TEHRAN MUSE

Daily Fortune Cookie

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 10:18:00 PST

Daily Fortune Cookie -- Confucius say: When being TEARGASED -- wash your face with coke or inhale a mixture of onions and vinegar.

Escape into Life

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 12:39:00 PDT

nends:

Athanasii Kircheri Fvldensis Bvchonii E Soc Iesv Presbyteri; Ars Magna Lvcis Et Vmbrae : In decem Libros digesta, Rome 1646
(Source: diglib.hab.de)

(via yama-bato)

Escape into Life

twt.fm / anouar brahem [le voyage de sahar] -- "le voyage de sahar"

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 14:00:00 PDT

twt.fm / anouar brahem [le voyage de sahar] -- "le voyage de sahar"Sahar

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hamidandco
hamid tekebaye

Headlines & Highlights | The Iran Primer

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 21:23:00 PDT

United States Institute of Peace

Since its 1979 revolution, the Islamic Republic has been an ever-increasing challenge for the West to understand and to engage. But Tehran’s controversial nuclear program, disputed 2009 election, growing violations of basic human rights, and angry rhetoric have generated deeper hostilities with the outside world than at any time since the revolution’s early days. The stakes—and consequences—are greater than ever. Fifty experts—half Western, half from the Middle East—came together in “The Iran Primer: Power, Politics and U.S. Policy” to explain what lies ahead.

U.S. – Iran relations
         Prospects for reconciliation with the United States are low while Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei remains in power. At the same time, any engagement policy Iran that aims to ignore or bypass Khamenei is equally unlikely to succeed. In both the domestic and international context, Khamenei is averse to compromise under pressure, fearful of projecting weakness and inviting greater pressure. Karim Sadjadpour

         Some U.S.-Iran trade continues, especially in food. Iran is a large wheat importer; some years, it buys as much as $200 million in U.S. wheat… U.S. airlines pay several million dollars a year in fees to the Iranian government for air traffic control services while overflying Iran. Taking advantage of the peculiar U.S. classification of tobacco as a food for trade purposes, Iran bought large amounts of American cigarettes...While Iran has often complained that the United States does not allow Iran Air to buy spare parts for its aging Boeings, in fact, the Bush administration issued a license for such exports but Boeing has been unable to make a sale. Patrick Clawson
         The Algiers Accords ending the [1979-1981] hostage crisis returned only a fraction of Iran’s frozen assets…Iran received only $4 billion or one-third of its original assets. The cash loss to Iran amounted to about $150 million per hostage, or roughly $300,000 per day for each hostage. The cost, and the incalculable loss of international legitimacy that has dogged Iran ever since, suggest that the hostage episode is not a model that is likely to be attractive to other countries and is unlikely to be repeated. Gary Sick

Politics
          Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards have formed a symbiotic relationship that buttresses the supreme leader’s authority, and preserves the status quo…The Guards may be able to maintain the political status quo if they remain a unified force. However, they face internal divisions, which could potentially weaken Khamenei’s hand in a moment of crisis. Alireza Nader

         Khamenei initially supported President Ahmadinejad, but the distance between the two men has been growing…Ahmadinejad has been able to build a base of support among the very constituencies on which Khamenei depends: the Revolutionary Guards, the paramilitary forces, the security agencies and the judiciary. Shaul Bakhash

         Short-term, the opposition faces political purgatory. The regime has been willing to use unprecedented brutality to maintain power. Long-term, Iran’s many challenges are likely to be solved only in a democratic environment. These challenges include a dominant, Internet-savvy youth, an assertive women’s movement, structural economic difficulties (including double-digit unemployment and inflation), badly needed large investments in the oil and gas industries and a dying private sector. Abbas Milani

Headlines & Highlights | The Iran Primer

GOOD Voter Guide to California: Propositions - Politics - GOOD

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 15:56:00 PDT

Over the course of the next two weeks, we will be publishing primers about the important items on the ballot in California as part of our GOOD Voter Guide.

