Sorry, I was trying to write about Michelle Bachmann and this song kept running through my head.

World Music Day

Today is World Music Day. I try to celebrate music day every day, but here's a great quote by Freiderich Nietzsche,  the misunderstood and often misquoted philosopher who was also a composer influenced by Schopenhauer.

"With out music, life would be a mistake."

KEATON

“This famous stunt in the movie was actually built around what went wrong with the original stunt. Keaton intended to leap from a board projecting from one building onto the roof of another building, but he fell short, smashing into the brick wall and falling into a net off-screen. He was injured badly enough to be laid up for three days. But when he saw the film (his camera operators were instructed to always keep filming, no matter what happened), he not only kept the mishap, he built on it, adding the fall through three awnings, the loose downspout that propels him into the firehouse, and the slide down the fire pole.”  Buster Keaton in The Three Ages, 1923 

Ft Calhoun nuclear plant swamped as Flood berm collapses

See my post on June 23, Mumbley Peg.

my favorite planet

heatwave

An all time record breaking 105 degrees here in La Sechere. Incredible silence.

I will personally kick the fat and flabby ass of any global warming denier who dares to get in my face today.

Meanwhile, here is THE WHO on French television back in 1965.

Tonights Very Special Guest

Yma Sumac or Amy Camus? 

Either, or, in any case, Ernie Kovaks was a very strange fellow.

A Beacon For Social Justice

Why, o, why do basic human rights have to be legislated in America? Last night the New York State Legislature passed a landmark bill legalizing same sex marriage. Why is this important? Because the way our legal system works in America, a legal marriage is the key to insurance coverage, right on down the line to who gets visitation rights when a loved one is dying. Giving legal acknowledgement of a relationship seems to be such a basic concept, but the unconstitutional opposition based on kowtowing to the prejudices of religious groups has been a major social impediment. Here's some of  Governor Cuomo's remarks as he congratulated the Legislature for their brave action:

CUOMO: And what we accomplished with marriage equality, really in some ways brings it all home, because this state, when it is at its finest, is a beacon for social justice. The legacy of this state was that we were the progressive capitol of the nation. And when you look back at so many of the great progressive movements that were birthed here in New York, the women's rights movement was birthed here in New York. The environmental rights movement was birthed here in New York, Storm King on the Hudson.
The workers' rights movement was birthed here in New York after the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire. All these great progressive movements, the gay rights movement was birthed at Stonewall. And what this state said today brings this discussion of marriage equality to a new plane. That's the power and the beauty of New York.
The other states look to New York for the progressive direction. And what we said today is you look to New York once again, because New York made a powerful statement, not just to the people of New York, but to people all across this nation.
We reached a new level of social justice this evening, marriage equality. I said to the legislators, you look at the first word, marriage, it's really about the second word, equality. It's really about New Yorkers, our brothers and sisters, looking at us and saying, we want equality. We want equality in society, equality in our relationships, equality in our love, equality in our families. We want full recognition, marriage equality, and we did it today.

FREUD

"Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive
 and will come forth later in uglier ways."
Sigmund Freud

Peter Falk

I had just watched the 1979 Peter Falk/Alan Arkin film, The In Laws.

Peter Falk was one of a kind. Colombo will live forever here in France.

Mumbley Peg

Hey am I freakin you out? Hah...I kin do this all night long! I gets better after a I has a few drinks or four or five...
Don' try tuh stop a man when he's playing mumbley peg cause you might git hurt...
You watch in fascination as the Nuclear Industry plays mumbley peg with the Earth...heck, they only had a few accidents. It's not like they blew up the whole damn planet...Chernobyl, Fukushima...you don wanna go there, there's a whole lotta other places to go. Heck, Three Mile Island happened in the 70's and people still around there. Coulda bin worse, lot's worse...but we take our chances because we think we know how to play the game. It's all about playin the game. The big companies have to make more money and the way they do it is by cutting every safety measure in the book. It's like mumbley Peg, see? 
But Fukushima was predictable. In America, there are three nuclear reactors that regulators are most concerned about. Like the predictable crisis now threatening the Fort Calhoun Reactor in Nebraska.
Last year, federal regulators, questioning the plants flood protection protocol, told the Omaha Public Power District that they had to do more sandbagging in the event of major flooding along the Missouri River.
After initially contesting the findings, the plants operator, The OPPD, said the problem had been resolved.
On Tuesday,The Daily Mail reported that the flooding on the Missouri River had risen to 18 inches of its walls, threatening to shut down the plant and flood it, raising fears that a Fukushima type of event was a real possibility.
Likewise, the Cooper Nuclear Reactor, also in Nebraska is threatened by the flooding as well. Water has already risen to within 2 feet of the danger level that would force a shut down of the plant. On the Missouri side of the border, a levee is dangerously close to being washed away. It is only a matter of time before the area around Hwy 136 in Atchinson County is flooded.

