As I write this we're watching Beyonce, who just won Best MTV VMAs Video of The Year, really show that class still exists in America by asking Taylor Swift to come out and take a bow that she really should have been able to have before.
What happened was that Kayne West really showed how little class he (surprisingly) has by storming the stage, grabbing the mic and saying, as Taylor won for Best Female Video..
“Yo Taylor, I’m really happy for you, I’ll let you finish, but Beyoncé has one of the best videos of all time. One of the best videos of all time!,”
Taylor was shocked. My jaw hit the floor. The Radio City crowd hooted and screamed. And over the next segment of the show, it seemed as if the mood was racially divided, and there was no need for that at all. Kanye really did a bad thing. I can't think of any other sane way to put it.
What somewhat made up for Kanye's butt-showing moment was the awesome voice of Lady Gaga. That chick, and yeah, she's all woman, can rock the house. Amazing talent. Beautiful woman. Focused and talented.
And now, Jay-Z's riffing a new song that's a tribute to New York City to end the show.
I've got to give Janet Jackson a real big thank you for opening the show with an incredible number celebrating the music of her brother Michael Jackson. You could see the emotion just pouring from her and his soul was in every second of the music she produced.
Show host Russell Brand was just ok. I didn't like the way Brand stopped to make fun of Megan Fox's comments on her mental condition, which I blogged about yesterday. No one laughed at all. He could have left that out.
In all, a great show. But I also give MTV a a load of credit for a website that integrated Twitter and Facebook in a way that will change the way I look at how such efforts should be designed for events like this. Check out the site.
Now, I can't wait for the new clip of the movie "This Is It" about what was to be Michael's concert tour. I have mixed emotions about this, which I'll share later. They're playing it now. I'll have it here later.
I received this email below from a viewer which explains the person's shock over the Calvin Klein SF Union Square store front display. I went over to make the video above and get your view on the display.
As I've stated in the video, it was not a good idea to approve a store front that is at best questionable. Everyone who's seen the video thus far has a reaction to it, from furled brows to frowns and raised eyebrows, the video does not make for a stoic reaction.
Why someone would do this is a question I will ask Calvin Klein's staffers in the days ahead. Indeed, the worker that talked to me through the glass admitted that she did not the racial overtones in the display until they were pointed out to her.
But for now, read the email below, then take my poll on this certainly controversial Calvin Klein store display.
The email:
Hey Zennie,
I'm kicking myself for not taking a picture (I don't usually use my phone for anything other than a phone, so it escaped me in a moment of anger), but I just got back from the San Francisco Shopping Center where I happened upon an appalling window display in the Calvin Klein store next to Bloomingdale's on the 3rd floor.
Imagine a window full of frolicking monkeys, swinging from tree branches in various playful poses, but instead of monkeys, there are mannequins wearing the latest Calvin fashions. And instead of swinging from tree branches, the mannequins are swinging from ropes finished in nooses at the ends. All of the mannequins are black. It doesn't sound like much, but I'll tell you, those nooses caught my eye in the first place, and it didn't take long to piece it all together.
Why am I sending this to you? Well, you've got a voice on several forums, and could make this very public and embarrassing for Calvin Klein. That anyone could get past the basic design stages of such a display without questioning its bad taste is unbelievable. That such displays are crafted by designers with an eye on every detail makes it even less excusable. That such displays are often dictated to stores by corporate headquarters and duplicated at all locations makes it a disgusting travesty.
If you happen by that store, or know someone in SF who could take some pics for you to post, you could shine a bright light on a very ugly message going out to the thousands of people who pass by that carefully composed collection of symbols. I was deeply offended, but rather than contact Calvin Klein so they can quietly change their windows, I figured I'd contact someone who can give it a bit more exposure.
In a blockbuster development, Ecuador Judge Juan Nunez, the key legal figure in the Chevron Ecuador environmental damage case, is captured in a video shown here explaining that he plans to rule against the oil giant and for an award of $27 billion "more or less". The judge explains that the verdict will happen and that Chevron will be blocked from filing an appeal of his ruling. In that segment of the video, the Judge explains he's only there to talk about the verdict, not about "the other stuff" which refers to a $3 million payoff request. Later in the video its implied that Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa will benefit from the bribe amount.
On video today I talked to Chevron Media Relations representative Sean Covey about the video and Chevron's investigation.
In the video Judge Nunez, Aulo Gelio ServioTulio Avila ("Avila"), and Pablo Almeida and are talking with two gentleman, Wayne Hansen and Diego Borja who are environmental remediation contractors and in the Judge's chamber in Lago Agrio, Ecuador. Hansen and Borja have pen-installed camcorders in their shirt pockets. Diego Borja has worked for Chevron before, Hansen has not, according to Chevron.
