39 going on five
Take a trip down memory lane at the Canadian Expat Blog with the Friendly Giant.

I loved this show, along with Mr. Dressup, as a kid. And the funniest thing I've ever heard on radio is Radio Free Vestibule's expose on Casey and Rusty the Rooster. And screw the guys at Canadian Expat, the rocking chair is MINE!

No one is above the law
Not even Dennis "the Menace" Hastert. Apparently the Speaker of the House of Representatives has his panties in a twist over the FBI searching the congressional offices of Louisiana Democrat William Jefferson. He and Newt Gingrich and house majority leader John Boehnert are calling it an "invasion of the legislative branch" for some reason.

This is the first time in U.S. history the feds have searched a lawmakers office, but as far as I know there is no legal grounds for preventing them from doing so. A lawmaker's office should be no different from any other premises when it comes to the police having the right to search it. If a judge grants a warrant on the grounds of probable cause - and I think videotape of the congressman accepting a $100,000 bribe is sufficient cause to think a crime may have been committed - there is no reason I can think of for the FBI not to search the man's office.

The Republicans often defend the president's illegal wiretapping program by saying that Americans who are not dealing with terrorists have nothing to fear from the intrusion into their privacy and violation of their civil liberties, because if they are innocent, then they have nothing to hide, right? Well, that sort of logic cuts both ways --- what do Hastert and Boehnert have to hide?

I understand how there would be reluctance to give the executive branch carte blanche to use law enforcement agencies to investigate political opponents, which is a fine old American tradition dating back to Tammany Hall and carried on by such luminaries as Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover, but I don't think this is a case of the White House going after Jefferson for political reasons -- from what we have seen of the case so far, the guy has some major explaining to do. ("No really, I keep $90,000 in my freezer because I like to pay all my bills in "cold, hard cash" get it?)

In some countries, elected officials are immune from prosecution while in office. The reason given is to prevent them from being locked up on trumped up charges by their political opponents or an autocratic national leader. Has it really come to that in Amerika?

The Man of Bronze
When I was a kid, I loved superheroes. I collected comic books, watched all the superhero tv shows -I even had a crush on Lynda Carter. I often told myself that this was the summer I was going to do it, I was going to train, train, train until I had superhuman powers. If I had found this programs back then, who knows what evildoers I might have triumphed over by now?

constitution, schmonstitution
The man who is supposed to be the top legal authority in the United States seems to think that the first amendment, like the fourth, can simply be ignored when it gets in the administration's way:

"Mr. Gonzales said that the administration promoted and respected the right of the press that is protected under the First Amendment.
"But it can't be the case that that right trumps over the right that Americans would like to see, the ability of the federal government to go after criminal activity," he said. "And so those two principles have to be accommodated."
Mr. Gonzales sidestepped a question concerning whether the administration had been reviewing reporters' telephone records in an effort to identify their confidential sources."

IN YOUR EAR

Kevin Wood / Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions

Sony Music Entertainment, 2,835 yen

Fans of Bruce Springsteen's full-bore rock 'n' roll from the '70s and '80s--songs like "Thunder Road" and "Born to Run"--may be a bit shocked to hear the Boss singing "Froggie Went a Courtin'" on his latest album, and folk purists may decry his newfangled arrangements of old favorites, but those who recognize good music can safely ignore such closed-minded nattering and embrace We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions.

It was while recording a version of the titular song for a Pete Seeger tribute album in 1997 that the notion of doing a folk album first took root with Springsteen. The idea grew slowly and it wasn't until eight years later that he brought the same group of musicians together again for a pair of daylong recording sessions at his New Jersey farmhouse.

The Seeger Sessions is a bit of misnomer in that none of the songs on the album were actually written by Seeger, though they are certainly all in his vast repertoire and he is responsible for popularizing some of them.

While Springsteen may have been slow to act on the initial idea, he threw himself into the 2005 recording sessions with a sizable amount of enthusiasm. We Shall Overcome is a bighearted, rollicking spree of a record. The accompanying video of the recording sessions makes the whole thing look like a boozy musical house party with guitars, a banjo, fiddles and drums jamming in the living room and a horn section out in the hall.

Filling out the string band simplicity of the guitar, banjo and fiddle with a New Orleans-style brass section and zydeco accordion turns the old spiritual "Oh Mary, Don't You Weep" into a revival tent meeting that fairly storms along and "Pay Me My Money Down" into a drunken levy camp romp.

