Author: Serkadis

It was a decade that began paralyzed by confusion and uncertainty with our hands hovered, quivering over the panic button. It was period that started when we were so disoriented and nervous that we didn’t even bother naming it. Sure there was the ’70s and next the ’80s, then naturally the ’90s, but what the hell was this? The naughts? The Ohs? Why name a decade when we weren’t even sure if we’d be there to see it out?

When the date line hit two, triple-zero in the year column, we began a new decade (and century) with our fingers crossed, eyes half-shut and one foot in the bomb shelter, half-expecting our world to come to a catastrophic end as the clock struck midnight.

Ten years on, we’re still here, but our fingers are still crossed. Taking a step back from it all, it’s not quite clear if we are any better off now than when we started in 2000. A decade that began with Y2K endured some the most horrific manmade and natural disasters, was marred by constant turmoil and now ends in one of the worst economic situations this nation has seen since the Great Depression.

Looking for metaphors for the sake of comparison, it would be almost too easy to compare the travails of the naughts to the ordeals of the music industry in the last 10 years. The decade began concerned not with Y2K, but rather MP3, as an industry scrambling to topple Napster during the file-sharing service’s heyday. It was the beginning of a decade-long campaign against the idea that music did not constitute a free public domain. And despite the shutting down of the company, today, failing record sales, the collapse of labels and one savvy marketing ploy by Radiohead have all been a tribute to the way that consumers now view and obtain their music.

In terms of musical creation, we’ve never seen a more schizophrenic decade. It’s been a time when the title of “indie” has slipped into mainstream thought and when Jay-Z is as likely to be heard blaring from the Upper East Side as the Bronx. Music has become niche-ified as artists, struggling to make a name for themselves, have stretched themselves to the limit with garage-revival, Afro-pop, house, lo-fi, hi-fi and all the stupid labels that come with diversification.

The result? On one hand, it’s kids with 100 gigs of music, ear buds jammed in on full-blast pumping Arctic Monkeys and Kanye. The decade has seen the creation of a listening public with the inability to stay content with one artist or genre and an insatiable desire to have the latest and greatest music. On the other side, this decade has seen the development of a plethora of great sound that has never been heard before. Artists fed off the decade’s uncertainty and listeners’ fickleness to push the envelope and explore what was really out there.

So here’s a pick of the 25 finest albums of the last 10 years. With contributions from Death Cab for Cutie to The Streets, these releases ushered in a new era and helped to define and provide a damn good soundtrack to an uncertain and unpredictable decade. -RM

1. Radiohead–”Kid A” (2000)

Divisive to fans, disappointing to those who viewed Radiohead as “the saviors of rock,” confusing as hell on the first listen. It’s less melody, more rhythm; less voice, more ambience. Radiohead’s “Kid A” is one of the most haunting, elusive and eccentric albums to also debut at the top of the charts in six countries. Its minimalist textures, heavy distortion and puzzling lyrics–some of which were created by words pulled out of a hat–reflect a well-established band that felt a heavy dissatisfaction with the wave of “anthem rock” and trite conventions of popular music. The band struggled to create a new, almost non-sound, warped vocals, electronic layering and, in one song, a distant horn section improvising over a steady rhythm. It’s easy to claim that Radiohead’s sharp turn down a figurative dark alley paved the way for post-rock and experimentation, but that would be mistakenly putting a grandiose veil over an album that’s great precisely because it’s small. As Yorke wails, “I’m not here, I’m not here / This isn’t happening,” it’s not about a band pulling a daring twist, but just a few guys looking for the way out of a bleak place. -EH

2. Arcade Fire–”Funeral” (2004)

How did “Funeral,” actually written about the experiences of some of the band members, create such an eclectic mix of emotions and sounds in just 10 tracks? Even more perplexing, how did the quintessentially indie Arcade Fire create such a popular record? The last decade could easily have taken a turn toward electronic, inhuman music. “Kid A,” though phenomenal, can sometimes feel filtered because of the heavy use of computers. “Funeral” is the triumphant response, using organic sounds and human expression to create the shortest possible path between the minds of the artist and the listener. It was a comforting reminder that music was still made by mortals, for mortals. The title might be a reminder that we’ll all perish, but the music is a reminder of what happens before then–and damn it’s a lot. “Funeral” doesn’t just succeed in overall feel, though. “Rebellion (Lies)” is easily in contention for song of the decade. The strings, drums, guitars and voices peak to perfection in the second-to-last track of the album. Five years since it’s release, the track is still guiding and motivating alternative music and “Funeral” as a whole continues to be regarded as a tome for success. -CD

3. The Strokes–”Is This It” (2001)

In the years before “Is This It” was released, rock n’ roll had been pleading for a savior. Floundering in a post-grunge haze, rock needed someone and it needed them badly. So when five ragged but fresh faces rose from the dirt with a mix of NYC swag and garage band innocence, it was so hard to deny that this was indeed it. From the brazen roughness of Julian Casablancas’ voice and raw guitar interplay, The Strokes sure played the part and, with their first release, did something that no one had done for some time: provide hope. It was the hope that one band could redefine a stale scene and that youthful swag could carry rock into an uncertain future. Listening to songs like “Hard To Explain” and “The Modern Age,” which are so inexplicably brilliant, who could have blamed anyone for wishing? While The Strokes didn’t exactly set the room on fire with their following work, the impact of their first release is undeniable, fleshed out in the music of bands like Arctic Monkeys and The Libertines. “Is This It” was hope when it was needed most and, for 37 minutes, it was inspiration for a decade trying to find its musical identity. -RM

4. Death Cab for Cutie–Transatlanticism (2005)

From one of the best bands of the decade comes one of the decade’s best albums. Offering an intimate musical experience unlike any other, Death Cab for Cutie’s “Transatlanticism” is an 11-piece lullaby for the contemplative, the lonely, the passionate and everyone else looking for a deeper, meaningful connection in the form of sound. Frontman Ben Gibbard’s plaintive vocals–which range from the nostalgic strength of “We Looked Like Giants” to the crushing fragility of songs like “Tiny Vessels,” “Passenger Seat” and the title track–float lightly atop syncopated percussion, delicate piano and gritty guitar throughout the album, providing an all-around musical experience for any kind of listener. Of course, in Death Cab style, there’s the creative opener–”The New Year,” an epic tale of New Year’s Eve love that sets the stage for the remainder of this heartstring-tugging album. The lighter “Expo ‘86″ and “Death of an Interior Decorator” balance out “Transatlanticism,” and the infectious underlying beat of “Title and Registration” have had listeners’ bodies swaying for the past seven years. Ten years. Five albums. Five EPs. Four guys. One band. Last decade will not forget Death Cab for Cutie and I suspect the Washington natives will not disappoint this decade either. -DB

5. Wilco–”Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” (2002)

Since the band’s formation in 1994, Wilco has switched out all of its original members except singer Jeff Tweedy and bassist John Stirrat. It has also undergone a series of genre-bending changes from light country twang to 15-minute tracks ending with existential radio fuzz, thrilling some and angering even more. But Wilco struck gold with their fourth album. “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” is the Goldilocks of their discography, straddling the divide between strong songwriting and slow-paced, curious meditations. The album, recorded before the Sept. 11 attacks, nevertheless in its wake shows echoes of the tragedy, like when Tweedy sings in “Jesus, Etc.”: “Tall buildings shake / Voices escape / Singing sad, sad, songs.” Eerie foresight aside, though, Wilco has always been able to slip in understated lyrics that only hit you the fifth time around. “All my lies are always wishes,” we hear and if you’re really listening, that simple statement can make you pause. And then the next song does it to you again. And again. If for no other reason, “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” stands out among others for its consistent appeal to the simple song that worms its way into your mind while you’re least expecting it. -EH

6. Radiohead–”In Rainbows” (2007)

Radiohead is getting boring. All they do is completely revamp their sound and put out a critically-acclaimed, revolutionary album. “In Rainbows” is just the latest addition to their absurd resume that includes the best album of the ’90s, “OK Computer,” and the best album of the 2000s, “Kid A.” This time, they decided to take on the entire music industry as well, releasing the album through a choose-your-price system. Even though ?0 could be paid, the average price chosen by listeners was around ?4. In a decade where getting music for free is something to brag about, people chose to pay to discover just how Radiohead could top themselves again. What they discovered was 10 tracks of musical bliss, created from unorthodox and even unmelodic individual noises and rhythms. “15 Steps” opens the album and is a perfect example. The bonus disc easily deserves mention as well, with “4 Minute Warning” and “Last Flowers to the Hospital Bed” topping any list of the best songs ever from a bonus album. “In Rainbows” isn’t going to fade away or be forgotten. Remember how much you paid and where you where when you downloaded it–your grandchildren will be interested. -CD

