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Red Flag Over the ReichstagRed Flag Over the ReichstagRed Flag Over the Reichstag 04/12/2004 03:43 AM Some very moving Soviet war photography, notably several shots of the famously doctored (not to mention staged) but nonetheless dramatic hoisting of the Red Flag over a burned out Reichstag (a scene which, by the way, recently appeared in a videogame). This is a GrokNews Entry: (what is grok?)Red Flag Over the ReichstagGrok Headline matches for Red Flag Over the ReichstagNo Red Flag at Red Hat?No Red Flag at Red Hat? 06/17/2004 01:45 AM Business Week Jun 17 2004 6:08AM GMT "That flag is our flag""That flag is our flag" 07/26/2004 05:51 PM Veterans, led by war heroes Wesley Clark and Max Cleland, charge out of the trenches in Boston for John Kerry. "Flag on the Play""Flag on the Play" 09/07/2004 02:01 PM Chequered FlagChequered Flag 04/01/2005 07:59 PM Welcome to Chequered Flag Fly your freak flag!Fly your freak flag! 05/26/2004 07:40 AM Dylanesque rhymes from "outsider" Danny Cohen; a carefree tune from the obscure The Robot Ate Me; and a coming-out song that evokes George Michael -- and that's a good thing. The tarnish is the flag...The tarnish is the flag... 05/16/2004 07:25 PM It's probably evidence of the good that a couple of days off work can do to a man that I suddenly find myself able to write a brief post about politics - a subject that I'd normally handle with kid gloves attached to the end of a long barge-pole, itself glued to the end of some kind of excrement-encrusted stick. In my experience, most arguments about any subject function by flattening down complexities to tiny arguable issues. Normally we derive significant utility from this style of argument - but I think with politics our ability to find core and simple arguable issues disappears. With each person added to a political situation, the complexity grows exponentially, and when we try to reduce things down to first principles we end up with the sparsest and most atavistic of binaries - things like "them" and "us", and appeals towards cheap solidarity or patriotism, desperate attempts at face-saving and feeble gestures towards self-interest. Which brings me to a post from the 37 signals weblog called It's good that you're upset. It's not an evil piece, it's not even a stupid piece - it's actually a desperately sad and mournful piece that tries to scrabble for positive meaning out of the behaviour of a small selection of incredibly stupid American servicemen overseas. Here's a quotation: The world is rightfully disgusted by the treatment of some Iraqi prisoners, but the fact that the world is outraged is a good sign that America is still held to a higher standard. The Arab street remained mostly quiet when Saddam tortured for three decades or when American soldiers were dragged through the streets and hung to dangle in public a few weeks back. And how many leaders in the Arab world will be outraged that one of their own ruthlessly beheaded an American contractor after forcing him to name his parents and his siblings (and don’t forget about Daniel Pearl who had to admit he was a Jew before his head was cut off)? The world barely gave notice to the Taliban’s systematic and despicable treatment of women in Afghanistan or the destruction of ancient works of irreplaceable art and culture. The world was barely interested in stopping the carnage in Bosnia until over a half-million were killed (and then the UN still didn’t want to get involved). The world is still barely affected by the genocide taking place right now in Africa. But, when the US humiliates some Iraqi prisoners, people are outraged and are calling for resignations at the highest levels of our government. And that’s a good sign for America. We’re held up to a higher standard and it’s something we should be proud of. Not the vile treatment, of course, but the world’s response. We’re in trouble when people stop caring about how we act as a nation. I wish I could agree, because although the UK's own parallel media situation has been resolved, I don't doubt for a minute that some British soldiers somewhere have undertaken very similar actions to the ones that these American servicemen perpetrated. But to try and find in that evidence that the tarnish is so noticeable because the flags are so bright... Well, it's pretty far from convincing. The world is not looking towards these things as a momentary blip - that's not why they're so powerful. They're seen as emblematic, as representative, as illustrative of a relationship that America has with the rest of the world. These actions are seen by people to be illustrations in microcosm - direct analogies - with the way America (and the UK) acted flagrantly without consent from the United Nations. They're seen as directly illustrative of their disregard for international law, directly illustrative of America's perception of itself as superior to the rest of the world and qualified to police all of it according to what best serves it's own best interests. Those countries that are railing against America because of these pictures are not doing it because they're holding America to a higher standard, they're doing it because they finally feel they have human-scale evidence of the enormous insensitivity and clumsiness of the entire nation. I think the most important thing I could say at this point is that it doesn't matter whether that's true or not. It doesn't matter whether or not America is a rampaging power, it doesn't even matter that an incredibly small minority of US forces have been behaving in this way or exposed. What matters here is that we in the west actually understand and accept that the stances of our governments are not seen by much of the world to be moral or good or positive, but rather self-serving, arrogant, interventionist and actually corrupt, and that pretending that we're well-liked isn't going to anyone any good. Raise your Flag.Raise your Flag. 02/19/2004 06:33 AM Thanks to Baba Yoshihiko Fink has now taken the necessary steps to allow for internalisation efforts. The improved infrastructure enables us to display a multilingual web-site to our visitors from all over the world. This also means that we need volunteers. The Fink web-site needs to be translated into the language of your choice. A translation into Japanese is being worked on and the translation into French has been taken over by Michele Garoche. Which language are you willing to translate? If you are willing to become a member of the internationalisation team or wish to provide acknowledgement on the web-site feel free to join the new mailing-list. You can do so by going to our mailing-lists page. The full announcement on the existing mailing lists can be read here. A Red Flag Over LakesA Red Flag Over Lakes 05/04/2004 04:49 PM A management focused on its stock price is a good reason to fold. Flag Day, June 14thFlag Day, June 14th 06/15/2004 03:56 AM What the Heck is Flag Day Anyway? .. June 14th .. feestdag usflag.org/flag.day.html Wal-Mart Waves Red FlagWal-Mart Waves Red Flag 06/28/2004 11:53 AM The leading retailer lowers its June sales forecast as worries persist over a lawsuit. Microsoft Waves the Flag?Microsoft Waves the Flag? 04/28/2004 08:52 AM On the heels of blasting the European Commission for its proposed antitrust remedies, Microsoft is making available for download "The European Flags Screensaver." Thai flag with pornThai flag with porn 12/07/2003 08:39 PM CNET Asia Dec 7 2003 8:05PM ET Can we deal on the Broadcast Flag?Can we deal on the Broadcast Flag? 06/17/2005 07:13 PM Congressman Richard Boucher says that the broadcast flag should only be approved if Congress is also willing to establish clear legal pathways to fair use. But what does the content industry really want? "Canadian flag causes flap in the U.S. ""Canadian flag causes flap in the U.S. " 12/10/2003 10:15 PM Flying the product flagFlying the product flag 04/16/2005 10:09 AM Express Computer India Apr 16 2005 2:14PM GMT Is flying the flag patriotic?Is flying the flag patriotic? 06/08/2004 06:03 AM The St George's flag is everywhere in the run-up to Euro 2004, but many people still feel threatened by it. Send us your views. It's like the broadcast flag... in your
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