Thursday, October 28, 2010
Behind The Wall of Sheep
Mon and I saw the Smithereens live back in 2007 and it was one of the best shows I have even been to. I also saw them at Beatlefest a few years back and got to interact with some of the band afterwards. Good guys all around.
So imagine my joy when I saw Part One of an interview with Smithereens front man Pat DiNizio today over at Parbench:
The Smithereens’ Pat DiNizio Pt 1
Pat DiNizio, songwriter and vocalist for the successful rock band The Smithereens (“A Girl Like You,” “Blood and Roses,” “Only A Memory”), has long faced alienation from the liberal entertainment industry because of his semi-conservative views.
He says, “People who are extremely left wing, who think it’s an artist’s obligation to be extremely liberal and espouse that philosophy and they don’t get it from me, they hate me. I’m a traitor and they want to burn my records."
Now, keep in mind when you are reading this that we're talking about one of the nicest people you'll probably ever meet. When you are on the "wrong" side, none of that matters. I have seen some of the nicest people I know called horrible things just because they refuse to march off the cliff with the rest of the lemmings.
That's what I always like about the "free speech" crowd: they love the concept...until someone disagrees with them.
I'll link Part Two when it becomes available.
Friday, October 22, 2010
Down To The Wire...
Thursday, October 21, 2010
The Bullying Conundrum
Thursday, October 07, 2010
Keeping Score of All That "Change"
Sunday, October 03, 2010
On To The Post-Season
Despite that, they did finish the season with the second-best record in baseball (one game behind the Rheys) and managed to snag the Wild Card. I am not expecting much but with a short series, you never know. The pitching staff is in a state of flux and the key will be if Sabathia can come up big and Phil Hughes can step up. Jeter also needs to be "Derek Jeter" again, not what he has been for the second half of the season (the second coming of Wayne Tolleson). Arod will also have to be Superman again and Texiera will have to snap out of it. If any one of these things does not happen, it will be a short post-season trip this year.
A note to all the self-appointed "baseball purists" out there (the ones that watch 10 games a year and call themselves experts) that do nothing but complain about "modern" baseball (which hasn't actually changed in ages): enough already. The DH has been around for thirty-nine years. The Wild Card (with all its' minuses and believe it or not, pluses) has been around for fifteen years already, and is probably not going to change until Bud Selig's corpse is dragged out of the Comissioner's office. In other words (as the kids say), 'it is what it is' and it's probably not changing any time soon. Stop obsessing and complaining about it like little spoiled chidren every fifteen seconds and shitting on the people that just want to watch a damn baseball game. You hate the way it is? Great...but those of us that still like watching the game are sick of listening to the never-ending whining. We get it. Change the channel. Go watch something more your speed, like bowling on ESPN Classic or something.
Here's a late-breaking news bulletin: nothing is the same now as it was 150 years ago, including baseball. There were times when hitting a runner with the ball was an out and the World Series was a best of nine. There were times when the post-season was a round-robin tournament (you know...like poker). There was a time when ballplayers wore high-button collars and corduroy pants. They don't do any of those things anymore, either. Change is gonna happen in every walk of life no matter what you do, and complaining about it endlessly is, well, a bit OCD. I'm not so much of a narcissist that I need sports (of all things) to be tailored to my every personal whim. I can still can enjoy watching the game regardless of some arbitrary playoff system I have no control over.
In other words, I have dealt with change and MOVED ON, rather than succumbing to BDS (Baseball Derangement Syndrome). Life's too short to obsess about inconsequential bullshit when there's so much there to relax and enjoy, know whut ah mean?
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Assemble This
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
That Time Of Year...
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Gots The Sickness
Got the throat, upper-respiratory infection yuckiness...and a relentless tiredness that has just sucked the life out of me. Got meds, got blanket, already called out sick. Looks like a day of tea and sympathy on tap (possibly mixed with James Bond movies) and soup.
Just as well. I need the break anyway.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Vote Rangling
I give the Dems credit for one thing: they know how to pick their spots. Whenever they have a scheme in mind that involves painfully un-electable candidates, they find the proper nuthouses to run them in where even a sack of guano would get elected if it had a (D) next to it (New York, California, Minnesota...). Find the crazy people and give them someone they can relate to.
The big so-called "Tea Party" wins in DE and NH last night are already being written off by the mainstream media as losses for the GOP in November, which only shows that they still don't get what is going on. Both states showed double the estimated turnout for Republican voters last night (dwarfing Democrat voters almost 2 to 1). I don't think that happened by accident. People are pissed off with the status quo, yo. Only the media and the Republican hierarchy refuse to acknowledge it.
