Tuesday, February 27, 2007

The Blog Police

Does Al Gore Use Twenty Times More Energy Than The Average U.S. Household?



Does Al Gore use twenty times more energy than the average U.S. household? According to The Tennessee Center for Policy Research—an independent, nonprofit and nonpartisan research organization—the answer is yes. They issued a press release late Monday (See below).

I don't know if Tennessee Policy is legit or not, if it's really just some redneck front organization, or whether these facts and figures are true or not. I will state that I am pulling for Al Gore as the dark horse in the presidential race. I do believe he was screwed by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2000. I was an Al Gore delegate to the Washington state convention in the 1980s. I don't have an axe to grind with him. Quite the contrary. However, if what the Tennessee Center for Policy Research says is true, it gives one pause. There is no queston that Al Gore's mansion is big.

Is Vice-President Gore asking us to cinch our belts without pulling his own in a notch or two? I don't know. I've never been comfortable with the "don't do as I do, do as I say" school of politics. I do know that this estimate does not even include the many miles Prince Albert spends jetting around the globe on jets, or speeding around town in limos. Can some of you Gore supporters tell me how this really works?
_____________________________

According to the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, the former Vice-President may not be shooting from ther hip:

"Gore’s mansion, [20-room, eight-bathroom] located in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville, consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, according to the Nashville Electric Service (NES).

"In his documentary, the former Vice President calls on Americans to conserve energy by reducing electricity consumption at home.

"The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average.

"Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359.

"Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth, Gore’s energy consumption has increased from an average of 16,200 kWh per month in 2005, to 18,400 kWh per month in 2006.

"Gore’s extravagant energy use does not stop at his electric bill. Natural gas bills for Gore’s mansion and guest house averaged $1,080 per month last year.

“ 'As the spokesman of choice for the global warming movement, Al Gore has to be willing to walk to walk, not just talk the talk, when it comes to home energy use,' said Tennessee Center for Policy Research President Drew Johnson. "

In total, Gore paid nearly $30,000 in combined electricity and natural gas bills for his Nashville estate in 2006. [1]

[1] For Further Information, Contact: Nicole Williams, (615) 383-6431, itor@tennesseepolicy.org .
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Are you a capitalist?

I am apparently 16% Capitalist, 84% Socialist

You see a lot of injustice in the world, and you'd like to see it fixed.
As far as you're concerned, all the wrong people have the power.
You're strongly in favor of the redistribution of wealth - and more protection for the average person.

---o0o---

How's your vocabulary?

Your Vocabulary Score: A

Congratulations on your multifarious vocabulary!
You must be quite an erudite person.
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Monday, February 26, 2007

Poem: Dual Mortality



Petting my cat Booya
I count the cats I've had
And wonder how many more
I get to have?
---o0o---

More Memories Of Kent, Washington: The Internment Of The Japanese Families




The first wave of immigrants to the Kent, Washington area happened shortly before 1900. The immigrants were mostly European. There were, even as I was growing up, several Italian families still farming the valley. The 1900 census count shows 13 Japanese families in and around Kent.

The number of Japanese immigrants rose steeply over the next few years until 1907, when the US Government put the brakes on the number of Japanese allowed to immigrate. Eventually, in the 1920's, they were banned altogether. The Anti-Alien Land Law in 1923 barred these immigrants from owning land, and even from becoming citizens. Those with a child born in America could put land in the child's name. Some of the Japanese worked for established farmers and some cleared land and began their own farms in Kent, Auburn, and the nearby villages O'Brien, Orillia, and Thomas.

Many Japanese farmers had dairy farms until the price of milk plummeted after the Great War. Those farmers jumped into vegetable and berry farming, and their truck farms were profitable. They sold produce in Seattle, at farm stands, and shipped lettuce and cabbage to the east coast.



In 1930 there were about 200 Japanese families farming in the White/Green River valley. In 1942 during WW II all Japanese people in the White/Green River Valley were ordered evacuated from this area and were detained at the War Relocation Camp at Tule Lake, California. They lost their businesses, farms and personal belongings. They lost everything in the war hysteria.
.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered them jailed with Executive Order 9066, a law designating certain "military areas" as zones from which "any or all persons may be excluded." Thus, in one of our more shameful national acts of jingoistic racism, all people of Japanese ancestry were removed from the entire Pacific coast--all of California, Oregon and Washington (except for those already in internment camps). In 1944, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of this law, saying it is permissible to curtail the civil rights of a racial group when there is a "pressing public necessity." I don't know if that decision still stands or not. Perhaps this is the precedent we use for locking up various Muslims and people of middle-eastern extraction.

The forced removal encompassed about 120,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans--3/5 of them U.S. citizens. They were sent to quickly and shoddily constructed camps called "War Relocation Centers" in remote portions of the nation's interior. . .far away from where they might have, say, used a flashlight to guide a fleet of Japanese bombers toward the Boeing warplane plant.
My mother, Betty Brummet, remembers Japanese American kids being marched from Ballard High School one day. Some of the students lined up and booed.
The phrase "shikata ga nai" (loosely translated as "it cannot be helped") summarized the interned families' resignation to their helplessness. This was even noticed by the children, as mentioned in Farewell to Manzanar. The Japanese people tended not to make waves, and complied with the government to prove themselves "loyal citizens."

Dust storm at an internment camp a/k/a relocation center

In our war hysteria, we didn't want any Japanese Americans near the west coast. They would form cells and assist soldiers and pilots from the motherland in attacking The Pacific Coast. The number of Germans and Italians placed in the camps is only a fraction of their total population compared with the Japanese, virtually all of whom were locked up.
After the war only about thirty families returned to the valley area. I remember the Miyoshis, Yamadas, Nakaharas, Koyamatsus, Hiranakas, and Okimotos. Some of them got back into farming (not on their old farms, which had been confiscated and sold). I worked on the Yamada's farm a couple of springs, cutting and boxing rhubarb, and I worked for a couple of weeks on Kart Funai's farm one summer, bunching radishes and scallions.

