VAGUE SPACE

Faux News

I was at the car dealer this morning getting new brakes and in the waiting room, the television was tuned to Fox News Channel's delightful morning program, "Fox & Friends," universally considered (at least by the blogs I read) one of the most biased and horrific "news" programs on television.  I think I used to watch it occasionally some years ago, and I don't remember it being so bad.  So either my memories are failing or they have lurched remarkably to the right, because what I saw on there today in a brief thirty minutes shocked me to my very core.  The program was basically an advertisement for the Republican party, or more specifically, the very extreme right wing of the party, which represents at most 20% of the American population.  And this is the most popular cable news morning program on television.  An extremely biased right wing discourse peppered with Republican talking points, that is actually being sold as some sort of unbiased news program -- to an unsuspecting or flat-out stupid public that is consuming their product.  I was literally appalled.

You Should Be in Sweden

About a year ago, I posted about the sudden influx of Swedish bands into my listening ears.  Apparently it has continued strong into 2007...

• Peter Bjorn and John - (from their wikipedia entry)...  is a Swedish indie rock band, formed in Stockholm in 1999. The current members are Peter Morén on vocals, guitar, and harmonica; Björn Yttling on vocals, bass and keyboards; and John Eriksson on drums, percussion, and vocals.

  To date they are best known for the 2006 single "Young Folks", which featured Victoria Bergsman of The Concretes and was a top 40 hit in the UK Singles Chart. It was also named NME's second best track of 2006, beaten only by "Over and Over" by Hot Chip.^[1] It was voted number 16 in the Triple J Hottest 100 of 2006.

  • Pre-order the soon to be released U.S. double CD version of the album on which "Young Folks" was recorded, Writer's Block.
  • Download Peter Bjorn and John - "Young Folks".mp3
  • Download Peter Bjorn and John - "Up Against the Wall".mp3

• Loney, Dear - again from wiki ... Loney, Dear is the pseudonym of Swedish singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Emil Svanängen. He has self-released four albums of music in his native Sweden. His first major release will come this year in the U.S. when Sub Pop re-issues his latest album "Lonely, Noir".
• • Pre-order Loney Noir, due February 6th at Amazon.
  • Download Loney, Dear - "I Am John".mp3

Poker Night, Part Deux

(Editor's Note:  This is the second part of a two-part series on my experiences playing poker on subsequent nights last week.  But don't look for the first part of the two-part series.  It wasn't actually written.  Just be grateful you're getting anything.  I could just be posting about the weather again.  F Switsky.)

8:30 pm:  I arrive late after witnessing a magnificent performance of J.M. Barrie's classic play "Peter Pan," at the world-renowned South River Middle School Cafetorium.  While the accommodations were not quite up to Broadway standards, it was certainly nice to get to see some theater.  Even if the number of forgotten/mumbled lines in the first act reached triple digits.  But after one of the main characters appearing in the first scene got locked in a storage closet backstage while he was supposed to be speaking lines, things could only get better.  On the bright side, there were no injuries incurred by the support staff moving the sets around.

8:35 pm: Koren goes all-in at the adjacent table at the Texas Hold 'Em tournament.  I am told that it has happened three times already.  We're still on the first blind level.

8:40 pm:  I enter my first hand, folding quickly after a LegFu/Lenny raise.  Koren goes all-in at the other table.  Apparently Eric's 22 match losing streak hasn't taught him much about changing strategies.

Holy Shit It's Cold

I'd post something longer today but my fingers are too cold to type without shaking.  It's 9 fucking degrees outside right now.  So much for no winter.  And sorry for all the cursing, but fuck it's cold.  And sorry if you live in a climate where 9 degrees is nothing out of the ordinary.  When my teeth start chattering between my car and the Dunkin' Donuts, I don't think that's a good thing.  You know, when I got home at one in the morning last night, it wasn't nearly this cold.  Sure, I had a 6-pack of Sam Adams Winter Lager in me (I freakin' love that beer) and I'd just had a miraculous survival for third place in the poker game after going all-in with 8s against Qs and an A-2 that hit 2 pair on the flop (a queen came on the river, knocking both me and the 2 pair guy out, but since I had more cash going in, I came in 3rd - earning money and a very valuable point for the Tournament of Champions, while he got a big fat nothing besides disappointment, grief, and the very bitter knowledge that at least he beat out 13 other players).   But it wasn't nearly this cold last night, I don't think.  I thought the Weather Channel guy this morning was joking when he said it was 9 degrees.  Then I walked outside.  Not good times.  On the bright side, I fucking love Dunkin' Donuts coffee and the lack of sleep and sub-freezing temperatures gives me enough cover to say I need the 8,000 calories in sugar and cream I'm ingesting.  F Simmons.

