Where do I sign up?

The Procedure, with Willem Dafoe & WIll Ferrell from Adam "Ghost Panther" McKay

"Stairway to Heaven" 24/7? Whooo!  But seriously, if they made these with a bluetooth connection to the ipod, I'd probably be on the waiting list now.

Leave your "Best song/worst song" to have stuck in your head forever in the comments.

For the record, I could live with this nonstop for the rest of my life. Everything is cooler when your personal soundtrack is by Miles Davis. 

This, on the other hand, would cause me to rip my own head off my body before lunchtime the first day.

the eye (or ear) of the beholder

Via Montreal Simon    -- who both you and I ought to read more often -- we are lead to this review/commentary from the Guardian

It wasn't singer Susan Boyle who was ugly on Britain's Got Talent so much as our reaction to her
Is Susan Boyle ugly? Or are we?
On Saturday night she stood on the stage in Britain's Got Talent; small and rather chubby, with a squashed face, unruly teeth and unkempt hair. She wore a gold lace dress, which made her look like a piece of pork sitting on a doily. Interviewed by Ant and Dec beforehand, she told them that she is unemployed, single, lives with a cat called Pebbles and has never been kissed. Susan then walked out to chatter, giggling, and a long and unpleasant wolf whistle.
Why are we so shocked when "ugly" women can do things, rather than sitting at home weeping and wishing they were somebody else? Men are allowed to be ugly and talented.

Susan Boyle doesn't really sing my kind of music, but you'd have to be tone deaf not to realize she is a talented vocalist. And contrary to the prevailing opinion she isn't ugly. A little on the plain side, sure. A bit plump, yeah. So what? She's there to sing, not model bikinis. It isn't like she has some kinda massive facial scar or a third eye or anything. She's just sort of ordinary looking. Ever get a good look at Aretha Franklin? How about Ella Fitzgerald? Not exactly beauty queens - until they start to sing.  How about Joe Cocker or Bob Dylan or Elvis Costello? Not exactly matinee idols either. But, pretty boy idols aside,  men who sing are not rated on their looks while women  very much are. Which is pretty stupid.

While there have been female singers and actresses who have become popular based on their talent and perhaps in spite of their looks, appearance seems much more important in the way we judge women than in the way we judge men. See if you can think of ten relatively unattractive female performers who have made a career. Off the top of my head I'm not sure I can: Cass Elliot, Kathy Bates, kd Lang, Minnie Pearl, Lily Tomlin, Olympia Dukakis, Margaret Dumont, Rosanne Barr, Margaret Hamilton, um...that old lady from "Throw Momma From the Train", and uh....Mary Walsh?....okay I'm sure there are plenty more , but several on that list that I spent all of two minutes compiling are hardly major stars and at least three of them based their careers on the fact that they were unattractive or became famous late in life - and kd Lang was kinda cute when she was young and Olympia Dukakis probably was too -- and Cass and Rosanne aren't really ugly, just overweight and Mary Walsh is brilliantly funny, which counts for a lot in my books. Try the same experiment with male performers and you'll have a long list in seconds. And they won't all be character actors.

By the same measure, until recently we were, as a rule, far more tolerant of pretty girls who had little or no talent than we were of handsome men who couldn't act or sing  - teen idols being the exception - as long as they stayed young and pretty that is (see the film Searching for Debra Winger sometime to further expand on this notion) How many movies have you seen lately where the lead character is played by an actress over 45 that isn't Meryl Streep?

I don't mean to say we've become less accepting of less talented pretty women - far from it - its just that we have become more accepting of less talented handsome men in recent years.

Another good example - musicians. There are a lot of famous male musicians who are butt ugly, but respected and popular for their musical talent. Popular, highly successful female musicians are almost always singers first and foremost - some accompany their own vocals and write their own material - but the star female instrumentalist is the exception, not the rule and those who do make a name for themselves as instrumentalists - Candy Dulfur and Bonnie Raitt spring to mind - are usually attractive.
Consider this: If John Coltrane, Frank Zappa, BB King or Jerry Garcia (to name only a few) had been born female, we'd probably never have heard of them.
I'm not saying this situation is the way it ought to be, just that it the unfortunate and unfairand flat out stupid situation that we face in the world.