7. Sigur Ros–”Agatis Byrjun” (2000)

Besides Bjork, green hills and Vikings, what comes to mind when the music lover thinks of Iceland is the post-dreampop group Sigur Ros. From the four members of the band, keyboardist Kjartan Sveinsson is the only one who had any original music training, but from the beautiful arrangements and ethereal orchestrations displayed throughout their discography, nobody would know that. Their sophomore album, “Agatis Byrjun,” (translated to ‘An All-Right Start’) launched the group onto the world stage and soon, Sigur Ros began to play with major acts like Radiohead. Sung in a mix of Icelandic and a made-up language, the tracks are not anything that people sing along to, nor are they likely ever going to get a lot of radio play. Initially, the album may come off as confusing and overbearing, with ethereal and angelic patterns combined with utterly grandiose structures. Indeed, “Agatis Byrjun” seems like a soundtrack for Mother Nature herself, invoking imagery of the most beautiful vistas and the purest emotional experiences. With epic pieces like “Svefn-G-Englar” and tracks like “Staralfur,” with beautifully placed firework-like effects, it is not exaggerative to say that “Agatis Byrjun” can and probably will, bring tears to your eyes. -AH

8. Daft Punk–”Discovery” (2001)

When Daft Punk hit the scene in the late ’90s with “Homework,” no one realized how potent their brand of electronic–a concoction of House, funk and techno–could have really been…not even themselves. While they got a little more serious with “Discovery,” the odds were still stacked against them after its release in 2001. You would have been a fool if you were to believe that two grown men dressed as neon robots, pumping the obscurities of disco and sampling Barry Manilow could find success in this decade. I guess it just shows you how unpredictable the double-zeroes were. With club bass pounding and robotic samples purring, Daft Punk’s second album was a paradox. It was old, yet it was so new. It revived disco and made neon spandex and Day-Glo acceptable, but at the same time, it made AutoTune cool way before it’s exploitation (and subsequent D.O.A.) at the end of the decade. It brought back the ’70s with some funky keyboards and synths, yet it was hip before electronic duos like Justice and MSTRKRFT had even been conceived. Most importantly, however, it taught a generation that it was o.k. to dance and with “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” playing, who needed to be prompted twice? -RM

9. Coldplay–”A Rush of Blood to the Head” (2002)

Just one year after its 2002 release, “A Rush of Blood to the Head” made Rolling Stone’s 500 greatest albums of all time. To date, it is still Coldplay’s best-selling album, with 4.5 million sold in the United States alone. “Clocks” has created one of the best recognized piano riffs, but the award-winning single is barely the highlight of the album; “A Rush of Blood to the Head” is one of those rare albums that doesn’t contain a single dead track. Sure, the album has its highs and lows, but where most bands have them in quality, Coldplay achieves them in emotions. Consider how the album opens with the heavy-tempo intro of “Politik,” and ends on a piano fade out and “You came along and you cut me loose” from “Amsterdam.” Coldplay hit the full spectrum in a musical sense, while also appealing to a wider audience than any other band in the past decade. It would be hard to find someone who didn’t recognize at least one song from the album and even harder to find someone who wasn’t pleased with it. -CD

10. Jay-Z–”The Blueprint” (2001)

Arguably the best hip-hop album of the decade, Jay-Z’s “The Blueprint” is a masterpiece. Jay-Z himself knew that, all while penning tracks like “The Ruler’s Back” and “Takeover.” The man whom many consider a remarkable lyricist of our generation makes the album a smart, savvy and valid reflection on society and culture, without weighing the album down too much with seriousness. Jay-Z cemented his status as one of the kings of rap with homages to ’70s soul and decades-old hip-hop. With classics like “Izzo (H.O.V.A.)” and “Girls, Girls, Girls,” radio found gems that reached an audience on their own, without the support of the rest of the album. He raps, “No you’re not on my level, get your brakes tweaked, I sold what your whole album sold in my first week,” and while it sounds like swagger, Jay-Z has shown that it’s not just all talk. His three albums since “The Blueprint” have been extremely influential in the rap world and on the charts, with “Empire State of Mind,” released last year, becoming Jay-Z’s first much-deserved number one single. Despite crying retirement regularly, it’s clear that Jay-Z is not going to leave the rap world any time soon. -AH

11. Interpol–”Turn On the Bright Lights” (2002)

Interpol’s “Turn On the Bright Lights” has the greatest opening track of all time. “Untitled” isn’t the best track off the album, but never has an opening track so perfectly prepared the listener for a band’s distinct sound.  Although having lyrics, “Untitled” has the feel of an instrumental and this stays in the back of the listener’s mind for the duration of the album. Even the hit single “PDA” has a guitar-heavy conclusion just as impressive as the rest of the song. All the tracks contribute to each other, including “NYC,” with the complaint that the New York subway “is a porno,” and the closing “Leif Erikson,” which explores how romance can be difficult in the arctic. Although love for Norse explorers wasn’t a hot topic of the last decade, “Turn On the Bright Lights” as a whole gave us something completely new: a band focusing just on their music and making it show. The 2000’s gave birth to many over-the-top personas such as Kanye, Lady Gaga and Empire of the Sun. If only they had discovered the message of “Turn On the Bright Lights”<\p>–<\p>it’s not all about the musician, it’s about the music. -CD

12. Sufjan Stevens–Illinois (2005)

Sufjan Stevens is a prolific musician (to the tune of more than 10 instruments), songwriter (his “Songs for Christmas” come in five volumes) and dreamer (even if he made one album a year, he wouldn’t finish his 50-state saga until he was 82). As the second of two completed state-centric concept albums, “Illinois” should be just a piece in a (hopefully) growing puzzle, but it’s a work that defies a category and doesn’t need a pipe-dream project to justify its creation. Armed with his whispery voice, a guitar and a back-up mini-orchestra, Stevens attacks all aspects of the Midwestern state: “Chicago” is a breathless ride through the Windy City, “John Wayne Gacy, Jr.” shivers its way through the tale of a famous serial killer and “Casimir Pulaski Day” turns a state holiday for a Revolutionary officer into a quiet confession about young love, cancer and faith. “Illinois” will certainly teach you more than you needed to know about the state’s history and people, but in making a portrait of the state, Stevens has made a portrait of ordinary people, in brief snapshots of song. Come on, feel the Illinoise! -EH

13. Gorillaz–”Demon Days”

Despite initially being considered a gimmick and a joke, Damon Albarn, former frontman of Blur, conceived Gorillaz, the first “virtual hip-hop group.” Along with artist Jamie Hewlett and producer Dan Nakamura, Albarn released the album “Gorillaz” in 2001, with critics expecting nothing but cool cartoons and garbage. Instead, the world got four strange looking creatures with one of the sickest Web sites and multimedia presentations that the music world had ever seen, not to mention some really unconventional and exciting music. With the single “Clint Eastwood” becoming a smash success, the world eagerly awaited the release of the sophomore album “Demon Days.” And people were not disappointed. Enlisting DJ Danger Mouse, Albarn created a post-apocalyptic concept album that is hard for listeners to wrap heads around conceptually–think “Fire Coming Out of the Monkey’s Head,” featuring a just-plain-weird narration by Dennis Hopper–but the funky beats, spastic synths and catchy choruses make the tracks very accessible. Albarn proves his art-pop mastery with this album, highlighting futuristic themes with his typical detached vocals and exciting mixing. With “Feel Good, Inc.” and “DARE” shooting to the top of the charts in the United Kingdom, as well as in the United States, Gorillaz’s sophomore effort showed naysayers that this project was more than just some strange looking cartoons. -AH

14. Eminem–”Marshall Mathers LP” (2000)

The first words out of Eminem’s mouth on his third full album: “Sue me.” It was so blatant, so full of menace, pain and hatred that only one artist this decade could have pulled it off: Eminem. By now, we should have all had an earful of this rapper’s lyrical antics: songs about murder, beating women and all the amoral content that would have parents ripping the album out of their children’s CD players one minute into track two, “Kill You.” Yet, despite the criticism and calls for Eminem’s head, we’ve still remained fascinated, drawn back by the sublime skill and rhymes of one of the decade’s most gifted rappers. “Marshall Mathers LP,” Eminem’s crowning achievement, is the case in point. Playing off his critics, Eminem satirically warns listeners that he’s created a monster–hence the short skits throughout the album that foreshadow the dangerous thematic content. Despite this, it’s a car wreck and we just can’t look away, the 9X platinum proves it. Yet removing all the controversy from the album, the concept is simple: let Dr. Dre handle the production and have Eminem just rap, a phenomena so fluid and so accomplished that it’s jaw-dropping. Doubt it? Listen to “Stan” and try not to be impressed. -RM

15. LCD Soundsystem–”Sound Of Silver” (2007)

While it’s easy to cite names like Daft Punk for leading indie kids toward the waters of dance music, it was essentially LCD Soundsystem that made them take the drink. Sure, Daft Punk paved the way for those hipsters to dance, but it was James Murphy and Co. who made it so damn cool. Fresh off the name-dropping, cutting-edge of their self-titled hit, the band played a little bit of one-upmanship with “Sound Of Silver” with Murphy, a famed producer, proving that he was no one-trick pony by the time the album was released. While “Sound” and most of Murphy’s work have been classified under the catch-all title of dance punk, the label alone does little justice to the nine-track masterpiece. Each track was incomparable to the next from the mellow, sample-pieced track “Someone Great” to the piano-driven ballad “New York, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down.” But just to be sure that that last bit of doubt was extinguished as soon as you hit the halfway point in the album, Murphy drops “All My Friends,” exhibiting a flurry of production skills, songwriting aptitude and sheer emotional understanding that will blow your mind away. -RM