In 1988, the U.S. Congress passed legislation awarding formal payments of $20,000 each to the surviving internees—60,000 in all. This same year, formal apologies were also issued by the government of Canada to Japanese Canadian survivors, who were each repaid the sum of $21,000 Canadian dollars. President Ronald Reagan even apologized on behalf of the United States. $21,000 would buy a fraction of the hundreds of acres of stolen land. Sure, it's better than the reparations paid to the families of slaves (zero, to date), but a pittance compared to losing everything you owned, and the farms you nurtured. If they held on until now, they'd all be rich.

Through the 1950's the Green River continued to flood the valley floor in late spring. This is what made the valley floor some of the richest soil in the world. . .but, alas, flooding prevented big business from locating there. In 1963 the Army Corps of Engineers built the Howard Hansen Dam (an earthen dam, still protecting the valley from floods) to regulate the river waters. The danger of uncontrolled flooding ended. The flat, treeless land on the valley floor now was an attractive area for business. And build they did.
Boeing built an aerospace lab, and the floodgates were opened. Farming was over, and dwindled rapidly, although there are a few pockets left. One of my old high school mates, Danny Carpinito has in fact become a wealthy vegetable farmer. Of the Japanese kids I knew in school, virtually none remained in Kent after high school. Of course, neither did I nor most of my friends, although some of our familes still live there.

Sources:
The History of Kent, Washington: http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/curriculum/vtours/kent/
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Collage: The State Of The Union


click the collage to enlarge
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Sunday, February 25, 2007

Ex-Canadian Minister of Defense Hellyer Says We Should Not Let The U.S. Start A War With The Greys



From exopolitics.org, I learned that Paul Hellyer in a speech at the Exopolitics Toronto Symposium in which he spoke out about "extraterrestrial visitors & government secrecy."

In the hundred articles that have appeared here on Alien Lore, government secrecy has been a central issue. And now the Honorable Hellyer adds his voice to the chorus. It's good to have one of our brothers from the Great White North air his thoughts on this topic:

Hellyer claimed that evidence concerning UFOs is the "greatest and most successful cover up in the history of the world."

"The United States military are preparing weapons which could be used against the aliens, and they could get us into an intergalactic war without us ever having any warning ... The Bush administration has finally agreed to let the military build a forward base on the moon, which will put them in a better position to keep track of the goings and comings of the visitors from space, and to shoot at them, if they so decide."



Go here to read the entire article on http://exopolitics.org.
A recent posting on All This Is That concerning exopolitics: http://jackbrummet.blogspot.com/2007/01/alien-lore-no-94-exopolitics.html
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Collage: Condoleezza Rice and George Bush's Appetite For Manflesh Grows Stronger Every Day


Click Secretary Rice and President Bush To Enlarge
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A sick site: Coloringbookland.com

coloringbookland.com

coloringbookland.com


coloringbookland.com

coloringbookland.com
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Saturday, February 24, 2007

Barack Omama Gives Veep Cheney A Verbal Bitch-slap



Barack Hussein Obama, speaking at a huge rally in Austin, talked about England's decision to withdraw thousands of troops from Iraq. "Now if Tony Blair can understand that, then why can't George Bush and Dick Cheney understand that?" Obama asked the crowd of rain-soaked supporters. "In fact, Dick Cheney said this is all part of the plan (and) it was a good thing that Tony Blair was withdrawing, even as the administration is preparing to put 20,000 more of our young men and women in."

"Now, keep in mind, this is the same guy that said we'd be greeted as liberators, the same guy that said that we're in the last throes. I'm sure he forecast sun today," Obama said to supporters holding signs over their heads to keep dry. "When Dick Cheney says it's a good thing, you know that you've probably got some big problems.

Poem: Changes 37/ The Family




The influence that goes out
From the family
Is like the wind

Created by fire
Heat creates energy
The wind is stirred by fire

And issues from the flames
Travelling out
Into the world

Made affective and effective
As others adapt and conform to it
Gathering winds

Blow through the world
Roiling the sand and trees and water
Across the land and hills and seas.
---o0o---

Friday, February 23, 2007

Britneyspears.com


click image to enlarge. (Recent Britney Spears photographs added by All This Is That)
---o0o---

Thursday, February 22, 2007

My Elementary School Teachers, Part 1: As The Twig Is Bent

"As the twig is bent the tree inclines," Virgil wrote. Schoolteachers do just about more twig-bending than anyone. Mine were no exception. In elementary school, the teachers were mostly benign; I didn't get into the real sadist, misfit, misanthropic, lecherous, dried-up, bitter, shell-shocked, racist and jingoistic types until I hit junior- and senior-high school.

My kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Crowley, was a warm and kindly woman. She wore plaid. She had a reassuring smile, auburn hair, full lips, and a light dusting of freckles. My memories of her circle around reading, singing, drawing, and graham crackers and milk. I remember no traumas or anything untoward—a few tantrums by my fellow pupils, and an angry father bursting in once, fuming over some imagined injury to Sally or Billy's chrysalis psyche.

Mrs. Crowley had the joy, humor, patience and understanding that should be a job requirement for teachers. I was called on the carpet once, in an incident I wrote about earlier, for returning from a camping trip, and peppering my "Show And Tell" speech with a few f**ks, c********rs, and s**ts, capped off with the interesting hand gesture I'd learned to perform on the trip. My father got in more hot water than I did over that weekend.

The nine months I florished in Mrs. Crowley's warm benevolence was the calm before the storm. Those happy days would soon fade away—when I was savagely flung into the charge of Miss Echo, the very terrestrial personification of Sycorax. Her classroom was my Bastille or Tower of London.


click to enlarge Jack, and John, Sr. at the Bumping River

Miss Echo, my first grade teacher, was a hirsute, cranky, unsettling, misanthropic, foul smelling battleaxe a few months from retirement. As she ground out the last few months before her pension kicked in, she was determined to ricochet every slight and indignity she had suffered in her forty-year career back at the miscreants she fingered as the authors of her miserable life.




illustration from http://www.fearofflyingdoctor.com/

Even with a brother and father dying, a plunge into poverty, the many hazards and heartbreaks of adolescence, and a life at odds with the police, I was more traumatized by my first grade teacher than by anyone or everything else during my elementary years, and maybe everything and anyone since. At the very least Mrs. Echo instilled in me a life-long "issue" *cough cough* with authority figures [1] ranging from policemen to teachers,bank clerks, meter maids, foremen, shop stewards, union reps, counselors, principals, bosses, government clerks, principals, border guards, benefit screeners, poetry and art juries, insurance adjusters, Priests, televangelists, politicians, pontiffs, Judges, and maybe even pilots.

