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March 31, 2004
YOU SURE ABOUT THAT, MR. BUSH?
So Richard Clarke's a disgruntled former employee who's making stuff up... and the Bush administration's been focused like a laser beam on al Qaeda as the #1 threat to the United States. In fact, terrorism was always Bush's top foreign policy priority... did I get that right?
So how come Condi Rice was going to give a speech on September 11, 2001 that downplayed terrorism as a threat and said that the true focus of US defense policy needed to be missile defense?
The Washington Post has obtained excerpts of that speech -- and the White House, while refusing to provide the full text, admits that the excerpts are accurate. Wanna hear what Condelezza Rice was going to say about defense priorities?
The Post says: The address was designed to promote missile defense as the cornerstone of a new national security strategy, and contained no mention of al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden or Islamic extremist groups, according to former U.S. officials who have seen the text.
"We need to worry about the suitcase bomb, the car bomb and the vial of sarin released in the subway," according to excerpts of the speech provided to The Washington Post. "[But] why put deadbolt locks on your doors and stock up on cans of mace and then decide to leave your windows open?"
You know, I don't mind, necessarily, that my government didn't exactly realize that insidious and immediate nature of the threat that al Qaeda represented. Obviously I wish we'd have been able to anticipate and prevent the 9/11 attacks (between living in NY now and having spent 1994-1997 living in DC, both of my "homes" were hit that day... we didn't know where my brother was in DC and it took us until close to 2:00 pm that day to confirm that he hadn't been harmed; my best friend was in the Pentagon when it was hit -- he survived -- and I knew more people than I could count who lost somebody in the towers... so even if you disagree with my point, don't even try to turn this into some sort of I-don't-take-this-seriously-enough thing... 9/11 was personal for me, and I take it damned seriously). But I don't know if anyone could really have totally comprehended what those bastards had in mind, or gotten inside the plot enough to stop it. My anger doesn't come from the fact that we didn't prevent it.
But god dammit, Bush, stop lying!!! Quit telling me that al Qaeda was your #1 priority when you entered office. It wasn't! (If it was, then boy did you drop the friggin' ball, huh?) Quit trying to friggin' pussyfoot around and deflect blame for 9/11. Quit lying to me and saying that you were focused on stopping terrorism as the lynchpin of your foreign policy. You weren't. You were focused on missile defense systems and Iraq.
If Bush had just come out and said, "I let you down, we didn't see this coming because no one could really have anticipated evil on this level, and I was focused elsewhere. I'm sorry," I have to tell you, even I -- one of the most partisan Bush haters you will ever meet -- would have been inclined to cut him a bit of slack. Not only would I have respected the honesty, I would have also respected and appreciated a leader taking responsibility for a mistake. I would have been pissed off about Iraq still, but I would have been less angry about the Bush Administration not preventing the attacks.
But even if you dismiss the parade of people in the know who have said that this administration didn't focus on al Qaeda, the Post's review of Bush Administration foreign policy speeches from 2001 (before 9/11) shows that this White House was focused on missile defense and "rogue nations." They're lying now, trying to avoid blame that may not even have been there to lay... their crime is less the failure to avoid the attacks, and far more in their continuing to lie about it. They ought to be ashamed of themselves. I'm ashamed of them.
GHOST TOWN
I can't take credit for finding this -- nor even being the first to link to it. That honor, at least in my corner of the blogsphere, belongs to Pete over at A Perfectly Cromulent Blog. But damned if it's not an interesting site, so I'm gonna link to it and send you over there for a look.
Ghost Town is a site written by a Ukranian (I think?) woman named Elena who lives near Chernobyl. You know the place -- the one where we all saw just how safe nuclear power can be? Anyway, Elena also likes to ride her motorcycle, and rode through the Chernobyl dead zone, taking photos and sharing her impressions of what it was like to do so. She's put up her site -- and it's fascinating. Her English is okay... but you know what? My Russian sucks -- in fact, like most Americans, my vocabulary in other languages consists mostly of knowing how to say, "Do you speak English?" -- so I'll cut her some slack. You can pretty much understand what she's saying.
Her ride and her story are really interesting... and I must admit, I also find the Soviet-era articfacts or styles in some of her photos to be fascinating as well. (Not like anyone's gone there to take down any of the old CCCP propaganda or anything.) Whether you're a proponent or an opponent of nuclear power, I think you'll find her site interesting... please do go check it out.
AWESOME. JUST AWESOME.
I can't tell you how freakin' awesome I think this is. Candace Parker, a 17 year old high school senior from the outer 'burbs of Chicago, was invited to be in the slam dunk contest with the boys at the McDonald's All-American games this week. A girl, on the same court to go dunking with the boys.
Guess what? She won.
With a dunk that was as full of showmanship as it was skill, Parker became the first female winner of the contest, whose previous winners include NBA standouts like Vince Carter, Baron Davis, Carmelo Anthony and LeBron James. Parker's going to attend Tennessee next year, and I'm willing to bet that the Lady Vols will be pretty darn good with her in the lineup.
Pete Thamel has a great piece on ESPN.com on the significance of that moment on women's athletics -- rightly calling it a defining few seconds in not only women's basketball but all of women's sports. It's really worth a read, and worth thinking about what this may mean for women's basketball in the next few years.
But the two things I love the most about this story is that a) the crowd -- including her competitors -- roared with approval when she hit her winning dunk... they didn't see "a girl" out there, they just saw an athlete who'd done something amazing; and b) Parker's quote afterward. "That would be my dream," Parker said. "For 10 years from now for three or four girls entering the dunk contest and it's not a big deal."
Good for you, Candace. Ditto -- and congratulations.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO AN OLD FRIEND
I'm 35. I'm much closer to my next birthday than my last, but I am still 35, which means that I am the same age as a true icon. I self-identify with quite a few icons, call myself a child of many things or eras; I am a child of the 80s, a member of the original MTV generation, a Gen Xer, and most recently I entered that delightful demographic of the 35-54 year olds... you know us, the ones who aren't hip anymore and who no longer are the prime influence on culture, but who have entered their peak earning years and have the most disposable income to spend. (The idea that I am right now in my prime earning years is enough to make me freakin' bawl my underpaid eyes out and go into a full-on "if this is all there is, then I have failed and I don't get a do-over" panic attack, but I digress... that's the subject of a whole other blog someday.)
But there is one icon that I probably should identify with more than any other... one generation that I truly am a member of. In 1969, a radically different children's television show aired its first episode on PBS - and the Sesame Street generation was born. I am of that generation... and Sesame Street begins its 35th season this coming Sunday evening.
I was 16 months old when Sesame Street's first program came on the air -- just about the time I began watching TV, I guess -- and my first television memories are solely of that show. Kermit as the on-the-spot news reporter... Oscar the Grouch (who is still my role model, even today!)... Count Count ("five, FIVE bicycles! Ah-ah-ah-ha-ah-ha-ah-ha!"), those old countdown vignettes ("Nine! Nine! Nine! Let's sing a song of Nine! How many is Nine?")... Grover yelling "Heyyyy Everybudyyyyyyyyyyy!"... and of course Big Bird. Not to mention that well into my thirties, the only Spanish words I knew were those I learned on Sesame Street (Abierto. Cerrado. Hoo, Hoo... Peligro! And don't forget the ever-popular counting to ten!)
In its day, Sesame Street was Barney, the Teletubbies, and Blues Clues all wrapped into one to pre-schoolers everywhere; but unlike more recent faddish kids shows, Sesame Street never talked down to its audience. And Sesame Street was started with the purer intentions of educating kids instead of just making money off their parents. (However, I'll be the first to admit that the Children's Television Workshop took full advantage of the popularity of their invention. I don't think anyone ever associated with the show's production ever died of poverty.)
I haven't had any kids yet -- my oh-so-stellar track record in relationships and ever-so-questionable judgement in women have kind of seen to that -- so I haven't watched Sesame Street in at least 25 years, maybe longer. I'm almost afraid to; nothing is ever the same, for one... and everything I've ever seen of Elmo makes me think that I'd want to just freakin' throttle that little thing within about 2 minutes. But no matter how much it has changed, or how marketing-driven it might be now, I will always have very fond memories of what it was... and a world of respect for what it represented and what inspired it: a belief that children are not just easily amused props to be entertained, but intelligent little people who are smarter than we ever gave them credit for, who could "get" educational TV, and who deserved to be treated with respect instead of being patronized.
Happy birthday, old friend.
LOOK OUT, RUSH
Of course you knew I wouldn't let this go by without mentioning it... fellow liberals, after a decade plus of having to listen to conservative blowhards misinform the AM dial, we're about to take back the airwaves. Ok, so maybe we're not going to. Who knows if it'll succeed? But AirAmerica, the liberal talk radio network, signed on today. (If you're not a liberal, too damn bad. You've had AM all to yourself for 15 years... and you have your very own biased, thoroughly subjective, throw-out-all-precepts-of-journalism TV network in Fox "News." Go hear only the stories you want to hear -- complete with biased presentation - on that network.)
Actually, I'm not 100% sure I like this. I mean, don't get me wrong, I think it's great that liberals have finally gotten sick and tired of being painted as enemies of the state, and are going to fight back with the same tools the conservatives use. But as someone with an M.S. in Communications, and who's worked with or around the media for most of his career, I still have this silly idealistic belief that true journalism is supposed to be as unbiased as possible. Now, of course a reporter's worldview or outlook may seep into his/her coverage - I guess that can't always be helped - but to me, journalism should always strive for as objective a presentation as possible. Granted, AirAmerica admits that it is trying to entertain nearly as much as inform, so we're not talking pure journalism here... but I still am not 100% comfortable with any network, or any journalist -- on either side of the spectrum -- that goes into a story or goes about its reporting deliberately intending to be biased. That's the biggest reason why I have a huge issue with Fox, and if AirAmerica develops that same kind of pretense of being a news network and not an entertainment organization that happens to focus on the news, I will have a problem with them too.
However, for now I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Check out AirAmerica if you live in one of the areas where they have an affiliate -- if for no other reason than because Al Franken is very funny.
WELCOME TO THE FREEHOLD ACADEMY OF PERFORMING ARTS
After reading Andrew's very kind comments on the coffee post, I had to go check out his homepage. And as it turns out, I'm really glad I did. The Freehold Academy of Performing Arts looks like a great place for kids to learn all types of dance, receive voice lessons, learn theater, and much more. (Go check out the site, for pete's sake... do you expect me to tell you everything?!)
