Pre-2006 News Archives

September 3rd/ 2005

Well, if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, i always say! In direct collaboration with the US Army, we offer you a new song from our upcoming record! Go to the US Army’s official Canadian website to hear it!

-glen

September 2nd/ 2005

Hello, People!

Well the day is here. The fart haters known as Propagandhi, are completely and utterly done our record. We are just waiting for the sucker to hit the streets now. It will be entitled "Potemkin City Limits". It ended up being mixed by Jason Livermore and Bill Stevenson at Blasting Room Studios. They did a great job. We had a good time mixing it. We played a few games of "Sniff-ball" in the down time racking up a high score of 52 sweets and many rotten snifftrocities. The record has been very well recieved by people who have heard the final masters. I believe it to be our best effort to date. It will be printed on recycled traf patties! The Cd features cover art by Eric Drooker, and Booklet art by Sue Coe. I have also put my dihrty brush to the canvas for the CD face. There is some suprises and maybe a few stinky little tricks. By all means check this one out!

My Dad said last night that he’d like to kick Jesus in the ass and flush him down the toilet… for once we agree on something. I wish we could agree on the fact that he needs to brush his teeth, wash his body and change out of my Moms army pants.

-the Rod

September 1st/ 2005

By now many of you will have heard about the passing of Voivod guitarist and legend. Denis (Piggy) D’ Amour. I was absolutely shocked when I heard he was gone. Now, as the days go by, I feel more and more saddened by this fact. I believe there to be no other band to be more of an influence on Me, Chris and Jord. Many times when we are jamming we want certain things to sound more like Voivod or we’ll try to get Jord to play something like Away from Voivod on drums. They are our heroes. True heroes who play with heart, passion and integrity. They stayed the course and Piggy lasted in the band until his life ended. When I first heard "Ripping Headaches" as a youung kid my friend Kenton and I ran down stairs in disbelief and proceeded to beat the living shit out of a table and pretty much trashed my guitar trying to go as wild as they were going in the song. I was so confused by them. I couldn’t believe they were real. It led to a facination with their crazy music that had us in junior high trying to emulate the dissonant chords of Piggy and play heavy and creative. In those days any wierd type of chord in metal sounded like Piggy. He was the pioneer of the progressive thrash Propagandhi plays our own version of. Of course in the true spirit of Voivod we do not come out sounding much like them but if you listen to both bands there will be an undeniable influence. I take this time to send out my broken hearted condolences to Vovod!

They always promised proudly…. "To The Death!!!!!!" Unfortunately that day has come.

We love you Piggy.

-the Rod.

August 27th/ 2005

May 5th/ 2005

A reminder that today commemorates Holocaust Remembrance Day. Recognize. Always keep it in mind.

-chris

(please excuse brag-master’s previous posts. He can’t hold his coffee and the ringworm eating him from the inside out probably isn’t helping…"pubic fire"?)

May 4th/ 2005

Well, people….

I’m so excited I’m posting again. This next record is going to kill! It will
blow the others out of the water. It is 100 times better. Hannahs vocals
sound like an angel that spits pubic fire, and Jords drums sound like
thunder coming from grandest of canyons. It is as outrageous as it is
Putrescent. There are some special suprises. Prepare yourself…. It might be a little while yet. You’ll thank your little Christ for the extra months you
had to live.? Could one talk like this if one didn’t believe the words to be
true? Yes, everyone does it, all the time. But I mean it!

-Le Raud. (Zapped to Christ on coffee from 15 hours ago.)

May 3rd/ 2005

Hello,people!

How’s it going today? Good? oh me too, me too..

Well, what’s new over here? We are truly finishing up the very last
snibblets of our record entitled "Scorched Melvis". A couple more vocals
left to go. If I had one shred of talent this whole record writing and
executing thing might be a lot easier. haha.. Lucky I have fallen into the
lap of two master thrashers.

You may also ask "Why does it take those Hurculean Stallions so long to make records?" well, I took 5 different buses today all over the place searching for remedies for the scorching burning nightmare that infests my arm. That sets me back another 5 or 6 hours on our record. But I’d hope that you understand that I burned the least amount of fuel possible on the journey and therefore our world will last another split second longer. I do it for you.

I would also like to point out that I am almost proud to be a diseased freak
who flinches in agony night after night . Though I am vile enough to keep
catching diseases through pure glorious stupidity, at least I am a scourge
to our society. Even the lowliest bus rider cringes at my smoldering skin.
I’m "keeping it real." eh? Nay? get lost, fool!

Check out a movie called "The Corporation". It is excellent. You’ve seen it
already? Soak your eyes in bleach and watch it again!

I would also like to reccomend the all time greatest book called "Human
Cargo" by Caroline Moorehead.This is a great reminder why I wrote the song "Fuck the Border" and why there is another song of similar theme on our new record. This book is an essential document of human cruelty and fear. I think it is vital reading for citizens of our world. It may be of extreme interest to people from Australia, as there is a huge section on Australias’ refugee policy. What a crock. Isn’t Pauline Hanson the biggest pile of crap to ever walk the earth? Oh yes.. What was she called again "The lady with crappy gitch from Ipswitch" or something?

O.k. Scrotes I’m going back to work on our tunes. Jordy will be back on
Saturday playing drums for the Greg Macpherson Band at the Royal Albert Arms Hotel, where we will see a very happy Sam Smith rolling in buckets of cash due to the full house. Then Jordy will sing a possibly hallitosed but thrilling set of back up vocals for our record.

Over n out, Flitz Crappers…..

As they say in Regina "Ceebo Sabo Mix-Max-Mo Bri-Yyiii Briii-Yiiiii
Brbrbrbr-Rriii-Yiiiiii! "

-Bo Bice (aka The Rod) live from "The Royal Academy of Fun"

March 31st/ 2005

(And now another installment random punctuatuion and free-style sentence structure!)

‘Hello again, people! It’s been a little while now, eh?

Well, last night I typed a huge update and then leaned on some button and
erased the whole thing. It hurt.

Right now I speak to you while being cursed with a case of Ringworm,
strepthroat, a cough, a cold and a pounding headache. Lucky me. Apparently Chris has ringworm (no, he doesn’t — chris) too despite not being out of his space station for a week.

So, what’s new over here, you ask? Well we’re nearing completion of our next record entitled… “Attack of the Trolobyte Nads” (not what it’s called — chris). We have a couple more vocal backups to do and maybe one more lead vocal. Jordyboy is going on tour playing drums with Greg Macpherson for 3 weeks, as soon as he gets back we go mix the sucker. We may be slow like a tortoise but when you fall asleep waiting we will come ripping by, win the race and leave you scorched and mangled!

An unfortunate event has occurred over here. Me and Chris accidentally
erased my emails (what? no, not true — chris) that I had piled up on my computer. These go back quite far, I had to take a break for a bit before we went to record in November. Now the emails are all gone. So if you mailed and didn’t get a reply i’m sorry. We have tried for years to answer everyone. Right now I’d say we’re about 1000 behind. Have mercy.

Anybody see that guy who killed a bunch of his fellow churchgoers and his
priest two weeks ago? I think somebody should look into that nasty violent
book he was reading and ban it. It definitley was the contributing factor to
the murders. I think it was called The “Holey Bibble” or something.∫∫∫∫∫

This week the Canadian music awards “the Junos” is here in Winnipeg.
Whoopedy-doo. The greatest and most classic Canadian records of ALL time have never recieved such awards. RAZOR “Violent Restitution”…No Juno, the last VOIVOD, or Any VOIVOD…No Juno, Legends SNFU have got No Juno in their long amazing existence and are not there this year despite putting out an unbelievable record, NOMEANSNO.. NOJUNONO…., SACRIFICE “Forward To Termination” recieved…..No Juno, Doughboys…No Juno.. These bands have got no awards from sad industry dweebs but live forever in our hearts. Get my meaning? I hope the sad Juno bands enjoy their two seconds of personal glory and understand as they bounce up to get their goofy award that the true greats are not there and never have been. This however is just one mans opinion. But I used to skip the school PEP rallys so what do I know?

On a sadder and final note I would like to extend sincere condolences to the members of Nasum and friends of Nasum frontman Mieszko Talarczyk who was one of the victims of the Tsunami that hit South East Asia in December. A true talent who will be sorely missed. He left many great things in his footsteps. Nobody dies alone.

Take care people….

-The Rod.

February 3rd/ 2005

Hello People!

I hope all is going well this lovely evening. A nice temperature outside here. -10 or so..

What brings me over to the keyboard tonight is to comment on the amazing documentary “Shake Hands With The Devil”. CBC sure plays good stuff sometimes. This movie follows Canadian General Romeo Dallaire back in Rwanda ten years after the genocide. It is absolutley devastating. If you get any chance to see this, please do. Dallaire has a way with words that will give you the chills.

I may seem like a broken record always talking about the same things on this webpage but to have millions of people dying endlessly and not mention it over and over would be an absurdity and would truly be a letdown to myself as a person. To understand Rwanda and the DR. Congo is to gain a hard, clear and painful insight into humanity, the way the world works, and the nature of “Humanitarian” interventions and failures. To look hard into Rwanda and then think the U.S is in Iraq to save people would be impossible. If the world can come together with all the aid money for the Tsunami (which is good) why is DR Congo burning away unnoticed by the world?

Check out the books on this webpage..

http://books.bankhacker.com/Rwanda/

I would suggest “Conspiracy To Murder”, “Land Of A Thousand Hills”, “Shake Hands With the Devil”, “We wish To Inform You That Tommorrow We will Be Killed With Our Families”, “Key to The Neighbors House”, and “The Bone Woman”. They are all really good (Maybe I have no quality meter!). I recommend them all! haha…

What else is new? My head is itchy….

BSE, the future’s plague, is making the price of milk go up. Drink hard from the doomed teat.

-Rodmin.

January 23rd/ 2005

Hello, people!

How’s it going out there?

All is good here. Tonight I’ll be checking out the movie “Hotel Rwanda” I
think it will be great, but have no real idea.

For anybody that speaks Portugese out there, check out this website made by our Brazillian Propagandhi friend Erica. She did a great job.
www.propagandhi.rg3.net .

If you’re giving money to the tsunami victims, could I recommend “Medecins Sans Frontieres” (aka Doctors Without Borders) . They are legit and very good.

The weather is a little nicer here in Winnipeg, the other night I caught the
bus at 1:30 am in a -30c blizzard. The wind was swirling snow downtown like a farking funnel. pretty cool.

That’s all for now!

-Le Raud.

January 8th/ 2005

I thought I’d drop ya all’s a quick line to tell you about this new movie out in theaters. it’s called “Hotel Rwanda” about the Rwandan genocide that killed nearly a million people and has spilled over to the DR Congo killing 3.8 million more. Nobody else in the world seems to give a shit but at least one movie maker did.

Why is there no world wide relief for the DR Congo? Where are the celebrity donations? Where is the countries coming together? Maybe they’ll be lucky and get belted with a tsunami. It would actually save lives. How’s that for the negative outlook on life? Fuck it all, pass me the mersyndol.

http://www.apple.com/trailers/mgm/hotel_rwanda/

And for a little reading from someone with similar thoughts, but likes typing more than i do…..

http://www.canada.com/news/world/story.html?id=51f778e6-8d3a-4f8a-8255-93f9f 5809e46

See ya, everyone. Happy New Year…

I also do urge you to give some cash to the tsunami victims, or get mommy to do it if you are under 12 years old. O.K! see ya!

-the rod

December 28th/ 2004

Record delayed due to Dave Mustaine falling asleep on my arm. Thanks Mustaine you fuckin goof.

November 7th/ 2004

So we leave tomorrow for recording. Me and Jordy and resident weirdo Jon Schledewitz will be piliing into a van for the journey. Todd the Rod has been banned from travelling with us because he ate Mee Krob last nite and we don’t want to die before we get to vancouver.

So we’ve getting a bunch of emails from Americans asking how to go about moving to Canada since the U.S. election last week. I can sympathize, but all i can say to y’all is please stay where you are: if you have a progressive voice, you got to stay down there and get to work to make sure that "your" government stops steamrolling the rest of the world (not to mention your fellow citizens). If you think it’s bad now, imagine how bad it would be without anyone left to put any pressure on the psychos in power. Give it some consideration, at least.

November 4th/ 2004

…..an appeal to sane folks living in and around winnipeg. if you have time this saturday afternoon, please consider lending support to helping resolve this dire situation below.

when our own governments act in ways that will harm people, it is our responsibility to stop them. we can’t sit around on our thumbs for a few years and hope that the next set of fools in ottawa will make things any better. check out the info below……

(jordo)

Stop the Deportation of Ammar Khatib!

Winnipeg resident Ammar Khatib has been ordered deported to Syria. There he faces torture and imprisonment — just like Maher Arar and other Syrian-Canadians who have been jailed and tortured in Syria.  

Gloria Nafziger, a refugee coordinator with Amnesty International, has said "I have never seen a case, in my mind [with] such credible objective information that outlines risk that has been consistently rejected."

Ammar’s appeal to remain in Canada on humanitarian grounds has been rejected even though he is married to a Canadian citizen and has a 4 month-old daughter.  

We demand that federal Minister of Immigration Judy Sgro let Ammar stay.

Rally Saturday, November 6, 3PM at the Provincial Legislature, Winnipeg.

Help is needed to get the word out about the rally. Handbills and posters for the rally will be available by Tuesday November 2 at the Mondragon (91-A Albert St.) and the Islamic Information Institute of Manitoba (594 Ellice).  

To help make placards for the rally, come to the Canadian Federation of Students office on Friday November 5 at 8PM — phone 783-0787 from the lobby to let us know you’re there.

Get involved with the campaign to stop Ammar’s deportation!  The next organizing meeting is Sunday November 7 at 1PM at the Emma Goldman Grassroots Centre, upstairs at 91-A Albert St.

If you wish to make a donation towards’s Ammar’s legal costs, e-mail noii@a-zone.org or phone 783-0787 x. 3

November 3rd/ 2004

Yesterday was my birthday and I would like to thank America for the most revealing birthday present of all: the admission that, contrary to what the rest of the world tried to tell itself for the past 4 years (that the majority of Americans were a seperate ideological entity than their insane, rogue government), that America is indeed a freedom-hating, war-loving theocracy by popular decree after all. In the immortal words of the late GG Allin: eat my fuck. (christoph)

Hello, Everywang!

How’s it going today?

Well, well, well. If the puds of the greatest and brightest country in the
world didn’t re-elect Mr. Stupid again to lead them right back to the
toilet…

I guess now that the election’s over everyone can step back from these
things that "must be done" and notice that there actually was a reasonable
candidate running for president. He was shouted down at every turn in such a fine democracy. Way to go. Perhaps it’s time for some folks go and read one of Nader’s books. He actually has a brain.

Perhaps the American pubic saw through Kerry and his Bushlike war cry and
figured they’d go for the real thing. Hey why not? The system will go on,
don’t worry. In four years everyone can hold their nose once again and elect one of the two. Perhaps it’s time for the Democrats to step down for the Green party? Won’t happen, you say? No kidding. A long time ago the
Democrats and Republicans got together made a bunch of laws and hurdles to ensure they all stay in power as long as possible.

We’ll see if all the punks can switch gears now keep up the fight on a more
deserving campaign. Or will it all fizzle away back to where it all came
from?

O.K. Scrods… We have one week to go before we’re in the studio recording.

We have chosen our fellow Scrote and Mercyful Fate fan, Blair Calibaba to record this record. He is ready to rock and is coming out here today to hear what we got. We have 15 tunes, not one second of filler. It’s nice that
Blair gives a shit. a very good sign indeed. Wish us luck.haha.

Thirdly would like to say Go get the SNFU record "In The Meantime and in
Between Time". why do I say this again? Because they are great. Their new
record is what Punk music is about to me. Singer Mr. Chi Pigs delivery is
biting and funny. This record is abrasive, truly ripping, original, full of
personality, it makes me not know whether to laugh or pull my heart out of
my godamn chest. SNFU is a classic, classic band. The record is put out by
themselves, and exists in the same way the old classic SNFU records exist.
They rule in margins where puds fear to tread. the record cannot be easily
found in stores, at least in Winnipeg. Order it! www.snfu.com This may be
the greatest living punk band. Oh yes!

Finally One week til I Spy skin basher and all round wierdo Jimmy Juicepig
gets married and I’m saying the speech. hahah… you wonder now "How can this moron record in a week and be at a wedding in a week?" Well I fly to Vancouver the next day, of course! haha..

Adios everybody. Have a nice day. Enjoy your rotten world.

(the rod)

October 27th/ 2004

Another update?! I can’t believe it myself.

The people at Peace Not War over in the U.K. just sent us copies of the second volume of the Peace Not War CD series, upon which they have included our song "Albright Monument, Baghdad". Peace Not War CDs are being sold by local peace groups to raise funds for their campaigns, and at record stores everywhere. There’s a wildly diverse selection of music on this 2-album set, ranging from Sonic Youth to Jurassic 5, Michael Franti to Jane’s Addiction.

They have an online Peace Jukebox up at http://www.peace-not-war.org which has everything from the cd plus more available for free listening with no dumb ads littering the landscape.

They’re going to put up way more music soon, so if you got a recording you’d like to submit to the anti-war project, send it with full lyrics and info to jukebox@peace-not-war.org

-chris

October 26th/ 2004

Hello, people! How’s it going today? good…good..

One week from the U.S. election. Who will win this close race Warmonger 1 or Warmonger 2?

We record so soon it’s rediculous! haha………..

Aside from that check out the new SNFU record "In The Meantime And In Between Time". Now that’s a wicked record. True punk. They are coming across Canada in November make sure you go!

I would also like to congratulate another great singer/performer, Ashlee Simpson on successefully producing a great televison moment as her jackass lip-sync tpae started before the music then she droozled off the stage in shame. Hahhahaha… Thank you…. AAAASSSSSSSS!!!!!

Well, beyond that there’s people dyingeverywhere,possible war lurking in
Eritrea nd Ethiopia, 78 rioters killed in Thailand after being packed in a
bus by the cops,doom and death in Iraq, 40,000 women raped in Dr Congo,
Sudan still in genocidal crisis.. All looks well.. All looks well. Good night Irene.

Todd the Rod

p.s. Please save us Drew Carey, I mean Jim Carey, I mean Hare Kare, I mean John Larry…. Oh you know the guy from Skull and Bones, the rich one, Bush’s distant cousin.

Go get the SNFU and shut up. It will all be over soon. The Christ is on hims way. Yo Jesus man, don’t bite your nails.

October 20th/ 2004

Quote of the day, from Pat Robertson, founder of the U.S. Christian Coalition (can this douchebag not be sued for false advertising?), on warning that other famously violent "Christian", George W. Bush, about the war in iraq:

"I warned him about this war. I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, ‘Mr. President, you had better prepare the American people for casualties…I mean, the Lord told me it was going to be A, a disaster, and B, messy" (emphasis added).

Whoah! Run point B by me again? Messy? I mean, a disaster we can handle, but a mess? Now, are you sure you told Bush about that part of what the Lord told you about the war, Pat? Are you sure you remembered to tell him about point B?

Jesus frickin’ wept.

October 18th/ 2004

Do not walk, but instead run to see Team America: World Police in a theatre near you. Possibly the funniest movie of all time (after Captain Ron of course).

In other news, isn’t it cool how the Democrats are trying to stop other Americans from getting on the ballot for the upcoming U.S. election because they fear American citizens might actually excercise their freedom and vote for them instead of John Kerry? Now that’s democracy! That’s freedom! That’s the American way!

October 12th/ 2004

On October 20, Canada will hold its first hearing to determine the fate of an American Iraq-war resister in uniform: Jeremy Hinzman, who has applied for refugee status after refusing combat duty in Iraq. Hinzman, a North Carolinian, enlisted when he was just 17, when his father took him to the recruiting office, in part because of a promise of money for his education.

Hinzman also told Canadian television, "I also had a vision in my head of being a big guy and fighting for just causes." With the revelation that the reason for the U.S. invasion — Saddam’s pretended Weapons of Mass Destruction — was a lie, Hinzman decided the war was "a crime against humanity." That, he says, "is not part of defending your country and it’s not something I’m willing to kill someone else or lose my own life for." Hinzman applied for conscientious objector status after he received orders to go to Iraq, but was rejected while he was still serving in Afghanistan. He went to Canada while on leave.

Hinzman is not the only war resister in uniform to have sought refuge in Canada. Brandon Hughey, 19, fled to Canada from Fort Hood, Texas, in March because he doesn’t believe the U.S. war in Iraq is legal or moral; he has since become a prominent speaker at anti-war rallies there. Hinzman, Hughey, and the rest of the half-dozen uniformed war resisters seeking refugee status could face stiff prison terms if Canada returns them to the United States.

