Wild Fire in Spreads in Pittsburgh

Those of you who live in Pittsburgh already know this first part....

Mayor Bob (O'Conner) has a rare form of brain cancer. I really do feel bad for the guy. I've only met him once, at a debate a year or so ago, but he seemed like a generally decent sort of fellow. The irony of the whole thing is that for the past twelve years this guy has wanted nothing more other than to be the Mayor of the City of Pittsburgh. He kept getting narrowly beaten in the Democratic primary until - finally - he got the nod last year when Murphy retired. Now after only six months on the job he's been knocked out of commision, possibly for good.

Anyway, a strange thing happened this afternoon. My wife calls about 4:30 and says, "Did you hear? Mayor Bob died!" Apparently, a rumor started that he had passed. By three this afternoon My wife's boss had heard it. The UPS driver said something about it. The cops were talking about it. It was out there. When I got back to my car I was expecting to hear the real deal on the radio.

It was not the case. No change in the Mayor's condition.

it is funny what a small town Pittsburgh is, that an unsubstantiated rumor like that can get started and actually get enough traction that by quiting time it's the talk of the town.

T-Bone!

A hearty recomendation.....

If you like blues, especially early electric blues from the 50's and 60's this is a great guy to check out, T-Bone Walker. There's lots of great material available on CD and many of the titles are cheapies.

More information at:

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~sawyer/tbone2.html
or
http://www.there1.com/browse_articles.php?action=view_record&idnum=115
or
http://www.rhythmandtheblues.org.uk/artists/tbonewalker.shtml
(this last one is actually a pretty cool site on its own)

Remember: Eric Clapton is not the blues.

Some 80s Nostalgia

A friend of the Objector - the land-use policy guy - sent this link in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F272-2A2FDo

I hadn't seen anything about this is years, but it was a really big deal when I was in high-school. Congress, led in this instance by then Senator Al Gore (being pushed by his overly church-marmish wife Tipper) was holding hearings on the destructive influence of Rock & Roll lyrics on the minds of America’s youth. Somehow they got Frank Zappa and Dee Snyder of Twisted Sister to come and testify in defense of colorful lyrics, creating a gigantic media frenzy. This was on TV for days. Really though, Frank and Dee should have known better. The whole thing was a circus set up to allow congress to look like it was taking some action against immorality in the culture wars by beating up on two hapless guitar slingers (not unlike the annual flag burning amendment thing). The whole thing made a huge fuss and accomplished very little except to get those little "Warning: Explicit Lyrics" labels placed on album covers. Really silly stuff. Keep in mind, this was all well before any serious mainstream advent of hip hop, especially gangster rap which really took musical misogyny to a whole new level.

Interestingly, in the fall of '87, a year or so after this clip was filmed, I started college down in West Virginia. That first semester I saw my first concert in Pittsburgh at the old Syria Mosque and it was none other than Mr. Zappa, who was a lot of fun to see live. A great concert by a fabulous musician. I still have the ticket stub somewhere.

Bush Cites Progress in Visit to Gulf Coast

New Orleans, LA., Aug. 28th - President Bush visited Gulf coast cities hit hard by Hurricane Katrina one year ago. When asked about the highlight of the reconstructions effort Mr. Bush offered, "Well, let me tell you, we managed to remove one really big blue Democrat cancer from an otherwise fine Red Republican state, and that's really saying something!"

Oh, brother!

What a F%$#ing moron!

Chinaski Noir

hell, it's a dame, a looker, dressed to kill, she's rocking there on her high heels and long legs, one garter belt showing through her slitted dress. She said, lighting a cigarette, "remember me?"

"well, no," I said. "I've got a metal plate in my head and I drink too much vodka"

(exerpt from,'the dick' published in Betting on the Muse, Poems & Stories, C. Bukowski 1996)

You can't fight in here.... this is the war room!

I'm probably the last person to never have seen Dr. Strangelove (How I learned to stop worrying and love the atomic bomb) and I’m not sure how I managed to miss it all these years. It is a great piece of anti-nuke cold-war absurdism.

