Here's the alleged threat:

"I am going to locate you, disable you using either a quick 22 calibre to your lower spine and then duck tape and plastic shrink raps [sic]. Then I am going to kidnap you and take you to my secret hiding place.

"There I will castrate you and remove your penis using crude gardening tools, I will use a lightweight torch to cauterize your wounds and you will be awake and conscious during the entire procedure.

"Then I am going to prepare your genitals into some kind of meat loaf dish and use a nastro-gastric tube to force the fetid stew I have made from your genitals down your throat. Then I am going to cut into the left side of your brain using a power drill and an ice pick and I am going to study enough neuro-surgery that I have a good chance of making you aphasic so that you feel every bit of pain and terror I am going to inflict on you.

"Then I am going to use a blow torch to burn your skin off a little at a time until I am certain that you are close enough to death that and that [sic] the Burn unit and the Neuro-surgery unit has a medium chance to save your life.

Via Cryptome.

I did say on Fox that unwanted advertising "is a form of pollution."

This is what the sorry state of affairs in Dupont is going to be:

"A customer eats a glazed Krispy Kreme doughnut. A spokeswoman for the chain said it is long overdue to open a shop in the District. Photo Credit: Matthew Staver -- Bloomberg News"

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reports that a panel of elite economists have recommended that the executive pay cap be lifted. It is currently $1 million.

Jim Graham
1350 Penn. Ave NW #406
Washington, DC 20004

Dear Council Member Graham,

I write in regard to Metro's consideration of expanding advertising on trains and tunnels. The Washington Post reported on November 14 that Metro officials were considering turning "rail cars and busses into rolling billboards" and hanging "video monitors inside trains to broadcast commercials."

As a daily passenger on Metrorail and Ward 1 DC homeowner, I strongly oppose these plans. I would like express this opposition in person, but my understanding is that there is no public comment at the Board meetings. Accordingly, I have included my arguments below.

Metro should not expand advertisers' access to passengers for the following reasons: advertising will debase the Metro system, and passengers will be captive to the advertising. However, if it is expanded, Metro should not allow advertising of alcohol, tobacco, prescription drugs, or advertising to children; it should prohibit audio advertising, and develop a system to address future budget shortfalls that are followed by calls for more invasive advertising. Finally, if Advertising is expanded, Metro should develop plans to remove the advertisements once the agency is on firmer financial grounds.

Advertising Debases Public Symbols

Advertising debases public space and symbols. Recognizing this, a number of American institutions shield important national symbols from advertising. For example, the U.S. Senate's Ethical Rules discriminate against advertising use of Senate grounds near the Capitol. "…Senate rooms are available only for Senate related business…no products may be sold on the premises or displayed for future sale; and Senate space may not be used for any…commercial, promotional or profit-making purpose whatsoever."[1] Advertising on Senate grounds is unlawful under the U.S. Code: "A person may not carry out any of the following activities in the Grounds: (1) offer or expose any article for sale. (2) display a sign, placard, or other form of advertisement. (3) solicit fares, alms, subscriptions, or contributions."[2]

Similar protections exist for symbols of deliberative democracy. The Seal of the U.S. Senate, under ethical rules, cannot be used to convey the message that government has endorsed some commercial interest.[3] In fact, advertising use of the Seals of the United States violates a statute with criminal sanctions:

"Whoever knowingly displays any printed or other likeness of the great seal of the United States…in, or in connection with, any advertisement…for the purpose of conveying, or in a manner reasonably calculated to convey, a false impression of sponsorship or approval by the Government of the United States or by any department, agency, or instrumentality thereof, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both." [4]

The National Park Service strictly limits advertising on public lands which it manages for public benefit:

"Commercial notices or advertisements shall not be displayed, posted, or distributed on federally owned or controlled lands within a park area unless prior written permission has been given by the Superintendent. Such permission may be granted only if the notice or advertisement is of goods, services, or facilities available within the park area and such notices and advertisements are found by the Superintendent to be desirable and necessary for the convenience and guidance of the public."[5]

Similar rules exist for important government buildings, such as the Smithsonian Institution, where all photography for commercial or advertising purposes is prohibited,[6] and all commercial advertising and soliciting is prohibited.[7]