A petition has been launched in Canada in support of these G.I. War resisters. This appeal to the Canadian government has received important support from the Canadian labor movement. The petition recalls that, "during the period of 1965-1973 more than 50,000 draft-age Americans made their way to Canada, refusing to participate in an immoral war. At the time, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau said: ‘Those who make the conscientious judgment that they must not participate in this war … have my complete sympathy, and indeed our political approach has been to give them access to Canada. Canada should be a refuge from militarism.’ (yeah, well nice one there trudeau, i give you that one, but fuck you anyways, spit on your grave – jeeord)… We call on the Canadian government to demonstrate its commitment to international law and the treaties to which it is a signatory, by making provision for U.S. war objectors to have sanctuary in this country." (taken from oct.10th znet commentary by doug ireland)

sign here, weirdos:

www.petitiononline.com/resister/petition.html

AND IN ENTERTAINMENT NEWS:
 
consider checking out either of these two quality evenings of fine tunage this weekend here in friendly manitoba……

sadly, it’s the last show for malefaction and head hits concrete…friday, the 15th at the albert, with the end, and ken mode….

also on friday the 15th (nice planning!), is the first hip-hop show to take place in that pile of  genetically modified potatoes know as portage la prairie……i hear that a bus is leaving from old market square to this quaint rural offering at 8pm…..details and tix available thru mondragon, the vinylist, urban bakery, kustom kulture, and music trader.

…..and to round out the good times here in winnipeg, consider participating in the following events:

"voices for choice" is a response to the pro-life freaks having their national conference at, you guessed it, the delta hotel….

thursday  oct 14th 4-5:30 pm  @  women’s hospital – 735 notre dame ave…a rally to celebrate and defend women’s reproductive freedom
    
friday oct 15th 7pm @ mondragon – 91 albert st.
panel discussion

saturday oct 16th noon @ delta hotel – 350 st. mary road (between hargrave and carlton)
rally and protest
 
ssseeeeeeeeeeeeeeyyyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh….
 
jordy-boy half-head

October 5th/ 2004

"No president, through all of American history, has ever ceded — and nor would I — the right to preempt in any way necessary, to protect the United States of America" -John Kerry

"America is stronger when we are leading the world, and that’s how we are going to do it" -John Kerry

But don’t worry Baghdad! He’s a snowboarder and plays guitar! He’s rad!

October 4th / 2004

Yo, check this report issued last night by Amnesty International. Remember it the next time you hear some jack-ass (usually a white guy from the suburbs) complaining that women and aboriginals in Canada are "better off" than he is, and then feel free to do a somersault off the top rope onto his stupid starter-capped head.

September 22nd/ 2004

(Holy shit! It’s Jordy-Boy!)

Go friend go!! Go friend go!!

Hey, you know what?! if you happen to be reaaally, reeeeaaaaallly hungry at 1AM, i would not suggest having two cold bricks of tofu with garlic/chili sauce, followed by one litre of soy ice cream. i’ve apologized numerous times to my toilet, but it doesn’t seem to be it’s usually friendly self towards me these cold mornings…..

Aaahhhh…..on to more important matters.

Sorry, this is a bit last minute, but we just received the press release last night.if you’re looking for something to do in vancouver, victoria, cowtown, montreal, or the ‘peg tomorrow afternoon, consider this:

 

Thursday September 23rd is a national day of action and economic boycott againstSun Peaks and Delta Hotels in support of the Secwepemc fighting Sun Peaks Resort expansion on unceded territories in BC.

Demonstrations will be taking place simultaneously in Vancouver, Victoria, Winnipeg, Calgary and Montreal on Thursday September 23 as the Secwepemc people are fighting an additional $285 million expansion. Over
the last six years, the Secwepemc have attended various "stakeholder" meetings and clearly said no to the further expansion of the resort.

The Skwelkwek’welt defenders are currently occupying and building a physical structure adjacent to the Sun Peaks golf course as an assertion of their Aboriginal Title, reaffirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada
Delgaamukw decision. They have been served with a Trespass Notice and a Court injunction (sought by Sun Peaks) and face imminent forcible removal.

Former Chief Art Manuel writes, "The court order is kind of a BC form of legitimate apartheid. It is clear that the Secwepemc peoples have legal and
constitutional rights at Sun Peaks but they are being wilfully ignored by the federal and provincial governments and by Sun Peaks. The Canadian government has an outdated and internationally condemned Indian Aboriginal Title extinguishment policy."

Despite attempts by the province and Sun peaks to use a divide and rule tactic by stating that those fighting Sun Peaks are a marginalized group without support of their Indian bands, Chief Nathan Mathews of the Shushwap Nation Tribal Council said that the "Shushwap Nation Tribal Council supports the right of the Secwepmc people to occupy, use and enjoy the land."

Author of the best-selling book No Logo Naomi Klein recently visited the Secwepemc territories. She writes: "Let’s be clear about something: the massive expansion of the Sun Peaks Resort is an act of violence. The Secwepemc have never ceded this land, and their Elders have clearly said no to this development."

Three hundred people converged on Sun Peaks Resort on Sunday August 29, 2004 to protest the Sun Peaks expansion.

Protest locations are listed below:

VANCOUVER:
Meet at Victory Square @ 3pm
(Cambie and Hastings)
From there we will march to Delta Hotels (550 West
Hastings)
Contact: noii-van@resist.ca <mailto:noii-van@resist.ca> <mailto:noii-van@resist.ca>   or 778-552-2099

MONTREAL:
Fairmont The Queen Elizabeth Hotel @ 4pm
900 Rene-Levesque West
Contact: ipsm@resist.ca mailto:ipsm@resist.camailto:ipsm@resist.ca 

CALGARY:
Delta Bow Valley Hotel @ 4 pm
200 4 ave SE

Winnipeg:
Delta Hotel
350 St.Mary’s Ave downtown @ 3pm

 
Also, if you’re around winnipeg this weekend, be sure to check out the Canada Palestine Film Festival at Cinematheque……24th thru the 26th!!! Early word says there are some primo flicks to check out….

One last thang. Huge thanks to Fat Wreck for donating to the local No One Is Illegal fundraising efforts. The coinage was greatly appreciated, and was instrumental in helping establish a local chapter here in our city. Cheers to that.

 
p.s. i confirm that george soros was not among the cash donors……nay-buck…….no nay…

-Jordy-Boy

September 20th/ 2004

Well Hello, Hello!

How’s it going today? A nice rainy day here once again in Winnipeg. One month from recording. We’re hard at work in the last stages of record
making. It’s us against the clock now! We’re at it all day and all night to bring you our finest effort. In this last month I personally must get some more lyrics together, get better bass parts for Chris’ songs and get a few more exciting things happening in my own tunes. Easier said than done. haha…

As you can see on our intro page, weird-man is flying around the earth in his space turd trying to come up with hot riffs. haha…

Other than that, another weird, weird man.. Mike Rak (a.k.a. My Crack)
from Victorias Frog Eyes is due at my house any minute, so is local dork-boy "Biscuit" who wants to learn a guitar "lick" from me so he can impress his teacher at school. Who will arrive first? Reginas oddest man, or Winnipegs dirtiest kid? Frog Eyes will be playing tommorrow night here somewhere, if you want to watch Rak drift off into the realms of musical passion and oddity on his bass.. come on down. I’ll be throwing cups and what not at them. haha.. Hopefully no one will be upset this time!

O.k. dudes!!!!!! Take care out there in this dangerous world!

-Rodman!

August 26th/ 2004

And now, another installment of Todd Kowalski thinking out loud…

Hello, People!

I am pleased to update you today because I was sitting there listening to
a new song of Chris’s at my house and I’m totally excited by it. I think this
record is going to be Rad, it will have a nice mix between very hard worked
songs and the songs that come busting through here in the final stage of
writing and jamming. I am on a trip to space, travelling through tunnels,
beating the crap out of the Lord and then coming home. Other than that an average week…

I Spy drummer Jimmy Juicepig is getting married, my Moms softball team won the Austrian Championships, My brothers soccer team won the Provincial championships with him getting a shutout in net, Alice Cooper blew my head off live, my friend Joe got his nose broken in, believe it or not, The Ultimate Fighting Championships, and tommorrow we go to check out W.A.S.P. haha…

Surrounded by all these achievers and athletic superstars (lucky W.A.S.P.
is in there to lower the standard) {actually, blackie lawless was a semi-pro ball player, dawg –chris} no wonder I became an underachieving
headbanger/punk who lives on the planet Zenon. haha.. Oh wait I did get a
gold medal in Speedskating in grade 1. The glory lasted about a month then I was lapped by a kid named Igor Belevich which caused me to hang up my skates forever.

I still wait and hope to achieve my gold medal in the journey of life.

Nice talking to ya’s. If you read all that it’s safe to say you are you
are orbiting in your own pod somewhere.

Here are a couple good records if you so desire…Born Against, Crucifucks, Sticks and Stones (Theme Song For Nothing), and of course the new Voivod.

Peace, no fighting please.

(The Rod)

August 9th/ 2004

And now, ladies and gentlemen, a brief glimpse into the mysterious mind of Mr. Todd Kowalski…

Hello people!

How’s it going today? A little rainy here in Winnipeg. That didn’t stop my
little buddy Chris from coming over here and checking out my new vocal
attempts at a song for the next record. Apparently it was pretty hot stuff.
haha.. We also watched a crazy old video of my old band I Spy playing in
Barberton Ohio around 94 in front of 4 kids (three by the end). After that
we slapped in an Yngwie Malmsteen video from the "Marching Out" tour, pretty cool… but have no fear we won’t be out exchanging our diapers for leather pants any time soon.

So as you heard on the previous installment of our web updates, we’ll soon
be recording. This time around we’ll head to Vancouver and record with Blair Calibaba. It will be totally rocking, he seems ready to push it to the max!

After that we’ll begin touring again, I’m sure we’ll head your way. It will
be wicked, I can’t wait to play the new songs.

My friend Kenton from Fightthemontster, and Moral Panic was just here
visiting from Regina ( The Queen City!). He said Fightthemonster has 50
songs ready to record. haha.. What the???!!! If we had that we’d be set for
the next 20 years. haha…

Anyone listen to Hiatus? They were wicked.

Anyway that’s that! I gotta go back to my serious musical journey! hah..
pass the beans…

(Todd the Rod)

August 3rd/ 2004

Clann Zú back in Winnipeg tomorrow nite at the Academy Coffee
House. Lock up your fathers, River Heights. Check it, yo.

After
months of trying to figure out the where’s and who’s and how’s,
we have finally confirmed that we will start recording our
next full length record in november. This bastard will smoke
you fucks out of your holes. Good-night poser-bands of every genre.
Nice knowing you.

And finally, for anyone who remembers earlier
this year when the subject of a "popular uprising" in
Haiti flashed across our Tv screens for 3 nanoseconds while Canadian,
French and American
governments patted themselves on the back for their "peace-keeping" role
in it, you may want to check the ideas page for some additional,
perhaps new and possiblly utterly critical information and analysis.

June 11th/ 2004

Hey there people,

Christoph here. I just want to give people a chance to help a guy out. His name Anthony Jalil Bottom and he’s been in prison in the US for the past 32 years since being convicted in a politically-motivated and rigged trial for the murder of two NY police officers in 1971.

I had the opportunity to meet Jalil in prison in the late 90′s and he’s a fuckin good guy who has stayed strong and clear-headed through what I can only imagine continues to be a living nightmare.

Here’s a sample letter that people can print, sign and send off to Jalil’s parole board as his parole hearing is coming up in July. International support for Jalil carries weight, so don’t be dissuaded from writing if you’re not a U.S. Citizen.

if you can, you should also send a copy to Jalil’s attorney: Ms. Cheryl L. Kates, Esq., Edge ofJustice, 121 N. Fitzhugh St., Rochester, New York 14614.

This guy doesn’t deserve to be in jail. He should’ve never been sent there is the first place. He’s a political prisoner. For real. He should be let out. If you can, help him out by sending the letter as soon as possible.

(chris)

June 8th/ 2004

hey,

further to the Running Down the Borders fundraising event for No One Is Illegal – Winnipeg and the Ontario Coalition Against Povery. online pledges are being accepted now!!

that’s right! you can feel free to bust out your parents credit card for a great cause!! like i mentioned earlier, if the goal of raising $5000 in pledges is made before the run on june 19th, ol’ jordos’ creaky knees and hips will be decorated in a bumblebee costume for the entire 10K….

click below to ante up, fuckers!

PLEDGE!

(jordy-boy)

The Flames lost but Reagan is dead. I think that’s a fair trade. Here’s hoping he endured immeasurable suffering as the organ formerly-known-as his brain slowly transformed into a stinking husk of swiss cheese. Fuck you, Ronnie. Say hi to Hitler and Genghis Khan for us, you stupid bastard.

(christoph)

May 19th/
2004

howdy-doo stinkers!

there are a few local events going on here in the ‘peg that i’d
like to let ye all in on…

No One Is Illegal – Winnipeg is a new local committee of
a larger NOII network, which has active chapters in Montreal, Toronto,
Vancouver, the UK, and Australia. NOII represents what might be
called the "direct action" wing of immigration and refugee
rights work. In other words, NOII is involved not only in aiding
refugees in the filing of applications for status in Canada, and
in doing legal casework, but it is also involved in political activism
and public education to raise awareness about, and challenge systemic
racism in immigration policy.

NOII – Winnipeg are organizing three events over the coming
weeks.

On Friday May 21st, there will be a panel discussion titled "Systemic
Racism: Case Studies of Racism Affecting First Nations People, Refugees
& Workers on Colour in Canada". Place: Mondragon – 91 Albert
St. Time: 7:30 PM Admission: free, donations accepted. (note to
hockey geeks. if a game 7 happens between the flames-sharks, the
gametime is 9pm cst…….get your Dick Irvin impersonations ready.)

On Friday June 11th, again, at Mondragon, 7:30 PM, NOII presents
a panel discussion featuring representatives from the Ontario Coalition
Against Poverty (OCAP) and No One is Illegal – Montreal. The topic
is "Canada’s Racist Immigration Policies & the Current
Struggle for Justice". There will also be an activists’ workshop
on Saturday afternoon (June 12) for those wishing to get involved
in local organizing efforts – time and location will be announced
Friday evening.

Finally, on Saturday June 19th, NOII will be hosting "Running
Down the Borders", a 10 km non-competitive run, walk, skate,
bike, etc… Participants will collect $ pledges from friends, family,
and neighbours to help fund NOII – Winnipeg and OCAP.

For more info, to register, or send donations, contact:
Ph# 204-779-8984 email: noii@a-zone.org mail: NOII – Winnipeg, 339
Toronto St., Winnipeg, MB., R3G 1S4, Canada

Pamphlets and pledge sheets are available at Mondragon Bookstore
and Cafe – 91 Albert St.

The option to pledge on-line is in the works….more on that later.
We’re hoping to raise $5000, all donations will be most appreciated.
If the $5000 goal has been met in pledges by the 19th, jordy-boy
will run the entire 10 km dressed as a bumble-bee………methane
propulsion still in the works. pheeuuewf.

on another note, we’ve happened to receive a few emails from soldiers
involved in the present occupation of iraq. i’ve stuggled with responding,
not knowing what to say from my smelly hole way up here in winnipeg.

here are some words from former special forces officer-turned-author,
stan goff……please read, and feel free to distribute widely to
those currently in the military, and to their friends and family.

peace,

jordilix

Open Letter to Our Troops Stan Goff

In 1994, I was running an A-Detachment in 3rd Special Forces, ODA-354
to be precise, a team that specialized in free-fall parachute infiltration
and special (strategic) reconnaissance. 3rd Special Forces Group’s
area of operation encompassed sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean,
and our team was specifically designated for the Dominican Republic
and Haiti. So we had two language requirements on the team, Spanish
and French (even though most Haitians actually speak Haitian Kreyol).

I had a communications sergeant on my team named Ali Tehrani. His
father was an expatriate Iranian who’d married a German, and Ali
had been raised in extremely comfortable circumstances in Europe,
where his father and the society around him pushed him to fluency
in English, German, Spanish, and French. Ali also spoke decent Italian.
He was the most fluent French-speaker on the battalion, and a year
before we were sent to Haiti with the 1994 invasion, Ali had been
sent to the camps constructed by the United States military in Guantanamo
Bay, Cuba, for the purpose of detaining tens of thousands of Haitians
who were trying to escape the brutal repression and grinding poverty
of Haiti in ramshackle boats. Ali was needed there because of his
language fluency.

Ali was typical of many of the "non-white" members of
Special Forces in two respects. He was demonstrably patriotic –
compelled, it seemed, to prove his devotion to the American security
state — and he adopted the prevailing attitude within much of Special
Operations of Negrophobia — a kind of institutional disdain for
Black troops that served to bloc other "non-whites" with
whites in SF. It’s a peculiar mechanism of white supremacy where
there is not a master-race mentality so much as a deficient-race
ideology from which all others could self-exclude. This — along
with an anabolic version of masculinity — served as one form of
social glue in SF culture, though there were a few exceptions.

Ali’s Negrophobia wasn’t virulent like that I had witnessed in other
SF troops. In fact, he was willing to grant exceptions among individual
Black soldiers fairly easily. It was more part of his obsessive
desire to fit in.

Ali had spent six months "working the camps" at Guantanamo
in 1993.

When we received word of our mission to invade Haiti in 1994, he
reacted violently. His revulsion toward Haitians was visceral and
white-hot. Given that my own team’s mission might depend on both
Ali’s language capabilities ("my" language was Spanish)
and on our ability to establish rapport with local Haitians, Ali’s
outburst sent up a warning flare in front of me, and I made time
to sit down with him for a long talk.

Ali was, aside from his passive racism and the simmering rage that
one could always sense just below his surface, a very intelligent
and sensitive man. I always suspected that he may have suffered
either physical or psychological abuse as a child.

When we talked, we fairly quickly concluded together that his aversion
to Haitians had something to do with the role he had been thrown
into against the Haitians at the camps, the role of jail-boss, and
he agreed to keep that in mind and to subordinate his conditioned
reflexes on the matter to mental time-outs in order to assure that
he would behave appropriately while we were on the mission in Haiti,
which he did… most of the time.

But the point I’m getting to is this. The antagonism that Ali experienced
as an individual toward Haitians was structured by the institutional
antagonism built into the jailer-and-jailed relationship. Ali had
internalized the external reality that he was a prison guard and
they were the prisoners. His job was to dominate, to bend Haitians
to his will, and every exercise of human agency by the Haitians
threatened that. Their very humanity — that combination of independent
consciousness and will — was structured by the prison-camp phenomenon
to be an enemy force in relation to Ali and the other prison-keepers.

In 1971, Stanford University Professor of Psychology Phillip Zimbardo
designed an experiment that would come to be known as the Stanford
Prison Experiment. Subjects were recruited and paid a modest stipend,
whereupon they were separated into "prisoners" and "guards,"
and placed in a mock prison built in a Stanford basement. The prisoners
were stripped, deloused, shackled, and placed in prison clothes,
while the guards were given authoritative uniforms, sunglasses,
and batons. Long story short — within two days there was a near
prison riot, psychosomatic illness began to break out, white middle-class
kids in the role of guards became rapidly and progressively more
sadistic and arbitrary, and the two-week experiment had to be abandoned
after only six days… before someone was badly hurt or killed.

The experiment seemed to support the truism that "absolute
power corrupts absolutely." But that conclusion serves as a
description, not an explanation. It describes what happens to the
individual, but it fails to account for the role of rationalization
that legitimates the domination, and it completely fails to account
for institutional support of that domination.

When one uses the term "systemic," she is saying that
the source of this abuse is not individual moral failure, but a
predictable expression of the system and its structures.

The abuses of detainees, by US troops, by CACI International and
Titan Corporation mercenaries, and by the CIA in Iraq, is "systemic."
But in the same way that the system found an expression in the thoughts
and emotions of Ali Tehrani, in the same way that the structure
of domination and subjection pushed him to rationalize away his
shared humanity with his Haitian captives, we can now see in the
leering grins of the Abu Ghraib prison guards, who are regular people
– like the experimental subjects in the Stanford Prison Experiment
– who quickly learned to behave as sadistic torturers. The military
has admitted that 60% of these detainees are neither combatants
nor threats.

As this is written, the US military is about to release hundreds
of detainees who fall in that category, and there will be more horror
stories coming, because it was systemic.

People were not only humiliated and forced to pose in degrading
positions with each other naked. They were forced to masturbate
in front of taunting guards. Some were sodomized with foreign objects.
It appears that some were also beaten to death during interrogation
– one whose body was put on ice for a day then carted away the
next on a litter with a faked intravenous infusion in the arm.

Now the cover stories are being spun out like webs.

We are being asked to believe that:

(1) The only abuse that occurred against anyone detained by American
forces in Iraq was photographed and reported.

(2) No abuses occurred anywhere that were not photographed or reported.

(3) The one percent of US troops who are the "bad apples"
all happen to serve together in the same unit… the unit that is
the only one guilty, and that happened to get caught because of
the photographs.

(4) The aggressive investigation now being proclaimed by everyone
from George W. Bush to CENTCOM, about abuses that were already on
record in the military (an internal investigation had already been
launched in February by Major General Antonio M. Taguba, but was
kept from the public), would have happened had the photographs and
story not been aired on national television.

(5) The military was not attempting to cover up their own investigation,
and that they would have informed the public of these abuses even
had Seymour Hersh not put the whole miserable episode into print.

(6) The military did not cover anything up in the two weeks between
the time CBS warned them that they were going to air an expose and
when they actually did air it.