The Cooper plant had a major fuel rod accident in March which is still being investigated. The Federal Governments own Sandia National Laboratories have found striking similarities between the Cooper and the Dai-Ichi Plant in Japan, specifically: a lengthy loss of electrical power could cause a nuclear meltdown.


Hopefully, both the Nebraska reactors will survive this little mumbley peg incident.
But as I have been writing and doccumenting in this blog for  few years now, corporate nuclear policy has never paid any real attention to safety. Disasters have happened and will happen. If a nuclear incident like Fukushima occurs in America, it will be shown to have been entirely predictable.

Indeed, as shown by the Center for Public Integrity , many American reactors are built on earthquake faults:
What are the risks of an earthquake beneath a reactor near you? This image combines a 2006 map by the United States Geological Survey showing varying seismic hazards across the U.S. with locations of nuclear reactors. Reactors in black are active; reactors in blue are proposed sites for the new model known as the AP1000. Probability of strong shaking increases from very low (white), to moderate (blue, green, and yellow), to high (orange, pink, and red). Kimberly Leonard/Center for Public Integrity. The red lines represent the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers which illustrate the danger of flooding which is occurring now.
Nearly six years before an earthquake ravaged Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, U.S. regulators came to a sobering realization: seismic risks to nuclear plants in the eastern two-thirds of the country were greater than had been suspected, and engineers might have to rethink reactor designs.
But, rethinking nuclear plant design is again pouring money into a death wish. Nuclear energy will never be more than a dangerous high profit industry. A game of mumbley peg with the highest stakes. Each slip creates a nuclear sacrifice zone which incrementally increases the danger to us all for untold generations.
There are major reactors on earthquake faults all over America. Indian Point outside of New York City is a good example of how rules and regulations have been ignored and modified to get the plant back on line in 2013 after regulations were modified and ignored
The NRC is wholly captive to industry. The NRC has never turned down the request of a nuclear power plant to be relicensed in the United States. Relicensing is solely a paper process; there is no safety review.
The NRC's assumptions regarding a worst-case accident are ridiculous. For example, the NRC assumes only 1% of the fuel could meltdown, while 70% melted down at Fukushima. The NRC assumes no loss of containment, while there has been a major loss of containment in reactors 1-3 (especially 2) at Fukushima.
If there was a free market in energy, nuclear power would be over ... immediately". Nuclear plant owners can't get insurance; they can only operate because the U.S. government provides insurance on the taxpayer dime. The government also granted a ridiculously low cap on liabilityIf we had no subsidies for nuclear, coal or oil, we'd have a clean energy economy right now<
We have 4 reactors in California - 2 at San Onofre 2 at San Luis Obisbo - which are vulnerable to earthquakes and tsunamis.
No state or federal agency knows who would be in charge in case of an accident at Indian Point. It's like the Keystone Cops
Rolling Stone writes:
The NRC has long served as little more than a lap dog to the nuclear industry, unwilling to crack down on unsafe reactors. "The agency is a wholly owned subsidiary of the nuclear power industry," says Victor Gilinsky, who served on the commission during the Three Mile Island meltdown in 1979. Even President Obama denounced the NRC during the 2008 campaign, calling it a "moribund agency that needs to be revamped and has become captive of the industries that it regulates.In the years ahead, nuclear experts warn, the consequences of the agency's inaction could be dire. "The NRC has consistently put industry profits above public safety," says Arnie Gundersen, a former nuclear executive turned whistle-blower. "Consequently, we have a dozen Fukushimas waiting to happen in America.
And remember that a major nuclear accident - such as one at Indian Point - could bankrupt a nation.
Let's have another drink and play some more mumbley peg...Hell, I still have a few fingers left.....

DHS Just Doing It's "Job"

Ahmad Jamal is one of America's living treasures. He's 81, born in Pittsburgh and has been a major innovative influence and a star in the world of the uniquely American art form of jazz. He has been recording since the early 1950's. This song, Poinciana, was first released in 1957. He still tours and plays concerts all over the world.

He is now playing at a festival in Switzerland and is having major problems being paid because the Department of Homeland Security froze his American bank account when he tried to deposit the money he earned from the concerts from Switzerland.

Why? Because someone thought his name sounded too Islamic, and you know, you just can't be too careful. This matter will be resolved shortly, I am sure, but Mr. Jamal should get an apology for the insult at least. This man should be giving concerts ar the White House, but I'm sure all the flab brained squawkers at FOX, like Rusted Lardball, would accuse Obama of harboring Islamic terrorists. 
Don't you just feel just ever so much more warm and secure knowing that the dolts at the DHS are protecting you from great jazz musicians with funny sounding names?