Recently, the National Football League held a public event on the National Mall where "product sponsorship" was liberally allowed. Public reaction to this commercial use of the Mall was negative. The Washington Post Editorial Board lamented:

And so onto the Mall -- a space that, as the National Park Service observes, is as old as the capital city itself, one commissioned by George Washington and planned by Pierre L'Enfant to be an "ideal stage for national expressions of remembrance, observance and protest" -- comes now Pepsi Vanilla, the National Football league, and Coors beer. Is this the beginning, or will it be, mercifully, the beginning of the end for a trend out of control?"[8]

Metro should heed the Post's warning, and end this out of control trend. The Washington public transportation system is admired nationwide. The Metrorail stations are works of stunning architectural beauty. But more importantly, the transportation system is a public symbol of progress and good government service. We should not debase this public resource with additional advertisements beyond the limited space that is currently allocated for commercials.

Advertising on Trains and in Tunnels is Coercive

Coercive advertising is advertising that the viewer cannot avoid. Individuals can turn off a TV or radio to avoid advertising, but when one depends on Metro for transportation to work, advertisements in the system become coercive. Many of us do not have private vehicles, nor can we afford to take taxicabs to and from work. As Justice Douglas once noted in a 1952 case involving audio advertisements on DC streetcars, "Compulsion which comes from circumstances can be as real as compulsion which comes from a command."[9] Furthermore, it is clear from advertising plans that Metro intends to leave no surface uncovered with commercial messaging. Accordingly, the Metro provides a captive and coerced audience for advertisers.

Individuals should be free from coercive advertising, because this form of propaganda is a powerful tool that is used to influence us. One can simply read an issue of Advertising Age to see that advertising industry has long been a proponent of manipulation of the public mind.[10] Some advertisers refer to their trade as an exercise in "mass hypnosis."[11] The leading minds of the advertising industry have even argued that ads can create "false memories," and convince the public that they had an enjoyable experience at a restaurant, for instance, when they really did not.[12] Advertisers want captive audiences so that they effectively influence individuals' thoughts. It is unfair to hold passengers captive to these messages.

Advertising, if Expanded, Should Be Subject to Accountability

Since Metro passengers would be captive to advertising, it is important that the Board set the highest standards of accountability for commercial messaging. Products that are harmful, including alcohol and tobacco, should not be advertised. Neither should products from industries that have a historical record of false advertising. For instance, drug advertising should not be permitted.[13]

There should be a flat prohibition on advertising directed at children. Children are captive to advertisements on the Metro just as adults are. But, children often lack the critical thinking skills to separate advertising from official endorsement, or advertising from news content.

Advertising strategy towards children is riddled with language that suggest goals of manipulation and the creation of ubiquitous advertising environments. Until recently, the children's advertising groups held an award ceremony to honor ad writers who wrote pitches that were the best at "hooking" children. Words such as "infiltrate"[14] are used to describe the goals of commercial interests in placing advertisements in schools. Furthermore, researchers have demonstrated links between advertising to children and obesity, violent behavior, and materialistic values.[15] Because many children have to ride Metro to get to and from school, and because the advertising industry is competing to "infiltrate" their lives, Metro should not allow advertising to children in the transportation system.

Metro should never adopt audio advertising. When in a captive situation, audio advertising invades individuals' privacy, disrupts conversations, and makes it difficult to read, sleep, or enjoy a quiet moment. Again, I quote Justice Douglas objecting to radio programming and advertising on DC streetcars:

If liberty is to flourish, government should never be allowed to force people to listen to any radio program. The right of privacy should include the right to pick and choose from competing entertainments, competing propaganda, competing political philosophies. If people are let alone in those choices, the right of privacy will pay dividends in character and integrity. The strength of our system is in the dignity, the resourcefulness, and the independence of our people. Our confidence is in their ability as individuals to make the wisest choice. That system cannot flourish if regimentation takes hold. The right of privacy, today violated, is a powerful deterrent to any one who would control men's minds.[16]

Metro must also consider how it will avoid sliding down a slippery slope where adopting new, more invasive advertising technologies becomes a necessity when there are future budget shortfalls. Two technologies are worth foreshadowing here that could create a bad environment for passengers:

First, "HyperSonic Sound" (HSS) is a technology that allows a person to direct a beam of sound at an individual.[17] Whereas normal audio advertising can be avoided through earplugs, HSS is directed and concentrated. As a result, it literally feels as though the sound is inside in the individual's head. HSS is already being used for coercive advertising in Asia.