I just did a G.I.S. for "authority figures" and it brought me to The Fear of Flying Doctor website where I learned that my fear of flying, a/k/a aviophobia, may stem from a problem with authority figures! Can I blame that on Mrs. Echo too?



Miss Echo's voice could curdle milk, and perhaps even gasoline. Fingernails raked across a slate blackboard were mellifluous compared to the brittle, quavering rasp of her voice. She was a last vestige of the school of thought that punished southpaws to "cure" them. I was a rightie, but she never failed to belittle my handwriting, nor my parents for their genes, and for tolerating my slovenly hand.

The words "poor coordination" were etched into my brain until I came to believe it. I received no credit for being able to read at the fifth grade level, nor for the actual content of my writing. She treated me as borderline retarded due to my difficulties in executing cursive script via the long since discredited Palmer Method. This entire year of school was unique for me—it was the only time in my 16 year education that I didn't actually enjoy going to school. I can only guess at how many other young souls she twisted and even destroyed in her forty miserable years of teaching? How many serial killers, petty criminals and wife-beaters had she unleashed on society in her four decades at the helm? In the end, my handwriting didn't matter at all, and in the end, perhaps she was the one who taught me 1) how to not worry; 2) how to amble through life as if it were made for me; and 3) that maybe a healthy disdain of authority figures was not such a bad thing at all.

[1] Perhaps a problem with authority figures is not the deviant behavior we've been lead to believe. After all, the Milgram experiment showed that over 60% of a sample of Americans demonstrated willingness to severely torture another person when given orders from an "appropriate" authority figure.
_________________________________

Now, let's have an Amazon moment. If you liked this story, you might like these other stories appearing in All This Is That about Jack Brummet growing up, and having grown:

Fishing With The Old Man Uncle Romey Uncle Guy, more hillbilly cred, and living a good life My Grandma's tavern in Carnation, Wash. My Dog Slugger Hucking Eggs in Kent, Washington
Square Dance At Valley Elementary
Foot Washing Baptists & The Catholic Devils
Hillbilly Cred
Growing Up In Kent, Washington: Tarheels, Hayseeds, Hillbillies, and Crackers
Cruising the Renton loop with a keg of nails
The Time I Got Drunk With Roy Rogers
My Worst Jobs: 50 Tons of Sand
My Worst Jobs: McGoo
My Pathetic Political Career
The Month They Tried To Kill Me
My Worst Jobs - Brewburger
Stopping By Richard Nixon's
Defensive Daydreaming
My Worst Jobs - Design Insanity - Hype, Shuck, and Jive In The Dot-Com Years
My Worst Jobs - SALSA
Jerry Melin, still missing, still missed
18,906 Days On Turtle Island
The Day I went Bald My Jobs (List Number 9)
My Favorite Rock and Jazz Shows
More Shows I've seen over the years
---o0o---

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Poem: Changes 36/How to keep moving in the darkening of the light

1
The sun sinks
Beneath the earth
The sky darkens

2
You keep the inner light aflame
While outwardly yielding
Hide the light under a bushel no

You're going to let it shine
And not be shaken or swept
By circumstance

Play dumb play slow play luckless
Power is like fastening
A target to your back

When difficulty surrounds
You like a moat
You persevere

Spoof lie omit mislead spin
Don't awaken enmity
Be the stealthy smiler

With the knife beneath your cloak
Let things pass
Because all things must pass

3
With grandiose resolve
A man endeavors
To soar above all obstacles

The Lord of Light is subordinate to
And wounded by the Lord of Darkness
The injury is not fatal

But a hindrance
Help is on the way
The wounded man ignores himself

And thinks only of saving the others
Their great leader is captured
There is no longer hope

And you are able
To leave the scene of disaster
before the storm breaks

4
First he climbed up to heaven,
Then plunged into the depths of the earth.
Here the climax of the darkening is reached

The dark power
held so high a place
it could wound all on the side of the light.

5
In the end evil perishes in its own darkness
Like a squid simmered in its own ink
Because evil must fall at the moment

It has overcome the good,
And consumed the energy
To which it owed its duration.
---o0o---

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

G.O.P. in league with Taliban and Al Qaeda?


click photo to enlarge

A New York man sometimes called Michael Mixon, and also known as Abdul Tawala Ibn Ali Alishtari, is accused of trying to help terrorists in Afghanistan, according to the Associated Press. Over the last several years he has donated $15,000 to the House Republicans' campaign committee.

From 2002 into 2004, Michael Mixon gave donations ranging from $500 to $5,000 to the Republican Congressional Committee. At the same time, Mixon a/k/a Abdul Tawala Ibn Ali Alishtari accepted money to transfer $152,000 to Pakistan and Afghanistan to support an Afghanistan terrorist training camp.

Does this mean that the Republican Party are in league with terrorists? I'm not sure, but let's make them deny it! After all, in April, 2006, a National Intelligence Estimate concluded that Bush's Iraq War had become the "cause celebre" that helped spread and germinate Islamic extremism around the globe.
---o0o---

The Donner Party Was Rescued 160 Years Ago Today (Albeit A Little Late For A Few Members Of The Party)


click etching to enlarge

160 years ago today, in 1847, the first rescuers reached the surviving members of the Donner Party. These California-bound emigrants were stranded by snow in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and famously resorted to cannibalism. The story appears today on History.com's This Day On History.
---o0o---


Sunday, February 18, 2007

Video: The Beatles last performance--Get Back on a London rooftop (with Billy Preston on keyboards)

The Beatles final performance took place on a London rooftop outside their recording studio, with a few dozen people watching. Fortunately it was filmed, and it's on You Tube (at least until Apple Corps pulls it!).

The Beatles recorded Get Back (and performed this concert) with Billy Preston in April, 1969. The single—one of their last—was on the charts 23 weeks, and peaked at No. 1 for six weeks.


