James Lileks, Michael Moore, George Orwell and Bob Dylan

The Daily Bleat pointed to Christopher Hitchens' response to Fahrenheit 9/11 over at Slate/MSN. Interesting reading, but if you don't make it all the way through his deconstruction of Moore's disjointed anti-Bush spew, don't miss the George Orwell quotation near the end:

Perhaps vaguely aware that his movie so completely lacks gravitas, Moore concludes with a sonorous reading of some words from George Orwell. The words are taken from 1984 and consist of a third-person analysis of a hypothetical, endless, and contrived war between three superpowers. The clear intention ... is to suggest that there is no moral distinction between the United States, the Taliban, and the Baath Party and that the war against jihad is about nothing. If Moore had studied a bit more, or at all, he could have read Orwell really saying, and in his own voice, the following:

The majority of pacifists either belong to obscure religious sects or are simply humanitarians who object to taking life and prefer not to follow their thoughts beyond that point. But there is a minority of intellectual pacifists, whose real though unacknowledged motive appears to be hatred of western democracy and admiration for totalitarianism. Pacifist propaganda usually boils down to saying that one side is as bad as the other, but if one looks closely at the writing of the younger intellectual pacifists, one finds that they do not by any means express impartial disapproval but are directed almost entirely against Britain and the United States …

And that's just from Orwell's Notes on Nationalism in May 1945. A short word of advice: In general, it's highly unwise to quote Orwell if you are already way out of your depth on the question of moral equivalence. It's also incautious to remind people of Orwell if you are engaged in a sophomoric celluloid rewriting of recent history.

I'll try to remember.

On an unrelated note, an eminent poetry scholar has published a 500 page book about the poetry of Bob Dylan, and more or less misses the point. Good article if you're a Dylan fan, or especially if you're a high school English teacher subjecting the kids to a "Poetry of Rock" curriculum.

Cartoon Cat Commentary

Ray's Place is a bit short on advice today, but his analysis of (I guess you'd call it) Today's Alternative Rock sure strikes a chord. (How about G⁷?)

It is some hot heavy that you got a gig at Live 105... For those of you who don’t know, Live 105 plays alternative hits from the 70s, 80s and 90s, but they also spin the latest generation of alternative, you know, where a bunch of haircuts who are 20 play in a band that has the levels mixed essentially correctly and the lyrics are:

I’M A KID AND I’M KID KID YELLIN’
I’M KID KID YELLIN’
I’M A KID AND I’M KID KID YELLIN’
KID KID YELLIN’ AT YOU

So sometimes when Live 105 does “flashback lunch” or whatever, I can get meaty bones on old Iggy or also on an old Blondie track. But when they play Kid Kid Yellin’, I just feel like I have a big shit in my pants, and that Live 105 put the shit there with that type of tri-nozzle machine that fills up Twinkies.

Ray has a hella way with words. All hail, Chris Onstad.

The Daily Fripp

As an adult, in situations where there is no intention on my part to upset or disturb, the reaction of others is not, and cannot be, my responsibility. As adults we accept responsibility for our own emotional lives. If I hold a grudge over time, this is my responsibility, not the responsibility of the person who gave offence. The benefit of several decades of observing negativity closely held is a powerful argument to forgive, let go, move on.

Where someone is deliberately nasty, what registers is the intent. This is often, for me, like being pierced. It is an attack, and an attack does not take place by accident. The attack is not my responsibility. How I respond to that attack is my responsibility. In some situations, sometimes no response is a response, especially when past responses to the antagonist have been seized upon as an opportunity to engage in the dumping of more nastiness, or locking me into negative conversational knots.

Quietly sending goodwill, even when difficult, mysteriously changes something and sets up a series of unexpected & unanticipated repercussions. - RF - Friday 4th May, 2001.

That's some of his serious side, and this bit resonates with me somehow. The Quiet One. Hmm.