Second, Radio Frequency ID, or RFID, is a technology that allows tagging of individuals, identification cards, or products. It can enable "personalized" advertisements, much like the speaking billboards in the movie Minority Report.

Metro must consider how it can ward off these privacy invasive technologies at times where there are future budget difficulties.

Finally, Metro should develop a plan to remove advertisements when the budget is healthier. Advertising should not have a permanent, pervasive presence in the Metro.

Thank you for your consideration of these issues. If I can provide further information, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Sincerely,

Chris Jay Hoofnagle

[1] Use of Senate Space, Senate Ethics Manual, 108th Congress, 1st Session, 2003, p. 110, available at http://ethics.senate.gov/downloads/pdffiles/manual.pdf.
[2] 40 U.S.C. § 5104(c) (2003).
[3] Great Seal, Senate Seal, on campaign documents, Senate Ethics Manual, 108th Congress, 1st Session, 2003, p. 151, available at http://ethics.senate.gov/downloads/pdffiles/manual.pdf.
[4] 18 U.S.C. § 713(a) (2003).
[5] Advertising, 36 C.F.R. § 5.1 (2003).
[6] Photographs for news, advertising, or commercial purposes, 36 C.F.R. § 504.11 (2003).
[7] Soliciting, vending, debt collection, and distribution of handbills, 36 C.F.R. § 504.8 (2003).
[8] Marketing the Mall, Washington Post, September 3, 2003, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A17178-2003Sep2.html.
[9] DC PUC v. Pollak, 343 U.S. 451 (1952)(Douglas, J. dissenting).
[10] "One thing everyone can believe: Whether it's about agency billings and income or high-stakes geopolitical strategy, disinformation is part of the communications arsenal. Efforts to confuse, misdirect, mislead or confound a public are part of today's world." Defining disinformation dispensers, Advertising Age, October 20, 1986, p. 17.
[11] Inger L. Stole, Selling Advertising: The U.S. Advertising Industry and its Public Relations Activities, 1932-1945, Dissertation, Ph.D. in Mass Communication. U. Wisconsin-Madison, 1998, p 181.
[12] "A group of US marketing researchers claim that brand owners can make their customers believe they had a better experience of a product or service than they really did by bombarding them with positive messages after the event." Selling you a new past, The Independent, October 23, 2003, at http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/media/story.jsp?story=455650.
[13] Investigators Find Repeated Deception in Ads for Drugs, New York Times, December 12, 2002, at http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/04/health/04DRUG.html
[14] Carrie MacMillan, Readin', writin', and sellin', Promo Magazine, Sept. 1, 2002.
[15] See e.g. Facts About the Effects of Advertising and Marketing to Children, at http://www.commercialexploitation.com/articles/congressional_briefing_facts.htm
[16] Pollak, 343 U.S. at 469.
[17] The Sound of Things to Come, The New York Times, March 23, 2003, at http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/23/magazine/23SOUND.html.

The second story discusses my least favorite law firm, Sidley Austin Brown, which has been involved in some of the worst advocacy on behalf of rich people that screws poor people. Today's article discusses a former partner of the firm who was assisting really rich people evade taxes through sham shelters. In some cases, using consultants, companies pay no taxes at all. You end up paying their taxes.

"A House committee concluded yesterday that the FBI shielded from prosecution known killers and other criminals whom it used as informants to investigate organized crime in New England.

"The scathing report also found that the FBI tried to impede the congressional investigation into the long-running scandal.

"Beginning in the mid-1960s, the Federal Bureau of Investigation began a course of conduct in New England that must be considered one of the greatest failures in the history of federal law enforcement," the House Government Reform Committee report said. "The Justice Department made it very difficult for this Committee to conduct timely and effective oversight."

