D.R.Scott's Pulp Culture

Dave Chappelle

2009-10-29T10:46:00.000-07:00

Do The Math

2009-10-28T10:54:00.000-07:00

Saul Williams

2009-10-27T11:09:00.000-07:00

Bob Fosse

2009-10-26T12:07:00.000-07:00

The Sunday Funnies

2009-10-25T10:35:00.000-07:00

The Grateful Dead

2009-10-24T10:33:00.000-07:00

Bipartisanship

2009-10-23T03:28:00.000-07:00

Noma Bar, Illustrator

2009-10-22T05:02:00.000-07:00

Thanks to A Sport in The Drawer for turning me on to Mr. Bar. I'm forever in your debt, sir.

"Forgetfulness", a poem by Billy Collins

2009-10-21T11:10:00.000-07:00

Forgetfulness - Billy Collins Animated Poetry from smjwt on Vimeo.

Track Meet

2009-10-21T10:51:00.000-07:00

George Tuska, Comic Book Artist (1916 - 2009)

2009-10-21T03:54:00.000-07:00

"George Tuska, whose career in comics dates back to 1939 and his work in Will Eisner's studio, died around midnight on October 16 at the age of 93. The son of Russian immigrants, Tuska was born in Hartford, Connecticut on April 26, 1916 and grew up to attend the National Academy of Design. Even before graduation, he was assisting on the Scorchy Smith newspaper strip and making his way into the then-new form known as the comic book. In addition to the Eisner-Iger shop, he worked for a half-dozen other publishers and studios, including Fiction House, Fawcett, Harvey and Standard.

"Drafted into the army, he served during World War II working as a technical illustrator at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. By the time he got back to New York and civilian life, the trend in comics was swinging from super-heroes to crime comics. He went to work drawing gangster stories for Lev Gleason and quickly became the star artist for that publisher's best-selling books, including the ironically-titled (because of how well it sold) Crime Does Not Pay. Not only did he draw most lead features and the occasional cover but other artists imitated his style. One, an illustrator named Pete Morisi, went so far as to call Tuska and ask for permission to draw like him. Tuska was flattered and told him to go right ahead.

"Though Lev Gleason kept him busy, Tuska chose to freelance occasionally for other publishers, especially for Stan Lee at Timely Comics. When the comic book industry imploded in the mid-fifties, he segued to newspaper strip work, taking over Scorchy Smith for a time, followed by a long run drawing Buck Rogers. In the sixties, he was tapped to draw for Tower Comics on T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents and returned to work for Stan Lee at the newly-successful Marvel line. Lee found him to be a valuable utility man and he worked on many titles including The Avengers, X-Men, Captain America and Daredevil. He was the first artist on Luke Cage, Hero for Hire and became the primary artist on Iron Man for some ten years. From time to time, he picked up assignments for DC, where he was usually assigned to "team" comics including Challengers of the Unknown, Teen Titans, Justice League of America and The Legion of Super-Heroes".

-- Mark Evanier

Back in the 70s, Marvel Comics weren't very good. Ditko, Kirby, and Steranko left the bankrupt House of Ideas years ago. George Tuska was one of those ink-stained guys called up from the minor leagues when Stan Lee's bosses couldn't afford to pay Neal Adams. No, Tuska didn't re-invent the wheel with his artwork, but he worked hard, was always on time, and was a big reason why Marvel didn't cancel the series. Rest In Peace, Mr. Tuska.

Jean Luc Picard's Teapot

2009-10-20T04:58:00.001-07:00

Thanks to BoingBoing for the head's up.

Bag Check

2009-10-20T04:46:00.000-07:00

Baratunde Thurston

2009-10-20T04:24:00.000-07:00

Caught Stealing

2009-10-19T10:59:00.001-07:00

This is how life changes.

You're born in California and raised as an only child in a pleasant suburb a ways east of San Francisco. You have a nice childhood with parents who love you. You play baseball. You are tremendously gifted at the game and you love it. By the time you are seventeen you have a room full of trophies. You have played on two teams that have competed for the Little League World Series and are the star player on your high school's varsity squad. You're a four-tool player: bat, glove, arm, and legs. You play center field. You lead the team in homers, ERA, RBI, stolen bases, and have no errors. Pro scouts have been coming to see you play all year and when you graduate, everyone expects you will skip college to be signed for development by a Major League club. At every game you look into the stands and your parents are always there.

In the regional championship game you are caught stealing third. You slide hard into the bag as the third baseman leaps to snare a high throw from the plate. Your cleats dig into the bottom of the base and as you pop up out of your slide, the third baseman is coming down with the ball. He lands on the ankle of your caught foot and, as you continue up, he falls down with his full weight on your lower leg.

The bone sticks straight out from your calf, and you just stare at it.

The pins they stick in your fibula restrict growth in the bone. It will not heal properly and for the rest of your life you have a hard knot of scar and bundled muscle tissue that aches in cold, wet weather. No one even pretends you will play again.

You stay away from the games and don't see much of your old friends. You have new friends, and you get in a little trouble. You work after school and buy a Mustang and fix it up with your dad, the mechanic. You drive everywhere and drag all the local motor-heads. You always win. When there's no one around to race, you drive fast on the back roads outside of town and get a rush from the speed. It's not baseball, but it's something.

Out by the cattle ranches, after midnight, a calf wanders into the road through a split in the fence. You swerve and pound down on the brake pedal. The wheel crazes out of your hand and the car heels down on the front right tire. The tire explodes. The wheel rim bites into the tarmac and the car flips up and begins to sail end over end. You are suspended in the car, held tight to the seat by the four-point harness your dad insisted you install. The car tumbles through the air and passes harmlessly over the calf. The Ford completes a full revolution, lands on its bottom, careens across the road and slams its front end into an oak.

Your friend Rich does not have his seat belt on. When you first saw the calf and slammed the brakes, Rich was kneeling on his seat, turned around and rummaging in the back for a sweatshirt.

During the flip you are for a moment suspended upside down. Rich bounces around the interior of the car and falls to the roof, sprawled on his back. He is looking at you, into your eyes, his face less than a foot away, inches away. The car flips with sudden violence, Rich disappears from your vision, and as you plow into the tree he appears to leap at the front windshield from somewhere behind you. He launches through the glass and flies the short distance to where the oak catches him brutally.

Lots of people show up at the funeral and cry and hug you. You have a bruised sternum and a cut on your cheek, and you look no one in the eye. Afterward your parents take you home.

In the spring you graduate and in the fall go to college in Northern California. You think about being a physical therapist or an EMT. You think about teaching like your mom. You won't go to work in your dad's garage. You don't want to work on cars anymore. You don't even drive.

You never graduate. You go to college for six years and study a bit of everything and do well at all of it, but you never graduate. You're not sure what to do and then you meet a girl. She's an actress.

You show up in New York with your girl and the two of you stay on the couch at her friend's place. Two weeks after you get to the city, she gets a job on the road and leaves. The friend tells you that you have to move out.

New York has great public transportation. You never have to drive. You decide to stay. You find an apartment the size of your folks' kitchen. You get a job tending bar. For the first time in your life you start drinking. You're good at it.

You live in New York, but you always act like a guy from a small town in California. You help winos out of the gutter, you call an ambulance when you see someone hurt, you loan money to friends who need it and don't ask for it back, you let folks flop at your pad and you help the blind across the street. One night you go to break up a fight in the bar and get knocked around pretty good, so the next day you start taking boxing classes. You drink too much, but your parents don't know that.

You're a good guy, you're tough and you have a reputation in your neighborhood for helping people out. It's nice. It's not the life you expected, but it's nice enough for you. You feel useful, you have friends and your parents love you. Ten years pass.

One day the guy who lives across the hall from you knocks on your door. He needs a big favor. That's when life really changes.

The Sunday Funnies

2009-10-18T10:45:00.001-07:00

Leonard Cohen

2009-10-17T10:45:00.000-07:00

Are You Ready For Some Football? (Week 6 Picks)

2009-10-16T03:44:00.000-07:00

Schadenfreude, ya gotta love it.

Even better, the more Rush opens his big mouth, the more he validates the NFL's decision to keep him out. Didn't he learn anything from the "Monday Night Football" fiasco?

