A little entertainment for Friday morning. I liken this to Michaelangelo talking about his chisels and hammers and paint brushes. Very intimate and a very rare moment.
Enjoy!
Author Archive for Bill Lines
22
Feb
12
Dem Changes
“Well, my mind keeps going through dem changes, I think I’m going out of my mind…”
You know how your tastes change over time, from not liking something to really liking it or vice versa? I hated spaghetti until I was about 12, then loved it almost overnight! Hormones? Insanity? Teenage confusion?
Don’t know. I’ve never liked KISS and I was done with the Rolling Stones in the late 70′s. Bruce Springsteen never floated my barge, for some reason, and I’d rather pan fry my hands and eat them than listen to Billy Joel or hip-hop in almost any form.
So, it came as one of life’s changes recently when friends who own the city’s alternative weekly newspaper remembered that I was once a big fan of Joe Bonamassa. He’s coming back to Salt Lake City mid-March to play Symphony Hall and it’s sold out at $75 for nosebleed seats. No small feat and I give him huge props for selling out a hall that size in this town.
When I was trying to be Street Team dude for JB in Utah, no one had heard of him here save a tiny handful of people. I spent weeks telling people to get to Deer Valley Resort to see him open for BB King in the mid-00′s and I was the sober dude in the audience yelling to people all around me to “Watch this guy! He’s going to be huge! Listen to what he’s doing up there! He’s making magic!” A few strange looks from the wine-and-cheese-in-a-$200-designer-picnik-basket crowd, but exhilirating to see Joe in Utah and being warmly welcomed.
And thus comes dem curious changes: I used to love to watch JB in a 3 piece just kill it on a small stage in an obscure setting. That was fun. That was exciting. Tix were $10.
Now, lo and behold, he’s selling out symphony halls with a bigger band at $75 for the cheap seats. Don’t even know this guy.
So, when my friends at the paper offered me two free tickets to JB’s show next month, I politley turned them down and said,”I’ve so been there and done that! You need to share those with a new fan, someone who doesn’t remember him from 10 years ago. Someone who doesn’t like spaghetti, but isn’t sure why.”
The Payroll Tax Credit bill was just extended in Congress today for 10 months. Boehner and company stood at the microphone and said they had ‘caved’ to the Democrats on this policy, but really, didn’t they just kick the can down the road just past the 2012 elections?
Like Obama, much they do these days is seen as election-year manuevering and ass-kissing. It’s just that this started with the 2010 elections.
And the theme was crystal-clear, remember?
OCTOBER 2010:
GOP: “Put us in office. We’ll show you how to create jobs,
and begin showing this president and this adminsitration
the door.” (quote)
NOVEMBER 2010:
Ok, you got it. Overwhelming majority. 63 new gains.
Virtual complete control.
DECEMBER 2010:
No job bills.
JANUARY 2011:
No job bills
FEBRUARY 2011:
No job bills
MARCH 2011:
No job bills
APRIL 2011:
No job bills
MAY 2011:
No job bills
JUNE 2011:
No job bills
JULY 2011:
No job bills
AUGUST 2011
No job bills
SEPTEMBER 2011
No job bills
Lots of Religious MumboJumbo
OCTOBER 2011
No job bills
NO AID FOR DISASTER VICTIMS
PLENTY OF CASH FOR SOCIAL ENGINEERING
NOVEMBER 2011
No job bills
MANAGED TO REAFFIRM THE NATIONAL MOTTO
December 2011
No job bills
FOUND A SPOT FOR CHURCHILL’S STATUE
JANUARY 2012
HEY WHADAYA EXPECT?
WE MADE SURE WE ONLY WORK 6 DAYS THIS MONTH!
(courtesy poster on Huffpo 2/13/12)
It’s been a year. Frankly, it hasn’t done squat for a guy in my position other than allow one of my kids to stay on my policy for a few extra months before I lost that coverage because I lost my job. So now, I’m out in the market shopping outrageously expensive, benefit-limited, catastrophic health coverage that doesn’t pay for prescriptions or office visits until I pay out $10,000 out of pocket first. . .in a year. Yeah, like that’s going to happen. Can you say “public option?”
