These two songs have, so far as I can see, nothing much in common, though they were only one degree of separation in the youtube stream of consciousness.
One of the truly great rock songs, truly unintelligible at any speed.
This one occurred to me last week. It illustrates something about rock music in the distant past. It might be silly, but it makes you feel good. The Newbeats discuss their culinary preferences.
Couldn’t resist borrowing this from Colin McEnroe. Give it some time. It takes a minute or so to get going.
No blogging last night, since my wife and I, along with a bunch of other Groton Dems, went to Montville to attend Joe Courtney’s town hall meeting on health care. I can only say I’m glad that I go swimming every morning, because the chlorine in the pool had to be at least partially effective in disinfecting me.
I’ve never experienced sustained exposure to an unreasoning, hostile mob before. These people are impervious to facts, reason, or the lessons any rational person would draw from everyday experience. They firmly believe any internet rumor that strikes their fancy, never thinking to fact check the most outlandish statement. (Example: a person who serves a single term in Congress is entitled to a pension at full pay for the rest of his or her life. The truth is here, among other places). The level of ignorance was exceeded only by the level of hostility, and this one was probably mild in comparison to some of these things. Mindless repetition of meaningless Fox talking points (why is the length of the bill a meaningful criticism? What would one expect of a complex bill?) and refusal to take an answer for an answer. (Joe explained “where the money was coming from”, at least 4 times, even using that dreaded word “taxes”, but they kept insisting he hadn’t answered the question, because they didn’t get the answer they wanted, which isn’t surprising, because their position appears to be that the question is unanswerable.) A mindless herd just waiting for a demagogue. God help us.
In a few minutes I’ll be heading to Drinking Liberally, where I’ll be able to engage in some rational discourse while a beer or two completes the work of all that chlorine.
Looking for a great way to end the summer and kick off the Labor Day weekend. Looking to get together with fascinating people to talk politics and drink reasonably decent brews? Join us at the Bulkeley House, Bank Street in New London for September 2009’s edition of Drinking Liberally. As always, starting more or less promptly at 6:30.
There are two possible reasons why someone from an alleged financial network, and therefore someone supposed to know her stuff, could say something this stupid (it’s short):
1. She is, in fact, very stupid.
2. She is shamelessly serving the interests of her corporate masters.
I mean, even my social security clients, many of whom are seriously mentally ill, know that you can’t get Medicare when you’re 45.
Think Progress reports on a Missouri School District that forced its marching band to return T-shirts it ordered. The T-Shirt’s design is depicted below.
The reason?
Assistant superintendent Brad Pollitt explained that the t-shirts were banned because they were imposing on religious views:
Though the shirts don’t violate the school’s dress code, Pollitt noted that the district is required by law to remain neutral on religion.
“If the shirts had said ‘Brass Resurrections’ and had a picture of Jesus on the cross, we would have done the same thing,” Pollitt said.
Now, most likely this is just another example of school administrators following the path of least resistance. The fundamentalists will stand up and scream but the rationalist can usually be counted on to keep discretely silent. In this country, it’s considered unseemly to openly advocate for reason.
But it’s always possible that Mr. Pollitt actually believes he is being neutral on religion, which means that he thinks that evolution is a religious faith. It follows, then, that all of science is merely a religious faith, and that we can no longer safely assert in the public schools that the planets go around the sun, that the earth is round, or that the moon is not made of green cheese.
In point of fact, this is not neutrality on religion, this is an establishment of religion, since it basically holds that the public school will not allow recognition of any fact which contradicts any article of faith, no matter how absurd that faith may be. There’s a good article here pointing out that a) almost every religion believes some arrant nonsense that science has proven to be false, and b) that it is highly unlikely that Mr. Pollitt would have felt any need to be neutral between scientific fact and lunatic beliefs held by non-Christians (thus proving my point that this action is really an establishment of religion, specifically the totally ignorant variant of the Christian religion).
We are truly an ignorant nation.
My wife and I subscribe to Funny Times, which is indeed funny. However, the current issue (not on line) has a not terribly funny, but entertaining interview with sometime Funny Times contributor Lenore Skenazy, who has lately earned the sobriquet: “America’s Worst Mom”. Her crime? She let her 9 year old son take the subway by himself, after he proved to her that he was man enough to handle the trek on his own. She wrote a column about it, and all hell apparently descended upon her.
