Best Apricots I've Ever Tasted

Heck, the best dried fruit I've ever had the privilege of tasting, ever. Last Sunday, I was in Decatur Georgia (pronounced, "dick hater" due to the significant numbers of women who live an alternative same-sex lifestyle who reside there), and my buddy Ryan took me to the "Dekalb Farmer's Market". Previously, I had assumed this Farmer's Market was the traditional dozen or several dozen local farmers, in a cordoned off city block, selling their locally grown produce. Au contraire!

The place was the size of a Super Walmart, with entire sections dedicated to dried fruit, nuts, fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, breads (Naan, pitas, tortillas, etc), and gigantic counters of sea food, meats, salads, hummus, you name it - all bustling with shoppers of varied classes and ethnicities. It was a wonderful food store, with employs who represented much of the United Nation's variety of membership.

Anyways, I was there to look for dried apricots, banana chips, dried mango for my business trip snacks, if I could find them, as well as some cucumbers, pitas, and hummus as appetizers before dinner. Most of the dried fruit they had was sulphurized or made with oils or sugar, which I really don't need or want. But they had these World Direct Turkish Organic Apricots, in 1 lb bags. DAMN! These are THE BEST, most flavorful, sweetest, succulent fruit I've ever tasted. Concentrated flavor, excellent texture, , full of fiber, amazing all around. Dark as dates, sweeter than pineapples and addictive. Organic, and no additional sulphur - all fruit has a tiny bit of sulphur in it, naturally, but too many food suppliers ADD sulphur for preservatives to compensate for inefficient distribution networks. I am trying not to eat more than 3 or 4 a day, as they can act like prunes to the human digestive tract.

And to think, I used to eat granola bars with high fructose corn syrup while I was traveling... Massive Tip O the Hat to my buddy Ryan for this fantastic gastronomic delight!

Anti-Oxidants Infiltrated By Cheap Chinese Ingredients

For many many years, I've been taking L-ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) as a dietary supplement. Before moving to AZ getting fresh, delicious citrus was somewhat hard to do, and since moving here, I've just been in the habit. Most all living things need Vitamin C (in the current carbon based life form paradigm we have), and yes, taking lots (greater than 500mg/day) of Vitamin C laughably produces acidic & relatively expensive urine, but I have this theory that it also helps to dissolve the calcites that drive painful kidney stones, boosts the immune system, and is not really "bad for you" in any way that I can figure out - if anyone has some factual evidence of why taking large doses of Vitamin C is bad for you, please let me know.

So I ran out of my fat-soluble "Ester-C" this week, and thought about my earlier blog posting (Nov2008) of how China dominates raw material chemical production for industrial food stuffs. I called the toll free number (1-866-417-0739) on the bottle and got a very helpful operator, who was not at all offended by my inquiry about Chinese component ingredients in their product. Given the product number (next to the bar code), the Ester-C operator was able to quickly indexed her database - set up proactively, in case of re-calls, with recent food safety concerns globally, the operator stated. She admitted that the bottle I had just finished, did indeed contain some Chinese sourced ingredients. She re-assured me, that Ester-C does extensive quality testing to standards that are higher than industry and government requirements of all their ingredients, suppliers, and processes. She also stated, that not all of Ester-C's products contain Chinese ingredients, but she would need to have the product number to assure me if another bottle did, or did not.

That comforted me a lil bit, but my stomach is still turning - yeah, and I suck at Poker too, not very good at subduing autonomic & endocrine reactions to inputs that my logical brain knows are only infinitesimally harmful at best. So, in a larger perspective... if a name brand, "premium" supplier of vitamin supplements uses the cheapest of Chinese ingredients, then the generic, store brand products are certainly rife with them as well.

When I find a replacement bottle at a store (Costco had none 2 weeks ago), I will call the toll free number and inquire before buying it. Maybe I'll get lucky. My past trips to China have instilled a firm belief that having a kidney stone would be better than dieing of pancreatic cancer or some other trace contamination induced malady. Until then, it is fresh citrus, as often as possible, organic and local hopefully.

She wore pants!?!?!