16. Kanye West–”Late Registration” (2005)

While many Taylor Swift fans out there root for him to fail, Kanye West cemented his status as a force to be reckoned with when he released “The College Dropout,” the album that caused the hip-hop world to ruminate over his unconventional approach and interesting sound. One of the most vocal, absurd, opinionated artists of our generation showed that he was truly a powerhouse with “Late Registration,” an album that blew critics and listeners out of the water with its eclectic mix of Top 40 traditions and odd, yet surprisingly brilliant, sounds and harmonies. Songs like “Gold Digger” topped the charts, with artists like Jamie Foxx and Adam Levine of Maroon 5 lending their skill sets to the orchestrated hodgepodge of the tracks. Across the globe, musicians were astounded with Kanye’s grand arrangements and multi-layering of sounds. “Late Registration” is an album that proves that Kanye is indeed capable of some legendary hip-hop, “jackass” (as Obama eloquently called him) or not. -AH

17. Bloc Party–”Silent Alarm” (2005)

Syncopated beats, melting riffs and from-the-heart vocals dominate this album of the decade. “Silent Alarm,” the debut studio album of British indie rockers Bloc Party, immediately commanded attention to the British indie scene upon its release in early 2005 and has since had a lasting influence through such tracks as “Helicopter,” “Banquet” and “She’s Hearing Voices.” When asked to describe Silent Alarm, frontman Kele Okerere has called the album big, energetic, ambitious and tight–and that’s exactly what comes across the speakers. The rock sound is a step up from the standard beats, riffs and screams, instead incorporating sophisticated melodies atop syncopated rhythms, all packed tightly into a defined musical package. Passionate displays such as “Like Eating Glass” balance emotional outpourings such as “So Here We Are,” but the sound consistently exemplifies Okerere’s ideal of a ‘Technicolor’ album–one we surely will remember as we take on the new decade. -DB

18. White Stripes – “Elephant” (2001)

It’s hard to go wrong when you write the most recognizable riff of the decade. “Elephant” kicks off with a rumbling seven-note guitar lick that became the chant de jour for millions of crazed European football fans. The howling stomp of “Seven Nation Army” is a perfect introduction to an album that finds Jack White showing that he can do the whole white boy Zepplin electric blues better than anybody else. Sure, he never led society back to the promised land of rock and roll, but the music suggests otherwise. “I Want To Be The Boy To Warm Your Mother’s Heart” is pure old school rock-and-roll sweetness, while the snarl in tracks like “The Hardest Button to Button” and “Hypnotize” is pure menace. And then Jack reminds you that guitar is always the answer with the eight-minute showstopper “Ball And Biscuit,” so good that he must have made Robert Johnson’s deal with the devil for it. In 20 years when classic rock stations scavenge the decade for their own, Jack will be the chosen one. -WD

19. The Streets–”Original Pirate Material” (2002)

“Don’t conform to formulas, pop genres and such / Let’s push things forward.” Mission accomplished. Mike Skinner took two-step to the top of the charts in England by sitting in his mother’s house and telling stories about his life. And the impact was tremendous, with Skinner becoming a national treasure and paving the way for acts such as Dizzy Rascal. Critics like to wax poetic about “Original Pirate Material” as the successor to Blur’s “Parklife” in describing middle-class British life.  But more important are the songs, a rare “album” in hip-hop where each track lifts the others around it. Oozing charisma, his tales of “sex, drugs and on the dole” are by turn sweet, hilarious, sentimental and tragic. Standouts include “The Weak Become Heroes”, a nostalgic track about 1995’s London rave scene, the wickedly funny marijuana-vs.-alcohol rant “The Irony of It All” and the tragic breakup song “It’s Too Late.” But every track boasts original lines made all the better by British slang lessons such as Skinner explaining “Round here we say ‘birds’ not ‘bitches.’” -WD

20. The Killers–”Hot Fuss”

Soon after The Killers released their debut studio album in the summer of 2004, one reviewer thought the Las Vegas rockers could afford a “bit of honesty,” writing: “The Killers are just the latest band to be born too quick inside the popular music vacuum, where expectations for broad accessibility kill dudes’ potential for deeper creativity quite fabulously dead.” Now, as the decade has come to a close, The Killers have established themselves as more than “just the latest band”–and “Hot Fuss” was their branding. Songs like “Mr. Brightside” and “Smile Like You Mean It” defined the decade for countless rock music fans and though a bit monotonous at times, the album served as a powerful launching pad for the four desert rockers. Three albums later, The Killers continue to draw upon the early work in “Hot Fuss” that catapulted them near the tops of charts around the world. -DB

21. Bright Eyes–”I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning” (2005)

Usually the word “emotional” is spat like a curse when it comes to music. And yet of all the so-called “new Dylan’s,” emo king Connor Oberst kicked out unquestionably the best album of the bunch. The album is an ode to New York’s 20-something’s who spend their time looking for love, drugs and the meaning of life. Tightly played by accomplished Nashville studio musicians and backed by the incomparable Emmylou Harris, Oberst’s emotional wail reels off lines that would make you cringe if they weren’t so true. Self-absorbed in the best possible way, “I’m Wide Awake” catches the yearnings and heartbreaks of youth with acute lyrical skill and consistently beautiful melodies with the result very much like a modern day “Blood On The Tracks.” -WD

22. Yeah Yeah Yeahs–”Fever To Tell” (2003)

Brought up in a whirlwind of hype in the midst of a garage-rock revival, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs threw themselves into the arms of avant-garde adoring hipsters with their first album, “Fever To Tell.” Introducing the world to a screaming banshee of a frontwoman in Karen O and two obliging minions in Nick Zinner and Brian Chase, “Fever” was an assault on the eardrums and a not-so-subtle slap in the face to those doubting that there was no longer a mainstream place for feedback-laced riffs, headache-inducing percussion and larger-than-life rock stars. And at the center of it all was O, sporting a lipstick and beer-smeared sneer to lead listeners through a sometimes improvised, always loud, but never boring roller coaster. Add to that ride one surprisingly beautiful and vulnerable ballad in “Maps,” and “Fever to Tell” was one hell of an introduction for three Big Apple rockers looking to make a name for themselves and justify the prenatal hype. -RM

23. Bon Iver–”For Emma, Forever Ago” (2008)

Conceived in a cabin in the woods by a man simply trying to connect the dots, “For Emma, Forever Ago” is one of the most original and heartfelt musical creations of this decade. Justin Vernon, who records under the name Bon Iver, had spent a decade with former bandmates and the dissolution of the group weighed heavily on him. So, for three months, Vernon lived alone, chopping firewood, hunting deer and reflecting on his relationships with other people by purging an overwhelming backlog of sentiment, emotion and perspective into the form of song. The result: a nine-song collection of Justin Vernon’s free-flowing experimentation with his guitar and with his own mind during his hibernation. The layered vocals, topped with Vernon’s painfully expressive falsetto, take the listener on a slow exploration of the contemplative consciousness that exists within every person’s mind–the mind that has known and has forgotten, that has loved and has lost and that is consistently being shaped along the way. -DB

24. Outkast–”Stankonia” (2000)

A masterpiece featuring two of rap’s best flows, Big Boi and Andre 3000 effectively draw out the tension between their respective “player and poet” personalities. Over tracks that are unapologetically weird and impossibly catchy, the “blue-collar scholars” dropped some of the decade’s best singles. From the spacey disco of “B.O.B” to the irresistible braggadocio of “So Fresh and So Clean” to the sentimental “Ms. Jackson,” Outkast only got weirder and catchier, leaving rap (and the whole world) to wonder, “Where the hell did that come from?” “Stankonia” is where, the land at the “center of the earth, seven light years below sea-level…the place from which all funky thangs come.” Filled with politics, ideas, gangsters, whores with wigs Andre’s kajillion nicknames and an absurd amount of freakishly fast flows, the album has cemented its place in the rap–and pop–canon forever. Forever? Forever ever. -WD

25. Fleet Foxes–”Fleet Foxes” (2008)

For a band that has only recorded its first demo four years ago, it’s impossible to project if Fleet Foxes as a group has a staying power on the musical scene. Their first full self-titled release, however, has earned its place even in the unlikely event that the band proves to be only a blip on the radar. “Fleet Foxes” is woodsy and folksy, but also brings a kind of lyric maturity that is rare in debut albums. With songs that are humble, but fully fleshed out with rich harmonies and church-tower acoustics, it evokes images of a tiny choir that picked up instruments and moved into the forest a la Thoreau to spin minstrel-like songs and grow big, bushy beards. Somehow, they’ve managed to meld olden, almost madrigal-like melodies and instruments with conventional style and create something only possible in this crazy decade of the ’00s. -EH

What’s going on with Google? Millions of Chinese netizens are wondering.
On Google China’s Blackboard, a Chinese-language blog run by Google.cn, a post titled ‘clear the air of rumors’ stated:

过去几天里，我们看到有很多关于谷歌中国以及谷歌员工的不真实的传言，一 些报道称我们已经关闭了在中国的办公室，还有一些报道称我们在中国的员工已经接到通知将于近期离职。这些都是不真实的。目前，谷歌中国的员工同过去一样在 办公室正常工作，讨论产品开发，与客户进行沟通。尽管谷歌总部管理层近期宣布他们将会在未来的几个星期与中国政府就一些事宜进行商讨，谷歌中国的员工们仍 在一如既往地努力向我们的用户和合作伙伴提供最好的产品和服务，用户和合作伙伴对谷歌是非常重要的

Last week, Google in its official blog announced its surprising decision to stop censoring the content on its Chinese website, a move interpreted by many as a threat to quit the China market if necessary. It triggered mass reaction from Chinese netizens who mostly supported the action.

