I haven’t dared look at my traffic numbers in…? How long? A long time. I’m sure they’re in the toilet, and have been for about a year, because one thing you can’t really do when you are a servant of two masters — i.e., a journalist with a day job — is be a fun ‘n’ lively blogger. Plus, I’m absorbed once again in how much I don’t know, an experience that I always find shuts me up for a while. Nothing like being stupid to make you want to stop digging your hole of ignorance.
And there’s the other thing: I now write at the end of the day, when I’m a lot lower on energy. So consider this a blanket apology for general lameness, and maybe in the new year I’ll try some new models that give you all the conversation pit you seem to enjoy, and give the lurkers and drive-bys a little more.
And leave me time to write some other things. Not sure what, but it’s something else I’d really like to do. This isn’t a book I’d like to write, but it’s an idea I had last summer, when I was talking to Tom Nardone, the Mower Gang guy. Sooner or later, you learn that Tom’s day job, when he’s not saving Detroit parks for children, is selling sex toys on the internet. He really has a great story about how he got into it in the early-early days of the internet, how he started as a middleman for anything a person might find embarrassing to buy in person. He and his girlfriend went through every drugstore, Walmart and Target they could find and made a list of anything a person might be embarrassed to lay in front of a human clerk. It was a list that ranged from Rogaine to Fleet enemas to Preparation H. The company they launched, PriveCo, would sell you this stuff over the internet, and their value-add was that you’d never hear from them again — no mailing lists, no you-might-be-interested-in-this, none of that. And it went pretty well for a while, until Drugstore.com came online and undercut them on everything and threw in free shipping to boot.
So now they deal exclusively in sex toys, but because Tom is a total mensch, they do it their own wholesome way. Every year they put up a table at the Dirty Show, an annual erotic-art show here in Detroit, and raise money for charity. One year they offered “take a ride on the world’s largest vibrator” for $3, last year it was a claw machine called Mr. Grab Ass. (The joystick control was an actual joy stick, heh heh.)
You can imagine what his office is like. And it’s in this bland light-industrial park, which is to say, it’s in a light-industrial park, period. All light-industrial parks are bland; it’s like their designs are a competition for the most boring architects in the world. You could locate the CIA in a light-industrial park, and no one would ever find it. As he was walking me out, he pointed out the building next door, which was equally boring and beige and surrounded by boxy shrubs and nondescript trees. His neighbor, Tom said, makes some sort of custom-fabricated hot rod parts, and is considered the best in the world at it. So just in this one corner of this one industrial park, you have dildos and hot rods.
“What other secrets are lurking in this neighborhood?” I asked. And that’s the book idea: Secrets of the Light-Industrial Park: Adventures in American Capitalism.
I don’t particularly want to write it. But who knows, maybe someday I will.
In the meantime, I’m collecting some thoughts on jewelry advertising this time of year. Later in the week.
Bloggage? “The Queen of Versailles” is on my watch-one-of-these-days list, especially so after reading Dave Weigel’s take on it. The story of how two Florida sharpies set out to build the largest residence in the U.S. gets sidetracked by something bigger, i.e., trouble in their time-share paradise:
The hard-selling Siegel employees try to convince their marks to buy time shares before said marks can do the math and realize the risks. We see one couple, both tattooed and glum-looking, grow more and more interested as they’re told that they can save thousands of dollars if, instead of booking motels every time they come to Vegas, they buy a time-share condo in the tower. Eventually, the husband pushes a credit card across the table. “I can’t believe we just did it!” he says, with little evident joy. He could do it because he had credit.
The Freep does a huge, year-end (i.e., awards-bait) project on the Packard plant here in Detroit. If you don’t want to wade through a million words, I can recommend the video, which is really well-done.
The WashPost has a great report on the Kennedy Center honors this year. Start at Led Zeppelin and follow the links to the rest.
The week begins! December already. How’d that happen?
Dexter said on December 3, 2012 at 2:14 am
Gee…I would have guessed Mower Gang Tom would have been an office-bound accountant who loved jumping on his mower at day’s end for some sun and wind on his face…but he sells sex toys, eh? I B Dam.
I never get enough Packard stories and videos. The one video said demolition was supposed to have started in March of 2012…fell through, I suppose. The guy in the video said the cost of demolition would be covered by recovered junk. And the Iraq war was supposed to be paid for by recovered oil. That one didn’t work out so pretty good.