Pharyngula has a nice piece here about a Sudanese woman wearing pants to dinner, and receiving 40 lashes as punishment for doing so. I heard today on the radio that a retired Air Force general who is heading up the US relief efforts in Khartoum was stating that the US embargoes are making things worse, and that the genocide is over - contrary to the United States' UN Ambassador's position. I don't have an official position pro or anti embargo or relief, but I do appreciate when people wear pants to dinner, hiding their naked butts, or their stained under wear, and allowing me to sit down without having to bring my own towel to sit upon.

She wore pants!?!?! Did she "Plow on Sunday" as well?

Bill Kristol Believes The US Federal Government Can Provide the World's Best Health Care

More Right Wing hypocrisy - no surprise, as they're a gigantic herd of hypocrites generally, but the editor of the Weekly Standard stated emphatically on TDS Monday night, that US soldiers get great health care (he's never been to my brother-in-law's local VA hospital evidently) and they deserve the best health care. Jon Stewart calls him on it, and Weasel Kristol tries to squirm out of what he just stated, but it's impossible. the extended, un-cut interview is here.

I cannot stand people who are So Convinced and Absolutely Sure of their extremely biased opinion, as Kristol is (and Goldberg, Tracinski, Hush Dimbulb, and Olbermann, and other extremists on both sides) - those who believe there is so very little gray anywhere, and their way is the only way. I do love how Jon Stewart makes this weasel squirm, and "ugh, ugh, ugh {nervous smile}, heh heh {more nervous smiling}" whenever he is on.

Intense Rendering

Courtesy of my friend Jason, here's an intense example of extremely detailed embedded rendering. The entire sequence takes about 15 minutes to run. My pathetically low memory ZT systems XP machine ran it smoothly without staggering, so as long as you're not on an ancient mini-memory computer, your computer should run it also.

The time that must've gone into detailing and perfecting each of the scenes, I cannot imagine. I found the audio slightly intriguing, and the video, almost mesmerizing. (I ran it in the back ground while answering Bangalore emails, and the audio acts somewhat, like punctuation marks, to get the distracted viewer's attention).

Literally Presented

My buddy Zim has this hilarious posting of a ridiculously amusing video. I cannot stop laughing. thank you Zim!

TDS Explains Toothless Cap & Trade

I saw TDS Tuesday night on the hotel cable. Advance to the 40 second mark, for the details of how impotent the passed legislation really is. As Steven Chu says, "it's a start" ... a late, poor, lack luster one.. but something is slightly better than nothing. Cap'n Trade, is one sorry S.O.B.

Lindsey Graham - M.W.L.L.O.L.

Thanks to The Daily Show for pointing out that Senator Lindsey Graham (R - South Carolina) is featured on the website "Men Who Look Like Old Lesbians". Too damn funny! Dr Desert Flower and I could not stop laughing last night!

[Yes, the same Lindsey, who bought my buddy Matt's mint condition '94 Mustang and then transferred the title to a 25 yr old boy toy to whom he was unrelated. Don't worry Log Cabin Republicans, we won't tell anyone.]

Non Believers, suck on these facts!

To all the incredibly dedicated and delusional conspiracy theorists who believe we never actually went to the moon (here, here, here, and here), take a long hard look at these photos here. Oh, I forgot, those are made up too, right? LOL!

Thank You Dick Lugar

Dick Lugar, the senior republican U.S. senator represented my native state of Indiana for more than 20 years - when I was an 8 year old Hoosier he got elected, and has remained in that seat ever since. Today, he was the first one of the republicans to endorse Sonia Sotormayor for the SCOTUS. Yeah, judge Sotormayer barely stands up to legal giants like Harriet Miers (clueless). She's more similar to the empathetic & proclaimed moderate temperament of Samuel Alito (though she'll probably not buddy up with Scalia on as many opinions as Alito does), and sort of the antithesis of every major corporation's friend, John Roberts (just try, try really hard, to find any ruling he's ever made, that went against a corporation).

So an expensive, useless, no-value-added 4 day circus of confirmation hearings has ended, that certainly could have lasted 1 day, tops. Get on with it ladies and gentlemen. There's lots of work to be done!