Truffaut

Les Quatre cents coups
(The 400 Blows)
1959 by Francois Truffaut

TELEVISION

"What I want
I want now
and it's a whole lot more
than 'anyhow'..."

See No Evil/Television/1977

Naww, Sid, It's my fuckin' way or no way!

WOrd JUne 19, 2011

Made You Blink

So, you blinked, you let yourself be distracted by the antics of a brilliant but rather typical, self obsessed and seemingly insecure  Congressman who let himself be consumed and destroyed by his weakness. We watched Anthony Weiner waffle for 2 weeks as he dug himself in deeper and deeper denying the inevitable. Frankly, though, I did not agree with all of Weiners positions, I felt he could have been a powerful progressive voice and he was aggressively doing some pretty good work at the time he let himself be destroyed.
To be confused and blinded by the manipulative charges surrounding him in the media, hyped by Breitbart, makes it all too easy to just sweep Weiner under the rug and conveniently condemn him. But, for many,  the antics of Weiner, his very public media disgrace and the need for revenge continuers to create a diversion, the smokescreen that was originally intended.
So, what good does it do to keep this diversion alive by feeding into it by demanding the head of David Vitter? Let the Republicans obsess on it, because, they will and are doing it now. Rush Vigraboy Lardball and the self righteous Bill Felafel O'Reilly are already going trying to fuel the diversion. The truly progressive stance is best stated by a quote from Mahatma Ghandi, "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."
Why was Weiner destroyed when he was? He was carefully set up, his antics were monitored for quite a while. The NY Times has a very good investigative article detailing how the hacking was done, how he was set up with false user Twitter accounts to entrap him. A very important point is that his posting was in some cases obscene, his actual behaviour never really crossed any physical line. I won't go into the entire web of entrapment involving a fictitious California High School student using the name, "Nikki Reid", but the entire history is here in this June 18 NY Times piece.
Speaking of The NY Times, in todays edition, Sunday June 19, there is a piece detailing another ethical lapse by Supreme Court Clarence Thomas. Read it and weep, because if there was vengeance, if retribution that made any sense in the scheme of real justice, Thomas is the man to take the dive. The ethical conflicts of judicial propriety in fact is the real reason why Weiner was so methodically set up, why he was allowed to entrap himself in this pit of media hyped shame. In fact, as WeinerGate came to a head on Friday, one of the things the big bright spotlight didn't cover  was Clarence Thomas's re-amendment of his amendment of his financial disclosure forms.

All of a sudden, the news that Clarence Thomas was being forced to correct the lie that corrected the other lie (sorry, "impossible-to-believe double oversight") was overshadowed by the news that someone may have tweeted Anthony Weiner's ... something. Or somebody's something. (Think that was Breitbart's subaltern in those shorts?) 

What's the connection? Weiner is the reason that Thomas had to make that double correction. 

A timeline:

■ In January 2011, Common Cause reveals that Clarence Thomas has repeatedly failed to report his wife's Movement Conservative income (from the Heritage Foundation) on his financial disclosure forms. He checked the box marked "Not one dime" when he should have checked the one labeled "Between $1 and $686,589" in each of five years running. 

■ In February, Anthony Weiner gets 74 congresspeople to send a letter to Clarence Thomas asking him to explain himself, then launches a Conflicted Clarence Thomas campaign, attempting to shame him into a recusal on any health care case. From Weiner's petition (feel free to click and sign): 

The Thomas household has profited from opposition to health care reform. His wife has already taken nearly $700,000 from health care opponents and now openly advertises herself as a crack lobbyist with the “experience and connections” to overturn the law of the land.

Use the form on the right to stand with Anthony Weiner and his House colleagues, co-signing their letter and calling on Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from any cases regarding the constitutionality of the health care reform law immediately in the interest of maintaining impartiality in nation's highest court.

Note that the "nearly $700,000" number will turn out to be wrong, significantly low.

■ Liberty Central is forced, presumably by Weiner's constant tweaking, to release its own IRS forms showing $150,000 in payments to Ginni Thomas, President and CEO, in 2010 (jump to page 12 using the pop-up toolbar at the bottom). 

Liberty Central is on record as opposing Obama's Affordable Care Act, perhaps the reason this income didn't make it to Clarence Thomas's first round of income-correction. The ACA may well come before the Court on which Thomas sits. 

■ On May 27 (a Friday), Thomas announces he will release his amended disclosures later that day, and starting at 9:14 am there's a lot of Twitter traffic from @RepWeiner about it, eleven straight tweets at one point, including this one. 

