Battlefield ...

One of my favorite ELP tunes. As poignant today as it was in '71.

Emerson, Lake, and Palmer - Battlefield

Clear the battlefield and let me see
All the profit from our victory.
You talk of freedom, starving children fall.
Are you deaf when you hear the season's call?

Were you there to watch the earth be scorched?
Did you stand beside the spectral torch?
Know the leaves of sorrow turned their face,
Scattered on the ashes of disgrace.

Every blade is sharp; the arrows fly
Where the victims of your armies' lie,
Where the blades of grass and arrows reign
Then there will be very little sorrow,
Very little pain.

Confusion...will be my epitaph
As I cross a cracked and broken path
If we make it, we can all sit back and laugh

Back to packing ...

Sorry for the shitty recording but it's the only one I can find. When I get back I'll have to upload my own video of the tune.

And just because the video above wasn't the best, here's more from the same album, recorded at the Royal Albert Hall in '92. Just so you get the full effect:

Emerson, Lake, and Palmer - Tarkus

We Be Boopin'

This is one of Fixer's favorites.

Minnie the Moocher

The cartoon in its entirety here.

It's Shopping Saturday. Over the mountains and through the woods, to Carson City we go. See ya later.

Bush's Legacy

Note to Canuckistan: Keep this shit up and we'll bring you democracy. Heh.

Toronto Star

Historians will argue over whether George W. Bush is the worst president the United States has ever endured. But that is not the point. Five years after Bush's ill-starred invasion of Iraq, three years after Hurricane Katrina and seven months into the unravelling of the U.S. financial system, the point is that the 43rd president of the United States – regardless of his ranking in the pantheon – is a unique and unmitigated disaster.

Whether Bush is more of a warmonger than James Polk, who in 1846 manufactured a crisis with Mexico in order to seize what is now California, more tolerant of cronyism than poker-playing Warren Harding (1921 to 1923), or more unlucky than William Harrison (he died after catching cold at his 1841 inauguration) is interesting but irrelevant. What we do know is that this president, this "decider" (to use his favoured term), decided his way into a war that has destroyed the nation he was allegedly trying to free, destabilized further an already rickety Middle East and given Islamic terrorism a whole new raison d'etre.

In short, the road to Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay was open well before Bush took office in January 2001. But the current president has soared to new heights. His predecessors at least had the grace to be embarrassed about dabbling on the dark side. By contrast, Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney positively gloat about their attempts to subvert human rights.

Part of the reason is ideology. Bush did little when Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans, in large part because he does not think governments should involve themselves in matters of social welfare. His efforts in the current financial crisis are equally half-hearted and for much the same reason.

But there is something else, something disturbingly feckless about Bush. This has nothing to do with his malapropisms ("The only way we can win is to leave before the job is done"), his insistence on snuggling into bed early every night or his alarming propensity for bicycle accidents.

At a very basic level, Bush is incompetent. He likes to play at commander-in-chief of the U.S. armed forces. But in any other country a commander-in-chief who orchestrated an adventure as disastrous as the Iraq war would be court-martialled.

In some public events, he seems fully at ease. But in others – particularly his infrequent, televised press conferences – he seems to be observing events from another dimension.

Among U.S. historians, it has become great sport to rank the country's presidents. Bush vies with many for the title of absolute worst – from Ulysses S. Grant, who oversaw a post-Civil War era so corrupt it was known as Grant's Barbecue, to Richard Nixon of Watergate fame, to Herbert Hoover, the hapless president in charge during the stock market crash of 1929.

But Grant, Hoover and even Nixon did not do as much damage worldwide. Americans may still be debating Bush's legacy. I suspect the rest of the world has made up its mind.

Why can't our newspapers tell it like it is like this Canadian one just did? Oh, I remember...

Church Street Blues

Here's some really good flatpickin' by Tony Rice. This is from an old lesson tape. Lesson: Just play it like Tony does.

Saturday whorage

The next chapter of Thirty Days at Zeta is up at The Practical Press.

And, keeping up the tradition of taking you guys with us when we go on vacation, I'll be posting all our travel pics and stories at Worlds, starting Monday afternoon when we arrive at the pier in Red Hook, Brooklyn (maybe before if I think up some trip-related shit you should know).