Showtime’s “Homeland” is so scary and intense, the hour flies by so quickly. Last night’s main scene had me on the edge of my seat.
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James said on December 3, 2012 at 7:34 am
Homeland has become hopelessly implausible.
Magic cellphones that whiz video around with no glitches (that Abdul Nazir must have a great data plan). People known to be a terrorist being allowed to wander around the VP’s residence willy-nilly. That same person taking a call from another terrorist in a CIA safe house, and shouting the guy’s name at the top of his lungs, with no consequences. That same safe house with floor to ceiling windows, because, that’s how you protect someone from snipers…
There’s suspension of disbelief, and then there’s Homeland, which takes it to a whole ‘nother level.
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coozledad said on December 3, 2012 at 8:39 am
Zep deserves its honors just as much as any other act, but after having to imitate Robert Plant for hours at a stretch with a high school copy band for a couple of years, they ceased to resonate with me.
I will say one thing for them: they left an indelible visual record I can always consult when I begin to feel the cultural ambience of 1975-77 start to slip from memory.
It’s a skinny redneck in a CAT hat receiving an eye hit while fingering the guitar of his and every other displaced agrarian’s imagination. I think there’s a strobe light involved. Everyone’s seen it: a hunting-knife wearing maladaptive indulging an anagogic tribal response to a blond Tom Jones screeching something about a Hobbit.
Fuck dance, motherfuckers: Let’s art!
This bit from the article struck me as the essence of late century British working class flaneur:
For Plant, the group’s finest balancing act came with “Kashmir,” perhaps the most expansive rock song ever recorded, an eight-and-a-half-minute opus inspired by trips to Thailand, India and Morocco. “Just listening, and hearing, and smelling, and the occasional taste of fear in the back of your throat” — Plant snaps his fingers as if to wake himself from the reverie — “it’s magnificent! I think we did very well traveling and eavesdropping on other worlds.”
“Especially ones that had sweet fuck all gnat’s piss for a decent beer.” he neglected to add.
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 8:48 am
And indeed, in amongst the archetypes that one would have in an industrial park, you gotta have the company that nobody knows exactly what the hell they do – and which has the occasional bout of loud banging and clunking, and the occasional blazing, smokey fire that they then quickly put out; and the rental buildings that suddenly switch signs every 12 or 18 months; and the business that has its own fleet of delivery trucks (let’s say a uniform supply company, for example), and which – with some regularity – sends one off with the door open, thus spilling this or that box or other bit of awkward debris onto the road and into the drainage ditches; and, just for spice, the occasional police stake-out, wherein an unmarked car (but which is unmistakeably a cop car!) sits in one of the cul-de-sacs for a day or two, and then flits away…
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Minnie said on December 3, 2012 at 8:55 am
“We are your overlords.”
http://www.dennyweb.com/viking_kittens.htm
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nancy said on December 3, 2012 at 8:58 am
I was always a Led Zep 3 gal, m’self. Puts me in a tiny minority, I know, but it’s still the only album I still play from time to time. OK, OK, that and “Houses of the Holy.”
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coozledad said on December 3, 2012 at 9:09 am
Now I’m seeing a viking helmet with dildos instead of horns. The Valhalla.
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coozledad said on December 3, 2012 at 9:38 am
Sheesh. Rule 34. NSFW?
http://www.everystockphoto.com/photo.php?imageId=2076277
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Deborah said on December 3, 2012 at 9:56 am
Stairway to Heaven is what I chose to walk down the “aisle” with at my wedding (I say “aisle” because we got married on our Mesa in Abiquiu and we had rows of straw bales covered in canvas lined up for seating). My favorite line from the song is:
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run
There’s still time to change the road you’re on.
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basset said on December 3, 2012 at 10:21 am
http://www.dennyweb.com/viking_kittens.htm
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 10:25 am
basset – that was indeed rather good!
And Deborah – you go!
I’ve never been further west than Lincoln, NE (or Houston – whichever is further); but I wanna go-see your Southwest, at some point
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Dorothy said on December 3, 2012 at 10:33 am
Dildos and hot rods. The terms are practically interchangeable!