The report (PDF) is titled "Everything Secret Degenerates: The FBI's Use of Murderers as Informants."

"...And so this week Washington, D.C., will get its first newspaper written, produced, and distributed by local homeless people. It's called "Street Sense: 'Where the D.C.'s poor and homeless earn and give their two cent' " (or, they hope, "cents" if the typesetting can be fixed in time), and it's due out on the streets this morning.

"Lauren Wilkins attends classes at Texas State University with the usual accessories of a college student: pens, cellphone, textbooks. Less noticeable are her pocket pets -- two tiny marsupials, one asleep in her blouse pocket, the other in her cargo pants.

"I'm the kind of person who if things get hectic, I like to feel fur," says Ms. Wilkins. So she shares her dorm room and her pockets with Jax and Dawson, exotic creatures known as sugar gliders.

The popular new campus residents, illegal in some states and banned in many dormitories, are nocturnal mammals (Petaurus breviceps) native to Australia. They get their common name from their penchant for sweets and their ability, in the wild, to soar more than a hundred feet. They can live to be 15.

[...]

Children have been named after big brands as diverse as beauty company L'Oreal, car firm Chevrolet and designer clothes company Armani.

There are even two little boys, one in Michigan and one in Texas, called ESPN after the sports channel.

[...]

It is no different from the 19th century when parents named their children Ruby or Opal... it reflects their aspirations
Professor Cleveland Evans

He has found that car models are a popular source of inspiration; 22 girls are registered as having the name Infiniti while 55 boys answer to Chevy and five girls to Celica.

Seven boys were found to have the name Del Monte - after the food company - and no less than 49 boys were called Canon, after the camera.

"Metro officials who have long striven to keep the transit system uncluttered say financial pressures have forced a new philosophy: They want to turn rail cars and buses into rolling billboards, run animated commercials in dark subway tunnels, hang video monitors inside trains to broadcast commercials and welcome ATMs, florists and shoe cobblers at stations in exchange for a cut of the action.

[...]

"Transit officials also plan to drape advertising from the sides of parking garages, hang commercial banners from banisters inside the busiest stations, hoist advertising signs on light poles in station parking lots and sell ad space on bus shelters. "We want to leave no stone unturned," said Leona Agouridis, Metro's assistant general manager for communications.

"To the average person, who may not wish to make a speech or print a newspaper, it may be the greatest freedom of all. The right to be let alone is the only non-political protection for that vast array of human activities which, considered separately, may seem trivial but together make up what most individuals think of as freedom. I am thinking of little things, mostly taken for granted, such as the right to attend a football game, to refrain from attending a political rally, to wear a hat, or to ride a bicycle to work through city traffic.

--J. Braxton Craven Jr

--I. F. Stone, Incommensurate Equation: Justice and Security, January 24, 1955

"McJob . . . . noun (1986) : a low-paying job that requires little skill and provides little opportunity for advancement"

Via Blind Hona.

One thing everyone can believe: Whether it's about agency billings and income or high-stakes geopolitical strategy, disinformation is part of the communications arsenal. Efforts to confuse, misdirect, mislead or confound a public are part of today's world.

--Defining disinformation dispensers, Advertising Age October 20, 1986, p. 17.

"Yes," said Senator John Kerry, leading off. "Yes," said Senator John Edwards . "Yes," said Dr. Howard Dean.

[...]

"No," said Representative Dennis J. Kucinich. "But I think it ought to be decriminalized."

"I grew up in the church," said the Rev. Al Sharpton. "We didn't believe in that."

"Well, you know, I have a reputation for giving unpopular answers at Democratic debates," said Senator Joseph I. Lieberman. "I never used marijuana. Sorry!"

* Just a day prior to the Santa Monica tragedy, a 72-year-old Sarasota woman was killed when her elderly husband pressed the gas pedal instead of the brake, running her over in their driveway.

* In November 2002, an 84-year-old North Port woman was cited for careless driving and was recommended for driver re-exam after police say she hit three cars in San Pedro Catholic Church's parking lot. The woman crossed a grass area and hit three cars; a 79-year-old owner of one of the vehicles was transferred to the hospital. The 84-year-old told police she couldn't see because the sun was in her eyes.

