Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Emmylou Harris ~ Guitar Town & Half As Much

Thanks to 1000Magicians, UK.

I got a nice e-mail from 1000Magicians earlier in the week thanking me for my support by putting her uploads on the Brain. Quite the pleasant surprise! I use a lot of her stuff because it's among the absolute best on YouTube that I can snag, so I've sorta been expecting a "cease and desist" order. Heh.

Thank you, Laurie in the UK, for uploading such good Emmylou (and others) clips, particularly her European performances that us gringos wouldn't otherwise get to see.

The Mortgage Morass

Paul Krugman on the recently disclosed mass consumer fraud by alleged mortgage holders:

True to form, the Obama administration’s response has been to oppose any action that might upset the banks, like a temporary moratorium on foreclosures while some of the issues are resolved. Instead, it is asking the banks, very nicely, to behave better and clean up their act. I mean, that’s worked so well in the past, right?

The response from the right is, however, even worse. Republicans in Congress are lying low, but conservative commentators like those at The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page have come out dismissing the lack of proper documents as a triviality. In effect, they’re saying that if a bank says it owns your house, we should just take its word. To me, this evokes the days when noblemen felt free to take whatever they wanted, knowing that peasants had no standing in the courts. But then, I suspect that some people regard those as the good old days.

Ah yes, a return to the good old days of droight de seigneur, "the lord's right". There aren't any virgins anymore and the Repugs can't get it up anyway, but your home will do. IOKIYAR.

Feds oppose Calif. Prop 19 to legalize marijuana

Like duh. SacBee:

The Justice Department strongly opposes California's Proposition 19 and remains firmly committed to enforcing the federal Controlled Substances Act in all states, Holder wrote in a letter to former chiefs of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. The Associated Press obtained a copy of the letter, dated Wednesday.

"We will vigorously enforce the CSA against those individuals and organizations that possess, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use, even if such activities are permitted under state law," Holder wrote.

Yo, Eric dude, yer feds better bring their own food and gas and toilet paper and anything else they might need. When Prop 19 passes, ain't nobody here will sell you any. We're gonna have a 'tea party' that'll knock yer socks off!

And rightly so!

Thanks to the EssEffChron.

The 'Teach-the-Dems-a-Lesson' Myth

Robert Parry with a 'must read' historical look at why Dems MUST NOT sit out this election.

Tragically, too, the Left’s sideline-sitting contributed to the unnecessary deaths of millions of people in wars from Vietnam and Central America to Iraq and Afghanistan. Arguably even worse, U.S. inaction on global warming – a neglect surely to be continued if Republicans and Tea Partiers are victorious in Election 2010 – may doom the future of a livable planet.

In other words, the “teach-the-Dems-a-lesson” strategy not only doesn’t work, it’s extremely dangerous.

Over the past four decades, the only times when the Left and the governing Democrats have pulled together in a meaningful way were when the Republicans were in power and when that power went to their heads.

Dems don't have the balls to use the power when they have it, and the Repugs get drunk on the power and beat us to death with it.

In selling his policies, Reagan also was aided by a rapidly expanding right-wing news media that was bankrolled to challenge the remnants of the Watergate-era press corps. Meanwhile, the Left largely abandoned the goal of having a national media infrastructure.

How's that working out for us?

To justify spending hundreds of billions of dollars more on U.S. military hardware, Reagan also oversaw the politicization of the CIA’s analytical division so it would exaggerate the Soviet threat in the 1980s. Two decades later, that perversion of U.S. intelligence would help justify the invasion of Iraq with “fixed” analytical reports about non-existent WMDs.

In terms of government personnel, Reagan credentialed a young group of intellectuals and ideologues who became known as the neoconservatives. To justify U.S. interventions abroad, these neocons felt justified in using propaganda techniques to manipulate the American people, herding them like cattle in a desired direction.

Here's the money shot:

It may be a bitter irony that the one major political accomplishment of America’s Green Party will be that it helped condemn the world to environmental disaster. Whether Nader backers acknowledge their complicity or not, the hard truth is that the American Left – in this attempt to “teach the Democrats a lesson” – contributed to the dangerous ascension of George W. Bush to power.

In other words, the Left’s notion of “teaching the Democrats a lesson” is a myth. It may make some progressives feel morally pure, but it doesn’t work. And, the results of the last 42 years should make clear that the idea is not only folly but it is dangerous.