But in the vein of holding politicians accountable for their pronouncements, Think Progress had this today:
“During the nearly 10-month legislative battle that preceded passage, the GOP characterized the bill as a “socialist government takeover” and warned Americans that the bill would destroy lives and American society, hurling apocalyptic warnings that seem downright satirical a year later. Below are some of their most outrageous claims:
- REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R-OH): Passage of health reform is “Armageddon” because the law will “ruin our country.” [3/20/2010]
- FRMR. SEN. RICK SANTORUM (R-PA): Health reform “will destroy the country” because, “in the next year or so,” America will have to “dramatically cut the military because we can’t pay for it.” [10/23/2010]
- SEN. TOM COBURN (R-OK): “There will be no insurance industry left in three years.” [10/12/2010]
- REP. MICHELE BACHMANN (R-MN): “On page 16, you can read for yourself that no new health insurance policies can be written once this federal plan comes into effect.” [7/17/2009]
- GLENN BECK: “This is the end of prosperity in America forever … the end of America as you know it.” [11/19/2009]
- SEAN HANNITY: “If we get nationalized health care, it’s over; this is socialism.” [11/2/2009]
- REP. PAUL BROUN (R-GA): “That’s exactly what’s going on in Canada and Great Britain today…and a lot of people are going to die.” [7/10/09]
- REP. LOUIE GOHMERT (R-TX): “I would hate to think that among five women, one of ‘em is gonna die because we go to socialized care.” [7/15/09]
- REP. VIRGINIA FOXX (R-NC): “The Republican plan will] make sure we bring down the cost of health care for all Americans and that ensures affordable access for all Americans and is pro-life because it will not put seniors in a position of being put to death by their government.” [7/28/09]
- SEN. TOM COBURN (R-OK): “I have a message for you: you’re going to die soon…When you restrict the ability of the primary care givers int his country to do what is best for their senior patients, what you are doing is limiting their life expectancy.” [12/1/09]
- REP. MICHELE BACHMANN (R-MN): “Socialized medicine is the crown jewel of socialism. This will change our country forever.” [11/3/2009]
I read this linked story today from The Sydney Morning Herald. It’s pretty interesting, particularly the last paragraph:
“Neuroscientists are examining whether political allegiances are hard-wired into people after finding evidence that the brains of conservatives are a different shape to those of left-wingers.
Scans of 90 students’ brains at University College London (UCL) uncovered a ‘strong correlation’ between the thickness of two particular areas of grey matter and an individual’s views.
Self-proclaimed right-wingers had a more pronounced amygdala – a primitive part of the brain associated with emotion while their political opponents from the opposite end of the spectrum had thicker anterior cingulates.
The research was carried out by Geraint Rees director of the UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience who said he was “very surprised” by the finding, which is being peer reviewed before publication next year.
It was commissioned as a light-hearted experiment by actor Colin Firth as part of his turn guest editing BBC Radio’s Today program but has now developed into a serious effort to discover whether we are programmed with a particular political view.
Professor Rees said that although it was not precise enough to be able to predict someone’s stance simply from a scan, there was “a strong correlation that reaches all our scientific tests of significance”.
‘The anterior cingulate is a part of the brain that is on the middle surface of the brain at the front and we found that the thickness of the grey matter, where the nerve cells of neurons are, was thicker the more people described themselves as liberal or left wing (Wiki on anterior cingulate: It includes both the ventral and dorsal areas of the cingulate cortex, and appears to play a role in a wide variety of autonomic functions, such as regulating blood pressure and heart rate, as well as rational cognitive functions, such as reward anticipation, decision-making, empathy and emotion) and thinner the more they described themselves as conservative or right wing,’ he told the program.
‘The amygdala is a part of the brain which is very old and very ancient and thought to be very primitive and to do with the detection of emotions. The right amygdala was larger in those people who described themselves as conservative.’
‘It is very significant because it does suggest there is something about political attitudes that are either encoded in our brain structure through our experience or that our brain structure in some way determines or results in our political attitudes.’
Mr Firth – who recently declared he had ended public support for the Liberal Democrats – said he would like to have party leader and now Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg subjected to the tests.
‘I think we should have him scanned,’ he said.
He said the coalition made him ‘extremely uneasy’ but would not rule out voting Lib Dem in future.
‘I would have to see what identity they took on because I don’t recognise them at the moment. I think all three parties are in a state of re-evaluation.’