(7) No one in the chain of command above Brigadier General Janis
Karpinski is responsible for the failure to halt these abuses, even
though Lieutenant General Ricardo S. Sanchez was informed of the
investigation of these abuses, complete with sworn statements and
photographs, by General Taguba last February.

Other abuses and violations of the Geneva Conventions and Laws of
Warfare are already on record, some with videos available on the
web, such as:

(1) Shooting people who are clearly not armed and who are engaged
in no threatening behavior.

(2) Shooting into ambulances.

(3) Shooting wounded people who are not armed.

(4) Shooting wounded people who are obviously no longer capable
of fighting.

(5) Shooting into crowds.

There has never been a Stanford Military Occupation Experiment to
complement the Stanford Prison Experiment, unless we just count
the military occupations themselves. There is a structured, systemic
antagonism between an occupying military and the people whose land
they occupy. And there will be no investigations of any of it, because
there never are, unless and until the American public is confronted
with them.The National Command Authority and its cheerleaders cannot
say out loud… this is what we are doing, and it can’t get done
unless we dehumanize the occupied. This reality, this system, will
express itself in the thoughts and emotions of you, the troops who
carry it out, because this military occupation is in a sense making
a prison of Iraq and making you, the troops, its turnkeys.

It will only be those exceptional individuals among you in the military
who refuse to surrender their humanity — no matter how little you
may understand the big picture — and who will witness. You who
do break with the system and witness are very important people,
important to history, because your refusal to surrender your own
moral integrity to the system may lead to our collective salvation
by ending this felonious occupation. The troops who filed reports
about the abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison were such exceptions.

So were Tom Glen and Ron Ridenhour.

In The Culture of Narcissism, Christopher Lasch wrote in 1979 about
US leadership during the occupation of Vietnam:

Success in our society has to be ratified by publicity… all politics
becomes a form of spectacle. It is well known that Madison Avenue
packages politicians and markets them as if they were cereals or
deodorants; but the art of public relations penetrates more deeply
into political life… The modern prince [an apt turn of phrase
for the current member of the Bush political dynasty] … confuses
successful completion of the task at hand with the impression he
makes or hopes to make on others. Thus American officials blundered
into the war in Vietnam… More concerned with the trappings than
with the reality of power, they convinced themselves that failure
to intervene would damage American ‘credibility…’ [They] fret
about their ability to rise to crisis, to project an image of decisiveness,
to give a convincing performance of executive power… Public relations
and propaganda have exalted the image and the pseudo-event.

What these images of the Abu Ghraib humiliation and torture have
done in the United States is collide with the "exalted image
and the pseudo-event" of the Bush propaganda apparatus, just
as the images of the My Lai massacre did in 1969. That collision
between the reality and the real image of war startles civilians
here in the La-La Land of wide screen TV and suburban SUV’s, and
it shakes them out of their opiated shopper dream-state.

My Lai is what General Colin Powell was remembering when he implemented
"the Powell Doctrine" for the military, which includes
a co-opted press and a vigorous attempt to keep things like flag-draped
coffins off of those wide screen TVs.

Most of you don’t remember My Lai.

On March 16, 1968, units of the Americal Division, to which Powell
was assigned as a staff officer in Chu Lai, entered a Vietnamese
village called My Lai and spent four hours raping women, burning
houses, then finally massacring men, women, and children — including
infants who dying women tried to shield with their own bullet-riddled
bodies. The massacre was stopped by a Georgia-born helicopter pilot
named Hugh Clowers Thompson who landed his chopper between the few
surviving Vietnamese and the blood-intoxicated soldiers, and ordered
his door gunners to open fire on the Americans if they failed to
stand down.

A few weeks later, General Creighton Abrams, then commanding general
in Vietnam, received a letter from a young Specialist-4 in the Americal
Division named Tom Glen:

The average GI’s attitude toward and treatment of the Vietnamese
people all too often is a complete denial of all our country is
attempting to accomplish in the realm of human relations… Far
beyond merely dismissing the Vietnamese as ‘slopes’ or ‘gooks,’
in both deed and thought, too many American soldiers seem to discount
their very humanity; and with this attitude inflict upon the Vietnamese
citizenry humiliations, both psychological and physical, that can
have only a debilitating effect upon efforts to unify the people
in loyalty to the Saigon government, particularly when such acts
are carried out at unit levels and thereby acquire the aspect of
sanctioned policy… [American soldiers attack Vietnamese] for mere
pleasure, fire indiscriminately into Vietnamese homes and without
provocation or justification shoot at the people themselves… Fired
with an emotionalism that belies unconscionable hatred, and armed
with a vocabulary consisting of ‘You VC,’ soldiers commonly ‘interrogate’
by means of torture that has been presented as the particular habit
of the enemy. Severe beatings and torture at knife point are usual
means of questioning captives or of convincing a suspect that he
is, indeed, a Viet Cong… It would indeed be terrible to find it
necessary to believe that an American soldier that harbors such
racial intolerance and disregard for justice and human feeling is
a prototype of all American national character; yet the frequency
of such soldiers lends credulity to such beliefs… What has been
outlined here I have seen not only in my own unit, but also in others
we have worked with, and I fear it is universal. If this is indeed
the case, it is a problem which cannot be overlooked, but can through
a more firm implementation of the codes of MACV (Military Assistance
Command Vietnam) and the Geneva Conventions, perhaps be eradicated.

Glen’s letter was forwarded from Abrams’ office to the Americal
Division and ended up with Major Colin Powell in Chu Lai.

Powell never followed up by questioning Glen, and instead ended
his "investigation" of Glen’s allegations after accepting
uncritically the claim by Glen’s commander that Glen hadn’t been
close enough to "the front" (whatever that was supposed
to be in Vietnam) to have any knowledge of such alleged abuses.
Powell then began his career as a damage-control expert in the military
by writing a letter, dated December 13, 1968, in which he said,
""There may be isolated cases of mistreatment of civilians
and POWs… [but] this by no means reflects the general attitude
throughout the Division… In direct refutation of this [Glen's]
portrayal is the fact that relations between Americal soldiers and
the Vietnamese people are excellent." He went on to impugn
Glen’s account for having been brought to light only reluctantly
and lacking sufficient detail.

This was, of course, horseshit. Abuses were systemic.

Glen had only heard through rumors about My Lai. It was another
GI, Ron Ridenhour, an infantryman who was not willing to surrender
his humanity to occupier-racism, who finally pieced together, on
his own initiative, the story of the My Lai massacre, and brought
it to public light. When the photographs of the massacre were combined
with Ridenhour’s account, and the American public was confronted
with the reality of an entire unit participating in a systematic
massacre of civilians, it marked a turning point in the loss of
political support in the United States for continued military occupation
of Vietnam.

Powell himself admitted war crimes in his memoir, My American Journey,
where he wrote, "I recall a phrase we used in the field, MAM,
for military-age male… If a helo spotted a peasant in black pajamas
who looked remotely suspicious, a possible MAM, the pilot would
circle and fire in front of him. If he moved, his movement was judged
evidence of hostile intent, and the next burst was not in front,
but at him." Powell would also come to the defense of Brigadier
General John Donaldson who had the door gunners on his own helicopter
shoot Vietnamese for sport. Donaldson was exonerated, naturally,
in a military investigation.

Powell not only developed as a skilled cover-up artist, he would
eventually incorporate this ability to manage public perception
about war as a key element in the "Powell Doctrine," which
he imposed on the military and the press. He never forgot My Lai,
and he has always believed that exposure of My Lai and other atrocities
were responsible for the US defeat in Vietnam.

Donald Rumsfeld shares these beliefs with Colin Powell. They are
both wrong. The two phenomena that collide with this Powell-Rumsfeld
orientation were and are (1) the decision of their ‘enemy’ never
to quit, and (2) the inevitability that someone who is part of the
occupation force will be confronted with these contradictions between
"the exalted image and the pseudo-event" and the real
character of war — and that this someone will expose it in an attempt
to rescue his or her own humanity.

The war in Vietnam was lost by the French then the Americans because
they didn’t belong there, and the resistance endeavored to do whatever
was necessary to make that point. This is also the situation in
Iraq

So I’ll leave to others the analysis of whether the troops facing
courts martial are scapegoats (they are, and they are also probably
guilty as hell), and whether or not the military is letting the
officers off with reprimands and walking papers to prevent the fire
spreading (which it is). I’ll just emphasize that the war in Iraq
cannot be won. Not because of the inability of US troops to fight,
but because we don’t belong there. And since that’s the case (which
I firmly believe it is) every life — Iraqi, American, or otherwise
– that is lost or ruined… is wasted.

All this talk of whether Military Intelligence or the mercenaries
working for CACI International or the CIA or the MP commanders were
responsible is diversionary bullshit so we won’t see how Iraq itself
has become the Stanford Military Occupation Experiment.

Because if we conclude that the problem is systemic, then the only
thing to do to stop this is to walk away. And the Bush administration
sent troops there for the purpose not of building democracies, but
of building permanent military bases in the heart of oil country,
and if they walk away, they can’t rightly build bases, can they?

So we can either blithely obey and support our new Neros, or we
can continue to cling to the absurd notion that the vandal can rebuild
the house they just ravaged, or we can do what we might to make
them walk away. Troops that come forward will play a key role in
this moral imperative.

Every troop that comes forward with accounts of the inhumanity of
this war — while jeopardizing his or her career — is serving to
hasten an end to this criminal enterprise of the Military-Petroleum
Complex.

These troop/witnesses will serve to hasten an end to the suffering
of Iraqi families and the suffering of the families of the occupying
forces. They will serve to prevent more torture, more humiliation,
more suspicion and hatred, and more lives being thrown away on this
imperial folly.

Every troop who keeps his secrets, who faithfully serves the system
and never bears witness, can travel for the rest of his life.

She can go to Rio de Janeiro.

He can go to Bangladesh.

She can go to Lagos, or Montreal, or Tokyo, or Moscow, or Antarctica.

But no matter where he goes, there he’ll be — alone with the growing
weight of his own silence on his head, wrapping himself in his own
rationalizations, and restlessly turning away from the faces that
look back at him in the mirrors of his memory.

May 16th/ 2004

In a world of almost total bullshit and insanity, it’s often hard
to believe anyone has any power to change anything. But check out
the Ideas page for a story by Vandana
Shiva about a bunch of women in India who took on the Coca-Cola
Corporation (who were stealing and polluting their source of drinking
water) and won. They shut the fuckers down.

(christo)

May 10th/ 2004

Well, Hello, Hello! Le Rod here…

How’s it going out there, everybody?

In Winnipeg it looks like snow for the next couple of days, shocking!
So what’s new over here in our little camp? I’m trying like hell
to get back to all the nice folks who have sent emails, once again
i boycotted my internet company by not paying my bill and they shut
me down, so i’m done boycotting and am back in action. haha….

I would also like to take this time to say hello to all the people
who have done show’s for us in the past! Yo! HA. And what else?
We’re still going really hard on the tunes. The record will rock,
my brother says the next record sounds very good so far. if I’m
not mistaken he believes it to be superior to the other ones. haha…
Please don’t ask when it’ll be out, we’re working on it. haha..
get a job!

In other news..

In our pathetic country, 19 million chickens are now killed to due
the disease-spreading practices of unsafe and unhealthy factory
farming. It’s funny that these companies have a murderous business
and then when they spread plagues they get subsidized and reimbursed
by the government (yeah, and they use our tax dollars to pay
for it — chris). Way to go…

As we turn our microscope over to Africa, I would like to point
out the extreme crisis in the Darfour region of Sudan. There is
an ethnic cleansing of Black muslim people, which may kill up to
a million people, due to murder and starvation. Since G.W. bush
has attacked and wrought havoc in iraq no will join up with America
as a peace-keeper in Sudan, good work everybody!

It seems once again nobody has learned from the holocaust of Jews,
of Timorese, or of Tutsis and moderate Hutus in Rwanda. Check out
Sudanpost.com for some more details.

And then finally if you’re out checking out some movies here’s some
that I like that may be at a rental store near you.. "Dirty
Pretty Things", "Magdalene Sisters", and oh well..
that’s about it.. I’m busy making tunes!!

Well, that’s it! you may hear form me again.. I gotta go watch that
great show "The Swan"..and then go curling with "Dead
Steaming Chickens" it pleases me.. eat a beagle…
..sniff a drip. Take the bus…
ride your bike….jagel a star….
hahah.. yoink! hahaha!
slurp! ouch! Jord!

April 1st/
2004

Mar 31 2004 11:46AM
Soros soaked in Kyiv

KYIV. March 31 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Two unidentified individuals
hurled glue and water on financier and philanthropist George Soros
on Wednesday before a human rights forum in Kyiv.

The two young men got into the room where the forum was starting
and threw glue and water on the presidium where Soros was sitting.
The hooligans were shouting anti-Soros statements as they were being
led out of the room.
Commenting on the incident, Soros said he is sure that someone is
behind this attack. He could not say who, in his opinion, might
have organized it.

The conference continued as scheduled after the incident.

March 25th/
2004

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Bush poked fun at his staff,
his Democratic challenger and himself Wednesday night at a black-tie
dinner where he hobnobbed with the news media.

Bush put on a slide show, calling it the "White House Election-Year
Album" at the Radio and Television Correspondents’ Association
60th annual dinner, showing himself and his staff in some decidedly
unflattering poses.

There was Bush looking under furniture in a fruitless, frustrating
search. "Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere,"
he said.

Ok, so now he’s making jokes about his patently false pretext for
invading Iraq while human beings formerly known as living and breathing
have paid for it with their lives. Is there really not one person
in the entire population of 290 million Americans with the nerve
to put a bullet through this stupid fuck’s face?

Ha, ha! That’s a funny joke i just made about killing another human
being! I’m just like George W. Bush!

March 20th/ 2004

Hello people. I would like to pay tribute today to my little buddy
Phantom B. Warren who died today of kidney disease. Days like today
remind me very strongly that the reason we do the things we
do isn’t to be radical or cool, it’s because there is someone at
the end of every descision we make and when we make choices that
kill others someone misses them the same way we miss our little
friend. Do your best out there everybody, we’re trying just as hard
as you.

Adios….
toilet-face (aka the rod)

March 16th/ 2004

"IT’S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD" (Corrosion of
Conformity)

Life can be funny sometimes.

And by "funny", of course, i mean so horrifyingly absurd
that one becomes utterly paralyzed by depression to the point that
one considers choking one’s self to death with one’s own hands.

On February 3rd, we posted a reminder that Leonard Peltier
is spending his 28th year behind bars as a political prisoner in
the so-called "free-world". We also recognized the 10th
anniversary of the once-preventable genocide in Rwanda and
the lessons to be drawn from it. No one emailed us about it. Nobody
from the media called us or G7 or Fat Wreck Chords
with urgent pleas for details. Nobody flooded the punk rock messageboards
with expressions of outrage at the injustice.

On March 9th, we posted a call for action in defense of Mohamed
Cherfi, a community-activist and a real human being facing real-life
deportation from the so-called free world to face certain persecution
in Algeria. No one emailed us about it. Nobody from the media called
us or G7 or Fat Wreck Chords with urgent pleas for
details. Nobody flooded the punk rock messageboards with expressions
of outrage at the injustice.

Then 24-hours ago, after getting a string of emails asking about
our song on the upcoming "Rock Against Bush" comp,
i post some off-handed comment (see below, March 15th) about how
we won’t be on the comp and suddenly the sky is falling. Everybody
starts emailing us about it. The media is scrambling to get in touch
with us and berating Fat Wreck Chords with urgent pleas for
details. The punk rock message-boards are flooded with people expressing
their outrage at either Fat Mike or us.

"Sad" is a word utterly insufficient to describe what
volumes this speaks to where the modern punk-scene places its priorties.

CLARITY/PERSPECTIVE

Let’s get some clarity for starters. Look, if someone invites me
over to their house for supper and i start calling their mom a fuck-faced
fart-lover, it’s not censorship if they ask me to stop and it’s
not censorship when they insist i leave when i refuse to stop.

Yes, we thought being asked to remove the incredibly short and incredibly
vague allusion to George
Soros (who is, for the record, a fuck-faced
fart-lover…see Heather Coffins piece below) was lame, but nobody
in Propagandhi ever suggested we were being censored
by Mike or Fat Wreck Chords.

It just became clear that our respective perspectives on the US
electoral process and the strategies that could be undertaken to
effectively influence the US (and by extension, the world) political
climate towards something authenically sane had reached an
impasse. It became clear that our politics were incompatible with
goal of the "Rock Against Bush" project, which,
at least in the short term, is to get Democratic Party Leadership
Nominee John Kerry elected as supreme ruler of the planet…i
mean president of the united states.

That’s all. Nobody censored us. Anyone who says different
is tilting at wind-mills.

FAT MICHAEL SPEAKETH

Fat Mike phoned us today, visibly – well, audibly – upset
by the situation and reporting that the relatively innocuous post
i put on our site last night had exploded into some sort of media/internet
frenzy.

We were shocked as it is our experience that no one generally listens
to anything we say. Up until this afternoon, i thought the only
people who ever looked at our website were me and Kowalski (Hi Rod!
Nice dork ya got there!).

Nevertheless, through the course of my phone discussion with Mike,
we established that despite our important differences of opinion
that precipitated this pathetic melodrama, that people need to get
some perspective and that Mike deserves a chance to defend himself,
if only against the hyperbole and rubber-necking of the chat-room
set, who love to amplifly the least important aspects of meaningful
issues.

So here is Fat Mike’s contribution to perspective:

Hello everybody. Well this Propagandhi thing has gotten a little
out of hand when there really is no issue. A lot of people seem
to want an explanation, so here it is in detail. I asked Propagandhi
to be on the Rock Against Bush comp and they agreed. They also made
it clear that they didn’t want to be censored and that their
political views differ from ours. I said no problem and that I would
be stoked to have a different viewpoint on the album (as long as
it wasn’t pro-Bush). So they send the song which happens to
be a song off their last album, but with a different title.
The lyrics are about how both political parties in the US are totally
fucked and that it doesn’t really matter which one wins because
there will not be a significant change in the capitalist system
anyway. Here they are:

"Bullshit politicians. Bloated pin-dick motherfuckers. Bullshit
politicians bow and curtsey to the seats of power. We’ll never
learn and nothing will ever change if we stay this course of followers
and slaves. I can_t believe we’re still content just reshuffling
the same old deck of kings and queens and faux-democracies. I say
we hand it back to the bullshit politicians. Free John Hinckley.

This November, be sure to exercise your right to vote for either
the war-mongering, planet-raping, corporate-billionaire functionaries
or the other war-mongering, planet-raping, corporate-billionaire
functionaries!

Wake up for fuck sakes. The planet doesn’t need another U.S.
election. It needs an American Revolution.

This message not brought to you by George Soros"

Okay, so this is really not the message that I am trying to convey
because I believe that Democrats are a bit better than Republicans,
and I think that Bush is fucking the world worse than anyone possibly
could. But, I still want the song on the comp. So we get the liner
notes from the band and at the end it says, "This message was
not brought to you by George Soros". This is where the problem
starts. George Soros is a Billionaire who got his money from exploiting
the foreign currency exchange. He screwed a bunch of countries to
make his money. It is also important to note that he is also a member
of the Carlyle Group, which is a company that makes money from selling
weapons. Okay, that sucks. Meanwhile he has been giving close to
500 million dollars annually to progressive causes and has founded
a network of philanthropic organizations in over 50 nations throughout
the planet. He is spending a good part of his fortune trying to
get Bush out of office. Maybe he feels guilty or something, I don’t
know. The point is that he has given money not to us, but to many
great organizations such as Moveon.org and America Coming Together,
and these organizations help support us. I didn’t want an anti-Soros
message on the first Rock Against Bush comp, because I don’t
want to make enemies within our movement. I am trying to unite people
not alienate them from each other. So I asked Chris from Propagandhi
if he wouldn’t mind taking that last Soros comment out of their
liner notes. He said he wouldn’t take anything out. I said
okay, then asked if they would mind being on the Rock Against Bush
vol. 2 comp instead of the first one, which will be coming out 3
months after the first one.

There were 3 reasons why I wanted them on the second one. First
and most importantly, MoveOn.org is going to send a mass email to
their 3 million members encouraging them to buy the comp. Letting
them know that the more CDs we sell the first week, the more of
an impact it will make on the music scene. If it’s the number
one independent record in the country, CNN and other news sources
will report it. It will be a powerful message to Americans. MoveOn
did this for the "Uncovered" DVD and it sold 40,000 more
copies because of them. So I do not want to piss off MoveOn, not
to mention that they are doing fucking amazing work. They are leading
the online anti-Bush movement. Second reason; The first comp is
a little Fat Wreck Chords bands heavy. There are already 8 fat bands
on the comp. We had asked the Lawrence Arms to be on the second
one too. They said okay. The 3rd reason was that the Propagandhi
song wasn’t new. It was an old song with a new title. I thought
that this might piss a few people off.