GOOD Voter Guide to California: Propositions - Politics - GOOD

Lissie and Ellie Goulding on Vimeo

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 06:49:00 PDT

Lissie and Ellie Goulding on Vimeo

Bag Raiders - Way Back Home

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 06:45:00 PDT

Bag Raiders - Way Back Home on Vimeo

Joe Berlinger's Crude: The Real Price of Oil (2009)

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Sat, 02 Oct 2010 12:02:00 PDT

Crude The movie website

Christopher R. Al-Aswad Entered into life July 16th 1979 - Escaped into life July 27th 2010

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 10:17:00 PDT

The following is an excerpt Chris wrote in his own handwriting, from Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood by William Wordsworth.

From all of us who follow and love Escape into Life, thank you Chris, for everything.

hamid & company | Christopher R. Al-Aswad Entered into life July 16th 1979 - Escaped into life July 27th 2010

Terror Threats and Alerts in France

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 03:47:00 PDT

STRATFOR BOOK

The Devolution of Jihadism: From Al Qaeda to Wider Movement

A Month of Threats

After the French Senate approved the burqa ban Sept. 14 — which will go into effect next March — a bomb threat against the Eiffel Tower was called in that evening, causing French authorities to evacuate the site and sweep it for explosive devices.

On Sept. 16, five French citizens were abducted from the Nigerien uranium-mining town of Arlit in an operation later claimed by al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), a claim French Defense Minister Herve Morin later assessed as valid. In July, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon declared that France was at war with the North African al Qaeda franchise after the group killed a French hostage it had kidnapped in April. Fillon’s announcement came three days after the end of a four-day French-Mauritanian offensive against AQIM militants that resulted in the deaths of several militants. After the offensive, AQIM branded French President Nicolas Sarkozy an enemy of Allah and warned France that it would not rest until it had avenged the deaths of its fighters.

French officials have also received unsubstantiated reports from foreign liaison services of plans for suicide bombings in Paris. National Police Chief Frederic Pechenard told Europe 1 radio Sept. 22 that in addition to the threatening statements from AQIM, the French have received specific information that the group is working to target France.

On Sept. 6, Der Spiegel reported that authorities were investigating reports provided by the United States that a German-born Islamist extremist arrested in Afghanistan has warned of possible terrorist attacks in Germany and elsewhere in Europe — including France — planned by jihadists based in Pakistan. This story hit the English-language media Sept. 28, and included reports that the threat may have involved plans to launch Mumbai-like armed assaults in multiple targets in Europe.

In the words of Squarcini to the press, these combined incidents mean “all the blinkers are on red.” This statement is strikingly similar to one in the 9/11 Commission Report attributed to then-CIA Director George Tenet, who said that in July 2001 “the system was blinking red.”

While an examination of the current threat situation in France is interesting, it is equally interesting to observe the way that the French are handling their threat warnings in the media.

The Threat Environment in France

While its neighbors such as Spain and the United Kingdom have suffered bloody attacks since 9/11, the French so far apparently have been spared — although there are some who suspect the yet-unsolved June 2009 crash of Air France Flight 447 may have resulted from foul play, along with the explosion at the AZF fertilizer plant in September 2001.

France has long been squarely in the crosshairs of jihadist groups such as AQIM. This is due not only to its former colonial involvement in North Africa but also to its continued support of governments in countries like Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia deemed un-Islamic by jihadists. It is also due to France’s military commitment in Afghanistan. Moreover, on the domestic side, France has a significant Muslim minority largely segregated in slums known in French as “banlieues” outside France’s major cities. A significant proportion of the young Muslim men who live in these areas are unemployed and disaffected. This disaffection has been displayed periodically in the form of large-scale riots such as those in October 2005 and November 2007, both of which resulted in massive property destruction and produced the worst civil unrest in France since the late 1960s. While not all those involved in the riots were Muslims, Muslims did play a significant and visible role in them.

