A-FREAKIN'-MEN! Liberal policies work best and we shouldn't eff them up simply because there is some unwarranted need to be 'bipartisan'. We need to be as partisan as the Rethugs have been over the past 30 years.
"What progressives should be focused on now is taking on the political movement that brought Bush to power. In short, what we need right now isn't Bush bashing—what we need is partisanship." .....
"But any attempt to change America's direction, to implement a real progressive agenda, will necessarily be highly polarizing. Proposals for universal health care, in particular, are sure to face a firestorm of partisan opposition. And fundamental change can't be accomplished by a politician who shuns partisanship.
I like to remind people who long for bipartisanship that FDR's drive to create Social Security was as divisive as Bush's attempt to dismantle it. And we got Social Security because FDR wasn't afraid of division. In his great Madison Square Garden speech, he declared of the forces of 'organized money': 'Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred.'"
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Lawyer up. Put that shite dead center back on the table.
"We are lawyers in the United States of America. As such, we have all taken an oath obligating us to defend the Constitution and the rule of law…. We believe the Bush administration has committed numerous offenses against the Constitution and may have violated federal laws…."
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If you're a news geek like me you'll enjoy this challenge.
"ONTARIO, California (Reuters) - Between railroad tracks and beneath the roar of departing planes sits 'tent city,' a terminus for homeless people. It is not, as might be expected, in a blighted city center, but in the once-booming suburbia of Southern California.
The noisy, dusty camp sprang up in July with 20 residents and now numbers 200 people, including several children, growing as this region east of Los Angeles has been hit by the U.S. housing crisis."
I'm wondering where the howls of outrage are from the 'right-to-lifers' in this country? Oh yeah, she was already a fully formed human, not an embryo. Nothing to see here, then.
"A 17-year old died just hours after her health insurance company reversed its decision not to pay for a liver transplant that doctors said the girl needed.
Nataline Sarkisyan died Thursday night at about 6 p.m. at University of California, Los Angeles Medical Center. She had been in a vegetative state for weeks, said her mother, Hilda.
'She passed away, and the insurance (company) is responsible for this,' she said"
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The more things change, the more they stay the same. Nice dress, Hoover
"ASHINGTON - Former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover had a plan to suspend the rules against illegal detention and arrest up to 12,000 Americans he suspected of being disloyal, according to a newly declassified document."
"As Josh wrote earlier this week, I've been gobbling up the new tell-all by Allen Raymond, the former GOP consultant of New Hampshire phone jamming fame."
"Here's the beauty of pickup basketball: You may be a U.S. senator, a living symbol of racial healing and perhaps even the next President of the United States, but if you're gliding in for an easy layup and each point is precious, I've got no choice then, do I? You're getting hacked. So, yes, I'm hammering that arm and crashing headlong into your whippet-thin frame; and, yes, it's a foul so flagrant, so absurdly desperate, that all you can do, body buckling, is laugh. Hey, it's pickup. Everyone, even you, uses whatever he's got to win.
'Believe me,' Barack Obama says, walking to the top of the key, 'you can get shot for doing that.'"
"This year’s death penalty bombshells — a de facto national moratorium, a state abolition and the smallest number of executions in more than a decade — have masked what may be the most significant and lasting development. For the first time in the modern history of the death penalty, more than 60 percent of all American executions took place in Texas.
"Texas, where strip clubs have given rise to Anna Nicole Smith and many other less-generously endowed performers, is about to make it more expensive to watch a little bump and grind.
In what some have dubbed the 'pole tax,' the Lone Star State will require its 150 or so strip clubs to collect a $5-per-customer levy, with most of the proceeds going to help rape victims. The tax goes into effect on New Year's Day."
"(12-25) 21:12 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- One zoo visitor was mauled to death and two others severely injured when a Siberian tiger escaped from its grotto at the San Francisco Zoo early Christmas evening and went on a bloody rampage in front of terrified zoo patrons.
The tiger - the same animal that chewed a keeper's arm during an attack last December - was shot to death outside a zoo cafe by four officers who managed to distract the animal as it mauled one of its victims."
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When 'protecting our freedoms' goes horribly wrong. Who could of predicted.... who could of predicted.