So I ask Propagandhi to be on the second comp with all the lyrics
intact and with the George Soros comment and everything. NO CENSORSHIP.
Chris politely said no thanks. He said that the band has had cold
feet about the comp from the beginning, that their politics don’t
mesh with ours, and that he doesn’t want to be shuffled on
to the 2nd comp. I was bummed, but I felt that our message of getting
Bush out was more important than Propagandhi’s anti-Soros message.
There are no hard feelings between the band and I. Not only do I
think they are the most important band in punk rock, but I feel
that they are amazing people, and I am incredibly proud to put out
their records.

There it is. The whole explanation. Sorry no drama, but it never
was a big deal until it got all over the internet. Thanx for listening.

Sincerely,

Fat Mike

THE VERDICT

So there is Mike’s explanation. And here is my confirmation
that this issue of a song not appearing on a comp, like Mike has
said, is not some huge deal that required anybody to get their panties
in a knot over. It is not the important aspect of the otherwise
incredibly meaningful issue of ousting warmongering, planet-raping,
corporate-functionaries from political power.

Mike has been our friend for over 10 years. We’ve disagreed about
tons of things over those years. Fuck, back in 1993 we disagreed
about practically everything, probably including what year it was.
Never made us think twice about our friendship and never made us
question each others motives or sincerity. People can disagree,
even intensely, without one of the people having to be an idiot
or a sell-out. Disagreement doesn’t have to imply betrayal or animosity.
So everybody just chillax, for fuck sakes.

Allow me to quote Michael Albert of Znet,
another person who’s integrity i hold in high regard but also happen
to strongly disagree with on the issue of the upcoming farce known
as the US election:

"Reasonable people can disagree dramatically, even with
everyone broadly sharing the same progressive values. People should
follow the course that seems best to them, in light of their expectations,
and let others do likewise (everyone is going to do just that anyhow,
in case anyone has any doubts) and let practice reveal outcomes…
Meanwhile, let’s not overly aggravate one another and the process
itself, with endless vituperative debate that isn’t going to raise
consciousness, build movement organization, win any office, or propel
a better electoral outcome. Present our views compellingly, and
even passionately — of course, especially when they have broader
lessons, but let’s not question the integrity and motives of those
who see tactical matters differently. "

Words of wisdom, i think.

NOW THAT WE HAVE YOUR ATTENTION…RAISING CONSCIOUSNESS, BROADER
LESSONS, INFORMED DECISIONS.

So with that in mind, what is important at this point is to turn
this narrowly-averted soap-opera distraction into an opportunity
for us to provide some serious context for anyone interested in
actually making informed decisions in a democracy, which
is one of the stated, but neglected, goals of the punkvoter.com
project, which in our opinion has evolved into a simplistic, defacto
pro-Kerry lobby by its glaring omission of hard criticism
of the other half of the corporate duopoly: the Democrats.
So allow me to rephrase my own questions from yesterday’s now infamous
post: "Anyone But Bush" on whose terms? "Anyone But
Bush" at what cost? (incidentally, isn’t Nader "anyone"?
Aren’t you, dear reader living in an alleged democracy, "anyone"?)

In our opinion, this restricted focus doesn’t actually "educate
today’s youth about what is really going on in Washington,
DC" (quote from punkvoter.com). Rather, it serves to encourage
fans of famous bands to cast votes based on half of
the story of what is really going on in Washington DC. That ain’t
democracy man. That’s a charade, no matter how preferable the outcome.

You’ve read this far. We appreciate that. It shows you’re interested
in this issue beyond the low-brow sensationalism of wanting to see
two good friends get into an arguement and square off in a playground
after school.

Don’t stop now. What follows is a small selection of food for thought
that if digested critically, may help at least sober up some of
y’all who’ve been getting drunk on the excitement of seeing your
punk-heroes "taken seriously" by the establishment media.

No one’s got all the answers. Certainly we don’t. But we offer
these perspectives in the meantime. Read on, sisters and brothers.
Read on.

George
Soros, Imperial Wizard Heather Coffin (scroll down on this
one)

If
John Kerry is the Answer, What is the Question? William
Blum

Anyone but Morningstar, Perry
and Beers Laura Flanders

Bush
or Kerry? John Pilger

Money
& Elections Charles Lewis

A
Brief History of the Democrats Mickey Z

Democratic
Party? Don Fitz

Presidential Candidates: Compared
to What? Norman Solomon

Sincerely,

Propagandhi

March 15th/ 2004

Remember last month when my fine feathered friend Mr. Todd Kowalski
informed you that we had recorded a song for the upcoming "Rock
Against Bush" comp coming out on Fat Wreck Chords? Yes,
that’s the one. You have an excellent memory.

Well, guess which band got booted from it because they refused
to remove a pot-shot aimed at international billionaire, global
financier, war-profiteer and all-around asswipe George Soros
from their liner notes? No, it wasn’t Good Charlotte. Good guess
though. Try again.

That’s right, it was us!

Next time someone comes knocking on our door hawking the virtues
of joining a unified front against something, we’ll be sure to ask
them this: unity on whose terms? At what cost?

This message not brought to you by George Soros.

March 9th/ 2004

Join Us in Winnipeg as Part of a NATIONAL DAY of PROTEST in Solidarity
With Mohamed Cherfi!

(Similar events are being organized in Quebec City, Montreal, Ottawa,
Toronto, and Vancouver.)

TUESDAY, MARCH 9th, 4-6PM at IMMIGRATION & REFUGEE BOARD of
CANADA 391 York Avenue (Downtown Winnipeg) BRING BANNERS, PLACARDS
& NOISE-MAKERS!

BRING MOHAMED CHERFI HOME! Solidarity With Canada’s Non-Status
Algerians

Mohamed Cherfi was arrested in Quebec City this past Friday (March
5th, 2004). Mohamed had been in sanctuary inside the Saint-Pierre
United Church, on the invitation of the church’s pastor, the
Reverend Gerald Dore. This is the first time that Canadian police
or immigration officers have violated the centuries old tradition
of sanctuary.

According to eyewitness reports in Quebec City, at least 15 police
officers from the City of Quebec broke into the church at approximately
12:45pm to arrest Mohamed. The police claimed to have an arrest
warrant for Mohamed on a breach of a previous condtion of release
which apparently stipulated that Mohamed reside at the same address
in Montreal. Mohamed had taken sanctuary inside the church on February
18th in order to avoid an eventual deportation to Algeria where
he faces almost certain persecution.

Mohamed has since been deported to the United States where he is
in detention at the Battavia Detention Centre outside Buffalo, NY,
awaiting deportation to Algeria.

Mohamed has been an active member of the Action Committee of Non-Status
Algerians in Montreal. He has resided in Canada for close to seven
years, speaks fluent French, and has been a tireless advocate on
behalf of non-status refugees in Canada. He has helped hundreds
of non-status Algerians gain status in Canada, but he himself has
been targeted for removal due to his outspoken advocacy. Mohamed
has previously been arrested three times for his participation at
sit-ins and pickets.

Please call/fax the Ministers below and demand Mohamed be brought
back to Canada! Demand he be Granted Landed Immigrant Status!

The Solidarity Committee for Mohamed Cherfi (Quebec City), and Pastor
Gerald Dore (of the Saint-Pierre United Church) have both denounced
the summary arrest, kidnapping, and deportation of Mohamed Cherfi,
Algerian refugee and Quebec resident. The arrest breaks a long-standing
secular and ethical tradition of the right of sanctuary, the first
time such an outrage has occurred in Canada.

“The United Church, on whose ground Mohamed Cherfi had taken
refuge, considers it a moral duty to offer asylum to any person
whose life is in danger, if the state does not fulfill its responsibilities,”
said Pastor Dore.

Only a political decision could have prompted such a police intervention,
and such an undeniable miscarriage of justice on the part of the
authorities of Quebec and Canada. A warrant for arrest was issued
by the Municipal Court of Montreal, under the absurd pretext that
in taking sanctuary, Cherfi had changed his address without informing
the authorities! This warrant was then withdrawn immediately upon
Cherfi’s arrest and deportation. Cherfi was never given an
opportunity to defend himself in a court of law. It is clear that
his arrest, far from an “ordinary” police operation, is
an abuse of the rule of law, orchestrated by high-level officials
in order to silence a strong, outspoken, effective, and committed
defender of human rights.

If you are also outraged by the violation of sanctuary at the Saint-Pierre
United Church, we encourage you to express your outrage, politely
but firmly, to the following government ministers:

Anne McLellan (Minister of Public Safety & Emergency Preparedness)
Fax: (613)990-9077, Tel: (613)991-2924, McClellan.A@parl.gc.ca

Judy Sgro (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) Fax: (613) 947-8319
Tel: (613) 992-7774, Minister@cic.gc.ca

Michelle Courchesne (Minister of Quebec Immigration) Phone: (418)
644-2128 Fax: (418) 528-0829

A Solidarity Committee for Mohamed Cherfi is active in Quebec City.
They can be reached at: Tel: (418) 262-0144 E-mail: solimo2004@yahoo.fr
Website: www.mohamed.levillage.org

ORGANIZED BY: No One is Illegal – Winnipeg Contact: noii@a-zone.org
or 204-942-6994 (A-Zone)

February 23rd/ 2004

Hats off to Nader for having the nerve to run as an independent in the otherwise defacto corporate dictatorship also known as the U.S. presidency.

Shame on anyone, especially the “liberal intelligentsia” (Nader’s wonderfully candid words) who discourages *anybody* from rocking the boring, stupid, rich-man’s duopolist boat. The arrogance and hypocrisy of “Democrats” who lament Nader’s run for presidency as a “spoiler” is palpable. Clearly, they do not understand, let alone believe in, the meaning of the word “democracy”.

You can check out Ralph Nader’s reasons for running on his website: votenader.org Of particular interest is the FAQ under “Why Ralph?”. Check it dawgs.

On a darker note, there’s an article about a recently leaked Pentagon study on the ideas page that Jordy-Boy located in The Observer, a UK-based newspaper. Predictably, North American media has not yet found this horrifying report to be newsworthy.

Understandable, of course. After all, it’s only the fate of life on earth that hangs in the balance. Oh, well.

(chris)

February 3rd/ 2004

So here we are in 2004. There are two anniversary’s marked by this year that should not go unrecognized.

One is the anniversary of Leonard Peltier’s 28th year as a political prisoner in the penitentiary system of the United States. Amnesty International has been calling for his “immediate and unconditional release” for years now. Of course, he still sits in prison as an example to other native North Americans not to challenge the legitimacy of the state imposed upon this continent’s original inhabitants. You can read Leonard’s annual statement and learn about his case here.

The other is the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide. A web-site called Remembering Rwanda whose objectives are to commemorate and preserve the memory of this internationally ignored and preventable human catastrophe through public education.

Check it, yo.

P.S. anyone in the city of Winnipeg on Wednesday, February 4th may want to head down to Mondragon (91 Albert St) at 7:00 pm to hear a first-hand account of the situation in Occupied Iraq by David Pankratz, an aid worker and peace activist who returned in December after 6 months in Iraq with the Mennonite Central Committee providing humanitarian assistance.

(chrissy)

January 31st/ 2004

Hello, Doofus’!

A new month, a mere 32 days after my pop came to visit he’s struck off for home and I’m getting down to doing some recording here at my house…

Oh, wait I was wrong he’s still here..haha…wa.

Well, in the last month I have certainly been called a “doofus” more than usual. I have also never been better informed about a guys moment to moment activities, I’ve been updated about every 5 minutes.. “Hey look, I’ve put this paper clip over here now..” ” Hey look I’ve moved the pickles to the other side of the fridge”.. “Hey man, I’ve picked this piece of lint off the carpet, come and see how cool it looks now..”

Me and Chris (or Chris and I, for you scholarly doofus’) took the little man out for a very strange night of blues at the “Windsor Hotel”. Can anybody tame the crazy little freak? haha.. Jeezuz!

Oher than that we have been playing our instruments like crazy and we are marching onward towards our goals! We have high hopes and extreme visions this time! Success or death! See ya!

Le Rod.

January 12th/ 2004

A New Year Message from Todd the Rod (who takes full responsiblity for any comments regarding 33 year old Regals)

Happy New Year, Everydork!

I hope all is going smooth for you so far in 2004!

Over here we have big, big plans! We are bringing down the basement with new tunes. We just recorded a song for a Fat comp called “Free John Hinckley” who is, of course, the guy who shot Reagan. Haha… devilish, devilish! The song is a revamped improved version of “Bullshit Politicians”. I like it a lot better. We hope to record our next record in spring. Then we shall go on tour and whatever else it is that we do.

Right now I got my old Pops staying with me at my house for 2 weeks. All is going well, except for him pouring beer down my pants today as well as screaming, swearing,whimpering,moaning, snoring and coughing every night in his sleep. For a while it is terrifying but soon is a good indication he is still “in the zone” hahaha. He is being a good boy and making sure to put his “couch diaper” down before he sits down and leaves funny stinks.haha.. I must say it’s pretty funny over here right now. If he hits his head one more time we’ll have to lower his I.Q…. again! Despite all this the guy is a formidable force in the world of carpentry and electricity… When we go up in flames remember to mention at the funeral it wasn’t arson, we were in the middle of skirmish!

If any of you get the “Life Network” check out a show called “Crisis Zone”. It is a good window into the realities of life in some places. They follow people who work for “Doctors Without Borders” on their journeys. I find this show truly heartbreaking.

Check out www.worldhumanrights.com and the links that go all over the world. Any country you want to know about links to this. I find it really dudelike.

Alright, see ya! I have answered about 10 zillion emails and am crosseyed so I am on my way back whence I came, the land of Tools.

p.s. Propagandhi friend Sam Miller managed to pull himself away from his Transformers long enough to find himself a girlfriend on the net! I must congratulate him for that. Remember kids (girl and boy) love awaits you. Even old Propagandh roadie, inspiration and former singer for Corpus Vile, Derek Riel, found love at the age of 33 and has a beautiful christmas tree with an angel on it and his very own stocking!

December 3rd/
2003

OK people. I’ve went back to the drawing board on yesterdays update.(space)(capital
H)ahaha. Today I will take the timmy to use semi-correct speeling
and punchewshun.

So, like I was saying. Check out CBC’s new December television line
up. Starting with the unbeatable "Degrassi,the Next Generation"
and "Hot Type".

This months guests on "Hot Type" are tailored right to
my own viewing interests. First of all we have General Romeo Dallaire,
who was the general in the Canadian army during the 1994 Rwandan
genocide. They talk about his experiences in Rwanda and about his
new book "Shake Hands With The Devil". The interview was
played on Tuesday, and will air again on Sunday. It is a very intense
interview. I believe this guy to be a really direct and caring person.
His book is extremely good and should be read by everyone. Of course
there is some army crap talk that has to be edured for a moment
or two, but all in all it’s amazing. This genocide is in my opinion
one of the most horrific things the world has ever seen and General
Dallaire get’s right to the heart of it. In fact the co-author of
the book committed suicide while helping write the book, and general
Dallaire also attempted to kill himself. Heavy heavy reading.

Next week some old guy named "Norm Chumski" is on. Whoever
the hell that is. Some linguistics and political scientist geek.

Later in the month is Robert Kaplan, who wrote the amazing book
"The Ends of the Earth" in which he travels from Liberia
to Cambodia talking about the history and politics of each place.
I will warn you however, this guy has also wrote a bunch of books
that are worth checking out to see a different way of looking at
things but are not recommended philosphy in my opinion. I also think
he may say some absurd things in the interview. I’m glad I read
"The ends of the Earth" before his face started farting.
haha…

O.K.!!! What else??? We’re practicing very hard. The songs are going
really good. The next record will be the best one for sure! I hope
to have three of my tunes completed by Christmas. We want to record
in spring. Then we shall go on tour again!

O.k. Ho, Ho, Ho !!!

See ya Dorkshuns….

Le Rod.

November 14th/
2003

Yo, Winnipeg goofs, check it:

Alternative Radio with David Barsamian
Saturday, November 22nd 2003 – 7:30 PM till 11:30pm
West End Cultural Center

An Evening of Marginalised Information about the Worlds of
Bio-Tech, Nano-Tech, and Corporate Concentration

The West End Cultural Center, DWD Productions and CKUW are pleased
to bring Winnipeg a live recording of the internationally syndicated
radio program Alternative Radio with host David Barsamian and special
guest Pat Roy Mooney. The evening will also feature a talk by Mr.
Barsamian about Propaganda in the War on Iraq. Local radical hip
hop artist Gruff the Druid will also be on site.

Tix are $7 at Mondragon, fuckers.

November 8th/ 2003

Click here to watch The
Meatrix and free your mind.

November 11th/ 2003

Lest We Forget (by Paul Burrows)

This Remembrance Day, let us remember Canadians
who fought and died during the two World Wars and the Korean War.
Let us also remember those of other nations (Germans, Russians,
Japanese, Koreans and many others) who fought and died as our allies,
or our enemies.

Let us also remember that those who fought and died on both sides
were primarily working people, whether volunteers or conscripts.
They were not members of the privileged elites, whose class and
corporate interests (rather than their country’s alleged national
interests) sparked the wars in the first place.

Let us also remember those who fought against injustice without
the support of the Canadian government. Let us honour the brave
individuals (and entire brigades like Mackenzie-Papineau) who went
to Spain in the 1930s to defend the republic and revolution from
fascism. Let us not forget that these veterans of the Spanish War
fought and died despite our government’s threat to imprison
them upon their return.

Let us also remember those who refused to fight for unjust causes
and were called “cowards.” Let us for once acknowledge
their bravery — for standing alone with their principles, in
the face of ridicule, persecution, imprisonment, harassment, threats,
or violence from their own friends or family, from their own community,
or from the institutions of the Canadian state.

Let us also remember the combatants and civilian victims of a whole
host of other wars past and present — wars in which Canada
may or may not have sent soldiers, but Canadian arms manufacturers
made (and continue to make) huge profits through the sale of weapons.

Let us remember those who continue to fight and die resisting brutal
dictatorships — regardless of whether Canadian politicians
and our “free press” consider these dictators to be “enemies“
or ”allies.” Let us speak out against the exploitative
and repressive measures of these dictators, even while our government
helps to prop them up with money and military hardware. Let us honour
the dissidents who struggle to change these societies by any means
necessary. And let us honour, support and join those in our own
societies who work in solidarity with oppressed people the world
over.

And most of all, let us remember that one day a year is not enough.
The meaning of Remembrance Day is greatly diminished, even trivial,
if it is confined to wearing a plastic poppy every November. It
is meaningless if it is patriotic, as if our empathy and allegiance
should stop at a border that was itself constructed by conquest
and war.

Remembrance Day is also meaningless if it remains disconnected from
today’s struggles for peace and a better future, both at home
and abroad. The struggle to end war is literally the same as the
ongoing struggle to democratize our own country, to shift resources
from military to social spending, and to wrest control of our communities
and workplaces from corporations and private power. In Canada, we
must first acknowledge — and pay reparations for — historical
and ongoing crimes against First Nations peoples, and we must first
acknowledge — and completely reverse — our unsavoury,
immoral and profiteering role in foreign affairs, before we can
proudly (or accurately) claim to be a force for peace, freedom,
democracy or justice in the world.

This Remembrance Day, open your eyes and hearts to the ongoing,
daily, systemic class war against the poor in this country. Open
your heart to the fact that poverty is a form of violence (suffered
daily by thousands of Canadians), and we live under an economic
system that requires unemployment and poverty, in order to keep
wages low and private profits high.

Remember also the ongoing genocide committed against the Lubicon
Cree in Alberta and the Anishnaabe of Grassy Narrows (sadly, not
aberrations), as well as the daily racism and injustice faced by
First Nations peoples across the land. Remember, and stand in solidarity
with those who resist exploitation, torture, injustice, as well
as foreign aggression or intervention in Iraq, Afghanistan, East
Timor, Haiti, Palestine, Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, Sierra Leone,
Zaire, Somalia, Burma, the former Soviet Union, Tibet, Sri Lanka,
Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and on and on and on. Remember all these
struggles, at home and abroad, and work to change the structures
of power in your own community and country which give rise to war
and injustice in the first place.

This Remembrance Day, mourn your dead, and commemorate your fallen
heroes. But most of all, work for positive social change. Question
the pronouncements and rhetoric of your so-called “leaders.”
Become an activist for peace. Speak out against the racist attacks
upon — and racial “profiling” of — people of
colour in the wake of September 11. Join the fight against the wholesale
and racist deportation of Palestinians and other Arabs that is occurring
as we speak — merely the latest in a long line of shameful
bigotry and collective punishment in Canadian history, going back
to the so-called “reservation system” (which inspired
Apartheid), through the expulsion of the Acadians, to the internment
of the Japanese, and the closing of our borders to Jews fleeing
Nazi terror.

This Remembrance Day let us for once affirm that “No One is
Illegal!” This Remembrance Day, let us resist the criminalization
of dissent, and the attack on civil liberties in the name of a very
false security. This Remembrance Day, let us oppose the wars that
are now being waged, rather than simply buying a poppy to show how
mournful we are, while we fall in line behind the expanding American
Empire.

Oppose Canada’s ongoing intervention in Afghanistan, and any
Canadian participation in the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq. Fight
to end these and every other unjust war! Anything else is hypocrisy.
Anything else is not only immoral, but also sows the seeds of future
terrorism. Anything else is lip service.