Judge Nunez (on the left)
The idea of the meeting was for the Judge and his political associates to be paid by the environmental company for business that would come to them as a result of the Judge's planned verdict. Here's what the Judge said from the video and the Amazonpost website:
Núñez: “Any other questions for me as a judge?” Hansen: “Oh no, I, I know clearly how it is, you say, Chevron is the guilty party?” Núñez: “Yes Sir.” Hansen: “And the, the, the act (decision) is October or November of this year?” Núñez: “Yes Sir.” Hansen: “And it’s….?” Núñez: “No later than January.” Hansen: “January 2010. And the money is twenty-seven (billion dollars)?” Núñez: “It might be less, and it might be more.”
The Judge says "I have nothing to do with that other part" which is not explained in full but Garcia below fills in "the blanks" later, explaining that the Judge will be paid part of $3 million from the consulants.
Patricio Garcia
The second part of the video has an operative Patricio Garcia (photo from the Amazonpost website) who's reportedly a member of Ecuador's ruling party talking about how the $3 million would be delivered and transfered. This is what was said by Garcia:
Borja: “OK. Of the three million … one million is for the judge?”
Garcia: “Yes.”
Borja: “One million for the presidency…?”
Garcia: “Yes.”
Borja: “And one million for the plaintiffs?”
Garcia: “Yes, that’s right.”
Borja: “But, Loco, for the plaintiffs, who gets the money? Fajardo?”
Garcia: “No. The thing is, we’re going to handle it here.”
Borja: “You mean Alianza PAIS would receive the payment here?”
But there's more to this video than what's reported in the press thus far. The focus here is on President Rafael Correa, who's office is named by Patricio Garcia as a beneficiary of the planned bribe money as is "his sister" as stated in the video above. As of this writing Correa has not issued a statement, but his reputation has already come under attack.
The second part of the video was filmed at Alianza PAIS (which means "Proud and Sovereign Fatherland" according to the Wikepedia listing) Offices June 22, 2009. PAIS is a political movement led by President Correa. Who Patricio Garcia is beyond his appearance in this video and his role in PAIS is still basically unknown as of this writing.
Garcia says that the President's sister Pierina will be helpful (presumably in making sure that the businessmen get their piece of the planned $27 billion pie) and will meet with "The Gringo" (that's Hansen). I checked and "Prierina" is indeeddescribed here as "Pierina Correa, the president's sister and an Alianza País leader in Guayas province". That confirms my assertion that Garcia is tied to the President and his family as he states in the video.
Shocking.
Chevron wants Nunez taken off the case
The implication here is that as Chevron Media Relations representative Sean Corney said in my video above, Chevron wants Nunez taken off the environmental damage case. But given that Chevron has informed the U.S. Department of Justice, the revalation could have deeper implications.
It could cost the country its Andean Trade Preference Act (ATPA) status, which was just renewed in June of this year. Whatever the case, this news sends a clear message that doing business in Ecuador is not the "clean" experience it should be. Until now, blogs have reported the problems of corruption in Ecuador and with respect to President Correa's involvement in the Chevron case, but now we have visible evidence to back those claims.
The news also forever destroys the claim made by Ecuador lawsuit legal advisor Steve Donziger and others who say that the lawsuit against Chevron has nothing to do with the Ecuadorian Government and is brought by citizens of the Amazon. But Correa has appeared with Donziger in public and has been interviewed about the case.
Right.
One can see that the bribe money's not going anywhere near those groups of people Donziger claims to represent; the political party PAIS would get it and "handle it" as Garcia said in the video. The question is, did Donziger or his associates in Ecuador and America know about this bribe plan? Was he to be one of the plaitiffs that would get the bribe money? In the Amazon Defense Coalition statement today, he does not address the possibility that he may be involved, instead he said "As the facts come out it's going to backfire heavily on Chevron."
Amazon Defense Coalition defends Judge Nunez
Karen Hinton of the Amazon Defense Coalition told Reuters that the video shows Judge Nunez resisting the bribery matter. (This is Hinton's full statement.) In point of fact, the video shows the judge saying that he's speaking in the role of Judge and "does not know about that other matter" which is a way of saying he does know but does not want it to be officially said that he does know. It's called "plausible deniability ."