And, Nucks found GM is gonna be bringing back the El Camino.

Let us know what's going on at your place. Leave your links in comments.

The McCain/Feingold Bill?

Not so much.

The Vato and the Brother

This is good.

No Country for Old Men: The Reality of Iran in the Shadow of War

Excellent piece at Empire Burlesque 1.0:

What will become of us without barbarians?
Those people were some sort of a solution.
– C.P. Cavafy, "Waiting for the Barbarians"

When it comes, it will come quickly. No big build-up, no new "roll-out of the product." The groundwork has already been laid, the specious casus belli already embraced, enthusiastically, by Congress. Proposed legislation to "compel" Bush to seek Congressional approval for an attack will be ignored, just as Bush blatantly ignores any Congressional stricture he dislikes. If he decides to launch an attack on Iran, no institutional or legal fetter will stop him. That's the stark truth of the matter.

The attack will probably be a limited one at first, with the immediate "reasons" being offered up afterwards or in media res. After all, who is going to seriously question the Commander-in-Chief when our brave boys are in the air over enemy territory in Iran?

And make no mistake, the Bush faction's predatory designs on Iran are business – big business. The entire "War on Terror" is an engine for crony profiteering on a monstrous scale – and the greatest transfer of public wealth into private hands the world has ever seen. Those who believe that the Bushists would hold back from striking Iran because it is too "risky" don't understand the stakes these warmongers are playing for. As they will never suffer personally or financially from even the worst outcome of their policies, the game is well worth the candle for them. Others will do the dying. Others will face the ruin. Others will weep with pain and grief.

Please read the rest.

And then there were three...

AP

WASHINGTON - The passport files of the three presidential candidates — Sens. Barack Obama, Hillary Rodham Clinton and John McCain — have been breached, the State Department said Friday.
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State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the breaches of McCain and Clinton's passport files were not discovered until Friday, after officials were made aware of the privacy violation regarding Obama's records and a separate search was conducted.

This is getting better and better! It'll be interesting to see how it all shakes out. Somewhere between high-level skulduggery and the usual Bush administration incompetence at every level, I think.

The Media-Gone-Wild Promise of Passport-gate: A Short History of Buffoonery

P.M. Carpenter, from his new digs at BuzzFlash as 'The Fifth Columnist'.

Although no one yet knows anything of any verifiable substance -- especially the haplessly in-charge Condoleezza Rice, which naturally is just par for the course -- Barack Obama really needed this.

Thank you, oh "-gate" giving gods, for in all your mysterious playfulness we see that you do indeed giveth what you taketh away. And these days really quickly, too.

This is politics, so imagination and suspicion are happily permitted to substitute for material reality and facts. We watched this axiomatic sordidness unfold with splendid exactitude in the aftermath of the Rev. Wright fiasco -- 1) a "scandalous" story breaks ... 2) a thoughtful, convincing response is offered ... 3) the punditry crowd ensues with half-baked speculations and recriminations about number two, not one. We can rest assured, I trust, that irresponsible network jabber will dominate now, as much as before. It's only fair.

A big and booming business was here to stay -- the obsessive, profitable feeding of the unenlightened masses with heaps-more unenlightenment.

In our unaware darkness we never stopped to consider, for example, that the private and not entirely uncommon act of adulterous fellatio could alter if not end the course of Western civilization, but by golly it could, it just could. All we needed, as good citizens, was the proper news and information and truckloads of partisan, talking-head humbug.

Heh. Adulterous Fellatio. Lends a whole new meaning to the term 'AF weenie', don't it?

Fast forward to the present. Is he black enough or too black? Is he a secret Muslim? Does he hold hand over heart? Does he wear a flag pin? Was he sitting in the pews? Is he, in short, as gullible as we are?

Now that's news, and rightly the kind of crapola we can base our presidential preferences on.

The Media's motto seems to be, "If You Can't Dazzle 'Em With Brilliance, Baffle 'Em With Bullshit". We have to wade through 24/7 meaningless drivel to get a little nugget once in a great while. Like gold in a stream, it's a rare occurrence.

