"Turns out that the Discovery Channel isn't so interested in discovery"

I just learnt that the Academy Award nominated documentary Taxi to the Dark Side had it's rights bought by the Discovery Channel. They told the filmmaker they liked the documentary and wanted to present it to the broad audience on television. Well, the suits at the Discovery Channel changed their minds, saying it's "too controversial", now they own the rights and the film can't be aired for three years.

Here is the films trailer.
and my Sifting friends are asking - Is It OK for Iran to Waterboard Americans?

Ever since a Tom Cruise Scientology video "leaked" onto the internet there appears to be a lot more attention being put on the church. America Scientology is a tax exempt religion, like Christianity, Islam and the rest of them. (To me they are all loony, but thats another story for another day, no offense to anybody)

So, the Cruise video leaks, and suddenly flooding every internet community is "Anonymous" - which is an anti-Scientology group destined to bring down Scientology. Newsweek did a story about them last week. This online campagin resulted in mass protests all over the globe "in 100's of cities" thousands of people protested Scientology.

Check out Google for the latest headlines.

I've linked to the documentary A Beginners Guide to L Ron Hubbard before, but it's worth another look. Hardeep Singh Kohli investigates for Channel 4 UK whether or not he can find God through Scientology. This leads him on an unlikely adventure through Europe and eventually Russia where he chronicles his experience in becoming a Scientologist. It's embedded below, but full screen is recommended for longer videos.

For those who missed it, Barack Obama was on 60 minutes tonight.
More on CBS.

via videosift.com

The readers know I'm a sucker for a good documentary, and this documentary has been mentioned several times during the two both Bill O'Reilly vs Homeless Vets discussions. The portion below focuses on the newer homeless Iraq War Veterans, you can watch another segment about homeless Vietnam Vets here. Naturally, you should visit the films official website and pick up a copy (for yourself or your local library) and visit the recommended links.

Interesting Huffington Post article dug up from 2006 about Hillary Clinton and her actions during her six years on the Wal Mart board. The whole Wal Mart issue is just starting to become an issue, naturally Bill Clinton has been there to defend his wife.

So, I had to chuckle when I read that Clinton, having never said a bad word about the company in the past, recently said that Wal-Mart should pay more for its workers' health benefits. And, to boot, she returned the $5,000 she had received from the company. But, when asked what she did about the company's benefits for workers when she served on the board, she replied, "Well, you know, I, that was a long time ago ... have to remember..."

You can't have it both ways. You can't promote an image of being an intelligent woman who has a pile of facts at her fingertips but, at the same time, you suffer a sudden bout of amnesia when asked to answer for your record. And it would be an inconvenient record to defend.

In 1992, Wal-Mart was simply smaller than it is today. But it was still huge, with $43.9 billion in net sales, 1,714 stores and 371,000 employees. Even in 1992, Wal-Mart was already the world's largest retailer.

And the board Hillary Clinton sat on was rabidly anti-union, was exploiting sweatshop labor around the world, discriminating against women workers, forcing workers to labor off the clock and destroying communities that did not want them. This should not be a shock: Clinton was a partner in the Rose law firm, one of the most active anti-union law firms in the country.

So, the question still remains: what did Hillary Clinton do-or, not do-when she served on the board of Wal-Mart? Maybe, if her memory was refreshed, she could tell us how she protested the company's relentless union-busting, expressed feminist outrage at the widespread discrimination against women and was horrified that the mushrooming wealth of the Wal-Mart family was made possible on the backs of slave labor around the world....Read More...

Here is a clip from the Robert Greenwald Wal Mart movie to remind us all about what Wal Mart does to small towns.

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- Hoard's Mind Blowing Propeller Submissions

*Ok...So I've updated the content of this post thanks to this video from the New York Post. This video will probably entertain some. Meanwhile Obama was in Georgia taking on homophobia, anti-semitism and Xenophobia.

Being a Canuck, I never grew up learning about Martin Luther King Jr. Actually, there aren't many blacks outside of the major cities here in Canada. Either way, I think it's truly fascinating what he did, and his famous speech should give anybody goosebumps his legacy lives on MLK Day, read all about it.

Here is a quick clip from the 2006 Documentary American Blackout. Congressman John Lewis Illustrates some of the courage of Black Americans had during the time of MLK.

via videosift.com

It's incredible to imagine that we live during the most advance time in regards to medical science, yet millions of people will still go to churches, donate a percentage of their income, and literally get slapped in the face from a pastor and believe God will cure what ails them. Well these Mega-Churches become "mega" because they don't have to pay taxes and it looks like a handful are now under investigation. Including Benny Hinn, who is featured in the CBC documentary posted below.

Alternet.org has the full article about this news including the list of those that Senator Charles Grassley is most concerned about.

# Benny Hinn, a TV preacher who runs the World Healing Center Church in Grapevine, Texas. Hinn, who travels the globe conducting faith-healing revivals, lives in a seven-bathroom, eight-bedroom mansion overlooking the Pacific Ocean valued at $10 million. It is claimed as a parsonage.

# The Rev. Creflo Dollar's World Changers Church International in College Park, Ga. Dollar drives a Rolls Royce and has large homes in Georgia and New York. He is asked to provide a list of all vehicles provided for himself, his wife, board members and ministry employees.

# Paula and Randy White's Without Walls International Church in Tampa, Fla. In a letter to the ministry, Grassley asks the couple to provide a list of expense account items "including, but not limited to, clothing expenses and any cosmetic surgery for years 2004 to present."