October 21st/ 2003

10 days until halloween! I’m pretty excited because it’s the one
day out the whole year that people don’t ask me why i’m wearing
a horrifying mask.

Check out the ideas page for additional, real-life horror parading
around in an uncle sam costume.

People in or around Winnipeg in the next month or so may be interested
in dis:

PEACE, PROPAGANDA AND THE PROMISED LAND

5 documentaries on Israelis and Palestinians

Presented by Jews for Just Peace- Winnipeg

Thursday, October 16, 7:30pm

Palestine is Still the Issue
By John Pilger (2002, 100 min,
UK)
University of Winnipeg (Room 4M31, 4th floor of Manitoba Hall)
Journalist John Pilger intersperses
analysis of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict with interviews, ranging
from the father of a 14-year-old Israeli girl killed by a suicide
bomber to the senior advisor to the Israeli Prime Minister to a
Palestinian mother refused entry to Israel while giving birth. This
ambitious film serves as an answer to the fundamental question,
"What is the Occupation?"

Thursday, October 30, 7:30pm

Promises
By Justine
Shapiro, B.Z. Goldberg and Carlos Bolado (2002, 106 min, Israel)
University of Winnipeg (Room 4M31, 4th floor of Manitoba Hall) Promises
delves into the lives of seven Israeli and Palestinian children,
all living within 20 minutes of each other, but worlds apart. The
children talk about politics, religion, sports, family and life
before the filmmakers pose the question: Would you like to meet
kids from the "other side?" When these two groups meet
up, Promises becomes a powerful testimony to the innate human ability
to connect, in a region where so many people have failed to do so.

Thursday, November 13, 7:30pm

Palestinian Diaries
By Nazeh Adel Darwazeh,
Suher Ismael and Abdel Salam Shihada (1991, 60 min, Palestine) University
of Winnipeg (Room 4M31, 4th floor of Manitoba Hall) In 1990, an
international team supplied training and video cameras to three
young Palestinians in the Occupied Territories. These are their
stories. Footage includes a wedding engagement, a Palestinian day
care centre and interviews, particularly about the devastating curfews
imposed by the occupying army. Making no attempt to censor the anger
of the Palestinian people, Palestinian Diaries offers "a tiny
glimpse" of the Middle East conflict from a point of view rarely
seen in Western media.

The Right to a Home and Homeland
By Amir
Terkel (2002, 20 min, Israel) A refreshing look at the courageous
work of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, in co-operation
with Palestinian and International volunteers. All funds raised
this evening will go to the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

Thursday, November 27, 7:30pm

The Road to Rabin Square
By Michael Karpin (1997, 94 min, Israel) University of Winnipeg
(Room 4M31, 4th floor of Manitoba Hall) In 1993, Yitzhak Rabin and
Yasser Arafat made history when they shook hands on the White House
lawn. In 1995, Rabin was assassinated. By 2000, with the start of
the second Intifada, the Oslo peace process was over, taken by many
as proof that "The Palestinians don’t want peace," a false
and dangerous conclusion. The Road to Rabin Square traces the interlocking
roles of religious fundamentalists, Israeli West Bank settlers and
top political leaders from the Likud party in inciting the hatred
that led to Rabin’s assassination.

Thursday, December 11, 7:30pm

Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land:
American Media and the Subversion of Peace
(2003, 80 min, United States) Asper Jewish Community Campus, 123
Doncaster Street (Multi Purpose Room) Canadian Premiere This pivotal
video exposes how the foreign policy interests of American political
elites- working together with Israeli public relations strategies-
exercise a powerful influence over news reporting about the Middle
East conflict. Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land provides
a historical overview, insight into the nature of the Occupation
and examines factors that have distorted North American media coverage
and, in turn, public opinion. Features interviews with Noam Chomsky,
Hanan Ashwari, Robert Fisk, Rabbi Michael Lerner and Rabbi Arik
Ascherman, among others.

Admission to all films is free. Donations accepted.
All films will be followed by a discussion period. For more information,
call Louise Waldman, 772-9877

September 25th/ 2003

A sad day. We join in the mourning of the passing of Edward
Said.

Some words from Ali Abunimah:

"Edward Said was a fountain of humanity, compassion, intellectual
restlessness and creativity. At a time when the crude calculus of
raw power and fanaticism threatens to swamp global discourse, his
irreplaceable voice never needed to be heard more.

The most fitting tribute to Professor Said’s life and work is to
struggle with increased commitment for the vision of justice and
humanity that inspired all of his efforts."

I should also mention last week’s passing of local activist/colorful
character Ken Emberley. He was a passionate, vocal elder
of social justice here in Winnipeg and we can all only hope to be
as earnest and involved in activism as Ken was when we get older.

September 18th/ 2003

Hi fuckers. Fuck, have we been rocking hard in the basement, fuck.
We are going to destroy your heads with power and depth when our
new record is recorded next year. We’ll probably be charged with
multiple counts of manslaughter when these songs get released.

Hey, Todd the Rod was working security at a Bombers game here in
Winnipeg recently and the crowd was chanting "Nice facial hair,
you ass!" at him. Finally, someone had the guts to say it.

On a much more serious note and in the spirit of Fuck the Border,
please keep reading. A guy’s life is at stake.

NO ONE IS ILLEGAL!
STOP THE DEPORTATION OF AMMAR KHATIB

"Canada is party to the United Nations Convention against
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Under Article 3, no person may be returned to another State where
there are substantial grounds for believing he would be in danger
of being subjected to torture."
— Amnesty International Canada.

Ammar’s Story

Ammar’s family fled to Jordan and then to Saudi Arabia when
he was four years old to avoid persecution and death at the hands
of the Syrian Government. He has lived there for twenty years. He
was visiting the United States and without his parents’ knowledge
decided to come to Canada and seek asylum. He had heard that Canada
was a great country, was a beacon of hope for the hopeless. You
see, even though he was living in Saudi Arabia for 20 years, he
was not entitled to be a citizen of that country and so was not
entitled to the rights that Saudi citizens enjoyed. He wanted to
further his education. He walked to the Canadian border and surrendered
his passport and asked for refugee status. While his claim was being
processed, he lost his resident (not citizen) status to Saudi Arabia.
His refugee claim was denied. He appealed and decided to surprise
his boyhood friends who had settled in Winnipeg, with a visit. He
boarded a bus from Vancouver and made the long trek to Winnipeg.
For full details of his story, please read Lesley Hughes’ article
at:
www.islamicchamber.ca/article.jpg

Ammar has now become a man without a country. The Canadian government
wants to deport him to Syria on Monday, Sept. 15. If he goes there,
then we may as well have a funeral for him before he leaves. They
had given him an extension from his first deportation order date
(August 11) in order to find a country that he could stay while
his wife sponsored him. However, in order to get into a country,
he had to first get a visa from his country of birth – Syria.
The Immigration Officer does not believe that he will face torture
resulting in his demise if he is returned to Syria. Amnesty International
disagrees and has many cases on files:
www.web.amnesty.org/library/eng-syr/index

Syrian-Arab Republic

Scores of people were arrested during the year for political reasons,
including Syrian exiles who had voluntarily returned and others
suspected of membership of unauthorized political groups. There
was an increase in the repression of human rights defenders and
lawyers. Hundreds of political prisoners remained in prolonged detention
without trial or following sentences imposed after unfair trials.
Some were ill but were still held in harsh conditions. Ten prisoners
of conscience were sentenced to up to 10 years’ imprisonment after
unfair trials before the Supreme State Security Court (SSSC) or
the Criminal Court. For more info, www.web.amnesty.org/library/eng-syr/index

Who is a Refugee?

More than 140 governments have now signed the 1951 UN Convention
relating to the Status of Refugees (the Refugee Convention). This
Convention includes an internationally agreed definition of who
is a refugee. A refugee is a person who is outside her country of
origin and genuinely risks serious human rights abuses because of
who he/she is or what he/she believes. She cannot or will not return
because her government cannot or will not protect her.

Because of the persecution he/she would face, a refugee is entitled
to be protected against forcible return to his/her country of origin.

Even if he/she is not a refugee, Amnesty International (AI) would
also oppose the forcible return of anyone to a country where he/she
can reasonably be expected to be in danger of torture, execution
or "disappearance." Likewise, Amnesty International opposes
return to a country where a person faces the death penalty.

Is the Canadian Government Heartless?

Why can’t the Minister of Immigration issue a Ministerial Order
permitting Ammar to stay based on humanitarian and compassionate
grounds? Many lives are devastated by their decision: his young
wife, her parents, his parents and siblings, and all of his friends
here in Canada who have come to love and treasure him. He is a role
model for the youth and sending him to Syria to satisfy some bureaucratic
process is a reprehensible act.
One wonders: would an exception be made in his case, if he were
not Muslim? Is Canada a sovereign nation or the "new state"
of our next door neighbours?

Urgent Action Requested

Obtain the name and full contact information of your Member of Parliament
by calling (613) 992-4793, or by typing your postal code here.

Contact your local MP to convey your concerns. Ask him/her to contact
the Minister of Immigration to issue a ministerial order on humanitarian
and compassionate grounds to prevent the deportation of Ammar Khatib
who faces torture and possibly death should he be forced to leave
Canada for Syria.

September 8th/ 2003

"When they look at the forest,
all they see is money"

For anyone who was at the Grassy
Narrows Blockade benefit we played here in Winnipeg a little
while back, here is a picture of what Abitibi Consolidated
(a giant logging company) has done to the boreal forest in Northwestern
Ontario that the Anishinaabe (an aboriginal people here in
Canada) have traditionally depended on for survival since long before
Europeans arrived on this continent…

(photo: schled)

July 8th/2003

1. Tickets to the Grassy Narrows Blockade/ Palestinian Solidarity
shows next week are gone. If you snoozed, you losed. Rumour is there
will be some at the door at the Zoo. Beats me. I just work here.

2. Susan Sarandon, whose stolen costume-jewerly was found in a
3rd floor Royal Albert Hotel room along with a decapitated/dismembered
body here in Winnipeg last week, walked into Mondragon today and
bought a Propagandhi shirt. There is only one rational conclusion
to be drawn from this: Kowalski is a murderer.

July 7th/ 2003

Hahahahahaha!

What would summer be without some dough-head politician getting
pied in the fat fucking face?

Check out this picture of Alberta’s reigning reactionary dipshit
Premier Ralph Klein at his annual address at the Calgary
Stampede:

Haahahahaha! I love it! Fuck you Klein, you living flap-jack. Power
to the Pie Throwers!

June 18th/ 2003

Hello rejects!! Todd here (spelling, grammar and punctuation surgically
reconstructed by Chris).

Well,well..looks like we’re heading to good old Estevan Saskatchewan!
Last time i was there the Bloyds(Loyd and Blaine)were checking out
my cousin Bob’s trans am with their dudestaches and tinted glasses.
Yes, Estevan was my home away from home, and we comin home babies!!!!
My mom has already warned my cousins not to let their kids come
to the show, so bring your filthiest mouth and most swearsome attitude.
Hahaha. Actually they better be there, or we’ll hunt em down!! This
is all going down on june 28th. so iif you’re from Saskatchewan
you better be there. If you’re dead we’ll raise you from the ground
and if you’re in jail ..BREAKOUT!!!

The new Metallica is useless. Don’t bother. They can’t fool us that
easily…

The biggest famine in all modern times may be on it’s way in Ethiopia.
It seems as though no one cares. The cost to stop it?? Roughly 1.8
billion dollars. The cost of the war with Iraq (a war for humanitarian
reasons,apparently): 80 billion dollars and counting. Hmmm…..

Once again keep your eye on the Democratic Republic of Congo at
www.congopost.com. It’s vital that we don’t let Africa just stay
on the
sidelines of our thought. Check out these books on various African
countries, if you so desire…..

-Me Against My Brother
-Shadow of the Sun
-King Leopolds Ghost
-We wish to inform you that tommorrow we will be killed with our
families
-The Emperor
-The Graves Are Not Yet Full
-A People Betrayed: the role of the west in Rwanda’s genocide
-Another Day of Life
-The key to my Neighbors House

These books are all recent and should be available near you.

Adding to the spirit of "fuck the border" our little
wierdo buddy, Sam
Miller (haha) got taken in at the border on his way back to the
states after our shows and was questioned for an hour about whether
he hates the government or not. Making the world free..?

And finally, if you have sent us emails, we are getting back to
you, it
just takes a hell of a long time, especially when we go out of town.
Emails are a full time job…

see ya!!! loser. hahaha.

May 22nd/ 2003

hello wangs. the rod here.

i would like to direct your eyes for a minute over to the center of africa, to the Democratic Republic of Congo. there is an impending genocide there that unless the international community does something about it, could be even worse than the rwandan genocide of 94.

right now 4.7 million people are dead because of the wars there. CNN calls these killing “tribal “warfare but that is untrue. there are 7 or 8 different countries, as well as a bunch of western corporations, who are in the DR Congo raping the place of gold, diamonds and other natural resources. the people paying for it all is of course once again the civillians.

where is the “coalition of the willing”??? where have they been for the last 10 years as millions of people have been killed here and in the surrounding countries? this is a good indication that the troops were not in iraq for humanitarian reasons….

Please check out congopost.com, rwandapost.com. it is of extreme importance to those living and dying there that we get the word out. After years of inaction the U.N may be on the verge of doing something, we shall see…

p.s. the country music awards last night? ha. what a joke. alan jacksoff, toby “the slob” kieth and some other little wiener all in the house for their patriotic hits that claim they “don’t know the difference between iraq and iran”,and “we’ll put a boot in your ass: it’s the american way”….as the crowd boos the dixie chicks for mildly criticizing g.w. and gives these boneheads standing ovations…..indoctrination complete….welcome to your world of social censorship.

p.p.s. send me the presents geeks it’s my 30th birthday next week.

May 21st/ 2003

Ok, the Portage show is on the 6th of June at the Glesby Centre with Naked Midgets, Head Hits Concrete and Resistance. tickets are available in lots of places in portage and in winnipeg at the Mondragon Bookstore at 91 Albert St.

The Brandon show is on the 8th of June (Sunday) with Fermented Reptile, Fight the Monster and someone else. Venue still to be announced.

We are also playing the West End Cultural Centre in Winnipeg on July 18th. Fucking righteous.

Prepare.

May 5th/ 2003

We are playing Portage la Prairie, Manitoba on June 6th. It is me and Jordy-Boy’s homecoming. Brandon should be on the 7th. This will be the most exciting event in Portage la Prairie since Kristian Hambly punched Tony Simmons right in the eye on the banks of Crescent Lake in 1986. We shall destroy. I WILL POST DETAILS FOR BOTH OF THESE SHOWS (VENUES, TICKETS, BANDS, ETC) WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE, SO PLEASE HOLD OFF ON EMAILING US (OR ESPECIALLY G7) ABOUT IT.

April 18th/ 2003

From CNN:

“The United States awarded California-based Bechtel Corp., one of the world’s largest engineering, construction and development companies, a multimillion dollar contract for reconstruction in Iraq, the U.S. Agency for International Development announced Thursday. The contract provides $34.6 million for initial construction and allows for funding of up to $680 million over 18 months. The funding is “subject to congressional authority and availability,” according to a USAID statement. Riley P. Bechtel, the company’s chairman and CEO, was appointed in February to the President’s Export Council — President Bush’s advisory committee on international trade.” (emphasis added)

If it isn’t enough that the president of a company whose business is re-construction is advising Bush on policy (gee, i wonder if he favoured the bombing of Baghdad or not?), check out who else is on the board of Bechtel to confirm or deny for yourself if there is any connection between government and multi-national corporations:

George Schulz (former Secretary of State under Bush Sr)

Caspar Weinberger (former Secretary of Defense under Regan)

In an amazing coincidence, Bechtel gave 1.3 million dollars in PAC and soft money to Republicans in the last election. Huh, go figure.

Do i even need to bring up Halliburton, the company formerly presided over by current Vice-President Dick Cheney, and the windfalls Cheney enjoyed upon returning to the private sector after he awarded this company huge contracts during his initial stint as Secretary of Defense under Bush Sr.?

Do people really not see through this? Have the dots not been clearly connected with a giant felt tip marker? How can anyone dare endorse this crime of war or talk about “freedom” or “democracy” with these uncontested facts in mind?

This world is ruled by and for the rich at everybody else’s expense.

America claims to want democracy for Iraqis. Well, Iraqi’s are demonstrating their desires on the streets of Bagdhad right now. They want the American-led coalition out and they want them out now. I hope America is listening and indeed believe their own “We the People…” rhetoric.

April 15th/ 2003

Don’t forget to check our front news page every day to digest analysis from a wide variety of news sources. At the risk of understatement, allow us to suggest that CNN is not sufficient for the whole story.

In other vague news, Propagandhi takes to the stage again very soon.

March 24/ 2003

Ok, i’ve changed the front News page to
accomodate a news service courtesy of Electronic Iraq. Come back
often to read updates on the illegal invasion of Iraq.

March 22nd/ 2003 (jordy-boy speaketh yet
againeth)

well, i have to say, the protest actions here in winnipeg and around
the world have been somewhat of an inspiration to me during such
a dire time.

but, i think it is very important to take things to the next step,
hitting u.s. and british big business in the pocketbook. apparently,
this is the only language these scumbags understand…….so fuck
‘em.

for those of us not already doing so, i encourage everyone to seriously
check the links below, and begin to boycott the war machine in as
many ways possible. please circulate far and wide!!

www.adbusters.org

www.boycottamerica.org

www.boycottbush.net

www.boycottwar.net

Remember, as pro-free market US "journalist" and corporate/military
mouthpiece Thomas Friedman put it: "The hidden hand of the
market will never work without a hidden fist — McDonald’s cannot
flourish without McDonnell Douglas, the builder of the F-15. And
the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley’s technologies
is called the United States Army, Air Force and Marine Corps."
(A Manifesto for the Fast World, New York Times Magazine, March
28, 1999

(jordy-boy)

March 21st/ 2003

Word up to the thousands of high-school students in Winnipeg who
walked out of their classes today at 1pm in protest of the illegal
invasion of Iraq by the Americans and the Brits. Keep it up, young
fuckers.

There will be a hopefully massive protest down at the American
Consulate down at Portage Ave and Notre Dame tomorrow at 1pm. This
shit ain’t over yet. They want us to resign ourselves to the fact
that the war began despite global protests, as if our efforts are
futile. Global protest delayed this war. Continued, growing, more
militant protest and direct action can shut it down.

March 19th/ 2003

I’m beyond commenting on this insanity. You can find level-headed
commentary and the Ideas page from Michael
Albert. The following is a letter from an American addressed to
the brutal dictator George W. Bush:

A Letter from Michael Moore to George
W. Bush on the Eve of War

George W. Bush
1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Washington, DC

Dear Governor Bush:

So today is what you call "the moment of truth," the day
that "France and the rest of world have to show their cards
on the table." I’m glad to hear that this day has finally arrived.
Because, I gotta tell ya, having survived 440 days of your lying
and conniving, I wasn’t sure if I could take much more. So I’m glad
to hear that today is Truth Day, ’cause I got a few truths I would
like to share with you:

1. There is virtually NO ONE in America (talk radio nutters and
Fox News aside) who is gung-ho to go to war. Trust me on this one.
Walk out of the White House and on to any street in America and
try to find five people who are PASSIONATE about wanting to kill
Iraqis. YOU WON’T FIND THEM! Why? ‘Cause NO Iraqis have ever come
here and killed any of us! No Iraqi has even threatened to do that.
You see, this is how we average Americans think: If a certain so-and-so
is not perceived as a threat to our lives, then, believe it or not,
we don’t want to kill him! Funny how that works!

2. The majority of Americans — the ones who never elected you –
are not fooled by your weapons of mass distraction. We know what
the real issues are that affect our daily lives — and none of them
begin with I or end in Q. Here’s what threatens us: two and a half
million jobs lost since you took office, the stock market having
become a cruel joke, no one knowing if their retirement funds are
going to be there, gas now costs almost two dollars — the list
goes on and on. Bombing Iraq will not make any of this go away.
Only you need to go away for things to improve.

3. As Bill Maher said last week, how bad do you have to suck to
lose a popularity contest with Saddam Hussein? The whole world is
against you, Mr. Bush. Count your fellow Americans among them.

4. The Pope has said this war is wrong, that it is a SIN. The Pope!
But even worse, the Dixie Chicks have now come out against you!
How bad does it have to get before you realize that you are an army
of one on this war? Of course, this is a war you personally won’t
have to fight. Just like when you went AWOL while the poor were
shipped to Vietnam in your place.

5. Of the 535 members of Congress, only ONE (Sen. Johnson of South
Dakota) has an enlisted son or daughter in the armed forces! If
you really want to stand up for America, please send your twin daughters
over to Kuwait right now and let them don their chemical warfare
suits. And let’s see every member of Congress with a child of military
age also sacrifice their kids for this war effort. What’s that you
say? You don’t THINK so? Well, hey, guess what — we don’t think
so either!