Moves by the French government such as the burqa ban have stoked these tensions and feelings of anger and alienation. The ban, like the 2004 ban against headscarves in French schools, angered not only jihadists but also some mainstream Muslims in France and beyond.

Still, other than a minor bombing outside the the Indonesian Embassy in Paris in October 2004, France has seemingly been spared the type of attacks seen in Madrid in March 2004 and London in July 2005. And this is in spite of the fact that France has had to deal with Islamist militants for far….

Read more: Terror Threats and Alerts in France | STRATFOR

Pipilotti Rist

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 10:42:00 PDT

I have always found her work, especially her treatment of colors mesmerizing. Infact sometimes I find myself wishing I was her. well - you know what I mean.

some pics of her past and present work -- details of current installation -- and a clip of her Just Released film “Peperminta”.

BIO--PDF

Pipilotti Rist
Friendly Game – Electronic Feelings
8 July – 1 November 2010
Press Preview:
Wednesday, July 7 at 12 noon
Opening:
Wednesday, July 7 at 8:30 p.m.

Fundació Joan Miró
Parc de Montjuïc s/n, 08038 Barcelona
www.fundaciomiro-bcn.org
Centre Cultural de Caixa Girona
C/ Ciutadans, 19, 17004 Girona
www.fundaciocaixadegirona.org

Pipilotti Rist — Images and clips — Hauser & Wirth

Top Ways 9/11 Broke Islamic Law | Informed Comment

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 14:04:00 PDT

Fear mongering by the Republican Party in an election year -- how deep does the hole go in the Republican Party?

by Juan Cole

On the ninth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, it is clear that al-Qaeda was a tiny fringe terrorist movement, not a globe-straddling threat to Western societies. The organization has been decisively disrupted and now lacks command and control. Its leader, Usama Bin Laden, has not been seen in a video since 2004, and is either dead or horribly disfigured. Its number 2, Ayman al-Zawahiri, is dangerous only in the way that any other terrorist crank is, firing off crackpot messages to his dwindling band of followers from time to time. With the startling rise of anti-Muslim bigotry in the United States, fanned in large part by Republican Party fear mongering, it is worthwhile underlining the ways in which September 11 contravened Islamic values and Islamic law. (For a modernist, liberal interpretation, see this pdf file, “Jihad and the Islamic Law of War.”

1. It is forbidden to attempt to impose Islam on other people. The Qur’an says, “There is no compulsion in religion. The right way has become distinct from error.” (-The Cow, 2:256). Note that this verse was revealed in Medina and was never abrogated by any other verse of the Quran. Islam’s holy book forbids coercing people into adopting any religion. They have to willingly choose it.

2. Islamic law forbids aggressive warfare. The Quran says, “But if the enemies incline towards peace, do you also incline towards peace. And trust in God! For He is the one who hears and knows all things.” (8:61) The Quran chapter “The Cow,” 2:190, says, “Fight in the way of God against those who fight against you, but begin not hostilities. Lo! God loveth not aggressors.”

3. In Islamic war, not just any civil engineer can declare or launch a war. It is the prerogative of the duly constituted leader of the Muslim community that engages in the war. Nowadays that would be the president or prime minister of the state.

4. The killing of innocent non-combatants is forbidden. According to Sunni tradition, ‘Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, the first Caliph, gave these instructions to his armies: “I instruct you in ten matters: Do not kill women, children, the old, or the infirm; do not cut down fruit-bearing trees; do not destroy any town . . . ” (Malik’s Muwatta’, “Kitab al-Jihad.”)

5. Muslim commanders must give the enemy fair warning that war is imminent. The Prophet Muhammad at one point gave 4 months notice. Sneak attacks are forbidden.

The World Trade Center had a mosque in it, which Bin Laden destroyed, and he killed dozens of innocent Muslims in the attack along with thousands of others. All of this is an abomination in Islamic law.