If the pundits are correct and the Democrats go down to a crushing defeat on Nov. 2, the result will not be more progressive legislation but even less; not more spending on green jobs and a rebuilt infrastructure but more neglect; not a strengthening of the middle class but even starker financial inequities and enhanced corporate power; not a reordering of priorities away from the military-industrial complex but more tough-guy foreign policies.

Indeed, some of the more extreme Tea Party-backed candidates have made clear that their ultimate goal is the total repeal of FDR's New Deal. For both governing Democrats and disaffected progressives, the results of Election 2010 could well prove catastrophic.

The choice is yours. To slightly modify what one of our readers said, "Hold your nose and vote Dem or hold your ankles and don't vote."

A vote not cast is a vote for the Repugs. The Repugs are counting on it.

Ear necklace ...

When I was growing up, I was about 5 years too young to get drafted for Vietnam, but all of the kids I hung with had older brothers who went over for a tour or two. I knew a couple guys who didn't come back quite right (looking back at it from an older man's perspective now, I realize they weren't quite right before they left). One of them had a necklace made of ears, 'souvenirs' he took home from the war. Another had other souvenirs, personal possessions (cigarette case, watch, stuff like that) from those he'd dispatched on the field of battle. At 12 and 13, we thought they were cool, tough men of the world. As I got older and began to understand, I became more revolted.

That said, I thought we'd left that problem behind in Vietnam. Not so:

...

The portrait of rogue soldiers at a forward operating base in Afghanistan has been painted by the Army itself in chilling charge sheets leveled at 12 members of the 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, based out of Joint Base Lewis-McChord outside Tacoma, Washington.

Five of the dozen are charged with pre-meditated murder in what investigators call the "staged" killings of three civilian Afghans. Those soldiers and the others face various other charges as well from unlawful use of illicit drugs, possession of a human skull, fingers and leg bones to the assault on Stoner.

Two directives have been sent to military and civilian attorneys representing the Stryker dozen. They involve grisly photos allegedly showing dead bodies and body parts, and soldiers posing as if they had killed a deer on a hunt.

...

As our good pal 'Nucks (from whom I stole the link) says:

... These people are going to come home to us.

God fucking help us ...

I am so fucking glad it's Friday.

I hope you sell a lot of 'em, General

Raw Story

Ex-top soldier: Iraq war ‘fiasco’ due to Rumsfeld’s ‘lies’

The US had no reason to invade Iraq in 2003, and only did so because of "a series of lies" told to the American people by the Bush administration, says Gen. Hugh Shelton, who served for four years as the US's top military officer.

"President Bush and his team got us enmeshed in Iraq based on extraordinarily poor intelligence and a series of lies purporting that we had to protect Americans from Saddam's evil empire because it posed such a threat to our national security," Shelton writes in his memoir.

"Spinning the possible possession of WMDs as a threat to the United States in the way they did is, in my opinion, tantamount to intentionally deceiving the American people," Shelton writes.

Like duh. Gee, General, we knew all this years ago. I mean, thanks, but why wait 'til now?

Shelton's book goes on sale on Friday.

Oh.

"Kosher" is an "entry drug" ...

They get crazier by the day:

...

And just as its a small step from a simple nosh on a kosher hot dog to waking up one morning wearing a yarmulke and sporting newly-grown payots, just tasting one tiny spoonful of halal Campbell’s Soup will have you shouting Allahu Akbar during Monday Night Football and surfing the web for the latest in suicide vest fashions.

...

Anybody know where to buy a prayer rug?

Christ ...

I don't bother ...

To try and talk sense to rabid Republicans anymore. It ain't worth the effort and if they haven't seen the light by now, they never will. That said, sometimes pearls are found among the acorns:

...

To be perfectly honest, I didn't really participate in the conversation all that much. I didn't have to. The two cousins sparred for the better part of the meal and I sat and nodded my head - when I wasn't defending my new "leftist" cousin. Cousin #1 left the restaurant looking defeated and confused, albeit better informed than when he walked in. He conceded nothing, but was forced to admit that the Republican party had turned into a bunch of far right wing extremists and probably more extreme than he was comfortable with.

...

An' a one an' a two an' a 19 an'...