Note that the "nearly $700,000" number is now $800,000 (that we know about). 

■ Later that evening, Weiner tweets that his Facebook account has been hacked and the chicken-in-the-pants pic goes out (no link; this is why god made google, folks). 


Look, I'm as pissed off and disappointed with the seemingly human failings of Tony Weiner as anyone, but as a fellow human who readily admits to having failings and weaknesses, I have a lot of empathy. I think my the brunt of my anger towards whim is that he let himself be sucked into this pit blindfolded and willingly, just as his efforts to combat Clarence Thomas, whose Anita Hill problem continues to haunt him, seem to have been paying off.
If there is vengeance to be had, then let it fall upon the proper target. We don't need to become embroiled in a further media sideshow to take down another republican sex freak. They will do it to themselves.
We have to open our eyes, stop blinking dammit!

turn off your mind, relax and float downstream....

Sing Along With Me

Here's the version of La Marseillaise, the French National Anthem 

from Abel Gance's 1907 version of Napoleon.

Yes, it's a nasty, violent, almost ridiculous song with copious blood running in the fields, violated women and massacred infants. It was guaranteed to cause big problems when it was written and it still does, but heck, it's easier to sing than the Star Spangled Banner. 

I, for reasons best left unsaid, have to learn how to sing at least the first verse, correctly.

If I can get it down with all of the actors emotive gestures, 

I think I'll have a mega smash hit on my hands!

"There is no better than adversity. Every defeat, every heartbreak, every loss
contains its own see, it's own lesson on how to improve your performance next time."

Malcom X

How To Create Monsters

A few years ago we heard about the Evangelical Conservative "Jesus Camps" parents were sending their kids to so they would be indoctrinated in good old fashioned Republican Religion. That seems to be what the Republican Party has devolved into. Less of a ideological philosophy and more of an illogical set of beliefs and much of the criteria to be an upstanding Republican is how ostentatiously you display your Christianity.

Now we've gone a step further and see the beginning of the enshrinement of the utterly illogical belief system of the TeaBaggers become a program of indoctrination for their offspring. This also represents a totally cynical program of manipulating and cashing in on the paranoid projections of TeaBag families who think that they can instill their beliefs in their children. The Tampa912 Project is now accepting applications for week long summer seminars for grade school kids purporting to teach them their version and interpretation of America's Founding Principles.
The organization, which falls under the tea party umbrella, hopes to introduce kids ages 8 to 12 to principles that include "America is good," "I believe in God," and "I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable.
"We want to impart to our children what our nation is about, and what they may or may not be told," Jeff Lukens, a conservative writer who is the organizer, said.
He said he was not familiar with public school curriculum, but, "I do know they have a lot of political correctness. We are a faithful people, and when you talk about natural law, you have to talk about God. When you take that out of the discussion, you miss the whole thing."

Tampa Liberty is modeled after vacation Bible schools, which use fun, hands-on activities to deliver Christian messages.
One example at Liberty: Children will win hard, wrapped candies to use as currency for a store, symbolizing the gold standard. On the second day, the "banker" will issue paper money instead. Over time, students will realize their paper money buys less and less, while the candies retain their value.
"Some of the kids will fall for it," Lukens said. "Others kids will wise up."
Another example: Starting in an austere room where they are made to sit quietly, symbolizing Europe, the children will pass through an obstacle course to arrive at a brightly decorated party room (the New World).
Red-white-and-blue confetti will be thrown. But afterward the kids will have to clean up the confetti, learning that with freedom comes responsibility.
Still another example: Children will blow bubbles from a single container of soapy solution, and then pop each other's bubbles with squirt guns in an arrangement that mimics socialism. They are to count how many bubbles they pop. Then they will work with individual bottles of solution and pop their own bubbles.
"What they will find out is that you can do a lot more with individual freedom," Lukens said.
While the Liberty school is the first of its kind in the Tampa Bay area, Lukens said a group in Kentucky ran a similar school, and he learned from their ideas.


Things rarely turn out the way you want them to when you try to control every little detail. Children are individuals who will become the sum of their total experiences. 


These people are raising their kids to be insufferable, proselytizing Ayn Rand adolescents or black-clad teen-age loners who love Death Metal and hate their parents.
Even though Ayn Rand hated religion that won't stop Tea Partiers from passing her teaching on to their children. It's such an odd mix of ideas when you enter in the obsession of turning back the clock to the the gold standard, but the insanity of it all makes perfect sense and it fits all together like a mega puzzle of the Moral Majority, South African Apartheid, Friedmanism and Randian selfishness.

Jack Rabbit Slim's Motherfucking Twist Contest

Vonnegut

How to write a short story.

