Number Six Escapes at Last

Patrick McGoohan (1928-2009)

Keep on trucking

(Or, Kolchak gets into shape by jumping to conclusions.)

I’m not a truck driver—and I’m sure that comes as a big surprise to everyone—but I drive the interstates often enough to have noticed a few changes in truck stops.

One change I’ve noticed is that there aren’t as many truck stops as there used to be. Now, you’re more likely to find a travel center or a travel stop than a truck stop. I’m not sure what the new nomenclature accomplishes, if anything. Maybe the owners are just trying to make their places more attractive to non-truckers.

Another change seems to be taking place on the paperback rack. You can find a lot of westerns and war stories at truck stops—sorry, travel centers—but I don’t think that’s new. What may be new is the number of science fiction and fantasy novels you can find. There seems to be a focus on series books, rather than individual novels : Star Trek novels in sf and series like Forbidden Realms and Warhammer in fantasy.

Over at the audiobook rack, things are changing too. On my most recent trips, I’ve been looking at a series of CDs that are described as full-cast dramatizations and “Movies for your mind.” This series features adaptations of prose stories featuring DC super heroes and post-holocaust action stories.

I’ve seen four different series in the latter category: Death Lands; Outlanders; The Survivalist and Doomsday Warrior. I know the first two are active series, but I’m pretty sure The Survivalist is out-of-print and I think Doomsday Warrior is too.

In an ultimate sense, you could call the emphasis on pulp-style characters depressing, but, personally, I have a very simple rule-of-thumb here: reading for pleasure is better than not reading for pleasure. And the same thing holds with listening for pleasure.

Now THIS is holiday cheer....

One of the best covers I have ever heard....

Check out their other stuff..  Phenominal group...

Tip of the old sombrero to Kolchak for turning me on to these guys. I was having a truly horrible day...and it just went away....

Thank You Weird Al

The only Christmas carol I can abide...

Update:

Of course I was immediately proven wrong about that as my bloggy buddy Neddie reminded all of us here.

"Bark us all bow-wows of folly"   Ain't it the truth...

On the shuffle this afternoon

1.  Namania                      Habib Koite                                
2.  Toubala Kone              Amadou Et Mariam                
3.  Here                              Salif Keita                                    
4.  Diaraby                        Ry Cooder & Ali Farka Touré    
5.  7 Seconds                      Youssou N'Dour                          
6.  Diablo Rojo                    Rodrigo Y Gabriela  
7.  Petit Pays                      Cesaria Evora  
8.  USA                                Akoya  
9.  Tessassategn Eko         Bahta Gebre-Heywet    
10. On verra ça                   Orchestra Baobab  
11. Sunday Arak                 Balkan Beat Box  
12. Uhiki (Pinye's Rmx)    Hardstone  
13. Massakè                        Habib Koite  
14. N’Teri                            Habib Koite  
15. Safarini                          Frank Ulwenya and Afrisound  
16. Silent Moon                   Jia Peng Fang  
17. Mouna                            Amadou Et Mariam  
18. Ana Na Ming                 Salif Keita  
19. Soixante Trois               Tinariwen  
20. Lasidan                           Ry Cooder & Ali Farka Touré  
21. Mustt Mustt                   Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan  
22. Ndeleng Ndeleng           Orchestra Baobab  
23. Aicha (Version Mixte)   Khaled  
24. Orion                                Rodrigo Y Gabriela  
25. Chan Chan                       Buena Vista Social Club 

The Old Songs Really Are the Best

via ICanHazCheezburger.com:

Poem of the Day

The Poet in the Box by Martin Espada
 
  for Brandon
  
We have a problem with Brandon, 
the assistant warden said.
He's a poet.
  
At the juvenile detention center
demonic poetry fired Brandon's fist
into the forehead of another inmate.
Metaphor, that cackling spirit, drove him to flip 
another boy's cafeteria tray onto the floor.
The staccato chorus rhyming in his head
told him to spit and curse 
at enemies bigger by a hundred pounds.
The gnawing in his rib cage was a craving for discipline.
Repeatedly two guards shuffled him 
to the cell called the box, solitary confinement,
masonry of silence fingered by hallucinating drifters, 
rebels awaiting execution, monks in prayer.
  