I have a daughter who is six years old. In my admittedly biased opinion, she is very pretty and will likely grow up to be an absolute knockout in the looks department. Which is both good and bad. Good, in that good looks, especially for women, open a lot of doors and get you a lot of attention. Bad, in that, despite the fact that she is plenty smart, because she is attractive, she will probably not be taken seriously for her intellect or ability until she is in her 40s, barring some kind of major societal change. 

If she learns to play guitar like Django Reinhardt, she'll still end up being the "hot girl that is a pretty good guitar player" with a career that ended at 35, while my son could have two noses and if he could play like Django, he would be worshipped like a god and make records until he died at 95. I think that sucks.

Furthermore - and perhaps this tendency is more pronounced in Japan than North America these days - she is already getting the message from friends, television and even teachers that it is more important to be cute than clever. That as long as she can bat her big brown eyes and smile, she can get away with anything - a tendency I am doing my best to discourage.  But at this point it appears to be Dad vs the Disney machine and thousands of years of patriarchy.

A lot of what makes a person attractive in real life is attitude and personality. I've met models -  they look great in photos, but a lot of them have nothing to say and in a conversation in a dimly-lit bar, they aren't any more attractive than the next woman, considerably less so if the next woman isn't obsessed with her appearence and happens to have a sense of humor and some brains and hasn't been convinced that because she isn't six feet tall, 90 pounds, and blonde with cheekbones you could cut your finger on, that she's ugly.  Nothing is as sexy as confidence. After the first five minutes, it really isn't the package anyone with any brains is interested in, its the contents. Cases in point: Janis Joplin, Billie Holiday, Minnie Driver, Terri Garr, Meryl Streep, Barbara Streisand, and Ingrid Bergman -- all of whom can be breathtakingly, stunningly beautiful when they turn on the inner light, but none of whom you'd pick out of a line up if you hauled them in out of the rain. Well...okay...Ingrid Bergman in her 20s would probably stop traffic no matter what as far as I can see, but she'd never be a pin up today. Physical beauty may be objectively judged by the standards of the day I suppose, but attractiveness is always largely subjective.

Let's think of a few major stars on the other side of the gender gap and consider them in terms of pure physical beauty: Humphrey Bogart, Dustin Hoffman, Woody Allen, Jack Black, Mark Knopfler, Phil Collins - I already mentioned Bob Dylan and I bet you don't even know what Charlie Parker or Django Reinhardt look like. Not a matinee idol among them - sure Bogart was cool, but he was no Cary Grant - but they have seen pretty high levels of popularity at one time or another, despite their looks and don't seem to have too much trouble attracting the opposite sex. 

I guess what I'm trying to say is that pretty is nice, but but brains, talent, attitude and character are more important in the long run - and even in the short run. And that despite the advances of feminism over the years, as a society we continue to judge women on looks far more than we do men, and that is just plain stupid.

So more power to Susan Boyle and the hell with the pretty people. Smart, funny, talented people are sexier anyways.

She was a soldier

Dear Michael Coren,

Having read your latest column about the death of Canadian Forces Trooper Karin Blais as the result of a roadside bomb in Afghanistan, let me be as polite as I can in saying this: Fuck you, you sexist moron. Try your "women can't serve in combat" horseshit on some of the women in the early Israeli army or the Russian Army in World War II or any of these women. You'll be glad of Canada's universal health care system in the aftermath. Trooper Blais was a soldier like many, many others who volunteered, was trained to do a job and died serving her country with honor. Like Capt. Nichola Goddard, and 115 other soldiers, she accepted the risks involved in doing her job and for you to say she was "dressed up as a soldier" is an insult to every woman serving in Canada's military. Women have been serving in combat roles in the Canadian military with distiction for nearly 20 years. She was a soldier and died like one, her gender had nothing to with it.