You may need to click play 2x

Get Back
by John Lennon and Paul McCartney

Jo Jo was a man
Who thought he was a loner
But he knew it couldn't last
Jo Jo left his home in Tuscon, Arizona
For some California grass

Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back Jo Jo

Go home

Get back, get back
Back to where you once belonged
Get back, get back
Back to where you once belonged
Ooh, get back Jo

Sweet Loretta Modern thought she was a woman
But she was another man
All the girls around her said she's got it comin'
But she gets it while she can

Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back Loretta

Go home

Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Yeah get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged

whoooo

Get back Loretta
Your mummy's waiting for you
Wearing her high heel shoes
And her low neck sweater
Get back home Loretta

Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Yeah get back, get back
---o0o---

Painting: Keelin Curran deconstructed/reconstructed


click keelin to enlarge
---o0o---

The folk song "Side By Side"



Oh! We ain't got a barrel of money
Maybe we're ragged and funny
But we'll travel along
Singing a song, side by side


Don't know what's comin' tomorrow
Maybe it's trouble and sorrow
But we'll travel the road
Sharin' our load, side by side


Through all kinds of weather
What if the sky should fall
Just as long as we're together
It doesn't matter at all

When they've all had their quarrels and parted
We'll be the same as we started
Just travellin' along, singing a song
Side by side; side by side
________________________________
And then, there is a twisted British version:


Side By Side

We got married on, Sunday,
The party didn't finish till, Monday,
And when the guests had gone home,
We were all alone, Side by side.

Well we got ready for bed then,
And I very nearly dropped dead when,
Her teeth and her hair, she placed on the chair,
Side by side.

Well the shock did very near kill me,
When a glass eye did fall,
Then her leg and then her arm,
She placed against the chair (wall?),

Well this left me broken hearted,
For most of my wife had departed,
So I slept on the chair,
There was more of her there,
Side by side.
---o0o---

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Video and Lyrics: Elvis Costello Performs Nick Lowe's (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, And Understanding?



(What's So Funny 'Bout)Peace, Love And Understanding?
by Nick Lowe

As I walk through
This wicked world
Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.

I ask myself
Is all hope lost?
Is there only pain and hatred, and misery?

And each time I feel like this inside,
There's one thing I wanna know:
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

And as I walked on
Through troubled times
My spirit gets so downhearted sometimes
So where are the strong
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.

'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me wanna cry.
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?


So where are the strong?
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.

'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me wanna cry.
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

<---o0o--->

Harry Potter: Hey mates! Look at me bum! Daniel Radcliffe Nude Onstage In Equus


click on Daniel Radcliffe's bum to zoom in


"Warner Bros have been building up their publicity machine for Harry's first - chaste - screen kiss when the next Potter film (Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix) comes out in the summer. "Now our star is out there doing full-frontal sex. We've been blown completely out of the water by this."
In what is one of the most memorable examples of career suicide ever committed, Daniel Radcliffe began starring in Equus in the U.K., appearing nude in a long scene. Executives at Warner Bros, the studio behind the film versions of the Potter books, were"utterly dismayed" by publicity shots of Radcliffe naked. Studio chiefs are petrified this could possibly put the skids to their multi-million-dollar cash cow. Some folks even alluded to Radcliffe being replaced as the young wizard. His naked sex partner in the play, Joanna Christie, 24, plays the stablegirl with whom he has a relationship.

You think the suits at Warner freaked out about the publicity stills? How do they feel abut Radcliffe airing out his willie for a full ten minutes on stage?

Equus previewed in London last night, and opens February 27th.


---o0o---

Friday, February 16, 2007

House of Representatives Tells The President To Take His Surge, And. . .Uh. . .Insert It Into A Place Where "The Sun Don't Shine"


Click The White House Bummer Flag To Enlarge

The Democratic-controlled House lobbed a toothless, but still stinging, rejection of President Bush's Surge™ into Iraq today, according to the AP.

So begins a potentially hairy showdown between the executive and legislative branches over The President's madness prosecuting an unpopular war and unjust war, with acceptable losses of 3,100 American boys and girls (and climbing).



It was a bi-partisan and non-binding vote: 246-182.
---o0o---

Evolution by an unknown artist


Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention—If We'd All Been Living In California "lyrics"




FZ put a tape of a band meeting on his album Uncle Meat. The band was obviously struggling--making a few hundred bucks a month each. I don't know which band member Frank was talking to, but it was one of these guys:

Ray collins (vocals)
Jimmy carl black (drums)
Roy estrada (electric bass)
Don preston (electric piano)
Billy mundi (drums)
Bunk gardner (piccolo, flute, clarinet, bass clarinet, soprano saxophone, alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, bassoon)
Ian underwood (electric organ, piano, harpsichord, celeste, flute, clarinet, alto saxophone, baritone saxophone)
Arthur tripp (drums, timpani, vibes, marimba, xylophone, wood blocks, bells, small chimes)
Motorhead sherwood (tenor saxophone, tambourine)
Ruth komanoff (marimba, vibes)


"If We'd All Been Living In California"
Frank Zappa and an unknown Mother of Invention

FZ: Ok, now you still want to get your name in the magazines. And he wants 500 dollars a month.

Unknown Mother: Where does it come from? We worked one gig this month. And thats....so what do we get? Two hundred dollars for this gig up here if we're lucky. If we're lucky, we'll get two hundred. And it will be two weeks before we get it.

FZ: Probably.

Unknown Mother: I mean after all, what is all this sh*t in the newspaper? If we got such a big name, how come. . .we're starving man! This f**king band is starving! And we've been starving for three years. I realize it takes a long time but God damn it! Does it take another five, ten years from now.

FZ: There's some months when you're not going to work as much as other months. There's some months when you're going to make a lot of money and if you average it out, you do make more than two hundred dollars a month.

Unknown Mother: Expenses are sure high too. If we'd all been living in California, it would have been different.

FZ: If we'd all been living in California, we wouldn't have worked at all.