YubaNet

Sacramento, CA October 13, 2010 - Voters looking for help sorting out California's nine ballot propositions have a new tool at their fingertips. "The Proposition Song" is a three-minute, nonpartisan music video now playing on YouTube. The song describes each of the nine measures and the video displays the lyrics to the song while it plays, encouraging viewers to "sing along".

Anybody got the bongo player's phone number? I've got a Proposition for her...

Thanks to kimalex3.

Headline of the Day il due

Cast of Jersey Shore: ‘Carl Paladino Giving Italians a Bad Name’

Wait'll he gets a Speedo...

One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor...

TPM

Carly Fiorina: 'Every Speech Should Begin With A Shot Of Tequila' (VIDEO)

Republican Senate nominee Carly Fiorina sure can trill, and both she and gubernatorial nominee Meg Whitman seem to be able to hold their liquor*.

Friday night at the Hispanic 100 Lifetime Achievement award dinner, the women -- both former CEOs of Silicon Valley businesses -- were captured on video doing tequila shots and getting into the spirit as a mariachi band played.

*Old punch line: By the ears?

Lightweight! Let's see ya do eight shots and see if ya can hold yer mud on yer talkin' points without throwing up.

And remember, Carly, when ya drop the drape and make wit' the shake, everybody's got a vidcam these days. Heh.

Thanks to JoeNicholsVEVO.

Headline of the Day

When Karl Rove Squeals, You’re Doing Something Right

A little "Dueling Banjos" please, Maestro! Heh.

"Dear Sen. DeMint: Your mom called. She's having some regrets."

If it's Wednesday, it must be Morford with a 'must read'.

In my calmer moments of euphoric benevolence, when the wine has opened nicely and the light is streaming in just so, I sometimes find myself awash in unexpected feelings of kindness and generosity aimed in a very unexpected direction.
...

Do you ever feel, that is, a wave of empathy for the various egomaniacal, powermongering doorstops of America, the wonks and politicos, crusaders and congressional chyme, thinking, "Oh you poor, poor thing, there there now, it will all be over soon, you'll be dead in a relatively short time and no one will care anymore about that Very Ridiculous Thing you think is so mandatory to the lifeblood of American ignorance and pain?"

I do. Well, sometimes.

Behold, Sharron Angle, Glenn Beck, Jim DeMint. Behold the endless parade of Tea Party dinkbuttons, Nazis and homophobes and God-fearing yoga haters, oh my.

Note to Mark: Lose the wine, dude. Go straight for the 100-proof vodka and you'll power on down to blessed oblivion right through empathy for the devil so fast you'll never notice it.

What to make of Ohio's very own Republican (of course) congressional candidate and Tea Party nutbunny Rich Iott, who's been dressing up for years in Nazi Waffen SS outfits to participate in wacky little historical re-enactments? Iott says it's all just innocent fun, all for the love of WWII. Sort of like dressing up as a serial rapist just because you like women, eh, Rich?

On Witchy Woman:

What's it like to wake up in her shoebox of panicky fairies every morning? What's it like to be a bar of soap in her lukewarm bath?* Shudder and sigh and wish her well on her demon-haunted path, that's what I try to do.

*Take a well deserved bleach break and go read the rest.

Death From Within!

As the resident VFW member-at-large (our local post is still on the books, but it's deader'n a carp) around here, I see this as a microcosm of the right wing eating its own.

MoJo

They've made it through Tarawa, Chosin, Khe Sanh, Desert Storm, and a whole lot more. But the Veterans of Foreign Wars are waging a new battle for survival this year: They're fending off a mutiny by tea partiers.

"Stand by to repel boarders! Man yer walkers!" Heh.

[...] In all, at least 11 GOP tea party candidates (see a list below) with solid military credentials have been passed over by the VFW, even as it's endorsed incumbents like Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barbara Boxer, and Jesse Jackson Jr. (The VFW's also proven friendly to incumbent conservatives like John McCain, Chuck Grassley, and Joe "You Lie!" Wilson.)