Then we figured it out, the assistant warden said.
He started fights so we'd throw him
in solitary, where he could write.
  
The box: There poetry was a grasshopper in the bowl of his hands, 
pencil chiseling letters across his notebook
like the script of a pharaoh's deeds on pyramid walls;
metaphor spilled from the light he trapped
in his eyelids, lamps of incandescent words;
rhyme harmonized through the voices
of great-grandmothers and sharecropper bluesmen 
whenever sleep began to whistle in his breath. 
So the cold was a blanket to him.
  
We fixed Brandon, the assistant warden said.
We stopped punishing him. He knows
that every violation means he stays here longer.
  
Tonight there are poets 
who versify vacations in Tuscany, 
the villa on a hill, the light of morning; 
poets who stare at computer screens 
and imagine cockroach powder 
dissolved into the coffee
of the committee that said no to tenure;
poets who drain whiskey bottles 
and urinate on the shoes of their disciples;
poets who cannot sleep as they contemplate
the extinction of iambic pentameter;
poets who watch the sky, waiting for a poem
to plunge in a white streak through blackness.
  
Brandon dreams of punishment,
stealing the keys from a sleepy jailer
to lock himself into the box, where he can hear
the scratching of his pencil
like fingernails on dungeon stone. 
  
from Alabanza: New & Selected Poems

Some modest suggestions

My decidedly old school recommendation wishlist for the new administration. I look forward with wonder and delight (and probable amazement) to President Obama's actual choices.

Agriculture:  Kathleen Sibelius

Attorney General: Robert Kennedy, Jr.

Commerce: Michael Bloomberg

Defense: Wesley Clark  (when he becomes eligible)

Director of National Intelligence: Jane Harman

Education: Graham Spanier

Energy: Amory Lovins

EPA: Al Gore

FEMA: Douglas Wilder

Health & Human Services: Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg

Homeland Security: Janet Napolitano

Housing & Urban Development: Ellen Sahli

Interior: Olympia Snowe

Labor: Andy Stern

National Security Advisor: Richard Clarke

Poet Laureate: Martin Espada

Special Prosecutor: Dennis Kucinich

State: Bill Richardson

Transportation: Susan Kupferman 

Treasury: Paul Krugman

UN Ambassador:  Bill Clinton

Veterans Affairs:  Max Cleland

Poem of the Day

 
Joy, Shipmate, Joy! by Walt Whitman
  

  Joy! shipmate--joy!
(Pleas'd to my Soul at death I cry;)
Our life is closed--our life begins;
The long, long anchorage we leave,
The ship is clear at last--she leaps!
She swiftly courses from the shore;
Joy! shipmate--joy! 

YES YES YES YES YES YES YES

YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES 

Voter Diary

Just back from voting.  At 11am I was number 526 to vote. In 2006, I was number 178 at 4 pm. 2004, around 425 at that same time. This is shaping up to be a VERY high turnout.

All going smoothly in my precinct except for the common error of dividing the alphabet evenly at j/k and expecting even length lines.  From the personal experience of years of convention registration work I can tell you  that American names are weighted very heavily to the first quarter of the alphabet. Dividing registration at E or even D will get you equal length lines in most groups. As a result, the a-j line had 50 people in it while I, being R surnamed, was behind 3 when I entered the building and voted quickly.

Another pleasant surprise, my county has completed the change back to paper scan ballots since last fall. No more Dieboltian vote swallowers here.

No McCain workers outside the polling place. 4 Obama workers and a lone sad looking supporter for the local Congressional candidate.

GO OBAMA!

Update: Reports on local radio say that over 1000 Penn State students were in line before polls opened at one of the downtown State College precincts. Go Lions!

Vote

A reminder:

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For John McCain

Create a playlist at MixPod.com

Since we had a singing shout out to Barack Obama earlier this month, we thought it only fair to do the same for John McCain. Enjoy John.