Talking about the experiment, he said: ‘I took this on as a fairly frivolous exercise: I just decided to find out what was biologically wrong with people who don’t agree with me and see what scientists had to say about it and they actually came up with something.’”
18
Dec
10
What The Fox?
This study caught my eye on ThinkProgress this morning:
“ThinkProgress reported yesterday on a study conducted by World Public Opinion — a project managed by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland — which found that that “greater exposure” to Fox News during the run-up to the mid-term elections this year “increased” daily viewers’ misinformation about specific issues. When asked by New York Times media reporter Brian Stelter to comment on the study’s finding, Fox News’ senior vice president for news editorial attacked the university, claiming it’s merely a “party school”:
Asked for comment on the study, Fox News seemingly dismissed the findings. In a statement, Michael Clemente, who is the senior vice president of news editorial for the network, said: “The latest Princeton Review ranked the University of Maryland among the top schools for having ‘Students Who Study The Least’ and being the ‘Best Party School’ – given these fine academic distinctions, we’ll regard the study with the same level of veracity it was ‘researched’ with.”
Mr. Clemente oversees every hour of objective news programming on Fox News, which is by far the nation’s most popular cable news channel.
“For the record,” Stelter noted, “the Princeton Review says the University of Maryland ranks among the ‘Best Northeastern Colleges.’ It was No. 19 on the Review’s list of ‘Best Party Schools.’”
So, that’s the best defense Fox could offer, that the U of Maryland is a “party school?” Not much of a party school, ranked at #19. I would have really appreciated a little more cerebral response, but perhaps that’s wishful thinking. Given the recent “outings” of Fox internal memos and emails where managers instructed staff to craft stories on health care and other key Obama initiatives that would cast a negative light on them to viewers. I probably wouldn’t mind if Fox would just come out and speak the truth about its deeply partisan activities while claiming that stupid marketing phrase about being Fair and Balanced and it’s all George Soros’ fault. And, most Fox viewers probably don’t know who George Soros is.
09
Dec
10
And It’s Only Been a Month. . .
This in from Think Progress this morning:
“Perhaps to the surprise of many Tea Party populists who helped elect them, the Washington Post reports, ‘Many incoming GOP lawmakers have hired registered lobbyists as senior aides. Several of the candidates won with strong support from the anti-establishment tea party movement.’
These lobbyists are not public servants. They are experts at carving out special deals and tax giveaways to powerful corporations:
– Rep.-elect Marlin Stutzman (R-IN) selected lobbyist Tim Harris as his chief of staff. Harris works as lobbyist for a trade association representing the shareholders of energy companies like American Electric Power, Duke Energy, NiSource, Vectren.
– Rep.-elect Mike Pompeo (R-KS) selected Mark Chenowerth as his chief of staff. Chenowerth previously worked as a lawyer on the lobbying team for Koch Industries, the conglomerate owned by Charles and David Koch. As ThinkProgress reported early this year, Pompeo was groomed for office by Koch Industries-run front groups, and has served as an executive for Koch Industries oil company subsidiaries.
– Rep.-elect Robert Dold (R-IL) selected corporate lobbyist Eric Burgeson as his chief of staff. Burgeson works for the lobbying firm BGR Holdings serving business clients in China, the coal industry, and a nuclear company.
– Rep.-elect Chip Cravaack (R-MN) selected corporate lobbyist Rod Grams as his chief of staff. Grams works for a lobbying firm called Hecht, Spencer, and Associates where he represents 3M, Norfolk Southern and the Financial Services Roundtable, the trade association for the country’s largest banks.
– Rep.-elect Krisi Noem (R-SD) selected Jordon Stoick as her chief of staff. Stoick is a vice president at the lobbying firm Direct Impact. Direct Impact also specializes in building public support for corporate causes, boasting on its website that it once generated hundreds of letters to the FCC on behalf of the telecom industry.
– Rep.-elect Jeff Denham (R-CA) selected corporate lobbyist Jason Larrabee as his chief of staff. Larrabee is the founder of his own lobbying firm.
– Sen.-elect Pat Toomey (R-PA) selected former corporate lobbyist Chris Gahan as his chief of staff. Gaham previously worked at the lobbying firm Latham and Watkins.