Seriously, I think this is great. The arts in general -- but especially performing arts -- are underfunded, underutilized, and not paid enough attention; but if you've ever had any experience in them, you know that there's nothing like the feeling of performing for an audience. The confidence and enjoyment kids can get out of learning the arts are well worth the investment... not to mention that it helps make 'em more well-rounded as they become adults. So, for any of you in New Jersey -- or anywhere in the Tri-state, really -- who have kids, think seriously about dance, theater, or voice lessons... and when you do, check into FAPA.
March 30, 2004
BASEBALL SEASON BEGINS
The 2004 Major League Baseball season began today, with the Yankees losing to the A's 8 to 3. So the second best part of this incident was that I now get to say that to say, "the last-place New York Yankees."
But best of all, it's a Vulture update! I got the season off to a great start - Toby Hall and Aubrey Huff came through for me, Victor Zambrano pitched pretty solidly. And with one day gone, and 180 more to play, I am in second place at the moment -- with a .556 batting average, 4 RBI, 6 strong IP from my worst pitcher. So... the season looks great! (Well, so far, anyway.)
All I need now is for Tampa Bay to keep playing this well. Or, at least against the Yankees! On the whole, this was a great Opening Day!
JUST WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS
You know, I enjoy a $5 cup of coffee as much as the next guy. But Starbucks is out of control... they are the Wal-Mart of flavored beverages. They're already everywhere -- I swear, you can't spit without hitting a Starbucks, no matter where you are in the US... but now they want to triple the number of stores?
It's wrong, I tell ya. Just wrong. Oh well. They're making the world safe for inferior coffee. Joy.
March 29, 2004
I'M BACK -- DIDJA MISS ME?
So after a well-earned (if I do say so myself) vacation for the last four days, I am back home in Noo Yuck and am back online. It was great to get away - and Vermont is a beautiful place to get away to.
As you may have guessed, I was part of the surprise 35th birthday celebration that Tim's wife Donna threw for him. (Before I go any further, let me just say that Donna is a saint. The amount of planning it took just to get this weekend in place was astounding -- and then Donna pretty much ran the show this weekend once we were there. Donna, on the off chance you've actually got a spare moment and you're reading this, thank you for everything ... you did a wonderful job!)
Anyway, so we had this surprise ski weekend booked in Killington, Vermont - probably the best ski destination on the east coast. Donna had arranged for family members from literally all over the world to attend (all unbeknownst to Tim), as well as a couple who live next door to Tim, Mike & Jenn, and li'l ol' me. 15 people, 14 of whom knew what was going on, one of whom did not -- and yet we managed to keep it a secret. (That's why I couldn't tell you where I would be - couldn't take the chance that Tim might read it before we left. So Friday morning, Tim left with five others for the four hour drive up to Vermont - not knowing that any of the rest of us would be showing up. I trucked on over to Mike & Jenn's, and we all went up together. (Head over to Mike's site and ask him about the speed traps on I-87 just north of Albany, NY!)
We got to Killington around 2:00, and Tim was suitably surprised - and seemed pretty happy to see us. (Which is a good thing, I suggest.) I have to tell you, I ordinarily would not plug the place we stayed, for privacy reasons -- but not only is the house amazing, but the owner, Kevin, is an incredibly nice guy and accomodating host, and he took very good care of us. So, if you are ever in the mood to go skiing in Killington and are looking for a group chalet/house to rent, I recommend The Matterhorn.
I actually didn't go skiing this weekend. I do like to ski, but my knees don't allow it much anymore... and my right knee especially has been bothering me for much of the last week. So I held back, deciding that it was better to just get away from home for a few days and enjoy the relaxation, rather than push my knee and make it worse. One other person didn't ski either, but we were able to nab a couple of last minute appointments on Saturday at The Spa At The Woods. I have to tell you, a 50 minute massage was really, really refreshing after the last few weeks at work -- and much to my surprise, my knee just did not hurt anymore after the therapist finished! So that was outstanding. Of course, between skipping out of skiing due to knee pain, raving about a peppermint oil massage, and my unfortunate choice to drink a Smirnoff Ice instead of a beer, I set myself up for plenty of "you're such a girl" comments from the boys for the rest of the weekend. (You guys who're reading this? You're all bastards.
I have quite a few very fond memories and sights out of the weekend...Mike's slightly(?) inebriated skid toward the hot tub on the rain slickened deck around 9:00... he slipped, skidded for a moment, then slipped into the air, reaching an altitude of about three feet while achieving a perfect 180 parallel degrees to the deck, before thudding to the wooden deck like a short, bald sack of potatoes. Thankfully, he wasn't hurt -- which made it damn funny.
Dinner at The Grist Mill and their great jambalaya special. Someone getting the bright - if inebriated - idea that an emptied out hard-sided suitcase might make a decent sled... and then taking it out for a spin on the Great Eastern Trail. The Burger King commercial where the guy eats the woman's Whopper with extra mayo... she notices his cheek, licks it, and says, "Mayo"... then the geek sitting nearby looks at the guy and brays at him. "Baahhhhhhhh!" (We laughed our collective asses off at that one.)
Wandering off while Tim was buying new ski boots and finding Ppeppers Bar & Grill, intending to have a drink ... until we ran into their "Perfect Screwdrivers," which are made with orange juice so freshly squeezed that you actually watch them squeezing the juice for your drink as you order it. (We kind of stuck around Ppeppers for a couple of hours, watching the oranges roll through the presser and then tasting them in the screwdrivers.) Watching Silence of the Lambs in front of the fire, and everyone's half-drunken attempts at Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter impressions. ("No! That is in-ci-DENT-lllllllll." "Was she big through the hips? Rrrrrrrrrooomy?")
We left first thing Monday morning for home - everyone tired and sort of ready to go back, but at the same time wishing it wasn't over. I think it's safe to say that Tim had an okay birthday. I think it's even safer to say that Donna has set the bar incredibly high when it comes to planning birthday bashes... and that Tim has his work cut out for him when planning Donna's 35th when it comes. It was a great weekend, with great friends, and was a much needed break from the tension of being here in NY. Thanks, Donna!
(Pictures are forthcoming... as soon as I get 'em developed and posted.)
March 25, 2004
THE VISUAL ALONE IS PYTHON-ESQUE
You know, there are few headlines in the world that you just don't expect to ever see. You know, things like "Mike Tyson Saves Oprhans From Fire." Or "OJ Finds Real Killer." Or "George Wendt: The Playgirl Pictorial."
There's one other that I had to remove from this list -- it's not one I don't expect to see anymore, becaise I have seen it. "Exercise Guru Richard Simmons Cited For Assault."
Yes, kids, it's true: Richard Simmons has been cited for misdemeanor assault. Of course, this being Richard Simmons, it's not exactly how it sounds. Most of us hear "assault," and we think right hooks to the jaw or left crosses to the chin. Richard? He bitch-slaps.
The man "made the off-hand comment, 'Hey, everybody. It's Richard Simmons. Let's drop our bags and rock to the '50s,"' said Phoenix police Sgt. Tom Osborne. "Mr. Simmons took exception to it and walked over to the other passenger and apparently slapped him in the face."
Why do I suddenly get a mental image of Monica and Rachel slap-fighting on "Friends?" Or of a Monty Python skit? And what about Simmons' victim? How would you like to go through life as The Guy Who Got Bitch-Slapped By Richard Simmons? I mean, that guy's masculinity is in serious question. He might as well lace up his corset and snap his garters on... how do you be less masculine than Richard Simmons?
As for Simmons, there's no confirmation that he's angling for a cage match with Carson Kressley.
COULDN'T HAVE SAID IT BETTER MYSELF
I hate to do a ManeyDigital style blog, but sometimes there's just no choice. Sometimes, someone just says it too well. So head on over and check out Altercation by Eric Alterman today. A little teaser:
Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame, Max Cleland, Paul O'Neill, General Zinni, and Dick Clarke are all unpatriotic liars and weenies right? Has to be true; otherwise, this administration is both incompetent and dishonest. And that's not possible. I mean, on the one hand we have people who have given their entire careers to serving the American people and in many cases, paid dearly for it. On the other, we have a guy who didn't bother to show up for his cushy National Guard service during a war he supported, spent most of his first forty years drinking and carousing, and having been made wealthy by his father's associates, fell into the job of president where he (undeniably) misled his country into a war based on falsified evidence. Gee that's a hard one.
Can I get an 'amen?!' Preach on, Brother Eric!
GO KORN GO
I knew there was a reason I like this band... I mean besides the fact that their lyrics are all alienated and angry (I think they sing the national anthem of Curmurdgeonland. But beyond that, their new single and video takes square aim at the music and radio industries that are dominated by an oligarchy of conservatives -- political conservatives, in the case of radio, and creative conservatives in the case of music... people who, rather than give chances to unique and fresh musical voices, look to clone the four acts that meet their approval and then play the same twelve songs over and over again.
The video to "Y'All Want a Single" ... was shot at an out-of-business Los Angeles record store. In it, Korn, joined by fans, storms through the aisles smashing the display cases and CDs with crowbars.
While the store is being destroyed, statements taking the music industry to task cross the screen, including: "One corporation owns the 5 major video channels in the U.S.;" "98% of the bands signed to a major don't make a profit;" "Two radio conglomerates control 42% of listeners;" "The music industry releases 100 songs per week."
"The stuff we said in the video (is the stuff) the music industry doesn't want kids to know about," (Korn lead singer Jonathan) Davis says. "Everyone is in bed with everyone in the industry. One corporation owns all the video channels, one corporation owns all the radio stations, and all the venues we play at are also the promoters. It's a whole monopoly. They basically deem what kids are going to hear."
You go, Jonathan. Although, I can bet you that neither ClearChannel nor Viacom will air the single or the video. But their hearts are in the right place, man - and that's enough for me.
March 24, 2004
LEVERAGING MY SYNERGIES
One of the worst things about working in Corporate America is the ridiculous, nonsensical business-jargon that gets used by every MBA and business administration major within spitting distance. Try as you might to get these guys to speak English, they become physically incapable of doing so, instead spitting out these made-up phrases that sound important but really say nothing. I'm convinced they do it simply to feel superior. It's worse still when these jokers want you to put their gibberish into a press release or a speech, and get all flustered and upset when you refuse & tell them that their language is in fact worthless. (Although it is rather fun sport to observe the different shades of purple you can get them to turn.)
There are several phrases that, if I never heard again, I would still have heard too often. The worst thing of all is that via osmosis, some of this crap actually begins to sink in, and you find yourself thinking like that, if not actually saying the words. ("Leveraging our synergies" is my personal un-favorite... if I could amend the US Constitution just once, I would make it legal for me to slap the living ... snot... out of any business or marketing major who even got two syllables of that phrase out anywhere near me -- in fact, anywhere in the US. What the (hell) does it mean to leverage someone's synergies?