Meanwhile, there are a handful of astroturf right-wing groups, seeded by big conservative money and interests, for vets who've started to endorse the tea partiers—and they stand to gain clout with disaffected VFW members. West's website boasts that he's been "endorsed by Freedom for Vets PAC." (Actually, he meant Vets for Freedom, a PAC run by former soldier and Bear Stearns banker Pete Hegseth that has deep GOP and Swiftboater ties.) Besides Vets for Freedom, there's also Move America Forward, Combat Veterans for Congress, Gathering of Eagles, and others—all ready to cater to the military tea partier. "VFW CONTINUES BAD ENDORSEMENT BINGE," Move America Forward's PAC blog gleefully points out. "Shouldn’t groups like the NRA and VFW give preference to endorsing it's [sic] own members wherever possible?"

Wolf's not ready to defect just yet. While he personally is threatening to leave, "I don't want to see the VFW get broke up," he says, gruffly. And he's not crazy about the alternatives: While he admires Hegseth's group, he takes issue with Vets for Freedom's political stridency and its legislative scorecard. Lilyea agrees, saying VFF's right-wing litmus tests are ridiculous. "They're gonna vote against a good bill that gives funding to veterans because it has some amendment for, I don't know, $4 million for a NAMBLA monument or something," he says, conjuring an extreme example of how VFF caricatures its political opponents.

If that's the alternative, Lilyea says, he hopes the VFW will get out of politics altogether. He likens it to Afghanistan: "I'm not anti-war, but if you're not in it to win the thing, then get the hell out of there." But a withdrawal from the political theater is unlikely until the VFW gets some fresh blood. "Have you seen these guys? These members of the board of the PAC look like they rode with Pershing," he says. "They don't know what's going on."

That 'Pershing' crack is real similar to the attitude a lot of Vietnam vets faced when they tried to join the VFW. A lot of the mostly WWII and Korean vet members, aka "the tailgunners", didn't see Vietnam as a 'real' war and Vietnam vets as 'real' war zone veterans, probably because we lost, and resisted them joining. Cooler heads prevailed as the tailgunners started to die off and membership shrank. Now the Vietnam guys are in the majority and are the dinosaurs to the younger vets.

The VFW is an old-line conservative outfit, but they do a lot for veterans. While I'm not thrilled to have to give them any credit at all for supporting yingyangs like McCain, at least they're resisting the whackjob teabaggers in their midst. It might tear them apart. Again, they do a lot for veterans and in that regard it would be a loss.

As the teabagger shit passes, and it will, they'll probably recover.

I wish Fixer'd join the VFW. I betcha he'd liven up his post's meetings. I'd go to New York just to go to a meeting and watch. Heh.

Quote of the Day

Montag:

Hey President Obama!

It is with great sadness that I have to tell you that Judge Virginia Philips of the U.S. District Court in California is more of a man than you and a damn sight better Constitutional scholar.

...

But it's okay ...

If you're a Republican:

...

So, let's be clear about this: Bashing Obama for knowing Illinois politicians or where he went to Church in Chicago or where he was born or being a community organizer, that's OK.

Asking Joe Miller why he is against government handouts when he colluded with is wife so she could file for unemployment assistance or why he takes the state's oil money (him, wife, 8 kids, means they collect $12,810) or why he has six figures of credit card debt or why he availed himself of government-backed student loans, that's not OK.

...

Always.

***

Schedule's all screwed up today. The Mrs. is taking me to work, dropping off the older dog at the vet for a spay procedure. The little one needs shots so she's coming along too. Chooch (the older one) wasn't allowed to eat since last night so we decided the Mrs, would feed the little one when they got back. Then she has to come pick me up to get the older dog after she comes out of anesthesia. Needless to say, neither of the dogs are happy right now. Heh ...

In a sane world ...

Guys like Alan Grayson would be elected in a landslide. In a sane world, guys like 'Taliban Dan' Webster and their associates would have been institutionalized, or, at the least, publicly humiliated into irrelevance.

...

Lovely fellow. I sure hope all those Orlando voters who plan to vote for Webster because he's such a nice Christian man who should never be compared to the evil Muslims enjoy being governed by a good friend of Bryan Fischer.

I remember when there was a time these people would be taken for what they were (at least in this little corner of the world where our local crazy is Carl Paladino), fringe lunatics. As I reach middle age, I'm horrified these people now have a voice in our political discourse.

Neocon College Hijinks.

Interesting story about yet another Bush maladministration fuckup in Iraq.

John Dolan

I Was a Professor at the Horribly Corrupt American University of Iraq... Until the Neocons Fired Me

Horror stories from the graft-ridden American University of Iraq campus in Kurdistan.