I'm not delusional. I know the big-money corporate overlords in the NFL didn't reject Limbaugh because of their moral values. I'm sure most of these Good Old Boys laugh at the same jokes Rush does. The big difference, however, between Rush Limbaugh and the owners of the NFL is that they can't afford to believe in bullshit. Bullshit is thinking that Donovan McNabb is an "overrated" quarterback. Bullshit is thinking football is a gang fight between Crips and Bloods. Thinking that way will lose you games and that's not good business.

Besides, other than the immense embarrassment of being associated with a stupid, openly racist talk show host, there's another reason the NFL didn't want Rush Limbaugh.

Football is the most successful sport in the United States, and it got that way by treating the athletes like shit. The union is weak, there are no guaranteed contracts, and careers are short. The great Emmitt Smith said that playing football was like "being in a car accident every game." The money these guys are paid isn't commensurate to the damage they do to their bodies. But the players love the game and most of them are too young to envision the painful future at the end of the their careers. The owners like it this way.

Now, with the possible threat of a lockout in 2010, the last thing the owners want is a professional loudmouth racist like Rush Limbaugh coming in the league and reminding the players that they're nothing but property. "Barack, The Magic Negro" ain't gonna be on too many iPods in the locker rooms. The GOP's Great White Hope would be the best argument for a strike the player's union ever had, and Jerry can't afford to have that billion dollar cathedral empty for a season.

Sorry, Rush. Nothing personal. But this is business.

O.K., I'm tired talking about Rush. Are you ready for some football?

The New York Giant vs. The New Orleans Saints
Sunday's best game. When it's over, we'll know which team is going to the Super Bowl.

The Buffalo Bills vs. The New York Jets
The helpless Bills can't run, can't stop the run, can't score. The Jets can't wait.

The Baltimore Ravens vs. The Minnesota Vikings
The Ravens won't lose three in a row. After this game, Brett Favre is gonna age faster than the bad guy in Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade.

The Kansas City Chiefs vs. The Washington Redskins
I'm starting to get the feeling that the only thing Scott Pioli said to Belicheck was, "One or two sugars, Bill?"

The Philadelphia Eagles vs. The Oakland Raiders
Some crazy friends of mine played a drinking game where they did a shot every time JaMarcus Russell fumbled, missed an open receiver and/or looked confused. The EMTs barely got there in time.

The Houston Texans vs. The Cincinnati Bengals
The Bengals got good, got bad for a couple of years, got good again. The Texans were never good.

The St. Louis Rams vs. The Jacksonville Jaguars
Uglier than Rush Limbaugh in a hot tub.

The Carolina Panthers vs. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Uglier than Rush Limbaugh and Karl Rove in a hot tub.

The Pittsburgh Steelers vs. The Cleveland Browns
The Steelers remember that they're Super Bowl champions. The Browns forget how to play football.

The Denver Broncos vs. The San Diego Chargers
Throughout the years, the enigmatic Chargers have been a good team victimized by awful coaching. I think this is the season it finally catches up with them. Norv Turner is a nice guy, great offensive coordinator, lousy coach, future ESPN talking head.

The Arizona Cardinals vs. The Seattle Seahawks
Matt Hasselbeck's ribs get worse.

The Detroit Lions vs. The Green Bay Packers
Maybe the horrible screams of the Lions getting their butts kicked will drown out Favre's mocking laughter. Maybe.

Coming Attractions

2009-10-15T08:08:00.000-07:00

S.O.S.

2009-10-15T08:01:00.000-07:00

The Bum's Rush

2009-10-15T04:32:00.000-07:00

"I mean, let’s face it, we didn’t have slavery in this country for over 100 years because it was a bad thing. Quite the opposite: slavery built the South. I’m not saying we should bring it back; I’m just saying it had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark."

"You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor? James Earl Ray [the confessed assassin of Martin Luther King]. We miss you, James. Godspeed."

"Have you ever noticed how all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson?"

"Do you know what? The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies"

"African-Americans? They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?"

"Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it."

Yeah, Rush, you said it. That's why the NFL wants you to stay the fuck away. As the great philosopher Bill Parcells said, "You are what your record says you are". Rush Limbaugh's own words prove without a shadow of a doubt that he's a) racist, or b) a cynical opportunist who says racist things to make a buck. Either way, that makes him a contemptible human being, and in a sport where 70% of the players are black, it also makes him a very, very bad idea. Words don't go away, Rush. Ask George Allen.

Invisible Man

2009-10-14T05:43:00.000-07:00

Meanwhile, Somewhere In An Alternate Universe...

2009-10-14T05:32:00.001-07:00

Speaking Truth To Power

2009-10-14T05:03:00.000-07:00

"But they've now hoisted themselves on their own insured petard. They've exposed themselves. If they had to compete with a public insurance plan, they couldn't get away with this threat. They couldn't pass on the extra costs. They'd have to compete with a public insurance option that forced them to give consumers the best deals possible.

"Now's the time for Congress and the White House to say to the insurance industry: You want to play hardball? Okay. We'll play it, too. You didn't want a public insurance option. That was one of your conditions for supporting the bill. You wanted gigantic profits from having thirty million new paying customers and the market to yourself. The Senate Finance Committee and the White House agreed because they wanted your support and were afraid of the negative ads and hurricane of opposition you could finance. But you're even greedier than we imagined. And now you've demonstrated that greed to the American people. They don't want to turn over even more of their hard-earned money to you. So, insurance companies, we've got news for you. We're going to make sure Americans have the freedom to choose a public insurance option that's cheaper and better, and you're going to have to work hard to keep them your customers."

-- Robert Reich, Former Secretary of Labor

Imaginary Enemies

2009-10-13T10:58:00.000-07:00

Meleanie Hain: Gun-Carrying Soccer Mom Killed By Husband In Murder Suicide, Police Say

LEBANON, Pa. - A soccer mom who was thrust into the national gun-rights debate after taking a loaded pistol to youth sports events was killed by her husband in a shooting witnessed online by her video chat partner, authorities said Friday.

Scott Hain used his own gun to fire several shots into his 30-year-old wife, Meleanie, while her video chat was active and perhaps as she washed dishes in their kitchen, police said. Scott Hain, 33, later killed himself in an upstairs bedroom.

Meleanie Hain's loaded pistol -- with a bullet ready in the chamber -- was in a backpack hanging from the front door.

The couple's three young children were home just before the murder-suicide, but authorities stopped short of saying they were home at the time. The online friend heard a shot and screams and turned to see Scott Hain firing, they said.

He "observed Scott Hain standing over where Meleanie was and discharging a handgun several times," Lebanon Police Chief Daniel Wright said at a news conference. The man, who was described as a friend of both Scott and Meleanie Hain, called 911.

"He kept open his Web cam episode; however, he heard nothing or saw nothing after that," Wright said. The chat was apparently not recorded.

Meleanie Hain became a voice of the gun-rights movement last year when she fought for the right to carry a holstered pistol at her young daughter's soccer games. Other parents complained, prompting a sheriff to revoke her concealed-weapons permit, a decision a judge later overturned.

"I'm just a soccer mom who has always openly carried (a firearm), and I've never had a problem before," Hain said last fall. "I don't understand why this is happening to me."

Meleanie Hain died because she didn't understand what was really going on.

Hain's death exemplifies the stupid white people who get loud, scared, and angry about the wrong things, not realizing that they're putting their own lives in danger. They're Rush Limbaugh fans, Sarah Palin groupies, the audience that believes everything Fox News tells them to believe, the Teabaggers, the Birthers, and the "Country First" idiots who want to help Grover Norquist drown the government in a bathtub.

Guess who pisses these people off?

No, it's not the rich bastards who own over 90% of the wealth in the United States who bust unions, empty pension funds, close schools, deny cancer patients medical insurance, ship jobs overseas, and send kids to die in unnecessary wars. Of course not. It's a nigger welfare queen driving her stolen Cadillac to pick up that AIDS-infected spic faggot who's sneaking illegally into this country before stopping at the hospital to kill Grandma. Shee-it, let's buy another AK-47, just to feel safe.

