A Party Divided...Let's Hope

Sarah Palin doesn't seem to like being in the No. Two position. And John McCain just plain doesn't seem to like her. And the party seems bent on self destruction, so...I'm guessing here...but I think that after Obama wins on November 4th, we may see the Republican party split itself in two. Does that immediately make you think of the Meat Puppets? Yeah, me too.

On one side, the older and more conservative side of the Party. What I call the "reasonably sane" Republicans, if still not to be completely trusted. They'll get to keep the franchise name and dumb animal trademark.

On the other - nutjobs. Cranks. Crackpots. Crazies. Wingnuts. Loonies. Freaks. And Sarah Palin. I'm bettin' they have the word "American" in their party name. To differentiate themselves from all us un-Americans.

Hmm. I can't make up my mind if this is a good or a bad idea. What do you think?

----------------
Now playing: Jimi Hendrix - Wild Thing
via FoxyTunes

Bartleby the Voter

In America, we should be able to say "Fuck You" to power. I'm pretty sure that's in the Constitution. In fact, I'm positive. It's called "The First Amendment." And fuck you right now if you're gonna say it's not in the Constitution, it's in the Bill of Rights. I know that. Everyone who took middle school civics knows that. But the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are complimentary documents, like some kind of crazy political geometry theorem. Pretty much one and the same in the American heart now.

The most powerful "Fuck You" every American has at his or her disposal is our vote. Our Sacred Privilege. Our Finger on the Button. Or Our Middle Finger in the Air.

Don't be a Bartleby. Don't say "I'd prefer not to." That's un-American.

Instead, on Election Day, proudly stand up and say, in your loudest voice, as proudly and patriotically as you can:

"Fuck You!"

----------------
Now playing: Neil Young - Pardon My Heart
via FoxyTunes

My Glass Jaw Just Dropped. Anyone Got Glue?

Cognitive dissonance. Remember these two words while you watch this video.

This is the best question asked of any candidate this entire, overly long, incredibly stressful political season. It needs to be asked repeatedly of Palin and McCain, of Obama and Biden too. I want all of their answers on record.

If there is any way you are still clinging to McCain-Palin, still thinking that they can do a better job than Obama, unless you are a bomb-making doctor-killing foetus-loving domestic terrorist yourself, these few seconds of video should change your mind.

I won't elaborate any further, just push you over to this much better piece on Daily Kos.

----------------
Now playing: MC5 - Poison
via FoxyTunes

Get Out of the Bathroom

Obama's gonna visit his sick Grandma for a day or two. He's a good kid. While he's gone, watch this clip from his speech in Virginia yesterday.

If you are an "undecided voter," if you still don't know who you're voting for, if you are in some way still waffling after watching this, the exit is to your left. Or right. Depending on your political perspective.

Vote Obama!

----------------
Now playing: Oil Tasters - Get Out Of The Bathroom
via FoxyTunes

You Want Fries With That?

A very cranky old man was on MSNBC this morning. No, it wasn't McCain. It was Lawrence Eagleburger, Bush the First's Secretary of State. Golly, but he had some tough words for that whippersnapper Obama!

I think Morning Joe Moron, after getting thoroughly beat down by Zbigniew Brzezinski yesterday (who, btw, is not one of my favorite people in the world regardless of his association with President Carter - the man was a scary freakin' hawk who would've been better off with Reagan), wanted a soft-ball player to make him feel better this morning and back up his favorite meme about Obama having no experience. (If you haven't watched it yet, check out ZB eloquently and politely crushing Joe's skull in his aged fingers. It's a good thing.)

But Secretary Hamburgler couldn't have been a worse choice. Besides calling Obama "Governor," he both played the "inexperience" card and then refuted the argument when it was asked of him that, technically, didn't Jimmy Carter have more foreign policy experience than Reagan during the 1980 campaign? Hamburgler almost choked on his milkshake at this point, spluttering about how that doesn't matter, that's irrelevant, by gum! - because Carter's experience didn't count! Experience, to paraphrase this senior Republican moment, only counts when you agree with the candidate's policies!

Oh, to the Hamburgler's credit, when Pat Buchanan tried very hard to get him to say that the Powell endorsement was all about race, the old man wouldn't take the bait. He quite resolutely and politely put that racist cracker bull down where it belongs by refusing to speak to it.

All in all, though, it was a textbook example of IOKIYAR. They finally pulled the plug on the guy and went to commercial so that Joe could clean his soiled parts in private. I think Mika B. was laughing by the end of it. She seems to be getting a charge out of yanking Joe's sad chain lately. I bet she's voting for Obama! I was laughing so hard I almost spilled my coffee.