# Joyce Meyer Ministries in Fenton, Mo. Grassley asks Meyer and her husband David to explain expenditures like a $23,000 commode with a marble top, a $30,000 conference table, an $11,000 French clock and a $19,000 pair of vases for the ministry headquarters.

# Kenneth Copeland Ministries in Newark, Texas. Copeland is asked to explain how cash offerings are handled during overseas crusades and to explain the use of a ministry jet for "layovers" in Maui, Fiji and Honolulu.

# Long's New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Ga. Among other things, Long is asked to explain a church official's 2005 claim that Long no longer accepts a salary from the church but does take a "love offering."

In honour of Guantanamo Bay's sixth birthday (Happy Birthday GB!!) I've found a documentary that I am sure will serve as educational and interesting. Also this post comes day a few ex-detainees failed to sue Rumsfeld.

Guantanamo Bay is an interesting place, it's been under control by the USA thanks to a old treaties dating back to the Spanish/American war, The USA pays Castro roughly $4,000 a year to lease Guantanamo bay. Castro however has never cashed a single check because America has broken the treaty in so many ways Cuba now calls America's use of Guantanamo Bay an "Occupation."

Below is the Trailer, to watch the full length Docudrama click here and for synopsis and links visit this Wikipedia page.

/More January Docs

Excellent Mashup from the 2005 Sundance film festival that has made it's way onto youtube and thus onto videosift.

"Planet of the Arabs is a powerful 9 minute collage of racist stereotyping of Arabs in movies.Out of 1000 films that have Arab & Muslim characters (from the year 1896 to 2000) 12 were positive depictions, 52 were even handed and the rest of the 900 and so were negative. A montage of Hollywood's relentless dehumanization of Arabs and Muslims."

The inspiration to the Planet of the Arabs mashup was an MEF documentary titled Reel Bad Arabs, the trailer for that documentary can be viewed next.

Reading online debates about Evolution and Religion are incredibly fun or frustrating, depending on the person. Most recently, when posting the Theory of Evolution video, I knew the comments would descend into chaos. You have you read the religious comment threads Dinesh gets and understand the fundamentalist commentators will most likely spill over onto any video I post about science or religion.

Regular Newsblogger Steve posted an excellent comment in that Theory of Evolution thread, and it reminded me of the documentary Journey of Man. There are so many interesting and fascinating things you can learn once step out of the dark ages, start off by watching this Spencer Wells Documentary.

Lonely this Christmas? Why not sit back and spend some time learning about how the mess in Iraq was created, No End in Sight is a documentary that should blow your mind. The full length feature is currently online and can be viewed full screen here, here is a brief synopsis provided by wikipedia, where you can also find a list of the high ranking officials interviewed for this film.

No End in Sight is a documentary film that concentrates on alleged mistakes made by the Bush administration in the two-to-three-month period following the invasion of Iraq in March 2003. The film portrays these errors as the cause of ensuing problems in Iraq, such as the rise of the insurgency, a lack of security and basic utilities for many Iraqis, sectarian violence and the risk of complete civil war.

To a large extent the film consists of interviews with the people who were involved in the initial Iraqi occupation authority and the ORHA (the Office for Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance, later replaced by the CPA, the Coalition Provisional Authority). 35 people are interviewed, many of them former Bush loyalists who have since become disillusioned by what they experienced at the time.

Not sure if you want to commit such valuable time, here is a primer clip. This particular clip outlines three policy decisions made by Paul Bremer that ultimately changed the course of Iraq for good. Bremer was rewarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his efforts.

As promised not too long ago I mentioned while away for my Xmas holiday I would post some mind blowing documentaries as I am taking a break from posting current events. Recently the Newsbloggers had an active discussion about John Lennon, so I thought it would be appropriate to post this incredible documentary I came across about how America attempted to silence the world famous anti-war activist. Here is a brief synopsis delivered by Wikipedia, and the full length feature can be viewed on Google, as long as it's available, I recommend watching in Full screen.

Here is a deleted scene from the Michael Moore documentary SiCKO. Norway is the best country to live in, let's see how they set that standard.

/How Norway stacks up the world.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/

Suddenly everywhere in the rolling news I am reading about the escalating tensions between Iran. "Nuclear Holocaust," "world war III" no less. Although the IAEA is working some very important diplomacy, the United States appears to not be supporting it. These developments along with the high level of "war on Iran" rhetoric going on in the American media, really reminds me of the war drums before the Iraq war, will people think they are watching a re-run and ignore this?

Here is 'blast from the past' Hans Blix answering some very important questions about the Nuclear Iran situation.

The Westboro cult is a fascinating real life story about religion gone horribly wrong. If you have never heard of them, you should check out their Wikipedia page for more info, as they are possibly the most hated family in America today. The family consists mostly of lawyers, but today I learned that they finally got what they deserved.

The brokenhearted father of a Marine killed in Iraq won a long-shot legal fight today after a federal jury in Baltimore awarded him nearly $11 million in a verdict against members of a Kansas church who hoisted anti-gay placards at his son's Westminster funeral.

The jury's announcement 24 hours after deliberations first began was met with tears and hugs from the family and supporters of Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, whose March 2006 funeral was protested by members of the Westboro Baptist Church with signs including "Thank God for dead soldiers."...Read More on the BaltimoreSun.com...

More info, this time in the form of video, for those still unfamiliar...

First, an hour long BBC Documentary with Louis Theroux who spent two weeks with the Westboro Cult last year.

And Second, Michael Moore having a little bit of fun.