"Washington, DC (Rotters) - Children worldwide breathed a collective sigh of relief as Santa reportedly dodged an errant anti-missile strike this evening. The Department of Defense insisted that the strike was an accident due in part to NORAD's participation with Google Earth in providing a Santa Claus tracking service this year. Santa and all of his reindeer suffered a close call but were unhurt according to North Pole sources."
"MAUSTON, Wis. - Capt. Scott Southworth knew he'd face violence, political strife and blistering heat when he was deployed to one of Baghdad's most dangerous areas. But he didn't expect Ala'a Eddeen"
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Tommy is my best buddy Shipper's boss. You can check the trip I took to Palau a couple of years ago here:
Tommy Remengesau Jr. is interested, too. "We'd like to look at it," said the president of the tiny western Pacific nation of Palau.
The Defense Department this October quietly issued a 75-page study conducted for its National Security Space Office concluding that space power — collection of energy by vast arrays of solar panels aboard mammoth satellites — offers a potential energy source for global U.S. military operations.
It could be done with today's technology, experts say. But the prohibitive cost of lifting thousands of tons of equipment into space makes it uneconomical.
That's where Palau, a scattering of islands and 20,000 islanders, comes in.
"While shopping at a local grocery store earlier this week, I was taken aback by something I found in the meat counter - bacon in a camouflage package."
Pre-order the new album Brighter Than Creations Dark from the official Drive-By Truckers store for your chance to be entered in a drawing for one of 2 grand prizes to include a signed poster, a gift certificate for $100 of merchandise from the official Drive-By Truckers store and 2 tickets to an upcoming headlining Drive-By Truckers show of your choice. In addition, the first 100 people to purchase the Brighter Than Creations Dark CD & T-shirt bundle will ALSO receive a signed tour poster from the Drive-By Truckers.
Contest begins December 20, 2007 and ends January 22, 2008. To guarantee deliver on the release date, domestic customers must select the express shipping option and place their orders by 3 PM on January 18. All pre-orders taken by this time will ship that Friday. The release date delivery option is not available for international customers. Orders that ship by the standard shipping method will take between 3-5 business days to arrive.
Remember, only the first 100 people who order the Brighter Than Creations Dark CD & T-shirt bundle will receive a signed poster, so hurry up and order yours today!
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A few odds and ends today as we gear up for the Holidays:
"'Athens music is losing some good ones: Adam & Wendy Musick of Southern Bitch are moving away any day now, taking over their family's farm in Virginia. Kimberly and Brad Morgan (of The Everloving Band and Drive-By Truckers respectively) had a few musician friends over to play songs as a farewell, and record it for a keepsake. We thought some fans might enjoy it too.
Chuck Bradburn (Southern Bitch), Brad Morgan, Wendy Musick and John C. Stubblefield (Lucero) perform along with the lead singers listed above.'
"It’s funny-made-up-word Tuesday! I love words that are FUN to say. You know, words with ZAZ. (By the way we went to see Dethklok the other night and that shit ROCKED! Moreonthatlater) As I was saying, ZAZZY words"
"More than 20 years later, there's very little that I don't remember about my first rock concert - Van Halen on the '5150' tour at the Cow Palace in Daly City. I was 15 years old, and drank cans of Budweiser in the parking lot while listening to 'Led Zeppelin II' on the stereo in my friend's two-toned beige and brown Dodge conversion van. Some older dude with a black beard walked up and said, 'I'm going to have to give you a citation ... for not partying hard enough!' I was so relieved that he wasn't going to send us to jail, I paid him $10 for a bumper sticker."
"The first sign of a true rock star? When a man named Saul Hudson changes his name to Slash... and it sticks. The second? When said rock star puts two stolen items together and instantly creates a fashion sensation. The former lead guitarist for Guns N' Roses (now with Velvet Revolver) recently chronicled his rise to rock stardom in his eponymous book Slash. I spoke with the guitar legend about how and why he developed his signature style:"
A man being held in a Dutch police cell on suspicion of growing cannabis got an unintended treat in his lunch — a piece of hashish-laced cake, a spokesman said Thursday
"The GOP's clamor to identify itself as a party of Christian piety has failed to include some key elements of the faith -- namely Christian principles, according to a Washington Post columnist who says modern Republicans recall the hypocrisy of the Ku Klux Klan."
