Obama Administration Does Good Thing

Political Carnival:

The Obama administration rescinded most of a federal regulation Friday designed to protect health workers who refuse to provide care they find objectionable on personal or religious grounds.

The Health and Human Services Department eliminated nearly the entire rule put into effect by the administration of President George W. Bush during his final days in office that was widely interpreted as allowing such workers to opt out of a broad range of medical services, such as providing the emergency contraceptive Plan B, treating gay men and lesbians and prescribing birth control to single women.

Milwaukee Archbishop: "Respect the Legitimate Rights of Workers"

Hell yes, Archbishop Listecki:

Milwaukee Archbishop Jerome E. Listecki on Wednesday said in a letter to lawmakers that workers should not be "marginalized," in a reference to Gov. Scott Walker's efforts to limit the rights of public employee unions.

He said in the letter there is a "moral obligation each of us has to respect the legitimate rights of workers.”

Go Wisconson workers.

My First Blue Bottle Jellyfish Sting

And info on the colony of creatures that is a blue bottle jellyfish.

The Changing Middle East -> U.S.

Via that other blog:

It just occurred to me: If a good chunk of the Middle East makes a dramatic move toward democracy over the next few months or years, the U.S. is going to have to change dramatically, too.

Just saying.

"ROONEYYYY!"

Good god in heaven just listen to the sound of this first. Close your eyes and listen to the first seven seconds. Listen to the announcer shout the name, and go speechless, and listen to what they mean when they say a crowd "explodes." This is a moment that explains why there is such a thing as "sport."

UK court: You're Too Dumb to Have Sex

BRITney Spears inconsolable.

My Personal Quest for a New Australian Word

From my American-Aussie blog, Little Australia:

So I'm in a local mall the other day when I asked Christine if we were going to the "newsie," short for newsagent—a shop that sells newspapers, magazines, candies, fishing licenses (so I found out) and assorted sundries.

She looked at me like I had just said something really stupid. In Bulgarian.

"It's a newsagent, it's not a "newsie." She said it just like that, all snotty.

I was sure I'd heard her call it a newsie, and told her so. She insisted I had not.

We go into the not-newsie, and the clerk says the woman who just left had left something behind. I went and found a woman who I thought I'd seen in the shop and asked her, "Were you just in the newsie?" It just slipped out.

She looked at me like I was stupid, and Bulgarian, and said, "Do you mean the newsagent?"

Christine has told anyone who will listen about this minor event, every time while pointing and laughing at yours truly.

Now here's the thing: Australians shorten everything, either by adding an "ie," a "y," or an "o." A fisherman is a "fisho." Chewing gum is "chewie." A mosquito is a "mozzie." A present is a "prezzy." A car registration is a "rego" (soft g, just like in registration). If something is expensive it's "exy." A freaking fireman is a "firie," for god's sake. They shorten, in short, everything.

But not "newsagent." The one Australian word I decide to use on my own, that I take out for a little linguistic test run—no no no no no. Not that one. Wrong.

"If it was going too be shortened," said Christine's sister, Shannon, "it'd be news-o, not news-ie." Everyone agreed with her.

There's a rule, apparently, in Australia, regarding the shortening of words, and whether you shorten it with an "o" or "ie." Everyone, apparently, knows this rule. And so I have been informed that not only did I shorten a word that is one of the only words in the entire English language that is not under any circumstances to be shortened, I shortened it in a way that it would not be done if it were to be done at all. I was wrong, and I was wrong wrongly.

Well, enough is enough.

I will henceforth be using the word "newsie" whenever I approach, enter, mill about in, leave, or just think about a newsagent. I will speak about "newsies" to my friends, to relatives overseas, to strangers that I meet on the street. "Do you know where the nearest newsie is? Is that a good newsie? Does the newsie have chewie? Is the chewie exy at the newsie? Have you ever been spanked in a newsie? I have. Delicious good fun, being spanked in a newsie..."

I will shout "newsie!" into the windows of sleeping children, so as to infiltrate their dreams with this brand new word.

I will hire small airplanes to drag banners through the sky saying, "Get the latest news—at the newsie—you bastards!"

I will write letters to the editor of every newspaper in the country, and I will mention "newsies" in said letters at least fifteen times each, even if it makes no sense at all to do so. I will newsie the freaking newsie out of all the newsiest newsies in newsie-dom.