However the matter is more complicated than people thought. Rumors about Google’s real intent soon spread across the internet. Different interpretations and perspectives on its possible exit were floated and the controversy has not yet ceased.

Spy inside
It was reported that Google is investigating its employees on suspicion of hacking from inside. As an article in Reuters suggests:
Local media, citing unnamed sources, reported that some Google China employees were denied access to internal networks after January 13, while some staff were sent on leave and others transferred to different offices in Google's Asia Pacific operations.

Let’s look at the original version in Chinese which is widely cited and circulated on the internet.

Google总部在声明退出中国之后，立刻取消了所有中国工程师访问Google代码服务器的权限。
他们都是在上班后发现服务器的home目录进不去了。事先根本没有通知。

如果Google是有预谋的撤离，为什么要采取这种手段？他完全可以让员工继续工作，做一些善后工作。为什么Google突然那么不信任中国这边的团队？

唯一的原因就是，Google内部的技术人员中被安插了党的特务（就在Google上海办公处）事实真相就是，这个人在受到党的派遣，应聘Google成功之后，就把Gmail的关键代码down下来然后上交给了组织。而这个组织破解gmail系统的目的就是为了获取“人权团体”的邮件，这些在Google官方的声明都有

这样一来会暴露gmail系统的所有漏洞，而且Google官方不能承认这个事情，否则他在国际上的声誉会大受影响。特工这次的窃密行动，使Google有面临全面破产的危险（Google官方博客也说了，牵涉到知识产权的问题），说白了，再在中国呆下去，可能要威胁到整个公司的生存，所以才如此仓促的把中国部门的一切工作全部停掉

The post furthermore claimed that there were three spies, all of whom were Party operatives. However, quite a few responses to the post ridicule this as simply a sensational speculation.

A rational decision

In boxun.com, a journalist summarized the troubles entangled Google since its entry into China.

2006年2月 牌照门
2006年11月 辞职门
2007年2月 地图门
2007年4月 词库门
2007年5月 抄袭门
2007年6月 报告门
2007年7月 流氓软件门
2007年8月 恶搞门
2007年10月 税务门
2008年3月 抄袭门2.0
2008年3月 漏税门
2008年6月 捐款门
2008年6月 泄密门
2008年11月 广告门
2009年1月 低俗门
2009年4月 低俗门2.0
2009年6月 涉黄门
2009年10月 版权门
2009年12月 涉黄门2.0

Partial translation:

试想，有哪一个跨国公司架得住如此频繁的折腾？据统计Google在中国的收入大概是其全球总收入的1%，即使退出中国市场也不影响Google的整体业绩，损失不大，丢脸的是中共独裁政府。

Blogger Yemingzhu suggests Google takes the chance to quit China as a pretext for its business failure.

另一种说法是谷歌退出中国，采取这样高调的方式是为了掩饰其在中国的商业失败，从数据上讲，谷歌在中国是属于典型的叫好不叫座，赢得美誉度，没有得到实惠，还投入巨大的成本，从商业上讲，对股东要有交代，退出不是不可以解释。

Google is currently the second largest search engine in mainland China and has about 30% of market share to Baidu’s 60%.
Ma Yun(马云）, the well-known president of Alibaba.com, an e-commerce website, criticized Google:

他说，谷歌在美国的成功是一种创业者精神的成功，是一种永不放弃的精神的成功。而进入中国市场后，则变成了以为可以用钱去改变市场，忽略了过去用脚踏实地、用梦想去改变别人的精神。

He also called Yahoo’s support of Google a rash decision.

Political conspiracy
Gaoren thought Google’s exit has political motivation, possibly backed by the U.S government.

Google是在中国政府的网络监察制度更严格的时候进入中国市场，希望在中国市场分得一羹。在中国政府的网络监察制度越 来越宽松的情况下退出市场，但站出来高调批评网络监察制度，这本身就是滑稽的，也是站不住脚的。至少表明Google和其声明中的道德是格格不入的。 Google只不过是利用政治作为撤出中国市场的遁词。

按照Google自己的高调标准，Google本身是一个高举道德大旗的魔鬼。2008年印度22岁的IT专业人士 Rahul　Krishnakumar　Vaid因为在Orkut网站写下“我恨索尼娅甘地（I　hate　Sonia　Gandhi）”而遭逮捕。 Orkut是Google在印度的一个社交网络网站。Google立即向印度警方提供了Vaid的Gmail电子邮件信息。

2010年1月7号，国务卿希拉里.克林顿（Hillary　Clinton）在国务院请吃饭。这是一场小规模的晚宴，规 模虽小，来客却都是通讯科技界的重量级人物。客人名单上有谷歌首席执行官埃里克.施密特（Eric　Schmidt）、Twitter联合创始人杰克.多 尔西（Jack　Dorsey）、微软首席研究与战略官克瑞格.蒙迪（Craig　Mundie），以及Mobile　Accord总裁James　 Eberhard，　Cisco的行销总裁Susan　Bostron，纽约大学教授Clay　Shirky，　Personal个人民主组织创始人 Andrew　Rasiej等。这是美国国务院利用信息技术来推进美国外交目标的努力的一部分。

没过几天，在2010年的1月12日Google就跳出来。Google是否在为美国政府的政治目的服务呢？大家拭目以待。如果Google成为美国政府的政治打手，那中国政府对其政治约束是完全必要和合理的。

Show: AntiWar Radio
Host: Scott Horton
Channel: KAOS 95.9 FM in Austin, Texas
Date: 01/22/2010

Download the interview as an MP3 file here. (29:49 minutes)

Transcript

Scott Horton: Alright, it’s Anti War Radio, KAOS 959 in Austin Texas, streaming live worldwide on the internet at kaosradioaustin.org and antiwar.com/radio. And I’m happy to welcome our next guest, Dr. Ron Paul, representative from district 14 down there on the Texas Gulf Coast and the only decent congressman in American history. And, of course, we all know him from his run for president in 2007 and 2008. Welcome back to the show, Ron. How are you doing?

Ron Paul: Thank you, doing well.

Scott Horton: I really appreciate you joining us on the show today.

Ron Paul: Good to be with you.

So, so most important thing here to start with, I think, is a story in Harpers Magazine by the other Scott Horton, renowned international human rights lawyer and anti-torture hero, about three men who quite apparently were murdered on the night of June 9th, 2006. And apparently there is a massive cover up involving the Navy criminal investigative service, the justice department, the FBI, and perhaps even parts of the Congress, in trying to kill this story. And I just wonder whether there is anything that you can do about this as a member of the Foreign Relations committee? Would you have any jurisdiction to hold some kind of hearings or do anything to further investigate this?

Ron Paul: Well, it’s probably judiciary. I don’t think they would touch it, probably even the committees that are responsible are not likely to touch it. But it’s just another tragedy; there are so many of those tragedies around. So I’m not predicting that much will happen, but I know international relations wouldn’t touch it.

Scott Horton: And, I mean, how troubling is that? Did you have a chance to read the article?

Ron Paul: You know, I read it; it was a rather long article. I did not get the whole thing read, but I just got the gist of it and it just got me so upset because it’s just another cover up, another atrocious act by our government. So it’s a real shame.

Scott Horton: Well, I learnt when I was a kid that what brought Nixon down wasn’t the crime, it was the cover up.

Ron Paul: Yeah.

Scott Horton: It’s really not a big deal on Washington DC, you know, a few CIA agents torture a guy to death; we’re used to that. That happens all the time. But the problem here is that the FBI and the Justice Department and all these other people making sure that the investigation doesn’t go anywhere.

Ron Paul: Yeah, and I think that principle must be the same thing that helped me on getting the Audit the Fed Bill along. Because we were often talking about transparency, we weren’t talking about what exactly what the Fed was doing. But it’s the transparency; the hidden activities that they have, or the cover ups. So, I think good people, left or right or center, always say, “You know, that’s wrong. That is wrong. The cover up is bad and the hiding of government is so bad”. I’ve always argued that we have things turned upside down here. If the governments have a function they ought to be protecting and guaranteeing our privacy. But what do they do? They protect their secrecy. And they go and they do tricks like this to hide what they do. At the same time they undermine our privacy. So I think our government is absolutely on the wrong track.