Tragically, because Meleanie Hain was so obsessed by imaginary enemies, the gun-carrying soccer mom of three young children wasn't able to recognize the killer that shared her bed.

Hallucinations

2009-10-12T12:58:00.000-07:00

What Birthers Believe - watch more funny videos

The Sunday Funnies

2009-10-11T09:54:00.000-07:00

Sinead O'Connor

2009-10-10T14:43:00.000-07:00

Give Peace A Chance

2009-10-09T15:32:00.001-07:00

(Otherwise known as the "Thank God You're Not The Other Guy!" award)

Happy Birthday, John

2009-10-09T15:23:00.000-07:00

Are You Ready For Some Football?

2009-10-09T12:06:00.000-07:00

Steelers vs. Lions
Not a good day for Detroit as Pittsburgh finally gets over its Super Bowl hangover. No, this season's Lions won't go 0-16 again, but they're not very good either.

Jaguars vs. Seahawks
"Hey, you wanna watch Weekend at Bernie's?"

Redskins vs. Panthers
Ick. It's time for another painful episode of "Dead Coach Walking". The players hate his guts, but as long as Danny Boy lets his pride get in the way of his common sense, Zorn won't lose his job. This game is gonna be uglier than watching Joe Theisman's leg getting pretzeled. Ick.

Cowboys vs. Chiefs
Cassel figures it out. Romo still clueless.

Bengals vs. Ravens
Joe Flacco is the best QB for the Ravens since Trent Dilfer. Because he can score, that superb but aging defense doesn't have to stay out there all day. On the other hand, Carson Palmer is looking like the cold-blooded sniper he was before his knee injury three years ago. A shootout.

Vikings vs. Rams
Brett Favre: a hypocritical narcissist with a million dollar arm and a shit-eating grin. Enjoy it while you can, he won't make it to the end of the season.

Raiders vs. Giants
When did Al Davis turn into Gollum?

Jets vs. Dolphins
The Tuna never would have left New York if Mark Sanchez was his QB. By the way, the "Wildcat" got stale faster than the second season of "Heroes".

Colts vs. Titans
Peyton Manning is The One. Kerry Collins is a backup. Vince Young doesn't know who he is. Ladies and Gentlemen, the 2009 Detroit Lions.

Browns vs. Bills
"Hey, do you want to watch Weekend At Bernie's 2?"

Falcons at 49ers
Who's scarier, Mike Singletary's eyes or Sauron's?

Texans vs. Cardinals
Hey, look! Kurt Warner is burning another copy of "Origin Of Species"!

Patriots vs. Broncos
Romeo or Juliet. Mangenius. Sorry, Charley. Bill Belichick's former assistants haven't done too well after leaving Gillette Stadium. Josh McDaniels, however, might be in a better position to succeed than the other guys. A ridiculously loyal fan base, a supportive owner who steps aside after signing the paychecks, and a stud QB. Not this game, though.

Bucs vs. Eagles
Donovan McNabb proves once again what an asshole Rush Limbaugh is.

Happy Birthday, Mr. Pekar

2009-10-08T16:30:00.000-07:00

The Eigenharp

2009-10-08T08:51:00.001-07:00

Do you drum it, strum it or stroke it?

By Tim Masters
Entertainment correspondent, BBC News

It looks like something played by the alien musicians in the bar in Star Wars.

This is the Eigenharp - described by its developers as "the most expressive electronic musical instrument ever made".

One of my colleagues calls it more simply "a sci-fi bassoon".

The Eigenharp is the brainchild of John Lambert, a musician and software entrepreneur, whose Devon-based team has been working on the project for eight years.

Gig stress

The idea dates back to the early 90s when Lambert played in ambient trance band Shen, who would travel to concerts in a truck packed with musical gear.

"The gigs were really good fun," says Lambert, "but the setting up was just a nightmare. Lots of stuff, equipment, wires, endless stress.

"At the same time I would go to the folk club, take my acoustic guitar out of the box, tune it up, get a pint of beer, and play."

Lambert says the new instrument bridges that gap - bringing a vast range of sounds and drum loops to the fingertips of live performers.

Eigenharp from Eigenharp on Vimeo.

Happy Birthday, Sigourney

2009-10-08T07:04:00.000-07:00

"I'm no Ripley. I had doubts that I could play her as strongly as she had to be played, but I must say that it was fun exploring that side of myself. Women don't get to do that very often."

God's Photo Album

2009-10-08T04:15:00.000-07:00

Fantasy Island

2009-10-07T07:30:00.000-07:00

"So what is the theme of our history lesson? It is a story of remarkable volume and utter weakness. It is the story of media mavens who claim to represent a hidden majority but who in fact represent a mere niche — even in the Republican Party. It is a story as old as “The Wizard of Oz,” of grand illusions and small men behind the curtain.

"Over the years, I have asked many politicians what happens when Limbaugh and his colleagues attack. The story is always the same. Hundreds of calls come in. The receptionists are miserable. But the numbers back home do not move. There is no effect on the favorability rating or the re-election prospects. In the media world, he is a giant. In the real world, he’s not.

"So the myth returns. Just months after the election and the humiliation, everyone is again convinced that Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and the rest possess real power. And the saddest thing is that even Republican politicians come to believe it. They mistake media for reality. They pre-emptively surrender to armies that don’t exist.

"They pay more attention to Rush’s imaginary millions than to the real voters down the street. The Republican Party is unpopular because it’s more interested in pleasing Rush’s ghosts than actual people. The party is leaderless right now because nobody has the guts to step outside the rigid parameters enforced by the radio jocks and create a new party identity. The party is losing because it has adopted a radio entertainer’s niche-building strategy, while abandoning the politician’s coalition-building strategy.

"The rise of Beck, Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and the rest has correlated almost perfectly with the decline of the G.O.P. But it’s not because the talk jocks have real power. It’s because they have illusory power, because Republicans hear the media mythology and fall for it every time."

--David Brooks, columnist for The New York Times.

Well, what do you know?

Usually, Brooks is a two-faced, contemptible asshole, but he's absolutely right this time.

Remember what a cakewalk the presidential election turned out to be? Believe me, it wasn't like the night I helplessly sat and watched the ascension of St. Ronnie a hundred years ago. Despite all the noisy propaganda coming from the screaming heads at Fox News, it was obvious early on that Obama was gonna win and win big. No matter how hard the Republicans tried to steal Obama's presidency, they couldn't. The real Americans outnumbered the ditto-heads.

Still, the one thing I would disagree with Brooks about is it isn't just the Republicans who are hypnotized by the Becks, the Limbaughs, the Bill O'Reillys and the other cogs in the GOP's Pretty Hate Machine: it's the Democrats as well. Why else would they continue to act like they're the minority party?

Months ago, in a rare display of arrogance, Obama said two words to a Republican jerk who was arguing with him at a contentious meeting: "I won."

I hope President Obama and the rest of the Democratic party remembers that reality, otherwise they won't get to keep their hard-earned victory for long.

28 Days Later in 60 Seconds, One Take

2009-10-06T14:04:00.000-07:00

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Groucho

2009-10-05T14:58:00.000-07:00

By Jon Carroll
The San Francisco Chronicle
Friday, July 22, 2005

Many people, at some point in their lives, think they want to start a magazine. I was at that point some years ago, and with a bunch of friends (most of them refugees from Rolling Stone), I did indeed participate in the starting of magazine. It was called Flash. We put out Issue No. 0 in an effort to attract investors. We attracted no investors. Thus ended Flash.

See, we had the idea that investors wanted to see great writing. So (unlike most "for-purposes-of-raising-money-only" dummy issues), ours had a whole magazine's worth of writing.

This just in: Investors do not care about writing. They care about business plans, advertising commitments, market research and demographic profiles. We had no plan, no commitments, no research, and our demographic profile was us. We wanted to make a magazine for us. We did, of course, contain multitudes, but our multitudes were not an attractive demographic.

If we'd had a trust fund, that would have been cool. But we didn't. If you have (a) an idea for a magazine, (b) great writing and (c) no trust fund, please consider a career in auto parts.

But I did get an interview with Groucho Marx out of the deal. I called him up and asked; his home number wasn't that hard to get. I may have intimated that I was from Esquire. If I'd said I was from Flash, he would have hung up on me. You see the dilemma.