Thankfully, there are some folks in the UK who've collected many of the overused modern business cliches in one list. The Plain English Campaign asked its 5000 members to vote on the most annoying trends they've observed in the last year. They released the list today - and while no synergies are leveraged anywhere near the list, it does contain many of my other un-favorites... including "value-added" (which has become so overused that it's become self-parody; unfortunately executives don't often realize that), "in terms of" (man, did I used to have an executive who abused the hell out of that one!, and "at the end of the day," which is now in fact said not at the end of each day, but in fact "24/7."
Anyone speaking this language and not doing so in a self-deferential way that conveys its parody ought to be shot.
CHILL EFFECT
Way to go, Kobe, you rapist with piece of garbage lawyers. Thanks to you, we probably set rape victims back about 15 years today. Experts believe that other women who are vicitms of rape will now will be far more reluctant to press charges against their assailant, because of the precedent you set today of forcing rape victims to testify about their sexual history.
"I'm frightened about this decision, only for the fact that families will not support victims and survivors to go report because they can now say, 'Look what happened to so-and-so,'" said Jeri Elster of Los Angeles, who was raped in 1992 and has lobbied for changes in the law. "It feels like a huge setback for survivors and victims to come."
I've said it before and I'll say it again. I don't care if the girl had a habit of taking on three guys at once on her days off, or if she was with some other guy earlier that night. If a woman says no, that means no -- whether she's the virgin or the whore. Her sexual history has nothing to do with what took place in that hotel room. And because of the Bryant defense, thousands of women who will be raped in the next few years, who might have been inclined to courageously fight back and report what was done to her, will no longer be as willing to come forward or feel as safe if they do.
Nice legacy, asshole.
INSTANT KARMA'S GONNA GET YOU
The world's greediest man, Bill Gates, was today fined a record amount of $613 million by regulators from the EU, who said in essence that in amassing his record fortune, Bill Gates cheated. He doesn't play fair, said the EU, and they punished him for it.
The world's second greediest man, Alex Rodriguez, was playing against the Red Sox, only the most recent of the many teams he's screwed. A ball thrown by one of Rodriguez' own teammates took a bounce off another player and smacked him in the face, bruising his cheekbone and sending him to the hospital for a CT scan.
The immortal words of John Lennon keep ringing in my ears tonight.
March 23, 2004
IT'S ONLY ROCK AND ROLL, BUT I LIKE IT
I just watched the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremonies for 2004 on VH1. I'm incredulous. This year's class contains one guy who definitely doesn't have any business being there, and one other who more than likely doesn't belong.
Jackson Browne being in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is like putting Bombo Rivera in the baseball hall of fame. (If you just said, "who?" you get my point.) Jackson Browne had what, two or three years of being relevant? I mean, "Doctor My Eyes" is a good song, and "Running on Empty" is all right, but you know what? "Flagpole Sitta" was a good song too - and no one is aiming to put Harvey Danger in the hall. Let's face it: Jackson Browne is better known for the hits he put on Darryl Hannah than the hits he put on the charts. (For the record and in case anyone's ever been unclear, let's get it straight: any man who EVER hits a woman, EVER, deserves to be sodomized with a Louisville Slugger embedded with barbed wire and coated in tobasco sauce. Freakin' cowards.)
I know rock success and legend status isn't dependent on chart success -- just ask Led Zepplin or the Velvet Underground. But what other contributions to rock did Jackson Browne make outside of his chart songs? Being a no-nuke activist? Well, I appreciate the sentiment, Jackson... but Michael Douglas was a no-nuke activist after "The China Syndrome," and no one's putting him in the Hall of Fame. If Jackson Browne can get in the rock hall, then I guess there's hope for Crowded House and Hootie and the Blowfish.
Bob Seger? Beyond the fact that the man ought to be stoned to near-death for the way classic ClearChannel overplays "Night Moves," and the fact that Chevy has been using that damn "Like a Rock" for fifteen damn years, I don't have too much problem with the guy... but is he a Hall of Famer? I mean, Dale Murphy was a decent ballplayer back in the day, but he's not a Hall of Famer. Same with Seger. Decent musician, I don't deny his symbolic importance to his home state of Michigan. But he's not a hall of famer.
On the plus side, Prince did show last night why he definitively is a Hall of Famer. Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, and Dhani Harrison (George's only son) were playing "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" as a tribute during George Harrison's induction. (As a side note, how come "Weeps" has become the unofficial Harrison anthem? It is a great song, but he did so many other strong songs... why has everyone seemingly settled on this one?) So Prince comes on and plays with them - he's not really known for being social, so that was noteworthy in and of itself... and when the time came for the solo at the end, Prince let loose with one the best solos I've heard. Man, I was just in awe. He just rocked the joint out, man - let it all fly, a Hall of Famer paying tribute to another Hall of Famer. Great way to honor George, and a great way to end the show.
LIFTING THE SHROUD
Paul Krugman in the New York Times has an opinion piece about the Bush administration's habit of trying to assassinate the character and credibility of anyone who disagrees with them, whether those people are former "friends" or not. Krugman highlights some of those from the Bush administration or with tight connections inside the White House who have tried to publicly reveal this administration's true agenda... and talks about how dangerous it can be to your career health to disagree with this administration -- and then questions why Richard Clarke might be motivated to set himself up to be in the Bush crosshairs.
Some great excerpts from "Lifting The Shroud:"
"It's important, when you read the inevitable attempts to impugn the character of the latest whistle-blower, to realize just how risky it is to reveal awkward truths about the Bush administration. When Gen. Eric Shinseki told Congress that postwar Iraq would require a large occupation force, that was the end of his military career. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV revealed that the 2003 State of the Union speech contained information known to be false, someone in the White House destroyed his wife's career by revealing that she was a C.I.A. operative. And we now know that Richard Foster, the Medicare system's chief actuary, was threatened with dismissal if he revealed to Congress the likely cost of the administration's prescription drug plan."
"After a few hours of shocked silence, the character assassination began. He "may have had a grudge to bear since he probably wanted a more prominent position," declared Dick Cheney, who also says that Mr. Clarke was "out of the loop." (What loop? Before 9/11, Mr. Clarke was the administration's top official on counterterrorism.)"
Read more here.
SILLY WABBIT... CUD IS FOR COWS
I've alluded to this once or twice in writing here, but it's far more obvious when you know me in person that my biggest pet peeve in the world is grown adults who have not yet learned the basics of table manners. Nothing sets me off faster and makes me grind my teeth in utter contempt as someone who doesn't keep their mouth closed while eating, or manages to smack their lips or suck their teeth in the process of eating. (Although, people who are so rude that they will not stop eating while they're on the phone are a damn close second -- and I have seen that happen around our office more times than I can count.) I'm not talking about the occasional crunching apple or sound that escapes while a normal person is enjoying a meal; I am talking about those rude bastards who were never taught as children that polite people close their mouths when chewing.
You might suggest that it's a simple fact that people make noise when they eat, and I am being oversensitive... and perhaps you're right. Be that as it may, the curmudgeon's handbook has a chapter that specifically says that we're allowed to hold things against people that they can't help. So it is that I just go on edge when I hear people making unnecessary eating noises. (Gosh, it's a wonder that an easygoing charmer like me is still single, ain't it kids?)
I bring all this up because we had a whole bunch of people from our other offices visiting today... one of the ironies of my recent "move up" within the company is that I went from having my own semi-private office to being placed in the middle of a cube farm - real important, aren't I? Anyway, the cube nearest to me was vacant today -- its occupant is one of our telecommuters who is only in the actual office two days each week, working from home the other three days -- and so one of our visitors was given that space for the day.
I will never know how it is that someone gets into their 30s and becomes a professional and upstanding member of society in every other respect without learning how to chew gum quietly. The woman who took that seat is a former colleague; I like her, she's a good worker and a nice person, and I looked forward to being able to schmooze with her during the day... until she popped in the first piece of gum at around 10 am. I kid you not, there are 9 year olds with better gum etiquette. I don't think she closed her mouth the rest of the day... chomping and snapping and popping... I felt like I could almost see her behind my cube wall, twirling it around her finger like some junior high schooler.
My usual recourse when dealing with a loud eater, since I am physically incapable of concentrating or working when someone is doing this near me, is to break out my headphones and CRANK the iTunes or Net radio loud enough to drown out all outside sound. Which is what I did today... and do you believe it, at one point she actually came over to my cube and complained that my music (from inside the headphones) was too loud? I was this close to throttling her and saying, "IF YOU COULD CHEW GUM LIKE A HUMAN BEING AND NOT A COW, MAYBE I COULD TURN MY VOLUME DOWN! UNTIL THEN, HOPE YOU LIKE SYSTEM OF A DOWN!"
I tell you... there are days when I wish I was Agent Smith in "The Matrix" and could just make some people's mouths disappear.
March 22, 2004
LIFE IMITATES ART
I was lucky enough in high school to be in a great play -- Tom Stoppard's "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead," a brilliantly satirical retelling of Shakespeare's Hamlet from the point of view of two befuddled minor characters. Almost 20 years later, I still list it among the funniest and most well-written plays I've ever seen or read. If you ever have a chance to see a production of it, even on a high school level, I can't recommend it strongly enough.
Anyway, I've been thinking back to that play today. See, watching the Bush White House try and attack the credibility of Richard Clarke -- like they've tried to attack the credibility of David Kay, Hans Blix, Paul O'Neill, Mohamed el Baradei, and so many others before them who've revealed the true agenda of this administration... well, it's reminded me of one of the soliloquies I had to memorize all those years ago as Guildenstern. The two main characters are trying to make sense of their situation, trying to figure out if they're really experiencing what they think they're experiencing...
A man breaking his journey between one place and another, at a third place of no name, character, population or significance, sees a unicorn cross his path and disappear. This in itself is startling, but there are precedents for mythical encounters of various kinds, or to be less extreme a choice of persuasions to put it down to fancy; until -- "My God," says a second man, "I must be dreaming. I thought I saw a unicorn." At which point, a dimension is added that makes the experience as alarming as it will ever be. A third witness, you understand, adds no further dimension but only spreads it thinner, and a fourth thinner still, and the more witnesses there are the thinner it gets and the more reasonable it becomes until it is as thin as reality, the name we give to the common experience.
Reality is the name we give the common experience... and there are enough witnesses now who have revealed Bush's true agenda and deception about his intentions that it now qualifies as a common experience.
THE BORDER
So I went into a fast food establishment tonight, the best option available to me after a late evening at the office. I won't tell you which one, but it's the one with the chihuahua and that invents new products every few months and figures that as long as they give it a name with three syllables and that ends in an "a," we'll believe that it's something we could buy in Monterrey.