Oh, and sorry to Jill for knocking out your Ks with my K8 that flopped a set of 8s.  It's not polite to knock out the host in that way, but your husband did knock me out with his Qs later on (and presumably won the night? - I don't know what happened in the final two).  And sorry to Robyn for kidnapping Matt and keeping him locked up in the kitchen playing a side game with Billy and Tomazic long after being knocked out despite being away in San Francisco all week.  I know he missed you but we tied him up and wouldn't let him leave until after 1 am.  My bad.

• Download Arcade Fire - "Cold Wind".mp3
• Download Kristen Hirsch - "Ice".mp3
• Download Mono - "The Flames Beyond the Cold Mountain".mp3

iPod Shuffle

I have about 5500 songs and 50 videos / TV shows/ movies on my 30 GB 5th-generation iPod, which is just about at its gigabyte limit.  I've got two options at this point, (1) buy one of the 5.5 generation 80 GB iPods - which would hold more music than my computer hard drive could handle, or (2) start weeding out my collection.  Weeding is the cheaper and probably more useful option, especially since I haven't cleaned out my iTunes collection at all in the 3 years since I first purchased an iPod (has it only been that long?  seems like I've had one forever).  And my music tastes have changed considerably since then I think.  I rarely put my iPod on pure shuffle anymore and when I do, I get confronted with a whole host of songs that I have no interest in listening to (but I once loved - or at least liked enough to put into iTunes).  So that discourages me from listening to the shuffle, which means I only listen to playlists, which are basically new albums I've purchased or a grouping of new songs I've downloaded.   Which means of the 5500 songs on my iPod, I listen to a group of 50-100 in any given week and then I get tired of them pretty fast since I listen to them so much in one week, so I have to scour the Internet for newer bands and songs and I end up downloading the new Explosions in the Sky album weeks before it's going to be released and trying desperately to resist the urge to listen to it immediately.  Not good times.   And don't get me started on all the new Arcade Fire posts from their concerts last weekend, featuring live versions of all the  songs on theirnew album.  So far I think I've heard about half of Neon Bible, so when I actually get to hear the rest on March 6th, it will probably be impossible to be anything but disappointing (see Some Loud Thunder).  The solution?  It's time to purge...

State of the Union

President Bush's State of the Union... circa 2003... ah, those were good times -- American troops had made much progress in Afghanistan (we were even closing in on Osama bin Laden)... and the world still supported our efforts... and oil prices were still low... and 3,000 American soldiers had yet to be sent to Iraq to die... and upwards of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis citizens had yet to die simply for being born in a country about to be invaded by warmongering American neo-conservatives and their idiotic leader... and Iran wasn't trying to secure nuclear weapons... and North Korea hadn't secured nuclear weapons yet... and the global warming crisis had yet to reach true crisis stages... and a terrible hurricane had yet to ravage our shores and be ignored by an inept government response that killed over a thousand American citizens... and hey, we'd just gotten our second round of tax cuts and I was still a Republican voter.  Yes, those were good times...

Here's Mr. Bush's speech highlights from 2003, from the way back machine.  Notice how many times he's completely wrong (or just flat-out lying).  In case you've had your head in the sand since 2003, the answer is close to 100%.

From three Iraqi defectors we know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs. These are designed to produce germ warfare agents, and can be moved from place to a place to evade inspectors. Saddam Hussein has not disclosed these facilities. He's given no evidence that he has destroyed them.

The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production. Saddam Hussein has not credibly explained these activities. He clearly has much to hide. [...]

