Won’t Be Around Much The Next Few Days

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Hi guys. I’m off to Seattle for a few days to record the theme song for the sequel to Monsturd, The “RetarDEAD.” So I probably won’t be posting as much ’till I get back on Monday night.
FYI, I have already loaded up a bunch of new Daily Show clips that I’ll try to get around to posting individually on the blog should I get a hold of a good connection up there. (The “new” clips are dated from 9-17-03 on.)
You can always peruse my archive for yourself to see what I’ve got going in there. Often, I upload stuff that I don’t get around to blogging for days, so feel free to poke around and link to whatever you like.
Anyway, have a great weekend!

Info On The Department Of Defense’s SERVE Voting System

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Someone sent me this interesting thread about the Department of Defense’s SERVE program. I’m still digesting this myself, but it seemed worthy of passing on to you.

When you recall that military absentee ballots were a critical factor in the Florida election of 2000, the scrutiny the SERVE project should attract a great deal of attention. But it has been running well below the radar since it was announced on June 2nd and and, as Slashdot pointed out, it will be a Microsoft Windows-only election.
In addition to military stationed overseas, citizens of Arkansas, Florida, Hawaii, Minnesota, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Utah and Washington will be able to vote using SERVE. All the voters need to do is submit a form and they’ll be registered.
The troubling aspect of the SERVE program is that it appears to have no security features that will allow voters to check their votes were correctly recorded. The privacy statement on the SERVE site suggests that changing information is illegal and that connections will be monitored, but the ability for citizens to have oversight on the process is entirely absent. Say what you will, but hanging chads were important because they constituted a physical record. A vote intercepted and changed on the Internet or changed later by corrupt officials, which the 2000 election demonstrated is a potential factor in presidential elections.

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More About Filesharers Coming to Brianna’s Aid

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C-notes for Brianna
Outpouring of donations in download suit
By Helen Kennedy for the NY Daily News.

Furious music lovers nationwide flooded 12-year-old Brianna LaHara of Manhattan with donations yesterday to help pay off her debt to the recording business.
From $3 pledges for the Help Brianna fund to $1,000 offers, hundreds of people wanted to help pay the $2,000 settlement between Brianna and the Recording Industry Association of America.
“The whole deal with going after the actual consumer – and the fact that it’s a 12-year-old girl with a single mother who lives in the projects – well, these people have no decency,” said Taylor Finley, a California film student who started the Help Brianna fund.

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State Of Illinois Challenges Shrub Environmental Policy

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State to Challenge Bush Pollution Rules
By the Associated Press.
Here’s the whole article. It’s a little one.

State to Challenge Bush Pollution Rules
Sep 22, 2003 1:38 pm US/Central
SPRINGFIELD (AP) Illinois officials are planning a legal challenge to President Bush’s change in anti-pollution rules.
The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and the state attorney general said today they will file a petition to block the rule change.
State EPA Director Renee Cipriano says the new rules would threaten air quality.
A spokeswoman for Attorney General Lisa Madigan calls the rules “an all-out assault on public health.”
The Bush administration last month announced it was making it easier for power plants and factories to make large upgrades without having to install anti-pollution technology.
The new rules would allow improvements worth up to 20-percent of a plant’s total value before pollution-fighting devices are required.

Michael Moore On The Lying Liars Who Tell Lies About Him

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How to Deal with the Lies and the Lying Liars When They Lie about “Bowling for Columbine”

One thing you get used to when you’re in what’s called “the public eye” is reading the humorous fiction that others like to write about you. For instance, I have read in quite respectable and trustworthy publications that a) I’m a college graduate (I’m not), b) I was a factory worker (I quit the first day), and c) I have two brothers (I have none). Newsweek wrote that I live in a penthouse on Central Park West (I live above a Baby Gap store, and not on any park), and the Internet Movie Database once listed me as the director of the Elvis movie, “Blue Hawaii” ( I was 6 at the time the film was made, but I was quite skilled in directing my sisters in building me a snowman). Lately, my favorite mistake is the one many reviewers made crediting the cartoon in “Bowling for Columbine” as being the work of the “South Park” creators. It isn’t. I wrote it and my buddy Harold Moss’s animation studio drew it.
I’ve enjoyed reading these inventions/mistakes about this “Michael Moore.” I mean, who wouldn’t want to fantasize about living in penthouses roughhousing with brothers you never had. But lately I’ve begun to see so many things about me or my work that aren’t true. It’s become so easy to spread these fictions through the internet (thanks mostly to lazy reporters or web junkies who do all their research by typing in “key words” and then just repeat the same mistakes). And so I wonder that if I don’t correct the record, then all of the people who don’t know better may just end up being filled with a bunch of stuff that isn’t true.
Of course, it would take a lot of my time to contact all these sites and media outlets to correct their errors and I think it’s more important I spend my time on my next book or movie so I just let it ride. But is that fair to you, the reader, who has now been told something that isn’t true?
With the unexpected and overwhelming success of “Bowling for Columbine” and “Stupid White Men,” the fiction that has been written or spoken about me and my work has reached a whole new level of storytelling. It’s no longer about making some simple errors or calling me “Roger” Moore. It is now about organized groups going full blast trying to discredit me by knowingly making up lies and repeating them over and over in the hopes that people will believe them

Exit Polls Anyone? Let’s Try To Collect Some Numbers On Our Own This Tuesday

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I’ve always been against the Recall — I’m shocked and dismayed that we’re wasting so much of our valuable time and resources when we have so little of either. It’s really important for you to get out and vote this Tuesday!
I’ve been toying with the idea of trying to organize some kind of exit polls the night of the election. I know a lot of us have to work that day (those of us lucky enough to have jobs), but what if we all spent even just that last hour between 7 and 8 pm asking people how they voted on the way out of the polling place? I’d be happy to coordinate the results by hand if necessary.
Would anyone be willing to work on this with me? Email me at lisarein@finetuning.com if you would.
Thanks!

Arianna Pulls Out Of The Race And Asks Us To Vote “No” On The Recall To Stop Arnold Petewilsonegger

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This came in yesterday from MoveOn.org:

***In front of a national audience last night, Arianna Huffington outlined the dramatically simple reality facing Californians: if you don’t vote against the recall, Arnold Schwarzenegger will become governor. Today we’re passing along a letter from her explaining why she dropped out of the race and is working to defeat the recall. Please get the word out that a vote for the recall is a vote for Arnold Schwarzenegger: FORWARD THIS EMAIL to friends, coworkers and family.
Dear Friend,
Last night I withdrew my candidacy from the recall race and today I am writing to sound an alarm about what is at stake in this election. I am devoting all my time and energy in these remaining six days to defeating the recall — and to defeating the Arnold Schwarzenegger-Pete Wilson forces that are trying to use the recall to hijack our state. Please help me do that by forwarding this message.
I have signed MoveOn’s “Recall No, Democracy Yes” pledge and I urge you to do the same. More than 260,000 people have pledged to do something — such as forwarding this email! — in these last days to defeat the recall and stop Arnold Schwarzenegger. Click here to sign the pledge:
http://moveon.org/pac/recall/
From the beginning of my campaign I have said that I opposed the recall on principle. It was backed by a bunch of Republican sore losers looking for a backdoor way to overturn an election they lost. Nevertheless, once the recall was set, I felt that the opportunity it offered to elect a truly independent and progressive governor was too important to let pass. And so I entered the race.

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