My bright spot to the day so far? Being on hold with Expedia.com and hearing the Allman Brothers “Jessica”.
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BigHank53 said on December 3, 2012 at 10:38 am
That’s some picture, coozledad. The dildo-ed helmet’s the least of it, though: where on earth did they find that mannequin head? Because that thing is just wrong.
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Connie said on December 3, 2012 at 10:47 am
For a story of industrial parks, look for the special the Mythbusters made about all the industrial park locations and warehouses they have been kicked out of by various landlords. Do you have to wonder why?
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coozledad said on December 3, 2012 at 10:53 am
Hank: I don’t know, but it could easily be a window display from a hipster place in Durham, NC.
Ooh-la Latte. They sold vintage clothing, coffee and dildos.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 11:04 am
As an inveterate devotee of the adventures of Hank Hill, I figured the Mower Gang guy sells propane and propane related products for a living.
Deborah, that was the little known Yogi Berra fanboy aspect of Robert Plant coming out. “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”
The jewelry industry advertising meme that I find interesting is that disingenuous formula for how much to spend on an engagement ring bullshit. OOOhWeee, that is some smooth con.
Louisiana is a fetid bayou of backwards “educational” thinking, but even in Louisiana, a judge can see education vouchers for the attack on public education they really represent. A science test that demands knowledge of what exactly the LLord made on each of the six days before She saw that it was good and rested. Reminds me of the two days mandated by the GA legislature in my college Biology class for the Creation story. Most fun two days of class ever.
Coolers abounded, and mean-spirited humor and sarcasm ran high. Born-agains complained of being mocked, and everybody else pointed out to them that our tuition money was being wasted on a tribal, superstitious creation myth. The TAs that ran the travesty were smug and insulting to the bible kids, as they should have been. Somebody showed up in a dinosaur costume with a Western saddle stapped to his back.
For my money, In Through the Out Door is the best Led Zep album, followed by the XOSO and them the first, second and third in that order. The leslie speaker guitar solo in Fool in the Rain is exquisite, maybe Page’s finest moment not in Kashmir and not with a bow. But I still play all of the albums, and I particularly love to play When the Levee Breaks as loud as possible. The opening drum assault is boneshaking, and there is a point at the break for the bridge harmonica solo when the band overwhelmed the studio equipment and things get distorted. That kills me every time I hear it. I had a Sophomore dorm neighbor that played Laura Nyro incessantly. My defense was The Immigrant Song, loud.
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Kirk said on December 3, 2012 at 11:06 am
Led Zep III, indeed. “Since I’ve Been Loving You” one of the great rock ‘n’ roll blues songs, along with Jimi’s “Red House.”
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Jeff Borden said on December 3, 2012 at 11:19 am
For all the talk about the so-called liberal bias of the New York Times, it employs two conservatives who absolutely bug the ever-lovin’ shit out of me. David Brooks and his lame attempts at calling for comity by having Democrats bow to Republicans in the name of bipartisanship is bad enough, but Russ Douthat sends my blood well beyond boiling.
The column yesterday could’ve been written by an admitted xenophobe like Pat Buchanan or Bill O’Reilly. Basically, Ross wants all you white women to get busy and start pumping out kids because if you’re not we’re going to have nothing but Messican babies running around.
How many young’uns is Mr. Douchehat raising???? Sadly, the article does not say.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 11:33 am
A rum tale of Chicago Newspapers, with some fine bits of Royko and Ebert.
Especially ones that had sweet fuck all gnat’s piss for a decent beer. That’s where that occasional taste of fear in the back of your throat comes in.
My hero of this crop of Kennedy Center honors recipients is Buddy Guy. Every time some idiot compiles a Guitarists list and has Buddy way behind BB King, it pisses me off immensely. Not remotely close. And I saw the brilliant Makarova in Giselle once, a stunningly gorgeous woman, and the closest performer to an actor I ever saw in a ballet. And, really, Giselle is about the extent of my pawdeen sensibilities regarding ballet.
