SOMEONE CALL CATALLARCHY!

Goose Creek goose-stepper Get Crackin' McCrackin's been re-assigned!

Following a November drug sweep in which police with guns drawn ordered Stratford High students to the floor, Berkeley County School District officials announced Monday that Principal George McCrackin had resigned.

"I realized it is in the best interest of Stratford High School and of my students for me to make a change," McCrackin said.

District Superintendent J. Chester Floyd said he had had several conversations with McCrackin and that the decision to reassign him came last weekend.

"These past 60 days have been extremely challenging and pressure filled, particularly for Mr. McCrackin," Floyd said. "His decision reiterates his commitment to doing what's best for the school and the students at all times."

But doesn't reassignment really suggest that, far from offering atonement, McCrackin's now liable to bring his callous disregard for the young scholars in his charge to other schools?

Floyd has not decided to what position McCrackin will be reassigned, but he said McCrackin would probably spend time in the coming weeks preparing for two lawsuits filed by students stemming from the incident.

Only two? I thought that this was "The Litigious Age"!

TO LIVE & DIE IN ALABAMA

FROM THE TOO INCREDULOUS TO PASS UP FILE:

The Secret Service puts the screws to a counterfeiting scholar down Al'bamey way.



By KAREN TOLKKINEN
Staff Reporter

A Clarke County student's presentation to his economics class about the U.S. Treasury went awry last month, and the teenage boy ended up being questioned by the Secret Service.

Economics class? I wonder what the nature of his presentation was. Simply noting it was about the U.S. Treasury is way too vague.

The student, whom authorities did not identify because he is a juvenile, had printed a sheaf of $10 bills on a "simple, cheap printer," said Thomas P. Impastato, resident agent in charge of the Mobile office of the Secret Service.

Oh, oh, Mr. T-Man! Competition!

What actually sent me on my nascent quest to Libertarianism and eventually Austrian economics in my teenage years, besides drunken-driving roadblocks in Indianapolis, were two books. "The Warmongers" by Howard Katz and "The International Man" by Douglas Casey. They opened my eyes to a world I had not at that point realized existed. What struck me about each book (the best quarter dollar I ever invested in was the combined purchase price of these two books) is the illuminating notion that a nation's currency controls and printing operations are tied in directly to the amount of liberty the inhabitants of that nation enjoy. Katz, in a break from exposing the funneling of assistance and technology from the American taxpayer to the Soviet bureaucrat, even took time to discuss the Ithaca dollar. From each, I was pointed to Antony Sutton's books, from there to Rothbard, and from Rothbard to Mises.

The boy gave them to classmates at Clarke Preparatory School in Grove Hill because the presentation requirements included a handout, officials said. Afterward, however, he failed to collect the bills. A student tried to spend one at a country store in Whatley, saying he had gotten it from his school lunch room, according to a Clarke County Sheriff's Department report.

This Christmas, I purchased for the Missus the DVD special edition of "To Live & Die In L.A.". It's a thoroughly engrossing depiction of one chaotic month in the lives of two U.S. Secret Service agents in Los Angeles and their attempt to collar the counterfeiter who put the kabosh on the heartbeat of the senior agent's former partner. So thoroughly did director William Friedkin plunge his story into the world of counterfeiting that the production team actually counterfeited hundreds of thousands of dollars (a still from the scene is pictured above). Friedkin, shooting without permits in the first place, later found several of his production crew in hot water with the Treasury after a few of the bills weren't destroyed and the teenage son of the co-producer got into his father's lockbox and tried to spend some of the bills. The story is included in the illuminating documentary contained in the DVD's special features. Austrians, libertarians, and gold standard advocates who possess a DVD player really ought to get this one for their collection.

"It was a darker color and whoever done it, it wasn't too good a counterfeit," said store owner Robert Edward Garrick, who expressed displeasure that such activity was taking place in a school. "It looked like two bills had been stuck together. It wasn't lined up."

Garrick said he made the student wait there while he called law enforcement.

Snitch.

In early December, the Secret Service, whose job is not only to protect the U.S. president but the money supply, interviewed the boy who made the bills, his mother, the school headmaster and the teacher, Impastato said. The federal investigator was accompanied by Clarke County deputies, he said.

"It wasn't too good a counterfeit". Remember that? Because counterfeiting clearly wasn't the intent. If this kid is fined or spends a day in jail, it's a miscarriage of justice.

The Secret Service has turned the matter over to local investigators because the boy is a juvenile, Impastato said. The Clarke County investigator, Virgil Chapman, said Monday that the case will probably be wrapped up this week.

The bills that Impastato showed the Mobile Register on Monday were of similar color to real cash but were obviously fake, chopped too short on the right side and with the phrase "For school purpose only" scrawled on the front. But Garrick said nothing was written on the bill he had.

Much ado about nothing. A government this paranoid is... well... government. Maybe the lad's next econ essay will be on the dangers of fiat currency or, better yet, government monopoly in general.