6. Finally, we love France. Yes, they have pulled some royal screw-ups.
Yes, some of them can be pretty damn annoying. But have you forgotten
we wouldn’t even have this country known as America if it weren’t
for the French? That it was their help in the Revolutionary War
that won it for us? That our greatest thinkers and founding fathers
– Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, etc. — spent many years in Paris
where they refined the concepts that lead to our Declaration of
Independence and our Constitution? That it was France who gave us
our Statue of Liberty, a Frenchman who built the Chevrolet, and
a pair of French brothers who invented the movies? And now they
are doing what only a good friend can do — tell you the truth about
yourself, straight, no b.s. Quit pissing on the French and thank
them for getting it right for once. You know, you really should
have traveled more (like once) before you took over. Your ignorance
of the world has not only made you look stupid, it has painted you
into a corner you can’t get out of.

Well, cheer up — there IS good news. If you do go through with
this war, more than likely it will be over soon because I’m guessing
there aren’t a lot of Iraqis willing to lay down their lives to
protect Saddam Hussein. After you "win" the war, you will
enjoy a huge bump in the popularity polls as everyone loves a winner
– and who doesn’t like to see a good ass-whoopin’ every now and
then (especially when it ‘s some third world ass!). So try your
best to ride this victory all the way to next year’s election. Of
course, that’s still a long ways away, so we’ll all get to have
a good hardy-har-har while we watch the economy sink even further
down the toilet!

But, hey, who knows — maybe you’ll find Osama a few days before
the election! See, start thinking like THAT! Keep hope alive! Kill
Iraqis — they got our oil!!

Yours,

Michael Moore
www.michaelmoore.com

March 8th/ 2003

-Hey fuck, Robert Fisk is coming to town next week. This guy kicks
some serious investigative journalistic ass. Check it:

Jews for a Just Peace (Winnipeg) and CKUW 95.9
fm present:

An Evening with British Journalist ROBERT FISK
"IRAQ, THE MEDIA, AND THE WAR ON TERROR"
THURSDAY, MARCH 13, 7:30 PM
University of Winnipeg, Riddell Cafeteria

Fisk is an award-winning reporter for The Independent newspaper
in London. He served as Middle East correspondent of the Times (London)
from 1976 to 1987 and for The Independent since 1987. Fisk received
the 1998 Amnesty International UK Press Award. He is a seven-time
winner of the British International Journalist of the Year Award
(most recently in 1995 and 1996). Fisk currently lives in Beirut.
His writing appears in The Nation, The Independent, and other publications
worldwide.

-In other news, i’ve spent the last week recording
Malefaction for a release this spring on G7. This is some
heavy shizznat. Their best stuff yet. It will bulldoze you. On a
related note, these guys use an unusually large amount of toilet
paper. It’s weird.

February 7th/ 2003

Please read the article from the Electronic Intifada on the front news page concerning Colin Powell’s address to the Security Council.

These fuckers must be stopped. It may just seem like some far-off place now that has no effect on our lives in Canada, but how long until these expansion-obsessed control freaks turn their gaze north for, say, our water, which is fast becoming a commodity only second to oil in value and which is what we have alot of?

So stand up for the people of Iraq. Dropping bombs on their infrastructure, destroying their schools, their hospitals, their sewage treatment facilites, isn’t going to help them unseat that fucking Hussein bastard. We should cocentrate our efforts on a regime change in the United States. Maybe the UN should pass a resolution authorizing the use of force to remove Bush.

There is a global demostration for peace on February 15th in many cities across the planet, including Winnipeg. Find out if there is one in your town and hit the fucking streets. NO WAR.

January 29th/ 2003

So i had this dream before we left for Calishitnia that our plane crashed in Denver. Shortly after leaving Denver, two planes collided over the city and crashed into the suburbs. Friends offered that they would’ve been more impressed with my extra sensory perception had i actually been on one of the downed planes. I will set fire to their fucking prom.

Anyways, me and the Rod got back from the Evil Empire the other day. We had lots of fun down there despite the fact that Toby played the old bait-and-switch game on Super Bowl Sunday and effectively had us banned from the festivities. But yeah, it was great. AYCE reunited during our set to bask in the glory of a live rendition of Technocracy and the aforementioned Toby had his weak little American ass rescued from the wrath of my Great White Northern Pipeage by a crack security team moments before i turned his fancy fucking lapels into a goddamn hang-man’s noose. The Helmet-cam does not lie. Many thanks and shouts out to everybody at Fat, all the bands and all the party-animals who made it all fun. Floyd even gave us Hockey-Jesus!

Jordy-Boy is, once again, AWOL in America. If anybody finds him, can you please wash him and put him on a bus to Winnipeg, Ok? Thanks.

January 23rd/ 2003

Tomorrow morning we leave this freezing hellhole to venture into the not-so-freezing hellhole known as San Franshitsco. Superbowl Sunday. Steve Earle. Napalm Death. Warmongering fascist empire. Open bar. Should be interesting.

January 5th/ 2003

Welcome to another new year on the planet earth. Rest assured that promise, hope and progress will not clutter the agenda as war-mongers and money-grubbers lurch predictably forward to a variety of wars in a variety of theatres.

Anyways…

In propagandhi news: we have begun working on a series of recordings that will appear as an album this summer or fall featuring our versions of other people’s masterpieces whose greatness has been understated or even forgotten over the years. Our first daring foray into righting these wrongs has been to record our version of Corrosion of Conformity’s Technocracy. If i may be so bold, i will suggest that we have done this unbelievable opus full and complete justice. It is a childhood dream come true.

Also, for those interested:

Facts from the Israeli Front Lines: Denial Is Not Good for the Jews
Presentation by Ronnee Jaeger
- Israeli Citizen
- Founding Member, Machsom (Checkpoint) Watch
- Winnipeg Talmud Torah Graduate
Wednesday, January 8th
7:30 p.m.
Adult Lounge
Asper Jewish Community Campus

December 21st/ 2002 (Jordy Boy speaks!)

…..uh, so…uh, yeah….uh, oh yeah….

the last of the scabs were lightly picked off my chin earlier today
(that’s right, those weren’t zits to any of the 5 people i’ve happened
to see over the past three weeks). the injuries were incurred while
my chin was dragging down the streets of manhattan in total fuckin’
awe of seeing mindblowing players such as dennis chambers, dave
weckl, billy cobham and rashied ali…..all in a matter of six days
(95% of the time which was spent desperately looking for a spot
to piss).

well, being exposed to that kind of shit can leave you either wanting
to hang up your boots, or to be inspired to try convince the guitar
section to explore the fascinating world of jazz fusion.

ha.

actually, my scabs (now attached to the corresponding ticket stubs)
will inspire me to explore all ends in an attempt to execute and
deliver new variations, harder and more furiously thundering, to
what we know as "the fast beat".

AND with a fresh drum set to work in, the plans will be even more
of a pleasure to work on. (yee-fuckin’-haw!! no mention of the make
here, of course, because, of course, we have zero endorsements.
but a big "seeyah" goes out to pearl and their offshore
operations. fuck you, you fucking goofs….)
Ol’ Red did stick around for awhile, but it has taken a severe beating
over the last eight years…..

……so as i was leaving the airport in nyc, i saw that the new
york times had a cover story announcing the appointment of well-known
international state terrorist Henry Kissenger (you think 3000 deaths
to innocent civilians is bad, try hundeds of thousands of civilian
deaths, yeah, that’s right, 100′s of 1000′s….) to oversee an "independant"
inquiry into issues surrounding 9/11. since then he has resigned
from the position…..but here are my odds for who i think could
likely be his replacement:

George Bush Sr. – 2:1
Trent Lott – 3:1
Janet Reno – 5:1
Nancy Reagan – 15:1
Jesse Ventura – 40:1
Ronald Reagan – 100:1 (hey, anything is possible, it would even
kind of make sense, no??)

…..to get the dirt on kissenger, visit:

www.thirdworldtraveler.com

anyhoo, it’s time for another soy-nog and spiced rum……..
in reflecting upon another crap-taculous year, each passing one
increasingly an embarrassing testimony to 99% of humanity and 100%
of the world being fucked over by the rest, i wish a merry GOD DAMNED
xmas to ye all stinky fools, and a thrashing new year.

(jordy)

November 27th/ 2002

Ok, people have been complaining again about a lack of updates
about what we’ve been up to. It’s funny, cuz when Jordy Boy was
trying to justify his leaving G7 earlier this fall, he was all like
"Y’know, i want to free up my time to help more with things
like the Propagandhi website" and "i want to concentrate
on practicing drums more". Funny, cuz i don’t see no updates
with Jordy-Boy’s name on them and where is Jordy-Boy now? Is he
in his basment practicing rudiments for hours on end? No, he is
in New York, sitting in a candle-lit bathtub, reading poetry to
Billy Sheehan.

Me and the Rod forge ahead in the meantime in our respective dungeons,
raising the bar inch by inch, waiting for the day we can unleash
our fury upon the ears of planet earth again. That day will not
be soon, but when it comes, you are fucked. I mean that.

Other things of interest (?): Todd the Rod recently brought home
a gold and silver medal from a Jiu-Jitsu tournament in Minneapolis.
Way to go, Killer! Jordy Boy and Christoph both had birthdays that,
in true fashion, were duly ignored by everyone but themselves. Christoph
has been selling everything he owns in what appears to be a pathological
attempt to build a fully functional recording studio in the septic
tank he calls his house (plans are in motion for Christoph to record
an upcoming Greg MacPherson ep and a new record by the mighty Malefaction).

What else? New stuff up in the Ideas section. Couple new things
in the Armoury section.

Oh, yeah, i think we are playing the Fat Wreck Chords 10 or 11
or 12 year anniversary party in San Francisco in January. It’s a
show featuring the first four bands that released stuff on Fat.
Apparently we were one of those four. I think it’s supposed to be
at the Great American Music Hall (will we even be allowed into a
place with a name like that?). Don’t know anything about tickets,
so if you have questions, email Fat Wreck Chords (www.fatwreck.com).

And finally, ciitizens of the United States must remember that
it is their constitutional right to make Bush one of the 11,000
Americans that will be killed by a gun this year.

No war against Iraq!

(chris)

October 28th/ 2002

Do not walk, but instead run to see Michael Moore’s new
documentary "Bowling
For Columbine". One of the most powerful pieces i’ve ever
seen. If the term "emotional rollercoaster" ever meant
anything, this film is it.

Speaking of powerful, all Winnipeger’s must venture out to the
Collective Cabaret on Osborne Street tomorrow night (tuesday, october
29th), to see Hamilton’s WarsawPack.
Last time they were in town, they tore the place apart. Another
must-see.

October 25th/ 2002

Howdy!! Y’all been waiting for a time to express your livid outrage
against an out-of-control military machine operating for the interests
of big business?!?!

GOD DAMN FUCKING "A" RIGHTS YOU HAVE!!

This Saturday (Oct.26th) people from around the world will be joining
to protest the warmongering fuckheads in the Bush 2 administration
and in the US Congress (and their spineless international allies).

Please visit:

www.internationalanswer.org

www.notinourname.net

for info regarding protest actions in your area.

AMERICA NEEDS A REGIME CHANGE!!

In Winnipeg, people are meeting for 2:30 PM at legislative building……heehee….

(Jordy-Boy)

October 17th/ 2002

I wanted to share the following letter with you, from our friend
Shira of the Canada-Palestine
Support Network, concerning our very close friend Paul who is
doing work in Palestine with the International
Solidarity Movement. To say we’re worried about his safety would
be an understatement…

"Hi everyone,

For anyone who doesn’t know, CanPalNet’s own Paul Burrows is
currently in the West Bank working on the International Solidarity
Movement ‘Olive Harvest Campaign’. The intention of the campaign,
is for internationals from around the world to join in the harvest
with
Palestinian farmers who are often targeted on their own land by
settler violence. Many farmers have been killed this way, others
have been injured and still more are simply driven from their lands
and forced to watch settlers claim the crops for themselves. This
olive harvest is going to be crucial. The Palestinian economy has
been systematically crushed by the Israeli government. The vast
majority of people are unemployed, poverty has become the norm,
and childhood malnutrition runs rampant. The olive harvest, a cornerstone
of the Palestinian economy, simply can not be lost.

Paul has been in the West Bank now for four days. For the last two,
he and 12 other international have been stationed in the town of
Yasuf (pop. 1,750), in the largely agricultural Sulfit region of
the West Bank. Yasuf is surrounded by four illegal Israeli settlements
which wish to claim the ancestral farmlands of the people of Yasuf
as their own. The first day the internationals were there, was apparently
uneventful. They had a productive day of harvesting with a local
family. They ate, talked, learned some arabic and played with the
children without seeing a single settler.

However, when Paul called early in the morning on their second day
(late last night here), they were in the midst of a dangerous
confrontation. A group of five armed settlers from the nearby settlement
of Ta’Puah, had begun attacking a local family in their fields before
the internationals even arrived for the day. They had been shooting
and were now throwing stones to drive the family away. When the
internationals arrived, they formed a line in front of the family,
the police were called and they sent a spokesperson to attempt to
talk to the settlers. When Paul called, he told me that the settlers
were on a hill above them continuing to throw stones at everyone
and were pointing a gun at the American woman who was speaking to
them. Apparently the conversation went something like this…

Settlers: (throwing stones and pointing guns) "get out of here"

ISM rep: (arms spread in sign of nonaggression) "we just want
to make peace"

Settlers: "We want peace to – get off our land" (continue
throwing
stones and pointing guns)

Paul said they felt like a bunch of sitting ducks as they stood
in a line with nothing to shield them from the rocks that just kept
flying. When I asked Paul if he felt that presence of internationals
had a significant effect on the settler he said, "they seem
to shoot a
little less, that’s all".

Not too much later, the military and police did actually show up.
One of the settlers got irritated and shot into the group of
internationals (no one was hurt). The police disarmed him and sent
all the settlers back home. They then declared the olive grove a
closed military zone and told the Palestinians and international
they were not allowed to be there. When they protested that this
was in fact the families own land, the soldiers physically forced
the Palestinians away. Last I heard the internationals were refusing
to leave in a sign of solidarity with the people who are being robbed
by settlers and soldiers, two arms of Israeli government policy,
of their own land and only source of income.

As soon as Paul is able to, he will send out his own updates which
everyone can access along with photographs etc…
at http://www.a-zone.org/palestine/

Also, find below an associated press article which outlines
some of what Palestinian farmers have been facing and what internationals
hope to be able to do to help.

Take Care All

Shira

Associated Press
14 October 2002

About 120 American activists heading to West Bank
to support Palestinians during olive harvest.

NEW YORK — Kate Rafael is leaving Friday for a month
in the West Bank, joining about 120 activists who plan to help the

Israeli settlers have harassed and attacked Arab olive-pickers.

"I’m going to try to increase the protection for the
Palestinian people as they try to complete their harvest, which
is
incredibly important to their economy," Rafael, 42, said
Monday.

The Jewish woman from Berkeley, California, said she
is opposed to Israel’s "brutal" occupation and feels a
"personal
responsibility to take an active role in helping bring justice
and peace" to the region.

Most of the activists, who hail from the United
States, Britain, Germany, Japan and other nations, are linked to
the
International Solidarity Movement and plan to be in
the northern West Bank until mid-November.

Activists from this pro-Palestinian group gained
attention this spring when they tried to enter the besieged Church
of
Nativity in Bethlehem during the 39-day standoff
between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian gunmen inside.

Israeli police have confirmed that Jewish settlers
have harassed Palestinians gathering olives or interfered with their
work several times in the last couple weeks.

On Oct. 6, a 22-year-old Palestinian man was shot and
killed while harvesting olives near the village of Aqraba.
Palestinians and B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group, claim
the
shots were fired by settlers from the nearby settlement
of Itamar.

One settler was arrested after the incident and six
others were detained and questioned, said Gil Kleiman, a police
spokesman. Six weapons were also confiscated.
The arrested settler was released a few hours later
and no charges were filed, he said.

B’Tselem claims that the day before the shooting,
armed settlers from the Yizhar settlement beat and threw stones
at Arabs
harvesting olives in another area near the town
of Inbus.

In at least two incidents in early October,
Palestinians found Jewish settlers harvesting the olives from Arab-owned
property, B’Tselem said in a letter sent to Israeli
authorities that was based on Palestinian eyewitness accounts and
posted
on the group’s Web site.

After Palestinians filed complaints with Israeli
authorities, security forces came to the olive groves. But in one
case,
they didn’t intervene for an entire day, and in
another the settlers continued picking the olives as soon as the
Israeli
soldiers left, B’Tselem said.

The activists hope their presence will prevent any
more trouble or violence during the olive harvest, which runs through
mid-November.

Producing olives and olive oil is critical part of the
Palestinian economy and culture and is a major source of income
for many
families.

The activists also aim to protest the destruction of
tens of thousands of olive trees by the Israeli military and settlers.

Most of the activists will be living in rural areas
near the cities of Tulkarem and Qalqiliya, according to Zaid Khalil,
a
New Yorker who has been in the territories since
August organizing the campaign. Many will be staying with Arab families.

Dunya A., a 39-year-old from Boston whose mother is
Jewish and father Arab, said she is making the trip because she
believes
Israel’s occupation is a violation of international
law and inflicting great suffering on the Palestinian people.

"I want to show solidarity with the Palestinians and
resist the occupation in a non-violent way," she said, asking
that she not be further identified out of concern that Israeli security
officials may deny her entry into the country.

Allowing the Palestinians "to establish a viable state
is the only tenable future for that part of the world," she
said.

As an American citizen, Dunya also says she wants to
register her dissent with the economic and political support the
United
States provides Israel, which receives more than $3
billion a year in American aid.

Raised in a family with strong Zionist views, Rafael
said her parents and siblings don’t necessarily agree with her,
but that
none have tried to dissuade her from making the
trip.

"Maybe none of them agree with what I’m doing, but
they realize that I’m doing it out of a deep moral obligation,"
she
said.

"The values that we were raised with are that what you
believe, you had to act on. You can’t just sit around."

September 2nd/ 2002 – Athens, Greece

- propagandhi to relocate to Athens

August 31st/2002

European tour update

- todd the rod banned from the vatican for visible ballsack. still
can’t figure out how jord got in.
- chris fractures foot in 6-5 loss to F.C. Leece in football (that’s
soccer to us stupid north americans). climbs cliff to the acropolis
using his fingernails.
- propagandhi to relocate to budapest?

August 14th/ 2002

Shit, it has been a while, huh? I kinda got
sidetracked helping the weirdos in Head
Hits Concrete record some shizznat. Heavy duty. Will people
be calling me Bob Rock? No. Knob Sock? Yes.

Ok, all people in the vicinity of Winnipeg simply *must* go the
West End Cultural Centre tomorrow night (August 15th) to see WarsawPack.
They are the best new band in Canada. I fuck with you not.

We leave in, like, two days for europe. We are so excited our pants
are stuck to your leg.

July 17th/ 2002

european tour dates are up here.

July 11th/ 2002

Here is an "essay" submitted
to us by a back-packing dot-commer working for anexxa.com (a company
whose business it is to make money off of other people’s efforts
and sacrifices by monopolizing domain names), who draws bizarre,
if not offensive, analogies between delinquent accounts and rape
in the hopes of convincing you that propagandhi are capitalist pigs.
We were planning on paying this pirate with a box of 37,500 pennies
in April of 2003. Now i’m not so sure we’ll be so courteous.

Anyways,
you can read his "essay" and judge for yourself.

Title: "Is Propagandhi a capitalist pig?"

Wow, now that I have your attention….. Chris invited me to write
this"essay" and he’d post it on his site. Interested to see
if it’ll be put up in full and what the surrounding Into or Reply will be…..

Well, here goes:

Have you ever asked yourself how much you are like George Bush?
Have you ever wondered if your role model is actually a George Bush,
but without the media power? Well, let me tell you my saga…..

I am in the business of Domain Traffic Aggregation. That sounds
great but what is it? Well, I get to fund my travel bug backpacking
bills by buying domains that have been abandoned by their previous
owners but that still have traffic. I bought a pile of abandoned
domains in an odd-lot from a company that had been giving them away.
I bought over 100. Most of them were junk names that meant nothing,
some were diamonds in the rough. But that was the deal. Buy them
all, junk and all. After buying the domains, a couple of people
emailed me saying "hey that’s my name, I want it". I have
no interest in being a cybersquatter so we’d work out a reasonable
price. There’s jerks out there who point the domains to Adult sites
and demand $5000 to $10000 for each domain, but I’m happy enough
just generating a small amount of money off traffic on domains no
one wants. One of the domains in the group that I had bought was
propagandhi.com. After going through the pile o’junk, finally a
decent name. I figured I could link it to record sales or something.
Then, before I had done anything with the domain, Derek Hogue from
G7WelcomingCommittee.com emailed me asking: "Perhaps we can
negotiate a fair deal for transferring the domain, no?"

After a few emails back and forth, we agreed on $375. Not much,
but I’m not in the business of holding domains hostage.

Derek said the band didn’t want to send the money first since they didn’t know who I was, but that the band was trustworthy and reliable.