Update: Nice to see the Torch weigh in on this one as well. It is nice to see some on the other side of the blogosphere break ranks to slap down such an offensive troglodye.(H/T to Dr. Dawg for the milnet link) If only they would do it more often. Why does the Sun give Coren a platform? Why on earth is such an ill-informed and offensive douchebag on television?

And, yes, I sort of figured this would set the Skipper off, but sometimes you need to call in the big guns to make a point.

Among the many idiotic things in Coren's column is his fear that should things descend to close combat, Trooper Blais' armored vehicle, machine gun and sidearm would be no match for the long knives and heavy clubs of the Taliban. Uh....right.
He also seems very, very worried that such a pretty young thing would be raped as a matter of course. Given the well-documented tendency of the Afghan mujahedeen to take the idea of foxhole buddies to a whole new level, I strongly suspect that raping of prisoners would not be confined to female prisoners. (For further first-hand observation of the hot mujahideen-on-mujahideen action phenomenon, see BBC journalist Phil Rees excellent book Dining with Terrorists")

More updating: Once again proving that there is no situation in which certain right-wing douchebags won't feel they need to score points.

Great moments in bad taste

Yes we can!...but these guys probably shouldn't have. I don't think I can really add anything to this. I think the Chia Obama speaks for itself.

Sunday night fun

Yes, its that time of the week again - Radio Woodshed time! You should know the schedule by now: 8 to 10 EDT/5 to 7 PDT  for the finest in roots, blues, jazz, psychedelic rock, folk, bluegrass and country - along with other, less classifiable things-all hosted by your humble servant. And a vintage movie - This week "The Sweet Smell of Success" with Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis.

As always, you can join us on the internet radio by clicking to the right or get on up to the Red Zeppelin in Second Life and get on down with the Cafe Wellstone crowd. 

"Going, going, Galt" or "How can we miss you if you won't go away"

The Amish have the right idea: When someone's antisocial behaviour is so extreme as to become intolerable, they should not be allowed to be part of society and should be shunned.

I'd like to see all these "Go Galt" teabagging "I'll keep my guns, my money and my freedom, you keep the change" chowderheads either put up or shut up. They want to go Galt? Fine, I say we don't even send a bill for the protection of the social contract they've enjoyed so far in life. But from now on, they get a regular bill for the breathable air and drinkable municipal water and product safety protection and every road is a toll road for them. No taxes for you John Galts, you don't want your money subsidizing shiftless layabouts like those pointy-headed academics in states universities or those faceless bureacrats in the oppressive state civil service. You are all independent free agents -- we get it, you can pay your own way without The Man to hold you back.You have resigned your membership in society.

So, you don't get the special members rates from the hospitals and fire departments and other parts of society either anymore. In fact, some of the services we offer members, such as use of hospital surgical facilities and oil refineries are so much in demand, that we are going to have to restrict them to use by members only. Good luck building your own CAT scan machine, though I'm sure you can find some doctors willing to treat you at several times the regular rates. You have private medical insurance, so you don't need society and the state. Of course, if the insurance company doesn't live up to its end of the contract, I'm sure you can talk them round. After all a contract is legally binding on both parties and failure to live up to the terms of the contract nullifies that contract, so you could take or business elsewhere, I'm sure the company will miss you terribly. If only there was some way to force them to hold up their end of the bargin, some big stick you could wield against them, like the court system or a government licencing agency, but that's just the machinery of the oppressor.

Oh, and if I see any non-members of the public on public property, I'm calling the cops - who can do whatever they want with them since they are no longer members of society and have no rights. In fact, maybe I'll just shoot them or run them over in my car - what are they going to do, have me arrested? sue me? The police and the law and the courts are part of the apparatus of the state. They are here to serve and protect members of society. You decided not to be a member of the club called society, remember?