Out of pocket for some time

I have a funeral next week I have to go to for my cousin who died this week, and then to the buckle of the bible belt, Greenville SC, followed by Tool at the Gwinnette Performing Arts Center with my buddy Ryan the week after. Not sure how much time for blogging there will be. Il faut voir.

Sessions, you're way out-matched

"SESSIONS: Do you stand by your statement that my experiences affect the facts I choose to see?

SOTOMAYOR: No, sir. I don't stand by the understanding of that statement that I will ignore other facts or other experiences because I haven't had them. I do believe that life experiences are important to the process of judging. They help you to understand and listen but that the law requires a result. And it would command you to the facts that are relevant to the disposition of the case. "

Jeff, if you're gonna try and pick a fight with a highly qualified, extremely experienced, wise Latina Federal Appeals Court Judge, be ready to admit defeat and eat crow when she calmly, sweetly, with a smile, deconstructs your accusations to reveal you sir, for the ignorant cracker you really are. Compared to the unqualified racist buffoon that you were when you were nominated by Reagan for a Federal Judgeship, Sotomayor's replies to your pathetic attacks is like her bringing a mini-gun to a knife fight.

Obama corrects his previous mistake for Surgeon General pick

Let Sanjay Gupta go look for 'patient zero' sensationally in Mexico. I'm very happy that CNN's 'medical correspondent' declined. Dr. Regina Benjamin hopefully will be confirmed soon. This crusader for the indigent and under-served rural & poor communities should bring a superb perspective to the SG position. Even Fox has nice things to say about her! As does AP/Yahoo, and the Washington Post and of course, Huffington.

It'll be interesting to see how Glen Beck, Dimbulb, InsanityHannity, and other mouth pieces criticize this choice.

Book Cart Drill Teams? LOL

Heard this on the radio yesterday. Too damn funny! Perhaps my love of libraries is not very healthy, if I think such silliness is hilarious. Juxtapositions are very good things.

The Hurt Locker = Visceral

After the hilarious Brüno movie going experience Friday night, I drove across metro Phoenix Saturday night to the only arts movie theater in this city of 4 million denizens to see The Hurt Locker. I thought I might have a beer or stop by a club after the 10:30pm showing of the movie ended (130 min run time).

Children of Men, Schindler's List, Hotel Rwanda, all sucked the evening's jovial energy out of me, and my buddy Ryan (when he and I went to see Schindler's in ATL years ago), and Dr Desert Flower back in 2006 in Greenville. Kathryn Bigelow has directed an intense, visceral, consuming window into daily life in Iraq. Mark Boal's (who spent time embedded in Iraq) script is pretty good, but in places, drops into movie-going impossible fictionality that didn't really 'test believable boundaries', as much as it trounced them with Hollywood emotional characterizations in the extreme. Had Boal and Bigelow toned down the 'unconventional rebel' aspects of the protagonist, just a few percentage points, I'd say this was an incredible movie experience. As it was, it is a good movie going experience, that opens up the eyes of the viewer. I require healthy doses of realism, in my paradigm, to fully embed myself into the movie.

Should be required viewing for every Chicken Hawk who votes to send troops into war zones.

SBC is funnier when he's unscripted

I saw Brüno Friday night. The Theater was packed for the 9:50pm show. It was a funny movie - but Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, in comparison, was funnier. Sacha Baron Cohen is a genius guerrilla comedian, duping Congressmen into eating cheese made from his sister's breast milk, or extolling potassium to rodeo fans, or running naked through a convention center, or revealing the stupidity & racism of some drunken SC college students. Most of Borat "seemed" unscripted, spontaneous people speaking what they really think, not from queue cards.

A great deal of Brüno came across as contrived, scripted, almost 'rehearsed'. Richard Bey used to have a talk show, but that ended more than 8 years ago. I wanted to believe the talent agency interviews were unscripted, but it was very hard to make that leap. The Alabama hunter scenes were hilarious and massively pushed boundaries, but did not get to the authenticity of the visceral hatred revealed in the Arkansas cage match.

I heard one NPR reviewer (Mondello) say he liked it and appauld SBC's ability to "remake himself", and another (Edelstein) laud it for how it promoted gay awareness, even if it sort of beat it into your head - Edelstein also detested Borat.