I will use the word "newsie" so often that Australians will start using the word themselves, thinking that it's a perfectly natural word, that they've been using it all their lives, never knowing that it was me, it was me that planted that word in their minds, in their language, in their country.

This is my personal quest for one simple and perfectly sensible short word: "newsie."

Mohammed's Radio

I hear it louder than ever these days.

You've been up all night listening for his drum

Hoping that the righteous might just might just might just come

I heard the General whisper to his aide-de-camp

"Be watchful for Mohammed's lamp"

Shooting in the Streets

A tweet from Cairo:

I am hearing more gunfire outside tonight. Neighborhood watch told me last night they shoot sometimes to keep people alert

Egypt

Unbelievable.



Good Egypt Twitter feed here, so I've heard.

Obama Can't Back Democratic Forces in Egypt?

The fact that a Dem president cannot just come out and call Mubarak a dictator who should be overthrown is just so incredibly depressing. I understand that Mubarak is "our son-of-a-bitch," but good god, if Dem president can't do this, what hope do we have for any president ever truly promoting democratic government around the world?

None. That's fucking depressing.

Mubarak is speaking now. And saying nothing.

Tea Party News Brief

Via Maddow, if this isn't the strangest thing you've ever seen you've eaten way too much acid.





I am too confused to speak. Honestly.

Cancer News

The disease that we all know way too well may have just gotten a small kick in the teeth:

British scientists have discovered a "rogue gene" which helps cancer spread around the body and say blocking it with the right kind of drugs could stop many types of the disease in their tracks.

Researchers from the University of East Anglia said their findings could lead within a decade to the development of new medicines to halt a critical late stage of the disease known as metastasis, when cancer cells spread to other parts of the body.

The culprit gene, called WWP2, is an enzymic bonding agent found inside cancer cells, the researchers explained in their study, published in the journal Oncogene Monday.

It attacks and breaks down a naturally-occurring protein in the body which normally prevents cancer cells from spreading.

In tests in the laboratory, the UEA team found that by blocking WWP2, levels of the natural inhibitor protein were boosted and the cancer cells remained dormant.

If there's anything more perfectly sickening and terrifying than how bits of our own bodies can attack us—and travel around to attack us again and again—I don't know what it is. Nor do I want to know.

Little Pied Cormorant, Cat's Eye Sea Shell

Over at my Aussie site.

Boiling down the RW response to Loughner

Joe Scarborough of all people finally helps me to boil down what's so wrong the RW response to the Tucson shooting. What they all are really saying:

The fact that I'm an irresponsible and offensive asshole doesn't make me responsible for the Tucson shooting!

Yeah, well, they may be right.

"The *educated* ruling class"

One well known commentator, on Obama's speech at the Tuscon memorial:

It was, it was all the things the educated, ruling class wants their members to be and sound like.

"Educated" is a bad thing, apparently.

Haate crime

The Washington Post had a word contest years ago in which they invited readers to take a word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition for the word. Here's one:

Haate crime: What Dutch Nazis get charged with.

Opossums, Possums, and the Art of Photoraphy

A post at my other place.

"Blood Libel" Experts, Table of Two Million!

Today is going to be another stupid day in media world.

What I Want on my Gravestone

If I actually planned to have one:

[sic]

That oughta do it.

GO DUCKS!

They don't have the game on the telly in Sydney, but I'll be keeping tabs online.

Oh well. Hell of a try.

Rage Against the Dying of Lead Paint

This guy would protest government regulation off uranium in children's toys.

My Own Best Friend (The Dog Song)

"My Own Best Friend," the video. (Warning: Contains words that cause cancer in laboratory mice.)

Happy Birthday: Long Tough Blog!

This lesson in internet distraction began on New Year's Eve, 2005. Happy Birthday to us, and a sincere Happy New Year to anyone passing by.

It's New Years Day in Australia, we had a fabulous time on Collaroy Beach watching the fireworks and families with Tin and her friend Di, had a few beverages, watched the fireworks at the Harbor Bridge on TV. Had a swim this morning - it's about 90° F - got some work down, now Im having a beer and listening to Penguins on a Rock.

I love my life.
 

The zombies: "Time of the Season"

I woke up with this song in my head and it will not go away. Maybe I dreamed about listening to the radio when I was four.