----------------
Now playing: Neil Young - The Last Trip To Tulsa
via FoxyTunes

Our Founding Fathers, Eighth in a Series

Captain Beefheart - Live at the Radar Station (1980) Part 1
Captain Beefheart - Live at the Radar Station (1980) Part 2

The wonderful world of bootleg recordings is full of highly obsessive people. Thankfully, one of them obsesses highly about the Good Cap'n, Don Van Vliet. Otherwise I wouldn't be able to tell ya'all that this is a live compilation bootleg from different venues and different years, supposedly recorded in the late '70s and early '80s. Though the oldest recording date is 1980, according to the info I was given about it. The information on bootlegs is often highly contraindicatoryful, if ya know what I mean.

(Funny thing I noticed on the home page of the Beefheart obsessatorium, that there's a link to an early interview of the Captain by Rick McGrath, who is another obsessive personality - J. G. Ballard is his thing. I've traded extensively with Rick over the years; got an incredible Fahey recording from Madison in 1984 from Rick that I haven't figured out how to share with you yet. Rick wanted some of my 1960s back issues of New Worlds. But he ain't ever gonna get 'em. Hey, I offered scans! I may be a jerk, but not a total ass. I'm just kinda obsessive myself is all. Anyway, the point is that it's a small, shiny world, kids.)

Personally, the Captain and I met when I bought the rerelease of Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) in the late 80s. Fact, I think I bought it from Ed when he was working at Rose Records. Hey, Ed - do you remember this? You were very excited. Can I say bouncy, even? Previously, I had stared in wonder, horror, awe and cosmic trepidation for several years at a battered LP copy of Trout Mask Replica behind the glass of the counter at Penny Lane Records (I think this was the name of the store) prior to this.

Buy the Captain's shit!

APOLOGIES: 'Tis fixed now, but I forgot to put the download link in when I posted this. That'll teach me to not get enough sleep - stupid monkey!

----------------
Now playing: The Byrds - 5D (Fifth Dimension) {mono}
via FoxyTunes

Funny Pictures = Serious Message

I really like this. The animation is easy on the eye, with a multi-decade retro style going on, and the filmmaker presents the information in a graphically memorable way. That's not easy.

Vote Obama!

----------------
Now playing: Mumps - Dance Tunes for the Underdogs
via FoxyTunes

Weird Reasons to Vote for Obama #9

Women you do not know will smile at you.

Do you want pretty women to smile at you? Are you an even vaguely heterosexual guy between the ages of 25-to-Death, losing your hair, seriously worried about what you still affectionately call your "love handles" for some stupid reason, and think it's totally awesome if strange when a woman you don't know smiles at you for some unknown reason?

Then fret no longer, my friends, because I have the answer to the last of your pathetic problems if not the previous ones:

Get an "Obama" button.

Seriously. Women you do not know and will never see again will smile at you in public, regardless of how balding or fat or ugly or stupid you look. I'm pretty much all of these things and "It" has happened to me. More than once in the last week.

Why, I've been wondering, are women smiling at me in public? That's unnatural, that's weird, that just don't happen to the 'monkey. It honestly scares the 'monkey. The 'monkey prefers not to be noticed by man, woman, child, dog, cat (maybe not cat) and insect when in public. He don't like it. It bothers him.

Today, I realized why. When a woman at the chain-store-box-hardware-place-thing smiled at me, making me very uncomfortable and causing me to wonder where I knew her from though I obviously didn't know her and thus freakin' me out even more - AND DOING IT AFTER LOOKING AT THE MIDDLE OF MY CHEST WHERE MY MANBOOBS ARE!!! - I got it. It's the damn "Obama" button!

It ain't me they're smilin' at - it's that goddamn Obama! Christ on a stick, but that's an ego-deflater if ever there was. Just his name in writing on a small circular piece of pressed metal stuck to a windbreaker is more exciting and interesting and cool than I am in the flesh. Damn, but this confirms every suspicion about my place in the Universe that I've ever had.

Sometimes fat, bearded, bespectacled, balding, stupid, liberal white men just can't get a break. No wonder Powell endorsed Obama - he did it for the chicks! Screw you, Pat Buchanan/George Wills/Rush Limbaugh - race ain't got nothin' to do with it.

I hope My Smart Wife gets that this is a joke.

----------------
Now playing: Gunslingers - Gigolo Albinos
via FoxyTunes

Hey, Joe!

Joe McCarthy's ghost is haunting John McCain's campaign a lot these days, chortling with glee, shaking the red-hot chains of Hell wrapped around his bloated throat, egging McCain and Palin and their demonic surrogates and racist supporters on and on an on to greater heights of lunacy and depravity in their almost demonic obsession to keep control of the White House in the hands of the Republican Party and keep a black man out of it.

----------------
Now playing: Roky Erickson - Stand For The Fire Demon
via FoxyTunes

An Invitation

I've been cross-posting some of my bits here on Daily Kos lately. Just a couple. Today the 'Kos got one first. If you want to read it, you gotta go over there. Don't be a lazy sod - just do it!

And check out how we're changing, kids, how the paradigm is flipping out. It's a weird world, eh?

I'm looking for more tunes for next week. Any requests?

----------------
Now playing: Throbbing Gristle - Weapon Training
via FoxyTunes