Senior Moments

Tony Peyser

When John McCain made a foreign policy gaffe in Jordan, Joe Lieberman quietly pointed out the mistake, giving McCain an opportunity to correct himself in front of the international press corps. Later in Israel, Lieberman gently intervened when McCain made an incorrect reference about the Jewish holiday of Purim. This is the best dummy-ventriloquist routine since the heyday of Willie Tyler & Lester.

The movie about Lieberman's life finally has a title: "The McCain Whisperer."

McCain is showing the signs of senile dementia before the election that Reagan didn't start showing until he was in office. Fair warning.

Update:

Go see some of his dumbass McCainisms:

"I think I'd just commit suicide." --in October 2006, on the prospects of the Democrats taking back the Senate in the November election

Keep yer promises, old man...

Dance on this, bitchez!

Patricia Ward Kelly in toto:

Re “Soft Shoe in Hard Times” (column, March 16):

Surely it must have been a slip for Maureen Dowd to align the artistry of my late husband, Gene Kelly, with the president’s clumsy performances. To suggest that “George Bush has turned into Gene Kelly” represents not only an implausible transformation but a considerable slight. If Gene were in a grave, he would have turned over in it.

When Gene was compared to the grace and agility of Jack Dempsey, Wayne Gretzky and Willie Mays, he was delighted. But to be linked with a clunker — particularly one he would consider inept and demoralizing — would have sent him reeling.

Graduated with a degree in economics from Pitt, Gene was not only a gifted dancer, director and choreographer, he was also a most civilized man. He spoke multiple languages; wrote poetry; studied history; understood the projections of Adam Smith and John Maynard Keynes. He did the Sunday Times crossword in ink. Exceedingly articulate, Gene often conveyed more through movement than others manage with words.

Sadly, President Bush fails to communicate meaningfully with either. For George Bush to become Gene Kelly would require impossible leaps in creativity, erudition and humility.

Patricia Ward Kelly
Los Angeles, March 16, 2008

Gene could dance in the rain, the Chimp is whistling past the graveyard.

Link thanks to Avedon.

Quote of the Day

Jeff Fecke channels Yakov Smirnoff:

...

As Yakov Smirnoff might say: "In Soviet Russia, government reads secret passport files on political opponents. But in America, same thing! What a country!"

As the husband of a Russian Jew, I've heard comments like this around the house for the past 8 years. As someone who was in the military when our greatest enemy was the Soviet Union, my comment is "this isn't the America I put my ass on the line for."

Careful ...

Pic stolen from our pal pygalgia.

Update:

A sample of the 'democracy' we brought to Iraq (might be disturbing).

Old time Rock and Roll

Sometimes Fixer inspires me. To new heights of oldfartism, probably, but I just had to express my sentiments musically, so here we go. And yes, I did dance around in my underwear whilst previewing this, to the delight of my neighbors (I think. I hope they weren't tourists!), but it is as nothing compared to my delight in remembering Tom Cruise getting a grip on himself, so to speak, and practicing up to be the bull goose loony Scientologist he is these days!

Bob Seger

Green-card Marine

CNN

TWENTY-NINE PALMS, California (CNN) -- U.S. Marine Lance Cpl. Mario Ramos-Villalta flashes a broad smile from beneath his camouflage cap as he talks about the country he loves and why he became a Marine.

He's fought twice in Iraq and survived an attack on his Humvee in October 2005. Now, he's preparing for deployment to Afghanistan.

Yet he's not even an American. He's a citizen of El Salvador serving in the U.S. military.

"A lot of the papers I get [say], 'You're a great American,'" the 22-year-old Purple Heart recipient says. "I am not an American citizen yet, but I still fight for it."

He adds, "Sometimes, I do get depressed about still not being a U.S. citizen and going over there."

Ramos-Villalta isn't alone. He is one of an estimated 20,500 "non-U.S. citizens" -- dubbed "green-card warriors" -- serving in the military.

In the case of Ramos-Villalta, he says it's been a painstaking process because he's been deployed to war; he was wounded in action; and is now training for a third combat deployment, leaving him little time to deal with the paperwork and lawyers needed to file for citizenship.

"It's frustrating and sometimes I get real sad about it," he says. "There is nothing I can do about it. I mean it's not up to the military. It's up to Immigration Services."

