h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Don't forget Time Bandits !!!!!!

Himura unusually for you, yo have said something interesting.

Your higlightint of the baby rape case does bring an interesting subject up.

In certain parts of Africa sex with a virgin (raping infants) is said to be a cure for AIDS. We all know it is not as a fair proportion of Africans do but desperate people will do extreme things.

Whats sad about this is that both Europeans AND Americans of a certain ideolgical bent are doig their best to ensure Africans dont learn ways to prevent the spread of AIDS in the first place. People in the west are actively trying to keep Africa ignorant while innocents get raped.

It proves something I have been saying for a long time and was said long before I was born.

No man is an island. We should see everything done by humanity as our collective problem and our collective duty to rectify. Blaming this person or that group for such and such is not the answer.

one love

thanks blicky


i must say some interesting stuff


no?


awe i feel so...unintelligent

The was a programme on the TV last week called The Power of Nightmares.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cgi-perl/whatson/search/advance_search.cgi?keyword=the+power+of+nightmares

It tells how the neo-conservatives hyped up the Cold War to make the threat seem worse than it was. A 35 year old Donald Rumstead spouting black propaganda generated by the CIA as if it was true, even after the CIA told him it was black propaganda and not true.

Or the story that no acustic tracking devices could not be detedted on Soviet submarines. Therefor they had to be using some other method that had not been discoverd, consequently the submarine threat was greater than previously thought.

Donald

Yeah, I was meaning to watch that, but watched a movie with someone instead. Was it very shocking/revealing/convincing? If so, I might watch the other two parts.

It wasn't particularly shocking, just put some flesh on something that a lot of people suspected for a long time.

That there is a group of people in the US that see the only way of keeping the country united is to unite them against a common enemy. If no enemy exits, then one must be manufactured. First it was Communism and the Soviets. With the demise of the USSR then another enemy had to be found and Arab terrorists seemed as good as any.

It was convincing though.

Donald

Thank you, Donald! I agree that some topics are not fit material for jokes, as Bliunky himnself would agree, if he wasn't being contrary, and as my brother himself recognised..

It looks like a great programme, Donald! I wish things like that were shown here...
There is so much that can be said about the Cold War - including a mad book I read in about 2001, by a guy who said it was all hyped up to enable budget items that were *really* to fight s and ! When we "defeated" the aliens, the Cold war was allowed to end. Is this the ultimate in disinformation for conspiracy theorists or what? Whos for the Lone Gunmen? (As in X Files and the spin-0ff series.)

I don't go along with the alien conspiracy theory, but the Cold War certainly was hyped out of proportion. The was absolutely no evidence that the Soviets were ever contemplating a preemptive nuclear strike, something we in the West were led to believe.

I think the alien conspiracies were generated to draw attention away from the real reason for hyping the Cold War and that was to the enormous profits being made by the arms industry.

While on the subject of conspiracy theorizes, the was another interesting programme on UK TV recently concerning the assassination of JFK. The conspiracy theorists have always maintained that there must have been another gunman firing from the front of the motorcade because JFK was thrown backwards by the impact of the bullets. If the bullets that hit him from behind where the only ones fired at him, should have slumped forwards.

However, it transpires that JFK had sever back trouble for most of his life which meant he had to were a spinal brace just to be able to walk. The brace made him so stiff and rigid that he couldn't have slumped forewards even if he had been hit from behind by a 20mm shell.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/tv/body_of_jfk.shtml

Donald

We have a videotape from my brother of a TV programme about the JFK assassination - don't know what it is yet, but we must get around to watching it. Clearly, the Warren Commission report was a load of sh*te!

If it is the TV programme I am thinking of it did point a few fingers but did not come up with any conclusive evidence one way or the other.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/tv/third_degree/kennedy_dynasty.shtml

One thing the programme did do though was tear huge holes in the Oliver Stone film JFK. That was nothing but typical Hollywood manipulation of the truth. All that proved is that Oliver Stone is a good story teller and Kevin Costner is a good actor and not a lot else.

