Fausta's Blog

Winning for Best Latin American Coverage! THANK YOU, DOUG!

I won last year for Best Latin American Coverage, and Doug Ross will soon announce this year’s winners of the Fabulous 50 Blog Awards.

Will I win?

or not?

your Kindle, that is, along with subscriptions to your favorite blogs!

The perfect gifts for everyone on your list!

Friends Howard Portnoy, J.E. Dyer, Dustin Siggins and Libby Sternberg, all former Green Room contributors, kindly invited me to join them at the new blog, Liberty Unyielding.

Today’s our official launch!

My LU post today is Assange: Freedom of expression for me, but not for Ecuadorians…while he hides at the Ecuadorian embassy.

As you can see from the heading, the blog’s name was inspired by Thomas Jefferson’s quote,

The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.

Please visit LU daily, tweet, and tell your friends.

I am considering ceasing to blog on politics.

For eight years I have posted on serious issues taking place in our hemisphere that affect our everyday lives, and, to be honest, I’ve about had it. Every post on Latin America takes time researching sources from the country in Spanish, French or Portuguese, plus English-language reports. And what for? The American media and the American public would care more if the Iranians were making deals with Martians than they care if Hezbollah makes deals with the Zetas right in our own country.

The American politics posts draw more traffic but are clearly out of the mainstream of a coddled, self-absorbed electorate that thinks their vaginas, their abortions, and their welfare checks are more important than national security, chronic unemployment and respect for the Constitution.

Half the country doesn’t even pay federal income taxes. They do not value the effort of us who do.

The re-election of Obama ensures a bad economy, which in turn ensures that I will remain unemployed as a translator. At the same time, I have always been interested in literacy. Therefore, I’m considering blogging my Spanish-to-English translation work so it’s available for free for whoever may want to read it or not.

I may continue the Carnival of Latin America on Mondays, since that’s the sort of thing I have been reading on my own time for decades.

And to hell with politics.

UPDATE,
Linked by Preppers, MacBourne’s, and Doug Ross. Thank you!

And many thanks to all commenters here, Facebook, and Twitter for their encouraging words.

Linked by Monty Pelerin. Thanks!

I’m inaugurating my new translation-related website, Fausta Translates/Fausta traduce. It’ll showcase my most recent translations from English to Spanish, and from Spanish to English. Please visit it often!

And,
Yes, I’m available for freelance work. You may contact me at faustaw2 “at” gmail “dot” com.

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The Other McCain,

Let me clarify a few things that should be obvious, but evidently are being overlooked by some people:
1. This isn’t just about “SWATting,” but about a broad pattern of harassment by Kimberlin and his associates.
2. We don’t know who was responsible for the alleged SWATtings of Patterico, Erick Erickson or Mike Stack.
3. Nearly all the harassment being carried out online — we won’t name the website or Twitter accounts involved, nor describe the types of harassment involved — is being done under pseudonyms and we will not know who did what unless and until there is criminal prosecution of the persons responsible.
4. Neal Rauhauser has previously described Kimberlin as his “client.” It is therefore entirely reasonable to suspect that Rauhauser is being paid (and may be paying others) to conduct an aggressive online assault against Kimberlin’s critics.

From the Memeorandum thread,

Michelle Malkin:

Going dark to urge congressional action: Who will protect the freedom to blog?  —  My syndicated column today covers the crucial battle between truth-telling bloggers versus convicted bomber Brett Kimberlin and his band of malicious online thugs.  In honor of the National Day of Blogger Silence called …

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Discussion: “The Lid”, The Other McCain, The Moderate Voice,CANNONFIRE, The Radical Watchdog, The Radio Patriot, National Review, EBL, The Conservatory, Wake up America, BobGriggs.com, The Mental Recession, Right Wing News, Little Green Footballs, Nice Deb,The Jawa Report, Wizbang, Booman Tribune, American Power, The Camp Of The Saints, Hot Air, The Lonely Conservative, Examiner, Pundit & Pundette, Sister Toldjah, Riehl World View, The Sundries Shack,Datechguy’s Blog, alicublog, neo-neocon, Pirate’s Cove, Instapundit, The PJ Tatler, TBogg, Patterico’s Pontifications, Popehat and Conservative Hideout 2.0

And, last but not least, Ace.

Linked by Lonely Conservative. Thanks!

Unchain a PR campaign prior to CPAC to promote this blog.

Show up, maybe.

Bingley’s dinner, THE social event of the NJ blogosphere, took place last night and I was honored to have been a guest.

Suzette brought the wonderful delicate phyllo triangles and posted about the procedure. Here’s what the finished product looked like,

The Chinese pilgrims added to the festivity,

Gregor and Mr & Mrs PRS were there, too. It was a great evening.

Yesterday I posted on how the Zetas allegedly tortured and killed a man and a woman, who still remain unidentified, for posting on the internet on drug violence in the country.

However, the two victims are not the first bloggers to be murdered because of their posting: Last month Humberto Milan Zalazar, who ran a website, was killed also because of his posting.

The Economist comments on the most recent murders,

It isn’t clear how the killers selected their victims, as such blogs usually allow anonymous comments.

I’ll let the techies discuss how hard or how easy it would be to find the IP address of a post or a comment and compare it to the IP address of a smart phone from someone you have kidnapped. However, it is clear that the narcos are driving their point of dominance by terror.

Mexico is one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists, and for bloggers.

IN AMERICA, WE HAVE ATTACKWATCH.COM. In Mexico, a deadly threat to ‘scandal mongers’ using social media.

Attack Watch – a White House website that quickly has become a joke – doesn’t disembowel and hang anyone a few miles from the US border.