By the laws of classical Islam and the instructions of the Quran, then, the September 11 act of terrorism was illegal. It is not an affirmation of Islam but a departure from its laws of war. That is why, contrary to popular belief, Muslim authorities have roundly condemned al-Qaeda’s actions in no uncertain terms. See also the Amman statement, to which large numbers of prominent Sunni and Shiite leaders subscribed.

More on: Top Ways 9/11 Broke Islamic Law | Informed Comment

twt.fm / talk talk [the color of spring] -- "i don't belive in you"

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 00:48:00 PDT

twt.fm / talk talk [the color of spring] -- "i don't belive in you" don't belve in u

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hamidandco

Pordenone Montanari

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 14:12:00 PDT

Read articles here, here, and here,

gary's choices | The Goldberg Variations: Are we going to bomb Iran?

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 03:32:00 PDT

You must do what we can’t, because if you don’t, we will. (How I wish I had said that.)

In circles that I frequent, people just can’t stop talking about the Jeffrey Goldberg article in The Atlantic, “The Point of No Return,” which argues that a US and/or Israeli military attack on Iran in the next year or so is highly probable.

If you read my recent posting in this blog (just below this one), you will know that I think that is intellectual garbage, or maybe just propaganda — is there any difference? It is so transparently pushing the “threat” of an Israeli attack in order to get the US to do something utterly foolish, that I have a very hard time even writing about it.

The all time very best comment about the neo-con cum Israeli advice urging the US to attack Iran was by Paul Woodward in a recent blog posting: You must do what we can’t, because if you don’t, we will. (How I wish I had said that.)

Still, if this subject really turns you on, here is someone else writing about it who knows a lot about Israel, nukes and US policy. Joshua Pollack wrote in “Some Straight Talk About Iran” in the aptly named ArmsControlWonk website:

After reading Jeffrey Goldberg’s lengthy article in The Atlantic about Israeli calculations on whether to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities, I’m left with an observation and a judgment. First, the observation…..

More: gary's choices - The Goldberg Variations: Are we going to bomb Iran?

OTTO DIX | Neue Galerie NY

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 01:13:00 PDT

OTTO DIX

March 11-August 30, 2010

Not much time left to see this first solo museum exhibition of works by Otto Dix ever held in North America. The show containing more than 100 works is organized by Olaf Peters, Professor of Modern Art History and Art Theory at the Martin-Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg. The show will travel to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

Portrait of the Lawyer Dr. Hugo Simons 1925, Tempera and oil on wood 75 x 60 cm (29 1/2 x 23 5/8 in.)

Reclining Woman on Leopard Skin,1927, Oil on wood 68 x 98 cm (26 3/4 x 38 5/8 in.)

Group Portrait: Günther Franke, Paul Ferdinand Schmidt, and Karl Nierendorf,1923, Oil on canvas, mounted on wood 40 x 74 cm (15 3/4 x 29 1/8 in.)

Portrait of the Dancer Anita Berber, 1925, Oil and tempera on plywood, 120 x 65 cm (47 1/4 x 25 5/8 in.)

Dr. Heinrich Stadelmann 1920 Oil on canvas
90.8 x 61 cm (35 3/4 x 24 in.)

The Artist's Family 1927, Oil on wood
80 x 50 cm (31 1/2 x 19 3/4 in.)

MORE: OTTO DIX | www.neuegalerie.org

choi + shine architects: the land of giants

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 15:05:00 PDT

'the land of giants' by choi + shine architects
all images courtesy choi + shine architects

american firm choi + shine architects recently received the 2010 boston society of architects award for unbuilt architecture for their project 'the land of giants', which they originally designed for the icelandic high voltage electrical pylon competition back in 2008.

making only minor alterations to well established steel-framed pylon design, the architects created a series of towers that are powerful, solemn and variable. these iconic pylon-figures will become monuments in the landscape.

the pylon-figures can be configured to respond to their environment with appropriate gestures. as the carried electrical lines ascend a hill, the pylon-figures change posture, imitating a climbing person. over long spans, the pylon-figure stretches to gain increased height, crouches for increased strength or strains under the weight of the wires.