Election Predictions

from my post to the Blatt on July 5th:

-------

Obama will win by 323 to 215 electorial votes. The Dems will hold all the states they had in 2004 and add AK CO IN IA MT NM NV OH VA and possibly NC.

In the Senate, the Dems will pick up 10 seats in AK CO ME MN MS NC NH NM OR VA, leaving themselves one vote short of being fillibuster proof.

In the House, the Dems will have a net pick-up of 18 seats. They will give the GOP a strong run for our congressional district (PA 05), but will probably lose...it will depend on turn out in State College.

--------

Looking back, it seems that I was too conservative on the EV count.  Obviously I am wrong about AK, but I still feel pretty confident about the rest. I'm moving NC to a win and adding MO and IN as strong possibles. Weak possibles are WV, GA, MT and ND.

O 346 to M 192  5.8% spread in popular vote

In the Senate, I am certainly wrong on ME, I stand on predicting wins in AK CO MN NC NH NM OR VA and add GA and MS as  strong possibles, meaning there is a shot at being rid of Traitor Joe.

In the House races, I now think 18 is too few, but I am not sure how many more...say a total of 32 seats picked up...

Glenn Thompson (R-unqualified idiot) will win in our local Congressional race, but Mark McCracken will do a lot better than the average someone who has spent less than $1 for every $6 of his opponent does. I say an 8% spread

All the local State House and Senate incumbents will win handily.

The water system finance bond will pass easily.

The Dems will continue to hold all the State row house offices (Auditor General, Attorney General, Treasurer, etc) 

Hey Joe Six-Pack...

via Doghouse Riley over at Bats Left/Throws Right:

The Republican National Committee paid more than $150,000 for clothing, makeup and accessories in September that apparently went to Gov. Sarah Palin and her family, according to an article on Politico.com.

That included $9,447.71 to Macy’s, $789.72 to Barneys New York, $5,102.71 to Bloomingdales; $49,425.74 to Saks Fifth Avenue and $4,902.45 to Atelier.

In one heavyweight shopping trip in early September, $75,062.63 was spent at Neiman Marcus in Minneapolis, a host city of the Republican National Convention.

The expenditures were listed on the R.N.C.’s monthly financial disclosure forms.

Update:

NEWSWEEK has also learned that Palin's shopping spree at high-end department stores was more extensive than previously reported. While publicly supporting Palin, McCain's top advisers privately fumed at what they regarded as her outrageous profligacy. One senior aide said that Nicolle Wallace had told Palin to buy three suits for the convention and hire a stylist. But instead, the vice presidential nominee began buying for herself and her family—clothes and accessories from top stores such as Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus. According to two knowledgeable sources, a vast majority of the clothes were bought by a wealthy donor, who was shocked when he got the bill. Palin also used low-level staffers to buy some of the clothes on their credit cards. The McCain campaign found out last week when the aides sought reimbursement. One aide estimated that she spent "tens of thousands" more than the reported $150,000, and that $20,000 to $40,000 went to buy clothes for her husband. Some articles of clothing have apparently been lost. An angry aide characterized the shopping spree as "Wasilla hillbillies looting Neiman Marcus from coast to coast," and said the truth will eventually come out when the Republican Party audits its books.

The Pettigrew principle

From KOLCHAK:

Barack Obama’s campaign for the presidency is nothing less than a history-marking event, regardless of how it turns out. For those of us who attended Catholic school in the 1960s, however, the campaign is not entirely unfamiliar.

If you were attending Catholic school at that time, you could subscribe to a comic book called Treasure Chest. As you might imagine, given the time and the audience, there were lots of “educational “and “inspirational” stories in Treasure Chest. As an adult, I would probably find these stories stupid or offensive, or both…if I remembered them. Fortunately, the stories I remember are the ones that slipped in under the radar. There was a series about kids living on a space station that I remember liking, and there was 1976: Pettigrew For President..