They keep saying these grassroots candidates can't win primaries, yet they win handily. Then they tell us they can't win general elections. We'll see. Right now nothing is "in the bag" for ANY candidate. As a result, the Big Bag O' Dirty Tricks is already being dipped into by the Dems and their willing accomplices in the media. It will only get louder and nastier as we approach November.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Tea Trumps Kool-Aid
How Tea Party Organizes Without Leaders
Strange though it may seem, this is a coordinated network, not a hierarchy. There is no chain of command. No group or person is subordinate to any other. The tea parties are jealously independent and suspicious of any efforts at central control, which they see as a sure path to domination by outside interests. "There's such a uniqueness to every one of these groups, just as there's an individuality to every person," Wildman says. "It has this bizarre organic flow, a little bit like lava. It heats up in some places and catches on fire; it moves more slowly in other places."
It's a new world, a different paradigm now (as the hipster doofuses like to say) and I don't think there's any turning back. If anything good came out of the wreckage of the 2004 - 2009 political climate it is that the PEOPLE started to care again. The sleeping giant re-awakened. This is good news for everbody (except for pergressive elitists, who as we all know, know better than everyone else). Let them keep laughing. Keep pretending it doesn't matter.
PS - I still feel like crap after a week of feeling like crap. At this point I just want to either get a full-blown cold or have this goes away. Soon.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Thursday, September 09, 2010
Meh
Wednesday, September 01, 2010
I'm Alive (A General Update)
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
The Comparison Is Striking...
*Sigh*...I miss The Gipper...truth be told, liberalism should have been crushed in this country after the Reagan Revolution, left as a smoldering remnant of foolishness past. The problem is the Right got complacent, sloppy and fat in the position it was in. The same goes for after 1994. When you become too comfortable, when you become too smug and complacent, you make yourself weak and beatable. That's what happened in 1992, 1996 and 2008.
The OTHER problem is...when you abuse the position you are in and forget how you got there, that's how we end up in the mess we are in now. The end result is everyone suffers and the country suffers more irreparable damage. When you have something with so many positives that it should sell itself, don't screw it up. Just ask Coca Cola. Don't become stagnant; remember how you got where you are. The Left will never be able to do that without using fear and trickery. Conservatives don't have to do that.
Maybe one day the politicians that are supposed to be acting in our "best interests" will remember that.
Saturday, August 14, 2010
This Just In...
And they said it was impossible to talk out of both sides of your mouth at the same time!
More details as they become available. Film at 11.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Remembering George Steinbrenner and Reflecting On Life
The first Old-Timer's Day I ever went to, Roger Maris, Elston Howard, Mickey Mantle were all alive and present. Once The Mick died, I realized that there would come a day when DiMaggio wouldn't be around anymore...and that one day Phil Rizzuto would be taking the George Washington Bridge to the eternal 7th inning. We all followed what was going on with Bobby Murcer and prayed for the best. I saw that Eddie Layton and Bob Sheppard were getting up there and I knew I should treasure them both.
Then Joe D got sick and went soon after that. Phil retired and he left us as well. Bobby fought the best he could but lost the battle in the end. Eddie Layton retired and then he too was gone. Bob got sick and never returned. Throughout all this I'd had George in the back of my head but kept it buried there. When Bob Sheppard died at the age of 99 this past weekend I started to think about George again. When I heard on the news yesterday morning that he'd had a heart attack I knew it didn't sound good.
George Steinbrenner was such a larger than life character you almost expected him to transcend things like illness and mortality. I'd always had this image in my head of an aged, 90-something-year-old Boss, barking orders at Cashman like Mr. Burns does to Mr. Smithers…and Cashman responding with a “Yes, Boss”. Alas, it was not to be and now one of the last great icons - perhaps the last great 'king of the jungle' we'll see in professional sports - is gone.
After his reinstatement to baseball George changed. Once beyond unbearable and abrasive, he mellowed out somewhat and sought to rectify some of his past transgressions later in his life (not unlike Dickens' Ebenezer Scrooge - not due to visits from three spirits, more likely due to the visit of one suspension). He became likeable (almost loveable) and while still in control, he allowed his staff leeway to run things. He did commercials. He allowed himself to be lampooned on Seinfeld. In death, the level and magnitude of his philanthropy and charity is just now being truly revealed.
This makes his passing all the more melancholy. I sometimes try to explain to people that do not follow professional sports (or have narcissistically labeled themselves too good to do so) how when you live and die with your team day in and day out they essentially become your extended family. George morphed into that crazy uncle (or grandpa) that was never approachable in the past but was now the first one at the family gatherings to start telling jokes. When he's not around anymore, you're sorry that it took so long to get to know him. So it is with George.