With the cold war now being over for fifteen years it might be tempting to watch a film like this as a bit of nostalgia, but with all the apocalyptic nuts running around these days I think its still pretty relevant, especially as we hear ongoing reports that certain people in Washington are actually advocating for a pre-emptive nuclear strike against Iran. It's baffling to me that I would feel compelled to state this in 2006, but nuclear war was insane forty years ago and it’s still insane today. I don’t mean to sound morbid about it, but Dr. Strangelove has not become a quaint anachronism by any stretch.

Nevertheless, this movie is really funny. There's a great scene with Peter Sellers as the President of the United States, trying to explain to the Soviet Premier on the telephone which of them is sorrier that we'd accidentally launched an unintended nuclear first strike. "Now Dimitri....No, you can't be more sorry... Dimitri, I'm just as sorry as you are.... Of course I'm sorry... OK we're both sorry...how’s that?"

Finally, as the loan bomb carrying Slim Pickens to atomized glory falls towards a remote Soviet base, the movie closes with the leadership of America contemplating the abandonment of the standard monogamous marital relationship in a discussion of what would be an appropriate male to female ratio neccesary to re-populate the planet (1 to 10). Apparently realizing that there is nothing to be done about the impending Armageddon, they sit around discussing their opportunity to build a sort of Playboy Mansion bunker for the survival of the human race, with standards built in for the attractiveness of the women, naturally.

Oddly, the first time I saw a clip from this movie was at a Stevie Ray Vaughn concert in NYC on New Years Eve ....1989? 1990? Instead of an opening band there was this great musical/film montage of things like Bugs Bunny dancing to Black Sabbath. The final cut in this thing was the shot of Pickens riding the bomb. At the point where the bomb explodes (in the film the screen goes bright white) the screen and the whole room went black with all the house lights off and SRV opened with the chords to Pride and Joy. It was pretty cool. Of course, this having been my college years it would be redundant to point out that we were drunk, which might have made it seem cooler than it was.... but hey.*

Anyway, it's probably old news to all of you, but if you haven't watched it in a while it is a great movie. Terrific performances by Sellers, George C. Scott, an early minor role by James Earl Jones of all people, and of course Pickens playing the same character he always plays.

(*This was also the night we were wandering up Broadway 4 A.M. contemplating Ali's Pizza with a sign that read “open 23 1/2 hours a day” and we were really concerned that we would be there for the wrong half hour. That was a great night!)

Is it fear and panic or just bread and circuses?

(This post just wasn't gelling, but I'll put it up anyway)

There is an oft quoted and probably overused line that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting that somehow the outcome will be different. As applied to the political world....well... it is and it ain't.

In military matters (which at this point are wholly intertwined with politics) I think that this definition of insanity applies. In Iraq for example, we set out to keep a relatively small military force on ground, thinking it would be sufficient to control the situation and that it would allow us to sit back and watch democracy bloom. It’s working brilliantly. In fact it’s working so brilliantly that three years in we’re still doing the exact same thing. According to the aforementioned definition, that is really insane.

In more truly political matters doing the same thing over again might not be so bad, at least not for the GOP. The news that I do get is full of stories about the President and his minions out and about telling the people that the Democrats are almost like terrorists and that voting for them will cause everything from new attacks in the United States to the further and ultimate decay in the moral fabric of our nation. This strategy really has worked wonders in the last two elections so I can see why they’d trot it out again.

I heard a quote this evening from Karl Rove speaking to a hand-picked group of GOP supporters at a $5,000 per plate dinner at a Cleveland country club. His explanation was that the Democrats just don’t understand the terrorist threat. He suggested that decorated Vietnam Marine veteran and outspoken critic of the Iraq adventure John Murtha was a ‘doting’ old man who should update his maps of the world.

Good thing Karl Rove served in the Marines so he can compare himself so favorably Mr. Murtha.

It’s going to be that kind of election season again. A campaign marked by a McCarthy-esque lack of shame in leveling reckless charges against people who question direction of the GOP and the President.

Terrorism is the new ‘Bread and Circuses’. Every time the administration needs to distract the electorate from its own incompetence – whether the war or domestic policies that would be deeply unpopular if people were paying attention – they drag out terrorism. Suddenly the people become rapt and compliant and under the cover of an always imminent green cloud of poison gas the administration cuts services to the poor, or eliminates overtime guarantees for whatever workers it can, or it cuts taxes for billionaires, or it reneges on promises to help reconstruct New Orleans…. The list goes on, all in the name of national security.