The less lighthearted numbers, like the antiwar Irish ballad "Mrs. McGrath," are no less passionate. Springsteen has rarely been in better voice, belting out "John Henry" with a gutbucket urgency and crooning "Shenandoah" with sincere warmth. We Shall Overcome overflows with good humor, spontaneity, high spirits and heart.

The Boss has put the hoot back in hootenanny.

DONAVON FRANKENREITER

Move by Yourself

Universal International, 2,200 yen

Maybe it's the luxuriant locks and mustache, maybe it's the Marvin Gaye grooves but singer, songwriter, guitarist and pro surfer Donavon Frankenreiter seems stuck in the '70s.

Not that there is anything wrong with that. The '70s may have been the decade of disco, but it also was the pinnacle of the Motown funk and soul sound, a vein Frankenreiter mines to considerable advantage on his sophomore album, Move By Yourself.

While his first effort on surfing pal Jack Johnson's Brushfire Records was a bright slice of rootsy Southern Californian folk, Move By Yourself is a sunny chunk of blue-eyed feel-good funk. The same comfortable grooves are here, but this time backed with basslines that owe more to James Jamerson than James Taylor. Echoes of his earlier, mellower incarnation can still be heard in the pretty acoustic ballad "Beautiful Day."

Frankenreiter is no slouch as a guitarist either, showing off his chops on "That's Too Bad" and teaming up with guest G. Love on the bluesy "Girl Like You." His real talent seems to be his ability to build great old-school soul songs around catchy guitar and keyboard riffs.

(May. 20, 2006)

Paging Lt. Calley
this report on a bunch of marines gone wrong is scary. I know the troops in Iraq face a hostile population and it is sometimes tough to know who the enemy is, but I'm guess the three year old girl these ignorant cowboy jarheads shot to death probably wasn't much of a threat - but you better believe that everyone that knew her and wasn't killed in the massacre will be a threat from now on. Yup, freedom is certainly on the march.

Deciderata

Orcinus, while a great site, is rarely a lot of laughs. Writing about hate groups doesn't exactly lend itself to comedy, but I wonder if Dave Neiwert has a hidden talent ....

Deciderata
Go smugly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in stonewalling.
As far as possible, leave no chance of surrender
and be on superior terms to all other persons.

Speak your truthiness loudly and garbled;and never listen to others,
especially not the wise and the well-informed;
they can all just go to hell.
Seek out loud and aggressive persons,
they are a vexation to your critics.

Constantly compare yourself with others,so that you remain vain and bitter;
for you always must be assured there are lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements, even if they only consist of catching large perch,
as well as your plans, even if they go to shit.

Keep covering the tracks of your own failed and calamitous career;
because if anyone ever clues in to your incompetence,
your fortunes will change in time.
Abandon caution in your business and political affairs;
for the world is full of trickery,
but no one is better than you.
But let this not blind you to what use in virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of suckers.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign intelligence.
Always be cynical about war;
for in the face of all effeminite sensitivity
it is as eternal as blood.

Take blindly the counsel of the years,
grasping desperately the things of youth.
Nurture the strength of your liquid spirits to cushion you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings;
they are for weaklings.
Many fears are born of care and thoughtfulness,
which is beyond your ken.
In your weekly discipline session,
tell her to be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the Bizarro Universe,
no more brains than God gave a rock;
you have no business being what you are.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is crumbling around you as it should.

Therefore be at war with the Enemy,
whatever you conceive him to be,
and use those labors and aspirations
to justify warrantless surveillance on your nation.

With all its Hannities, Drudges, and Fox Networks,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be oblivious.
Strive to be happy.
29 percent approval ratings notwitshtanding.


By David Neiwert
With apologies to Max Ehrman. Sorta.

Check out this all-purpose error message generator and links to sign generators.

President Harper
The Mop & Pail's Ian Brown reports on the complete centralization of the Canadian federal government around Big Daddy Harper.

That whistling sound
that you hear is the popularity of George W. Bush dropping like a 500 pound bomb from an F-18 on an Iraqi orphanage, ....uh, I mean insurgent safe house. Ride Holden, ride!

Uncle Sam really wants you
The U.S.?government is clearly desperate for more grist for human mill in Iraq. It has upped the induction age to 39. The army's stop-loss programs are keeping people in uniform against their will for much longer than before. Recruiters are trolling the malls like pedophiles for gulible teens and now they are trying to enlist the mentally disabled

Darn those pesky enviromentalists
Cheryl over at the galloping beaver gives us a chilling example of why the terms "self-regulating" and "self-policing" should not be used in close proximity to the term "chemical industry."