Foreign money backs GOP. Well, hayull and shitfahr. Knock me over with a feather.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 11:47 am
Borden: You are so right on Brooks and Douthat, and you can nurture your disgust with the two creepazoids by checking in occasionally with the Driftglass political blog:
http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2012/12/in-which-david-brooks.html#links
http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-moving-hack-writes.html#links
Mr. Douchehat raising? I’m imagining that as sung by Jim Morrison in horror move tones. Of course the even more notoriously liberal-biased WaPo employs the bunchbacked toad Krauthammer and the three-dollar bill phony George Will, along with the hilariously obtuse Jennifer Rubin. Liberal press just ain’t what it used to be since WaPo went whole hog for the false equivalency school of reporting in its allegedly straight news political pieces. But seriously, I read editorial content in LAT, ChiTrib and Seattle Times regularly, all of which are decidedly GOPer-friendly (although the Seattle paper is surprisingly reasonable and even-keeled) and the regular commenters at all of those sites seem to believe with all their flinty little hearts that those papers have a liberal bias. It’s like they all went to school at LA voucher schools.
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 11:54 am
I’m a huge Zep fan, but on a lot of bike rides I go with early Floyd. Yesterday, I was climbing Torrey Pines to the psychedelic sounds of Piper at the Gates of Dawn… the stereo mix.
Back to Zep, one remarkable thing was the vast number of alternate tunings that Page used on his guitars. I don’t know how a mind works that can figure out such things. Mastering the fret board in standard tuning alone is a life-long endeavor for most, but his delightful artistry is related in part to the his use of these altered tunings. For instance, DADGAD (Black Mountain Side, though half-pitch sometimes), DADGBE (Going to California), EBGDAE (Friends), CACGCE (Open C6 for Bron-Yr-Aur) and the ever delightful DGCGCD (Rain Song). I used to keep one of my acoustics tuned to DADGAD for Black Mountain Side and Celtic music at open mic nights and another guitar tuned to DGCGCD because I loved playing Rain Song so much… and the song practically falls out of the soundhole with the tuning set right.
Contrast that to playing all-standard-tuning Steve Howe songs like “Clap,” which breaks your hand, but in a good way.
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Julie Robinson said on December 3, 2012 at 12:03 pm
Just heard that William & Kate are preggers, and she’s in hospital, as they say on the BBC, for morning sickness. Let the royal baby hype begin!
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LAMary said on December 3, 2012 at 12:06 pm
Just to clarify…LA voucher schools mean Louisiana. Not Los Angeles. We don’t have that sort of crazy here.
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Joe K said on December 3, 2012 at 12:09 pm
Always heard there is a sex swinger club at the old harvester building.
Pilot Joe
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nancy said on December 3, 2012 at 12:17 pm
She’s in hospital for hyperemesis gravidarium, which is more than just morning sickness. Let’s hope she gets over it — it really is a terrible condition, and the No. 1 cause of second-trimester abortions. Not to hang crepe all over the nursery, but h.g. can be life-threatening. It’s basically constant puking and nausea for the whole term. Atul Gawande did a great piece on it some years back. God knows that girl needs a few extra sandwiches now.
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Suzanne said on December 3, 2012 at 12:23 pm
Pilot Joe, I remember hearing the same thing about the swinger’s club.
Jeff @ 18, some Protestant church bodies that formerly were pretty muchmmon the fence about contraceptives are now joining the quiverfull movement and promoting the idea that God wants you to have as many kids as he feels inclined to give you. Even a condom would have you interfering with Divine providence. Although most would not openly admit it, at its heart, I believe, is the notion that whites are going to be overwhelmed by the hoards of immigrant babies if we don’t get crackin’ and start cranking out more babies.
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Scout said on December 3, 2012 at 12:28 pm
I’ve already specified that Stairway to Heaven be played at my memorial service, someday, hopefully a long time from now. And yes, Deborah, the “There are two paths you can go by” lyrics are my favorite too. I also like “and the forests will echo with laughter.”
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 12:36 pm
Ross Douthat by driftglass:
http://driftglass.blogspot.com/
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 12:48 pm
Dunno….
If I had to pick out funeral music – maybe Even Flow by Pearl Jam…suitably subdued, of course (or maybe Nothingman)
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 12:53 pm
My pick for funeral music:
Either the apocalyptic-sounding Piggy Pig Pig:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60b3VYfLOiA, or Whisky Train:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-RN2JV8hV4
Either one, loud as hell.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 12:57 pm
And I’d like to be dressed in that shirt Gary Brooker is wearing in the Whiskey Train video. Propped up in my kayak, with the boat set on fire and pushed out into Bull Sluice, on the Chattooga:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvgwD0-L6gs
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Jeff Borden said on December 3, 2012 at 1:06 pm
Prospero,
Thanks for the link! I burns me to think of all the fine writers and thinkers I know -including the proprietor of this very site– who can’t find a high-paying job while these mediocrities pull down handsome salaries from the Times.