It Happened Last Night

Again!

and the winner is?

The nominations for the most disgusting Republican attack ad ever are now open! We have two entries at this point and this is your chance to nominate another if you think it's a contender or you can vote now!
Our first entry is the popular oldie, the sleaze filled, quadraplegic veteran smearing, idiot panicking ad paid for by Saxby Chambliss that was used to destroy Democrat War Hero,   Georgia Democrat Rep. Max Cleland by attempting to link him to Osama Bin Laden. 

Pretty sleazy, eh? But it worked with the idiots in Georgia, but this one might be a real contender for most disgusting Republican attack ad ever! Craig Huey, a TeaBag business man running against Los Angeles Democratic Rep. Jane Hahn has pushed the limits here with discredited claims that are racist, sexist and perhaps hinting that his opponent, Ms. Hahn should be shot. 

What do you think? Is there an ad that you think is sleazier? The nominations are open and you can VOTE NOW!

Sun Ra, 1956, from the We Travel The Spaceways album

Lesson #2,953,624

It Was 44 Years Ago Give Or Take A Day

About 44 years ago, this was the title track from biggest selling record on the planet. Sergeant Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band was released June 1, 1967 and a week later it was the number one selling record for months. Hendrix covers the song for your listening pleasure live....

Just Another Rather Unpleasant Side Effect

Over the last 10 years, there have been increasing common and larger "blooms" of different species of Jellyfish  in polar and tropical areas in the worlds oceans. Scientists now blame the acidification of the oceans, the "evil twin" of global warming. Oceans have been taking up to 25% of the carbon dioxide that man has produced over the last 200 years. They act as a buffer for climate change. When you add mor CO2 to sea water, it becomes more acidic. This is now occurring at a rate that hasn't been seen in the last 600 million years.
So, our planet has evolved the environment which makes it possible for us to live comfortably. The oceans evolved a fragile equilibrium which made it possible for our life to have evolved to our present stage. It took eons to create the proper balance, and it is taking us only a few decades to destroy it.
Jellyfish are representative of a primitive stage in the evolution of ocean life. They flourished under conditions which exist when things are out of balance. Normally, there are blooms of jellyfish from time to time and as the local conditions change, they go back to their normal populations. This is normal.
As the oceans become more acidic and warmer, a vicious cycle has started. The jellyfish now are in a larger more persistant environment that they contribute to and continue to by their ever increasing numbers.

Already, Marine Scientists have discovered the role jellyfish have had in depleting the normal level of bacteria, which plays the major role in recycling nutrients back into the food web. While bacteria absorb carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and other chemicals given off by fish when they die, they cannot do this with jellyfish. The jellyfish, populating the sea in ever increasing numbers, break down into biomass with especially high levels of carbon, which bacteria cannot efficiently absorb. Instead of using it as a nutrient, the bacteria exude more carbon dioxide, which is released into the atmosphere, contributing to the vicious cycle. This makes them into a kind of ecological vampire syndrome.
The acidification of the oceans is already predicted to have such a corrosive effect that unprotected shell fish will dissolve by the middle of the next century.
The implications of this are beyond our conception. Most of the sedentary calcium based rock was formed by deposits of sea life over untold eons. We are already seeing the effects of "acid rain" on limestone and marble buildings and sculptures almost before our eyes.

ship sinking 400 lb Nomura Jellyfish

Research shows that the jellyfish spike is turning the marine food cycle on its head. The creatures devour the plankton which small fish need. This restricts the the transfer of energy up the food chain, because jellyfish do not have many predators. The predators that they do have are sharks and tuna, both of which are threatened by the rise in sea temperatures, which encourage the jellyfish.
So, the reports of giant refrigerator sized, 200 kilo ship wrecking jellyfish are going to get more common place as swarms of more than 2,000 different  jellyfish species appear earlier each year and expand their populations.
Just another rather unpleasant side effect of global warming.

SKUNK

1972, Skunk Sonically Speaking, by the MC5 from their last official record, High Time.

Politics, Guitars, Free Jazz and the biggest beat on the planet. No wonder that by 1970 they had trouble playing anywhere with out the police showing up to shut them down.

So why aren't they in the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame?

After all, they have been continually referenced for the last 35 years as one of the most influential bands in Rock History. 

That's the question that Dennis (Machine Gun) Thompson, the drummer of the band is asking today in 2011. If that's what he wants, then we will do everything we can to make it so!

Kin Ah Have Wun?

I Need This!

Kafka 15 Minute Nude WorkOut....

Look, I'm not an expert. I'm only a pathetic 61 year old dude who is only too aware that 

RUST NEVER SLEEPS!

I was never athletic. I was forced against my will to play on a football team in grade school.