Scott Horton: Well now if you were the president after September 11th, how would you have set this up? Because this seems that now that Obama has come into power, not too much has changed. They say they’re going to give trials to some of these men, but then they say, “Well, if they’re acquitted we’ll go ahead and hold them anyway”. And some of these people are going to get military trials, others aren’t going to get trials at all, though. They’ll just be held by the military indefinitely. So we we’re not sure how much of a change Obama’s making to the Bush policy. But what should be done with Khalid Sheikh Mohamed and the rest of these guys? Just put them on trial in New York, Dr. Paul?

Ron Paul: Well, you know, long term what you have to change is the foreign policy so that we can get ourselves out of this business. But, yes. I would try them in our courts. You know, the individuals that committed the bombing, I believe it was in 1993, they were arrested, brought to trial, they committed the crime in this country and they’re imprisoned for life. I mean, what is so horrible about that? I mean, it’s this whole idea of secret rendition and secret prisons and torture, the assumption that that if somebody declares you a enemy combatant, one individual, that that is equal to being a terrorist. You know, they’re suspects. But that means you can be tried by one individual and held forever.

And American citizens are subject to that as well if you’re declared an enemy combatant. And I think the conditions are just horrible. If we have a breakdown of law and order here and if our economy really tanks and there is more violence, you can see where they could declare martial law and start holding people like this. So I think these are key issues, although for the average guy on the street this is rather esoteric. “Oh, they haven’t come after me”, that sort of thing and they pass it off. But I think what they’re doing is setting a precedent for being able to handle domestic violence here. Because what happens if they get careless with the definition of ‘enemy combatant’. Almost anybody who talks sympathetically or even not sympathetically, but just tries to explain the situation, they say, “Oh, you’re one of those guys that blame America first, and you could be declared an enemy combatant”. So I consider it very dangerous.

Scott Horton: Well, at least in one case, Jose Padilla was arrested on American soil by FBI agents, and then ended up being turned over to the military and the CIA for torture. In fact, the FBI agent who arrested him said he didn’t think he was dangerous. He was trying to flip him and make him an informant. And because he wouldn’t go along with becoming an informant, that is why they declared him an enemy combatant.

Ron Paul: Yeah. And then they beat him to death and they might not have any information and they pretend they know information just to stop the beating. You know, it just goes on and on. And how many people have been arrested or picked up over in these foreign countries just because they’ve been squealed on by somebody else. We pay them money to turn somebody over, then we assume, “Oh yeah, they said he was a bad guy. Oh, he’s an enemy combatant”. So we throw him in prison. I think there are examples of teenagers being put down in Guantanamo, 14 and 15 years old; and they’ve still been there. So yes, something has to be done. The whole process has to change. But to change the whole process you have to change the foreign policy. You have to release the ones you have absolutely no evidence on, and try the rest and there will always be one example of one guy who got out and committed another crime. But once again, what should you do? Endorse a system where they can arrest a hundred people and one guy might know something and you torture all hundred because there is some vital information in there? I mean, what have we turned ourselves into? It’s just really, really a dangerous situation.

Scott Horton: Well, this goes to my next topic here, which is your really great interview on the Rachel Maddow Show, I guess about two weeks ago now. And one of the things that she said to you there was, from her position, of course, being a liberal progressive she has an interest in faction fights on the right and that kind of thing. But still I think there was a lot of truth when she said that the Republican Party has a severe lack of intellectual leadership here, and it’s really come down to you on one side and Dick Cheney on the other, as far as who’s leading the philosophy of the Republican Party. And, like you, I kind of have a problem with that. I’m sure you kind of have a problem with that. You didn’t just run for president and give all those great speeches about liberty and you don’t go on all these TV shows and teach people about Austrian economics and all the peace mongering you do and the rest of this in order that all your Ron Paulian fans might all line up and vote for the Republican Party, right?

Ron Paul: No, as a matter of fact it came up yesterday on CNN on Rick Sanchez’s show. He asked me about that. And I’m essentially totally uninterested in parties. Libertarians get upset with me because I’m not interested in setting my goals to building the Libertarian party. But certainly that isn’t a goal of mine to build the Republican Party. I live in the real world, the real world is that if you want a political soap box, you have to participate in one of the two parties. I have no criticism about people doing it other ways. But the last thing I’m interested in is promoting a party. But it is true that I want to influence the party. But I’ve frequently said, you probably have heard me say, that if we have a true revolution then the revolution is pervasive and it affects both parties. And I refer to the old statement of Nixon back in the 1970s when he declared we were all Keynesians now. Which means that the Keynesian revolution infiltrated both parties and Norman Thomas said he didn’t run the last time for president as a socialist because the major parties have accepted their platform.

So if we’re successful in promoting once again the cause of liberty, it’s not going to be a single party. It’s not going to be the Libertarian party or the Republican Party. It will be in acceptance of majority of American people say, “Yeah, they bankrupt us, they ruin us, they can’t help us, and they fight too many wars.” And we only want people in Washington that will fight for those values, Republican or Democrat. And certainly on economic terms we would want to have both sides have an understanding of Austrian free market economics.

Scott Horton: On the Cheney side of that debate the National Review published a thing by Andrew McCartney the other day saying that the reason this guy Brown won in Massachusetts was because the American people know that we have to torture people and this is what the American people demand. Never mind, because I agree with you and I’m completely uninterested in the party politics and that kind of thing as well. But, in terms of the philosophical debate, this is a major rift on the right. Whether we are warmongers and torture mongers or peace mongers and constitution mongers. If it’s fair to call the libertarian movement part of the right at all, which I think is…

Ron Paul: But you know, still in spite of all the shortcomings and the problems we’ve had over the last several decades, the individual always picks the top two because they always figure, “We don’t want to waste our votes for anybody else. We want to pick the top two”. Of the top two, the one that offers the strongest case for peace usually wins. Bush represented that position because he was critical of Clinton and all his activities. And then Obama, of course, criticized Bush and McCain for this. So the people seem to lean in our direction for this issue as well as, you know, back when Nixon was elected he was supposed to stop the Vietnam war. But the problem is, the people might lean in that direction and then we put somebody in and nothing changes, but right now the people are catching on and I think that’s why not only are they catching on that you can’t trust politicians, but they’re also aware of the fact that the economic system is so friable and the jobs are disappearing that the status quo cannot be maintained.

Scott Horton: Well, this is not a banana republic, not completely yet anyway. And it is possible and we’ve seen examples of the American people actually getting their way on some things when they really demand it. And I’m thinking of a great article I read at Glen Greenwald’s blog, our guest about a month back or so, or maybe a little more than that, where he talked about how the reason that you’re Audit the Fed Bill with Alan Grayson was able to get out of committee was because liberal bloggers had… I mean obviously you’d already gotten all the Republicans in Congress on board. They’re in the minority, they’re not risking much. But liberal bloggers had set up a campaign over there at www.FireDogLake.com which is one of the prominent liberty blogs there where they said, “Look, here’s all their names and here’s all their phone numbers. Call your Democrats and tell them that you support this”. And that apparently Alan Grayson actually, I don’t know, had printouts or something, and showed these other Democratic politicians, “Look, it’s safe. Your base is telling you to please do this”. And so it was this coalition of us versus them, rather than left versus right that really came together to be able to get that Audit the Fed bill out of committee and then eventually attached to a bill that passed. And I wonder whether you think that we can follow that model in really bringing together a left-right us-versus-them coalition to defund these wars? Isn’t that the next step?

Ron Paul: You know, let’s hope so. But immediately after Obama was in, our left-right coalition against the war, they were a few Republicans with a bunch of Democrats. So it was Obama’s war. Most of them sided, except for person like Denis Kucinich and few others and Jim McGovern; they stuck with this. But the Democrats are just like the Republicans; they have this obedience to the king and they have to abide and they won’t buck him. And I think what the example you described there is relatively close to the truth because the person that introduced my bill over in the Senate was Bernie Sanders, and he called himself a progressive socialist. And Grayson would be in that camp, too. But if you look at all the Democratic supporters of the bill, there were a lot who were in swing districts and they were first and second termers, and they were worried about reelection and they were influenced by the people back at home. And I don’t want to diminish this idea of a right-left coalition on some of these issues, because that’s what I work for all the time, but it’s not like some of these Democrats that are called Conservatives, we can still call that a coalition. But it is true that people like Grayson and Bernie Sanders are certainly very solidly in that camp.

Scott Horton: Well, and speaking of the wars here, we have an occupation of Iraq; a state about which we will be talking to Michael Hastings about later in the show about how the so called success of the surge is all unraveling in front of us. We have an escalation in Afghanistan, the CIA bombing in Pakistan, and now to some degree or another, we have the joint special operations command in the CIA at work in Yemen and in Somalia. Major calls from movie stars and other important people calling for the spreading of the war into Sunni-Arab Darfur in Sudan. Some things got to be done to put an end to this, or we’re going to be in real big trouble here. This is too many fronts for even America to fight on. Wouldn’t you agree, Dr. Paul?