* In March, a 15-year-old North Port boy escaped with minor injuries when his bicycle was struck by a 1996 Ford van driven by an 85-year-old Venice man who was charged with failure to yield to a pedestrian at a traffic light.

* In April, a 72-year-old man escaped injury when his 1997 Lincoln struck the Eckerd Drugs building on Tamiami Trail. The incident happened when the North Port man attempted to pull into a parking space in front of the store. Instead of hitting the brake, he hit the accelerator.

* Over the summer, Joseph D. Pastore, 60, of Pinellas Park, told police he was trying to pass another car when he plowed into 20 bicyclists, injuring 13. Police are investigating whether Pastore, who carried a cane and has a disability license plate, was impaired or suffered from a medical condition.

* In July, a 57-year-old woman crashed through China City restaurant in Schoolhouse Square when she stepped on the gas, thinking her car was in reverse when it was in drive.

"After complaints from parents and students, police in Goose Creek, South Carolina, defended their decision Friday to send a team of officers, some with guns drawn, into a high school earlier this week for a drug raid that turned up no drugs.

And check this out:

"A canine unit was brought in and the dog responded positively to 12 book bags, which were then searched by school officials, said David Barrow, secondary school supervisor for the Berkeley School District. But no drugs were found and no arrests were made.

If the drug dog is that inaccurate, doesn't that call into question the ability of police to use dogs as a tool to do a search?

I'm thinking about going to the next public meeting of the Office of National Drug Control Policy to complain about this craziness. The meeting details are in the extened entry below.

"STRATFORD — A Stratford policewoman on the job for only three months suffered head injuries when she was hit by a pickup truck as she directed traffic along Broadbridge Avenue late Thursday afternoon, police said.

"The officer was struck by an elderly driver just before 5 p.m., said Lt. Douglas Tesla.

Man, even the AARP warns the public that the elderly are at risk of dangerous driving:

"As one ages, specific functions related to driving skills may be impaired. These functions include vision, hearing, sensation, and cognitive and motor abilities. For example, a decline in peripheral vision may affect the ability to pass approaching vehicles safely, and the decreased range of motion in an older person's neck may impair the ability to look behind when backing up. In addition, reaction time decreases by almost 40 percent on average from age 35 to 65.

"The aging process may also affect cognitive skills. Short-term memory loss, for instance, can impair driving skills by interfering with a person's ability to process information efficiently when merging with traffic or changing lanes. Such difficulties are magnified when the older driver performs these driving skills under stressful conditions. The higher incidence of cognitive impairment, particularly dementia, among older adults produces an increased risk of accident involvement.

2) Despite all of this boyfucking, donations to Catholic churches increased in 2002 but gifts to the Bishops declined: "Catholics put an estimated $5.8 billion in Sunday collection baskets to support their local parishes in 2002, an increase of 4.9 percent, or twice the rate of inflation. Yet they cut their pledges to bishops' annual appeals for diocesan operations by 2.3 percent, to $635 million."

3) A woman was sentenced to five days of community service today for having sex with her now deceased boyfriend in St. Patrick's Cathedral. The radio station that promoted this act of adultery was fined $357k.

In any case, the Raelians really don't like the Catholic Church's position on AIDS and condom distribution:

"The Catholic Church is deceiving! The president of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for the Family, Cardinal Alphonso Lopez affirmed on the BBC channel on October 9th, 2003, that condoms are permeable to the AIDS virus. He suggested that governments should invite populations to stop using them (see:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3176982.stm).

The Raelians urge the public to take an act of Apostasy! "Fill out this form (PDF) and send back this act of apostasy to the diocese that registered your baptism, with this document you ask to no longer be on the lists of the Catholic members." Whatever you do, don't trade one stupid religion for another...

It's also scary to hear the U.S. government justify the practice:

"Officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the Arar case fits the profile of a covert CIA "extraordinary rendition" -- the practice of turning over low-level, suspected terrorists to foreign intelligence services, some of which are known to torture prisoners."

[...]