Previously, in the same post he queries: "Ian's English humour shines through throughout. The question is: why has he not written material before now?" My question is, why doesn't a literate, clever, insightful and intelligent (not to mention small and mobile) unit like the Fripp write any lyrics for King Crimson? I guess the short answer is that the singer must write his own words if he is to believe them and deliver them believably. With certain historical exceptions. Playing guitar is hard enough. What Belew does within the band is demonstrably miraculous. Still, a more overt reflection/incarnation of the Head Crim's remarkable outlook within their recorded output would be a cool addition to the KC fabric...

Recommended Download

The Master Plan - "Find Something Beautiful" from their new album, Colossus Of Destiny. The band is Andy Shernoff from the Dictators, Keith Streng and the drummer from the Fleshtones and another guitarist from the Waxing Poetics, who I haven't heard of previously. Yes, it rocks; intelligently, with good spirit and emphatically. Excellent quality complete song, 192kbps mp3, and the CD is available directly for $12 postpaid. Paypal accepted. Recommended.

Where To Find People

Langenberg.com has Zip code lookups, White Pages, Yellow Pages, etc. It's a meta-lookup thingie, if I'm using that technical jargon correctly, as it will submit your search info to a number of sites and link you to the results. Anyway, it works pretty good, and at home the other day I couldn't remember it and Google just seemed to point me to a bunch of frickin' pay sites...

Twyford Vitromant

That's a two word phrase that's been stuck in my head for some time. I have no idea what it means, other than it's Bonzo Dog Band related. A bit of Googling suggests it's a Neil Innes song, and uncovers an excellent Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band page. Educate yourself, and if you don't have a mess of recordings by these guys, you've only yourself to blame. Or maybe you had to be there. I never was, quite, myself, but your mileage may vary. Still, classic immortal British insanity in abundance, if that sort of thing appeals to you.

Stop Grovelling!


You are a GRAMMAR GOD!


If your mission in life is not already to
preserve the English tongue, it should be.
Congratulations and thank you!

How grammatically sound are you?
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I don't know what my score was out of the twenty questions, but I can't argue with having Divinity bestowed upon my person, now can I?

Debra Niswonger Foote

So, right now I gotta go say goodbye to a friend who died of ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease) a few days ago. At this evening's "Time of Rememberance", I shall, on the advice of my Spiritual Advisor (The Reverend Doctor Pastor Mojo Blarney), praise God and give thanks for the resurrected Christ in addition to sharing her memory with her family and friends. Peace, Deb.

Now, That's Writing!

I read Penny Arcade's "News" section as well as the webcomic itself every Monday, Wednesday and Friday... I seldom know much about the games that are their obsessions, but the sense of humor and skewed outlook is highly recognizable. Apropos of Nothing, as the saying goes, and somewhat out of context, this, from yesterday, made me laugh out loud...

Despite some comics you may have seen online, Gabriel and I are not gay and we rarely have sex with one another. Indeed, long ago we solicited the services of two young women for this exact purpose and eventually went about securing them in exclusive contracts. I chose the Brenna model and have thus far been reasonably satisfied with the purchase. There's only one facet of the union that grinds, and that is her acquisition of a nicotine addiction. She doesn't chew, I never retract from intimacy with any kind of mulch on my face. She smokes. I don't care if you smoke, as the odds are good I never have to taste the inside of your mouth.

It's a "hobby" she picked up during one of her bacchanalian summer drama tours. I asked her if it was accurate to say that she started doing it because the cool kids were, and she replied that, no, it was because everyone else was doing it. Apparently there are points of distinction between those two things that my apparatus doesn't have the magnification to detect. For a long time, I only suspected it - when I would kiss her during some college visit, it would taste as though she had been eating cats still crisp from a barn fire.

She has tried to quit before, but she clearly didn't mean it and I had no energy to support her in some grueling ordeal she had only nominal interest in. This worked out great for her, because then when she failed it could be my fault. It's a service that I provide people too lazy to take the reins of their own lives.

Photo Phunnies

John Kerry on the Campaign Trail