I’m just a half-hour away from entering my classroom at the community college, where I will teach a group of students that are the GOP’s worst nightmare. First- or second-generation Indian, Pakistani, Assyrian, Egyptian, Korean, Japanese, Polish, Albanian, Greek and Mexican kids. There are two politically conservative kids of Irish extraction, but they are not social conservatives with the exception of one who is a very big on the Second Amendment.
Friday night at my poker game, a couple of my conservative fellow players were lecturing me on how the Hispanic vote will soon lift the Republican ship as this socially conservative, large family, heavily Catholic group continues to grow. And I’m flashing back to the insanity perpetrated by right-wingers on Hispanics in Arizona, Georgia, Alabama, etc. and I’m wondering what was in the beer my friends were drinking to make them think a group long used as a pinata by right-wing hate-mongers will suddenly get religion and turn Republican???
Or do you think they’re correct?
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Dexter said on December 3, 2012 at 1:11 pm
“Stairway…” was agreed upon as “our song” decades ago. Lots of tunes comprise the soundtrack of my life, none so accurately as “Late Lament”, by Graeme Edge. You all know this one:
“Late Lament”
Breathe deep the gathering gloom
Watch lights fade from every room
Bedsitter people look back and lament
Another day’s useless energy spent.
Impassioned lovers wrestle as one,
Lonely man cries for love and has none.
New mother picks up and suckles her son,
Senior citizens wish they were young.
Cold hearted orb that rules the night,
Removes the colours from our sight.
Red is grey and yellow white,
But we decide which is right.
And which is an illusion?
Source:
az lyrics
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Dexter said on December 3, 2012 at 1:14 pm
oh bullshit, prospero!
There’s only one funeral song for you, and it is this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eV23AytI0UI
🙂
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Little Bird said on December 3, 2012 at 1:17 pm
My stepmother has requested that the Halleluia Chorus be played at her funeral.
I have zero problem with that.
But she probably wouldn’t appreciate that in private I’ll also play Ding Dong the Witch is Dead.
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Bob (not Greene) said on December 3, 2012 at 1:19 pm
Great cover of a Led Zep tune by Chicago’s Devil in a Woodpile
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWYy2-H-UEg
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 1:25 pm
Jeff – the GOP had success with Latino voters as recently as the W Bush admin.
It’s really very simple, I think. If the Republicans want to appeal to angry white people, then the played 2012 just right.
With gerrymandering in place, their geriatric polemics met with more than a little success (control of lots of state legislatures, and the US House of Representatives).
But they’ll never win the presidency again, with their odd appeals to visceral white male anger; they’ll have to genuinely put that stuff down.
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 1:26 pm
Little Bird: LOL!!
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coozledad said on December 3, 2012 at 1:26 pm
Jeff Borden: The right is working off a racist projection that Mexican immigrants are illiterate poors who came up here to grift, rather than people trying to escape a kleptocratic system like the Republicans would build here. A lot of professionals in the mix.
My doctor’s an immigrant. Old school European manners. About as far removed from Amway as medicos get.
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Mark P said on December 3, 2012 at 1:36 pm
I know this is way off topic, and the only reason I mention it here is that there was some interest last week. I finally put up a post about the amazing sundog, arc and halo display over Huntsville, Alabama, in October. I link to the great shot a NASA employee made, which Susan linked to in the comments on Thursday. I don’t have much in the way of photography to compete with that, but I do try to explain a little about the phenomenon. Nancy, if you decide this is too off topic, I’ll certainly understand.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 1:46 pm
That cracked me up, Little Bird.
I love Robert Reich’s cartoon lectures, and this one is a great exposition of how Dems should handle this “fiscal cliff” hoohaw:
http://front.moveon.org/dear-democrats-please-stick-to-these-8-principles-from-robert-reich
Wish I’d had that guy for Micro and Macro. And can anybody name a GOPer that is Reich’s match for coherence and reasonability? Nope. Didn’t think so.