"Renditions are a legitimate option for dealing with suspected terrorists, intelligence officials argue. The U.S. government officially rejects the assertion that it knowingly sends suspects abroad to be tortured, but officials admit they sometimes do that. "The temptation is to have these folks in other hands because they have different standards," one official said. "Someone might be able to get information we can't from detainees," said another."

Meanwhile, doctors are trying to detect and treat victims of torture. The Lancet reports on the Istanbul Protocol, "a manual for the effective investigation and documentation of torture, adopted by the United Nations in 2000. The protocol is a set of step-by-step guidelines that offer a straightforward means of gathering evidence that will stand up in a court of law. It can be a very effective way of achieving justice for the victims of torture, but outside a few select settings, it is hardly used."

"An elderly woman ran a red light in Shadyside, crashed her car into a Pittsburgh firetruck and then backed into a firefighter who got off the truck to help, city police said Wednesday."

We're all worried about terrorism, snipers, and anthrax, but we're probably at much greater risk from all these old drivers! Check out the AMA's page on older drivers:

"Motor vehicle injuries are a leading cause of injury-related deaths in the older population (persons 65 years and older). Per mile driven, the fatality rate for drivers 85 years and older is nine times higher than the rate for drivers 25 to 69 years old."

Check out this new addition: the "True Touch." Marketing to true hipsters, true independents, true organics, true conservatives...

[...]

"The fact is, daily life at FNC is all about management politics. I say this having served six years there - as producer of the media criticism show, News Watch, as a writer/producer of specials and (for the last year of my stay) as a newsroom copy editor. Not once in the 20+ years I had worked in broadcast journalism prior to Fox - including lengthy stays at The Associated Press, CBS Radio and ABC/Good Morning America - did I feel any pressure to toe a management line. But at Fox, if my boss wasn't warning me to "be careful" how I handled the writing of a special about Ronald Reagan ("You know how Roger [Fox News Chairman Ailes] feels about him."), he was telling me how the environmental special I was to produce should lean ("You can give both sides, but make sure the pro-environmentalists don't get the last word.")

"Editorially, the FNC newsroom is under the constant control and vigilance of management. The pressure ranges from subtle to direct. First of all, it's a news network run by one of the most high-profile political operatives of recent times. Everyone there understands that FNC is, to a large extent, "Roger's Revenge" - against what he considers a liberal, pro-Democrat media establishment that has shunned him for decades. For the staffers, many of whom are too young to have come up through the ranks of objective journalism, and all of whom are non-union, with no protections regarding what they can be made to do, there is undue motivation to please the big boss.

"Sometimes, this eagerness to serve Fox's ideological interests goes even beyond what management expects. For example, in June of last year, when a California judge ruled the Pledge of Allegiance's "Under God" wording unconstitutional, FNC's newsroom chief ordered the judge's mailing address and phone number put on the screen. The anchor, reading from the Teleprompter, found himself explaining that Fox was taking this unusual step so viewers could go directly to the judge and get "as much information as possible" about his decision. To their credit, the big bosses recognized that their underling's transparent attempt to serve their political interests might well threaten the judge's physical safety and ordered the offending information removed from the screen as soon as they saw it. A few months later, this same eager-to-please newsroom chief ordered the removal of a graphic quoting UN weapons inspector Hans Blix as saying his team had not yet found WMDs in Iraq. Fortunately, the electronic equipment was quicker on the uptake (and less susceptible to office politics) than the toady and displayed the graphic before his order could be obeyed.

"But the roots of FNC's day-to-day on-air bias are actual and direct. They come in the form of an executive memo distributed electronically each morning, addressing what stories will be covered and, often, suggesting how they should be covered. To the newsroom personnel responsible for the channel's daytime programming, The Memo is the bible. If, on any given day, you notice that the Fox anchors seem to be trying to drive a particular point home, you can bet The Memo is behind it.

Via PR Watch.

Krugman writes: "The most striking feature of these stories is the rawness of it all. Never mind all that stuff you've read in the past about how political contributions buy "access," which allows interest groups to influence policy. The companies now riding high don't just contribute to Republican campaigns, they contribute directly to the personal wealth of future (and in some cases current) public officials. And they don't influence policy: they write it, directly."