We had an appointment with Groucho at noon at the Bistro in Beverly Hills. My partners in interview (and, may I say, in deception) were the writer Michael Goodwin and the photographer Robert Altman. Being impoverished, we got up at 4 a.m. and drove down to Beverly Hills from San Francisco. When the interview was over, we drove back. That's 16 hours on the road (Interstate 5 had not been finished yet) for two hours of interview. On the other hand, it was an interview with Groucho Marx.

Goodwin had made some driving tapes. He had an extremely fine concept: He would put a song on the tape, then a variable gap of silence, then another song. It was as if the music were taking part in the conversation. I don't think you can program an iPod that way, so the Goodwin High-Concept Driving Music Program has been obsoleted. Too bad.

We drove through tule fog. Because we had an appointment with Groucho Marx, we drove fast. I was terrified. The phrase "50-car pileup" crossed my mind more than once.

It was a pretty great interview. Groucho was 76, but he was entirely Groucho. He wanted to talk about sex, so we talked about sex. He also wanted anarchy. At one point he asked me, apropos of nothing: "Are you a girl?"

"No, I'm not a girl," I riposted.

Groucho: "I thought it was time we settled that."

Me: "Are you talking about my hair?"

Groucho: "No, it was the mustache. Will you pass the pumpernickel, please?"

The pumpernickel was a running gag of the interview. Anytime there was a subject he didn't want to talk about, the pumpernickel made an appearance.

Goodwin asked Groucho if he'd made enough money in his career to live comfortably.

Groucho: "As a rule, I don't answer any questions as personal as that. Suppose I asked you how much you had?"

Goodwin: "In my pocket right now?"

Groucho "No."

Goodwin: "I'll tell you."

Groucho: "But I'm not interested."

Carroll: "That's why we're interviewing you and you're not interviewing us."

Groucho: "So far all I've had are two slices of pumpernickel."

There was a bizarre not-pumpernickel-related coda to this interview. At one point, talking about the sad state of things in the Watergate years, Groucho said, "The only hope for this country is the assassination of Richard Nixon." This was right at the time the Black Panther member David Hilliard was locked up for "threatening the life of the president."

When it became clear that Flash was going nowhere, Goodwin sold the interview to a Canadian film magazine, and from there it was picked up (illegally, I might say) by the Berkeley Barb.

James L. Browning, an ambitious attorney general, was shown the interview and promptly announced that he planned to arrest Groucho on the same charges that faced Hilliard. Contacted for his response, Groucho said: "I didn't say that. I never tell the truth."

Oh Lord, how I wish that case had come to trial. The cross-examination of Groucho Marx -- that would have been a moment in American history.

Groucho said: "Oh, I know my way around a joke. It's like a guy who builds a cement wall, he knows how to do it. I never had any writers, except in the movies."

The Sunday Funnies

2009-10-04T03:52:00.000-07:00

Michael Franti and Spearhead

2009-10-03T05:04:00.000-07:00

A Change Is Gonna Come?

2009-10-02T09:28:00.000-07:00

O.K., I'm a grown up. I know in the Real World, it takes luck and a lot of hard work to get things done and it doesn't happen overnight.

However, we're seeing a clearer picture of what kind of President we have and it's disturbing. Repeatedly saying to ourselves "Well, he's not a bad as Bush" or "President McCain?" isn't good enough anymore. When I voted for Barack Obama, I didn't expect to see a moderate Republican in the White House. While I enjoyed watching Rep. Alan Grayson beating up on Republican assholes, I would have enjoyed it more if I saw Obama do it.

History has shown us that the great Presidents have been smart, charismatic, imaginative, articulate, and ruthless. As H.L. Mencken said, "There comes a time in every man's life where he wants to spit on his hands, haul up the black flag, and start slitting throats." That's the attitude that gave us the Emanicipation Proclamation, The New Deal and The Great Society.

Sadly, unless he's beating up on leftists, progressives, gay people or uppity field negroes, Obama is afraid to yell at Rich Old White Guys. Obama doesn't want to be FDR. Obama wants to be Sally Field ("You like me! You really like me!"). Call me skeptical, but I don't think this timid, inoffensive, why-can't-we-all get- along approach is gonna work. To paraphrase a popular bumper sticker, "Well-Behaved Black Men Rarely Make History."

It was a great moment for America when Obama was elected president. But we don't know yet if he's going to be a great President.

History's waiting, Mr. Obama.

Third and Goal

2009-10-01T11:57:00.000-07:00

“Looking at the former restrictions on human rights in our country starting with slavery, women not being able to vote, blacks being counted as two thirds of a human, segregation, no gays in the military (to list a few) all have gone by the wayside. But now here in 2009 same sex marriages are prohibited. I think we will look back in 10, 20, 30 years and be amazed that gays and lesbians did not have the same rights as every one else. How did this ever happen in the land of the free and the home of the brave? Are we really free?”

--Brendon Ayanbadejo, linebacker for the Baltimore Ravens

Brendon Ayanbadejo sure doesn’t fit the stereotype of a dull-witted NFL player, huh? It’s exhilarating to see a player from one of the toughest football teams in the league proving that you don’t have to be a homophobic jerk to be a man. Besides, anybody stupid enough to call him a “faggot-loving punk” is gonna get their ass kicked.

A Letter From Dawn Smith

2009-10-01T09:43:00.000-07:00

Dear MoveOn member,

I'm at the end of my rope. What CIGNA is doing to me is—well, it's outrageous.

I have a brain tumor. Doctors are ready to help me. But CIGNA has been blocking me from getting testing and treatment for two years, while almost doubling my premiums.

Then, this week was the kicker. CIGNA's pharmacy called to say that the co-pay on the medicine that helps control my debilitating head pain is skyrocketing from $10 to $1,115. That's not a typo. They're making me pay one hundred times what I'm paying now, in addition to my $753/month premium.

I can't afford that. So when the pain comes, I won't have any defense. I'll spend hours in the fetal position, out of my mind with pain.

When my story went public a couple of weeks ago—with the help of over 100,000 MoveOn members—CIGNA said they would pay for a test I'd been asking for at Cleveland Clinic. It was a step in the right direction. But after two years of denials, and with a long course of treatment ahead of me, I knew better than to just take them at their word.

So I asked questions. But they wouldn't offer any explanation for why they denied my coverage for so long, or any assurance that they had changed their procedures so I wouldn't face the same unjust denials again. And I began to wonder if they were more interested in just sweeping my story under the rug than actually helping me.

When I got this latest news from CIGNA's pharmacy on Tuesday, I kept asking myself, is this a mistake? Or is this happening because I went public with my case? Are other CIGNA customers receiving the same phone calls?

I used to give CIGNA the benefit of the doubt, but after years of unexplained denials, I've had enough. So I'm asking for your help again. For myself, and for everyone else who is suffering, I am asking CIGNA for answers.

And I think it would help if thousands of people like you were to join me in demanding them. I'm writing them a short letter with a simple question: Why? Can you add your name to my letter?

Here's what I've written to Dr. Jeffrey Kang, CIGNA's Chief Medical Officer:

As you probably know, your company has denied me needed care for two years while I suffer from a debilitating but treatable brain tumor. I pay my $753.47 premiums. I follow the proper procedures. But CIGNA refuses to give me the care I need.

Instead, you keep increasing my prices. First my premiums rose by hundreds of dollars, and now my prescription costs are going up by more than 10,000%.

What makes you think you can treat sick people this way? When will you stop doing this to me and the thousands of people like me who are suffering? And if you solve this latest problem, how do I know you won't do this to me again next week—that you're actually changing your ways and not just trying to make your PR problem disappear?

Please answer these questions. I need to know, for the sake of my health and my life. Many others have signed this letter too, to support me and make sure I get answers.

Respectfully,
Dawn Smith

Thanks for all you're doing. I don't know where I'd be without MoveOn members' help.

Most sincerely,
Dawn

Roman Polanski, Rapist

2009-10-01T02:59:00.000-07:00

The odds are good that Roman Polanski is going to get away with it.