Catch stooges saying stupid, racist, greedy, ignorant, xenophobic, fundamentalist, Idiocracy-type things, and it is comic gold. Have them read it off a teleprompter, and it loses it's punch. I liked Brüno, ut it was not as good as Borat.

American Hand Tools & Home Defense

Ever find yourself in the hand tool aisle at a hardware store, and try to find the few remaining Made In USA tools that are offered? I love the hardware aisle as almost as much as Dr Desert Flower loves a shoe store sale. In my search for functioning replacement carbon monoxide detector (required by AZ residential building code) I found myself at Home Depot. So there I was, looking at literally 30 different types of hammers, made by 7 different branded manufacturers, and only Estwing (Rockford IL) is made in the USA. I'd bought a nice 22 inch Estwing clam hammer several years ago, and love it. Not only does it pound nails handily, but I keep it on my office shelf as an expedient means of home defense as well. One Japanese wrecking hammer, 2 Mexican framing hammers, and the rest of the massive display, Chinese.

Ever find yourself looking at hand tools (hammers, crowbars, pry bars, awls, screw drivers, et al) and thinking, 'which of these would be best for defending against / braining / brandishing / wielding against a home invader?' It's not paranoia when 1 out of 3 homes are vacant & foreclosed here in my neighborhood on the west side of the nation's kidnapping capital. So I selected the 16 inch claw hammer (3413962381), proudly made in the USA - I don't want to rely on a Chinese tool for defense, it just doesn't work in my head.

Maybe I'm the only one who has these kinds of thoughts at the hardware store...

BTW - FireX COQ-8 120V AC "wired-in" CO detectors are total crap. They fail, en masse, exactly at the 5 year warranty - all 3 of them within 2 months of each other (manufacturing dates are even stamped into the back of the plastic casing, from 2003). The Kidde 900-0120 is an adequate replacement (4787100120), but being made in China, only 2 of the 3 replacements actually worked, forcing me to return to HD to exchange for a 4th. At $30 each, you'd think they would be a little more reliable, but hey, America loves to market cheap Chinese garbage.

Why our recession will last at least 10 years

Bill Moyers' interview with former regulator, now professor at University of Missouri KC, William K Black, is solid gold, infuriating, illuminating, captivating. 100 to 1000X worse than the S&L crisis that McCain helped to bring us in the 80s, with 1/5 the number of Federal agents as watchdogs now, compared to what we had then. Fraud on a massive scale. "AIG alone was at least as big as the S&L crisis". AAA ratings issued on derivatives that were assembled 'liars loans', sub-prime toxicity - the total destruction of global trust in the banking system. The Japanese 'lost decade' will look meager and tame compared to how deeply the American banking system, and our lack of effective regulation have gotten us all into. Geithner's finger-prints are all over this mess as former head of the NY Fed where he was supposed to be over-seeing and REGULATING, throttling back, subduing, the evils of Goldman-Sachs and other massive banks.

I need another drink.
Tip of the hat to Ron and to Mike S for the links to this interesting (and depressing) financial blog.

Candidate Obama vs. President Obama. Hypocrisy in action.

Back in 2003, The Daily Show started running a "Bush vs Bush" segment - man, Jon Stewart aged alot in the last 6 years! It's always acerbic and amusing to see a politician skewered on his own words and blatant hypocrisy, when you didn't vote for the plutocrat.

I've been holding my breath, hoping that the hypocrisy and plutocratic evil tendencies that President Obama's administration has started to exhibit would pass... but they seem to be growing, not diminishing.
Candidate Obama railed against the secretiveness of Bush & Cheney meeting with Oil Executives to write energy policy.
President Obama won't disclose which Coal Executives met at the White House.

Candidate Obama wanted to close Guantanamo - we can't imprison people forever afterall!
President Obama states that some people will be held without trial indefinitely, possibly forever [now granted, I don't think they should be released. I think, if they are seething, vicious, admitted America haters, let them meet their maker]

Candidate Obama spoke clearly and succinctly against warrantless wire tapping.
"There is also little doubt that the Bush Administration, with the cooperation of major telecommunications companies, has abused that authority and undermined the Constitution by intercepting the communications of innocent Americans without their knowledge or the required court orders." [That's pretty damn clear, to me, that he was against it]
President Obama wants to continue the program.