The current crop of Democrats don't know how to fight. They're afraid to fight, they're incompetent at fighting, and they're incapable of fighting because they don't know how to fight. They think that issuing a press release with the right talking points is fighting back. They think that holding a simple press conference on the Hill will generate a news story. And they think that a single, or even a week's worth, of news stories is a victory. They simply do not understand what the Republicans all know too well - how to take a story, a theme, and jam it down your opponents' throats for weeks, if not months, if not years, on end. To a Democrat, if you get a blurb in the Washington Post, one day, that's a public relations victory. To a Republican, once that blurb is repeated every day for 30 years then they declare victory.
The current crop of Democrats and their consultants and the non-profit advocacy groups in town have no idea how to fight like a Republican, how to fight to win. It's not just a lack of will, a lack of backbone, they quite literally don't know how to fight, so when they do rarely fight back, and lose because it was done so poorly, the lesson they take away isn't that they need to learn how to fight better, but rather, they think they lost because they fought back. And it will get them nowhere until they realize that they don't know what they're doing, and others do.
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If human fat can be used as fuel, then the U.S. should be energy independent by... yesterday.
"The fastest eco boat on the planet will attempt to break the round the world speed record using fuel made from human fat."
Demonstrating further commitment to the cause, Bethune underwent liposuction and donated enough to produce 100ml of biofuel, while two other, larger volunteers also had the procedure, making a total of 10 litres of human fat.
"WASHINGTON - It sounds like a stretch, but a new study suggests that the missing evolutionary link between whales and land animals is an odd raccoon-sized animal that looks like a long-tailed deer without antlers. Or an overgrown long-legged rat."
Really!?! This is what it has come to? A 'health-care gift card'? The richest nation in the world and our national health care plan is a rip off of Starbucks?
For perhaps as many as 27 million American adults, keeping warm this winter will mean borrowing money and 20 million will use credit cards to be able to afford their heating bills, according to a CreditCards.com poll."
Best. Country. Evah.
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Is that a candy cane in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
"NEW YORK - Peter Jackson and New Line Cinema have reached agreement to make J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Hobbit,' a planned prequel to the blockbuster trilogy 'The Lord of the Rings.'"
"So far, the mainstream press coverage of Don Siegelman's ordeal has pointedly ignored the theft of the 2002 election. Clearly, Siegelman himself does not regard that theft as a side issue, but as a major crime, and one that is quite relevant to his whole story.
Today, the Alabama governor is not allowed to speak up on his own behalf. He's locked away inside a federal prison cell, and, for good measure, has been silenced by the Alabama courts. As Scott Horton has so aptly put it, Don Siegelman is the Man in the Iron Mask."
"WASHINGTON - White House visitor logs are public documents, a federal judge ruled Monday, rejecting a legal strategy that the Bush administration had hoped would get around public records laws."
"Harry Reid just pulled the telecom bill. The Senate will take it up again after the first of the year, but for now there will be no retroactive telecom immunity."
"A Princeton University junior who claimed to have been beaten by two men in black ski caps for his conservative views admitted on Monday that he made up the attack, according to Princeton Township police officials."
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Finally, FINALLY an organization that's will clean up all of this filth.
"Here’s the barebones story of how 18-year-old Mike Huckabee’s son, David, and 17-year-old Clayton Frady killed a dog when they were Boy Scouts, and got fired for it. From the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in 1998 (as quoted in DogBlog):"
"Prohibition, during which the sale of alcohol was illegal, ran from 1920 to 1933, yet in San Francisco, where the thirsty, working-class populace refused to hop on the temperance wagon, spirits flowed in hotels, dance halls, coffee shops, clandestine rooms and underground tunnels."
"Americans are taught from an early age that there are four basic tastes -- sweet, salty, sour and bitter. But what describes the taste of chicken soup? To an increasing number of chefs and food-industry insiders, the answer is 'umami,' dubbed 'the fifth taste.' First identified by a Japanese scientist a century ago, umami has long been an obscure culinary concept. Hard to describe, it is usually defined as a meaty, savory, satisfying taste."
"THE HOME FRONT WORLD TOUR 2008. We are pleased to announce dates for the first two legs of THE HOME FRONT WORLD TOUR 2008.
The tour, which will be previewed in Athens GA on Jan. 10-13 begins in Anaheim CA on Feb. 11th.