What caught my eye as I walked in was the sign placed prominently on the wall behind the registers, right alongside the employee of the month plaque. It said, "We proudly wash and rinse our hands." This apparently is a mark of great pride for the ownership and employees of the establishment; perhaps they feel that other places in the area don't wash, or maybe they think I'll be more inclined to eat more if I realize that they do indeed wash & rinse. Frankly, if they feel the need to point it out to me that they wash their hands, I'm less inclined to ever eat there again.
THE DEAD SHALL RISE FROM THEIR GRAVES
Does anyone else find it deliciously subversive that "Dawn of the Dead" -- about people who rise from death to wreak havoc -- has overtaken "The Passion of the Christ" -- about people wreaking havoc so that someone could rise from death -- as the #1 movie at the box office?
And how come when zombies do it they're bad, but when Jesus does it he's good? I mean, wouldn't people have been kinda creeped out to see him walking down the side of the road too? So if you eat other people's bodies, you're bad... but when other people eat your body, it's good? The amusing (not to mention sacreligous) possibilities are endless.
For those of you who are about to be offended... lighten up. God invented humor too. And for your information, he is not going to send me to hell for making zombie jokes when a horror movie overtakes The Passion at the box office. No... he's sending me to hell because I support a woman's right to choose and the right of homosexuals to get married. Don't you guys listen to the Christian Right?! Come on, people, get with it! The movie jokes have nothing to do with it! It's because I'm a liberal!
Yeah, yeah, I know. I'm bad.
March 21, 2004
MISSED OPPORTUNITIES
It's been a full weekend for me, and so after I got home this evening from Tim's (where we were having another in a series of bon voyage parties for Mike & Jenn), I did a dumb thing and fell asleep for about 90 minutes. Not only does this mean that I'll be up all night, but it also meant that I slept through 60 Minutes, which I really wanted to watch tonight as Richard Clarke became yet another figure close to the Bush administration to admit or charge that Bush was pre-planning an invasion of Iraq long before 2002, and wanted desperately to find evidence connecting Saddam Hussein to 9/11 (dare I say manufacture that connection, like they manufactured the "case" for war in Iraq?).
Thankfully, Tim, Mike and Marine's Girl were paying attention, and posted about the story on their sites. Man... Paul O'Neill... David Kay... Karen Kwiatkowski... Richard Clarke... how many more people who were in a position to know have to come forward before the American people realize that the Crawford Cretin and his puppeteers intended to invade Iraq -- with or without a catalyst -- from the day Katherine Harris and Antonin Scalia installed him as president?
"The president dragged me into a room with a couple of other people, shut the door, and said, 'I want you to find whether Iraq did this.' Now he never said, 'Make it up.' But the entire conversation left me in absolutely no doubt that George Bush wanted me to come back with a report that said Iraq did this.
"I said, 'Mr. President. We've done this before. We have been looking at this. We looked at it with an open mind. There's no connection.'
"He came back at me and said, 'Iraq! Saddam! Find out if there's a connection.' And in a very intimidating way. I mean that we should come back with that answer. We wrote a report."
The right wing attack machine will no doubt be in hgh gear over the next few days, trying to attack Clarke's credibility. Our friend Tom (who to his credit keeps coming back to this lefty site despite how much it would appear to make his blood boil) will probably argue that Clarke has an axe to grind or is trying to sell books. But Tom (and everyone else)... come on. One insider with a grudge, I can understand. Two with ulterior motives... less likely, but possible. But this is happening over and over again... people who were in positions to know come out and either imply or directly say that this administration intended to "get" Saddam, and had it as their end game even upon assuming office. Are we to believe that all these people have axes to grind? (If so, then I'd argue that this president has a bad habit of pissing his inside people off, if so many of them have developed axes to grind in the time they've worked for him.) Or is it more likely that these people are telling the truth, and that this president had a vendetta from the day he moved in and was determined to carry it out even if he had to invent the justification as if it were yellowcake uranium? It would seem that the right wing's just upset because so many of the family insiders are violating omerta on this one.
Another interesting article is in Newsweek this week -- their series, "Storm Warning." It details how two administrations failed to take the necessary action to stop or destroy al Qaeda... Clinton because he, perhaps distracted and rendered impotent by the self-initiated scandal surrounding him, or perhaps out of lack of resolve, failed to step in and end the bureaucratic struggles among his policy makers, thus keeping the US response to al Qaeda paralyzed by governmental in-fighting... and Bush because his obsessive agenda of getting Saddam Hussein precluded him from focusing on any other threat or policy direction.
I'm not absolving Clinton. If there was truly an opportunity to take preventative, preclusive steps and eliminate bin Laden and the threat al Qaeda represented, then he and his administration failed us -- no matter his distractions or the impact of the impeachment hearings on his political capital. If he had the chance to do something to stop al Qaeda, he had taken an oath to do so, and thus failed it. So when we criticize Bush, let's not forget that Clinton had his chances too. But Bush is, to my mind, the far greater traitor to the oath he swore. Ignoring a growing threat to the people he was elected -- oops, I mean appointed -- to protect, all in order to pursue a family blood feud (and reward a few of his oil buddies while at it)? Inexcusable, and unforgiveable.
VULTURE NEWS
A couple of the Vultures have been getting some good coverage in their local papers. Miguel Cabrera is looking more and more like he might be the best $12 bargain in our league's history... I'm still stunned I got him that low, I expected to pay $16 for him and was willing to go to $20. From what the Palm Beach Post has to say, Cabrera might have even been a bargain at $19, the way he's hitting this spring.
I wasn't thrilled about having to go with Mark Loretta at second. My plan going in was to get the Angels' Adam Kennedy. But after reading this piece in the San Diego Union Tribune, I am feeling a little better about having him in my lineup. I hadn't really realized how well he played last year -- hitting .314 with 13 homers and 72 RBI -- and I was thrilled to read that he is batting .533 so far this spring. I've also read some promising reports about how Padres' rookie shortstop Khalil Greene is playing this spring... I picked him up as a $1 backup, maybe he'll turn into more.
For another owner's perspective on the draft and on his team, check out Tim's assessment of his Hazzard County Dukes.
March 20, 2004
AND GOD SAID, LET THERE BE VULTURES... AND THERE WERE, AND IT WAS GOOD
I'm very, very sleepy. I've been up since 6 am today - it takes 30 minutes to drive to Tim's, and I needed to stop and pick up some donuts and breakfast stuff. So complete sentences may not be so easy to come by right now... sorry if you expect that in your downtime reading. Anyway, the good news is, for the first time in about 4 seasons, I actually stuck to my strategy this year. I came out of this draft having done virutally everything I intended to do when I walked in the door. A couple of my fellow owners noticed - I even heard some comments about how surprising it was that I was sticking to my guns this year. So in that sense, it was a successful draft. The bad news is that in hindsight, I'm not 100% sure it was a winning strategy that I stuck to.
I went in thinking that I was going to spend big ($24 or more) on three offensive players and three pitchers -- and that I was definitely going to land the #1 offensive player and one of the top three pitchers, no matter what I had to spend. I knew that was going to end up costing me around $160 or so; I figured that I could fill in my bench with 8 or 9 $1 players at the end of the auction, which would leave me about $90 to spend on my remaining 10 players. I knew that would be tight - but a $12 player here, an $8 player there, and I could get some decent starters to augment my six stars. And you know what? I preety much managed it.
The problem is, I think I went with one stud too many. You can't fill in a roster with decent starters on $90 - even when you are anchored by 6 stars, you need more than $90 to complete the team. So after the first four hours, I had 8 players -- 6 of whom are stars -- and I was feeling damn good about my squad. By the time the second four hour session had ended, I was feeling much less smug. I do have my six studs, but the rest of my team is pretty weak. I'm going to be counting on my Big Three pitchers especially to carry me through the year. If I had to guess, I'd say I'll compete for the middle of the money slots -- finishing somewhere between 3rd and 7th (the top five finish in the money).
So, without further ado... ladies and gentlemen (cue "Hell's Bells" by AC/DC) ... your... 2004 Vice City Vultures!!!!!
At first base... simply the single best offensive player in Major League Baseball.... from the St. Louis Cardinals, Albert Pujols! At second base, playing in a revamped San Diego lineup that promises to score a lot more runs in 2004... Mark Loretta! Next... coming off a promising rookie campaign, we're looking for big things this season from Arizona Diamondbacks shortstop Alex Cintron! At third base... the highest rated third baseman in the game, he's found new life in St. Louis, he'll give you power AND decent batting average... Scott Rolen!! At catcher... our perennial favorite, he plays for us every year, please welcome back the San Francisco Giants' A.J. Pierzynski! In the outfield... he emerged last year as a bona fide superstar, delivering 34 home runs and 106 RBIs depsite playing in the baseball desert of Tampa Bay... the Devil Rays' Aubrey Huff! Next, he's only 21 years old, but many scouts say he's soon to be one of the game's next superstars... a World Series hero last year at only 20... the Florida Marlins' Miguel Cabrera!! And rounding out our outfield... a former #1 overall draft pick in the Major League draft... they call him "Pat the Bat"... the Philadelphia Phillies' Pat Burrell!
Your pitching staff is anchored by the single greatest right hander of his generation. He dominates every game he pitches in when he's healthy, and he dropped that old Yankee coot Don Zimmer like a sack of potatoes in last year's playoffs... ladies and gentlemen, the best pitcher in the game... Pedroooooo Martinez! Your #2 starter is one of Oakland's famed "Big Three" - and at only 26, he's entering the prime of his career... Mark Mulder! Your #3 starter has emerged from the Minnesota rotation as a bona fide Cy Young candidate... with a strikeout ratio that makes grown men cry... the Twins' Johan Santana!!!!! Your #4 starter won a Cy Young award in 1996 as a member of the Toronto Blue Jays, and has returned to Toronto this year to finish out his career at the site of his greatest successes... the Blue Jays' Pat Hentgen!! And the last member of your starting rotation, he's the ace of a young and improving Tampa rotation, the Devil Rays' Victor Zambrano! And your relievers... the new closer for the improved Houston Astros, flamethrower Octavio Dotel! And finally... the best young set-up man in the game, primed to take over as the Angels' closer should Troy Percival struggle or go on the DL... 2002 postseason hero Francisco Rodriguez!
And the rest of the team: Tino Martinez, Chase Utley, Khalil Greene, Adrian Beltre, Toby Hall, Craig Wilson, Craig Biggio, Mark Kotsay, Kenny Rogers, and Chad Cordero!! Give it up for YOUR Vice City Vultures!!!!!!!
Yes, I know I am a geek. But there's a PA announcer in every guy just waiting to get out. Sue me.