Unknown Mother: Oh, that's true. Well, we're not working now anyway. We worked one gig this month Frank. What's wrong with getting two months in a row of this good money? Or three months in a row? Then we could afford to take three of four months off and everybody can. . .After the first month I can get just enough ahead, but if I had two more months man, I'll get ahead. Because I'm not living very extravagantly, I'll tell you for sure.
---o0o---

Thursday, February 15, 2007

Poem: Ephemeral Communications


click to enlarge Frederick Remington's Smoke Signals


Native American smoke signals
May be the most transitory
And ephemeral communication of all,

Next to the voice
—A whisper
In your ear—

That transmogrifies instantly
Into memory
While the smoke signal

Takes its own sweet time
Rising
And drifting slowly and inexorably

Toward Heaven,
Achieving evanescence
Somewhere in the troposphere.
---o0o---

Video (and lyrics): Elvis Costello performs Radio Radio on SNL after a false start on Less Than Zero

This is the famous "false start" clip of Elvis Costello & The Attractions on Saturday Night live (circa 1977). He had cleared the song Less Than Zero with the show, but a few seconds in, decided he didn't like it, and the band stopped and launched into his great song Radio Radio.

There is an oft-repeated story that producer Lorne Michaels was so angry about the switch in tunes that he stood off camera in the wings and gave Elvis a double middle finger throughout the performance.

Radio Radio is an eloquent and vitriolic statement about radio, and no doubt one reason it upset the suits on the show is that much of what Elvis sings/writes about radio applies to their medium as well. . .




Radio Radio
by Elvis Costello a/k/a Declan McManus

I was tuning in the shine on the light night dial
doing anything my radio advised
with every one of those late night stations
playing songs bringing tears to me eyes
I was seriously thinking about hiding the receiver
when the switch broke 'cause it's old
They're saying things that I can hardly believe.
They really think we're getting out of control.

Radio is a sound salvation
Radio is cleaning up the nation
They say you better listen to the voice of reason
But they don't give you any choice
'cause they think that it's treason.
So you had better do as you are told.
You better listen to the radio.

I wanna bite the hand that feeds me.
I wanna bite that hand so badly.
I want to make them wish they'd never seen me.

Some of my friends sit around every evening
and they worry about the times ahead
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference
and the promise of an early bed
You either shut up or get cut out;
they don't wanna hear about it.
It's only inches on the reel-to-reel.
And the radio is in the hands of such a lot of fools
tryin' to anaesthetise the way that you feel

[Chorus]

Wonderful radio
Marvelous radio
Wonderful radio
Radio, radio...
---o0o---

Video and lyrics: Geroge Harrison's Crackerbox Palace

This is a bent video—not surprising when you remember how close George was to the Monty Python gang (some of who appear here). It is one of my favorite post-Beatles tunes by George.

How can you not love the trans-gender nanny, the bobbies, images of barbed-wire, freaky costumed dancers, gargoyles, fantastic women in lingerie, and the spooky Mr. Grief. And George ends this twisted tune so typically: "Know that the Lord is well and inside of you." No matter how twisted things become, you're still walking with The Lamplighter.

I've been on a George-jag lately, re-immersing myself in the Wilburys, and listening to the Concert for Bangladesh. And, of course, the great Beatles remix album, Love, that has rarely left my playlist since it was released.



Crackerbox Palace
by George Harrison

I was so young when I was born
My eyes could not yet see
And by the time of my first dawn
Somebody holding me . . . they said

I welcome you to Crackerbox Palace
We've been expecting you
You bring such joy in Crackerbox Palace
No matter where you roam know our love is true

While growing up or trying to
Not knowing where to start
I looked around for someone who
May help reveal my heart - someone said

While you're a part of Cracerbox Palace
Do what the rest all do
Or face the fact that Crackerbox Palace
May have no other choice than to deport you

I welcome you to Crackerbox Palace
We've been expecting you
You bring us joy in Crackerbox Palace
No matter where you roam know our love is true

Sometimes are good . . . sometimes are bad
That's all a part of life
And standing in between them all
I met a Mr. Grief - and he said

I welcome you to Crackerbox Palace
Was not expecting you
Let's rap and tap at Crackerbox Palace
Know that the Lord is well and inside of you

(Chorus)
---o0o---

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Radical Islamic Extremists Snowboard Into U.S. Embassy?

Video and lyrics: The Traveling Wilbury's Handle Me With Care

This song was the genesis for The Traveling Wilburys. George Harrison's new album needed a single. He and his producer--Jeff Lynne--wanted to record this song for the single, somehow while recording it, they bumped into some of the other Wilburys--Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, and Tom Petty. They had a great time recording. When George and Lynne submitted the tune to the record company, the record company realized this was too good for a single. In the end, they got together, wrote a bunch of tunes and recorded them in a very short time, racing against an upcoming Dylan tour. The Traveling Wilburys, Volume 1 is an album Rolling Stone immediately said was one of the 100 best albums of all time.





Handle Me With Care
by The Traveling Wilburys


Been beat up and battered round
Been sent up, and Ive been shot down
Youre the best thing that Ive ever found
Handle me with care

Reputations changeable
Situations tolerable
Baby, youre adorable
Handle me with care

(chorus)
Im so tired of being lonely
I still have some love to give
Wont you show me that you really care

(bridge)
Everybodys got somebody to lean on
Put your body next to mine, and dream on

Ive been fobbed off, and Ive been fooled
Ive been robbed and ridiculed
In day care centers and night schools
Handle me with care

Been stuck in airports, terrorized
Sent to meetings, hypnotized
Overexposed, commercialized
Hand me with care

(chorus)

(bridge)

Ive been uptight and made a mess
But Ill clean it up myself, I guess
Oh, the sweet smell of success
Handle me with care
---o0o---

The CIA Kubark Counterintelligence Interrogation Manual--The "24" Torture Manual


click the poster to enlarge

What follows is an excerpt from the infamous Kubark Counterintelligence Interrogation Manual, or, basically the Handbook of Torture. This is legit., and was freed up under the Freedom of Information Act. The creators of 24 keep copies of this manual around for inspiration...

"The routine use of torture lowers the moral caliber of the organization that uses it and corrupts those that rely on it…."

You can read the entire document here:

Part 1 (pp. 1-60) - Part II (pp. 61-112) - Part III (pp. 113-128)

It is fascinating reading. As as a student of psychology, those portions of the manual are particularly intriguing. . .and distressing. Happy Valentine's Day!