Let's remember, there's no gray area here. In a civilized society, this case would be a slam dunk for the prosecution. Polanski is a rapist, a child molester and a sociopath. The famous Oscar-winning director took a 13 year old girl to Jack Nicholson's house and sodomized her. What's worse, the cops didn't have to work very hard to find out what happened because not only did Polanski confess to his crime, he bragged about it. "Everybody wants to fuck a young girl," Polanski explained.

And the idiotic Hollywood celebrities eagerly signing the "Free Roman Polanski!" petition obviously agree. Behind the pathetic excuses and lame rationalizations, what these politically-correct assholes are really saying is that Rich White Guys have the right to fuck children. "Maybe Roman was wrong, but hey, I loved Chinatown." Jesus. Only in Tinseltown is an Oscar a "Get Out Of Jail Free" card.

Does anybody remember Leona Bobbit? Now that was a woman who knew what to do to a rapist.

When Republicans Attack!

2009-09-30T04:06:00.000-07:00

Rep. Alan Grayson hit the bull's-eye.

Call me a crazed, don't-wanna-grow-up fanboy, but Grayson's no-bullshit presentation reminded me of a scene in Independence Day. As you recall, the earth is being attacked by invaders from outer space. When an alien is taken prisoner, the President of the United States asks it, "What do you want?"

"We want you to DIE!!!" the alien screams.

Maybe the Republicans don't have death rays, but their intentions are the same. I'm glad Grayson reminded us.

The Marie Osmond Interview

2009-09-30T03:15:00.000-07:00

I remember the day I fell in like with Marie Osmond.

It happened years ago when I was watching an episode of "Hollywood Squares" and Marie and Donny were the guests. During the show, Donny (as usual) said something that was stupid and incredibly insensitive.

As everybody else cringed with embarrassment (Donny, of course, was clueless), Marie looked at her doofus of a brother and said, "My God, I hope it's not genetic." The audience roared.

Throughout her career, Marie always came across as a smart, gracious, and honest woman who wasn't afraid to speak her mind, and this interview quietly reaffirmed her integrity and strength of character. When you think about how the LDS Church financed the campaign banning same-sex marriage in California, Marie gently but firmly spoke out against her church's homophobia and showed people that not all Mormons are bigots.

It's so easy to be loud, angry and cruel these days. But Marie Osmond did a very brave thing: she dared to be kind. That's what Jesus was talking about.

Lily

2009-09-29T02:38:00.001-07:00

Man invented language to satisfy his deep need to complain.

Ninety-eight percent of the adults in this country are decent, hard-working, honest Americans. It's the other lousy two percent that get all the publicity. But then, we elected them.

No matter how cynical you get, it is impossible to keep up.

Reality is a crutch for people who can't cope with drugs.

Sometimes I worry about being a success in a mediocre world.

The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat.

We're all in this alone.

Don't be afraid of missing opportunities. Behind every failure is an opportunity somebody wishes they had missed.

I worry that the person who thought up Muzak may be thinking up something else.

The road to success is always under construction.

Sometimes I feel like a figment of my own imagination.

I always wondered why somebody doesn't do something about that. Then I realized I was somebody.

The Next Great Depression Is Just Around The Corner

2009-09-28T04:52:00.001-07:00

U.S. Job Seekers Exceed Openings by Record Ratio

Despite signs that the economy has resumed growing, unemployed Americans now confront a job market that is bleaker than ever in the current recession, and employment prospects are still getting worse. Job seekers now outnumber openings six to one, the worst ratio since the government began tracking open positions in 2000. According to the Labor Department’s latest numbers, from July, only 2.4 million full-time permanent jobs were open, with 14.5 million people officially unemployed.

And even though the pace of layoffs is slowing, many companies remain anxious about growth prospects in the months ahead, making them reluctant to add to their payrolls.

“There’s too much uncertainty out there,” said Thomas A. Kochan, a labor economist at M.I.T.’s Sloan School of Management. “There’s not going to be an upsurge in job openings for quite a while, not until employers feel confident the economy is really growing.”

Duh.

What the fuck do people expect?

The United States wilingly destroyed its manufacturing base and outsourced most of the jobs. We all can’t be cashiers at WallyWorld.

The last I heard, capitalism only works if folks got the money to buy shit. Hey, somebody tell that commie rat Marx to stop laughing.

And lately, the only thing a Visa card is good for is cutting your throat.

Maybe I’m wrong, but wouldn’t it be a great idea if this country made a serious investment in our infrastructure? Besides creating jobs, it would make me (and a bunch of other people) feel a lot better knowing the bridge I’m driving on ain’t gonna fall down.

Fat chance. If the Republicans and the treasonous Blue Dog Democrats are able to kill the public option in Obama’s timid, not-so-ambitious health care plan, did you think they’ll let keep any of his other empty promises?

No wonder my father idolized FDR. That was a president who knew how to get things done. As he told opponents of the New Deal, “They hate me, and I welcome their hatred.” Bipartisanship, my ass.

In enacting sweeping social reforms, Roosevelt was more of a gangsta than Obama will ever be.

Anyway, at least it'll be easy to find the unemployment office. Just follow the long long line over there.

The Sunday Funnies

2009-09-27T12:16:00.001-07:00

Gandalf Murphy and The Slambovian Circus of Dreams

2009-09-26T05:48:00.000-07:00

Losing The War

2009-09-25T03:51:00.000-07:00

Did you hear this?

"They have a president, a large majority in the House and 60 votes in the Senate," Senator Mitch McConnell said. "If they all want to join together in unison and raise taxes and cut medicare, they can do that." Amazingly, this Republican idiot decided not to lie which just goes to prove, I guess, that accidents happen.

However, McConnell's right. The state of health care in the United States is a big problem and it's getting bigger. Duh.

45,000 Americans are dying every year because they're uninsured. If this was a war, we'd have surrendered a long time ago.

Can you say "genocide"?

But nothing's happening.

The Republicans don't care because it's their job not to care. Inside their bodies are black holes that suck up light and any random crumbs of compassion.

The Democrats care because it's their job but they won't do anything and they feel really really bad about it. Maybe it's because they don't have any balls and a wet limp fraying rope where their spines should be. Leverage means nothing if you won't use it.

45, 000 and counting.

I think you and I and the other progressives have to re-think our strategy. Those numbers are going to catch up with us sooner or later.

Obviously, it isn't the Republicans who are the problem. It's the cowards, the Blue Dogs and the two-faced Democrats who act like Republicans in the closet. Until we can vote them out nothing will change.

But they keep on getting re-elected, damn it.

What can we do? We can't vote for the Republicans, the party of Rush Limbaugh, the teabaggers and Fox News. But how can we vote for the Democrats, the do-nothing party of the cowardly, two-faced Blue Dogs?

Maybe we shouldn't vote at all. Yeah, that'll help.

Shit.

What a lousy menu. Ain't much to choose from.

Somewhere, a sad Ralph Nader is saying, "I told you so."

Grandma Got Run Over By The CEO of an Insurance Company

2009-09-23T05:28:00.000-07:00

Charley Pierce has an essay in The Nation that everybody should read:

Does anyone honestly believe that this White House has acted in good faith? With its allies in Congress? With its constituents? Hell, with its own campaign promises? Does anyone honestly believe that, say, Chuck Todd gives a rat's ass how many people out in the country slowly sicken and die as long as Chuck can tell us who's up and who's down, and what's politically feasible and what's not, and that he can still get a good table at the Palm? Never in my long career as a professional cynic have I seen an spasm of Beltway bubblehood so far removed from the actual concerns of people's lives--so far removed that, last weekend, we had a gathering of the politically halt, lame, blind, and crippled in Washington, gathered for the sole purpose of petitioning various oligarchs to keep screwing them with their pants on. Never in my long career as a professional cynic have I seen a spasm of Beltway bubblehood so far beyond even the limits of Irish Smartass to describe it. The political class in this country--politician and journalist, lobbyist and legislator, Republican and Democratic, Executive and Legislative -- has made a collective decision to protect the profits of one of the least popular industries in the history of the Republic, to preserve the iron grip of corporate bureaucrats over the practice of medicine in America, and to refuse virtually without serious discussion to adopt measures favored by 77 percent of the voting public. It is to be in awe, is what it is.