It's been a tough week for Yankees fans and for all of baseball. It IS nice to know that George goes out a winner, the way he would have wanted it. His team is the reigning World Champion, the last game he saw was a win (an 8-2 drubbing of the Mariners) and many of his players are proudly representing his team at the All Star Game he did not get a chance to see. I also chuckle knowing that George stole the spotlight from the "midsummer classic"...even in death, he's making Bud Selig's life miserable.
Love him or hate him, the guy liked to WIN. He was more than just an owner, he was a fan. He found himself emotionally involved with the team’s daily goings-on to a fault, for better or worse. As a result, he knew you had to spend money to make money (unlike some of his contemporaries that sit around and bitch about disparity while they tuck into another poached lobster purchased with wasted revenue sharing money). For that we Yankees fans should all be grateful.
In a world where things don’t seem to mean much anymore, it meant a lot knowing that while we cared about him, he also cared about us and did his darned best to put a winner out on the field year in and year out - not just for himself, but for the fans. Thanks for that, Boss.
Enjoy those calzones.
Friday, April 23, 2010
B.S. Is As B.S. Does
Cut me a freaking break. First of all, I'd LOVE to know how See-BS and the Time "massaged" these poll numbers. Thier stances on such things speak for themselves, as do their reputations (you know, the same folks that brought you forged documents as news and Jayson Blair working together like the League of Doom). So any poll numbers they present - working TOGETHER no less - send my Bullshit Detector well into the stratosphere.
Second, any moron that takes these BS poll numbers and uses them as an excuse to further paint the Tea Party movement as a bunch of rich white folk or lyinchin' Klansmen (interesting combo there, BTW) is more full of shit than a Port-O-San at a construction site. Where was the anger three years ago? If any of them BOTHERED to do five minutes worth of research, they would might have learned that the Tea Party Movement was BORN during the Bush era in response to the spending largesse of the administration - and started to gain ground after the insaity of the TARP bailout.
The main difference then was there was not a House and Senate interested in creating untolled trillions worth of increased debt like we are seeing now. Spend, spend, spend and let the great-grandkids pay it off. What a great way to "fix" problems - like putting chewing gum in a dam leak. All the while smiling like the cat that ate the canary. THAT'S why people are pissed off now, you dumb media bastards.
Maybe some of these numnuts that keep running around like Chicken Little screaming "racism" like fire in a movie house, should give this a watch:
Not that they'll pay any attention...as Forrest Gump so correctly stated, stupid is as stupid does...and the mainstream media seems to be full of plenty of stupid these days.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
How 'Bout That Hughes?
Electric Hughes nearly no-hits A's
Bid for history spoiled in eighth, but Yanks win sixth straight
OAKLAND -- Phil Hughes couldn't help but know that he might be possessing no-hit stuff. If the Athletics' feeble swings and quick trips back to the bench weren't telling him, the scoreboard glaring into the Yankees' dugout surely was.
Sweet.
Monday, April 12, 2010
Pete Sayek's Day Off
Coming off a great weekend, Monday "off-days" are the best. It's a beautiful spring day, the windows are open (how about that...?) and the breeze is nap-inducing. I may take it up on it's offer.
In the "big picture", it's all good...Yanks are 4-2 and come home tomorrow, Rags got eliminated yesterday (in a shootout, no less) and I don't have to hear the name "Tiger Woods" again - at least for a few weeks. Shopping is already done, washer is chuggin' in the background and the afternoon is my oyster. Or erster, depending on where you come from.
It's easier to sit back and drink these things in when you're not workin'.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Feeling The Love
It's after games like this when my love for baseball is reaffirmed, and why despite all it's shortcomings it's still the most complex and enjoyable sport to watch. There's a reason why I defend (and enjoy) the game of baseball and it's afternoons like this. Rock on.
Wednesday, April 07, 2010
How Do You Know It Will Work If You Haven't Come Up With The Plan Yet?
Yes, you heard correctly - they haven't announced they ARE now open like a screen door with a broken hinge - no, they've FINALLY come up with "The Plan" to be open! A little over one year and three months into this presidency, after 10.5 Trillion dollars in "bailouts" that allowed unfettered government takeover of the mortgage, auto and banking indusrties - and after forcing through one of the most secretive, backroom-deal-laden, Constitutionally bankrupt bills in U.S. history (so we could "find out what is actually in it"), NOW the White House has come up with A PLAN!
Isn't that awsome? I guess I was wrong about Obama all this time.