You want to withdraw from society - fine with us. But if I were you, Mr. and Ms. Rugged Individualist, I'd stock up on on no-doze, because all those guns won't help you if you're asleep when we decide we want your stuff, or for that matter, feel like it might be fun to hunt you for sport. You wanted the government off your back, remember? Woooolverines, baby! Welcome to Lord of the Flies, starring you as Piggy.

As a very powerful man once said "you're either with us, or you're with the enemy" - If the Galters want to leave society, fine, don't let the door hit you on the ass on your way out, but don't expect society to have anything to do with you. You're independent, remember?

What's that phrase so beloved by the righties that they've shouted it at any protester since the Vietnam era? "America - Love it or leave it" 

Well, guess what teabaggers? You had your eight years to cut taxes on the rich and "run the government like a business" and we all saw how that worked out. You lost the election, it wasn't even close. Now, either suck it up, pay your (reduced if you make less than $250,000 a year) taxes and play by the rules - or get the fuck out. Maybe you can all get together and convince Richard Mellon Scaife that in exchange for your services in keeping his tax rate down, he should buy you an island somewhere for you to live out your Randian fantasies while you slowly starve in your own filth.

But in the meantime, quit your tiresome fucking whining. Yes, members of society have the right to free speech, no matter how insufferably stupid their speeches are and since you haven't actually "gone Galt" just yet you still have that right, so I'm not advocating the government shut down your little tea parties or anything like that - though you might go a little easier on the talk of violent, armed insurrection against the gubmint, since I'm pretty sure that is treason. I'm just exercising my free speech rights to tell you to quit your mindless yammering about "going Galt" and shit or get off the pot. 

You want to go Galt? So go already! Who's stopping you? Shit, I'll even volunteer to help you pack.

Dear conservatives: Just breathe thru your nose

The things I find funniest about the "tea parties" of angry incoherent right-wing nuts this week are numerous - here's a very short list.

1. Very few of the people showing up to these things look like the types to be making enough that the tax increase on the top 5% of income earners will effect them.

2. Most of them don't seem to know what exactly they are protesting or what they want done. They don't like the bailouts - fine, neither does anyone else - but are we supposed to do, just let the banking system collapse?

3. For something that is pretty transparently put together by Steve Forbes, Richard Mellon Scaife and Rupert Murdoch and the rest of the billionaire wingnuts to help push for a flat"fair tax" system, you'd have thought they could get someone other than Beavis and Butthead to come up with the theme and name of the "protest movement."

4. The identification of Fox News as the "teabagging Network" -- nice to see them admit to the description of them we've been using for years.

5. Even though the meaning of the term has been point out to them - ad infinitum - conservatives are determined to show us damned sniggering liberals just what conservatism means: That just because an idea is stupid, it doesn't mean you don't stick with no matter what.

Shared pain is lessened, shared joy is increased

That's the most important lesson I've learned from the work of Spider Robinson, but its hardly the only one. For his Callahan's Bar stories alone, I owe the man - never mind all the excellent novels he's written and the great music he's turned me on to or his excellent podcast. He made me realize that punning was not a criminal offense and he introduced me to Bushmills  (okay, so maybe he owes everyone who's ever met me an apology - but not me, I owe him BIG).

And so, I wanna tug on your coatsleeve for a minute.

First, for those of you not in the know, let me say that the man is a national treasure. As a writer, he's won most of the major awards they give out in science fiction and with good reason. He's also a regular writer for the Mop&Pail though they foolishly discontinued his regular column a few years back. We won't even get into the massive runaway thing that Callahan's has become on the internet. Suffice to say that at one point the Callahan's bulletin board forum was just about the biggest non-porn site there was back in the days of usenet. Furthermore, he's a natural storyteller and ten minutes listening to his podcast will make you wonder why the CBC hasn't signed this guy as the second coming of Peter Gzowski or at least a summer replacement for Stuart McLean. 