Federal law allows color copying of U.S. currency only if:

The resulting bills are one-sided and less than 75 percent the size of the original or more than 150 percent.

All negatives or other devices used to store the image are destroyed or deleted.

The student who gave out the counterfeits in class was "just being a child and not thinking," said school Headmaster Billy Pritchett. "I guess assuming that no one would pay much attention to it or use it or think it was real."

Impastato said most of the fake bills have been collected.

"They weren't all recovered," he said. "I think there were four or five that were destroyed by being thrown away."

It really burns Impastato's wick that some of "them bills" got away. Wascally devils.

MORRISSEY: IN HIS OWN WORDS

The other day, bored out of my mind as the snow piled up outside, I revisited a book I had not delved into since my willfully homeless, gutterpunk teenaged years... "Morrissey: In His Own Words".

It remains that I am beyond fond of the Smiths. Fantastic, insightful lyrics about our intimate relations and pleasing, jangly melodies... it's hard not to be so fond of them. The book is basically a compendium of Morrissey quotes, but compiles a scant few post-Smiths breakup quotes, so the book is basically Smiths vintage. While I would not claim to be on any kind of similar political plateau as Morrissey, at least not at this point in his life, I find many of his musings to reporters relevant and witty and, above all, interesting. But one statement leapt out at me in the chapter called "Politics":

"We don't need all this excessive technology, it's just a select bunch of people who think we have to keep up with the Japanese. People's requirements are quite basic. You need food and shelter and anything else you can live without."

To the last point, that may very well be true. But who would want to (live without anything other than food or shelter)? I wonder how Morrissey... whom in other sections of this book expresses his sincerest and undying devotion to these "excessive" things such as books, music, womens' blouses, pugilism, James Dean movies, hearing aids, floral bouquets, public immortality, and the technologies that bring all of these to him and the rest of us... and whom eerily resembles yours truly... could seriously profess a belief such as this.

Of course, I may be reading too much into it.


Morrissey? Or Astropolis? Only their mothers know for certain.

FIGURES IT'D BE LP-WASHINGTON TYPES

From Anti-War.Com's illustrious blog...

LP Hawks Start 'Fight for Liberty' Caucus

A Washington state Libertarian Party member has helped found an organization of "libertarian hawks" that will encourage the LP to support a more aggressive defense policy against terrorists.

The group, Fight for Liberty, "recognizes the need for a powerful military, whether private or state, to vanquish the terror movement," said Kevin Bjornson, an LP Life Member and former chair of the West King County LP.

The group supports a "victory over terrorism," and opposes Libertarians who would "shrink the U.S. military to dangerous weakness," he said.

The current LP platform, which calls for a non-interventionist foreign policy, the withdrawal of American military troops stationed abroad, and an end to foreign aid, is either "insanity or merely ridiculous," said Bjornson.

Fight for Liberty has passed a six-point program that advocates allowing Iraqis to have AK-47s, privatizing the Iraqi Oil Industry, legalizing drugs for U.S. adults, charging allies for NATO-type defense services, preventing the "theocratic/terror state of Iran" from developing nuclear weapons, and encouraging the "establishment of secular, rational government[s]" around the world.

Bjornson said Fight for Liberty will post foreign policy analyses, offer speakers for libertarian supper clubs and conferences, and serve as a "central posting board" for hawkish libertarians.

"COLD MOUNTAIN" SENT U.S. JOBS TO ROMANIA?

EDITED! (passages newly inserted marked by asterisks)

In a letter to the editor of the Tacoma News Tribune, published on December 26th, David Garden of Tacoma wrote:

RE: "Rain, mud, and heat color 'Cold Mountain" (TNT, 12/22)

In a recent television interview, Anthony Minghella, director of "Cold Mountain" told Barbara Walters that he shot the film in Romania because he had looked at locations all over the American South and could not find any large expanses which "had not been touched by modern times".

Anyone familiar with the South knows that this is completely untrue. What is true is that wages for workers in Romania are considerably less than wages anywhere in America.

There is currently a great deal of discussion about outsourcing and its impact on our economy. I am outraged that many companies have exported their manufacturing, customer service, and technical jobs to foreign countries. "Cold Mountain" is no different. This movie represents many hundreds of jobs. The well-established communities of film workers throughout the Southeast would have benefitted.

When such an American story is taken away from its roots, it loses its soul. Those who have already seen the film and know the South say that Romania does not look like the Blue Ridge Mountains. Daily Variety (12/8) says it best: "There is an intangible something missing."

It's impossible to say whether this stems from the fact that the film was shot in Romania, from it being made mostly by foreigners, or from the variability of the accents by an Anglo/Aussie cast.

You can send a message. Do not contribute to "Cold Mountain's" profits by buying a ticket or a DVD.