From what I’ve been able to put together so far, 1976: Pettigrew For President ran for 10 chapters in 1964. Treasure Chest came out every two weeks, so the story played out over roughly half a school year. The title character was Gov. Timothy Pettigrew, who was running for his party’s presidential nomination in that exotic future year of 1976. I would’ve been in fifth grade when the series ran, but my parents were already wondering how much longer would I be reading those weird funnybooks.

It probably took me a couple of chapters before I realized that there was something strange about “Pettigrew.” We would never see the governor’s face. We would hear his voice as part of a telephone conversation, but, if he was in the room, his head would always be blocked by something, or someone. I knew that the strip’s creators were building up to something, but I don’t think I had any theories about what it was. So I was definitely surprised when, on the last page of the story, as he accepts his party’s nomination, Tim Pettigrew is revealed to be African-American.

I know: to an adult, this all sounds heavy-handed, at best. To a fifth-grader, though, it was anything but, even though we never find out if the governor was elected president.
For what it’s worth, there’s a similar reveal in “Judgment Day,” a story that appeared in one of the classic EC science fiction comics. In this story, a man from Earth comes to Cybrinia, a planet where humans had deposited a colony of super-intelligent robots sometime in the distant past. The visitor was to evaluate the culture the robots had developed, to see if Cybrinia was worthy for inclusion in the Galactic Republic.

While many aspects of the cybernetic culture are positive, the Earthman quickly discovers that the robots with orange skins are discriminating against the robots with blue skins. This disqualifies the Cybrinians for membership in the Republic. Throughout the story, the human visitor wears a spacesuit that obscures his face. In the last panel, though, he takes his helmet off and “the instrument lights made the beads of perspiration on his dark skin twinkle like distant stars.”

“Judgment Day” first appeared in 1953, but I first read it in Tales Of the Incredible, a paperback reprint which came out in 1965 (and is sitting beside my computer right now).

Someone named Bob Wundrock—another survivor of the Catholic School system, I’m guessing—has posted some pages from 1976: Pettigrew For President on YouTube. They confirm another memory I had of the series—Pettigrew actually looks a bit like Obama—and they provide some plot points that I’d forgotten.

Pettigrew’s major opponent for the nomination is the ominously-named Senator Oilengass. The governor picks Oilengass to as his vice president , but a typo adds some unintentional humor to the invitation. The word balloon reads: “Senator, will you run as vice-president with me? I’d be proud to have you?”

Go ahead, look at it again. I’ll wait.

Even in fifth grade, I was far enough into comics that I was looking at credit boxes and noticing artists’ signatures. So it registered on me at the time that 1976: Pettigrew For President was drawn by Joe Sinnott. Sinnott is probably best known as Jack Kirby’s inker on the Fantastic Four comic, but he was providing both pencils and inks here.

As for the writer, I still don’t know much about him. He appears to be someone named Barry Reese, but that’s all I’ve been able to find out. For the record, “Judgment Day” was drawn by Joe Orlando. I haven’t been able to find a writing credit for this story either, but stories in the classic EC comics are usually credited to Al Feldstein.

1776:Pettigrew For President may have been an indicator of the liberal trends in the Catholic Church at the time. Or it may have just slipped in under the radar. In either case, the so-called real world is finally catching up to it.

Barack O'Bama

 Obama is as white as he is black.

And he is neither as well.

This song hits exactly the right tone about something that has always baffled me about the subject of race in America. Oh I understand the "reasoning" about a "drop" of the fatal blood and all that. But if being white is so superior you'd think that well, the "good" would overcome the "bad'. Seems to me.

Of  course that doesn't stop someone who has a cousin who dated a woman who once kissed an Irishman from claiming that that makes him Irish as well.

Oh and by the way, you fucking racist asshats coming out to Gov. Palin's rallies..

KISS MY MIXED RACE BEHIND!

Submitted without comment

From the end of last night's debate

Biden calls out John McCain as the coward he is

This is so appalling

These are the people Sarah Palin is bringing out. My God. If I were McCain I'd hang my head in shame that I'm depending on them for their votes. Unbelievably foul human beings.