Second, let me say that his wife, Jeanne, is also a national treasure as one of the country's foremost choreographers and former modern dancers. She is currently engaged in bringing to life an idea that was the foundation of a trilogy of great science fiction novels Spider and Jeanne co-wrote called Stardance that won a hatful of awards. That idea is dancing in zero gravity and you can see the early experiments here and follow the project here.

So, Spider and Jeanne Robinson are some of my favorite people and their presence their alone is enough to make me consider moving to Bowen Island, BC, when we do move back to Canada.

 

Kumbayah, hugs and shots of Bushmills all 'round.

Now we get to the harder part. 

I learned last week from Spider's podcast that bad things happen to good people. Jeanne went into the hospital for what was supposed to be minor surgery a couple of months ago and it was discovered she had a very nasty case of cancer. She starts radiation treatments this week. Spider's been lucky enough to have her sisters fly in from the east coast to help care for her over the last month or so and apparently has lots of good friends and neighbors to help out too. But I suspect, no, I know, it isn't going to be easy for him to write the new series of books he just signed up to do or any other paying copy while his  mind is occupied with trying to help his wife and obviously Jeanne is going to be doing any work for awhile either. Unless someone is making a multimillion dollar movie of your novel, science fiction writing does not pay that well, no matter how good you are and their home is not called "Tottering on the Brink" for nothing. 

So if you could drop a few bucks in the hat for them, it would be very, very much appreciated.

 

Reasons #3,947 thru #3,951 to hate "Canada's New Government"

3, 947. They lie.

3, 948. They lie all the time.

3, 949. They aren't even good at lying.

3, 950. They lie about things its pointless to lie about, that can be confirmed as untrue before they can finish the sentence.

3,951. Pants+fire=CPC  

Pogge and Paul Koring speak, you listen. 

Dark Star

Yet another reason to love Obama. Truly, the DFHs have taken over the White House. That noise you hear that sounds like popcorn is wingnut heads a-poppin'. When they talk in Washington about someone drinking the koolaide, I didn't think this was quite the kind of koolaide they had in mind. I betcha there are bootlegs available within the week.

The smell test and a new SLOTM

They say that quitters never win, but sometimes the best thing you can do is quit (listen up Norm Coleman) - in fact, sometimes its the only ethical thing you can do. Just ask ethicist John Jones, former technical advisor to the ethics committee of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police.

The short version: Ethics committee warns board of directors of police chiefs association that it is unethical to accept sponsorship money and gifts as it could constitute a conflict of interest or create the impression of conflict of interest. Board tell ethics committee to mind its own business and pass the doughnuts. Ethics advisor does the right thing and resigns on the spot.

From Christie Blatchford's well-detailed story in the Globe:

The technical adviser to the ethics committee of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police has resigned over corporate sponsorship - including that of Taser International - of the group's annual conference.
John Jones, an expert on police ethics who has advised the committee for three years, quit Thursday after the committee's efforts to stop the practice was rebuffed by the board of directors.
"I said in that case, I can't remain a member," a saddened Dr. Jones, the author of Reputable Conduct: Ethical Issues in Policing and Corrections, told The Globe and Mail in a phone interview yesterday from his Ottawa home. "[Such sponsorship] doesn't pass the smell test."

The fine folks at CBC Radio's As It Happens were on the story like a cop on a donut. Listen here to their interview with the soft-spoken ethicist who walks the walk and the executive director of the Association who merely talks the talk.

Jones and the rest of the ethics committee were concerned by the fact that the police chiefs - who charged with ensuring their own officers don't accept so much as a free cup of coffee - were availing themselves of free concert tickets and sponsorships from the Canadian Bankers Association, Loto-Quebec, Microsoft, Bell Mobility and Taser International.

"Generally, commercial enterprises do not operate altruistically. When they donate money, they expect there is something in return." Jones told the Toronto Star, which points out that the Association issued a position paper supporting the use of "conducted energy weapons" last year. Taser International is just about the only maker of "conducted energy weapons" - to the extent that the term is synonmous with their brand name.