The Feb. dates will be supported by The Felice Brothers. I haven't seen them live, but their songs on myspace are fantastic and my friends who have seen them have raved about how great they are."
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Check out DBT's MySpace for The Righteous Path and I'm Sorry Huston from Brighter Than Creations Dark.
You can also check out A Ghost To Most posted last Friday.
"Lists be damned! LaVette, Hood and the rest of the Truckers have put something on wax that can’t be undone. They’ve proven that music is for ingesting and digesting, not for ranking and grading."
"HEY DBT.... WELCOME TO PRIME TIME TV!!! I JUST HAPPENED TO BE DOZING IN FRONT OF A TV TONIGHT, AND CAUGHT A SHOW CALLED CRIMINAL MINDS, ON CBS. WELL, THE SHOW STARTED WITH 'WHERE THE DEVIL DON'T STAY' AND ENDED WITH 'DECORATION DAY.' AS FAR AS THE PLOT OF THE SHOW, WELL, I DIDN'T REALLY PAY ATTENTION TO IT. JUST DAMN COOL TO HEAR SOME DBT ON PRIMETIME TV!! CONGRATS! MUCH LOVE!! ~~MARK THOMAS~~"
"pretty funny thread on phishhook about staurday's gig... think there's a download of the show available as well...courtesy of the master himself sloan simpson!!!
Here's another Drive-By Truckers song from Monday night's show. 'Zip City' from Southern Rock Opera was written by Mike Cooley from the perspective of a teenage guy.....
Your Daddy was mad as hell He was mad at me and you As he tied that chain to the front of my car And pulled me out of that ditch that we slid into Don't know what his problem is Why he keeps dragging you away Don't know why I put up with this shit When you don't put out and Zip City's so far away
Zip City really exists. The Alabama Ass Whuppin' blog, which is written by an Alabaman transplanted to San Francisco, includes this photo tribute to 'Zip City.
"Lyrics of the Day The Drive-By Truckers concert Monday night at the Park West was so awesome, I can't even write about it without gushing like a lovestruck schoolgirl. Let's just say they would have blown the doors off a certain band from New Jersey that was playing across town that night (and DBT played acoustic (mostly))."
"Big Congratulations! Cheers to my buddies in the DBT and my old friend Chris Tompkins on their Grammy nominations. The Truckers were nominated for their work on the great Bettye Lavette album 'Scene of the Crime,' and Chris for the Carrie Underwood song, 'Before He Cheats,' written with Josh Kear. Good job and good luck."
"Chris Tompkins was in the Charlotte, N.C., airport when he heard the news Thursday that he has been nominated for a coveted Grammy Award. Tompkins, a songwriter and Greenhill native, was nominated for the award for his work with the Carrie Underwood hit, 'Before He Cheats.' The song, which Tompkins co-wrote with Josh Kear, has been nominated for two Grammys."
"With his Sirens of the Ditch (New West) solo debut landing Top Ten honors in HARP’s annual “50 Best CDs of the Year” feature, Jason Isbell is riding high. Throughout 2007 he toured steadily with his band the 400 Unit, selling out shows in NYC, Raleigh, Atlanta, Toronto, San Francisco, Denver and Austin. Isbell & Co. played the Voodoo Festival in New Orleans, Hardly Strictly in San Francisco and toured the country with both Son Volt and Cracker. Isbell continues his success on the road with a winter tour, presented by HARP -- this time teaming up with Will Hoge in a co-headlining cross-country trek. In addition, Isbell is playing two nights of the Warren Haynes Christmas Jam in Asheville, NC (one with The 400 Unit and one solo). He has also secured a coveted spot during the opening night of the New York Guitar Festival “Royal Albert Hall Project” honoring Bob Dylan. Meanwhile, in late January, Isbell will release a live EP recorded on November 16 at Twist & Shout Records in Denver, CO. This will be the first proper release from Isbell with The 400 Unit. The EP will be available exclusively at all Coalition of Independent Music Retailers."
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Jimbo has got some live cuts of JI400's last tour. Sounds mighty good.
Mixed and Mastered at the Nutthouse in Sheffield, AL by Jimmy Nutt
If Kings of Leon started listening to more AC/DC, you would have something that sounds a lot like Sons of Roswell. In fact, Sons of Roswells’s self-titled album makes Kings of Leon’s Because of the Times seem pretty feeble in comparison.