March 19, 2004
FAVORITE MTV MEMORIES
Tim commented on my J.J. Jackson blog by saying that great minds blog alike... and as it turns out, he had a really good post yesterday on his site sharing his memories of JJ and of the early MTV years. He mentioned one of the first MTV contests, in which the network gave away a house in Indiana, inspired by John Cougar's then-current hit, "Pink Houses." (Hey, back in the day there was no such thing as a Mellencamp. John Cougar ruled MTV; John Mellencamp rules the Geritol Network.) The kicker to the contest was that the house would of course have to be pink, fitting with the song. Cougar and his band would assist the new owner... and in one of the most memorable of all MTV soundbites, the promo for the contest closed with Cougar looking at the camera and drawling, "And we'll paaaaint the muuuther paaiiiink." That commercial is darn near 20 years old now, but I have seeing and hearing it in my mind all day, thanks to Tim's blog. (You're an evil man, Tim.)
Rather than be dismayed, I have allowed my memory to run wild, back to the days when MTV was new, when VH1 didn't exist and when MTV's airwaves were actually filled with videos instead of god awful reality programming and stupid stunt shows. Here are a few of my favorite memories from the years when MTV was still MTV:
The snare drum full of milk from the J. Geils Band "Centerfold" video. The bizarre midgets dancing around the maypole in the video for "Safety Dance." The white horse that kept appearing out of nowhere -- and for no apparent reason or connection to the song -- in "Total Eclipse of the Heart." The nerdy fan in the audience pumping his fist and singing along to the Scorpions "Big City Nights." The bizarre Attack of the Painted Woman theme to Scandal's "The Warrior." The old "I Want My MTV" promos with Cyndi Lauper, Billy Idol, Pete Townshend. The 10 second teaser that they'd play between commercials, featuring an Australian band saying, "We're the Hoodoo Gurus, and we're on MTV. Who are you, and what are you on?"
The alien that walked up the stairs and knocked on the door in "Who Can It Be Now?" The cheerleaders in the god-awful, cheesy video for "Mickey." Fire climbing up Nikki Sixx's leather-clad legs while he played his guitar (a neat trick achieved by pouring lighter fluid on the pants and lighting it... it never even singed him). Billy Idol falling back into the electrical transformer in "Dancing With Myself." Eddie, Michael and Diamond Dave doing that strange little synchronized hop-step toward the camera at the end of "Jump." The old lady standing in the window whipping cream in "Whip It." Bono dressed all in black, waving that giant white flag and marching in place while the mist clouded around him in the live version of "Sunday Bloody Sunday" shot at Red Rocks in Colorado.
The guy washing the window in the background in "Every Breath You Take." The nasty, grungy overalls with no shirt underneath that those crazy Dexy's Midnight Runners wore in "Come On Eileen." Madonna writhing in the middle of a road at night and looking VERY hot in "Burning Up." Joe Elliott's Union Jack muscle-tee, and "Unta, Gleeben, Glouten, Globen" -- whatever the hell that means. The marching hammers in "Another Brick in the Wall." The punk little girl who took the chain saw to the piano in "Close (To the Edit)." The girls from Bananarama tossing banana peels onto the windshield of the cop cars following them in that semi -- ostensibly blinding the cop and preventing anyone from following them -- in "Cruel Summer." Rick Springfield using his guitar to spear the bathroom mirror into submission in "Jessie's Girl." (They were always breaking things in 80s videos, weren't they?)
Asia in Asia. The brick set that the VJs hung in. Kiss unmasked. The suitcase that got up and walked away at the end of Wang Chung's "Dance Hall Days." Reagan and Chernenko beating the hell out of one another in "Two Tribes." Realizing Geogre Michael was gay a decade before he did while watching "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go." ("Choose Life," George?) The cello drawn on the woman's back in "She Blinded Me With Science." The fact that the girl who was being "remade" in the video for "Legs" had better legs and was much hotter than anyof the Eliminator girls. That funky hand move thing that ZZ Top did in every video. ZZ keychains. The stupid shades with the blinking red lights in them that all the guy members of Blondie put on at the end of "Rapture." Milton Berle in drag in "Round and Round."
Man, 80s MTV kicked ass. What a great era. I'm sure I missed some great ones... feel free to share your favorites in the comment section.
EAT YOUR HEART OUT, LIMBAUGH
An article on CNN.com this week entitled "The Rise of the Online Citizen" proclaims that blogs are "the liberal version of conservative talk radio." The article cites some compelling stats and raises some interesting points. It also asserts that "Most political reporters now read blogs - just as they listen to conservative talk radio." So to all you political reporters out there reading this site... how about hiring me to do analysis for you. Come on... give me some sugar -- I am your neighbor!
THE FINAL COUNTDOWN
No, I'm not talking about that cheeseball 1987 song by Europe. (More on that in a moment.) But as I write this, it's after 9 pm on Friday - which means that the fantasy baseball draft is less than 12 hours away. Tomorrow morning we'll all be getting together at around 7:30 (how dedicated -- or stupid -- must we be to be awake that early on a Saturday?!) at Tim's place, and at 8:00 am sharp the first player will be thrown out for bidding. I feel like a little kid on Christmas Eve.
My team name has become one of the running traditions in the league, in that my franchise changes names almost every season. If a name doesn't bring me great success, it gets trashed -- and since my team usually sucks, the names don't last too long. For the last two seasons, my team has been known as "The Green Monster" in honor of my beloved Sox. But after finishing 11th and 8th in a 14 team league, it's time that name was retired. For the new name, I have looked to my favorite ultra-violent video game for inspiration. This year's incarnation of my franchise will be.... (drum roll, please)... the "Vice City Vultures." (See logo below, courtesy of Rockstar Games and some creative additions using a graphics program.)
The Vultures aren't going to take any guff from anyone, let me tell you. With this guy's attitude, the rest of the league had better watch their step. I'll let you know tomorrow night which players became Vultures for 2004.
Posted by Christopher at 10:02 PM | Comments (0)
March 18, 2004
A SAD PASSING
The older you get -- obviously -- the more reminders you have that you're getting older. Your body makes strange and frightening sounds when you get out of bed in the morning. You find yourself walking through malls thinking, "Those darn teenagers!" ... and then realize in horror that you sound exactly like your parents once did. You look in the "hip" clothing stores and realize that not only do most of the styles look utterly foreign, but that you would like very, very silly if you tried to wear those clothes. You start avoiding places that look too crowded or too loud. You hear a song on the radio that you haven't heard in a while and start singing along... and then realize that it's Saturday Night at the Oldies.
Most of these changes, though, aren't so bad - even if they are somewhat shocking when you first realize them. You decide that most of them can be seen as positives, signs that you've grown up. (Except for those sounds when you get out of bed. My knees make so many popping noises that I've started calling the left one Orville and the right one Reddenbacher.)
But every once in a while, a reminder of your own advancing age comes along that you can't joke away or dismiss. It's not the event or reminder itself that is so sad, as much as what it represents for you. And today, I've had one of those reminders. J.J. Jackson, one of the original five MTV veejays, died today in Los Angeles of an apparent heart attack. He was 62.
I am one of the original MTV generation. I had just turned 13 when MTV signed on the air on August 1, 1981. Today, it's easy to dismiss MTV as a channel of youth; it's degenerated into self-parody in many ways, and shows the growing pains that come with having become part of the Establishment instead of the rebellious outsider. But when MTV premiered, it really did change everything. It was a new art form; video presented listeners new ways of appreciating music and artists with a new medium of expression. MTV changed advertising; MTV changed music; MTV changed history.
And while adults might not have exactly gotten that point right away, we did. There was a sense of excitement about MTV from the very beginning. Watching videos was a happening... much like "The Apprentice" or "Survivor" today, we watched MTV as much to be part of The Collective Experience as we did for the music. And back in the day, before they became just a slick tool for marketing a song, artists were actually using video to make artistic statements. Even as the "80s video" cliches developed, they were developing because someone had done something new that was worthy of duplication.
And the Original Five were part of that excitement. J.J. Jackson, Alan Hunter, Mark Goodman, Nina Blackwood and Martha Quinn were as much a part of my teenage life as my first girlfriend. Hell, Martha was my first girlfriend, in a sense... she was the first famous woman I noticed once I started realizing that girls were pretty cool; Martha was my first crush. As such, she was my favorite -- but I liked all the veejays. They were my partners in some new, bold adventure that the older generations didn't get. (I either didn't realize or just didn't care that J.J., at 40, was several years older than my mom... he was still one of us, not them.) I spent my waking hours glued to every image that the veejays offered me, hung on their every word, laughed at their every joke. The veejays were an integral part of the early MTV experience, far more than today's fans can understand.
Of course, eventually, they all moved on. Martha tried to be an actress -- she even married Bobby Brady in one of the insipid Brady Bunch reunion movies -- but most of them went back to their radio roots and disappeared from public view. There were the occasional reunion specials, or one of them might be interviewed for some nostalgia TV show. And every time one of them came on, the old magic returned. I don't know what it was, but whenever Nina, Mark, Alan, J.J. or Martha -- actually, especially Martha, because she's still a hottie even into her mid-40s -- appears on TV, I stop channel surfing and watch them... even when Alan or Nina did those awful Time-Life infomercials for 80s music collections. They've kept their hold on me, even into my 30s.
And today, J.J. is gone... not in an accident, not of some overdose or other excess of the Rock Lifestyle (tm), but of natural causes. When the icons of your childhood begin to die of natural causes, it ages you in a way that no wrinkle, no responsibility, no physical reminder ever could. J.J. Jackson never got within 200 miles of me, so far as I know; he wasn't even my favorite veejay. But his death has left me feeling somehow emptier tonight and more alone... not so much by reminding me of my own mortality, but in the permanent removal of that little piece of my childhood. My teenage years are long gone, but until today we always had nostaligia specials, or even just the knowledge that they were out there somewhere, to fall back on. Now, we don't even have that anymore. After today, we really can never go back again, can never again visit that part of my youth for a couple hours like an old friend. We can't go back, because J.J. is gone, and it wouldn't be the same unless we're all there together. And I am feeling strangely sad about that tonight.
Rest in peace, J.J. -- and thanks for being a great part of my childhood.
March 17, 2004
MY, TENNESSEE MUST BE PROUD
You know, I'd really like to believe the conservative arguement that they oppose gay marriage because they're simply trying to "protect the sanctity of marriage." I'd still find lots of fault with that argument, but I could at least believe that the folks upset at gay marriage were good-hearted people with whom I just have an honest disagreement.
Unfortunately, stuff like this, makes it pretty much impossible to not see the pure hatred and bigotry that underlies so much of the "protect marriage" crowd. Yep, you read this right, kids... the same county that carried out the Scopes Monkey Trial in 1925 is now trying to make it county law that homosexuals can't live there.