I checked out a few of the interviews and writeups on Chris and Propagandhi and thought "hey, looks like a bunch of cool guys
doing something active in this world". So I let the domain
be transferred to Propagandhi with the agreement that the $375 would
be sent immediately after via paypal.com

Well, that was in April. After a month and lots of emails to Derek,
I called him. He says that Chris is in charge and passed the phone
to Chris. Chris says "don’t call me, we’ll send you the money
soon" but in a pissed off tone like "when hell freezes
over". Well, maybe I’m wrong, after all, I don’t know if that’s
how he usually talks on the phone. I honour his request not to call
him, but after another month, and a few emails to Derek, still nothing.
Hmm, ok, I’m not stupid. Either Chris has just played me or he’s
busy. Since he’s got a good rep on the ‘net and lots of fans it
must be the latter. Ok, another month, and by now Derek has given
me Chris’s email address but Chris isn’t replying to any. Geez.
Ok, I must have been wrong. I must be stupid. More emails to Chris
and Derek and nothing.

I send this email this to Derek and get a reply!

> I have sent repeated emails but have not had a single reply
from Chris.
> I am begining to wonder about the professionalism that you
represented
> Chris to have.
>
> Would you let me know if Chris is in the office?
>
> Thank you,
>
> Noel

And Derek replies!!!

"I never represented any professionalism on Chris or Propagandhi’s behalf. I said that they had a reputation as reliable and trustworthy
people, as they do. Chris has been absent from the office for some
time. The band is very busy as of late. Sorry I can’t help ya more.
Derek"

To which I say:

"Odd answer – "professional" should be substitutable
for "reliable and trustworthy". Anyway, I’m wondering
if I should write an essay on the irony of an idealistic group that,
when given the opportunity, seems to take its capitalistic turn
of taking advantage of its power in a situtation when it appears
that it can "get away with it". Reminds me of the survey
of American college students that found that a large percentage
of frat members would sexually assault an unconscious female student
if they were 100% certain they would not be charged. Might make
an interesting read.
Noel"

Which brings us here. This stupid essay. Do you remember in High
School or College reading Animal Farm by Orwell? Remember the pigs
that are the oppressed but when they get power they oppress the
other animals (or was it the other way around). Anyway, the message
was power corrupts. If you don’t have it, you complain about its
abuses (usually rightly so) but as soon as you have the, you have
the natural urge to practice those same abuses. Another Psch class
I was once in referred to a survey that said approximately half
of males surveyed would rape if they could get away with it. Similar
message. Power corrupts.

I mean, if Chris didn’t like me owning the domain, just say "you
shit, I’m going to take you to court" or more appropriately
go and invoke the Universal Domain Resolution Process. But instead,
it looks like he said "hmm, if we lie to this guy and say we’re
going to pay him, we can have the domain and then just screw him".

So, where does that leave me? I’m still hoping to be proven wrong,
but it looks like power has corrupted Chris Hannah at Propagandhi.
We agreed on a fair price, they asked for the domain to be transferred
first, and now, with no explanation as to why, they haven’t paid.

Instead I get an invitation to write this essay and Chris says
he’ll post in on the website:

"you write it. i’ll post it on our website.
chris"

By the way,here’s the link to that survey:

http://www.holysmoke.org/sdhok/rape019.htm
"Even more horrendous on a scale of 1-5, 1 being most likely,
when asked if *THEY* personally would rape if the could get away with
it 51% fell between 1 and 2, and 21% fell on 3. "

- Noel Thomas

July 9th/ 2002

This just in:

Jordy-boy drops bomb. Christoph’s brain melts. Todd the Rod waits
on porch for 2 hours loving his own riffs.

More details as story develops.

June 22th/ 2002

Man, talk about last minute. I guess someone dropped the ball somewhere
and tickets for the Calgary show weren’t available in record stores
there until yesterday. So hopefully more than 20 people show up
and hopefully those 20 people didn’t get fucking mugged by Ticketmaster,
because that company should be summarily tried and executed for
highway robbery. Once again, fuck Ticketmaster. All indie record
stores should have the tix by now.

June 20th/ 2002

Posted a very interesting and important article by Sean Gonsalves
regarding treatment of anti-capitalist globalization protesters
by the media on the ideas page. Check
it out before the show next week.

And with that in mind, wherever you are check out g8.activist.ca
for news and info on the Summit and related events in your locale.
It’s your future the powers-that-be are fucking with. Shut ‘em down.

June 17th/ 2002

Here’s an interesting item from the land of the free and the home
of the brave…

"Graduating students at Ohio State University were told
that they would be expelled and arrested if they turned their backs
on the speaker at their commencement ceremony: George W.
Bush. They were alerted that dozens of staff members and
police officers would be watching the stands, as well as the Secret
Service."

More at: http://www.turnyourbackonbush.com/

June 10th/ 2002

Anybody who was at our last Calgary show in the fall remember what
we played? We want to make sure we don’t do the exact same friggin’
set for y’all, so if you know, drop us an email. thanks!

(chris)

June 6th/ 2002

Ok, it’s short notice, but we’re playing in Calgary on June
26th at Macewan Hall. This will be a fundraiser for the inevitable
legal defence costs that will be incurred in both Kananaskis and
Ottawa during the protests against the G8. More info as it becomes
available.

(chris)

May 26th/ 2002

-Wow, Curtis Joseph must’ve eaten a Vector Energy Bar before the
game last night.

-So our friends in the awesome hardcore band Hiretsukan
are going on a North American tour in June and July and need help
with solid, reliable shows in these cities: Washington DC, Virginia,
North Carolina, West Virginia, Ohio, Texas, San Diego CA, Santa
Cruz CA, Oregon and Washington. Can you help? If you can, please
send me an e-mail
and i’ll forward your info to the band, ok? Thanks!

(chris)

May 20th/ 2002

Anyone who remembers and took interest in the first song on the
last record we made may want to check out the Ideas
page today. The song was called Mate Ka Moris Ukun Rasik Kan,
which translated from Timorese to english means "life or death…independence".
Well, today is the day East Timor finally acheived it. From
Cynthia Peter’s commentary…

"On May 20th this year, take a moment to celebrate with
the East Timorese. As activists, our lives are crowded with crises.
We constantly sift through devastating news and make impossible
judgements about how best to respond. Winning seems impossible.
It is tempting to consider giving up. But the East Timorese did
not. They organized. They waited. They eventually won…"

Fuckin’ rights, we say.

In other news, we’ve been getting complaints about not including
much news about the band in the updates. So here you go:

-todd’s scabs on his face and ears are finally beginning to heal.
-jord continues his spiral into anger and reclusion.
-chris updates website. Feeds cat. Film at 11.

May 15th/ 2002

The almighty Mico play tomorrow night at the Collective
on Osborne. All Winnipeggers should be there.

And Leafs rule, again.

(chris)

May 8th/ 2002

A really excellent new article (courtesy
of Znet) up on the Ideas page by Aziz Choudry. Is it absurd
to draw comparisons between Canada and Apartheid South Africa or
the behaviour of the state of Israel in the Occupied Territories?
Read and decide for yourself.

(chris)

May 1st/ 2002

Mayday! In celebration, off your boss.

In other news, Warsaw Pack ruled. Razor ruled. Voivod
ruled. Motorhead ruled but should learn to treat their opening
bands with more respect, especially when they can blow you away.

And hahahaha to all you loser Islanders fans. Leafs rule, ok.

That is all. As you were.

(chris)

April 24th/ 2002

Hi. Once again, i will be away for the next
few days. Please refrain from sending emails to us until Monday,
April 29th. Thanks! Not only will i be seeing the almight Warsaw
Pack in Guelph, i will be seeing the almighty Motorhead
with not only the almight Razor opening, but the almighty
Voivod with the almighty Snake back on vocals. Unbelievable.
Somebody pinch me.

Addtionally, please take a few minutes to read this
article by Naomi Klein that appeared in today’s Globe
and Mail. Very important food for thought for those of us who oppose
the state of Israel’s blatant, brutal and illegal occupation of
Palestine and at the same time, detest the idiotic ideology of anti-semitism.
Check it out.

April 15th/ 2002

Hi. No one will be around here this week.
Please refrain from sending emails to us until Saturday, April 20th.
Thanks!

April 4th/ 2002

Here’s an email i received from Paul Burrows,
a member of a local Palestinian support group, asking for people
in the vicinity to speak out against the censoring/ slandering of
a local human-rights journalist covering the conflict in Palestine.
Please give it some serious consideration:

Greetings Folks,

I would like to appeal to everyone to take the time to read what
follows, and more importantly, write a letter, or make a phone call,
to
the Manitoban to express concern.

I have come to view the events at the Manitoban newspaper over the
last
few weeks as indicative of a serious "caving in" to pressure
from
pro-Israel individuals or groups. A worst case scenario, is that
the
actions of the student newspaper reflect more than just a fear of
"rocking the boat," a fear of upsetting reactionary elements
in the
Jewish community, a fear of losing one’s careerist "respectability."
The Manitoban’s treatment of Krishna Lalbiharie, in my opinion,
also
reflects a lack of fundamental journalistic integrity, and a kind
of
"witch hunt" mentality (i.e., who can distance themselves
from a source
of controversy first…?).

A concerted Zionist or pro-Israel response to a March 13 article
by
Lalbiharie has been waged, in which no less than 8 letters and 3
opinions pieces have been published in two issues (March 20 and
April 3)
– attacking not only the ideas expressed in Lalbiharie’s column,
but
engaging also in a smear campaign designed to discredit the person.
The
smear campaign, Lalbiahrie’s reputation, the knee-jerk charge of
"racism" and "hate-mongering" which ANY criticism
of Israel generates,
and so on, have become the focus of discussion — at a time when
the
killing in the Occupied Territories has reached unprecedented levels,
the IDF is engaging in summary executions of prisoners, it is targeting
medical workers and ambulances, it is shooting at journalists and
foreign peace activists, and the Knesset is openly discussing "transfer"
of the Palestinians (an act that is universally recognized as "ethnic
cleansing".)

It is absolutely outrageous that the focus of attention has become
Lalbiharie himself, rather than the truth or validity of his criticism
of Israel. Spin-off "coverage" and letters on Lalbiharie
in the Free
Press, CBC, and other mainstream outlets, has focused on everything
but
the argument. The mainstream media had no interest in Lalbiharie
for
the last ten years, while he was covering human rights violations
in
East Timor, Yugoslavia, Iraq, and elsewhere. Now, suddenly, it is
newsworthy to focus on allegations of plagiarism and bigotry levelled
against him by Zionist groups on prime-time television! Genocide
in
East Timor was a non-issue. Half a million dead children in Iraq
was
irrelevant. But personally discrediting a long-time, solitary voice
of
dissident journalism? Personally attacking one of the few tireless
critics of Canadian and U.S. foreign policy in this city? Apparently,
that’s news.

Let me close by saying that I submitted a lengthy (1800 word) response
to the Manitoban on Thursday, March 28th, six days before the next
issue
was due to be released (i.e., well ahead of their deadline). I even
spoke to two people at the Toban office, and asked for someone involved
in "features" to call me at home. No one contacted me.
They claimed on
Tuesday, April 2nd that my e-mail submission had been lost or delayed
in
cyberspace, and due to "miscommunication" the proper editor
had not
received it in time, and thus, it would not make it into this week’s
issue. They also claimed that it was too long, and would need to
be cut
in half! Amazingly, however, the very next day there were 7 more
letters and an additional opinion piece attacking Lalbiharie, including
charges of racism, printed in the Toban. All told, there has been,
collectively, about 4000 words of pro-Israeli mythology, and personal
slander, printed by the student newspaper. Not a single defence
of
Lalbiharie has been run (addressing either the issue of Israel itself,
or the shameful ad hominem attacks of his opponents). My solitary
article on the Israel-Palestine conflict, however (and the ONLY
rebuttal
submitted to my knowledge), was "lost," or mysteriously
failed to reach
the right desk. My solitary article was considered "too long"
to print
– but the Toban has had space to publish eleven different people,
taking up at least double the number of column inches, in order
to trash
Lalbiharie, and re-assert the dominant, pro-Israeli framework found
in
the corporate media!!

For people interested in the fledgling Palestine Support group in
Winnipeg, it is critical that some kind of organized, letter-writing
response be made. Even short (two or three paragraph) letters to
the
Toban are worthwhile , though longer pieces would also be lovely.
The
next issue (April 10) will be the last one of the year. Letters
(or
longer pieces) should be submitted today or tomorrow to:

toban@cc.umanitoba.ca

And just to be safe, send it simultaneously to:

toban_opinions@hotmail.com

We wouldn’t want your letter to mysteriously disappear….

Of course, we need not confine ourselves to the Manitoban. There
are
other outlets and forums to utilize or contest….

Again, I remind people that the next Palestine support meeting is
Sunday
(April 7) at 2pm at Mondragon. It is critical that we get moving
on our
local organizing, and join with other social justice voices across
the
country to begin forming a national-level federation. Hopefully,
we can
make tentative steps towards this by communicating, supporting,
linking
up with similar groups in Vancouver (like CanPalNet at
http://www.canpalnet.ca ) and Toronto (folks working with al-Awda
http://www.al-awda.org ) and other cities. Any further contact names,
numbers, and websites across the country that people have would
be most
welcome.

See you Sunday.

Paul Burrows

April 3rd/ 2002

Please check out the Ideas
page for a very interesting perspective from an Israeli reservist
(one of many refusing to serve in the Occupied Territories) entitled
An Open Letter to Jewish Americans.

On a very different note, i had the distinct
pleasure last night to see Rik Emmet, formerly of Canadian hard
rock legends, Triumph, perform at the tackiest venue in Winnipeg,
the Coliseum. It ruled. This man is a guitar and vocal god. The
set included Fight the Good Fight, Magic Power and an unreal rendition
of Midsummer’s Daydream. No Never Surrender unfortunately, but you
can’t have everything. I can’t believe this guy has play the fucking
bar circuit. There is no justice in the music industry.

(Christoph)

March 16th/ 2002

-excellent new piece up on the Ideas page
by Ed Herman.

-we are going to Europe again. Southern Europe
this time. We have to choose between Spain or Greece. AAARRGH! I
want both! Keep an eye out on the Shows page for news as it develops!

-we have a new song that will destroy all
posers. get the fuck outta the way.

March 4th/ 2002

Some words from Todd the Rod today:

I am extremely, extremely sad to say that
my 98 year old granny Barbara "Dean" Shockey died of pneumonia
4 days after shopping with her buddies on a freezing winter day.
There is no one i have ever loved or respected more than my dear
old granny. She was born in Saskatchewan before it was even called
Saskatchewan and went through the "dirty 30′s" and years
of here friends and family dying. Never giving in to greed, religion,
prejudice or stupidity, she lived as i hope to…goodbye granny.
Treat this world right, people. My granny is in that dirt now R.I.P.
(Todd)

February 25th/ 2002

McGretzky is still a sell-out goof, but that game was sweet. If only someone in the stands had the presence of mind to assassinate Dick Cheney during the medal ceremonies, it would’ve been a perfect finish to the tournament.

New report up on the ideas page regarding the Pentagon’s plan to tell more lies, only now without the pretense of telling the truth. Anybody got a plane i could borrow?

February 22nd/ 2002

In 1984, i was 13. I was sitting in my room in Portage la Prairie crying because my mom wouldn’t drive me into Winnipeg and take me to the Venom/ Slayer show at the Rendezvous. A full 18 years later, this past Wednesday in Calgary, me and Jordy Boy finally did it. We saw Slayer. With Lombardo. Fucking awesome.

February 17th/ 2002

Sweden 0, Canada 11. Now that’s more like it. I’ve always said “if you want something done right, get a winnipegger to do it”. Who needs a bunch of over-paid NHLer’s when you got true amateur atheletes like Jennifer Botteril tearing shit up and putting Swedes in their place? It’s funny, you don’t hear the Canadian women’s team crying about not being used to playing without a red-line or adjusting to a larger ice-surface, do you? Just the millionaires on the men’s team.

February 16th/ 2002

Sweden 5, Canada 2. Maybe Gretzky shoulda spent more time thinking about hockey than about all the McMoney he was making stuffing Big Macs and McFries into his McFucking face. i can’t believe i used to worship this sellout goof.

February 14th/ 2002

Valentines Day and no valentines for christoph.

Noam Chomsky and his Turkish publisher were cleared of patently Orwellian charges of “terrorism” yesterday (read more here). Surreal.

So yeah, that news is better than a dumb old valentine, anyway. Hmph.

February 13th/ 2002

Anybody hear about the FBI’s statement to the U.S. Congress yesterday that identifited organizations like the Animal Liberation Front and Earth First! as “emerging domestic terrorist threats”? People trying to save rabbits from having bleach poured into their eyes and people trying to save the natural environment are “terrorists”. Apparently the companies pouring bleach into rabbits’ eyes and decimating the environment for profit represent American values.

Ok. Color me terrorist.

And click here to read an interesting take on Bono of U2. Fuck, i hate that motherfucker.

February 2nd/ 2002

-another sad announcement for the music world today. Paul Baloff of Exodus died over the weekend from a massive stroke. i never got to see Exodus play with Baloff, but me and the Rod had the chance to meet Baloff last summer in California. A true banger, truly appreciative of the fact that 2 skids from the asshole of canada loved Bonded by Blood enough to recognize him on the street 15 years later. At least we got to tell him that.

January 26th/ 2002

-Winnipeggers!!! Tonight at Mondragon Bookstore!! Ward Churchill speaks about his assessment of September 11th!! Not to be missed!

January 20th/ 2002

-is it just me or is the new fugazi record pure genius?

January 18th/ 2002

-Yardsale page has been changed. Will re-title it when i feel like it. Check it out, yo.

-We got our equipment back from Europe. Boy, was that quick! Only took two months! Wow, Locher Evers is such a great shipping company! What great service! What great prices! I hope we can deal with them again in the future!

Why are there monkey’s flying out of my ass?

January 2nd/ 2002

-new piece up on the ideas page by Richard Duboff. 22 reasons to not be optimistic about the prospects of a new year on earth.

-new Chomsky piece on Afghanistan up on the front news page. Again, anyone interested in sanity and justice may want to read this carefully.

-interesting fact: we left Europe on November 11th, 2001. Our equipment was shipped from Europe on November 12th, 2001. We still don’t have it on January 2nd, 2002. Ho-hum.

December 17th/ 2001

Todd the Rod just called me and told me that ChucK Schuldiner died
yesterday of brain cancer. Chuck Schuldiner was the guitarist/ vocalist
for Death, who were one of the greatest metal bands of all
time. I spent many hours of my life listening to Chuck’s playing
and now looking back, although i took a different musical path,
i can honesty say that he was one of the guys who made me want to
play guitar. Tonight, the turntable is reserved for Death
and my stereo goes to 11. Death lives.

December 11th/ 2001

So, Professor Marc Herold from the University of New Hampshire
has compiled some interesting stats that he’s collected since the
beginning of the so-called War on Terrorism. Download
his findings in spread-sheet format here. Strangely enough,
his research indicates that this war to avenge the officially estimated
3,700 civilian dead and missing (source: CBS
News) in New York City has now claimed at least 3,700 civilian
Afghan lives. Does that mean America’s thirst for vengeance has
finally been quenched? Has justice now been infinitely served? Has
freedom now endured? What a joke. What a farce. No wonder the rest
of the world hates the West. We’re just a self-absorbed culture
full of hypocrites, fools and murderers. I’m so proud to be part
of it.

December 6th/ 2001

-new article by Cynthia Peters on the news
page, which means the ideas page has also
been updated.

-couple dumb photos added to the visuals
page.

-and in case you forgot: Ok, all you European
people, Marcus from BA Records in Hamburg, Germany wants y’all to
know that he has some Propagandhi shirts available that were left
over from the recent tour. For Europeans only! So
go here!

-and don’t forget about the 3 live tunes
on the audio page. fun stuff.

-people are asking if we are planning to reschedule our last 6
US shows that got cancelled after the Trade Towers came down. No
plans as of yet.

-*might* be playing in San Francisco in February at the 11th anniversary
party for Fat Wreck Chords.

November 30th/ 2001

-Happy Birthday, Mom!

-hey, it’s actually december 4th, but i’m
too lazy to make a new december page. Now that’s lazy! Ok,
all you European people, Marcus from BA Records in Hamburg, Germany
wants y’all to know that he has some Propagandhi shirts available
that were left over from the recent tour. For Europeans only! So
go here!

November 26th/ 2001

-For fuck sakes, another fucking golf-course
development for rich fuckers on unceded indigenous land. It’s possible
that if you’re living in Canada, you’ve seen some sort of mention
of the brewing crisis at Sun Peaks in British Columbia. We’ve posted
an informative article about the conflict on the Ideas
page. And from the Secwpemc people…

"Please express your concern about
the expansion project of Sun Peaks Resort and about the non-recognition
and acknowledgement of our Title and Rights.

We also require donations of funds to carry out direct actions including
the establishment of homesites in our traditional areas.