KUBARK
Counterintelligence Interrogation
July 1963


IX. Coercive Counterintelligence Interrogation of Resistant Sources

A. Restrictions

The purpose of this part of the handbook is to present basic information about coercive techniques available for use in the interrogation situation. It is vital that this discussion not be misconstrued as constituting authorization for the use of coercion at field discretion . As was noted earlier, there is no such blanket authorization.

[approx. 10 lines deleted by the U.S. Government]

For both ethical and pragmatic reasons no interrogator may take upon himself the unilateral responsibility for using coercive methods. Concealing from the interrogator's superiors an intent to resort to coercion, or its unapproved employment, does not protect them. It places them, and KUBARK, in unconsidered jeopardy.


B. The Theory of Coercion

Coercive procedures are designed not only to exploit the resistant source's internal conflicts and induce him to wrestle with himself but also to bring a superior outside force to bear upon the subject's resistance. Non-coercive methods are not likely to succeed if their selection and use is not predicated upon an accurate psychological assessment of the source. In contrast, the same coercive method may succeed against persons who are very unlike each other. The changes of success rise steeply, nevertheless, if the coercive technique is matched to the source's personality. Individuals react differently even to such seemingly non-discriminatory stimuli as drugs. Moreover, it is a waste of time and energy to apply strong pressures on a hit-or-miss basis if a tap on the psychological jugular will produce compliance.

All coercive techniques are designed to induce regression. As Hinkle notes in "The Physiological State of the Interrogation Subject as it Affects Brain Function"(7), the result of external pressures of sufficient intensity is the loss of those defenses most recently acquired by civilized man: "... the capacity to carry out the highest creative activities, to meet new, challenging, and complex situations, to deal with trying interpersonal relations, and to cope with repeated frustrations. Relatively small degrees of homeostatic derangement, fatigue, pain, sleep loss, or anxiety may impair these functions." As a result, "most people who are exposed to coercive procedures will talk and usually reveal some information that they might not have revealed otherwise."

One subjective reaction often evoked by coercion is a feeling of guilt. Meltzer observes, "In some lengthy interrogations, the interrogator may, by virtue of his role as the sole supplier of satisfaction and punishment, assume the stature and importance of a parental figure in the prisoner's feeling and thinking. Although there may be intense hatred for the interrogator, it is not unusual for warm feelings also to develop. This ambivalence is the basis for guilt reactions, and if the interrogator nourishes these feelings, the guilt may be strong enough to influence the prisoner's behavior.... Guilt makes compliance more likely...."(7).

Farber says that the response to coercion typically contains "... at least three important elements: debility, dependency, and dread." Prisoners "... have reduced viability, are helplessly dependent on their captors for the satisfaction of their many basic needs, and experience the emotional and motivational reactions of intense fear and anxiety.... Among the [American] POW's pressured by the Chinese Communists, the DDD syndrome in its full-blown form constituted a state of discomfort that was well-nigh intolerable." (11). If the debility-dependency-dread state is unduly prolonged, however, the arrestee may sink into a defensive apathy from which it is hard to arouse him.

Psychologists and others who write about physical or psychological duress frequently object that under sufficient pressure subjects usually yield but that their ability to recall and communicate information accurately is as impaired as the will to resist. This pragmatic objection has somewhat the same validity for a counterintelligence interrogation as for any other. But there is one significant difference. Confession is a necessary prelude to the CI interrogation of a hitherto unresponsive or concealing source. And the use of coercive techniques will rarely or never confuse an interrogatee so completely that he does not know whether his own confession is true or false. He does not need full mastery of all his powers of resistance and discrimination to know whether he is a spy or not. Only subjects who have reached a point where they are under delusions are likely to make false confessions that they believe. Once a true confession is obtained, the classic cautions apply. The pressures are lifted, at least enough so that the subject can provide counterintelligence information as accurately as possible. In fact, the relief granted the subject at this time fits neatly into the interrogation plan. He is told that the changed treatment is a reward for truthfulness and an evidence that friendly handling will continue as long as he cooperates.

The profound moral objection to applying duress past the point of irreversible psychological damage has been stated. Judging the validity of other ethical arguments about coercion exceeds the scope of this paper. What is fully clear, however, is that controlled coercive manipulation of an interrogatee may impair his ability to make fine distinctions but will not alter his ability to answer correctly such gross questions as "Are you a Soviet agent? What is your assignment now? Who is your present case officer?"

When an interrogator senses that the subject's resistance is wavering, that his desire to yield is growing stronger than his wish to continue his resistance, the time has come to provide him with the acceptable rationalization: a face-saving reason or excuse for compliance. Novice interrogators may be tempted to seize upon the initial yielding triumphantly and to personalize the victory. Such a temptation must be rejected immediately. An interrogation is not a game played by two people, one to become the winner and the other the loser. It is simply a method of obtaining correct and useful information. Therefore the interrogator should intensify the subject's desire to cease struggling by showing him how he can do so without seeming to abandon principle, self-protection, or other initial causes of resistance. If, instead of providing the right rationalization at the right time, the interrogator seizes gloatingly upon the subject's wavering, opposition will stiffen again.

The following are the principal coercive techniques of interrogation: arrest, detention, deprivation of sensory stimuli through solitary confinement or similar methods, threats and fear, debility, pain, heightened suggestibility and hypnosis, narcosis, and induced regression. This section also discusses the detection of malingering by interrogatees and the provision of appropriate rationalizations for capitulating and cooperating.
---o0o---

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Video (and lyrics): Frank Zappa's Greatest Band Performs One Of His Greatest Songs: Inca Roads

This video showcases what has to be Frank Zappa's greatest group performing one of Frank's greatest songs: Inca Roads, from One Size Fits All. Sure, I probably like the song because it contains a touch of Alien Lore. The stellar band on this outing includes (among others) George Duke (on piano, synthesizer and vocals), Ruth Underwood (marimbas), Napoleon Murphy Brock (Sax and flute), Tom Fowler (bass), and Chester Thompson (drums).