Frankly, I haven’t heard these guys actually come up with a new idea to fix anyhing in a while, let alone a good one. It really is just bread and circuses.

Know your rights.....

..... all three of them

As long as your not dumb enough to actually try it.

the band of regime change since 1977

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Clash

A lazy day in the burbs

Have you ever read an article in a magazine or newspaper that accuses suburbanites of being ill-informed, self-centered cultural shut-ins who refuse to acknowledge the problems of the greater world because they are too busy taking the kids to soccer practice, or playing golf or any number of other pleasant yet vapid suburban pursuits?

Yeah, me too. But now I live here and I can see how they got that way.

There was an article in today’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about a string of shooting in the city's Homewood neighborhood. Six people were shot in three separate incidents during a 24 hour period, including two children ages 3 and 4. No one knows if the same shooters are involved. No one knows if there is any common thread to the shootings. No one is talking to the police.

http://www.pittsburghpost-gazette.com/pg/06231/714799-53.stm

When I worked in non-profit I used to go down to Homewood pretty regularly. I had some homeowners there who were clients. I did some outreach work with a local minister and we used to do cookouts in the parking lot of the church and talk to residents about homeownership while handing out burgers and dogs. One fellow one time, while eating a hot dog, spent a half an hour telling me why he hated living Homewood. Drugs, gangs, prostitution were the things on his corner that he objected to the most. Meanwhile, the Reverend was optimistically building some new houses trying to attract new residents. I think he was a man ahead of his time.

At one point I was organizing some lawyers to offer a clinic for neighborhood residents who were being foreclosed on (Homewood is the foreclosure capital of Pittsburgh). We actually got a million dollars a year worth of lawyers into the city's most violent neighborhood to offer pro-bono services, not just for one day, but on a commitment to come twice a week for eight weeks with an open ended commitment for individual clients after that. That doesn’t happen every day in this neighborhood. From what I hear that group of lawyers still works on foreclosure issues, although I understand they've moved to a more accessible - and probably safer - location in East Liberty.

Anyway, it occurred to me this morning while I was inspecting my lawn that looks like a shredded-wheat biscuit from the August heat, that today I would never have any cause whatsoever to go to neighborhood like Homewood. It’s a place you read about in the papers: a ghetto where poverty and hopelessness are prevalent and quick-trigger violence is common. I was telling one of my neighbors about working down there and they said I was crazy for even going. I have to admit, looking back at it I probably approached it with a certain amount of naiveté, but I never had any trouble.

I can also see why suburbanites have this reputation for being disconnected. None of my neighbors would ever give a place like Homewood a second thought because it’s so abstract to them. Poor black people and gun violence: The closest my neighbors ever get to this world is if one of their teenage kids comes home with a Tupac CD. We are very far removed from the ugliness of urban living out here, and that distance is – in large measure – why a lot of us came out here in the first place. I know that for me the final straw for city living was the little heroin problem across the street.

Anyway, it was a big story in today’s paper. Out here, people just kept watering their lawns and watching as their kids played with plastic toys in the driveways, like nothing was going on.

It was a nice day today too.

Harumph!!!!

This is in today's Times. Here! Here!

August 15, 2006
Essay
How to Make Sure Children Are Scientifically Illiterate
By LAWRENCE M. KRAUSS

Voters in Kansas ensured this month that noncreationist moderates will once again have a majority (6 to 4) on the state school board, keeping new standards inspired by intelligent design from taking effect.

This is a victory for public education and sends a message nationwide about the public’s ability to see through efforts by groups like the Discovery Institute to misrepresent science in the schools. But for those of us who are interested in improving science education, any celebration should be muted.

