or the Reader may not, in which case it is mine.]
>
> ps35ffi: Does it not say that what the prophets say is Allah's word and
> should be obeyed?
>
> AliDesuHussein: Absolutely my friend, it does.
>
> ps35ffi: Ok my friend. Yeshua said I am the way the truth and the life, no
> one cometh to the Father but by me.
>
> AliDesuHussein: where does it say this?
>
> ps35ffi: In my text, it's in John 14.6
>
> That, I decided, was enough evidence for Ali Desu Hussein. I sent my new
> spiritual advisor a private message to the effect that I was going to need
> to think very heavily on these matters. He was very pleased.
>
> And thus it was that I gave this fellow a gift beyond measure: the
> belief that he had managed to win over a religious enemy to his own, true
> faith. Overcoming the bad manners inherent to my atheism, I had performed
> the greatest act of politeness that the world had seen since Christ. Then I
> pirated a bunch of games.
>
>
>
>
>
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>
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>
>
> This message is the property of Wenner Media LLC or its affiliates. It may
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> reproduce this message in any manner that would allow it to be viewed by any
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>
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>
>
>
> This message is the property of Wenner Media LLC or its affiliates. It may
> be legally privileged and/or confidential and is intended only for the use
> of the addressee(s). No addressee should forward, print, copy, or otherwise
> reproduce this message in any manner that would allow it to be viewed by any
> individual not originally listed as a recipient. If the reader of this
> message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any
> unauthorized disclosure, dissemination, distribution, copying or the taking
> of any action in reliance on the information herein is strictly prohibited.
> If you have received this communication in error, please immediately notify
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