Candidate Obama deeply criticized McCain's vastly unpopular idea of taxing employer provided health insurance to pay for medical coverage for the uninsured.
President Obama won't rule out using that option? WTF? [Now, I would not object to paying $100 or $200 more dollars a year in some kind of tax out of my paycheck to help finance such a plan, but not thousands of dollar a year].

Yes, President Obama IS changing some things - Science is no longer considered a societal evil by the Executive Branch; Inspectors Generals have begun once again to do their jobs; America's reputation abroad is slowly starting to recover; Some level of Competency is being restored to the Federal Government... but damnit, why can't he make a clean break from his bubbling, misguided, incompetent, ignorant, plutocratic predecessor??

My "spidey sense" is not giving me a good feeling about this trend. I hope I am wrong.

What's your connection speed?

I recently had my company reimbursed internet connect bumped up from 3 meg a second to 20 meg a second. It's of course, never REALLY 20 meg a second, but I check it from time to time at Internetfrog. It seems to be a pretty good evaluation engine. Anyone have a better speed evaluation site they can recommend? I average 13 Meg mid-day most days, from the fiber-optic node 2 blocks away, and 3 or 4 Meg when everyone else gets home from work and starts checking their emails and such.

And yes, the price went from like $29/month (fixed for life) to $69/month from Qwest. Kind of a rip off, but while the company is reimbursing, I'll take advantage of it. A router is still a router.

Air Cover over the Sahara?

When Air Force 1 flies from Rome to Accra, does the US Navy (via Carrier Based aircraft, and in flight refueling) or US Air Force provide an escort?

I wonder how they manage flying over multiple countries, some of which have their own air forces, and some of which do not, when it is really no where near an ocean, for the majority of the flight.

Hubris & Incompetence Drive Massive Over-Compensation

Report: Bush surveillance program was massive - so was his paranoia, ignorance, hubris, and shame that he and his incompetent administration did not protect the American people, so he over-compensated.

Inadequate, ashamed, old white men... over compensating. Despicable.

Rosado Viña Rubican 2007

Rosado Viña Rubican 2007 Denominación de Origen Navarra Bodegas Corellanas
Total Wine - Alfio Moriconi Selection
$8 (yeah, a whole eight dollars - you could choke down a nasty magnum of Yellowtail for that)

Summer time in Phoenix can get really hot, and I learned many years ago, that a cool Rosé wine can be awesome on a very hot day, enjoyed in the shade, poolside. I found Bodegas Corellanas's Viña Rubican, Denominación de Origen Navarra at Total Wine in South Carolina, and recently had a bottle here in Arizona as well. Light, crisp, refreshing, smooth, with a lovely finish. Dr Desert Flower and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The only other reviewer I could find online didn't like it, but that's his problem. I recommend it, if you're looking for a refreshingly cool Rosé to enjoy in hot weather.

And once again, the government regulations that the Spanish have imposed on their wine industry, make buying a Denominación de Origen wine a much easier call. No nasty vinegar or brake fluid here.

Kids are expensive

I used to think a mortgage was expensive. Not even close to the investment in raising progeny.

Who's bringing the money?

Are you a proud health care lobbyist? Are you interested to know who's bringing piles of lobbying money to Washington to try and influence them as they make policy decisions that will affect 45 million Americans WITHOUT ANY health insurance? And 160 million Americans who have employer based health insurance, as well as the other 100 million (like my son) who are somewhere in the middle?

Take a look at this panoramic photo that NPR took at last month's kick off Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions first meeting. Be part of the greater good, to help identify the power players who are affecting the lives and futures of our fellow Americans.

Quote of the Day: Texas & Iran

Heard Roger Cohen on the radio earlier today say this gem: "To give Americans an idea of what the fiercely independent political atmosphere is in Iran, take Texas, and add 5000 years of history, and that gives you some idea."

He also spoke about how 70% of Iranian citizens are pro-American while the official government position is anti-American, in contrast to most of the Middle East, Egypt for example, where at least 70% of the population is strongly anti-American yet the government is staunchly pro-American.