This is not the first turnaround in recent Kansas history. In 2000, after a creationist board had removed evolution from the state science curriculum, a public outcry led to wholesale removal of creationist board members up for re-election and a reinstatement of evolution in the curriculum.
In a later election, creationists once again won enough seats to get a 6-to-4 majority. With their changing political tactics, creationists are an excellent example of evolution at work. Creation science evolved into intelligent design, which morphed into “teaching the controversy,” and after its recent court loss in Dover, Pa., and political defeats in Ohio and Kansas, it will no doubt change again. The most recent campaign slogan I have heard is “creative evolution.”

But perhaps more worrisome than a political movement against science is plain old ignorance. The people determining the curriculum of our children in many states remain scientifically illiterate. And Kansas is a good case in point.

The chairman of the school board, Dr. Steve Abrams, a veterinarian, is not merely a strict creationist. He has openly stated that he believes that God created the universe 6,500 years ago, although he was quoted in The New York Times this month as saying that his personal faith “doesn’t have anything to do with science.”

“I can separate them,” he continued, adding, “My personal views of Scripture have no room in the science classroom.”

A key concern should not be whether Dr. Abrams’s religious views have a place in the classroom, but rather how someone whose religious views require a denial of essentially all modern scientific knowledge can be chairman of a state school board.

I have recently been criticized by some for strenuously objecting in print to what I believe are scientifically inappropriate attempts by some scientists to discredit the religious faith of others. However, the age of the earth, and the universe, is no more a matter of religious faith than is the question of whether or not the earth is flat.

It is a matter of overwhelming scientific evidence. To maintain a belief in a 6,000-year-old earth requires a denial of essentially all the results of modern physics, chemistry, astronomy, biology and geology. It is to imply that airplanes and automobiles work by divine magic, rather than by empirically testable laws.

Dr. Abrams has no choice but to separate his views from what is taught in science classes, because what he says he believes is inconsistent with the most fundamental facts the Kansas schools teach children.

Another member of the board, who unfortunately survived a primary challenge, is John Bacon. In spite of his name, Mr. Bacon is no friend of science. In a 1999 debate about the removal of evolution and the Big Bang from science standards, Mr. Bacon said he was baffled about the objections of scientists. “I can’t understand what they’re squealing about,” he is quoted as saying. “I wasn’t here, and neither were they.”

This again represents a remarkable misunderstanding of the nature of the scientific method. Many fields — including evolutionary biology, astronomy and physics — use evidence from the past in formulating hypotheses. But they do not stop there. Science is not storytelling.
These disciplines take hypotheses and subject them to further tests and experiments. This is how we distinguish theories that work, like evolution or gravitation.

As we continue to work to improve the abysmal state of science education in our schools, we will continue to battle those who feel that knowledge is a threat to faith.

But when we win minor skirmishes, as we did in Kansas, we must remember that the issue is far deeper than this. We must hold our elected school officials to certain basic standards of knowledge about the world. The battle is not against faith, but against ignorance.

Lawrence M. Krauss is a professor of physics and astronomy at Case Western Reserve University.

Happy birthday Fidel, Love Phyllis (Hugs & Kisses!)

Dearest Fidel,

Now that we're both 80 I just wanted to let you know that there is nobody I'd rather swap dentures with. Everyone loves a smoldering Latin Lover and you are definitely mine!

Let's get together soon and paint Havana RED!

Smootchies!

Phyllis Schlafly

http://www.eagleforum.org/

Get bent you bug-eyed freak!

Sore Loserman!

In other news....

A word to Joe Lieberman:

You lost. Get over it. Get behind the party. This is no time to go off on an independent third-party snit. Otherwise you run the risk of being 2006's junior version of Ralph Nader.

C'mon Joe....

Now I'll offend at least half the people

Someone was passing this around the office today. I suspect its a fake as the "original" version that I got had an 'Advertising Archives' logo next to the picture. Still, it is kind of funny in a Leave it to Beaver kind of way.

The good wife’s guide
Housekeeping Monthly
13 May 1955

Have dinner ready. Plan ahead, even the night before, to have a delicious meal ready on time for his return. This is a way of letting him know that you have been thinking about him and are concerned about his needs. Most men are hungry when then come home and the prospect of a good meal (especially his favorite dish) is part of the warm welcome needed.

Prepare yourself. Take 15 minutes to rest so you’ll be refreshed when he arrives. Touch up your make-up, put a ribbon in your hair and be fresh-looking. He has just been with a lot of work-weary people.