I love this song, for childhood memory reasons, and for that opening riff: "dum dum dum (tick) ahhh! dum dum dum (tick) ahhh!" But: "Time of the season"? I'm as relaxed as the next guy about lyrics and odd usages of phrases, but that just seems lazy. Might as well say "period of the period of time."  Then the "Who's your daddy"" business. Never did quite get that. But hey, we'll let that pass.

Because this, my friends, is a legendary video (go here if it doesn't play):


The Zombies - Time of the Season
Uploaded by peakers. - Watch more music videos, in HD!



 

Australia: Where Even the Turds are Alive [update]

My Australia blog has a new post about turds.

I've moved to Australia, and I've got a new blog about it

Take a look: Little Australia.

Announcing: a Leak!

Why does Wikileaks announce that they're going to release leaked material they have? Doesn't it at least kind of defeat the purpose of the leaks? Especially in the case of a private entity like "a big U.S. bank"? Doesn't it give those being leaked from time to fix the damage that might be caused? In the case of the government, if the leaks could actually put people in danger, this is understandable, but even then you wouldn't have to announce it publicly. I don't get it.

Trying to Touch and Reach You...

Just for that one line, a beautiful George Harrison folk song for my beautiful far away girl.

Richie Havens: "License to Kill"

This song has possibly the weirdest line Bob Dylan ever wrote: "man has invented his doom, first step was touching the moon..." What, Neil Armstrong let loose the curst of the moon sphynx? Or is it space travel? Or am I missing something?

Probably missing something.

Anyway, it's a beautiful and haunting song, and the odd and slow tempo for some reason suits Richie Havens'guitar style in a very nice way.

It was legal "because the lawyer said it was"

You know, we really needed another one of these:



Thank you, George W. Bush. Thank you.

Twenty-Nine Dollars (and an Alligator Purse)

I'm not sure how I feel about this song on the cassette player for the ride to work on an early morning. I may not be right all day:

Tracheotomy

I wrote a song many years ago called "I Can't Wait to do a Tracheotomy." It's a love song. Some of my friends here might know it. I was just thinking about that song, and about my father, while looking out over a wide expanse of our Rogue Valley from the deck of my friend Eric's house - he's in Argentina - smoking a Seneca brand filterless cigarette that I bought on the Tonawanda Indian Reservation in Western New York recently. I was in Western New York to visit my father, and various other wonderful elements of my family. 


My father, it turned out, actually had a tracheotomy some years after I wrote that song. Some years after that he presented me with the metal tracheotomy contraption that he'd had to wear during that episode. The grandkids tell me he blew bubbles through it now and then. Dad gave the device to me because I'd written a song called, "I Can't Wait to do a Tracheotomy," and he thought I might like to have it. 


I still have that metal tracheotomy contraption; I saw it recently while going through my possessions in preparation for our move to Australia. I found it in a sandwich bag. Still shiny as ever. I think I'll take that contraption with me to Australia. Why not? 


I tell you this only because: There are some moments, some events, some memories, some combinations of moments, events, and memories, that make this weird painful thing called Life worthwhile. For me, that's one.

Thought for the Morning: Tax Cuts II

America, if Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Kobe Bryant, Alex Rodriguez, and David Beckham have to pay a bit more in taxes, they'll only have hundreds of millions of dollars left—and America will be destroyed.

This has been another Thought for the Morning.

Thought for the Morning: Tax cuts

What we need now in America - what we really, really need the very most - is for people with secret bank accounts in Switzerland to pay less taxes. That would make everything perfect. It would be especially good for the unemployed.

Redux: Health Care Reform SAVED Money

Because it's being said again, and louder now that Republicans have taken the House, I have to go back to this post from last January:

Democrats have done a terrible job countering the "It costs too much!" screams from the teabaggers and other Republican miscreants regarding health care reform. How difficult is it to get this across:

• Passing a health care bill, say the Senate bill, which will cost $849 billion over ten years, SAVES money- billions and billions - because the government would spend MUCH MORE than $849 on health care over the next ten years without the bill.

• Again: The government already spends money on health care. We just do it horribly. Passing the bill would save billions and billions of government dollars.

• Passing the bill would save money - while providing thirty million more Americans with coverage, and ending the odious practice of denial of coverage due to preexisting conditions.

How hard is that to get across to the "It costs too much!" crowd?

More here: How Health Care Reform Reduces the Deficit in 5 Not-So-Easy Steps; here: Budget office says health care bill saves money; and this is just interesting.

Thought for the Morning: King George III thinks Obama is a socialist!