That is some fine dobro picking Bob (NG). It’s funny how well Immigrant Song translates into reggae:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CO7FPU7a2g
And that band has a real Rootboy vibe, too.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 1:46 pm
And Robert Plant doesn’t take himself too seriously to appreciate Dread Zep:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNSSpXapks0
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Sue said on December 3, 2012 at 1:47 pm
“Life is a Long Song” and “Where to Now, St. Peter”, would be nice funeral songs, as long as no one looks too closely at the lyrics. Or who knows, the lyrics might fit a specific funeral need.
Wonder if anyone has ever chosen “Don’t Fear the Reaper”. I’m sure it’s been used, but the lyrics would only be appropriate in a really, really sad funeral.
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coozledad said on December 3, 2012 at 1:55 pm
I’m not sure I know all the lyrics, but this has got to be better than that “funeral for a friend” warhorse.
I’m still surprised the Spencers let them go with anything so obvious.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 3, 2012 at 1:55 pm
Ah, Dexter, thanks. Some good recollections tied up with that gathering gloom and days of future passed.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 2:03 pm
For Tull, I’d take Skating Away.
John Bonham, gorgeous shuffle a la Fool in the Rain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohlFjyCE0gA
I’d say that William Gibson’s Spook Country could aptly be called an industrial park novel.
You could freak out a group of funeral attendees with this song from Procol:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pL4MKE8vztQ
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MichaelG said on December 3, 2012 at 2:06 pm
JeffB the Rs really do think that way about Hispanics. They are conservative, quiet, hard working and religious. They need to be Rs.
Can you imagine what the landslide would have been like if Obama had been white?
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Sue said on December 3, 2012 at 2:15 pm
Prospero, Skating Away is my ‘just hang on, you can get through the day’ song. So it’s more of a life song for me, believe it or not.
I find a lot of Ian’s songs weirdly grounding for some reason.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 2:28 pm
Agreed about JT songs, Sue, for instance this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFkXk7mtRlA
But my favorite Tull “song” song is We Used to Know, not so comforting. Or War Child, or Bungle in the Jungle. Ian Anderson’s nutso, but he writes great lyrics. Best line: “That kind of racism doesn’t grow on trees.”
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 2:46 pm
OK – I won’t say this story “blew me away” – but it definitely stopped me in my tracks… and made me think of David Simon…
http://www.chem.info/News/2012/12/Safety-Town-Evacuates-Police-Relocate-Explosives/?et_cid=2975514&et_rid=44004269&linkid=http%3a%2f%2fwww.chem.info%2fNews%2f2012%2f12%2fSafety-Town-Evacuates-Police-Relocate-Explosives%2f
The lead (with emphasis added by me):
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A town in northwest Louisiana was being evacuated and state police were starting a criminal investigation of a company after finding about 6 million pounds of explosive material used in howitzers they say was stored illegally. Boxes and small barrels of the M6 artillery propellant were found both outdoors and crammed into unauthorized buildings leased by Explo Systems Inc. at Camp Minden, the former Louisiana Army Ammunitions Plant, state police superintendent Col. Mike Edmonson said Sunday. Police were evacuating the town of Doyline, about 270 miles northwest of New Orleans. About half the town’s 800 residents left Friday. The company’s “careless and reckless disregard made it unsafe for their own employees, for schoolchildren in Doyline, for the town of Doyline,” Edmonson said. The company is located on a portion of the former ammunition plant’s 15,000 acres that is leased for commercial use. Other sections are used for National Guard training.
I mean, wow. Talk about your oddball industrial areas.
Wow.
(and don’t miss the last sentence of the article, which again makes me think of Mr Simon, sorta…)
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 3:15 pm
Well, here is at least one conservative pundit who thinks that the supposed shared values between the conservative ideologies and the Hispanic voting block are a mirage. Maybe Borden’s poker buddies ought to read more.
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/332916/why-hispanics-dont-vote-republicans-heather-mac-donald
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 3:38 pm
Maybe Danny oughta quit with posting racist crap from the National Review – or whatever other porta-potty news sources he visits.