Donald

That looks like a good doco, Donald. Oliver Stone is not all he thinks he is, that's for sure!

Thank you, Donald! I agree that some topics are not fit material for jokes, as Bliunky himnself would agree, if he wasn't being contrary, and as my brother himself recognised

Dont you ever get tired of being proved wrong because you are too stupid or lazy to go and check the available facts.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/MJ200875?journal=96554&show=8&skip=8

Blinky, don't you recognise that that was a reference to Princess DI, and her butler? Honestly...

If you scrolled down the page you would have found this Della:
........................................................................
There is nothing...
Jun 3, 2003

There is nothing in this world, no matter how serious and weighty, no matter how seemingly inappropriate, that is not a fit subject for comic treatment.

Alexei Sayle once said "You know, as an iconoclastic comedian, people often ask me if there's anything I wouldn't make a joke about. And I say yes, I would NEVER make a joke about a ratchet screwdriver".

I couldn't agree more!

Now where does that disagree with the idea that everything is open to humourous reflection?

one love

America. What you are about to vote for, in my humble opinion, affects the future of the world, not just your country. I think there are no other people's in the world who would vote for George Bush at this time. There must be a valid reason for this and I hope you can see it as we do. What you do impacts on us all. It's a big responsibilty.
We know that 911 meant that you were afraid, and I believe that George Bush is happy with your fear, because he believes this to be his main attraction. Your fear is his biggest vote catcher. What does this say about a man? The world will always have fearful moments but it is a cruel man who makes a political advantage from painting a picture blacker than it is. A pre emptive attack on Iraq revealed no weapons of fearful mass destruction, only weapons of - shall we say minimal destruction and George Bush has allowed these to fall into the hands of those who would use them against Iraqi woman and children as well as our own troops. This is clumsy, careless and inefficient as well as stupid.
There were no members of Al Quada in Iraq before George Bush opened the door to them. The fundemental terrorists, headed by Bin Laden, had hopes for the first fundamental Islamic state in Afghanistan. George Bush has provided Iraq as an alternative country with the decisions he has made.
The decison was never, go to war or not go to war, there were other ways to achieve an objective (whatever that objective was- since there were no WMDs) things are never merely black or white.

Please register your vote, even if you are as intimidated as third world countries are intimidated during voting. Our hopes and good wishes are with you. Any Iraqi will tell you what a terrible thing it is not to have a fully democratic vote.
George Bush as President is not a guarantee of your safety, he is more likely to bring you deeper into jeapody.

"If one candidate is trying to scare you and the other is trying to get you to think, if one candidate is appealing to your fears and the other one is appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the one who wants you to think and hope."

Moth,

While I agree with the sentiment of your post I take issue with the statement "Any Iraqi will tell you what a terrible thing it is not to have a fully democratic vote."

How do they know? they have never had a democratic vote in their entire history, so how can they know what it is like not to have one. And there lies the problem. Forcing an alien system of government onto anyone by military force is never going to work, even if it is democracy.

America never tried to force democracy onto any of the right wing dictators they have supported in the past. Why the sudden drive to world wide democracy now - or is it just another excuse along with WMDs.

Donald

I don't understand it either.

And speaking only for myself, I was ~not~ afraid after 9/11. Angry yes, who wouldn't be? But afraid? Not for a second.

Donald
You misunderstand my reference to the Iraqi's 'democratic' vote. It was meant to imply that the US does not have a democratic vote either.( If I am to believe Michael Moore and the BBC who recently noted intimidation at Florida voting booths.) This is the irony, while the West claims to impose democratic election proceedure, it is busily underminng its own voting system.

Dear Mr. X WILL
I am glad that you were not afraid. If your anger, rather than fear, at terrorism is a general emotion in America then would I be correct to assume that the war in Iraq is about retribution and revenge rather than keeping the world a safer place? And if this is the case was Iraq the correct target I wonder?

I'm only asking this for understanding. My close up experience of terrorism, in my own country, suggested to me that anger is a by product of fear in these kind of situations.