It's only as I got older and wiser that I realized the value of regular exercise and a healthy diet.

I was an asthmatic kid, and still suffer from it, but I think the constant awareness of my affliction kept me  on the path to self improvement. I am a passionate bicyclist and try to enforce a certain fascistic self discipline that I would not expect any other other human to cower to in my fight against gravity.

There are rewards, I think of the alimentary items that most people shrink from in abject horror, such as cracklings, crispy chicken skin, potato chips, pork fat and ham as "health food".

So for years, my daily regimen has been push ups, sit ups, ab crunches and an assortment of  amusing bending and stretching exercises. It takes me about 20 minutes or so a day. If I miss a day, I feel really guilty, but on the other hand, I always give myself a day off. This has gone on for years. I am 6 ft tall and weigh 143 lbs on the average.

About a month ago, I was reading an article about Franz Kafka and his quest for physical health and his obsession with the exercise routines of Danish Gym Instructor J.P. Muller. Muller put together this program in 1904 and it is still is one of the best selling exercise books ever. Kafka did the routine everyday nude in his apartment. Unfortunately for Kafka, he suffered from tuberculosis. I read Mullers book on line and viewed the instructional short version of his program. I really think it's great. I used to do sit ups, but I swear by abdominal crunches. With a little adaptation, Mullers program really makes sense to me. Reading his observations on exercise, diet and modern life, written in 1904 is fascinating. He made a lot of sense then and makes even more sense now.
The video is pretty good at explaining the system by a doctor who is a third generation Muller exercise addict!

Iceland OS 2.1

In the wake of the economic disaster and remarkable recovery of Iceland, they have made the decision to reboot there governing system. They resisted the IMF and also held the financial institutions and government officials behind the collapse responsible. The former prime minister, Geir Haarde of the country is going to be charged for his involvement in the disaster. 
Meanwhile, the constitution, which was inherited from Denmark when Iceland gained its independence in 1944 is being scrapped and rewritten. They realize it is an out dated system, like an obsolete computer operating system which can be hacked and sabotaged by trolls who know how to manipulate it.
The constitution, in fact, is being drafted on the internet. The entire population of Iceland is invited to participate through Facebook and Twitter. The Constitutional Council has a YouTube Channel which posts the latest discussions of ideas and progress.
Perhaps this is possible because Iceland's population is less than 500,000 and the insular nature of the country enforces the sense of community awareness and interest.
Thorvaldur Gylfason, a member of the constitutional council, noted the level of goodwill and how positive and helpful the comments on the Facebook page have been. The constitution will be approved in a referendum, without any changes made by parliament, so this will be a document truly by the people, for the people. This seems so fitting for the country which is the worlds oldest continuous truly representational democracy.

Let Me Take You Down....

wORD JUNe 11, 2011

“A functioning police state needs no police”

William S. Burroughs, “Naked Lunch”

GOONS

The Goon Show, Spike Milligan and Peter Sellers, directed by Richard Lester.

It's as if Samuel Beckett did slapstick.

NYC! GIVE CASEY HIS $50 BACK!

Yeah, give Casey his Fifty Bucks back before he really hurts himself. 

I related to this video and this story because I rode a bike on these mean streets almost everyday for over 25 years. I rode in spring, summer, fall and winter. I loved to ride on Sunday mornings when the streets of Manhattan were almost totally deserted. I loved riding after midnight in lower Manhattan in the summer.

In all of my time on a bike, I was never ticketed and only suffered a few scratches and bruises...there was that incident with a car door on Grand Street, but amazingly, I landed on my feet!

There were no bike lanes except for a brief period in the 80's when Mayor Koch experimented with them, but the sight of healthy people enjoying themselves while commuting outraged the fat assed conservative gasoline huffing automobile addicts and due to a certain closeted conservative editorialist in the NY Post, who wrote of their embarrassment at having to look at healthy young men in tight lycra bike shorts, they were removed.

I recently was in NYC and got to bike quite a bit and experienced the new bike lanes. I have to admit, in principle, it is a good idea, but in reality, the traffic, the continual road work and the necessity of commerce presented a continula obstacle course which had to be ignored and avoided. That's what happend to Casey. That's why he got a ticket in one of the cities "crackdowns" on bike riders.

It makes me nostalgic for the good old days. I was a bike messenger for about 3 months, until I realized that was the probable life expectancy of a bike messenger on the streets of Manhattan, but there was a time when muscle powered demons on 2 wheels ruled the streets!