Rosemary Port is the blogger (and fashion model student) who for some reason believed it was ok to call fashion model Liskula Cohen a "psychotic, lying, whoring...Skank," under the blog post title, "Skanks of NYC" and from under the cover of a name not her own. On Wednesday August 19th, a U.S. Federal Judge ordered Google to identify the name of the person who we now know as Ms. Port.
And it's not because she's suing Google; it's because in using her blog to make malicious fun of Cohen, Rosemary Port unknowingly violated a provision of "Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act" that was passed in 2006.
Liskula Cohen
The little-talked-about law has three sections that specifically concern cyberstalking Sections 113 (Preventing Cyberstalking), Section 114, and Section 2261 A . This is what is posted at GovTrak.com for the purpose of this discussion. The entire bill section reads in summary:
Section 113. Preventing Cyberstalking ... Whoever ... utilizes any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet ... without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person ... who receives the communications ... shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than two years, or both."
The punishment for this is not less than a year in jail and the charges can be brought forth by the Department of Justice. This, then, is the law Ms. Port has ran up against. Given what she was doing against Ms. Cohen, Rosemary Port is in clear violation of this law and could see jail time if Ms. Cohen or the Department of Justice, or for that matter Google, pressed the issue.
I really think Ms. Port's lawyer is giving her some terrible counsel.
Cyberstalking is not free speech
Some are under the impression that the kind of blogging Port was doing is free speech. Nothing could be further from the truth. Classic free speech is standing on a corner and talking about something using your mouth to blast your voice into public airspace.
A blog is not really public to start with: everything from the web page to the internet service provider is privately owned, so they can control the content that gets out there - it's not the place for free expression. I think what's happened is that the relative ease of blogging has seduced some into thinking that they can write whatever they want, whenever they want, thus believing they have the right to free speech. Not so.
People are jailed for cyberstalking
Something else Ms. Port must consider is the timing of her actions could not have been worse. They not only come after 2006 and the laws against cyberstalking, but at a time when there's a war against the act and the people who do it. In England, a teenager by the name of Keeley Houghton is facing three months in the juvenile detention system for harassing and threatening Emily Moore, eventually writing that she was going to kill her.
And law enforcement has been active in America, too. In Southwest Florida in 2008 a teenager was arrested for the act. In Louisiana a pastor recently turned himself in after an arrest for cyberstalking. In that case, he was accused of "sending several anonymous, sexually-explicit e-mail messages" to a 21-year old woman who attended his church.
And more and more states and cities are installing their own versions of the law, and police departments are adding cyber crime units, so the infrastructure to stop this behavior is being created. It's about time.
I'm cyberstalked on a daily basis, as I have several blogs and video channels (10 channels with an average of 200 videos on each one, and over 600 on YouTube) and am on SFGate.com and the Examiner and CNN's iReport. I get racist emails, and comments that lie about me, insult me, or threaten me every day.
To say I'm tired of it is an understatement but I'm not going away. In 2008 I was twice the subject of a death message (and got such a comment on SFGate.com this year), leading me to make this video:
And vloggers like MelissaJenn (who I referred to in my video) have been treated terribly, with people stalking her and taking photos not just of her but of her dwelling then sending the photo to her writing "I know where you live." That's sick. Just plain ill. She stopped making vlogs for a few months after that, then came back to her normal schedule of vlogging. But the bottom line is we're tired of this and fighting back.
Blogs, news outlets and other online information outlets must beware of this war, because it they're not policing their sites, they too could be the focus of a huge lawsuit by someone who's life was threatened or just plain made to suffer emotionally. It's not right.
And now we have the legal tools to use, and will do so.
Rosemark Port should appologize to Liskula Cohen rather than going through a legal path that will only do her more harm than good. Port's not the victim here; she's her own worst enemy. She's not going to beat Google and moreover, she's not going to overturn that provision of "The Violence Against Women Act". Ironic that a woman would run up against that law, eh?
Still, I think it's time for some healthy and civil talk about where we go from here. I don't think teenagers should be jailed for these acts, and I do believe that more training is needed to save people, well, from themselves. Stay tuned.
TAKE THE POLL - http://www.pollsb.com/polls/p2137290-...
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/a...
http://zennie2005.blogspot.com/2009/0...