I'll probably have even less hair on my head and be a day older before this "plan" ever gets put into place (if ever). It's kind of funny that they keep telling us how "transparent" they PLAN on being because it's painfully easy to see right through them.
Tuesday, April 06, 2010
Lots of Win-Wins
In addition to everything else (which takes a load off my mind), I shall float to sleep tonight on a river of sweet, nectar-like tears of Yankee haters everywhere. Like a free-floating waterbed.
Good evening, indeed.
Monday, April 05, 2010
Sunday, April 04, 2010
Happy Easter!
Monday, March 29, 2010
March Going Out Like A Lion
Nothing really new right now...I'm a bit political-ed out right now, just too much overload in the wake of Death Care Reform. So I've been working on the archive and trying to figure out what to do with the RFNY site (which is in dire need of an upgrade) and the future of podcasts (since Pod-o-Matic seems to be flaking out).
Last weekend was Beatlefest weekend and with money being scarce and way too much work to do, I missed it for the second year in a row. I hope to make it back in 2011...I don't want the memory of my last Beatlefest to be what my last one was actually like - riddled with illness, crazy happenings and drama. I'd like to make it back to at least one more Fest so I could actually ENJOY myself without any peripheral jazz (like the last one I attended).
In the meantime the WHOT archiving is officially in the home stretch. After six years of archiving casettes, reels and video tapes, the light is at the end of the tunnel - at least for the WHOT tapes (proper). There are four ten-boxes left and that's it.
Now, I still have to find the missing tapes which are still dangerously AWOL and all hailing from the early-80s. I live in perpetual fear that these tapes are gone. I catalogued them shortly after the WHOT bust in 89-90, so they definitely DID exists - old tapes of WGUT shows, WQXQ and the WKRB Halloween show. All from 80-82. I hope they can be tracked down. I'd estimate there are about 40 tapes missing in all from this era.
Of course, once I finish THESE I move on to Phase II: the original Radio Free New York shows. There's some great stuff in there from 90-95, basement jam shows and other great stuff...AJ and I doing sports call in shows...these should be a breeze to go through compared to teh HOT tapes (all mono).
Anyway, that's what's new and exciting, which is not a whole lot. Feeling beat so I'm gonna hit the haystack. Hopefully I'll have an update on the RFNY Site and podcasts soon.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Do As They Say, Not As They Do
A little secret about Obama's transparency
The current administration, challenged by the president to be the most open, is now denying more Freedom of Information Act requests than Bush did.
"The Democratic administration of Barack Obama, who denounced his predecessor, George W. Bush, as the most secretive in history, is now denying more Freedom of Information Act requests than the Republican did".
Who here is REALLY surprised by this? Show of hands...anyone? Anyone? Beuller...?
The nut jobs are running the asylum while we all sit back and twiddle our thumbs and toes. The prospect of what is next frightens the bejesus out of me. It should scare the crap out of you too (unless you watch MSNBC every night and drool on yourself).
Monday, March 22, 2010
Good Morning, Amerika...
You vill get health coverage from Dear Leader!!!
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Why Report The Facts if the Facts Don't Feel Good?
Is it any wonder that the minority of lunatics that reside in the asylums known as the east and west coasts live under the misconception that they are actually the majority opinion, and the people that watch the news and take it as gospel continue to march off the cliff like good little lemmings?
It's OK...by this time tomorrow this, along with the very principles this country were founded on, should all be over.
Friday, March 19, 2010
The End Is In Sight
It looks like Sunday is D-Day for the Obamacare travesty vote. I may have metioned this once or twice before but when something gets done on a weekend or at one in the morning, it's being done that way so you won't notice. That's why the bring the sheep to the slaughterhouse at night when they can't see what is going on. Not that it matters - the sheep-le are perfectly OK with having government run their lives, so what's the big deal...right?
I tried to warn people in 2008 about what happens when you vote with touchy-feely emotions instead of your head (see: Carter, Jimmy) but no one would listen. Congratulations, Generation Y. Good work. You'll be old one day and probably denied service because of your age. Then you can REALLY enjoy the fruits of your stupidity.
Behind The Wall of Sheep
I love the Smithereens and I always have, since the first time I heard the "Especially for You"LP back in the summer of 1986. WHOT...
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As predicted, Jacko was given a pass by a California Jury. Interesting how the only high-profile case to be tried by a California jury in re...
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Hey pals and palettes, Hope everyone had a super-groovy Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays, full of warm...
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This just in via e-mail from Jim Nazium: From: Jim Nazium Sent: Monday, October 29, 2007 6:26 PM To: Pete Sayek Subject: It's over! ...