Evidence from intelligence sources, secret communications, and statements by people now in custody reveal that Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of al Qaeda. Secretly, and without fingerprints, he could provide one of his hidden weapons to terrorists, or help them develop their own.  Applause.) [...]

The United States will ask the U.N. Security Council to convene on February the 5th to consider the facts of Iraq's ongoing defiance of the world. Secretary of State Powell will present information and intelligence about Iraq’s illegal weapons programs, its attempt to hide those weapons from inspectors, and its links to terrorist groups.

We will consult. But let there be no misunderstanding: If Saddam Hussein does not fully disarm, for the safety of our people and for the peace of the world, we will lead a coalition to disarm him. (Applause.)

 

Read the entire speech here (if you dare):  January 23, 2003.

The Return

    Jim: "I miss Dwight.  Congratulations, universe.  You win."

Another hilarious episode of The Office centers around the aftermath of Dwight being forced out of the company last week and Andy's attempts to ingratiate himself into Michael's good graces with some overheated toadying that surprisingly does not go particularly well.  Pretty soon, it's not just Jim that's missing Dwight.  Everyone is, especially Angela and Michael. 

    Michael: "I don't want somebody sucking up to me because they think it will help their career.  I want somebody sucking up to me because they genuinely like me."

Some Loud Thunder

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!: Some Loud Thunder
Rating: 6.2 (out of 10)

Disappointing?  Strange?  Bad?   Well, let's just say it's "different."  I'm not exactly sure what the band was going for with this, their highly anticipated follow-up to the much-hyped (and in my opinion, deserving of the hype) debut album.  It is certainly a more daring and adventurous record than the first one, and I have to give the band props for that, but I can't say I really enjoy the direction they've gone in.  So that's definitely disappointing.  They've hooked up with uberproducer Dave Fridmann and his fingerprints are all over this album, but not in a good way.  It seems like every instrument had its mic turned on too loudly, for the songs sound very distorted, especially the lead track, the completely disastrous version of "Some Loud Thunder."  All last week, I had "Some Loud Thunder" as my #1 favorite song on the left of this page, but that was the very enjoyable demo version I downloaded from somewhere that didn't turn out to be the album version.  The album version?  Horrendous.  In fact, it is so bad, washing out the vocals behind a wall of painful distortion, that Insound had to write a disclaimer in its offer to download the songs with a pre-order subscription... ***The first track of the album is distorted on purpose. This is an artistic choice and not a limitation of the download or corruption of the file.***   I'm guessing a lot of people complained.  Not a good start.

Judgment Day

[Editor's note:  This was written over a week ago, after the Hall of Fame vote, but I didn't get the chance to post it until now.  It's not really about McGwire anyway.]

They fooled us.  That's what this is all about.  That is why Mark McGwire did not make the Hall of Fame this year - and didn't come remotely close.  That is why Barry Bonds is railed against in every major media outlook.  That is why Rafael Palmeiro went from upstanding elder statesman to immoral Satan-worshipper.  They fooled us.  Why did an NFL player who led the league in sacks and was elected to the Pro Bowl in the same season he was found guilty of steroid use  receive barely a negative word about him?  Because the football players didn't try to fool us.  McGwire and Sosa and Bonds did.  Plain and simple.

Cuse Win?

So I got home from class last night at around 11 pm and decided to watch the Syracuse/ Cincy game I'd Tivo'd, figuring I'd fast forward through most of it.  The Cuse was dominant early... Cincy has no front line to speak of, and we jumped out to a 19 point lead midway through the first half.  So I didn't fast forward through any of that.  Then Cincy started coming back, cutting it to 9, but a quick 5 points in the last 30 seconds gave us a comfortable 14 point lead.  By then it was almost midnight, so I figured I'd watch until the game got out of hand and then go to bed.

 

Syracuse won by a single point on Devendorf's two free throws with 20 seconds left.  What a complete disaster.  I watched the whole thing, as Cincy came all the way back by hitting 3s left and right and forcing turnovers by the bushel, until they took the lead.  After we won, it was almost 1 in the morning, I was so freaked I couldn't go to sleep and then I had to wake up at 6:30 for work.  Not good times.

 

I'm a little exhausted right now.