Vocalist Kevin Keenum and company present an even mix of bluesy hard rock and punk rock attitude served with a distinctly southern flavor. As a result, the boys of Roswell have created an album packed with strutting, cocksure, optimistic tracks that provide a refreshing alternative to the whiny, jaded music that predominately populates the pop music charts.
The real magic of this album lies in the song craft. Sons of Roswell demonstrate a real knack for writing catchy hooks, energetic bridges and simple yet blazing guitar solos that continually revitalize the songs before they can wear out their welcome. It’s difficult not to become too derivative when plumbing the depths of a classical southern/hard rock musical heritage like Sons of Roswell’s, but they’ve managed to produce an album that not only holds up to repeat listenings, it demands them. (Self-released)
"We've added several new shows in the past few days and hopefully will be adding several more in the next week or so. Check back often and if we're playing in your town we'd love to see you there!
Also, we added another song from the album a little while back. Stateline, It's different from the demo version we had up earlier this year and we like it alot! If you haven't heard it, go check it out.
Last but not least, for any Torrent users out there, our good friend Russ Corey posted our November show from the Old Town Tavern for free download. This show featured Jay Burgess from Sons of Roswell and has plenty of tunes that aren't on our record. There's even a couple of covers in there. The site is TheTradersDen.org. It's a bit-torrent site that's free to join and full of good live show downloads. Here's the link below:
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Music
Word has it that Foxboro Hot Tubs is actually Green Day. FHT has a free EP to download on their site. Give it a listen and decide for yourself. I dig.
"New York's 'Vulture' section comes to the correct conclusion about the music biz -- but for the wrong reason. In commenting on the Wired profile of 'Universal Music Group CEO/supervillain Doug Morris,' the folks at 'Vulture' have a yuck-fest over Morris' inability to come to grips with modern technology. I only had one real talk with Morris in my life. The Warners Music Group was in complete turmoil, beginning a really ugly death spiral that he insisted I buy into by going to work for a lackey of his. I refused and Morris was coincidentally fired soon after -- the lackey not long after that. Instead I wound up as president of Reprise Records."
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"If Ike hadn't of beat Tina there wouldn't of been no River Deep, Mountain High"
"SAN DIEGO — Ike Turner, whose role as one of rock's critical architects was overshadowed by his ogrelike image as the man who brutally abused former wife Tina Turner, died Wednesday at his home in suburban San Diego. He was 76."
"For users who purchase the add-on technology, the guitar recognizes pitch. Then, its processor directs motors on its six tuning pegs to tighten or loosen the strings accordingly. Tronical has offered its 'Powertune System' online and through retailers in Germany since March, according to the company's Web site. The Gibson Les Paul guitar model with Blue Silverburst finish goes on sale globally Dec. 7."
"LOS ANGELES - He wrote more than a thousand songs, ranging from his 'Dust Bowl' ballads to patriotic incantations like 'Pastures of Plenty' to the American classic 'This Land is Your Land.' He performed them everywhere he went, from community centers to Broadway theaters to California fields filled with migrant workers. He also recorded dozens on records. But one thing Woody Guthrie never got around to doing was recording any of his songs in front of a live audience — or so Guthrie's family thought."
"The second new Joel-penned single since his last pop album, 1993's 'River of Dreams,' is called 'Christmas in Fallujah' and hits iTunes December 4. There are two major differences between it and the classics that have made him one of the best-selling artists of all time. First, there's no piano on it, and second, there's barely any Billy Joel on it, either."
"NEW YORK - An auction at Christie's of rock 'n' roll memorabilia from some of the hottest bands of the 1960s and '70s hauled in big bucks Friday, including $20,000 for a Jimi Hendrix album and more than $4,000 for a Rolling Stones' T-shirt."
When the diviners of rock 'n' roll classics 'Stairway to Heaven,' 'Whole Lotta Love' and 'Your Time is Gonna Come' reunite for their first full concert in almost three decades, the question on everyone's mind is sure to be: How many more times?"
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Finally, you too can post a awful yet oddly intriguing YouTube video such a Tay Zonday did with Chocolate Rain....
...and become famous enough to have your YouTube turned into a full on booty shaking rap video called Cherry Chocolate Rain. Last line of the video "This internet thing is wild". Indeed it is, Tay. Indeed it is.