Be a little gay and a little more interesting for him. His boring day may need a lift and one of your duties is to provide it.

Clear away the clutter. Make one last trip through the main part of the house just before your husband arrives.

Gather up schoolbooks, toys, paper etc. and then run a dust-cloth over the tables.

Over the cooler months of the year you should prepare and light a fire for him to unwind by. Your husband will feel as though he has reached a haven of rest and order, and it will give you a lift too. After all, catering for his comfort will provide you with immense personal satisfaction.

Prepare the children. Take a few minutes to wash the children’s hands and faces (if they are small), comb their hair and, if necessary, change their clothes. The are little treasures and he would like to see them playing the part. Minimize all noise. At the time of his arrival, eliminate all noise of the washer dryer of vacuum. Try to encourage the children to be quiet.

Be happy to see him.

Greet him with a warm smile and show sincerity in your desire to please him.

Listen to him. You may have a dozen important things to tell him, but the moment of his arrival is not the time. Let him talk first – remember, his topics of conversation are more important than yours.

Make the evening his. Never complain if he comes home late or goes out to dinner or other places of entertainment without you. Instead, try to understand his world of strain and pressure and his very real need to be at home and relax.

Your goal: Try to make sure your home is a place of peace, order and tranquility where your husband can renew himself in body and spirit.

Don’t greet him with complaints or problems.

Don’t complain if he’s late home for dinner or even if he stays out all night. Count this as minor compared to what he might have gone through that day.

Make him comfortable. Have him lean back in a comfortable chair or have him lie down in the bedroom. Have a cool or warm drink ready for him.

Arrange his pillow and offer to take off his shoes. Speak in a low, soothing and pleasant voice.

Don’t ask him questions about his actions or question his judgment or integrity. Remember, he is the master of the house and as such will always exercise his will with fairness and truthfulness. You have no right to question him.

A good wife always knows her place.


So, I printed it, brought it home and stuck it on the fridge. The first thing my good wife said when she saw it was, "What? Did your mother send me another article?"

She hadn't.

I told her we obviously had some work to do to meet this standard. Being fair, I figured that we could ease into this lifestyle slowly, say, half the items on the list this week and the rest next week. That seemed reasonable. Of course this being the 21st century she would have to integrate this with her full-time job so as to not interupt our income.

Incidentally, the doctor tells me everything should go smoothly next week when he reattaches my.........

Walking the dog

My dog.... he doesn't watch where he's going. I was taking him for a walk this evening when he approached two stacked railroad ties. I thought he was going to just jump over them, but no; he never even saw the obstacle and whacked his head as he walked right into them. Good thing he's got stunning good looks, since he obviously can't rely on coordination. Note the drool in the picture.

(See that. It took me almost nine full months before I mentioned the dog!)

A gentleman never offends unintentionally

So I was talking to a friend of mine this afternoon and I mentioned that I hadn't received any e-mail in about a week.

He says to me, "Maybe you offended everybody."

Hmmm. I suppose its possible, but I doubt it. There certainly are people who would be offended by some of the things I write, but to the best of my knowledge I don't have any creationist right-wing christian-conservative gay-bashing war-loving Bush-love-fest Phyllis Schafly is the hottest thing on two legs type friends, so I think I'm safe.

Nice try though.

Kansas: A little less weird

Well, the results are in. The good people of Kansas voted to return a group of moderates to the State Board of Education, ensuring the re-introduction of a science based curriculum - including evolution - to the public schools.

You hear that? A science curriculum based on science. Jumpin Jehosophat! What will they think of next?!

Anyway, good for them.

That giant sucking sound....

.....is the seeds of reason being flushed down a toilet of ignorance and fanaticism.

Thats right....

Its election time for the Kansas State Board of Education; bastion of scientific discovery 'from a Christian perspective.' The newspaper today, quoting one board member said, "Ms. Morris, a retired teacher and author, said she did not believe in evolution.“It’s a nice bedtime story,” she said. “Science doesn’t back it up.”"

No wonder the students of every other industialized country in the world kick our butts in science and math: We teach fairy tales.

Great guns!