DAVID GARDEN
Tacoma

Garden's letter ran into, I'll assume, the TNT's word count limit and was somewhat truncated because it is basically a pared down version of the factsheet sent out by IATSE to its dues-paying legions to stir them to outrage.

I let a buddy read this letter before I offered him my thoughts on it. The first thing out of his mouth upon commencement was "WHAT? Does that mean because '2001' wasn't shot in space, it loses its soul?!" On that note, let it be known that IATSE shames the achievements of its members in one fell swoop with this assertion of soullessness inherent in films whose locations do not match their placing. IATSE members have toiled in countless productions set in locales farflung from their shoots. Does this mean that, inherently, these productions lack "soul"? Or is IATSE ordained by the Heavens above to seep productions they work on with soul a shoot shot elsewhere would not likewise enjoy? That out of the way, let's move on to the economic foolishness.

"Cold Mountain's" budget is currently assessed at $83 million. Most likely, the costs incurred are higher. Now, I let my IMDb Pro account lapse and I doubt it would have Romanian to American wage scale information on hand anyway, but let's guess that the budget for this feature were it shot in the American Southeast would be much higher, perhaps as much as double if not more. Costs this high are passed on to whom? The cinema going public, who it is maintained (but ever doubtfully) craves quality in a motion picture that they attend. A higher budget, it is true, is no guarantor of higher quality. But that is no matter. It can be said with some certainty that in the minds of many cinema-goers a bigger budget = better quality. Naturally, however, cinema-goers are certainly budget-conscious where it counts... their own wallets. It cannot escape notice, not even by the great minds at IATSE, that cinema-goers worldwide are put off by the higher costs of attending a motion picture exhibition these days.

Since "Cold Mountain" is not alone in its budget conflations and large segments of consumers demand an ever-increasing amount of technical sophistication from the films they screen, further pressures are put upon the production end to reign in costs while maintaining high standards. Part of this is, obviously, achieved by shooting overseas.

Now, no American jobs have been "shipped" anywhere here. No one, no one sane anyway, can counter that making "Cold Mountain" is, whether within a general filmmaking industry or not, a Southeasten industry. The production of "Cold Mountain" was a one-time thing, no proud tradition of "Cold Mountain" crafting is indigenous to the American South. No more than suggesting that Romanian jobs were shipped to America when post-production moved from the Carpathians to Los Angeles, would it be accurate to suggest that American jobs were lost to sinister Romanian interests.

* The logic implied here by IATSE could be extended to other motion pictures currently in circulation. Films that opt instead to employ CGI technicians when real industries could build replicas themselves unfairly hurts those industries, does it not? In the extreme category, when George Lucas mattes, digitally, cityscape shots of an urban world in his new Star Wars prequels, the lament could be made that millions of American construction workers got screwed. The argument sounds absurd. Because it is.

Further, no one... anywhere... has deprived American filmmakers their ability to make films in the Southeast. If filmmakers, as individuals or as groups, wish to set and produce their films in the American Southeast, they are certainly free to. No one is stopping them. Well... except maybe city, county, and state governments in addition to and in a seeming paradox... IATSE itself. For a good, honest account of IATSE and SAG thuggery, watch the DVD special features for the Canadian film "$lasher$" and see for yourself what happens to the struggling indie feature filmmaker trying to keep costs low on his super-low budget film. No production is too small to escape the thieving and conniving of IATSE and SAG and the thugs they send to do their dirty work.

Now, because Miramax Films and the myriad other investors that took a gamble with "Cold Mountain" shrunk their budget by shooting on Romanian soil, capital is freed up to be spent elsewhere. Instead of collectively pooling capital and resources into a behemoth "Cold Mountain" project, capital is left over to be spent on other projects. What kind of other projects? Presumably, this includes, and by vast numbers, American stories shot on American soil employing American workers. More than anything, shooting "Cold Mountain" on Romanian soil most likely "saved" American jobs, if we're going to insist on speaking in this context, because instead of putting one mammoth project and a few others on the docket and cutting yearly output of other projects, projects in jeopardy are saved and their funding secured. To mandate or attempt to, via political or consumer pressure, to force "Cold Mountain" (moot, a done deal anyway) to be shot on American soil is haughty foolishness and begets wasteful economic destruction, the projects that would not be completed because no capital was there for them attests to this.

And as to the assertion by an IATSE eager to make up the minds of their dues-paying members for them that the Romanian locations do not resemble the American South, two souls on this Garden Web Forum had this to say...

PatrickD_NC

A county to the south of us is Transylvania County and I think it was named so because of an alleged resemblance to Transylvania in Rumania.

Rich7asheville

The mountain area of Rumania and the vegetation actually did look like this area of North Carolina. At times I thought the scenes must be local.

* And why isn't IATSE attacking shows or films like TV's "Smallville"? Anyone who's been to Kansas knows that Vancouver's a poor stand-in. And Canadian labor, excuse me... labour is cheaper than American labour. Scandal!