Commissioner J.C. Fugate, who introduced the measure, also asked the county attorney to find a way to enact an ordinance banning homosexuals from living in the county. "We need to keep them out of here," Fugate said.
We need to keep "them" out of here... you know, when they said that about blacks, the world called it apartheid; when they said that about Jews, the world called it Nazism. When they say it about gays, I guess we call it Tennessee. Call it apartheid, Nazism, or Rhea County... I don't see a whole lot of difference.
Posted by Christopher at 10:14 PM | Comments (0)GO TERRIERS!!
Just want to get a shout out to my boys on the hockey team at Boston University. My alma mater's Icedogs did me proud last weekend... despite a mediocre season that resulted in the Terriers getting a lowly 8 seed in the Hockey East tournament, they put it together and knocked off the #1 seed, hated rival Boston College. So BC sits at home, and the IceDogs face #2 seed Maine in a three game series this weekend. Good luck and best wishes to Coach Parker and the rest of the BU Terriers. You go, boys! Woof!
FOR A GOOD LAUGH
There's a reason that Jon Stewart and The Daily Show are favorites both of the critics and in the ratings. The writing is just damn funny, and let's face it - the guy is hysterical. If you're in the mood to laugh, check out a clip from one of their shows this week. He takes shots at both Kerry and Bush - and even as a Kerry backer, I have to say the Kerry jokes are funny. Anyway, check it out.
UH... YOU WANNA RUN THAT BY ME AGAIN, COLIN?
Secretary of State Powell went to Afghanistan today and declared that al Qaeda is "on the defensive."
Now, I'll be the first to acknowledge that we've done damage to their network, killed or captured many of their leaders, and denied them many of their hiding places. I think we can all agree that we've slapped the bastards around quite a bit.
But the overwhelming evidence suggests that al Qaeda just killed 201 people and wounded 1600 more in Madrid one week ago. And our government keeps telling us that "foreign" elements are responsible for sabotaging our efforts in Iraq... and those "elements" just blew up a hotel today.
I don't want to be critical of the effort against al Qaeda -- I support it wholeheartedly. And I'm not suggesting for one moment that we haven't been very successful in that fight -- we have. But to say a group is on the defensive in the same week in which that group has killed hundreds and left thousands injured? Let's do ourselves a favor and be a little more forthright in our assessments. They seem a lot more on the offensive to me. That's no "shame" or dishonor to our forces or our efforts - it doesn't represent a failure in this overall effort, in my eyes. We've done a great job of taking the fight to them. But let's just stop saying that they're on the defensive when they're pretty obviously still capable of lashing out. I'll accept a lot of things, Mr. Powell. I won't get disheartened by the occasional setback in this war. I'm in it for the long haul. Just be honest with me, okay?
March 16, 2004
SUGAR GLIDERS: A NEW FAVORITE OF MINE
Erika was in town this past weekend, and she was telling me about this friend of hers who is interested in "sugar gliders." I had no idea what she was talking about - I honestly thought that the guy was into model planes or something. But as it turns out, sugar gliders are animals... and utterly adorable ones at that!
They're among the cutest little things I've ever seen... and I'm very intrigued by them, I am going to be trying to learn more about them. (I would not buy any right now - with my lifestyle and frequent travel and small apartment, it would be cruel to do!) I won't reveal Erika's friend's name out of respect for his privacy, but I figure that anyone who's got a soft spot for animals has got to be a good guy, right?
In the meantime, if anyone else has more information or knows anything about these little guys, please let me know!
THE EFFECT OF THE BUSH PRESIDENCY ON AMERICA'S IMAGE AROUND THE WORLD
A new international survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project has found that America's credibility and image around the world remain greatly damaged.
"Majorities in Germany, Turkey and France -- and half of the British and Russians -- believe the conflict in Iraq undermined the war on terrorism," the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press said in a summary of the findings. "At least half the respondents in the eight other countries view the U.S. as less trustworthy as a consequence of the war."
At least they know who to blame, though. "Although Bush had a 61 percent favorable rating in the United States, according to the survey, he was rated unfavorably by 57 percent of respondents in Britain, 60 percent in Russia, 67 percent in Turkey and Pakistan, 85 percent in France and Germany, 90 percent in Morocco and 96 percent in Jordan."
The Bush apologists will, I am sure, jump on the numbers in Morocco and Jordan and claim it's just because of "Islamist sentiment" - they'll argue that "They" don't like Americans anyway, so none of "Them" will like Bush. But look deeply at these numbers. Nowhere else in the world is the President of the United States viewed favorably by a majority of citizens. Nowhere. It's not just "the countries that don't like us." 57% in England? 85% in France and Germany? These are countries who have been our allies for a half century or more. And whether the anti-Islamists in the Bush camp like it or not, Jordan and especially Morocco and Turkey have been pretty solid allies of the United States for a couple of generations now as well. And none of these countries have a favorable impression of George W. Bush. In many of these countries -- yes, even the "Western" ones -- while Osama bin Laden is not seen favorably by a majority, he is seen as unfavorable by smaller numbers than view Bush unfavorably.
I am sure that some will try, no matter how incredible their argument may be, to say that it doesn't matter, that Bush needs to do what Bush needs to do and that going it alone is perfectly okay if that's the way the world wants it. But do you really believe that we're going to be able to have any credibility whatsoever in any international effort when so many people around the world believe that the American president is untrustworthy and unlikeable? (And for those conservatives out there who are about to say that we don't need the rest of the world... what about your 'global economy' that's allegedly creating so many jobs for Americans and is so critical to American economic growth?)
Deliberately setting up a world dynamic in which every other nation on earth - including those who by circumstance and political system ought rightly to be our allies - views the U.S. unfavorably and as untrustworthy is going to do irreparable damage to the United States of America. This cretin, this puppet under the complete control of a neocon cabal, has done more damage to the United States than any president in history. Thankfully, we only have to deal with this moron for another 231 days. Hopefully, that won't be too late.
I KNEW THERE WAS A REASON I LIKED THIS GUY
According to Newsweek, Kerry is trying to attract voters down south through country music. Yeah! Dude likes Johnny Cash! One more reason to like the guy!
Posted by Christopher at 09:15 PM | Comments (0)IS THE 9/11 INTELLIGENCE COMMISSION OBJECTIVE?
Look, I think it's not necessarily fair to decide up front that the members of the 9/11 Intelligence Commission can't be fair or unbiased. I do think it's fair, however, to call your attention to this article in Time that details the connections that most of the commission has to Bush. Since he appointed them, it is fair (I think) to ask them all publicly if they can & will be unbiased and not protect the president - either president, actually, Clinton or Bush.
For my conservative friends who are about to go off on a spirited rant about how I will not trust or give credit to anything that doesn't automatically confirm my opinion of Bush, let me please first show you some of these connections I refer to, and then ask you a question.
"A TIME examination of the panel members' backgrounds reveals a web of sticky connections to the Bush team and, in one case, an alleged lack of investigative curiosity. The nine-member panel is co-chaired by a Democrat, former Senator Charles Robb, and includes at least one proven maverick, Senator John McCain, who was put there, according to an official, to provide "instant credibility." But retired U.S. appellate court Judge Laurence Silberman, the panel co-chair, is a Nixon-era friend of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's and Vice President Dick Cheney's. Panel member Henry Rowen, a Hoover Institution scholar and former Rand Corp. president, worked under Cheney at the Pentagon during the first Gulf War. In September 1990, with Cheney's backing, Rowen cooked up Operation Scorpion, a secret plan to invade Iraq from the west, go all the way to Baghdad and topple Saddam. (The plan went nowhere.) Another panel member, former CIA deputy director William Studeman, now with Northrop Grumman, contributed $250 to candidate Bush's campaign in 2000. His wife gave the Bush re-election committee $500 just a week before her husband was named to the panel last month."
Now, my question: If in 1998, Bill Clinton had appointed his own panel to look into the Lewinsky allegations, and that panel included: people who had worked for and were friends with Vice President Gore and Secretary of Defense Cohen; people whose ties to members of the Clinton administration went back 30 years; and people who'd contributed money to the Clinton campaign... could you honestly tell me that you would have had no questions about the impartiality of that panel? Or would you have reacted rather skeptically that the foxes had just been appointed to investigate the chicken coop?
I don't categorically rule out the possibility that the members of this panel can be impartial and objective, no matter their personal allegiances or interests. However, this looks... well, it just looks fishy. Remember that thing ol' Willy said about things being rotten in Denmark? These connections earn this panel tighter scrutiny as it goes about its work. Not necessarily outright disbelief or lack of credibility, at least from the outset. But definitely scrutiny.
SO GLAD YOU'VE COME AROUND TO OUR WAY OF THINKING, GEORGE!
I quote George W. Bush today... "I think if you're gonna make an accusation in the course of a presidential campaign, you ought to back it up with facts."
I couldn't agree more, George. So let's see... where were those WMDs again? And exactly how was Saddam connected with al Qaeda's efforts on 9/11? And who tried to buy that yellowcake uranium from where, again?
Unfortunately, there weren't facts to back up Mr. Bush's assertions before the Halliburton War. So... I'm left to conclude that Mr. Bush believes that during a presidential campaign facts are required, but when taking our country into a war, he doesn't need to be burdened with such silly things as facts.
AFGHANISTAN: WHERE THE MEN ARE MEN, AND THE DONKEYS ARE SCARED
Okay, let me just state unequivocally and for the record that no matter how long a drought I were ever to suffer through, I cannot imagine that this would ever seem to be a viable alternative.
I mean, seriously: how desperate do you have to be to think that a donkey looks hot? Dude - when you heard those guys talking crudely about a piece of ass, this is not what they meant! What, in a certain light you thought it resembled J-Lo? Should Eeyore be running scared right now?
Sheesh. This guy's friends are gonna be all over him in the morning. I mean, I feel bad enough, and I only have to live with being known as The Guy Who Choked On Jeopardy. Can you imagine having to go through life as The Guy Who Knocked Boots With a Donkey? "Dude, your girlfriend's a real ass!" "Never mind him, Habib. Hee-haw, hee-haw, hee-halways says things like that."
Good grief.
SUCCESS ISN'T GOOD FOR YOU
As you all know, one of my favorite rants is about the evolution of the new corporate workstyle, in which we seemingly work 25x8x366 as they develop more gadgets to be able to extend their tentacles and reach us anywhere, and as they lay off workers and expect us all to do more with fewer colleagues... no matter the cost on our own well-being. As long as the suits get their six figure bonuses, they don't see to care much about the impact of the workstyle on the average employee. I've been arguing to anyone who'll listen to me rant that we're actually damaging the American way of life with this new culture. The argument back is usually that our work ethic has driven us to build the most powerful and affluent economy in the world. Sure, that's true. But first of all, the percentage of people who actually benefit from that work by achieving true affluence is relatively low. And more importantly to me, while I will concede that our standard of living may well be the highest ever, I believe that our quality of life is rapidly decreasing. And I'm not sure it's worth the trade off.