Paperwork? Lawyers? Fuck that shit. This kid has bled for this country. It makes no difference that he did it in a criminal war. Youngsters don't know much or care about that. He is doing his best, and it sounds like he's doing it well.

Give these 'green-card warriors' their citizenship papers when they graduate from recruit training. If they're willing to fight for us, they should get instant citizenship if they want it.

'Semper Fi' my ass. Just more bureaucratic bungling sung to the tune of 'support the troops'. Shameful.

Passing time by passing gas

Some days, ya just run across interesting fun stuff...

The Body Odd (MSNBC)

Dr. Billy Goldberg: The past eight weeks of my life have revolved around gas. On Jan. 22, I welcomed my second child into the world, a beautiful baby girl. It didn’t take long to realize that she was gassy like her daddy. In the wee hours of the morning when she was wailing from overwhelming intestinal distress, I had a revelation. I came to realize that we can mark the different stages of our life by how we handle our flatulence.

My poor little newborn desperately needed to let one rip. This is how we begin our life, unable to get them out.

I suppose it logically follows then that we will end our lives in a constant aromatic green cloud, largely, er, unattended.

On the other hand, what if a person willfully, premeditatedly, and with malice aforethought, renders himself potently flatulent? What if a middle-school student loads up, before school, on a breakfast of beans, broccoli, Brussels sprouts and sauerkraut? Can he then claim that the farting was something that couldn’t be helped, that it was “an accident.”

But there’s an even more profound philosophical and legal question to ponder. And that is: should farting constitute a mode of constitutionally protected free speech? If not, what necessarily privileges one orifice (the mouth) above another (the anus)?

Is there some overarching moral imperative that justifies society’s anathematization of the fart? By what usurpation of basic liberty can the state proscribe the natural expressiveness of the sphincter and the anus? In other words, can a fart be “art”?

Heh. Just call me "Rembrandt". Or "Jimi Hendrix"...

The Bush-Cheney Grand Finale of Destruction

BuzzFlash Editor's Blog

Amidst the passionate and contentious Democratic primary, all of us may have taken our eyes off the pending possibility that Bush and Cheney kicked Fallon aside to replace him with a politically-malleable military leader who will go along with nuking Iran.

That may be the final shock and awe that this monstrous administration will leave us with before they exit stage right.

Such an action -- dropping nukes on Iran -- may lead to a conflagration that will finally satisfy the End Times prayers of John Hagee and Tim LaHaye.

God help us all.

I wouldn't put it past those bastards. I hope - pray - there's someone with balls enough to stop them.

Just a thought ...

Before I head out.

If you have been watching the Dow closings lately, you'll notice the only 'up' days are days when the Fed takes action.

Now, I've worked on everything over the past 35 years, from lawnmowers to jets, and I know when something is broken. The banking/credit/investment industry is broken. Look at it like this:

A car comes in to me on the hook (it was brought in on a tow truck, not running). I push it into the shop and determine the fuel pump is shot. Am I gonna push it back out until the part gets here? Yeah, right. I'm gonna undo a vacuum line on the intake manifold and find an aerosol can of something flammable. I'm gonna put the Indian or Sam behind the wheel and tell them to start it while I'm spraying my ass off and we're gonna drive that car out into a parking space, me running along side. Human fuel injector.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Fed is the idiot with the aerosol can running along side the car. Without that constant spray, the market ain't gonna run. The can is just about empty. We got problems.

Off to fix the shit I can fix ...

Devil with a blue dress, revisited ...

I did a double-take when I heard it this morning:

When you read this story, you have to play back in your mind the vision of Brian Ross getting the release of Hillary Clinton's personal First Lady schedule, flipping through his heavily dog-eared copy of the Starr Report, and studiously matching up dates. All the while approving the clip art of the semen-stained dress and Lewinsky, making sure it all fit in the frame, etc. [Brain bleach*, please - F.]

You could bust a guy for sexual deviancy just for the work it took to produce this swill.

...

So, what was the first Mrs. McCain doing the first time 'Big' John started cheating on her with the current Mrs. McCain? Just askin' ...

Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band - Devil with a Blue Dress medley

*Not for Hil or Monica, but the vision of Brian Ross with his pants around his ankles, flogging himself furiously.