Ron Paul: Yes, but we’re not going to wise up. I mean, you think with this election that just happened up in Massachusetts that all of a sudden that maybe they’d be backing off from spending, they’re not going to do it. But that doesn’t mean it’s not going to end. I just don’t believe it’s going to end by us coming to our senses from my experience here. But it’s going to end with the economic crisis. Right now we’re in an economic-financial crisis, but we’re not in the dollar crisis; we’re still printing money and the world is still taking our dollars. But one of these days they’re going to quit. They just came up with a figure today that we have to roll over and borrow new money: over $67 billion every week this fiscal year. And one of these days one of those auctions won’t go so well. And that’s when if there is a panic, that’s when the empire falls apart. That’s what happened to the Soviets; it was as much of an economic issue as anything. They just ran out of steam. And I think that is what’s going to happen to us, and it can’t be all that bad.

Scott Horton: Well, and so I guess what you’re referring to there is that there’s so much debt that they’ll just going to have to print money to pay it down.

Ron Paul: Right.

Scott Horton: And then our $50 bills will be like nickels in our pockets.

Ron Paul: That’s right, and the debt gets liquidated, but only because they pay off the debt with money that has no value and you have runaway inflation. And I think that is what is coming, you just can’t keep printing money like this. As the productivity goes down, the good jobs are leaving us, unemployment rates stay up and even those who claim there’s a recovery say, “Oh well, this is a jobless recovery”. What kind of a recovery is that if somebody can’t get job? They’re supposed to feel better because there’s a recovery going on? And they’re unable to feed their family?

Scott Horton: I guess it’s a recovery for people with lots of stock.

Ron Paul: Or Goldman Sachs. They had a good recovery. Their bonuses were gigantic and their profits were huge today?

Scott Horton: Alright, yea I just saw a line graph about that where they’re bonuses are more than ever before. I guess its okay for rich people to be on the dole, just not poor people.

Ron Paul: And the people who were fiscally prudent are the ones who will be taxed one way or the other to take care of the people who got the bailouts.

Scott Horton: Alright, well now to stick with the terror war concept here for a minute. There was a video of you from a speech that you gave, I guess, over the weekend, that’s gone kind of array where you talk about the CIA and their war in Pakistan. And I think you really go so far as to say that the CIA runs American foreign policy basically from top to bottom. And I wondered exactly what you were talking about. If you meant something that’s happened just in the Obama administration, that the CIA has risen in power compared to the Pentagon? Or whether you’re just talking about the National Security state in general since World War II? What exactly did you mean?

Ron Paul: More general, what’s been happening and increasing and they’re in the driver’s seat. And I have been doing a little more writing on this issue and I’m working on another book and I was doing some reviewing of the CIA. It was on my mind and when I am giving my speech, I generally don’t have notes or anything, and that was just really talking about these issues that I thought were important. And that came up and I came out with a rather strong statement against the CIA.

Scott Horton: You said “take em out”, which is what they call “killing people”.

Ron Paul: Yeah, and of course everybody knows that I’m not violent and I’m not going to take somebody out, but denying them all their funds and revealing what they’re doing like remove them from office. But the surprise to me wasn’t that those were my views, because they’ve been my views along; it wasn’t anything brand new. But my shocker was it drew the loudest applause. I mean, they stood up and said, “Wow, somebody else has been thinking about these FBI and CIA and security agencies a lot more than I have”. I never anticipated that type of reaction but it got some people’s attention.

Scott Horton: Well, of course, the Fox News guys would say that’s just not realistic. You want the American government to be blind to everything that’s going on in the world?

Ron Paul: Well, we’re acting blindly now. We’ve spent $75 billion on 16 agencies, then they get a hot lead by a phone call from a father and they can’t handle it. I mean, that’ blindness. So I think we’ve become blind because there are too many trees and we can’t even see anything when it’s laid on a platter. So I think that’s the real problem.

No, I believe in intelligence gathering. I think good common sense and just reading the news and talking to people and looking at people who want to give you information is a good way to go. But all that money spent, $75 billion is spent to try to compensate for the anger we create by a flawed foreign policy. You could spend $150 billion dollars, but if your foreign policy is flawed and invites this type of hatred towards us, that money is not going to save us. It just won’t work. The more money you spend and the more agencies you have, the more complex it gets and the more information is lost.

And I think that is lot of what happened after 9/11, you know? The point about 9/11 is they probably had a ton of information in there. Some people believe it was deliberately ignored. But it’s easy for me to understand how they can have so much information and so many agencies, the government is just so inept. So I think it’s not serving us well. I don’t think the CIA is necessary. I think they are the culprit. I think they are the ones involved in the bombing right now; they’ve been involved with torture and rendition and assassinations, rigging of elections. There’s no reason for us to have an organization like that in a free society.

But then again, you still could have collection of information by people who claim they’re your enemies and deal with it. And I think you probably have every bit as much information and may be able to react much more sensibly with it. But nothing will improve our chances of avoiding these crises unless we change foreign policy.

Scott Horton: This is AntiWar Radio, I’m talking with Dr. Ron Paul, Republican congressman from the Gulf Cost of Texas. And I’m always impressed, Dr. Paul, by the fact that when you’re on these cable news shows, regardless of what they ask you, you really know all about it. You don’t just have a talking point to go over. You really know all about this. So when they ask you about Iran, you can explain to them, and sometimes I wish Peter Schiff was watching when you explained that the Iranians, at least as far as anyone knows, are not even making nuclear weapons, which is the entire basis, the entire premise of our policy of confrontation against them. Could you please explain to the people what it is that you know about Iran? And I see here an original at antiwar.com/paul, your last article that we published here is called “Iran Sanctions: A Precursor to War”. So this is not just an academic issue. This is something very important.

Ron Paul: Well, if we go by our CIA, the CIA in their reports have said they have no evidence the Iranians have worked on a bomb since 2003. That doesn’t mean that I believe that they don’t have a secret desire and incentive, but we don’t have any evidence. And what we do is we violate the NPT by telling them they’re not allowed to have any enrichment. But here they’re permitted under the NPT to enrich for peaceful purposes and for nuclear energy. But we violate it by saying, “You can’t even do that”. So we are the violators of international law, and then we close our eyes to other countries. There are other countries in that region that don’t belong to the international community for nuclear power and nuclear bombs. And you know, Israel and Pakistan and India, they all have nuclear weapons and we cozy up to them and they become our allies and we actually give them money.

The fact that we can’t control a few independent thugs, and that makes us furious. So therefore then we have to concoct these stories that they’re going to have nuclear weapons. See, I was in the service during the Cold War. The Soviets had like 30,000 nuclear weapons and inter-continental ballistic missiles capable of hitting us if they really wanted to. And we dealt with them, we talked to them. We remained strong and we won that without a nuclear war. But here we have these 3rd world countries, they don’t have an army or a navy or an airforce or intercontinental ballistic missiles and no nuclear weapons, and we are generating all this hysteria. But this serves the interests of the military-industrial complex. It serves the interest of saying, “Our national security requires it: we have to invade another country”. And that hopefully someday will change. The only thing I can tell you as an encouragement is when I go to the college campuses they don’t boo me for those kinds of statements as they did at the Republican debates.

Scott Horton: Well, I read an interesting quote here today from Dick Cheney, the former Vice President. Only this was when he was the CEO of Halliburton and he had taken a trip to Australia in 1998 and he was criticizing Bill Clinton’s administration and all the sanctions on Iran and was saying, “I think we could do a lot better if we were to expand and grow these relationships so that we can end normalizing our relations and doing business”. And that’s strange that Dick Cheney would be the one to sound like you saying something like that.

Ron Paul: Yeah, you have to pretend there is partisanship and they fight and fume and there is some partisanship over who controls the power. But ultimately, the policies don’t ever seem to change.

Scott Horton: But it seems like, you know, Halliburton actually really just preferred to make money doing business with Iran rather than waiting and just making all the money off the Iraq war like they were going to.

Ron Paul: Yeah, I’m sure they were lining up for some contracts. At present they did get some contracts and the invasion process and the contractor monies that were spent over there.

Scott Horton: Alright now, I just saw a youtube video of you introducing legislation to legalize competing currencies, and this is sort of your other way around rather than just outright repealing the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. This is how to make the Federal Reserve obsolete, isn’t it?

Ron Paul: That’s right. And I’ve always tried to figure out a transition. Some people say, “No, you just close the doors and bomb them and open it up”. But you ought to have a transition. Like for instance in post offices you have FedEx and UPS and hopefully they’re allowed to deliver First Class Mail some day. You don’t have to close the post office down in one day. Fortunately, we still have competition in schooling. You can still homeschool and private-school, so that helps neutralize a little bit the public school system. Also, in medicine if they would just legalize a private option, that’s what I would like, where you could just get out of the system and get a tax credit for everything you spend, that would be a private option.

But then in money, you can have a competing currency. Hayek actually wrote about this and it’s not so extreme. It’s just legalizing the Constitution because there was never repealed that gold and silver had to be legal tender. So you have to repeal the legal tender laws so the Fed doesn’t have a monopoly. You should legalize the right of a private company to mint a gold coin; they would be held in check by the fraud laws and counterfeit laws. Today there are no fraud and counterfeit laws that apply to the Federal Reserve. And then the last thing you would have to do is make sure you have no taxes on money. You don’t tax dollars when you buy dollars or pay capital against tax because the value of the dollar goes up. But if gold goes up in value, if you pay sales tax when you buy a coin, and then you pay a capital gains tax when you spend the coin, that would be ridiculous. It can’t be money. So you’d have to do these three things to allow people to use a currency different than the paper money.