You may have to hit the play button twice (don't ask me why)


Inca Roads
By Frank Zappa

Did a vehicle
Come from somewhere out there
Just to land in the Andes?
Was it round
And did it have
A motor
Or was it
Something
Different

Did a vehicle
Did a vehicle
Did a vehicle
Fly along the mountains
And find a place to park itself

Or did someone
Build a place
To leave a space
For such a vehicle to land

Did a vehicle
Come from somewhere out there
Did a vehicle
Come from somewhere out there
Did the indians, first on the bill
Carve up the hill

Did a booger-bear
Come from somewhere out there
Just to land in the Andes?
Was she round
And did she have a motor
Or was she something different

Guacamole Queen
Guacamole Queen
Guacamole Queen
Guacamole Queen
At the Armadillo in Austin Texas, her aura,
Or did someone build a place
Or leave a space for Chester's Thing to land
*(Chester's Thing... on Ruth)*
Did a booger-beer
Come from somewhere out there
Did a booger-bear
Come from somewhere out there
Did the Indians, first on the bill
Carve up her hill
On Ruth
On Ruth
That's Ruth
---o0o---

Dean Ericksen's review of the Grammys



My friend, and brother-in-law, Dean Ericksen weighed in with his take on Sunday's Grammy awards. As usual, it was an interesting take. . .

If you'd like to read other Dean emissions on All This Is That, I highly recommend you check here, or here.


I didn’t see all of the Grammys last night, but I feel like I saw enough to say: yeah! Right on!

The highlight for me (and music lovers everywhere) had to be Lionel Ritchie doing “Hello.” That one kicks my ass every time. Puddle. Of. Tears.

Rascal Flats are super. I’m a big fan. I saw them last night for the first time, sharing the stage with that little Jezebel Carrie Underwood – how could they even hold their instruments with her Farah-Fawcett-hair tossing around? Observation: if you’re going to play Hotel California, play the whole f***ing song. Jesus. It’s practically our national anthem and they chopped it up like scallions.

Poor Ornette Coleman. Why on earth do they put someone with that amount of dignity in the middle of this circus. He deserved better than a pat on the head.

I wanted to see the Police, but I missed ‘em … I bet that Clarke, a known-Police-o-phile will have a critique. I did see the promo photo of the three of them; Sting has arms like a pro wrestler. Big guns. What’s with that?

Christina Aguillera has pipes. I was impressed. Smokey Robinson appears carved from wax.

Reba looks good. Reeeeebah! Raunchy lioness!

How about those Dixie Chicks! Love that one song.

FYI: I’m sorry that I called Carrie Underwood a Jezebel. She probably isn’t.

Sorry for this email, it’s only function is to work-off a little coffee.

-Dean


Copyright © 2007 by Dean Ericksen
---o0o---

Monday, February 12, 2007

Wikipedia's list of counterculture films

You have to love the Wikipedia sometimes. This is a "list of counterculture films" made in the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. Some of my favorite movies are on this list. The list might lead you to think the counterculture ended in 1984. That's probably about right. The titles and years are from the Wikipedia. The inane comments and actors and directors names are mine.