For Israel to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, would unleash massive destruction not just in the Middle East, but all over the world, and be extremely unproductive. Il faut voir.

Tato Montepulciano D'Abruzzo - fantastico $8!

I found another delicious gem at Trader Joe's. The Tato Montepulciano D'Abruzzo 2005. It was a whole $8, and it tastes like a $40 Amarone. Delicious, silken, strong without being over-powering, notes of cherry and currant but not "too fruity". I agree with the Forbes review (and I almost never agree with anything I read in Forbes) on how good it tastes. [Also, a photo of the label, here]. The Demoninazione di origine that Italy has is an Awesome Government Control that truly helps to guide a wine towards being wonderful, regardless of how expensive, or inexpensive it is.

I disagree with "seriousjoke" and his review that says it is grassy and reminiscent of "wet soil". Wet soil? Having grown up 8 miles south of Lake Michigan's south shore, where the dirt was black, and then spending 16 years in the SC Upstate where the acidic, iron-filled, orange-brown staining, greasy soil had a much different smell, neither was represented in the '05 Tato Montepulciano D'Abruzzo - but it was delicious.

A reviewer called bjwdad must've gotten a bad bottle at his Trader Joe's in Phoenix, mentioning the low quality notes of earth and mushrooms [NOTE: a good wine, that is drinkable and has not spoiled in storage, is not supposed to have 'hints of cigar box', smoke, mushrooms, wet earth, musty, wet wood, or other scents of degradation] that were not at all present in my bottle.

Eight whole dollars, excellent Italian government guidance, and Trader Joe's customer centric service... very cool.

Juxtaposed in Black & White

Yeah Clarence, everything's equal. I wonder in the next generation, how far down from the top of the list ("Highest Standard of Living") that the USA will slide, from where they were in 1946.

What, only crap has been produced after 1978?

Last Friday night, on Real Time, Bill Maher interviewed Billy Bob Thornton, and during said taped interview, BBT made a statement that irked me. He passionately related a story to Bill Maher about how he was having an argument with a 20 something year old women about memorable music and musicians, and he said "you can't name 100 bands, starting from 1978 or after, who will be remembered in 100 years!" The delusional Thornton, who needs to get out more often, then continued with "I don't have enough paper in my house to write down all the names of all the bands from the 50s to 1978 who will continue to be remembered 100 plus years from now."

As the son of a retired book binder and print shop foreman, I can honestly say, BBT needs more paper in his home. And, since he claims his "Boxmasters" band is a "modbilly" genre, you would have thought he might've tangentially thought of SCOTS or Stray Cats, both whose origins are in the last 31 years and both of whom make far better music IMHO. He also got The Police wrong, stating they were pre-1978 - really, oh omniscient BBT?

So Dr Desert Flower and I put a list of about 80 bands together, 10% of which turned out to be pre-1978, and then I googled a bunch, and emailed a few readers of this blog, and gathered a few more names, to get to 109. I feel better now. Yes, such future prediction arguments are inane and pointless, but I felt slightly insulted by another baby boomer completely dismissing my generation, and all the music I grew up with, again.

So here's a list of 109 bands that a) became famous between 1978 and the present b) sold many "albums" [back when albums were sold in stores and not downloaded so much] c) were more than 1 hit wonders d) actually sang and played and created most or all of their own material [sauf teeny bopper air heads, country, rap sampling, par exemple]. There's more than 109, but that's enough for now, in my perspective (add a comment, and state your inputs). I don't like all the bands on the list, but I understand their larger body of work, and 100 or however many years from now, when people plug straight into their heads, there'll be a few copies of at least some of these artists songs around, just as there will be The Who, The Rolling Stones, and Zeppelin tunes still digitally recorded somewhere. The makers of the harpsichord might've thought the same way BBT did. Who knows?

I think some things are timeless.