I don't get it. Sure, 77% makes sense, no problem. But why isn't it 100%?

O.K., I understand that trying to figure out crazy people is a dumb thing to do, but seeing these mean, loud, angry and batshit crazy teabaggers protest against changing the lousy health care system in this country has given me a headache that won't go away. I should probably go to a doctor but I can't afford the co-pay. I wish I was joking.

What exactly are we "protecting" here? The cold hard statistics tell us the 45, 000 people uninsured people die every year no matter what Rush Limbaugh thinks. Yelling as loud as you can won't postpone the inevitable: everybody gets sick, sooner or later. You'll get sick, you'll get hurt, or you'll get old. There's a hospital bed in our future, and it's gonna cost us a lot of money.

But, as Ronald Reagan chuckled, "Facts are stupid things," and these idiots stubbornly refuse to face the facts. You see them on CNN and Fox News threatening the non-crazy people, carrying ugly posters of Barack Obama with a painted-on Hitler mustache, and oiling their guns. No, I don't get it. The teabaggers remind me of the clueless meat puppets in horror movies who ignore the horrible screams and the disembodied corpses until it's too late. "Huh? There's a monster?!?" the victim screams, just before he becomes lunch.

However, it's the CEOs of the insurance that are the real monsters here, and they like things just the way they are. No, they're not selling cigarettes that cause lung cancer or unsafe cars that fall apart, but they do get rich denying medical coverage for trivial and ridiculous reasons and letting people die. It's nothing personal, it's just business. They're hungry and we're on the menu. I wish I was exaggerating.

Protect Insurance Companies PSA from Will Ferrell

Willful Lobotomies

2009-09-22T13:46:00.001-07:00

Awful. Embarrassing. Tragic. Frightening. Obscene. Idiotic. I feel as though there aren't enough words in the language to express how I feel. The more I think about how criminally uneducated the high school kids in Oklahoma are, the more words come rushing in to fuel my horror and outrage.

However, there's one one that's inappropriate and I won't use it: funny.

It doesn't matter what I think, of course. The ugly jokes are going to be here sooner or later, like demented clowns tumbling out of a volkswagon. This fiasco is comedy gold and you know those writers on The Daily Show are already sharpening their pickaxes.

But it still isn't funny. The fact that there's high schools in America that can't (or, what's worse, won't) teach students who was the first President of the United States is a punch line wearing brass knuckles. Wanna bet it's not just history they're lousy at? Can these kids balance a checkbook? Fill out a job application at WalMart? But I bet they know the name of the actor who played Edward in Twilight.

Sadly, failure of the educational system is in further evidence of the decline of the American Empire. Our government starts illegal and unnecessary wars and tortures prisoners. Our CEO's loot the pension funds of their employees and are rewarded with big bonuses. And our schools keep schoolchildren dumb and don't feel bad about it. It's a global village now, and we're the village idiots.

But hey, stupid is as stupid does.

"Skinhead", A Poem by Patricia Smith

2009-09-21T04:48:00.000-07:00

They call me skinhead, and I got my own beauty.
It is knife-scrawled across my back in sore, jagged letters,
it’s in the way my eyes snap away from the obvious.
I sit in my dim matchbox,
on the edge of a bed tousled with my ragged smell,
slide razors across my hair,
count how many ways
I can bring blood closer to the surface of my skin.
These are the duties of the righteous,
the ways of the anointed.

The face that moves in my mirror is huge and pockmarked,
scraped pink and brilliant, apple-cheeked,
I am filled with my own spit.
Two years ago, a machine that slices leather
sucked in my hand and held it,
whacking off three fingers at the root.
I didn’t feel nothing till I looked down
and saw one of them on the floor
next to my boot heel,
and I ain’t worked since then.

I sit here and watch niggers take over my TV set,
walking like kings up and down the sidewalks in my head,
walking like their fat black mamas named them freedom.
My shoulders tell me that ain’t right.
So I move out into the sun
where my beauty makes them lower their heads,
or into the night
with a lead pipe up my sleeve,
a razor tucked in my boot.
I was born to make things right.

It’s easy now to move my big body into shadows,
to move from a place where there was nothing
into the stark circle of a streetlight,
the pipe raised up high over my head.
It’s a kick to watch their eyes get big,
round and gleaming like cartoon jungle boys,
right in that second when they know
the pipe’s gonna come down, and I got this thing
I like to say, listen to this, I like to say
“Hey, nigger, Abe Lincoln’s been dead a long time.”

I get hard listening to their skin burst.
I was born to make things right.

Then this newspaper guy comes around,
seems I was a little sloppy kicking some fag’s ass
and he opened his hole and screamed about it.
This reporter finds me curled up in my bed,
those TV flashes licking my face clean.
Same ol’ shit.
Ain’t got no job, the coloreds and spics got ’em all.
Why ain’t I working? Look at my hand, asshole.
No, I ain’t part of no organized group,
I’m just a white boy who loves his race,
fighting for a pure country.
Sometimes it’s just me. Sometimes three. Sometimes 30.
AIDS will take care of the faggots,
then it’s gon’ be white on black in the streets.
Then there’ll be three million.
I tell him that.

So he writes it up
and I come off looking like some kind of freak,
like I’m Hitler himself. I ain’t that lucky,
but I got my own beauty.
It is in my steel-toed boots,
in the hard corners of my shaved head.

I look in the mirror and hold up my mangled hand,
only the baby finger left, sticking straight up,
I know it’s the wrong goddamned finger,
but fuck you all anyway.
I’m riding the top rung of the perfect race,
my face scraped pink and brilliant.
I’m your baby, America, your boy,
drunk on my own spit, I am goddamned fuckin’ beautiful.

And I was born

and raised

right here.

The Sunday Funnies

2009-09-20T05:32:00.000-07:00

Peter Mulvey

2009-09-19T15:05:00.000-07:00

Jackass

2009-09-18T12:59:00.000-07:00

Sick

2009-09-17T15:34:00.000-07:00

Here's some more bad news about the health care crisis from The Washington Post:

Forty percent of employers surveyed said they are likely to increase the amount their workers pay out of pocket for doctor visits. Almost as many said they are likely to raise annual deductibles and the amount workers pay for prescription drugs.

Nine percent said they plan to tighten eligibility for health benefits; 8 percent said they plan to drop coverage entirely. Forty-one percent of employers said they were "somewhat" or "very" likely to increase the amount employees pay in premiums -- though that would not necessarily mean employees are paying a higher percentage of the premiums. Employers could simply be passing along the same proportional share of the overall increase that they did in 2009.

Costs go up, coverage goes down, insurance companies deny benefits and people die. But in spite of this never-ending horrorshow the Teabaggers snarl, "You won't take this shitty health care system away from me until you drag it from my cold dead fingers." The way things look, that won't take long.

Travels With Charley

2009-09-16T16:23:00.000-07:00

The Great Meltdown

2009-09-15T16:05:00.000-07:00

Jim Carroll, Poet (1949-2009)

2009-09-14T06:14:00.000-07:00

The Sunday Funnies

2009-09-13T13:56:00.000-07:00

Capercaillie

2009-09-12T11:08:00.000-07:00

You Lie, Boy!

2009-09-11T11:03:00.000-07:00

The Invaders

2009-09-10T03:48:00.000-07:00

Do you ever get the feeling that the United States has been invaded by aliens? What's worse, they're winning.

No, you won't see these alien invaders hovering menacingly over the White House in their flying saucers. Oddly enough, these enemies of the human race have been seen at the town hall meetings on health care, acting like angry rednecks yelling at the black kids sitting at the "white only" section in the cafeteria. When Barney Frank asked one of them, "What planet do you live on?", it was closer to the truth than he realized.

After all, what planet do these lunatics live on where they think this nightmare of a health care system the United States is stuck with is good? What planet do they live on where people are supposed to feel sorry for insurance companies? What planet do they live on where nobody ever gets sick?

Beam me up, Scotty, there's no intelligent life down here. Let's go to Canada instead. For some reason the aliens are afraid to go there.