Scott Horton: Well, some opponent of yours on MSNBC which say, “Yeah, but that would be inflationary to have every bank and every private company introducing their own currency.”

Ron Paul: No, I didn’t say that.

Scott Horton: No, I’m saying that that’s what they would say to you.

Ron Paul: Yeah. I would say that they misunderstand because all I’m doing is legalizing the constitution that says gold and silver can be legal tender. I’m not doing anything else.

Scott Horton: Unless you could turn lead into gold.

Ron Paul: Yeah, that’s it. There would be no inflation and the value of the gold currency goes up, the value of the paper currency goes down. And sometimes the populists who are sympathetic with what I say like the idea of everybody printing their own money. Even the states. But that’s prohibited. They’re not allowed to mint bills of credit, they’re not allowed to print money because they did have horrendous inflation in colonial times. So I don’t think that would be a good idea, at least to take that on now. But this would be strictly the gold and silver which you can’t inflate with. You get gold and silver by hard work and effort and that’s why it maintains its value.

Scott Horton: Right on. Alright, we’re all out of time, but I really appreciate your time on the show today.

Ron Paul: Okay Scott, good to be with you.

Scott Horton: Alright, that’s Dr. Ron Paul, he’s the author of “A Foreign Policy Of Freedom”, “The Revolution: A Manifesto”, and “End The Fed”. He represents district 14 on Texas Gulf Coast. And you can find his antiwar.com articles at antiwar.com/paul

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-Happening Now: Hope For Haiti Now: A Global Benefit for Earthquake Relief, the star-studded Haiti relief telethon. The event is streaming live via YouTube, Hulu, MySpace, AOL, MSN, Yahoo, Fancast, MTV.com and CNN.com and more sites. You can watch on your phone with AT&T, Verizon, Sprint or Alltel, or on Sirius XM. The people of the devastated island nation need our help. I’ve already made a donation, you should, too. Every dollar counts…..

-On Monday’s Oprah, Rosie O’Donnell will dish on moving in with new girlfriend Tracy Kachtick-Anders — who has six children of her own….

-George Lopez is throwing a benefit concert for Haitian earthquake relief. Help Haiti will take place Feb. 4 at the Nokia Center in downtown Los Angeles…..

-Shania Twain has the stuff to replace Simon Cowell on Idol….

-Marc Jacobs honored for contributions to fashion….

-Angelina Jolie Lends Support to Haitian Orphans….

-A Los Angeles judge has rejected Pervy Polanski’s request to be sentenced in absentia for his 1977 guilty plea to sex with a 13-year-old girl….

-Kitty Kelley’s unauthorized tell-all about Oprah Winfrey, titled Oprah: A Biography, will be published on April 13 by Crown Publishers…..

-Shauna Sand-Lamas is promoting that sex tape she swears she didn’t leak — riiiight. Here’s a quote from the former Playboy model’s recent interview with Paper Magazine:

“I have good morals and ethics and values and I’m really a family person. Just because I have a sex tape out there, or just because people said I slept with my stepson, doesn’t mean that I’m not a good-hearted person….”

-Bristol Palin wants Levi Johnston to hand over some of his Playgirl money….

-Former Broward County judge Larry “The Crier” Seidlin has written a book about the death of Anna Nicole Smith, which played out in his courtroom in 2007.

By Marwaan Macan-Markar* BANGKOK, Dec 23 (IPS) Until the global financial crisis hit, a journey out of poverty for women in rural Cambodia was assured by the vibrant garment sector that had taken root in the country’s capital. Tens of thousands of women in their twenties poured into Phnom Penh to secure jobs in the hundreds of export-oriented factories.

At the height of the garment industry in April 2008, the 300 factories in and around the capital had a 340,000 workforce, 85 percent of whom were female migrant workers from provinces such as Kampong Speu, Prey Veng, Takeo, Kampong Cham and Kandal.

Then the global financial crunch struck, beginning in the United States last year and spreading to this corner of South-east Asia. Suddenly the U.S. market, which accounted for nearly two-thirds of Cambodia’s garment exports, began to dry up.

The consequence, say experts studying the impact of the crisis on a mainstay of the Cambodian economy, is an increasing number of teenage girls from the provinces heading to Phnom Penh to seek jobs to make up for the loss of income that has hit their families.

Cambodian law permits such work, since child labour covers those who are 14 years and below.

"More family members, particularly younger women, are being sent to work from the rural areas to the city," says Sukti Dasgupta, senior specialist on employment and labour market policies at the East Asia office of the International Labour Organisation (ILO). "These women are in the 15 to 17 age group."

"They are from poorer backgrounds and less educated and have been sent to the city to make up for the loss in family income due to the financial crisis," she said in an interview in her Bangkok office. "They are going into vulnerable jobs and are more susceptible to exploitation."

While the ILO and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Cambodia have still to arrive at a number indicating the extent of this internal migration trend, anecdotal evidence has helped shape a picture about these new entrants into this poverty-stricken country’s workforce.

"There are a lot of young girls you see in the informal sector, as domestic workers in Phnom Penh households," says Haidy Ear-dupuy, advocacy and communications director at the Cambodia office of World Vision, a Christian relief and development organisation. "Many households look for these girls that are coming in larger numbers."

These young entrants into the labour force are also an increasing presence in the shops and open stalls in the city’s markets, Ear-dupuy said in a telephone interview from Phnom Penh. "They do light work, helping with sales." Yet those like Ear-dupuy and others working for NGOs are concerned that with the plum jobs in the garment sector not available, these teenage workers could be drawn into the city’s entertainment sector, exposing them to abuse.

There are cases of young girls who first come to the city as domestic workers and subsequently move on to work as waitresses or in karaoke bars in hopes of earning more, say researchers monitoring this emerging trend.

In July, a report by a United Nations agency revealed that the crisis had forced more girls and women into the sex trade.

"There are indications of an increase in women and girls entering the entertainment sector during the timeframe of the financial crisis," says the study by the United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking. "These workers come from numerous provinces in Cambodia, most heavily from Kampong Cham, Kandal and Prey Veng."

The two-month study done through April and May surveyed 357 women and girls between the ages 15 and 49. It said the women were labouring as "brothel workers, street workers, karaoke workers and massage parlour workers," it adds.

The study confirmed that the tough times faced by families in the wake of the economic crisis was a factor behind this trend. "For entertainment workers of all types, by far the most common reason reported for entering the sex trade was ‘difficult family circumstances,’ followed by ‘easily earn a lot of money in good working condition’," it noted.

The trying times rural families face as women have lost their jobs or their overtime rates slashed in factories are with reason. Most female employees in a factory earn a monthly wage of 73 U.S. dollars, which includes the minimum wage, overtime payments and cost-of-living allowances, says Catherine Vaillancourt-Laflamme of Better Factories Cambodia, an ILO-run programme. "They remit nearly half of that, about 30 U.S. dollars, to their families in the provinces."

"This is an important source of income for the families of the women working in the garment sector," adds Vaillancourt-Laflamme in a telephone interview from her Phnom Penh office. "Some women have decided to remain employed even at the expense of their overtime payments being cut."

According to current estimates about 50,000 employees have lost their jobs in the export sector since April last year. The number of factories functioning is down to 261 from a high of 300 last year.

The Cambodian factories, which supply major international brands such as Adidas, Nike and GAP, brought in 2.78 billion dollars in 2008, accounting for over 90 percent of the country’s total exports.

The garment sector has proved a major boon to a country of 14 million people where nearly 35 percent of the population live below the poverty line.

(*This feature was produced by IPS Asia-Pacific under a series on the impact of the global economic crisis on children and young people, in partnership with UNICEF East Asia and the Pacific.)

Geraldine Juarez writes in to let us know of her experience attending what was billed as a “public hearing” about the ACTA treaty in Mexico (link in Spanish, Google translation here), which sounded really messed up. First, despite it being a public hearing, originally those putting on the event wanted attendees to sign nondisclosure agreements. After pushing back on this, they finally agreed to remove that requirement, but there was a lot of confusion about it and it may have kept people with serious questions about ACTA from attending. The room, then, was mostly industry people, who were apparently concerned as to why everyday citizens were in attendance, and they even booed a lawyer who questioned the human rights angle. As for Geraldine, she tried twittering the event, and the industry folks demanded she leave (and had a guard escort her out). It’s almost like they’re trying to make themselves into a caricature of businesses plotting to harm the public. When others asked where the actual ACTA discussions in Mexico would be held, they were told that was “confidential.” It appears that the public is certainly not welcome.

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Confessions from a Reality Show Drama Queen: One of The Real World: DC housemates has admitted to faking cancer to get attention from a former boyfriend. Erika Lauren Wasilewski, a 22-year-old Illinois native and Columbia College graduate, pretended to be in a deadly battle against skin cancer to win back an ex flame.

The gossip first started when Shabooty.com got the scoop about Erika’s past.

“…I was the boyfriend that broke up with her. She actually faked some sort of skin cancer for close to 9 months. Everybody in our hometown believed her….”