When I learned that teen star and Twitter mogul Miley Cyrus had literally done a number on a stripper pole at the Teen Choice Awards Monday night, two thoughts entered my mind: first, who convinced the 16 year old to do it, second, does this mean a sex tape's in her future too. I say and write that because I learned she and her father Billy Ray Cyrus came up with the dance production idea. So if her dad's cool with his daughter dancing around that pole at her age, the sky's the limit, right?
http://www.zennie62.com - After years of ducking complaints about his occasionally offensive coverage, Lou Dobbs, host of CNN's Lou Dobbs show, may finally see either the end of his days of pretty much getting away with whatever crap he puts out, or the end of his show altogether.
http://zennie2005.blogspot.com/2009/0... - http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/a... - President Barack Obama held a "Beer Summit" today, as some have called it, with Harvard Professor Henry Lewis Gates, Jr., Cambridge Police Sergeant Officer James Crowley, and Vice President Joe Biden, bring an end to an unfortunate but necessary event in American Cultural history, and starting a new chapter in American race relations.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/a... - http://zennie2005.blogspot.com/2009/0... - It's all over the Internet: Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates was arrested by Cambridge police officer Sgt. James Crowley after trying to pry open the lock, which was already damaged, to his own Cambridge home with the help of his driver, who picked him up from a trip to China. President Obama, in a press conference on his health care initiative, chimes in by saying "the Cambridge Police acted stupidly." President Obama's totally right. Here's why. Distributed by Tubemogul.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/a... - You know, I'm sick of racists. Just plain tired of em. You know who they are - or maybe they're you. People who are really upset that America elected a black man as president but since they feel they can't say so without the anonymity of the Internet, they craft other means of expressing their anger, like hanging on the to the crazy idea that President Obama's not an American citizen. Distributed by Tubemogul.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/a... - http://zennie2005.blogspot.com/2009/0... - Today, singer Chris Brown, who violently struck his girlfriend the lovely and talented Rihanna earlier this year, gave a video-based apology to his fans and the World on his website and YouTube.
To review the story, Brown was arrested in the early morning hours after he and Rihanna had an argument over a text message she found in his phone from one of Brown's lovers that Rihanna didn't know the existence of. What Brown did during the argument was horrifying, CNN.com reports: The incident began when Rihanna, who was riding in the sports car driven by Brown, found a text message on his cell phone from "a woman who Brown had a previous sexual relationship with," according to a sworn statement by Los Angeles Police Detective DeShon Andrews. "A verbal argument ensued," followed by the physical attack, the statement said. It went on to describe the assault in great detail, saying Brown punched Rihanna numerous times and put her in a headlock, restricting her breathing and causing her to start to lose consciousness. He threatened to beat her and kill her, according to the statement, and he bit her ear and her fingers. Eventually, "Robyn F. began screaming for help and Brown exited the vehicle and walked away," the statement said. "A resident in the neighborhood heard Robyn F.'s plea for help and called 911, causing a police response. An investigation was conducted and Robyn F. was issued a Domestic Violence Emergency Protective Order."
That's a terrible level of violence and so much so that I personally find it hard to believe the appology he gave, and you can see in my video above. In an effort to gauge public opinion in the wake of Chris Brown's video, I created this poll:
More on pollsb.com
The poll captures not just the "Yes, I believe him" or "No, I don't" choices, it has three others: Yes, but I believe he cares more about his career than Rihanna; Sort-of. I need to see more from him; and Chris doesn't need to apologize for anything.
The last choice is deliberately controversial. It came from an episode of Oprah I happened to see where she and Tyra Banks had what could be called a kind of "town-hall" studio meeting on the incident in March. There' a teenager said "I kind of think she deserved it. If a girl has enough nerves to hit a boy, she should get hit back." That (not mentioned in the Salon blog article for some reason) set both Oprah and Tyra into orbit, and me too. I could not believe what I was hearing, but she said it.
I wanted to capture that view with this poll, if possible. Of course, given the fact that I'm focusing on it here, that it's rather ugly, and a choice in the poll, means those who would normally pick that choice may avoid it here. Still, one never knows so here it is in the poll.
What do you think? Take the poll and let's see what you and the public thinks. My view is Chris made the video for himself; he never once mentions Rihanna in the video and since she was the focus of his anger, she should be the first person on his mind beyond his fans. That's telling and may also mean Brown really feels no remorse for what he did to her, but what he did to his career.
The sentence of "labor" was really stupid. Brown's a public figure and should have been made to be a spokesperson against domestic violence, not just taking some course in anger management. What the judge was thinking here, I don't know, but it was the wrong way to go.
http://oaklandfocus.blogspot.com - Oakland's first tall green building is 1100 Broadway. It won the U.S. Green Building Council's "Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design" (LEED) award. Distributed by Tubemogul.
On YouTube from wmhttv, http://bit.ly/hUAa1 This feature story depicts the struggle between New York State Democrats and Republicans and who and how much gets spent on infrastructure projects.