Stabbed In The Back

2009-09-09T01:00:00.000-07:00

Van Jones is a globally recognized, award-winning pioneer in human rights and the clean energy economy. He is a 1993 graduate of the Yale Law School and an attorney.

Van wrote the definitive book on "green jobs": The Green Collar Economy. In 2008 — thanks to a low-cost, viral marketing campaign — his book became an instant New York Times bestseller. It is today being translated into six languages.

As a tireless advocate for disadvantaged people and the environment, Van helped to pass America's first "green job training" legislation: the Green Jobs Act, which George W. Bush signed into law as a part of the 2007 Energy Bill. He is the co-founder of a number of successful non-profit organizations, including the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and Green For All.

Van is the recipient of many awards and honors, including: the Reebok International Human Rights Award; the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leader designation; the prestigious, international Ashoka Fellowship; and many more. Van was included in the Ebony Magazine "Power 150" list of most influential African Americans for 2009. In 2008, Essence magazine named him one of the 25 most inspiring/influential African Americans. TIME Magazine named him an environmental hero in 2008. In 2009, TIME named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world.

President Obama had his "Sister Souljah" moment and Van Jones lost his job because of it. Now we see what happens when an uppity African-American man speaks his mind. Whatever else you can say about our former Commander In Chief, Bush always backed up his guys ("You're doing a heckuva job, Brownie!") But because Obama couldn't stand up to a delusional TV host, the bloodied scalp of Van Jones is hanging from Glenn Beck's belt. Somewhere, the Reverend Wright is saying "I know how you feel, brother Van."

Point/Counterpoint

2009-09-08T06:20:00.000-07:00

Thanks, Mock, Paper, Scissors!

Living Colour

2009-09-07T19:45:00.001-07:00

The Sunday Funnies

2009-09-06T10:40:00.000-07:00

Wicked Game

2009-09-04T16:26:00.000-07:00

My hands have stopped shaking by the time I arrive in downtown Sherwood. After checking my side street for suspicious characters—more than the usual, anyway—I grab half of David’s books from my trunk and head up to my apartment, over Dean’s Pawn Shop. It really is the best in town, as evidenced by the large red-and-white sign in the window: “No Stolen Goods.” Dean might as well have written “Wink Wink” at the bottom of the sign.

I enter through a double-locked, street-level door next to the shop, then clomp up a dark stairwell—I’ve been bugging Dean for weeks to change the unreachable light bulb—to another door, also double-locked, leading to my apartment.

The stale hot air chokes me. I hurry three steps down the hall to the bedroom, where my only air conditioner perches in the window. Soon my suit lies crumpled in the corner, and I’m standing before the AC in my underwear, letting the frigid breeze dry every drop of fear-infused sweat.

Once cooled to the point of shivering, I switch on my computer and connect to the Internet, then run to the kitchen to avoid the modem’s eviscerated-android screech.

I open the fridge to see one lonely beer looking for company. It finds its ideal mate in a piece of leftover pizza.

Back in my bedroom, my e-mail has finished downloading. At the top of my inbox sits a message from David, sent a few minutes ago:

ARE YOU LISTENING?

“Yeah yeah yeah.” I switch my alarm clock to the radio function and search for WMMP’s frequency. (Do they know that their call letters sort of spell ‘wimp’?) I scan the lower end of the dial until a harmonica purrs from the tiny speaker.

Returning to my e-mail, I noticed that one of my inbox's subfolders is bolded. It looks like this: “M (1),” which means I have one message from a person who gets filtered into her own subfolder “M.” She must have convinced the guards to give her computer access again.

The message crouches safely behind a wall of mouse clicks. After a few moments of stomach-churning hesitation, I leave it there.

Just before midnight, I send my last “I finally got a Job!” e-mail, this one to my former foster parents. Stretching to crack my vertebrae over the back of the chair, I notice the radio’s gone silent. Did the signal die? I grab my beer and cross the room to make sure the plug hasn’t slipped out of the ancient, fire-code-violating outlet.

Then a voice, soft and low, says, “I’ll never...never get out of these blues alive.” For a moment I wonder if the voice belongs to Monroe the DJ—I haven’t paid enough attention to know what he sounds like. Then a guitar eases in, followed by light applause. The words must have been the name of the song.

A slow, insistent drumbeat joins the hushed guitar, mesmerizing me even before I hear the first lyrics. I sit on the bed, gingerly, as if an abrupt movement could break the spell.

His voice sweeps over me, crooning of black coffee, cigarettes, and the futility of trying to sleep in the face of heartache.

An impassioned piano joins in, defying the lyrics’ doom. I close my eyes and I’m there, in a dim, smoky bar where loners sway, heavy-lidded, wrapped in thoughts of those they’ve lost. I swallow the last warm sip of beer and wish I had another.

The song ends. Applause erupts. I click off the radio before another voice can take the singer’s place. His contagious restlessness prickles my skin and shatters my sleepiness. I can’t lie down. Even the soft cool sheets would scour my nerves.

I draw up the shade and peer out my window. The quiet streets of Sherwood beckon, begging me to make one last run before this normal life tightens like a straitjacket.

I tap my nails against the wooden sill in a quickening rhythm and wait for someone, anyone. But in a small town at this hour, the sidewalks and alleys are empty of prey.

Besides, I always hunt far from home.

Sympathy for the Devil

2009-09-03T04:33:00.000-07:00

I bet Patrick Buchanan thought Hogan's Heroes was a documentary. Oh, those wacky Nazis!

Warning

2009-09-02T11:23:00.000-07:00

Congress gets lowest marks in 24 years

While President Obama's poll numbers are dropping, it could be worse.

A national survey out today gives such low favorability marks to Congress that it's at its lowest mark in the 24-year history of the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.

Only 37 percent of respondents had a favorable opinion of Congress, down from 50 percent in April, and 52 percent had an unfavorable view.

While the displeasure with Republicans (40 percent favorable) is still higher than for Democrats (48 percent favorable, the Democratic number has dropped 11 percentage points since April.

And Pew says there are warning signs for Democrats heading into the 2010 mid-term election.

"Voters are about evenly divided when asked how they would vote if the election for Congress were being held today," Pew says, with 45 percent saying they would vote for a Democratic candidate in their district, or lean Democratic, while 44 percent say they would vote for a Republican or lean Republican.

"At about this point four years ago, Democrats led in the generic congressional ballot by 52% to 40% and went on to win a majority of the popular vote and regain control of Congress the following November," Pew notes.

Most of the shift is among independents, who had overwhelmingly backed Democrats but now say they would back Republicans in their districts by 43 percent to 38 percent.

The poll, conducted Aug. 20-27, has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.

I think Obama needs to stop playing these useless political games of holographic chess with the Republicans and "Blue Dog" Democrats and pick up a baseball bat. Now.

Talent

2009-09-01T15:32:00.001-07:00

Louis CK, Comedian

2009-08-31T16:53:00.000-07:00

The Sunday Funnies

2009-08-30T12:24:00.001-07:00

John Mitchell

2009-08-29T10:59:00.000-07:00

Monster

2009-08-28T16:34:00.000-07:00

Boy, Rush Limbaugh is a hateful toad, isn't he? Still, over 50,000 people in Massachusetts showed up at Kennedy's funeral to say "Thank you". Other than friends and family, the only reason anybody would attend Rush's funeral would be to see if it was true.

Vidiot

2009-08-28T15:50:00.000-07:00

Lost In Space

2009-06-05T20:54:00.000-07:00

"Rush and his ilk have come up with a name for the first Hispanic on the Supreme Court that's been 99 percent white men for 200 years, and that name is 'reverse racist.' She is a racist and someone has to stop her because for too long white men have been kept down by powerful Puerto Rican women!"---Bill Maher

Oops.

The GOP doesn't seem to have any room for the Latino community in their "big tent".

This will not end well. When the approval for the Republican party is bottoming out at 28%, it sure doesn't sound like a smart idea to piss off Latinos, especially when they're going to outnumber the Angry White Guys eventually.

The Sotomayor nomination looks like another brilliant chess move by Obi Wan Obama. Unless the screaming heads at Fox News are able to produce photographs of our future Supreme Court justice eating a broiled white Christian baby with a side order of beans and rice, the Republicans can't stop her from being confirmed. And voters aren't going to forget how horribly Ms. Sotomayor was treated by the racist dirtbags of the GOP.

