BANGKOK, Thailand -- A Supreme Court sentenced fugitive former Prime
Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to five years in prison on September 27
after ruling in absentia she was guilty of negligence for not stopping
alleged corruption costing billions of dollars during her failed rice
crop subsidies.
   The military junta, which ousted Ms. Yingluck in a bloodless 2014
coup, is now using "spies" to track her after she missed a court
ruling on August 25 and reportedly smuggled herself out of Thailand
with the help of police, decoy cars and a black surgical face mask.
   Ms. Yingluck, 50, has not been seen in public since.
   "She has not yet applied for political asylum and I don't know
whether she will be able to get it," coup-installed Prime Minister
Prayuth Chan-ocha told reporters on September 26 amid speculation that
Ms. Yingluck was trying for asylum in England.
   "I know [her whereabouts]...I have spies," said Mr. Prayuth who led
the 2014 coup when he was army chief.
   Before disappearing, she insisted on her innocence and portrayed

he flag is a symbol, and there is no agreement as to what it actually symbolizes. By design, the flag’s thirteen stripes stand for the original 13 states, none of which would ban slavery. The 14th state, Vermont, was the first state to ban slavery, doing it weakly in its 1777 state constitution (not that the principle was enforced: in 1802 the Town of Windsor sued a State Supreme Court justice to get him to take care of an elderly, infirm slave he had dumped on town welfare; the town lost the case). The original flag had 13 stars for those same original 13 states, and it took over 70 years before all 36 stars in the 1865 flag represented states without slavery (but not states without racist Jim Crow laws and the freedom to lynch without consequence).

November 11 is Armistice Day / Remembrance Day. Ninety-nine years ago, on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, fighting ceased in the “war to end all wars.” People went on killing and dying right up until the pre-designated moment, impacting nothing other than our understanding of the stupidity of war.

Thirty million soldiers had been killed or wounded and another seven million had been taken captive during World War I. Even more would die from a flu epidemic created by the war. Never before had people witnessed such industrialized slaughter, with tens of thousands falling in a day to machine guns and poison gas. After the war, more and more truth began to overtake the lies, but whether people still believed or now resented the pro-war propaganda, virtually every person in the United States wanted to see no more of war ever again. Posters of Jesus shooting at Germans were left behind as the churches along with everyone else now said that war was wrong. Al Jolson wrote in 1920 to President Harding:

In The Last Tycoon F. Scott Fitzgerald rather famously quipped, “There are no second acts in American lives.” But I’m glad this isn’t true about drama, because I started drifting off during the first act of A Noise Within’s production of Jean Giradoux’s 1943 The Madwoman of Chaillot. I found Act I, which takes place at Angela Balogh Calin’s rather airy set for Café Chez Francis, to be too talky. But I decided to stay for the duration - and ended up being very happy I did, because the second act was quite gloriously delirious.

 

“If the righteous many do not confront the wicked few, then evil will triumph.” 

– Minority President Donald Trump, September 19, 2017, addressing the United Nations

 

Two young white boys and two men working outside with some sort of garden device

Saturday, Sept 30, 12-3pm
Franklinton Gardens
Facebook Event
Franklinton Garden's 3rd Annual Fall Festival is coming up! 
The event will be held in the outdoor space with benches across the street from St. John's Episcopal Church on Avondale and Town St. 
We will be making cider on-site with a ciderpress and distributing it to guests. Free food will be provided by Abe's Kitchen, and Jenni's has graciously agreed to donate some icecream.
Local band Blue Spectrum will be providing the tunes, along with local rapper Frances. Activities such as pumpkin tossing, corn hole and face painting will be put on as well.
It's tradition that farms celebrate their harvest, and what better way to usher in the fall harvest than bringing the community together around our food? Hope to see you there! Bring your friends! Free.

 

Movie poster with words Black Sabbath the end of the end and them playing in their band on stage in front of a crowd

Once had friend tell me he could not stand to hear Black Sabbath albums, covered sampled or remixed, because they were perfect. Now, I love Black Sabbath as much. However, growing up writing graffiti, you embraced Black Sabbath aura.

Obviously this is the most dominant aesthetic in music. 

My friend’s sentiment had a valid point.

Jack White and the Black Keys are both examples of how difficult it is to filter the blues and gospel into rock in roll without sounding like a complete cornball. My assumption regarding the mediocre current state of mainstream rock music is that most people who want to start bands probably haven’t gone thru the processes that Jack White or the Black Keys have so they just can’t….

Ok...so we know Black Sabbath is amazing. How is the movie?

Well, the best way I can explain is this: Ozzy Osborne obviously is most famous member of Black Sabbath. Black Sabbath is where the antics that made Ozzy a reality show spectacle are removed, and he is known more for important artistry.

This documentary is for the fans that want to enjoy the high quality of the group they love. It’s a film of mutual respect.

People of color posing as group

Friday, Sept. 29, 9a,-4:30pm
Frank Hale Cultural Center, 153 W 12th Ave, Columbus, Ohio 43210
Facebook Event
SÕL-CON: Brown & Black Comics Expo that offers a venue every year at OSU Campus's Hale Hall for Latinx and African American comic book creators to come together to change the lives of K-12 youth of color in Columbus. Panels. K-12 Comics and Zine Workshops. Talk-Backs. Expo.
Free.

Kneel, touch the earth. 

“Oh say can you see . . . ”

The anthem starts. I can feel the courage . . . of Colin Kaepernick, the (then) San Francisco 49ers quarterback who refused to stand for the national war hymn, not when one of the wars was directed at Americans of color. Occupying the public spotlight that he did, Kaepernick risked — and received — widespread condemnation. Rabid fans burned replicas of his jersey. I’m sure as he knelt that first time, as his knee touched the earth, he had a sense of what he was setting off.

This is patriotism. 

Not even a year has passed since Donald Trump’s election victory. Yet already, his over-the-top, pugnacious rhetoric and actions have exacerbated Washington’s conflict with North Korea to the point where some observers are comparing it to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis.1 But how are people being educated and informed about this crisis in the mass media? We are shown bountiful coverage of North Korean problems, such as Kim Jong-un’s own over-the top rhetoric, his government’s human rights violations, rapid development of nuclear missiles, and soldiers goose stepping, but hardly any coverage of American problems, such as our history of aggression on the Korean Peninsula, the “Military-Industrial Complex” that President Eisenhower warned about in 1961, and the ways in which Washington has been intimidating Pyongyang. Below is an outline of some myths that must be dispelled if Americans are to gain some basic understanding U.S.-North Korea relations today and if they are to feel motivated to pressure their government to negotiate a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

Myth Number 1: North Korea is the aggressor, not us; they are the problem

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