It is not immigration policy that creates the strong bond between Hispanics and the Democratic party, but the core Democratic principles of a more generous safety net, strong government intervention in the economy, and progressive taxation.
and
Hispanics will prove to be even more decisive in the victory of Governor Jerry Brown’s Proposition 30, which raised upper-income taxes and the sales tax, than in the Obama election.
Huh.
Sounds like “vote buying”, eh?
But, Latino voters = 23% of the California electorate, while blacks are another 6% of the electorate…and I don’t think your tax increase passed by 20 points, right?
And Prop 30 won by a 54-46 margin, yes?
Huh.
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 3:51 pm
I wonder how much Obama won California by….hmmmmmm
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 3:52 pm
Hey, Brian, what exactly is your problem?
1. Borden and a few others are kicking around the idea that some conservatives think that there is a natural alliance between conservative ideologies and Hispanic voting block
2. Then I post and article that I came across weeks ago that indicates not all conservatives are thinking this way.
And somehow this is me posting racist crap? All I was doing is pointing out that not everyone is thinking the same way with respect to this meme. I don’t even check out NationalReview. It was just a link I followed.
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 3:56 pm
I mean, if Californians went for the re-election of the president by, say, more than 20 points – while prop 30 won by 8, why, that would shoot the hell out of Danny’s linked pundit’s flatly racist recap of Romney’s “vote-buying” scenareio, yes?
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 3:58 pm
Sorry Danny – I’m just in no mood to hear that people who aren’t white wouldn’t vote for conservative values, but only for “what’s in it for me” free stuff
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JWfromNJ said on December 3, 2012 at 5:03 pm
and I want I don’t want a memorial service but since my family ignores all my wishes I’d want to have Springsteen and the E=Street band’s If I shall fall behind played:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1wg9jyvfN0
And I want my ashes tossed into the water here at Wabasso Beach and also at the Sunrise Mountain lookout in NJ’s Stokes State Forest.
http://www.workingoutthedetails.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/New-Jersey-Fall-Colors-from-Sunrise-Mountain.jpg
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Deborah said on December 3, 2012 at 5:27 pm
My ashes will be placed in one of two bronze bowls my husband and I have designed for our Mesa they will be side by side, and his ashes will be placed in the other. The bowls will be attached to a concrete base. They will be fabricated by a place near Milwaukee that spins metal. I had some ceremonial bowls made there for the World Food Prize project in Des Moines. The first one of us to die will keep the ashes of the other, then when we are both gone our cremains will be put in the individual bowls with the romantic notion that the wind will mingle the ashes and spread them across the land. We haven’t even thought about music.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 5:30 pm
The Obama vote-buying bullshit came full-blown from the head of the Obamaphone Zeus. I know it, Danny knows it. We are both aware, I assume that the phone program goes back to St. Ronald the Oldtimer, and it was updated to mobile phones when W was the Pretzeldent. Me, I find this endless and ongoing misrepresentation tiresome and juvenile, like Segretti’s pizza orders. GOPers have never admitted to getting their flabby belly-up-rubbers in the Hudson asses kicked, but that is sure as hell what happened this time. Like a redheaded borrowed mule. When GOPers pull this asinine, petulant revanche less than a month after getting their butts handed to them in a sling, the question becomes, are thes aholes really Americans?
Danny is hanging his idologically gyroed hat on there is a natural alliance between conservative ideologies and Hispanic voting block? Seriously,, that goes back to the Hispanics hate homos GOP talking point from a few years back. And hey-ho. I finally figured out who this Toure cat is that had Danny’s panties in a bunch a couple of weeks ago about that insidious Democratic Party racism the GOPers are trying to protect black Americans from. He’s some guy that looks like DJ Hughly (whose opinion I give great weight to) and seems to be a willing cross between Julian Bond (my old friend) and Little Richard. Whooowhee, he’s better looking than Ann Coulter and $Palin put together. I mean Wanda Sykes probably finds him attractive. How did GOPers ever decide the “soft racism of lowered expectations” was ever going to drown out the drumbeat of “you inferior thug blackamoor”? Really fracking stupid. Like the WWII GI Bill wasn’t an immense legup for all those Irish and Italian fellows. And when black guys became the cannon fodder in VietNam, did the country come through with that kind of GI Bill. Yeah, right.