We work harder and more hours than a society has in generations - but instead of manual labor that kept us active and relatively fit, we now largely live sedentary lifetsyles that have contributed greatly to an unprecedented epidemic of obesity. The stress levels that are involved in life today have fed a plethora of other ilnesses both physical and mental. All this work has made us affluent, but it hasn't made us rich. We're poorer.
This week's Newsweek contains a very interesting article called, "The Afflictions of Affluence." The article takes a very thoughtful look at a phenomenon no one might have expected: as societies obtain higher degrees of wealth, that affluence does not solve our problems. Or rather, it may solve our old problems, but entirely new ones have developed in the wake. The piece is more objective than I am, and I think you might find it interesting.
As for my ranting, clearly I am not so frustrated with The System (tm) that I'm ready to quit my corporate job and head back to the days of punching a clock and when working more than 40 hours means you get paid for overtime (although I swear to you that there are days when only my massive and forboding grad school loans prevent me from doing so). So I guess to be railing about it all the time makes me either a hypocrite or a willing pawn. But I swear, the day will eventually come where I leave all this behind and live happily ever after running my bar or writing the sequel to my best seller. Until then...
AVOIDING THE INDECENCY OF VITALE
Proving once again that the Conservative Bullshit Service (CBS) has been taken over by space aliens with a dastardly plan to make all of us mindless zombies who toe the right wing line, the Big Brother network has plans to put a ten second delay on the entire NCAA men's basketball tournament.
This is yet more overreaction to Janet's boob. What, you're afraid someone's going to say something obscene when trying to pronounce Emeka Okefor? You're offended because Vitale's name is Dick? You don't know exactly what people mean when they say Billy Packer? Oh, wait... it's because Duke's team name has the word "Devil" in it, isn't it? Or is it that St. Joe's getting a #1 seed is indecent?
What a freakin' joke. That network has sold out every precept of independence just to kow-tow to the right. Don't watch CBS, kids. You think too much for their taste.
March 15, 2004
THE DANGERS OF LETTING THE IGNORANT DO RESEARCH
This might be one of my top ten favorite stories of the year so far. The city of Aliso Viejo, California was about to ban styrofoam cups because dihydrogen monoxide is used in their production. You know dihydrogen monoxide, right? "An odorless, tasteless chemical that can be deadly if accidentally inhaled?" What a terrible thing! Thankfully, the city leaders were there to save the people from such a dangerous substance.
Wait... dihydrogen monoxide. Two hydrogens and an oxygen. 2H & and O. H2O. Uh.... water.
As it turns out, the city leaders are blaming some poor paralegal who works for the city for doing bad research. Yes, kids... there are grown men who run a city who a) weren't able to figure this one out; and b) are willing to publicly put the blame on some 20something instead of just admitting they got taken.
"It's embarrassing," said City Manager David J. Norman. "We had a paralegal who did bad research."
Actually, I think it's more embarrassing that Mr. Norman tried to pass the buck. Anyway, the paralegal or whomever it was fell victim to a mass Internet prank that makes water look like a very, very scary chemical. As a writer, I love this - it proves the power of words. Some clever person chose to write about water from a different perspective - and what a result! (For an example of how really official these sites can look, check out the DiHydrogen Monoxide Research Homepage.
NAILED BY AN OBSERVER
It's a couple of days old now, but absolutely worth going over to Eschewing Obfuscation to check out her take on her visit to our office on Friday with her dad. If you don't work in a corporate office environment, you may not laugh as much... but if you do, you're going to recoginze a lot more of yourself than perhaps is comfortable... but damned if the girl's not dead on. As one of the "lemmings" she utterly skewered, I could only throw my hands up in surrender. (Though I do want credit, Sarah, for having worn a different colored shirt to work today and not blue!)
THANKS, MARINE
Just a quick note... I noticed over on Marine Girl's blog that her Marine stops by Curmudgeonland every once in a while - or at least once, since he did notice one of the comments she made about SpinMD perhaps benefitting from some judo lessons. (Sorry, MG and Marine... it was too good of a shot for me not to repeat!)
Anyway, Marine has been serving our country overseas for quite some time now, and if you read MG's site often, you know he's been in Haiti recently. I invite you all to take the opportunity to use the comment section below to wish Marine well and hope he returns home soon -- and to say thank you. I'm not saying this to kiss up to one of my blog friends. Many of you know that I served as well, in the Reserves during the early 90s. My father was career Navy. To use the street phrase, I got much love for our armed forces.
Whatever any of us may think of how Bush uses the military, the Marines, soldiers, sailors and airmen of our nation carry out their duty selflessly, in the face of great danger and at tremendous personal sacrifice (MG's blog is an excellent window on what life is like for our military and their loved ones). They deserve our respect and thanks. We have our chance to tell at least one of our guys personally... so please feel free. And Marine? Thank you.
T-MINUS FIVE DAYS AND COUNTING
Five more days. After an entire winter's anticipation, the wait is over on Saturday.
Those of you who know me personally already know that I'm a geek, so with you there's no hope of pretending otherwise on this site. And for those of you I'm coming to know through our exchanges here, you probably have a sneaky suspicion anyway... but I'm about to prove it beyond the shadow of a doubt. I've written before about how deeply and passionately I love baseball... if there's one thing I enjoy more than real baseball, it is fantasy baseball. And Saturday is draft day.
To understand the excitement I have for this weekend, consider that if you were somehow able to take my birthday, Christmas Eve AND Christmas morning, New Year's Eve, the Fourth of July and the Super Bowl, combine them all together in a single day, and then have Britney Spears deliver me that day while wearing only a bow and a smile, I'd still take fantasy baseball draft day. (Well, okay, maybe if Britney delivered it to me in such a fashion, I'd skip the draft. But without Britney, you can keep all those other days. I'll be at the draft.)
It's not a draft, technically - it's an auction. All 14 of us in the league start the day with $260 to spend and needing to fill our 25 roster slots with it. Eight hours and lots of intense bidding later, we have our team for the season... or at least the foundation of that team. I won't waste your time and energy discussing the rules of the game... but I will say that getting together with 13 other guys who love baseball as much as I do, and combining that with the thrill of trying to out-strategize everyone else, plus all the banter that goes with it... it's the best eight hours I spend all year. (No, it's not better than sex, but in my current drought I'm not bloody likely to see eight total hours of that all year, so this is what I have to look forward to. Welcome to my sad and eunuch-like existence.)
The regretful pattern I've established over the last couple of years is that I have a great strategy heading in, then panic during the actual auction and throw that strategy out the window. Not this year. I can guarantee you that I know the three players who will be the cornerstone of my team. I won't divulge them; some of my competitors read this site. But I have my strategy set in stone this year. And if you begin to notice that my writing gets a little shakier over the next few days, it's because my hands are starting to shake like an addict going through withdrawal as I get increasingly excited about Saturday.
March 13, 2004
THEY BELIEVE IN FREE SPEECH, AS LONG AS YOU SAY WHAT THEY WANT YOU TO
The Reichstag -- I mean, the House -- overwhelmingly passed higher fines for radio and television "indecency" the other day. This was a failure for democracy on the highest levels... and the resounding nature of the vote (391-22) indicated that this isn't a Republican or Democratic issue. It's an issue of our so-called leaders laying down for the religious right. There are apparently only 22 members of the US House with any sort of spine or principle.
My issues with this are myriad -- too many to even begin to go into. I'm furious that a renegade band of evangelicals is bascially dictating to us what the rest of us can watch, hear or see. Who decides what is "indecent?" The Supreme Court only ruled on the seven dirty words - beyond that, there's nothing from the Supreme Court as who what constitutes indecency. And what bothers me most is that we've handed over our collective judgement to these southern-fried bible-thumpers who find Janet Jackson's breast or Howard Stern's interviews with porn stars "indecent." But you know what? I find televangelists who stage fake "healings" (like Benny Hinn does) indecent. I find religious "leaders" like Oral Roberts who tell old ladies and poor people that God will call him home unless they give him $8 million by a specific date... I find that indecent.
I find the airing of the 700 Club (on which Pat Robertson and his team of loonies and liars go about passing off whatever libel and slander they wish to about Democrats, claiming to have spoken to God about election results and the paths of hurricanes, and endorsing discrimination against gays, as well as hatred of liberals or anyone who thinks differently than they do) to be indecent. I find Jerry Falwell's show, in which he had the audacity to say that America suffered 9/11 as punishment from God for tolerating gays, abortion rights, and liberal thought, to be indecent.
So how about increasing the fines on that programming? What? No? You only want fines for programming that the religious right finds indecent? A ha... now we're getting to the truth of it. This isn't about indecency so much... it's about the squelching of thought or expression that the religious right does not find acceptable. And you can bet that once they've been given that toe in the door of your freedoms, they will kick it in until they're all the way inside.
Whatever happened to, "change the channel?" Moreover, whatever happened to paying attention to what your kids are watching on television - or even more importantly, whatever happened to actual parenting, as opposed to just plopping little Jacob and Hannah in front of the television as a surrogate?
"I am tired of hearing parents tell me how they have to cover their children's ears," Rep. Joseph Pitts, R-Pa., said during debate on the measure.
Yeah well, Pittsy, if those parents were doing their job instead of just using TV as a babysitter, maybe they'd have to worry about it less. Raise your own kids instead of letting television do it for you, and maybe this is less of a problem. I find it highly ironic that the group who screams the loudest about "family values" and the importance of family is the group that most stubbornly refuses to accept the most basic of all family responsibilities: active parenting.
But what infuriates me most isn't that the religious freakazoids made this effort. It's what they do. Religious zealots in this country have opposed freedom of all speech but their own since back in the days of the Puritans, through the Salem Witch Trials, and on up through American history. What is so maddening this time is how meekly our politicians rolled over and let them do it. Where were the fiery speeches in defense of free speech? Where was the principled opposition to censorship - the most un-American concept going? Where were the defenders of liberty?
I guess we haven't elected any lately. I guess 10% of the US population gets to dictate to the rest of us what is acceptable. Your Congress... your House of Representatives has just declared that some bible bashing preachers and housewives in Alabama somewhere get to tell you what is okay for you to watch, hear and see. Telling you what is okay to think isn't far behind, kids. That's what they want. And unless you call on your Senator to stand up for your rights instead of caving to the whims of censoring zealots, that's what's next.
If you don't like what's on, turn the damn channel. But how dare you try to tell me what's acceptable for me to be entertained by?!