Premier Gordon Campbell
Government of British Columbia
Legislature Building
Victoria, B.C Ottawa, Ontario
Telephone 604-775-1600
Fax 604-775-1688
E mail Premier@gov.bc.ca

Prime Minister Jean Chretien
Government of Canada
House of Commons
Telephone 613-992-4211

Mr. Masayoshi Ohkubo
Nippon Cable
C/O Sun Peaks Resort
1280 Alpine Road
Sun Peaks, B. C. V0E 1Z1
Telephone 250-578-7222
Fax 250-578-7223

Donations Accepted : Skwelkwekwelt Protection
Center
Royal Bank (Chase, B.C.) Account # 00880-003-100-552-9"

-If you haven’t already seen it, our pal
and instant-web-net master Derek has done some sweet work on the
Knowledge is Power pages. Both multi-media
pieces from Today’s Empires, Tomorrow’s Ashes are now on their way
up there. Way to go, mountain-man!

November 24th/ 2001

-Hey, i found some audio-tapes of us playing
live in Eastern Canada earlier this year. I’ve roughly mixed and
uploaded three tunes from one of the shows to the audio
page. I’m not sure if these were recorded in Toronto, Montreal
or Quebec City, but it was definitely on our way to the protests
in Quebec. The playing is more than a little frantic and for some
reason, Jordy-Boy’s vocals aren’t showing up (if i figure out why,
i will fix it and re-upload it), but you might find it enjoyable.
Or interesting. Or something. Hey, it’s an update, right?

November 19th/ 2001

-So I’ve had a week to reflect on Europe.
My biggest impression? Y’all wear tight pants over there and we
thank you for that.

-See
this? It’s the ticket i bought to get into the Karl Marx museum
in Trier, Germany.

Shortly after travelling through the very rooms where Marx conceived
and composed his historic critique of capital, Jordy-Boy farted
and ended up having to throw his underwear in the garbage cuz he
shit them. Fuck, it was pretty funny!

November 12th/ 2001

-I slept in my own bed last nite. Which means
we’re home from the UK/ European tour. The Man tried to hold us
back at every turn, but we persevered.

There are so many people that we need to
thank and give shouts out to, but i fear the attempt to list them
lest i forget someone. So, as usual, you know who you are and you
should know who you are not. Much respect to you.

One person must be thanked by name: Marcus
"Commando Pimpila" Wiebusch. Thanks for everything, big
buddy. Your words. Your work. Your friendship. Your last minute
attempts to have sex with the Rod. We will not forget it.

-New stuff on the Ideas
page and in The Armoury. Also a new
piece by William Blum under the Knowledge
is Power section.

-Don’t like reading? Prefer listening? Click
here
to hear a recent and important Real Audio recording of Noam Chomsky
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, regarding the issue
of terrorism.

October 3rd / 2001

Good job Hogarth! Let’s have a round of applause for the loudest
man on earth. Ok, so there’s a couple of new pictures up on the
"visuals" page and don’t forget that Randy play tomorrow
nite at the Albert!

October 2nd / 2001

Here you go everybody, hope ya like it. If anything is looking
a bit wonky, like images are stretched and distorted-looking, try
emptying your browser’s cache and refreshing the pages. Shit like
that happens when one changes the site. Ta-ta. – Derek

October 1st / 2001

-Yes, the European tour is still happening. Stop asking us if it’s
cancelled.

-For Dublin-ites, no, the show is not through MCD. It is through
a promotion group called "Straight" or something. So dry
your little outraged tears and prepare to be thrashed.

-new site up tonite!!!! yay!

September 25th / 2001

-So we got the final tally today for the Winnipeg Anarchist
Black Cross’s 10 kilometre Running Down the Walls fundraiser
that me and Jordy Boy ran in back in August: …"all tallied
we raised $3900 towards support programs for prisoners. Three
cheques of $1300 each were cut to the chosen organizations– the
local Elizabeth Frye Society’s Crossing Communities arts
program; the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty’s legal defense fund
and Anarchist Black Cross prisoner’s emergency and subsistence funds
(Warchest)."

-Also, from last week’s show at the Rendezvous, we managed to raise
over $3000.00 to be split between the Broadway Community
Centre (an inner-city community space that offers the kids in
the neighborhood an alternative to the streets that most of us growing
up in the ‘burbs take for granted) and legal defense for the Transforming
Columbus Day events in Denver next month. Thanks again to y’all
for helping out with that.

September 20th / 2001

-Boy, oh, boy, did we fun last nite at the show (played a benefit
for the Broadway Community Centre here in the ‘Peg)! I haven’t had
so much at the Rendezvous since Sacrifice played there in ’89 and
i did my first stage-dive and people were having sex on the stage
and some guy was screaming "I love death!" ! Thanks to
all y’all that came out and rocked with us. Special thanks to Ditchpig,
Malefaction, Greg "G Mac" MacPherson and of course, our
bros in Randy for playing it with us. Shouts out to Jason at Smallman
for doing a stellar job, Al at Canadian Backline for the kind help
with Randy’s equipment, all the Soundart dudes, Hopper for running
around like a crazed yak doing everything at once, Barney Barnacle
Butcher for the sonic assault, and last but certainly not least,
Lorna, Deanna, Derek and Krista who went above and beyond the call
of duty at the book/ shirt/ music tables (Lorna and Deanna were
the mean ones). We owe you.

-Randy left for Eastern Canada this morning. We miss them already.
The Blue Room just seems empty without them. I just can’t say enough
about these guys. Going on tour with them was the smartest thing
we ever did. *Sniff*

September 14th / 2001

-we cut our US tour with Randy short due to the events down there
this week. It sounds trite now, but it was best tour i had ever
been on until Tuesday morning. Randy are the best band we’ve ever
had the pleasure to travel with and they are the nicest bunch of
drunken Swedes on earth.

-Please visit the Ideas
page for what we consider to be critical perspectives concerning
the recent attacks on the World Trade Towers in New York, courtesy
of Michael Moore, John Pilger, Vijay Prashad, Ed Herman, Noam Chomsky,
Michael Albert and the Black Radical Congress. A brief statement
from us, Propagandhi, is on the opening News
page.

-I wonder if the group responsible for the attacks will make trading
cards and video games and t-shirts and have parades celebrating
the attacks on New York, like we did over here after killing hundreds
of thousands of men, women and children in the Gulf War?

August 24 / 2001

PHOTO ANALYSIS OF CARLO GIULIANI’S DEATH

Go to this site to view recently released photos of the now infamous
incident in Genoa this year. This series, with accompanying commentary,
suggests that the Italian security forces may not be as innocent
as the mainstream press and other assorted apologists for the police
state have been whining about for the past weeks:

August 13 / 2001

…MOUTHED FEET, EATEN HATS…

the good news: i (chris) took first place in the 10km fundraising
run for the Anarchist Black Cross Federation!

the bad news: it was first place in the 30-and-over division. Patrick
MacGuire and Eton Harris, two 24-year old jock-straps, finished
before me overall. To add insult to injury, Patrick, who is straight-edge,
took the time at the end of the run to remind me that i stood up
at a local bar a month ago and proclaimed that i was going to win
the run "for old drunk guys everywhere". He followed this
polite reminder with a patently unsportmanslike "In your face,
Hannah!" Savour the victory, spring-chickens. Next year you
are going down.

But seriously, it was a great event. Lots of people came out and
participated and lots of people made generous pledges (including
our homies down at Fat Wreck Chords! Word!). Powerful statements
from political-prisonsers in the United States and Canada were read
by the ABC membership at the end of the run. An intense game of
base-ball ensued shortly afterwords. Even made some new friends.
Can’t wait for next year!

August 5 / 2001

-new piece by Mumia Abu Jamal on the Ideas
page.

-tour dates with Randy up on the Tour-dates
page.

-don’t forget to pledge some loot for my run this coming weekend
(see last month’s news for details)! Thanks to everyone who already
has! I am nursing an injured knee but am still intent on leading
the field. I’ve talked way too much trash not to win this fucker.
I will look like a grade A dink-wad if i don’t. Other contestants
interested in throwing the run to me please get in touch at your
nearest convenience to arrange discreet pay-offs. Thanks!

July 24th / 2001

-Ok, people. I (chris) am going to be running in a 10km run on
August 11th, 2001, that is intended to raise funds for the Anarchist
Black Cross Warchest, the Ontario
Coalition Against Poverty and the Crossing Communities
Art Project. Now i need people to pledge money for this thing
(kinda like any other fundraising run). I have to raise a minimum
of $25.00 to enter, but i know with your help we can kick some ass
here. What’s in it for you? Well, the knowledge that you’ve contributed
to the longevity of some organizations that are doing critical work
in the field of political prisoner support. So here’s what i need
you to do: send your name, address, phone number and pledge amount
to info@g7welcomingcommittee.com

The organizers say this is a "non-competitive" event,
but fuck that touchy-feely-sensitive-90′s-man-shit. If i get enough
pledges–like $1000.00 worth–i intend to fucking win this thing.
Even if i have to threaten other runners out of running, i’m going
to win. Even if i have to have Kowalski pick me up in the van when
no one is looking and drive to the finish line, i’m going to win.
You can be part of this proud moment. Operators are standing by.
Do the right thing.

**Ok, Jordy boy is running now too. So he also wants pledges (same
drill as above). He says he will beat me easily. We shall see.

July 3rd / 2001

-new pics from the Cross Lake benefit from our pal greg up here:
http://www.yrogerg.mine.nu/pics3/propagandhi/

-working on a new tune during practice. It is a cool one. Raising
the bar. Pushing the envelope. Tickling plums. And so on and so
forth…

June 28th / 2001

-It’s with the deepest sense of sadness and shock that we pass
on the news of the sudden deaths of our friends Jai and Alana, who
were involved in a traffic accident on Wednesday morning here in
Winnipeg. I know that everyone who knew them are having a hard time
with this and hope everybody has someone around to talk to and help
you through it. Our heartfelt condolences go out to both Jai and
Alana’s families and particularily to the two awesome daughters
who they leave behind. I know there are alot of friends from all
over North America who will pull together and help them pick up
the pieces. I guess that’s all.

June 26th / 2001

-Y’all see any of the coverage of the World Bank protests in Barcelona?
Over 40 000 people took to the streets and actually shut the fuckers
down. Check out Indymedia
for up-to-date reporting and analysis.

-Went out to the Malefaction
record release show the other nite. They fucking killed. As did
Head Hits Concrete. Unfortunately, i missed One of these Days, KenMode
and Never A Victim, all of whom i’ve heard great things about.

-We have begun booking the Western Canadian/ US Midwest leg of
our Humanitarian Intervention tour. Keep an eye out for updates
on the "tours" page.

June 2nd / 2001

-So here we are back in the ‘Peg. Me and Jordy Boy have are back
at G7, Todd the Rod has returned to his Jiu-Jitsu training and the
three of us have invaded the basement again to resume our exploration
of the uncharted realms of political thrash. Much excitement in
the air as we not only look ahead to near-future recordings and
travels, but as we relearn songs (between 5 and 10 maybe!) that
were absent from our set-list for our past couple of tours. Oh,
yes.

-The cd to benefit those arrested during the FTAA protests that
i mentioned last month now has a web-site. It is www.gascd.com

-check out http://www.freemumia.com/news.html
for breaking news on Mumia Abu Jamal’s case, including an affadavit
from a mafia hitman named Anthony Beverly confessing to the murder
of police-officer Daniel Faulkner and clearing Jamal of the same.

-If you missed the banner on the "welcome…" page, i
will remind you that there is a cool music festival happening in
Winnipeg this summer called ArsonFest (www.arsonfest.n3.net).
According to their web-site, you can expect "…three days
of nothing but extreme music – loud, fast, grindy thrash and hardcore.
No gangster metal, no "post punk", and no pop punk".
Apparently, that is a good thing. Check it out.

May 28th / 2001

Did i forget to mention that Craig (the dude doing the "Nail
that Sticks Up" site) has a brother who has made what i believe
to be a Director movie for the song Mate Ka Moris Ukun Rasik
An? Well, he does and he did. Check it out here
(for high-speed connections) and here
(for slower connections). It’s quite good and uses some powerful
imagery from the ETAN site.

May 17th / 2001

Ok, a few things worth mentioning:

- we have been asked to contribute to a compilation record on Ani
Difranco’s Righteous Babe label intended to raise funds for the
legal defence of protesters from the FTAA. It will be a previously
released track, but of course we recommend you pick it up both for
the political end and for the wide variety of artists and speakers
that will also be contributing, from Maude Barlow to Gil Scott Heron
to Jello Biafra to Ani Difranco to Bruce Cockburn. Like the growing
movement against "Globalization"/ capital, there is going
to be alot diversity in the ranks. More info as it becomes available.

- new photos on the visuals page, courtesy of Greg Dixon and Jon
"Free Ride" Schledewitz!

- an update on the links page, including a link to a new-ish Propagandhi
site!

- new piece on media treatment of Palestine by Norman Solomon in
the Ideas section.

- there is a new book featured in the column to your left that
i must highly recommend. It’s not a pleasant book, but it’s impact
is huge (at least is was on me).

- there is a compilation on Fat that has been released (with more
unfortunate cover art, of course) with a "new" track on
it by us. The track is called "War is Peace. Slavery is Freedom.
May all your Inteventions be Humanitarian." It’s actually not
too bad. We like it. We think you will too. Sorta old school ‘Gandhi.

May 10th / 2001

I can’t believe we’re home. Our two months of pillaging North America
has finally come to an end. Seems like just a great big blur to
me now, but i’ll tell you what i remember…in order of appearance…roughly…but
not today, tomorrow, ok?

February 24th / 2001

Dude. The show was awesome! The crowd was great, the bands were great, the organization of the show was great, the volunteers from the West End were great, the amount of proceeds that will be going to the Pimicimak Cree Nation was great (circa $4000.00). The only shitty thing was that we had to haul frickin’ 2000 pounds of the wrought-iron stage material back the frickin’ Rendezvous at frickin’ two in the morning, forcing us to miss the after show mayhem at the ‘Crusher. Lame. No beer for Christoph. Anyways, thanks are due to Stefan, Chris from the West End, Chris from the U of M, Scott Hopper, the West End volunteers, Malefaction, Sixty Stories, Fermented Reptile (all rocked), all the activist groups that made the effort to attend, Lorna and Hogarth, and last but not least, all you motherfuckers that rocked along with us. It was sweet. Apologies to the people who couldn’t get in. We’ll play again soon maybe and it will be your turn to be thrashed.

February 21st / 2001

Jesus Murhpy. Two days to the cd release bacchanal. The good news is lots of people seem to be going. The bad news is there is no more room for anyone else to get in based on the tickets sold. Fuck. Well, i guess there’s a lesson to be learned here for those who find themselves ticket-less: the early thrasher thrashes the thrash.

Oh, and since Jord never looks at this site, i want to encourage everyone to start a chant of “Jord has crabs! Jord has crabs!” after we finish playing. If it happens, and if it’s fuckin loud, we will play more songs and watch Jord’s mom look on in horror while Jordy boy sniffs his fingers in confusion and sorrow, ok?

What else? I guess that is it. Oh, except that i just noticed yesterday, when i was looking at the gig poster i made for the first ever Propagandhi show (with Immortal Possession and the almighty Grog) that our offical 10 year anniversary is on March 8th. Wow. Time really flies when everybody just wishes you would shut up and die and you’re subsequently drunk all the time. So i guess since we’ll actually be rotting on an interstate in Pennsylvania that day, that we’ll make the Bacchanal our anniversary party too! So this is shaping up to be a real shaker. A humdinger of an event. A bender maybe even. There better be some underwear thrown up on stage. No there better not. Yes there better. Shhhh. Ok.

February 9th / 2001

Finally. It’s out. If you don’t know where to get it, go to www.g7welcomingcommittee.com and you can order it.

More updates for the Humanitarian Intervention Tour on the “shows” page.

More info courtesy of Will at the MCC regarding the conflict between Manitoba Hydro and the Pimicikamak Cree Nation on the ideas page.

February 1st / 2001

Only 5 days till the record is out. Ya-friggin-hoo.

We’ll be playing a CD release bacchanal (no wimpy little “party” for us) on February 23rd in the MPR at the U of M with Sixty Stories, Malefaction and Fermented Reptile Cooperative. Tickets are $10 each with proceeds supporting the struggle for justice undertaken by the Pimicikamak Cree Nation at Cross Lake. You can get some background information on their struggle here, courtesy of the MCC.

The show will rock. I’m sure we are going to be overly excited and going extra hard cuz y’all are our homies and that’s just how it’s gotta be. In fact, Kowalski’s head might actually get banged off for this one. You won’t wanna miss it.

January 24th / 2001

Hey, i forgot to give credit for the pic of my raging, manly bicep (don’t you just love slow shutter speeds that make pencil-necks look like Lou Ferigno’s?) that resides below. It was taken by Dan Lyth. You can see more of his pics and other neat stuff at www.dancingrevolution.com.

Also, our buddy Greg has some pics up on his homepage. You can see them by going here. Note Winnipeg legend and all round good guy Paul Anthony in the background representing in old school prop’ threads. Word up

January 19th / 2001

Hey there. We are back from Vancouver (kowalski, i lost that piece of paper you gave me so i’m winging it brutha…you do next one). It was great. Fun. Fun. Our set was a little chaotic and riddled with technical difficulties but we sure had some laughs. Mike Rak was one of them.

So a very sincere thanks goes out to the people in Vancouver who organized the show and who put us up and everything. I’m scared to list names in case i miss somebody, but extra special thanks must be extended to: Meegan (Che 127), the staff of the Vancouver East Cultural Centre, Krista, Shauna and Emma, Jen and Rebecca and Andy at the Submission Hold house, and Brendan at the Pigfarm. Word up.

Thanks also to everybody who came out and supported or played at the event. Sincere apologies to the people who got turned away at the door because there was not enough room. The organizers did the best they could with the resources available to them. We’ll be back there later this year and we guarantee they’ll be lotsa room for y’all and one motherfucker of a P.A.

There will be a CD release show in Winnipeg in February. More on that when we figure out where the fuck we gonna play.

This week is the 10th anniversary of the U.S. led carpet-bombing of Iraq and the on-going sanctions that constitute genocide against its’ men, women and children. To learn more about it and/ or to see what it is being done to end the insanity, visit this Znet Crises site.

December 30th / 2000

Religious holiday nonsense got you down? Well here’s a date worth
celebrating: January 1st. It’s the seventh anniversary of the Zapatista
rebellion in Chiapas, Mexico, and more importantly, the seventh
year of their continuing struggle to demand that the world elite
relinquish their monopoly of wealth and decision-making power to
the people. Znet hosts a good Chiapas page here.
Check it out.

2 weeks till we play in Vancouver at Rock For Choice. We are nervous
and excited. Feels like we’ve never played a show before in our
lives. Could be pretty funny. We will thrash you, nevertheless.

‘Tis the morning after the Canadian Federal Election. No witty
commentary. What can one say that isn’t redundant? Anyways…

We have been swamped by emails to our new address. We appreciate
that people are taking the time to write, but i must stress again
that it is going to take us a very long time to work our way through
them, so be patient. Be *very* patient. We’re starting to miss the
days before email.

There is an update on the "Shows" page! Yes, we’re playing.
I can hardly believe it myself. Rock for Choice. Check it out.

November 10th / 2000

Holy shit-lips, there were over 1600 downloads of “Back to the
Motor-League” yesterday. Not bad. Thanks to everyone who wrote us
kind emails saying they liked it. And thanks to everyone that didn’t
like it for not bothering to send us hurtful emails! Thanks! Us
skids have feelings to y’know! Actually, we’ve only gotten one negative
response so far, and that was from someone disappointed that we
hadn’t slowed down and “matured”!!! I must say, we are quite happy
to disappoint on both counts!

Most of the rest of the record is darker and heavier and faster
than “…Motor League”, so hold on to you ass-hats, sistas and bruthas.

Oh yeah, one more thing. We finally have our own email address.
It is propagandhi@g7welcomingcommittee.com

Please use it sparingly and respectfully and please understand
that we have alot going on and it is sometimes difficult to respond
to every message. Don’t take it personally if our responses are
brief or non-existent. Thanks!

November 7th / 2000

It is Tuesday night as I write this. Welcome to this, the new Propagandhi
website (designed by Mr. Derek “Human P.A.” Hogue). It will be officially
launched on November 8th to either:

1) Mourn the fact that another corporate suckling has shelled-gamed
their way behind the wheel of the world’s only economic and military
super-power

2) Celebrate the fact the fact that the Nader / Laduke ticket succeeded
in qualifying for matching federal funds in the next election by
taking 5% of the vote, thereby laying the foundation for a progressive
movement to decentralize, decorporatize, demilitarize and pro-democratize
the world’s only super-power, or

3) Mourn the fact that the “Democrats” fucked-over the movement
towards genuine democracy by taking away crucial votes from the
Nader / Laduke ticket with their bullshit fear-mongering and rhetoric.

Anyways now that the Today’s Empires, Tomorrow’s Ashes CD is officially
“in the can” (that’s music biz jargon for “finished”), a release
date has been set. So in honour of God’s gift to mid-80′s political
hardcore — Ronald Reagan — it will be released on February 6th,
the day that crazy motherfucker was farted out of his old man’s
sphincter. May he soon be flushed off this mortal coil.

For those of you who just can’t wait a couple more months to hear
the final product, go to the audio page
for a sneak preview of a track off of Today’s Empires, Tomorrow’s
Ashes. Act fast, before we change our minds!