– Rep.-elect Steve Pearce (R-AZ) selected Todd Willens as his chief of staff. Willens is a lobbyist at Vitello Consulting, a firm that represents a number of interests, including a casino.
– Sen.-elect Charlie Bass (R-NH) selected lobbyist John Billings as his chief of staff. Billings is a lobbyist for a food marketing and whole sale trade association.
– Rep.-elect Chris Gibson (R-NY) selected Steve Stallmer as his chief of staff. Stallmer is a lobbyist for the Associated General Contractors of New York State.
– Sen.-elect Ron Johnson (R-WI) selected Don Kent as his chief of staff. Kent is a lobbyist for the firm Navigators Global. Navigators Global represents AT&T, CitiGroup, and other major corporations.
– Sen.-elect Mike Lee (R-UT) selected lobbyist Spencer Strokes as his chief of staff. Lee is one of the most prominent corporate lobbyists in Utah, representing clients from the private prison industry to the nuclear industry.
– Sen.-elect Rand Paul (R-KY) selected anti-union lobbyist Douglas Stafford for his chief of staff. Stafford is the vice president of the National Right to Work Committee.
These Republican lawmakers, many of whom cast themselves as insurgents, are linking their professional decisions into the corporate establishment of influence peddling. Congressional chiefs of staff are often in charge of helping members make pivotal decisions, like which positions to take on public debates, how to vote on pieces of legislation, and of course, how to use your votes to raise money for your re-election.
As the Washington Post reported last weekend, freshmen “Tea Party” Republicans have already ingratiated themselves into the cocktail culture of K Street. Dozens of freshmen Republicans have crowded into near-daily fundraisers, parties, and high-priced dinners hosted by corporate lobbyists. Already undercutting a promise to wean themselves off earmark giveaways to corporate interests, the new Republican Chairman of the Appropriations Committee is leaning towards hiring a defense industry lobbyist as the committee chief of staff.”
So much for grassroots, populist movements.
I’ve been meaning to publish a few pics of our recent trip to DC and The Rally to Restore Sanity hosted by Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert. We were so far away from the stage and it was canned sardine-tight quarters in front of the multiple huge screens planted in intervals down the Mall. We loved every minute of it!
It was a beautiful, warm, fall day all the way around and for three hours, the vibe was friendly and kind of charming in a strange and inviting way. Not a sign of protest or anger and the most political sign we saw was “Sanity, Not Hannity!” The shot of the empty grass area of the Mall with the Capitol Building in the background was taken at 9:00 am the next morning. I couldn’t find a candy wrapper on the ground.
Ok, been a week and I still don’t have a job with benefits I can afford. The Republicans ran on ”fixing” healthcare and creating jobs, so, ball’s in their court. . .any time now. . .g’head, start making speeches and forming committees and making statements to the press.
Any time now, there will be a plethora of jobs and healthcare options available to all of us! And talking unicorns will fart rainbows and little children will float down streams of choclate syrup on giant marshmallows!
Sarah really raised the bar this year, gosh darn it. She made sure that her senate candidates that couldn’t get arrested in normal times, locked out traditional Republican candidates who could have soundly defeated their Demo counter parts and Repubs lost a chace at controlling both houses of Congress because “real” Americans decided that perhaps loony-brained extremists like Sharon Angle were a bit over the top. Yay, Sarah!
And the right-leaning Supremes allowed foreign and domestic corporate interests, with the help of Karl Rove and Newt Gingrich to pour millions of dollars into races against Democrats ’cause “Corporations are people, too!”
Yup, I’m all ready. I have my Zoloft, my popcorn, my remote control, my cat. Go, Republicans! I know you fucked us before, but I accept your apologies and I actually understand what it’s like now to accept an abuser who has abused before, but says he’s learned his lesson and won’t do it again, honest, baby, I was drunk, let me prove to you how important you are and how this is my Last Chance!
And, to you conservative patriots who did the Republican Party’s bidding this past election: Tea Partier Rand Paul just announced that he’s not going to turn down earmarks for Kentucky. Geez, not even sworn in yet and he’s announcing a huge flip-flop on a plank he ran on to get elected. He laughed and said that he was against earmarks, but he wasn’t “crazy!” I guess that confirms that the people who voted for him were, actually, “crazy.”
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