Mohsen Namjoo - Faghih Khoshgele (remix work)

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 07:26:00 PDT

Double-Dip Days - Project Syndicate

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 15:22:00 PDT

Nouriel Roubini

NEW YORK – The global economy, artificially boosted since the recession of 2008-2009 by massive monetary and fiscal stimulus and financial bailouts, is headed towards a sharp slowdown this year as the effect of these measures wanes. Worse yet, the fundamental excesses that fueled the crisis – too much debt and leverage in the private sector (households, banks and other financial institutions, and even much of the corporate sector) – have not been addressed.
Private-sector deleveraging has barely begun. Moreover, there is now massive re-leveraging of the public sector in advanced economies, with huge budget deficits and public-debt accumulation driven by automatic stabilizers, counter-cyclical Keynesian fiscal stimulus, and the immense costs of socializing the financial system’s losses.
At best, we face a protracted period of anemic, below-trend growth in advanced economies as deleveraging by households, financial institutions, and governments starts to feed through to consumption and investment. At the global level, the countries that spent too much – the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, Greece, and elsewhere – now need to deleverage and are spending, consuming, and importing less.
But countries that saved too much – China, emerging Asia, Germany, and Japan – are not spending more to compensate for the fall in spending by deleveraging countries. Thus, the recovery of global aggregate demand will be weak, pushing global growth much lower.

Nouriel Roubini

Nouriel Roubini is Chairman of Roubini Global Economics, Professor of Economics at the Stern School of Business, New York University, and co-author of the book Crisis Economics.

Young Empires - "AGAINST the WALL"

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 09:22:00 PDT

Young Empires - "AGAINST the WALL" teaser video on Vimeo

crossroads (what to do) on Vimeo

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 04:29:00 PDT

crossroads (what to do) on Vimeo

Davoud Geramifard ~ “Voices of the Unheard”

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 02:56:00 PDT

twt.fm / depeche mode [sounds of the universe 2009] -- "wrong (trentemoeller remix)"

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:52:00 PDT

twt.fm / depeche mode [sounds of the universe 2009] -- "wrong (trentemoeller remix)"

wrong

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hamidandco

Last Words | Charles Simic

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 18:53:00 PDT

Last Words

Charles Simic

The first instance of capital punishment on record in America was the shooting in colonial Virginia of George Kendall, accused of plotting to betray the British to the Spanish. If he had any parting quips, they were not written down. We have to wait for the execution of two Quakers, Marmaduke Stevenson and William Robinson, fifty years later, on October 27, 1659, for an account of the last words of the condemned. As one would expect, the two men, who were convicted and hung for disobeying banishment from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, reaffirmed their faith in God and reminded the spectators to mind the light that shone within them. Since then, as Last Words of the Executed, an enthralling book by Robert K. Elder, amply documents, there have been over sixteen thousand executions in this country and a vast record of final pronouncements taken from prison records, eyewitness statements, newspaper accounts, period diaries and written statements. Some of these are credibly attributable to the executed while others are of questionable origin or indisputably redacted.
Why this enormous interest in the final thoughts of men and women who were often guilty of committing horrific crimes? It must be the same morbid curiosity that brought huge crowds of Americans to public executions in the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. Many considered these grim occasions so much fun they brought their families along. The spectators didn’t mind if the hanging they were watching was botched and the condemned struggled choking for a long while at the end of the rope, or if his body dropped headless to the ground, and greeted such horrors with “rude jests” and “rabid laughter.” They expected, as part of the program, to hear a public admission of guilt, expression of remorse, appeal for forgiveness from God and the assembled, and a warning about the evils of booze and company of loose women. They were rarely disappointed…….

gotan project [inspiracion-espiracion remix] "del ruso [calexico version]"

noreply@blogger.com (HT) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 17:10:00 PDT

Gotan Project [La Revancha Del Tango] "La Del Ruso" a_del_ruso

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