Still alive and kickin'! Upcoming projects, and a little bit on "Blago"

Hi folks! Just a short post to let you know that yes, I'm still here, and yes, the blog is still going, albeit it's been in sort of a "hibernation" mode the past year or so. Unfortunately, my life's situation hasn't changed, so working on the blog has had to become sort of a "lesser" priority for me over the past 13 months or so, much as I'd like it to be different. That'll change eventually, but not for some time to come. But I have no intention of "letting it go" or "giving it up". Even though the "haters" have somewhat cut back their attention on Albania, Kosova, and the Albanian people in general (mainly because most of them seem to be of a right-of-center political persuasion, and hence seem to be a little more occupied with the political situation here at home right now....), they haven't given up, and they probably never will. So there still needs to be a voice calling them out on their crap.

One thing I will mention, though, is that I'm working right now, as time permits, on a definitive series where I profile the methods of the "haters" to sway the opinion of those who are not informed or are " on the fence" on the subjects of Albania, Kosova, and the Albanian people. Because they do have an identifiable, systematic methodology for trying to sway people over to their side and their way of thinking, and I think if one is aware of it, and of the false paradigms that its based on, one can do a lot better job of refining one's "BS" filters when one sees an example of it, and can better let others who might be swayed know it for what it really is.

Lastly, a few words on the Blagojevich scandal here in the US. It's interesting to me that if you look at Albanian-related web boards and blogs, you find little about this. To be honest, most Albanians I know just didn't-and don't-care about it. Now I can guarantee you that if the Illinois governor had been of Albanian descent, the Serbian National(social)ist blogs and web boards, not to mention folks like La Julia, Svetlana, Mary Monster, etc. would've been all over it like the proverbial "white on rice", saying how it proves that all Albanians are liars, crooks, etc. As for myself, I don't think ol' "Blago" did what he did because his parents came from Serbia. American history (and sadly Illinois history-and I say "sadly" because I'm an IL native) is replete with such malfeasance. Race or ethnicity I believe has nothing to do with such things. But I do think that maybe his whole attitude when he got caught (not to mention when he was doing the naughty things he got caught for) is a product of his being raised around a Serbian National(social)ist cultural milleu (his dad was a former Chetnik, among other things). Just take a look at all the whacko claims he made in his defense, claims that others were out to "get him" for this, that, and the other thing, the bizzare statements about calling the Clintons and WI governor Jim Doyle to testify on his behalf, proposing Oprah to be the next IL senator, etc., then compare them to similar "tin foil hat" statements made by Slobo, Seslj, Karadzic and others in the Hague, and it doesn't take a whole lot of straining the eyes to see the similarities. Frankly, not even during Watergate did I see people (including Tricky Dick) make quite such outlandish claims in an attempt to deflect guilt (OK, some of Nixon's statements did come pretty close, I'll grant). And that's all I have to say on the matter other than, for pete's sake Illinois, this time try and pick someone who's actually HONEST, hard as that may be to do!