My favorites=****

Look Back in Anger (1958)
Pull My Daisy (1959) I know Kerouac wrote the text. I think he appears in the movie too.
Shadows (1959)
The Savage Eye (1960)
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960)
Dog Star Man (1961-1964)
The Misfits (1961)**** A great John Huston movie with Marilyn Monroe, Gable, and Clift. Marilyn falls for a burned-out cowboy.
Knife in the Water (1962)**** (actually titled Nóz w wodzie) A great Polanski film--better than Chinatown.
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962)
Flaming Creatures (1963)
Scorpio Rising (1963)
Bande à part (1964)
Guns of the Trees (1964)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)**** In my top ten for sure. Kubrick's best?
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)**** Russ Meyers. Some people call this the Citizen Kane of B Movies. Three big-breasted strippers kill and go on a tear in the desert.
The War Game (1965)
Blowup (1966)**** Antonioni. . .an amazing film
Chappaqua (1966)
Chelsea Girls (1966) (Andy Warhol)****I wouldn't call it a good film, but it is Warhol, and worth seeing even if you don't get to see Edie Sedgwick or Viva naked. It is four hours long, and done in a split screen, with basically two different movies side by side. It's either the height or nadir of modernism...
Hallucination Generation (1966)
Masculin, féminin (1966)
Morgan! (1966)
The Endless Summer (1966) An interesting surfing movie by the king of surf movies
The Wild Angels (1966)
You're a Big Boy Now (1966)
The Graduate (1967)**** A great Mike Nichols movie. It cleaned up at the Oscars.
How I Won the War (1967) Richard Lester's movie with John Lennon in the cast.)****
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)**** The first movie I dug Warren Beatty in
I Am Curious (Yellow) (1967) One of the first mainstream porn movies
I Am Curious (Blue) (1967) A sequel
Magical Mystery Tour (1967) I thought this sucked. And the Beatles are deities to me.
The Trip (1967) Did Peter Fonda direct this, or just star in it? I'm too lazy to IMDB it...
Week End (1967)
Message for Posterity (1967)
Barbarella (1968) Jane Fonda's breakout movie. She doesn't wear a lot of clothes.
Faces (1968)
Flesh (1968)
Head (1968) - this was a surrealistic Monkees movie--written by Jack Nicholson!
I Love You, Alice B. Toklas (1968)****
If... (1968) (Malcom McDowell starred, I think)
Maryjane (1968) Do you wonder what this one is about?
Psych-Out (1968)
Revolution (1968)
Skidoo (1968)
Three in the Attic (1968)
Wild in the Streets (1968) **** This is one of the greatest B movies of all time. The voting age in lowered to 16 and a youth becomes president. I have always loved this film! Rent it!
Yellow Submarine (1968)****
Alice's Restaurant (1969)
Easy Rider (1969)**** Great soundtrack. Directed by Dennis Hopper.
The Magic Christian (1969)**** Not as good as the book.
Medium Cool (1969) This is a Haskell Wexler film. This great cinematographer's movies all have stunning camera work. But he was probably a better camera guy than director.
Midnight Cowboy (1969)**** This film still holds up, in a lot of ways.
More (1969)
Putney Swope (1969)**** I saw this at a drive-in in 1969. A fun movie by Robert Downey Sr.
Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970) Russ Meyer ****
Catch-22 (1970)**** Not as good as the book. A Mike Nichols movie with an all star cast.
El Topo (1970)
Five Easy Pieces (1970)****
Getting Straight (1970)****
M*A*S*H (1970)**** Another of my favorite Altman's (are they all on the counterculture list because Altman smoked a lot of pot?)
Performance (1970) A Rolling Stones movie I think.
Punishment Park (1970)
The Revolutionary (1970)
The Strawberry Statement (1970)****
THX 1138 (1970) George Lucas' tragically underrated and almost forgotten film.
Watermelon Man (1970)
Woodstock (1970)**** I love this movie, including much of the music.
Zabriskie Point (1970)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)**** Whew. Disturbing, a great use of music, and McDowell's best work I think (although he is pretty good in Entourage).
A Safe Place (1971)
Billy Jack (1971)
Gas-s-s-s (1971)
Harold and Maude (1971)**** A tearjerker by Hal Ashby with Bud Courte and Ruth Gordon.
McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)**** Tied w/ Nashville as Altman's best in my booklet.
Shaft (1971)**** But I'm talkin' bout Shaft...
Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971)****
The Last Movie (1971) I saw this Dennis Hopper directed movie, but don't remember it. That's OK. Hopper probably doesn't remember making it.
Two-Lane Blacktop (1971) With Beach Boy Dennis Wilson and James Taylor****
Vanishing Point (1971)
W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism (1971)
Drive, He Said (1971)
Cisco Pike (1972)
F.T.A. (1972) F*** the army!
Pink Flamingos (1972)**** Jon Waters
The Final Comedown (1972)
Fritz the Cat (1972)
Last Tango in Paris (1972) Never understood this movie's appeal other than seeing Maria Schneider naked.
Silent Running (1972)
Electra Glide in Blue (1973)
American Graffiti (1973)*** Lucas' second movie.
Flesh for Frankenstein (1973)
Jesus Christ Superstar (1973)
The Final Programme (1973)
Godspell (1973)
The Harrad Experiment (1973)
The Holy Mountain (1973)
La Maman et la Putain (1973)
The Wicker Man (1973)
Serpico (1973)***
Themroc (1973)
Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974)
Steppenwolf (1974)
Dirty Duck (1974)
The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat (1974)
The Trial of Billy Jack (1974)
A Woman Under the Influence (1974)
Zardoz (1974)
Sweet Movie (1974)
Tommy (1975)**** A messy but interesting flick.
Dog Day Afternoon (1975) One of my all time favorite movies. Cazale and Pacino are heartbreakingly great here.****
Nashville (1975) **** A stunning, gorgeous, brilliantly casted masterpiece by Altman. This may be my favorite movie. Ever.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
Lisztomania (1975)
That's the Way of the World (1975)
Helter Skelter (1976)
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976)
Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma (1976)
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976) David Bowie stars.
Opening Night (1977)
Coming Home (1978)
The Deer Hunter (1978)****
The Last Waltz (1978) The Band. Controversial but wonderful.****
Up in Smoke (1978) Cheech and Chong ****
Apocalypse Now (1979) Coppola's third greatest movie****
The China Syndrome (1979)
Hair (1979)
More American Graffiti (1979)
Over the Edge (1979)
The Rose (1979) Bette Midler
Out of the Blue (1980)****
Repo Man (1984) I haven't seen it since it came out, but I loved it then...****
Suburbia (1984)
---o0o---

Video and lyrics: Bob Dylan's Subterranean Homesick Blues

This is the famous opening of the Pennebaker movie Don't Look Back. In some ways, it was one of the earliest music videos. The movie/mockumentary Tim Robbins starred in and directed, Bob Roberts, has an excellent parody/tribute of this scene. Bob Dylan's lyrics appear below the video.


You may need to click twice to see the clip...


Subterranean Homesick Blues
by Bob Dylan

Johnny's in the basement
Mixing up the medicine
I'm on the pavement
Thinking about the government
The man in the trench coat
Badge out, laid off
Says he's got a bad cough
Wants to get it paid off
Look out kid
It's somethin' you did
God knows when
But you're doin' it again
You better duck down the alley way
Lookin' for a new friend
The man in the coon-skin cap
In the big pen
Wants eleven dollar bills
You only got ten

Maggie comes fleet foot
Face full of black soot
Talkin' that the heat put
Plants in the bed but
The phone's tapped anyway
Maggie says that many say
They must bust in early May
Orders from the D. A.
Look out kid
Don't matter what you did
Walk on your tip toes
Don't try "No Doz"
Better stay away from those
That carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose
Watch the plain clothes
You don't need a weather man
To know which way the wind blows

Get sick, get well
Hang around a ink well
Ring bell, hard to tell
If anything is goin' to sell
Try hard, get barred
Get back, write braille
Get jailed, jump bail
Join the army, if you fail
Look out kid
You're gonna get hit
But users, cheaters
Six-time losers
Hang around the theaters
Girl by the whirlpool
Lookin' for a new fool
Don't follow leaders
Watch the parkin' meters

Ah get born, keep warm
Short pants, romance, learn to dance
Get dressed, get blessed
Try to be a success
Please her, please him, buy gifts
Don't steal, don't lift
Twenty years of schoolin'
And they put you on the day shift
Look out kid
They keep it all hid
Better jump down a manhole
Light yourself a candle
Don't wear sandals
Try to avoid the scandals
Don't wanna be a bum
You better chew gum
The pump don't work
'Cause the vandals took the handles

---o0o---

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Eight Years Ago Today. . .President Bill Clinton Was Acquitted!



Eight years ago today, President Bill Clinton was acquitted in the U.S. Senate. The House of Representatives impeached Clinton on Dec. 19, 1998, and charged him with perjury and obstruction of justice during Lewinsky scandal investigations. The public was fascinated by the machinations of Linda Tripp, the blue dress, and tales of Oval Office sexual encounters. However, they also considered the march toward impeachment a partisan witch-hunt, and not germane to national affairs, and not an impediment to running the United States.
The public in general, while disgusted, considered this investigation to be possibly even less important than the earlier one investigating "Whitewater." In January, 1999, two impeachment counts were tried in the Senate. On February 12, the Senate acquitted Clinton.
---o0o---