The Association doesn't see any conflict of interest - I guess justice really is blind.

The editors down at the Mop&Pail agree.

And so, for having the courage to bite the hand that feeds him and quitting rather than going along with unethical behavior to get along with his employer, Dr. John Jones is our newest Spiritual Leader of the Moment.

Warning: professional geekery

The book is wrong, wrong, wrong!

Oddly, that works for me Glenn

"I think it would be just faster if they just shot me in the head. You know what I mean? How much more can he disenfranchise all of us? President Obama, why don't you just set us on fire?"
-- Glenn Beck

"Nope, no crazy there, no siree" he said, backing slowly out of the padded cell that doubles as a studio for Fox's latest ratings hero.

Deep bench

I've said it so often, but it still bears repeating: The Liberal Blogosphere has a very, very deep bench. Whether it is must-read stuff from the old masters or a fine debut from the newest kid on the block, the best place to start is the blog roll here or there or any of your other favorite blogs.

Sunday songs and cinema

Thanks to a bit of an itunes meltdown, this week's music is brought to you mostly by the letters B, C, D. Requests may be emailed or left in comments. This week's presentation from the Glorious People's Cinema Project will be "Harvey" to conclude our cavalcade of Jimmy Stewart films. Music from 8 pm EDT/5 Pacific, movie from  10 EDT/ 7 PDT -- join us here or in Second Life at the Red Zeppelin.

I know that my Habs will live on

But I'd really rather see Brofman in charge than that other Quebecois institution. But hey, at least they squeaked into the playoff.

Power ballad schlock queen eyeing bid for Les Habs.

I have seen more intelligent cacti

Republicans - because we needed a name for people who are dumber than houseplants. I just hope someone remembers to water Betty Brown occasionally, it must get dry in Texas.

Brown suggested that Asian-Americans should find a way to make their names more accessible.

“Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?” Brown said.

Brown later told Ko: “Can’t you see that this is something that would make it a lot easier for you and the people who are poll workers if you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that’s easier for Americans to deal with?”

Yes, Betty, because Asian names like Ko, Sato, Hu and Singh are much much more difficult than say Tatigliano, Satterthwaite, Papadopolis, Rogazinski, Medvedev or Gonzales. I'll admit that some Asian names are a mouthful  - Indonesian, Thai and Sri Lankan names in particular tend to be longer and more complex compared to short, blunt Anglo-Saxon monikers like Brown and Wood - but that isn't really the point here. Brown isn't suggesting that all names should be anglicized, just Asian names. 

But it isn't about race. 

Sure it's not. Nothing is ever about race with the Republicans and the conservatives, except when they get shoved back from the trough, then its all about discrimination against poor, persecuted middle-aged, wealthy, white men.

ending torture

Say what you want about Obama and his insistence on protecting the bankers and the wealthy and his refusal so far to prosecute his vicious, corrupt and venal predecessors -- if he does nothing else for the next eight years this is a significant accomplishment in cleaning up the mess left behind by the previous neofacist administration. This is the next step.

Sorry isn't good enough

I appreciate that the police in Vancouver have a difficult job to do right now what with the wave of gang violence engulfing the city, but the police have absolutely no right to seize cameras from journalists or any individual who is taking pictures at a crime scene, whether it interferes with their investigation or not. They are within their rights to request that news organizations not publish information that might impede an investigation, or to ask individuals to come forward with photos or videos of crimes, but the decision of what to do with such private property is up to the owner. The officer who assaulted the news photographer and threatened him with arrest should be fired immediately. This kind of conduct is illegal and a violation of a host of constitutional rights. In light of the actions of the police in the Dziekanski killing at the Vancouver airport and the attempt by the RCMP to confiscate evidence of their misconduct, and a cop in Ottawa not so long ago, this kind of thing cannot be tolerated by a free society. It isn't as if the Vancouver cops haven't been accused of this kind of thing before either.

No, but I think there may be anarchists in my broom closet

tip of the fez to Hypatia!!