I’m in perfect agreement with her basic thesis, which is that we have allowed ourselves to be terrified into believing that the world is a far more dangerous place than it is, and as a result many of us have wrapped our kids in cocoons that destroy their childhoods and stifle their ability to act independently.
This little interchange brought me up somewhat short, however:
Q: Why were our parents different from today’s parents?
A. Our parents were watching Dallas and Dynasty, where the biggest crime was big hair. Today’s parents are drowning in bad news …
Hold on a minute! That was me. I actually did watch Dallas, which is a story for another day. But in my recollection, the parents of my day were already far down the road toward overprotection. Is it possible that things have gotten even worse for our poor kids?
Maybe it has always been thus. When my kids were small I used to tell them that when I was young I used to have to put cardboard in my shoes to plug the holes. It wasn’t true, but I got the story from my father, about whom I suspect that it was. But it is a fact that when I was young, I walked to school (about a mile each way) every day from first grade on, rain or shine (I have a distinct recollection of the exception to the rule, when my mother actually picked us up when it was slamming down rain. ). When I felt like going somewhere I hopped on a bus, something I was certainly doing when I was nine, since I used to go to Korvette’s in downtown Hartford to waste my hard earned newspaper delivery money. If we felt like playing baseball, we went to Elizabeth Park, by ourselves, and played with whoever happened to be there. Not only did I go by myself, I don’t think I regularly bothered to inform my mother about where I was going. There were six of us, so she couldn’t keep track anyway. If Mark Twain is to be believed, the life of a kid in Hannibal was even more detached from parental oversight. If this pattern of ever increasing parental oversight holds true, what a constricted life the children of today’s children will be living.
I don’t think my experience was unusual, and I do think that it helped us become capable of living and acting independently. So hurrah for Ms. Skenazy for striking a blow for kiddie liberation. You can’t read the interview on-line, but she has a blog (who doesn’t?) you can visit here at freerangekids.com. It’s chock full of examples of the absurd lengths to which we have gone to “protect” our children.
My wife discovered these two gourds growing on the outside of the fence around her garden. They’re at least two feet long. I guess all this rain must be good for something. It’s surprising the deer don’t eat them, since they appear to eat everything else we would rather they leave alone.
My son says on his Facebook page that he attended a large pro health care event in New York City yesterday, which as far as I can see went unmentioned in the Times today. The sad fact is that without mention in the press these events may as well not take place, since if they are not covered they can safely be ignored by all the major actors in the debate.
I’m reminded of the many anti-Bush demonstrations that were ignored, despite substantial numbers of participants. There were demonstrations at both of his inaugurations, which were ignored. There were massive demonstrations against the war in Iraq, which were trivialized, with the numbers attending obviously minimized.
Nowadays, 10 anti-health care people at a forum are news, and if they do something totally outrageous, like comparing Obama to Hitler, intimidating people with guns, or chanting Heil Hitler to a Jewish health care supporter, they get on national television. The entire Democratic Party felt the need to condemn Moveon because one person posted a video that compared Bush to Hitler, but the Republican party floats unscathed above an ocean of such comparisons, to which Republican Congressmen and Senators give tacit and sometimes near explicit condonation.
This sort of asymmetry is interesting. A crowd of progressives or millions of anti-war protesters get less coverage, and less respect, than a few militia types or a handful of uninformed, Limbaugh manipulated racists.
Democrats don’t help, since they make no attempt to shape the debate. Still, it’s amazing how easily the right can dominate the conversation with lies and cries of victimhood.
Sheila Horvitz, of Takeback.org, has written to let me know that her organization and the Colchester Democratic Town Committee will be hosting a gubernatorial forum on Monday, September 21st at the Colchester Library. I’ll check back with Sheila on the exact time, and I’ll post something again as the date draws closer.
She asked if I had any questions to pass along for the candidates and potential candidates (other than Amann, I think they’re all still exploring). Anyone out there have any suggestions?
Update: The forum will start at 6:30. Amman, Bysiewicz, LeBeau and Malloy will be there, and Nancy DiNardo will be on hand as well. You can download the flyer below.