Because lying to start a war just isn't enough

Didn't Hugh Hewitt already do it?

The PM ate my baby!




A heroic infant struggles to avoid becoming lunch for the ravenous cannibalistic Steven Harper.

Call out the Mounties! Call out the OPP!
I want this man found and I want an Order of Canada medal pinned on him for informing the public of what I've suspected all along. Typically the tories and neocons are finding the whole thing about as humorous as you would expect them to, as the comments here show. Because nobody likes a good laugh as much as a Tory wanker, except me and my friends and anyone I know and anyone they know. Come to think of it, almost everyone likes a good laugh more than the Tories.

The Big Time
My neighbour and pal Jesse Glass's latest book of poetry --The Passion of Phineas Gage and Selected Poems--has been reviewed by the Guardian, which called it "brilliant and moving." Go buy it from Ahadada books (see blogroll)

Don't they have special magazines for people like this?
Some people have a thing for legs, others for breasts or even feet. Some people are into leather or nurse uniforms or stockings. Apparently the new White House Chief of Staff, the President's uhhh...right hand man, has his own peculiar fetish - Dubya's bloodstained hands

"Government should be run like a business"
No.

Wrong, wrong, wrong and wrong.

This has long been a typical conservative hobbyhorse and, as might be expected, has the accompanying scent of horseshit.

Government should be run like government, not a business. That is why whenever the sort of backslapping, Chamber-of-commerce "self-made men" who inherited Dad's hardware store and turned it into a chain of four hardware stores get elected to office and declare that "government should be run like a business" generally manage to completely screw things up and alienate the voters and the bureaucracy, while sending the state into debt (see: Reagan, Mulroney, Harris, Bush et al).

Businesses are run from the top down, the head of the company is pretty much god-like in his or her power over employees. Businesses are run to make a profit and the president and board of directors are answerable to the shareholders who own the company and no one else. Their ultimate goal is to maximize profit. They can be autocratic, they can focus on profitable areas of business and abandon businesses,products and services that are unprofitable. They are all about the money, the capital, the return on investment, the dividend. Not that there is anything wrong with that, in a capitalist economy it is the expected state of affairs.

Democratic governments are supposed to be by, for and of the people. They exist to serve all the citizens, not just those who can afford to own a share of the apparatus, or their customers. They cannot ignore public opinion. They cannot turn their back on unprofitable lines of businesses such as national defense or education or law enforcement. They are not supposed to make a profit -- that doesn't mean they can be fiscally irresponsible, but they should not be taking in significantly more than they are laying out. Their responsibility is not to line someone's pockets, but to ensure peace, order, and good government, protect people's right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Governments are an organized way for people to work for the common interest of everyone, to protect the underprivileged and disadvantaged, to provide essential services that business doesn't see any profit in, such as workmen's compensation or welfare, or that they should not be trusted with -- such as law enforcement or environmental regulation. Government is immediately answerable to the people, business is not.

So the next time some jackass in a nice suit and an expensive haircut starts telling you the problem is that goverment isn't run like a business, ask him if he'd like to see it run like a really successsful corporation like say...Enron. Then ask him if he thinks the police and fire department ought to only serve people who can afford their services or if we should get rid of all the environmental regulations, all those annoying zoning rules, and building codes. Ask if he'd like to have the cops run a credit check before they show up when his business is being robbed or his wife raped. Ask if he'd like the fire department to decide that having paramedics or local fire halls wasn't cost effective the next time he has a heart attack or his kid's school catches fire and the closest fire hall is on the other side of town where the rich people who can afford it live. Ask if he'd like to have his house fall over in the next strong wind because the builder cut corners or if he'd like a 24-hour-day strip club to open next to his kids school or an iron foundry and rendering plant to be built right next door to his home.

That's what running the government like a business would mean.

Don't fence me in
I think we can all look forward to Dave Neiwert's response to this bit of dimwittery from the knuckledragging Minutemen

Minutemen to Bush: Build Fence or We Will
Thursday April 20, 2006 4:01 AM
AP Photo NYET888
By ARTHUR H. ROTSTEIN
Associated Press Writer
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) - Minuteman border watch leader Chris Simcox has a message for President Bush: Build new security fencing along the border with Mexico or private citizens will.
Simcox said Wednesday that he's sending an ultimatum to the president, through the media, of course - ``You can't get through to the president any other way'' - to deploy military reserves and the National Guard to the Arizona border by May 25.