This has been another "Thought for the Morning."

 

What Makes You Vote the Way You Do?

People too often appear to vote as if some time in the past their feelings were hurt by someone or something, and that that hurt and humiliation never quite went away. They vote for people who prey on those feelings, and who clearly do not have their interests in mind whatsoever. It's a real shame. The ballot box is no place for such immature crap. We have a country to fix and run.

Not John

I'm Moving to Australia

Me and my other 5/8 are selling off most of what we own, putting a wee bit more in storage, heading off to New York to see and say goodbye to the dozens of members of my wonderful family, then, in December or so, we're headed to Sydney. Tin Tin is from there, and has wanted to go home for some time. I've already received a five-year permanent resident work visa. (I know that's an oxymoron, but that's what it says.)

I'll be writing still, only now as a freelancer rather than a staff writer. Tin Tin will be looking into acting, waking up her old agent skills, and making documentaries. And we will be making some books together, too.

After 20 years in little town, Oregon, this is a very big deal. A very big, very good, very exciting, downright freaky deal. (I'm going to go find me some platypi!)

On a very related note: Need a couple songs for the old electronic music device? This would be an exceptionally good time for a few thousand people to buy a song or two from my CD, Bottomfeeders. Please do go give a listen, I think you'll find something you like. (Over in the right sidebar there are many places to go for songs, including iTunes and Rhapsody.)

Thanks very much in advance.

P.S. Blogger has done some strange things with photos - it decided the center location and the size for that one. Oh well. It's a shot I took coming into Sydney in 2006. You can click to enlarge, and can see the harbor bridge and opera house right to the right of the bridge.

Seve Calls the European Ryder Cup Team

Seve Ballesteros called the European Ryder Cup team this week to tell them what life's really about. Looks like it worked. 14 1/2 -13 1/2 - wow! Wish I'd seen it.

Congratulations, E-Team. And well played, Americans, what a comeback.

P.S. For several posts on Seve, who has been battling brain cancer for many months, hit the "Seve Ballesteros" tag just below this post.

"Going to jump off the GW Bridge. Sorry."

We need a better understanding of cruelty. And shame. Just horrible.

The World Needs More Anne Feeney

Folk-singing unionmaid and all around ass-kicking hellraiser Anne Feeney is experiencing some medical difficulties, I'm very sorry to say. Purchases of her songs are especially helpful right now, as you can imagine. You can help out by buying a song or three here, here, here, and here at iTunes. (The first link, CDBaby, has several more places to buy Anne's songs.)

Here's Anne's Facebook page, and you can join Anne's Caring Bridge group here.

We're thinking of you Anne, and Julie, and all your family and friends. We are thinking of you.

Marijuana Growers Join Teamsters Union

Ho-lee crap:

The workers are trimmers, gardeners and cloners. Cloners clone different strains of marijuana, depending on its medical needs, said Lou Marchetti, the business agent for Local 70, which organized the workers and negotiated the contract. Marjyn Investments provides medical marijuana used by patients suffering from cancer, HIV and other life threatening illnesses.

[...]

Under the two-year contract, the company will pay for the workers’ health care costs. The workers will receive pensions under the Western Conference of Pensions Fund, and their wages, currently at $18 an hour, will increase to $25.75 an hour within 15 months. They also get 10 paid holidays and 60 hours of personal time per year.

The times they are a-changin'...

What a Jerk!

Ahem.



And evil to boot!

Now TPM has unearthed a 1997 C-SPAN video that shows O'Donnell voicing concerns that a drag queen ball "celebrates the type of lifestyle which leads to the disease," objecting to terming those with AIDS "victims" and calling AIDS a consequence of a certain "lifestyle which brings about this disease."

What an asshole.

George Washington: "I Cannot Tell a Lie. Glenn Beck Can, Though."

America's Creepy Uncle lies to his "restore honor" crowd. Yep. Sounds about right.

I'll hide behind a smile
and understanding eyes
and I'll tell you things that you already know
so you can say
I really identify with you, so much
and all the time that you're needing me
is just the time that I'm bleeding you
don't you get it yet?
I'll come to you like an affliction
and I'll leave you like an addiction
you'll never forget me
you wanna know why?
cause I'm a liar

Another Kind of Courage

Veterans of the Iraq War protest more over-deployed soldiers being sent to that mess.

Hitler Was a Black Jew

Neo-Nazis around the world: Suck. On. This.