Friday Graffiti Share

I have been snapping images of graffiti with my phone for some time now. About time I did something with them; so I have!

Voting for God

More on the fundamentalist nut-bags in the US;

God wants to build a pipeline;

"God's will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that" Says Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin - and like the Blues Brothers, we are on a mission from God, but not to save an orphanage but wage war in Iraq.

And the scary/funny - The fundamentalist formula for electoral success.
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Joel's Army: Crazy/Scary Christians

Oh. My. God. (Not). Check these lot out - it would be funny if it were not so scary. The next threat to democracy is not Islam - it's Christianity!;

Tattooed across his sternum are military dog tags that read "Joel's Army." They're evidence of [preacher Todd] Bentley's generalship in a rapidly growing apocalyptic movement that's gone largely unnoticed by watchdogs of the theocratic right. According to Bentley and a handful of other "hyper-charismatic" preachers advancing the same agenda, Joel's Army is prophesied to become an Armageddon-ready military force of young people with a divine mandate to physically impose Christian "dominion" on non-believers.

And they are busy-bees;

This also means that the US military has become an increasing target for infiltration. The very paramilitary training camp noted above has gotten quite official sanction by the general in charge of most of the US Air Force's military recon and IT security. This effort has become disturbingly successful; no less than two of the primary parties involved in the Abu Ghraib scandal including policymaker William Boykin are directly involved in the Assemblies and the "Joel's Army" movement within the denomination, and in many cases the US government has literally been paying for packing the chaplaincy of the US Army and Air Force with "Joel's Army" promoters. (Boykin is especially interesting in this regard; he has quite explicitly referred to Joel's Army theology in speeches to his fellow soldiers.) One of the major groups involved in infiltration of the military, Campus Crusade for Christ, has been known to promote this sort of theology as well.

Increasingly, though, these groups aren't restricting themselves to infiltrating the military (or political parties, for that matter) or having their kids play soldier in "Bible boot camps". Increasingly, "Joel's Army" theology is leaking into real world violence--including the neopentecostal dominionist hategroup "Watchmen At The Walls" (which has received official support from the Assemblies of God as a whole) as well as domestic terrorism (such as targeted assassinations of women's clinic workers and bombings of not only women's clinics but adult bookstores and LGBT nightclubs).

Holy. Fuck.
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Britian and US Run Deathsquads

It is no surprise in the moral swamp of the War of Terror, but British and US special forces have been running death-squads in Iraq, aka State Terrorism;

More than 3,500 insurgents have been "taken off the streets of Baghdad" by the elite British force in a series of audacious "Black Ops" over the past two years.

It is understood that while the majority of the terrorists were captured, several hundred, who were mainly members of the organisation known as "al-Qa'eda in Iraq" have been killed by the SAS.

...

Senior sources denied that the SAS was taking part in "extra-judicial killings" and added that any incident which appeared to be in breach of the British Army’s rules of engagement would be investigated internally by the unit and by the Royal Military Police if any wrongdoing was suspected.

The source said: "There is no shoot-to-kill policy in Iraq, but there are only a few ways of stopping a suicide bomber. A British lawyer is present during the planning stages of every operation and our troops operate under British rules, not American rules."

Right - not like the shoot-to-kill in Northern Ireland, Vietnam and Kenya in the 1950s and so on. This is sadly just standard counter-insurgency in action.
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Housing Timebomb: Edward Ware Homes Ltd Crashes

It has been a long time coming - but come it always was going to...the housing bomb is bursting and the first major local casualty has been announced; Edward Ware Homes Ltd goes pop. Not being one to say 'told you so' but back in 2003 when the papers were breathlessly enjoying the ongoing rise and rise of housing prices, without considering where it might go;

When the economy takes a down-turn, as surly one day it will, interest rates will rise and jobs will be lost. Then the time-bomb explodes. Those morgaged to the hilt will loose their homes. Those without their own homes in rented property will find their rent rising to meet the morgage costs. The already strained housing sectors, despite having the space to house us all will, because of economic factors out of our control, begin tearing a the fabric of the city. Developments will lay derelict, monuments to lost opportunities. The global investors will move out of our city, happy to wait until the market bounces back to realise a return on their investments. We’ll be picking up the pieces while they move their attentions to profitable opportunities elsewhere.

And so the fallout continues. Edward Ware Homes Ltd have collapsed with £5.1 million in dept. They owe lots of people money - including ordinary trades people who are set to only get around £2.50 for every £1000 owed. It is still trading, but only in the hope it can recoup a bit more cash for the creditors. The double-Irony is that Edward Ware Homes were the developers of the 'Panoramic' that infamously Tony Bliar and family brought two flats from. The irony is that the Neo-Labour machine has lorded over developments that have exacerbated the conditions under which this housing bomb is bursting. Again I wrote in 2003;

"To understand what is going on requires a little understanding into how the market is functioning. What is happening is that private capital is being poured into a large number of high-profit housing ventures. To be high-profit they must be luxury, as while you can make money from building affordable housing, you can make a whole lot more from luxury projects. To build anything significant, you require planning permission from the local authorities. They then act as a regulator of housing to ensure that what is being built matches the plans for the area and so, theoretically at least, benefits Bristol and it’s people. However, that regulatory role seems to have been overlooked in a rush to attract investment into the city."

Housing has always been more than 'assets', 'investments' and 'capital' to us normal people - it is a home, where we live and throwing that concept to the market was always going to hurt.