1978 Bauhaus
1978 The English Beat
1978 Echo & the Bunnymen
1978 Midnight Oil
1978 Public Image Ltd
1978 Prince
1978 The Dead Kennedys
1978 The Pretenders
1978 XTC
1978 The Police (Outlandos d'Amor, 2Nov78 UK & US) Recorded Jan–March 1978)
1979 Beastie Boys
1979 OMD
1979 Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five
1979 Hüsker Dü
1979 Stray Cats
1979 The Circle Jerks
1979 The The
1979 The Replacements
1979 INXS
1980 Eurythmics
1980 Frankie Goes to Hollywood
1980 INXS
1980 REM
1980 The Call
1980 The Fixx

1980 Def Leppard
1980 Depeche Mode
1980 New Order
1980 U2
1980 X
1981 Anthrax
1981 Duran Duran
1981 Front 242
1981 Metallica
1981 Ministry
1981 Pet Shop Boys
1981 Pantera
1981 The Alarm
1981 Sonic Youth
1981 Violent Femmes
1982 Everything but the Girl
1982 The Art of Noise
1982 The Pogues
1982 The Smiths
1982 Thomas Dolby
1983 Run-D.M.C.
1983 Southern Culture on the Skids
1983 The Dead Milkmen
1983 The Red Hot Chili Peppers
1984 Dinosaur Jr.

1984 Dr. Dre
1984 Primus
1984 Soundgarden
1984 The BoDeans
1984 The Cult
1984 The Jesus and Mary Chain
1985 Erasure
1985 Guns N'Roses
1985 Jane's Addiciton
1985 Love & Rockets
1985 Screaming trees
1985 The Bodines
1985 The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
1985 The Offspring
1985 The Stone Roses
1986 Howard Jones
1986 N.W.A
1986 Pixies
1986 The Proclaimers
1986 They Might Be Giants
1987 Alice in Chins
1987 Green Day
1987 Nirvana
1987 Public Enemy
1987 Rollins Band

1987 The Wonder Stuff
1988 Beck
1988 Barenaked Ladies
1988 Deftones
1988 Morrissey
1988 NIN
1988 The Smashing Pumpkins
1988 The Traveling Wilburys
1989 Phish
1989 The Charlatans UK
1989 The Verve
1990 Live
1990 The Cranberries
1990 Pearl Jam
1990 The Black Crowes
1990 Tool
1991 Moby
1991 Rage Against the Machine
1992 Radio Head
1992 Stone temple Pilots
1992 Wu-Tang Clan
1993 Dave Matthews Band
1993 Korn
1994 The Bloodhound Gang
1994 Blink-182

1994 Cake
1994 Oasis
1995 Foo Fighters
1996 Anti-Flag
1997 The White Stripes
1998 Coldplay
1998 System of a Down
2002 The Killers
2002 Kanye West

"The Family" and its values

The Family, by Jeff Sharlet, is on my reading list after hearing him on the radio earlier this week, and his description of this secretive but wide-spread CINO cult, that both adulterous Senator Ensign & incompetent & M.I.A. Governor Sanford are members.

The cult's head, Doug Coe, is quoted as referring to King David as follows:
" "Hey, you know what's interesting about King David?" ... "King David," David Coe went on, "liked to do really, really bad things." He chuckled. "Here's this guy who slept with another man's wife — Bathsheba, right? — and then basically murdered her husband. And this guy is one of our heroes." David shook his head. "I mean, Jiminy Christmas, God likes this guy! What," he said, "is that all about?"
"Because he was chosen," I said. For the first time David looked my way.
"Yes," he said, smiling. "Chosen. Interesting set of rules, isn't it?"

These self anointed douche bags are convinced that they are "God's Chosen People", since they believe that the Jews have fallen from "God's grace" it's now their cult's, er... I mean... group's responsibility to do Gawd's work. They despise churches, since churches help the poor and are not focused upon strengthening "the Chosen Ones" grip on global power. They can be summarized somewhat, as "trickle down Christianity" - once they are in power, including various dictatorships and sham democracies globally, they believe that their policies, their faith in Jesus, will cause good Christian people everywhere to do good acts, be more Christian, and make the world a better place. These plutocrats make the Bohemian Grove sound main stream and tame.

Do you golf?