There was an even bigger problem with fulfilling our messianic mission: the faculty. We were not an impressive bunch. There were good teachers at AUIS -- I won’t name them, because praise from me might get them fired--but they survived by lying low; being bright and a good teacher made you suspect in a place where center stage was firmly occupied by a clique of loud, provincial rightwing nuts. In this sense, AUIS was an excellent microcosm of the American polity that had produced it: the best lacked all conviction, while the worst (with apologies to Yeats) raked in the cash and talked nonsense.

Successful Profs: Red-State Brown-Nosers with No Qualifikashuns

There was a clear, simple formula for success at AUIS: be a Southern white male Republican with a talent for flattery, an undistinguished academic record, and very little experience in university-level teaching.

The American who boiled over was a strange little fello-- a hollow-eyed fanatic, one of those tenth-generation Calvinists who can’t help meddling in everyone else’s business. And what he hated most, naturally, was … free, independent women.

I felt the same mental confusion as when the HR director told us to keep any Jewishness to ourselves. Had Natali actually said that it was the rape victim’s own fault, and that any other woman who dressed immodestly deserved to get the same treatment? I remember hesitating to believe what I was hearing. I grew up in Berkeley, where you assume the world would end if anyone said such things out loud. But she was saying them, repeating them in the same crazy shriek, and everybody was taking her very seriously, or pretending to.

“[W]hen we in and out of the academy complain that our students are being indoctrinated rather than educated, our main examples all seem to come from areas like … English departments or, God help us, in the various sub-departmental “studies” -- Women’s, Gay, Chicano, and so on.”

Maybe Agresto enjoyed using the jargon of those “God help us” fields he despises to accuse me of “racism” toward white Americans, or maybe he’s just too stupid to see the contradiction between his scorn for the leftist critique and his eager use of it to quash a heretic. As always when dealing with the American Right, it’s difficult to say where stupidity gives way to malice, if indeed the distinction can be made at all.

The neocons have the 'Reverse Midas Touch' - everything they touch turns to shit, and they are still in charge in far too many areas. One is too many.

Stoners against Prop 19? Say whaaaat...

Good article at AlterNet, many links:

The Prop. 19 Battle Lines Are Drawn: Will Californians Make the Right Decision and Vote to Legalize Pot?

List of 'pro' outfits, shorter list of 'anti' ones.

The opposition so far has been relatively low profile -- because it doesn't have any money. [...]

Good.

[...] There is an additional fillip of conspiracy-tinged fears that Prop 19 will lead to a corporate takeover of the pot industry. Left unspoken is the economic self-interest of growers and dispensary operators.

None of those are reasons not to pass it.

Tensions boiled over during a debate last weekend at the Cow Palace in San Francisco during the International Cannabis and Hemp Expo, a pot industry trade show. Medical marijuana entrepreneur Richard Lee, the primary motivating force behind Prop 19, was subjected to loud heckling and shouting as he attempted to explain why pot people should vote for the initiative. A disgusted Lee finally rolled away in his wheelchair, leaving Conrad to carry on.

Nevertheless, Conrad sees the "Stoners Against Prop 19" types more as a distraction than as serious opposition. "I don't think they're that important, really," he said. "We have some serious opposition, and we're waiting for those ads to come out, we're waiting for the school bus full of children with the stoned driver. We're more worried about that kind of opposition in the works than we are by these people."

"What's not so clear is whether local governments might not have more power to tax, regulate, and potentially ban medical marijuana collectives," said CANORML's Gieringer. "The initiative gives very strong authority to local governments to do such things. It's not clear what their authority is now. Many patients feel that, under current law, local governments have to accept collectives and maybe dispensaries. My reading is that that is not required by Prop 215, but might arguably be required by SB 420. But SB 420 is a statute and can be changed by the legislature at any time. I wouldn’t be surprised if they start tinkering around next year regardless of Prop 19. But the stronger the vote Prop 19 gets, the stronger the position of both patients and other users next year."

On November 3, regardless of the intricacies of the arguments over Prop 19, the rest of the world is going to wake up to a headline from California. Is it going to be "California Legalizes Marijuana" or is it going to be "California Rejects Marijuana Legalization?" California voters have 27 days to decide.

I'm going for the Nov. 3 trifecta - Brown, Boxer, and legal mota!