Les Radis

This is a variety of radish which I grow called Saveur. They're mild flavored, sweet with just a bit of heat. Radishes are so easy to grow and come to maturity vary quickly. I also have a line of Radi Noir...Black Radishes which are nick named, The Poor Mans Sausage, because they grow to the size of a Saucisson. They also have a black skin. I eat a lot of radishes, and the way we eat them is with salt, of course and buttered bread. 
I wanted to post about radishes because of a minor miracle which I attribute to these tasty little nuggets.
About 6 am in the morning, I wake from a sound sleep and habitually, I stretch my legs..In the last few years, I tended to suddenly get nasty cramps. I also was getting cramps after intensive biking. I was trying to figure out how to deal with them and was reading that nutrition can play a big role.
Most articles I read about nutrition claimed that vegetables and fruits high in magnesium and potassium could really help. Then I discovered, as well as having one of the highest concentrations of Vitamin C of any root vegetable, radishes are one of the best sources of potassium. About a week ago, I realized that my leg cramps have totally disappeared. Totally. I attribute this to the tasty radishes I eat every day...try it.

The Unspeakable Horror Of Utterly Boring Reality

This is a greatest hits, replayed for my friend at NYC Edges....

Sometimes I just feel too damn French!

marketing

Raiders Of The Lost Sphincter...

I try hard not to mention the name of the media whore master, Ben Gleck, but sometimes, it is inevitable.

Here he is shamelessly choking his dead chicken of a program and trying to shill his Reeleee Big Money Making Media sideshow Rally to Restore Courage in Jerusalem. He's getting a cut from the travel agencies and selling tickets to his reelee beeg shoe....

Is this more predictable? Is this more panderingly desparate? Can I get a witness? Now Holy Joe Lieberman  has jumped on board the Love/Hate Train.

Listen, if there was a god,the beeg finalee to the spectacle would probably go a little like this: 

AFTER YOU EAT THE RICH, HEARTBURN IS INEVITABLE....

Here's a little follow up to my post, EAT THE RICH from Monday about millionaire Chicago playboy, Ryan LeVin who was convicted of killing two British Businessmen with his Luxury Porsche Sportscar and got off with house arrest in his parents Ft. Lauderdale Condo by paying off the families. This was in spite of a record of drug offenses and an incident in Chicago in which he hit a cop with his car and fled.
Her was wanted in Chicago at the time for probation violations.
The Judge, Barbara McCarthy has been severely criticized for her judgement in the sentencing, but the only recourse is perhaps she won't be so easily re elected when her term is up in 2016, depending of course on the attention span of the voters in Florida.
The kicker here folks, is that the Lawyer for LeVin, David Bogeshutz, who negotiated the agreement was Barbara McCarthy's deputy campaign treasurer in her election......

Well, I have to admit it is efficacious, but now I have this annoying hole in my head.

Everybody's Tryin To Be My Baby

This is so cool, George Harrison with his inspiration Carl Perkins...

I love that big fat Gretsch Country Gent that George has strapped on!

Microdot Sings

People ask me if I can sing tenor, I say yes, they say, well how's about ten or twenty miles away from here?

2 episodes of true terror from the legendary Pyramid Club in 1982 as the Giant Horrible Mr. Bubble Experience wreaks havoc. There is no hope and Go against the flow...You won't have to listen to this again, to paraphrase the philosopher, Richard Nixon. 

wOrd JuNE 6, 2011

“Run from what’s comfortable.

Forget safety.

Live where you fear to live.

Destroy your reputation.

Be notorious.

…I have tried prudent planning long enough.

From now on I’ll be mad”

RUMI

Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد بلخى), also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī 

(30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273),

Los Alguiens - El Internet

Los Alguiens, a Mexican (?) band, have produced this video for their song "El Internet," in which all the glories and wonders of the Internet are put on display. Ole!

Well, If The Aliens Won't Save Us.....

I guess we'll have to let the Belgians do it.

Here's a video of a new 2 mile long high speed train tunnel outside of Antwerp built to shelter the Paris/Amsterdam line from falling trees as it passes through a protected forested area. To protect the trees and the train, the tunnel was built and covered with 16,000 solar panels. The energy produced is enough to run the Belgian train system for one entire day a year as well as powering the Antwerp train station.

The price of solar cells has plummeted as their effectiveness has increased dramatically in the last 2 years.

This might seem to be a rather obvious solution, but there is a real push against the visionary projects by the massive energy industry, but these panels are German and they seem to be leading the way in efficiency and cost.

I apologize in advance for the musical accompaniment in the video....

TA DAAAAA!

EAT THE RICH!