In the last 2 months, I've been asked "Do you golf?" by 4 different people. I've calmly replied, after biting my tongue, with a simple "no, but I do miniature golf from time to time, I enjoy tangling with windmills and alligators". I've not gone on a rant, but I recall, inwardly, word for word, the sage perspective of George Carlin, R.I.P: (video link here - advance to 2:44)

I know where we can build housing for the homeless: golf courses. Perfect: golf courses. Just what we need: plenty of good land in nice neighborhoods, land that is currently being wasted on a meaningless, mindless activity engaged in primarily by white, well-to-do male businessmen who use the game to get together to make deals to carve this country up a little finer among themselves.

I am getting tired, really getting tired of these golfing c*cks*ckers in their green pants and their yellow pants and their orange pants, and their precious little hats and their cute little golf carts.

It is time to reclaim the golf courses from the wealthy and turn them over to the homeless. Golf is an arrogant, elitist game and it takes up entirely too much room in this country.

It is an arrogant on its very design alone. Just the design of the game speaks of arrogance. Think of how big a golf course is. The ball is that f*cking big! What do these pin-headed pr*cks need with all that land? There are 17,000 golf courses in America. They average over 150 acres a piece. That’s 3 million-plus acres; 4,820 square miles. You could build two Rhode Islands and a Delaware for the homeless on the land currently being wasted on this meaningless, mindless, arrogant, elitist, racist — there’s another thing: the only blacks you’ll find in country clubs are carrying trays — and a boring game. Boring game for boring people. Have you ever watched golf on television? It’s like watching flies F*ck.

And a mindless game, mindless. Think of the intellect it must take to draw pleasure from this activity: hitting a ball with a crooked stick, and then walking after it! And then hitting it again! I say, “Pick it up A**h*le, you’re lucky you found the f*cking thing. Put it in your pocket and go home, you’re a winner. You’re a winner — you found it!”

No, no chance of that happening. “Dorko” in the plaid knickers is going to hit it again and walk some more. Let these rich cocksuckers play miniature golf. Let him f*ck with a windmill for an hour and a half or so, see if there’s really any skill among these people.

I know there are some people who play golf who don’t consider themselves rich. F*ck ‘em! And shame on them for engaging in an arrogant, elitist past time.

If you golf, that's fine for you. You're part of a shrinking American population. I hope you enjoy it - my older brother sure used to - and I hope you're not one of the Plutocrats I'll be mentioning later this weekend, who use the past-time to further their good-ole-boy machinations.

You Betcha!

"A significant lapse in judgment" - T.Purdum
If you don't want to read the 10,000 word Vanity Fair article on how wrong of a selection the McCain campaign made when Palin was chosen, see this short video summary from Crooks & Liars.

Oh please oh please, run in 2012 Sarah! I want everyone to know that dinosaurs were on the ark, global warming is imagined, you didn't really sell your jet or give back the bridge to no where money, you wanted your daughter to marry a fertile red-neck simpleton, you support making rape victims pay for their own rape kits, how Wasilla is the meth capital of Alaska, how easy it is to get residents to like you when you pay each one $3K a year to be in your state. Repressed Conservatives cannot resist you (anymore than they can resist Argentinian women, Minnesota bathroom boys, or congressional pages)!!

Snopes funded by Adware - not a hoax

I wrote Snopes a "thank you letter" yesterday, telling them how I appreciate their debunking service, and inquired why they do it? since I've not seen ads on their site. Are they funded by a billionaire or something? I got back a form letter, that basically just had web links to stories praising them - it didn't answer my question. So I started Googling "Snopes funded by" ... and after wading through the BS where Republicans accused Obama of funding Snopes last year (LOL! what a bunch of whining sore losers!) I found several web rants of software / web designer type guys who curse Snopes for their malicious pop-up ads.

Pop-up ads? Huh? Since I installed Ad Blocker Plus on my Mozilla Firefox, I've not seen a pop-up ad in years. So perhaps the Adware accusations are true - link to Snopes's own forum here, where their fans complained. But if you run a capable browser - anything that is not "Internet Explorer" then you're much more immune to the insidious machinations, and still have access to the most comprehensive hoax / urban legends / debunking web database around.

Break The Chain and Hoaxbusters (.com [French] and .org [US]) are ok too... but Snopes usually has more depth, and is easier to search. Also, Politifact and FactCheck.org are mighty handy.