Erika confirmed the allegations are true in a new interview with TimeOut: “Um, there is some truth to what you’re hearing. Yes, it happened. Yes, I regret it. If I could take it back, I would. I was going through some severe emotional problems at the time. I was lashing out and craving attention wherever I could.”

Actress and aspiring singer Leighton Meester is preparing to release her debut album, Love Is a Drug, this spring. The Gossip Girl star debuted her Robin Thicke-assisted lead single, “Somebody to Love,” in November, without much success. Nonetheless, TV’s Blair Waldorf is giving things another go with her second single, “Your Love’s A Drug.”

Rock It or Drop It?

This post is part of the IT Innovation series, sponsored by Sun & Intel. Read more at ITInnovation.com.
Of course, the content of this post consists entirely of the thoughts and opinions of the author.

While I’m always a little skeptical of the numbers found in vendor surveys, it wouldn’t be too surprising to learn that the recent findings that half of all data centers find themselves understaffed are at least close to accurate. About 16% of the total surveyed claimed that their data centers were “extremely understaffed,” with another 34% saying they were just somewhat understaffed. Reasons for the understaffing included both the difficulty of finding qualified people for more technologically complex datacenters and general economic cutbacks — neither of which are particularly surprising.

The bigger question is what impact this will have. Chronic understaffing in a data center could lead to serious security issues, increased downtime (decreased reliability) and certainly decreased responsiveness to problems. With many of the survey respondents also claiming they’re hoping to decrease headcount even further, this could become a bigger issue going forward.

The report also claims that the survey’s creators were “surprised” to find out that mid-market companies were more likely to experiment with new technologies, as compared to the big companies, but I don’t find that surprising at all. Big companies are pretty resistant to change (especially if they have some big IT project that is “working.”) Still, if those companies are finding their data centers regularly understaffed, it could create more difficulty in getting getting new projects successfully off the ground. So I’m curious how companies are dealing with these issues and trying to avoid problems with understaffed data centers, while still being able to try out new technologies and services.

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Filed under: Chicago Auto Show, Detroit Auto Show, Motorsports, Spy Photos, Geneva Motor Show, Videos, Mini, Mitsubishi, Volkswagen, Peugeot, Skoda

Welcome to another edition of the Weekender. The Friday goods this week come from all over the world: Formula 1 drifting on ice in Montreal, an underwater Dodge Ram in Argentina, Skodas in Monte Carlo, a Hot Tub Edition Mini in New York, and free tickets to the Chicago Auto Show.

The domestic front also brings us a Fast Company profile of Volkswagen Group of America’s head honcho Stefan Jacoby, which includes him admitting, “It was clear we were not understanding of our customers. We needed to change our style in the U.S., as we are a very stubborn bureaucratic German company – and German management – to some extent. I am here to listen.”

And then there was all that singing and dancing at the Detroit Auto Show, but Beyoncé provided the lyrics this time, not the Chevy Volt marketing team. Follow the jump to get your weekend fill.

Continue reading The Autoblog Weekender: Mobs in Detroit, motorsport in Monte Carlo, and the Führer has words for Ken Block

The Autoblog Weekender: Mobs in Detroit, motorsport in Monte Carlo, and the Führer has words for Ken Block originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 22 Jan 2010 19:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Autoblog storms into Arizona for auction week

2010 Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale Auction Preview – Click above for high-res image gallery What a week to be in Arizona. Governor Jan Brewer declared a state of emergency yesterday following the…

2011 Shelby GT350 live at Barrett-Jackson

2011 Shelby GT350 at Barrett-Jackson – Click above for high-res image gallery The 2011 Shelby GT350 seemed to have a polarizing effect when it debuted at Barrett-Jackson’s opening gala…

Introduction to Ice Racing: Part 1

“You race on what now?” This is the typical response given when the topic of ice racing comes up. People can’t seem to get their head around the idea that you, a sane human being with as strong a…

Also of interest:

• British cars kick off RM’s 2010 Arizona auction
• Strong winds cause Russo and Steele auction tents to collapse (w/video)
• Harley-Davidson expands Sportster line with new Forty-Eight
• New Poll: 45% believe GM will need more bailouts
• Spy Shots: Americans, meet the next-gen Suzuki Swift you’ll be driving

Browse our archive of Daily U-Turn posts or subscribe to the RSS feed

Daily U-Turn: What you missed on 1.22.10 originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 22 Jan 2010 19:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Actress Anjelica Huston received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles Friday! Huston — who has appeared in features like The Royal Tenenbaums and The Addams Family – became a third generation Oscar winner, joining her father, director John Huston, and grandfather, actor Walter Huston, with her performance in 1985’s Prizzi’s Honor

Los Angeles County prosecutors have charged an auto insurance claims adjustor related to state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner with 60 counts of embezzlement and auto insurance fraud.

Paul Daniel Poizner, an adjustor for California Casualty Management and the second cousin of the Republican gubernatorial candidate, pleaded not guilty today to charges in connection with a scheme in which he allegedly submitted checks for auto claims in excess of the amount required for repairs and pocketed the difference.

In all, prosecutors allege that Paul Poizner stole $300,000, said Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office.

Poizner, 45, was arrested without incident Thursday morning at his Ventura County home by investigators with the district attorney’s Insurance Fraud Bureau of Investigation and was being held on more than $294,000 bail. Authorities said he is expected post bail later today.

The scheme was uncovered during a company audit of auto damage claims that were submitted between May 2008 and February 2009, according to the criminal complaint filed by L.A. County prosecutors.

Darrel Ng, a spokesman for the state insurance commissioner, said California Casualty Management informed prosecutors and his office about their findings in March. After being told the identity of the suspect, the insurance commissioner immediately recused himself from the investigation. 

Paul Poizner is due back in court Feb. 5 for a preliminary hearing.

–Andrew Blankstein

While everyone was focused on the new Kindle app store or the new royalty rates, perhaps a more interesting new thing slipped quietly by: without telling anyone, Amazon is now giving publishers the option to remove DRM from ebooks. It’s odd that Amazon wouldn’t publicly announce this, but I’m sure it has its own reasons. I doubt many publishers will actually go DRM-free for now, but at least a few can, and I would imagine that will make some Kindle users a lot more comfortable about buying those ebooks. Update: Hmm. In the comments someone points out that another take on this is that it’s actually allowing some publishers who didn’t use DRM before to use it. That would explain why it wasn’t mentioned…

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Ricky Martin has partnered with Habitat for Humanity to create a new relief fund for victims of the 7.0 earthquake that rocked Haiti earlier this month.

The Ricky Martin Foundation/Habitat for Humanity Haiti Recovery Fund was created this week after the Puerto Rican pop sensation visited the island nation alongside Habitat for Humanity International’s CEO Jonathan Reckford.

The group is taking donations through its website. Contributions will be used to help the organization repair housing for as many families as they can. You may also make a $10 donation by texting ‘RMFHAITI’ to 25383.

“Right now I’m going through a lot of emotions with the things we’ve seen here in Port-au-Prince,” Ricky says in a video blog on the official Habitat website. “But still there’s a lot [of] hope, because there’s a lot of space for healing. Little by little we are gonna start building just like we did in Thailand right after the tsunami… we can do the same. We need your help,” Ricky added. “We can help. Please join us.”

On our way into Port-au-Prince from the Dominican Republic, the driver, who is Haitian, but lives in the DR, said that he was really touched and impressed by the response of the Dominican people to the tragedy in Haiti.  Relations between the two countries have historically been troubled.  But this Haitian driver described a Dominican telethon that raised a very large sum of money to help the Haitian people.  And he told us how Dominicans without a lot were giving generously, like maids giving $50 from their savings.

We know that a lot of money has been pledged from around the world to Haiti.  But we still hear stories and meet people who are not receiving help.  Today, we visited the town of Petit-Goave, which was close to the original earthquake’s epicenter.  And it was the very epicenter of the second quake, the 6.0, that hit on Wednesday.

Great damage has been done to the once pleasant seaside town.  Some houses still stand.  Some appear unharmed.  Others are completely flattened.  Residents claim they are not getting food aid, not getting water, and they are desperate.  They say they need people to come in and tell them if the houses that still stand are safe enough to enter, even if just to grab a few personal items.  There are no professional teams clearing sites.  It seems the capital remains the priority so that things don’t descend into chaos there.

Petit-Goave is just 40 miles from Port-au-Prince, and yet it took us two and a half hours to get there.  Much of that has to do with the congestion in the capital’s roads but also some of the road leading to Petit-Goave are badly torn up in places.  Residents say they did not see outside help until a week after the earthquake.  And we did not see evidence of people distributing aid in Petit-Goave.

Still, despite all that, life is slowly getting back to normal, on some level.  There were people out vending goods.

Yet, we came across a local who used to live in Boston.  He had moved back to Petit-Goave.  His house had survived but he was worried to go back in.  We spoke about the immediate needs of the area.  I asked him what the town was famous for.  He looked dazed, and couldn’t come up with an answer.  He just said it was too hard to think about those things.  That the horror of what had happened to his country and to his town, trumped everything else.  He repeated, it was very hard to think about anything else but the painful present.