McCarthyism is back, friends. They just call it "decency" this time.
REVIEW OF THE SHOOTS - LIVE AT ACME UNDERGROUND
So we went into the city last night to catch The Shoots play their first gig in this incarnation. And I have to tell you, they wuz tight. They were strong on stage and they sounded great. Ethan can play a meaner lead guitar than I realized! And the venue was cool - small, and most of the crowd were friends of the band... but cool nonetheless. I think Ethan said that they recorded it, so maybe we can convince him to put some of the highlights from the show up on their site. E-mail him at ethan@theshoots.com and pester him until he does. (Specifically get him to put "Angels" up for download - it's a new song of theirs and I'm pretty sure you're gonna dig it.)
All right, I'm biased, because he's a friend of mine and because I wish I'd stuck with music a little longer and thus gravitate toward friends with bands or who play. But I'm telling you, guys... they're good. They're comfortable on stage and their songs are getting stronger. And you shouldn't be surprised when some college radio station near you starts playing some new song by this cool new New York band... and soon after that, some edgier "mainstream" station might just start throwing them out to you right after the cheesy "New Myoooozic!" prerecorded line. Check out their stuff, download 'em, start calling your local radio station and asking them to play that new song by The Shoots.
And then remember that I saw 'em first. I get to be the modern equivalent of Jon Landau, who wrote in Rolling Stone in 1974, "I have seen the future of rock and roll, and it's name is Bruce Springsteen." So in 2034, I will be the answer to a trivia question in The Shoots exhibit at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
March 11, 2004
THE SMOKING GUN
I had planned on blogging quite a bit tonight; many things caught my eye today and I had lots to say. But something has come along that is so important, so critical for every American to read, that I find it too important to bury in a series of posts. This is the only post I will make tonight. What is it?
The smoking gun.
The non-existence of WMDs in Iraq has been an embarrassment to the United States of America for a year now. As the occupation of Iraq has continued, George W. Bush's rationale for war has come under increasing scrutiny and criticism. It's become more clear every day that there are no WMDs in Iraq. While Bush and his apologists have repeatedly claimed that their belief in WMDs was legitimate and based on the intelligence that existed, many of us have openly wondered if Bush and his people deliberately exaggerated or manipulated intelligence information in order to bolster their case for a war that they desperately wanted to fight. Did Bush lie? Lots of us believe that he's the kind of man who lies routinely, and would have had no ethical issues over lying to the American people and the world over this. But that's always been just a matter of our own assessment of the man's character; there's never been any proof. Until now.
Salon magazine has broken the story of Karen Kwiatkowski, who worked in the Near East South Asia directorate in Rumsfeld's Pentagon from April 2002 through July 2003. Her office was the one within the Department of Defense that was responsible for Iraq intelligence. She watched first hand the creation by this administration of a special office inside the Pentagon whose specific responsibility it was to bolster the administration's case for war against Iraq. Note: not to assess what was really happening on the ground in Iraq, but rather to bolster the neoconservative case for war. In other words, this office was created to exaggerate, manipulate, or directly lie about Iraq in order to make the case for war. And Lt. Col. Kwiatkowski is talking.
"I witnessed neoconservative agenda bearers within OSP usurp measured and carefully considered assessments, and through suppression and distortion of intelligence analysis promulgate what were in fact falsehoods to both Congress and the executive office of the president."
"I saw a dead philosophy -- Cold War anti-communism and neo-imperialism -- walking the corridors of the Pentagon. It wore the clothing of counterterrorism and spoke the language of a holy war between good and evil. The evil was recognized by the leadership to be resident mainly in the Middle East and articulated by Islamic clerics and radicals. But there were other enemies within, anyone who dared voice any skepticism about their grand plans, including Secretary of State Colin Powell and Gen. Anthony Zinni."
"In the early winter of 2002, a co-worker U.S. Navy captain and I were discussing the service being rendered by Colin Powell at the time, and we were told by the neoconservative political appointee David Schenker that "the best service Powell could offer would be to quit right now." I was present at a staff meeting when Bill Luti called Marine Gen. and former Chief of Central Command Anthony Zinni a "traitor," because Zinni had publicly expressed reservations about the rush to war.
"Both OSP functions duplicated other parts of the Pentagon. The facts we should have used to base our papers on were already being produced by the intelligence agencies, and the war planning was already done by the combatant command staff with some help from the Joint Staff. Instead of developing defense policy alternatives and advice, OSP was used to manufacture propaganda for internal and external use, and pseudo war planning."
I won't just cut and paste the whole thing. You need to go to Salon.com here, and read "The New Pentagon Papers." But here it is, friends: the smoking gun that proves that neoconservatives in the Bush administration deliberately manipulated intelligence on Iraq and knowingly lied to the American people, in order to justify the Halliburton War.
You'll be disgusted. You'll want to string up every member of this administration by their damn toes and hang them in the streets like Mussolini. You'll want to demand the impeachment of George W. Bush and the imprisonment of many of the treasonous members of his administration.
Thank god for patriots like Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski. Impeach Bush and imprison Rumsfeld - NOW.
TRAGEDY IN MADRID
A few months back, Tim mentioned how personal it feels when someplace you've visited is hit with terrorism. I now know how he feels. For Tim it was Turkey; for me it is Madrid.
I spent a week in Madrid back in 1998 on the trip of a lifetime as the result of my game show misadventures. It was the first time I'd ever been outside the United States, and I was spellbound. Madrid is a bustling, energetic, exciting city; Madrdilenos, as the natives are called, are warm and friendly people whom I came to be very fond of during my stay. It's a picturesque place, too - I must have taken 6 rolls of film worth of pictures while I was there.
I know the Atocha station -- where today's bomb blasts were -- well; it was near our hotel and I went through it every day as we sojourned off to explore the Spanish capital. I remember being very charmed by the Madrid metro system; it's clean, convenient, and felt very safe to ride on. This morning, I have the same weird feeling that I had shortly after 9/11... I'd been in the city and in the mall below the Trade Center towers only two weeks before the attacks. I spent two hours browsing books and drinking coffee at the Borders in that mall on August 31. I had bought a book that day and was using the receipt as the bookmark... and after the attacks I kept staring at it, looking at the date on it and wondering if the clerk who'd sold it to me had been in the store on that Tuesday morning. I couldn't help picturing that store in my mind over and over again, realizing that there was likely nothing left of it.
I have the same sense this morning. Even though it was six years ago -- almost to the day -- that I was there, I feel like I was just in Atocha station... I can picture everything about it right now, as clearly as I could have the day I got back. And today's terrorist attacks don't feel to me like some far off event or a tragedy that's befallen someone else in a place far away. For me, this feels personal, and I am deeply saddened by the violence and loss of life.
God bless the people of Madrid and all those who lost loved ones today... and while we're at it, god bless everyone anywhere who's ever lost a loved one to a terrorist attack. They're all in my thoughts and rememberances today.
March 10, 2004
A DECIDEDLY UN-CURMUDGEONLY LINK
I don't know exactly what this says about me, but I might as well confess it. I am a true curmudgeon; like I have said before, I do not believe in silver linings, I believe in mercury linings that will kill you slowly and mutate your children. And so it is that a cynic like me can watch and/or hear of human suffering and not bat an eye. I can hear about a nightclub fire or a gangland shooting or a kidnapping or a car accident, and I don't even blink. It's not that I lack compassion, it's just that I truly believe that the world's a cruddy place and that these things happen.
However, the shoe is wholly on the other foot when it comes to animals. If I hear about any animal - even those that people don't usually find to be cuddly -- being injured or in pain, I just melt. Stories about animal cruelty make my blood boil almost as fast as George W. Bush does. A photo of a cat or dog or horse will get me every time. I have noticed that I have more compassion for animals than in general for people.
So I decided to mention my absolute favorite charity today. Best Friends is America's largest no-kill animal shelter; the sanctuary is home on any given day to roughly 1,500 animals. About 1,200 of these are dogs and cats; the rest include horses, burros, wild birds, rabbits, goats, farm animals, and an assortment of other creatures.
I give these guys money each year. I'd recommend that you do it as well. What a great legacy - to unite lost or missing animals with their families, and to promote animal welfare. Worth your time to check out, and to contribute to if you have the spare cash.
Posted by Christopher at 11:54 PM | Comments (0)ONE OF THE GOOD REPUBLICANS
Okay, I'm psyched about John McCain today, and it has nothing to do with the rumor that he'd be open to entertaining a run for Vice President on a ticket with Kerry. Rather, he's proven again to be one of the good Republicans ... by utterly shredding the jackass head of the MLB Players' Union, Donald Fehr, on the issue of steroids today. Tom Boswell of the Washington Post did a great column today on the faceoff between McCain and Fehr. A few excerpts:
McCain, visibly angry, promised Fehr that if baseball did not fix its "doping epidemic" and do it quickly, he would see to it that bills would be brought before Congress that would do the job. McCain said he hadn't figured out exactly what those laws would be, but if forced -- well, Don, make my day.
Good! Maybe he can revoke the anti-trust exemption while he's at it, and open the Yankees up to fair trade practices.
"If further compromise is necessary, we are prepared to discuss it," said Fehr. That was the last straw for McCain, who interrupted incredulously, "And you don't believe that 'further compromises' [by the union] are necessary?"
Whoa, go... go Johnny go! Go! Go Johnny go! Go... Johnny be good!
The union has behaved reprehensibly for years when it comes to safeguarding the long term interest of the game. They hide behind ancient history -- yes, management once treated players like cattle, and the union was necessary in 1971. Free agency was a good thing that happened to baseball for a while. But the balance of power shifted decades ago, and pretending as if baseball players are members of some exploited class whose rights would be erased by cruel and vengeful management were it not for the existence of the union... well, that's just shameful.
On the issue of steroids, McCain was damn well dead on in calling out Fehr and the players' union. I wish that Republicans showed as much gumption, principle and backbone in going after Ken Lay and Enron, for example, but I'll take what I can get. Thank you, Senator McCain, for saying what millions of baseball fans have been thinking for years.
WAITER, I'LL HAVE... OH, FORGET IT
Okay, if last week salad went off my list of things to eat when someone found a thumbtip in her lettuce. But if you thought pork was a safer option, guess again. You might find a hell of a lot more than a thumbtip if your pig came from this farm.
Yep, you read that right, kids. "Pork products processed and distributed from the farm of accused Canadian serial killer Robert Pickton may have contained human remains, police and health officials said Wednesday... "Given the state of the farm, and what we know about the investigation, we cannot rule out the possibility that cross-contamination may have occurred," B.C. provincial Health Officer Perry Kendall told reporters in Victoria.
Now that I've