Revenge is a dish best served cold. Please, sir, may I have some more?

Quote

2009-06-04T03:44:00.001-07:00

Beth Ditto

2009-05-02T09:22:00.001-07:00

Meanwhile, Somewhere In An Alternate Universe...

2009-05-01T04:04:00.000-07:00

The Hunt For Gollum

2009-04-30T04:50:00.000-07:00

Trailer 2 - The Hunt For Gollum [2]
by HuntForGollum

Ooops

2009-04-29T04:50:00.001-07:00

"The administration says they're replacing abstinence with---quote---'teenage pregnancy prevention programs that have been proven effective through rigorous evaluation.' So what??? Abstinence-only education effectively prevents teen pregnancy---just ask its new spokesperson, Bristol Palin. Sure, she had a baby. But imagine how many babies she would've had if she wasn't abstinent."---Stephen Colbert

Denny Dent, Rock & Roll Painter

2009-04-28T02:26:00.000-07:00

Get Over It!

2009-04-27T03:42:00.000-07:00

The Sunday Funnies

2009-04-26T03:25:00.000-07:00

Lily Allen

2009-04-25T03:37:00.000-07:00

The Fear video

Houston, We Have A Solution

2009-04-24T03:57:00.000-07:00

A Terrible Clarity

2009-04-23T01:57:00.000-07:00

George Will: Torture comes from a theory of government called "the unitary theory of executive power.” This was the tipping point.

Sam Donaldson: Where in the Constitution is this found, George?

George Will: I’m just saying here are intelligent people who believe...

Cokie Roberts: First amendment? The Congress?

George Will: It is not a theory I agree with, or you agree with, but there are intelligent people who do.

Sam Donaldson: “If the president does it is not illegal.” Thank you Richard Nixon.

George Will: Yes, but these are intelligent people...

I think it's sick that people wearing jeans gets George Will angrier than the fact that the United States government tortured prisoners. Then again, it's his job to provide an alibi for the Bush administration's complicity in these crimes. Besides being offensive, it's an useless theoretical debate.

It's like addressing concerns about racism by framing in it a "Suppose Whites were oppressed by African-Americans?" construct, or claiming women would rape guys if they had penises. These are bogus philosophical arguments manufactured for the sole purpose of confusing people. As George Orwell said, "The enemy of clear language is insincerity." Because George Will and the usual suspects (Hannity, Limbaugh, Coulter) are unable to admit that Bush gave the green light on torturing alleged terrorists, they'll spew this obtuse and dishonest intellectual gibberish instead.

No matter how many right-wing jerks idolize Jack Bauer and his use of violence as a means to an end, torturing prisoners is illegal, barbaric, and it doesn't work. As an interrogation tool, it's a stone axe that's clumsy, needlessly cruel, and a waste of time. This is a fact that has been substantiated by men like Jack Cloonan, a former FBI Interrogator interviewed in the Oscar-winning documentary "Taxi To The Dark Side".

Do you know what the dirty little secret about torture that nobody wants to admit? The United States didn't torture people because we wanted information to prevent another 9/11 from happening.

Our country tortured people because they liked it.

Buster Keaton

2009-04-22T03:21:00.000-07:00

Keaton was a genius of the silent film era whose later career was derailed by his alcoholism, bad luck, and dumb studio executives who didn't know what to do with him. Although Keaton was a contemporary of Lloyd and Chaplin, I thought he was funnier than those comedic icons. Lloyd was a one-trick acrobat, and Chaplin annoyed me with his cold, smug narcissism. What keeps Keaton fresh for me is his brilliance as a director. Even now, in the era of Industrial Light and Magic, film critics still can't figure out how he created some of his visual gags. Although it's an overused word, "genius" fits Keaton as well as his trademark porkpie hat did.

J.G.Ballard (1930 - 2009)

2009-04-21T03:54:00.000-07:00

All the while I stared at those parts of Gabrielle's body
Reflected in this nightmare technology of cripple controls.
I watched her thighs shifting against each other
The jut of her left breast under the strap of her spinal harness
The angular bowl of her pelvis
The hard pressure of her hand on my arm
She gazed back at me through the windshield
Playing with the chromium clutch treadle
As if hoping that something obscene might happen

It was I who first made love to her
In the rear seat of her small car
Surrounded by the bizarre geometry of the invalid controls
As I explored her body
Feeling my way among the braces and straps of her underwear
The unfamiliar planes of her legs and hips
Steered me into unique cul de sacs
Strange declensions of skin and musculature

Each of her deformities became a potent metaphor
For the excitements of a new violence
Her body with its angular contours
Its unexpected junctions of mucus membrane and hairline
Detrusor muscle and erectile tissue
Was a ripening anthology of perverse possibilies

As I sat with her by the airport fence in her darkened car
Her white breast in my hand lit by the ascending airliners
The shape and tenderness of her nipple seemed to rape my fingers
Her sexual acts were exploratory ordeals

As she drove towards the airport I watched her handle the unfamiliar controls
The complex of inverted treadles and clutch levers of the car
had been designed for her -- implicitly, I guessed, for her first sexual act
Twenty minutes later, as I embraced her
The scent of her body mingled with the showroom odor of mustard leatherette

We had turned off near the reservoirs to watch the aircraft landing
As I pressed her left shoulder against my chest I could see
The contoured seat which had been molded around her body
Hemispheres of padded leather that matched the depressions of her
brace and backstraps
I slipped my hand around her right breast
Already colliding with the strange geometry of the car's interior
Unexpected controls jutted from beneath the steering wheel
The cluster of chromium treadles was fastened to the steel pivot
Clamped to the steering column
An extension on the floor-mounted gear lever rose laterally
Giving way to a vertical wing of chromium metal molded into the reverse
of a driver's palm
Aware of these new parameters
The embrace of this dutiful technology
Gabrielle lay back
Her intelligent eyes followed her hand as it felt my face and chin
As if searching for my own missing armatures of bright chromium

She lifted her left foot so that the leg brace rested against my knee
In the inner surface of her thigh
The straps formed a marked depression
Troughs of reddened skin
Hollowed out in the forms of buckles and clasps
As I unshackled the left leg brace
And ran my fingers along the deep buckle groove
The corrugated skin felt hot and tender
More exciting than the membrane of a vagina

This depraved orifice
The invagination of the sexual organs still in the embryonic stages
of evolution
Reminded me of the small wounds on my own body
Which still carried the contours of the instrument panel and the
controls
I felt this depression on her thigh
The groove worn below her breast
Under her right armpit
By the spinal brace
The red marking on the inside of her right
upper arm
These were the templates for new genital organs
The molds of sexual possibilities
Yet to be created in a hundred experimental car crashes

Teabagging, R.I.P.

2009-04-20T02:42:00.000-07:00

No matter how hard Fox News tried, the rest of the United States was underwhelmed by the "teabagging" protests. The Octomom and Amy Winehouse's latest drug bust had bigger ratings. After the autopsy, it reaffirmed what we already knew: it was a ridiculous, vulgar, racist, misguided and pathetic display of frustration and rage. This wasn't a vast, populist uprising. It was the same angry white people who showed up during the McPalin's doomed presidential campaign. It was the same 26% of the country who supported Bush in spite of how bad he was. (Everybody else, however, was sick of Republican ideology and voted accordingly.) All the screaming about "taxes" was a lie to hide their bigotry behind. The teabaggers are terrified at finding themselves on the wrong side of history, but it's already too late. Their noisy delusions didn't keep Obama from being elected to the White House, and it won't get him out.

The Sunday Funnies

2009-04-19T03:57:00.000-07:00

Laurie Freelove

2009-04-18T04:04:00.000-07:00

Teabaggers

2009-04-17T03:16:00.001-07:00

Thre Gathering Storm

2009-04-16T04:03:00.001-07:00

Dead End

2009-04-15T04:51:00.001-07:00

Marilyn Chambers (1952 - 2009)

2009-04-14T04:00:00.000-07:00

650 Million Years

2009-04-13T05:00:00.000-07:00