On February 13, 2009, in Fort Lauderdale, FL , a $120,000 Porsche 911 Turbo driven by Chicago 36 year old Millionaire Playboy, Ryan LeVin jumped the curb and killed 2 business men who were British citizens.
He then fled the scene of the crime.
LeVin was on probation for for an offense in Chicago in 2006 in which he was pursued and arrested in a chase on The Kennedy Expressway after hitting a Chicago police officer with his car.
LeVin had already racked up over 50 traffic violations and had a long history of drug abuse.
When LeVin's unmistakable luxury auto was identified as the vehicle involved in the deaths, he lied, denied being in the speeding car and then tried to pin the blame on a friend.
Finally, he admitted to the crime after he was arrested. The sentence in Florida for the 2 vehicular homicide deaths could have been up to 45 years behind bars.
Instead, LeVin was allowed to walk out of court  under a 2 year "House Arrest" sentence in his parents Fort Lauderdale luxury condo. This sentence might actually preclude his extradition back to Illinois, where he is wanted for a probation violation relating to the 2006 police officer hit and run.
The  rather bizarre reasoning used by Broward Circuit Court Judge Barbara McCarthy  was "the need for restitution outweighs the need for prison."
She was referring to an out of court settlement for an undisclosed amount of cash reached by the widows of the victims. The settlement also finishes a civil suit started by the victims families. The court originally wanted LeVin to plead guilty in exchange for a 10 year sentence, then proceed to the civil suit. His lawyers placed his fate in the hands of the judge and money talked while justice walked.....
Why couldn't real justice have prevailed and made LeVin serve time and pay restitution?
Why is he being enabled to avoid any real responsibility for his dangerously irresponsible lifestyle?
House Arrest in his Parents luxury condo? He'll be back behind the wheel of his Porsche, coked out of his gourd roaring off to the next party with his rich buddies who will sympathize over the little problems he has had...maybe he will get to snort coke off of a marble fireplace at the governors mansion...
After all nobody's gonna force  this rich fuck to take a drug test. This is Florida, the land of  Governor Rick Scott who is enriching himself from destroying the health care system, and passing laws to prevent the unemployed from collecting benefits with out paying for drug testing out of their own pockets. In Florida, it would seem, the only real crime is being poor.

Perhaps, The Aliens Will Save Us....

That seems to be the attitude of the Japanese Government and TEPCO in the last few weeks. They keep down playing the disaster and giving projected dates for meeting goals in resolving the problems, then the news gets out that the catastrophe is much worse, and the dates they gave have to be "changed" in light of new developments. Like an imminent hurricane, or the fact that humans can't function in the protective gear they have to wear to risk radiation exposure in the heat of summer....
They are dousing the reactors in sea water to cool them, the sea water has to be stored, but they give no figures about how much water is leaking back into the ocean. There wasn't a meltdown, oh, wait, there was a meltdown...in fact there were three separate meltdowns and the situation is getting worse.
The disaster has been upgraded to the highest possible nuclear accident rating, but, wait...It's not as bad as Chernobyl!
Here's a video from just 2 days ago from the Fukushima #1 Reactor. It seems pretty innocuous, just leaking steamy pipes, but it is what is going on now...the radiation levels in the plant are higher than they have ever been before. The estimate is that the levels in the air were at 4000 millisieverts per hour, the equivalent to 40,000 chest x rays.  This is steam venting from a system that is self destructing. The heat is generated from the melting fused fuel rods that have gone critical and melted through the reactor bottom, boiling off the water being used to cool them as fast as it can be pumped. The steam goes into the atmosphere carrying the highest yet recorded doses of radiation.

Let's face it, the evidence is in. Pay attention because soon it will be too late. This is bigger than Chernobyl. Japan is fucked. The future of Japan is going to about learning how to live with industrial nuclear devastation. If there is a lesson to be learned here, it is the one that sane scientists and environmentalists have been trying to teach for the last 60 years. There is no such thing as safe nuclear energy. If we want to move forward, we have to draw a line in the sand and emulate Germany and Switzerland, two countries which have boldly stepped forward to definitively ban any new development and dismantle their old  nuclear power system. If we had spent a fraction of what we have wasted on nuclear energy on the advancement of passive energy technology, this would be a totally different world.
There are no Alien beings coming to save us, we have to save ourselves.
The nuclear power industry has to be branded and identified as the insane planetary destructive dead end criminal pursuit that it truly is.  Where do you start? How can you make a difference? How long before we discover that we are all considered collateral damage and expendable at the bottom profit line of the industry? To wait any longer is too late...I realize that I devote a lot of space to my feelings about the need to eliminate nuclear power, but in many ways, I feel it is the gravest threat to the future of the human race, and the one thing we can actually do something about. Hunor me....
The future of clean energy is now, it is here, we just have to demand it!
Because, to not care, to give up and say it is no use, is to admit defeat and we are far from defeated.

We still have the means, the power to save ourselves. We just need the will.
You can learn a lot from GreenPeace here.