And yeah, I spent hours of no drinks but my personal stache and no hope in the offing with Julian Fracking Bond. You have to understand, this is almmost like JFK or RFK to me. This is a hero. Knew Martin and nearly took a bulllet from Ray who was on the payroll of lifetime GOPer conspirators. Julian Bond was one of the most brilliant observers of the civil rights movement ever. And he was handsome and suave. Don’t know bout you but let’s get that asinine opinion from some fool like Harry K. Smith. And Gore Vidal would have kickced Buckley’s puny ass.
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 5:41 pm
For some people supposedly being so smart, there is an uncanny lack of reading comprehension that then proceeds to egregious missing of a point that then culminates into a cathartic and ejaculatory whacking around of a straw man. Bravo… Get it out of your system.
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MichaelG said on December 3, 2012 at 5:47 pm
I went to school on the G.I. Bill after Vietnam.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 5:48 pm
Bullshit Danny. You want to claim modern Democrats are racists and modern GOPers aren’t you are full of shit. And yeah, I am smarter than you are. Or not, and you’re alleged intelligence is nothing to consider something to excel. You are seriously nuts for trolling here. What a jackass.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 5:53 pm
MichaelG, then you admit that all sorts of vets got wanged with bullshit. I carried a large number of them to consideration. And we won a bunch. The fact that the Nixon ahreds held it against the combatants is thinly disguised. What was wrong with you assholes?
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beb said on December 3, 2012 at 5:56 pm
One way to let if your site is doing well is to look at the number of comments you get each day. By that standard NN.C is doing quite well.
Pros asks “can anybody name a GOPer that is Reich’s match for coherence and reasonability?” — Actually it would be hard to find a Dem with Robert Reich’s coherence and reasonability.
A friend of a friend requested “You get always get what you want,” at her funeral. She had cancer and spent time planning her funeral. Her parents were appalled by the choice of the song but, really, it summed up her situation totally.
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Prospero said on December 3, 2012 at 5:56 pm
Nixon’s hatred for Kerry was astounding. That was psycho, without a doubt.
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LAMary said on December 3, 2012 at 6:03 pm
Danny’s just cranky because the Dems have a supermajority in both house of the California legislature.
Obama didn’t give me anything to buy my vote. I’m white and middle class. I just don’t know how anyone could vote for Romney. I didn’t believe a single thing he said was a genuinely held belief and he showed very early on that he has no idea how a most people live. To actually suggest that someone should borrow twenty grand from their parents to start a business…seriously. Like it wouldn’t occur to someone if they came from a family with twenty grand in disposable income to borrow the money from the family, or that most people come from families with twenty grand lying around.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 3, 2012 at 6:04 pm
Nixon’s hatred is what kept him inflated, like helium for the Macy’s character balloons. Without it he’d collapse into a thin sack of dark blue pinstripe.
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Jolene said on December 3, 2012 at 6:19 pm
The NYT has a brief Q&A on hyperemesis gravidarum that explains how serious it can be. Worth a read.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/03/spotlight-on-a-rare-condition/
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alex said on December 3, 2012 at 6:51 pm
I recall not all that long ago when the right-wingers were predicting the gay rights issue would drive Hispanics and blacks into the arms of the GOP. We can see how well that worked out. The Republicans are also amazed to find that Roman Catholics aren’t especially interested in movement conservatism. The religious right doesn’t have any natural allies and the sooner the Republican Party recognizes it the better for all concerned.
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David C. said on December 3, 2012 at 7:24 pm
My wife wants her ashes planted with a tree. She loves plants and can’t think of anything better than being taken up into one. I don’t know what I want. The idea a being thrown to the wind doesn’t appeal to me. Maybe I’m strange, but I like walking around cemeteries. I look at the dates on the headstones and think of all the events that occurred during their lives. So I guess even if I decide to be planted with my wife’s tree, I at least want a cenotaph in the family plot in the cemetery along with the previous six generations of my family.
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LAMary said on December 3, 2012 at 7:26 pm
I’ve told my kids that when I start to look a little ragged to put me on an ice floe and send me out to sea.
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 7:59 pm
You know, my original point was a very narrow in scope… namely, that not everyone is thinking the way that Jeff B’s conservative poker friends are: “Well, here is at least one conservative pundit who thinks that the supposed shared values between the conservative ideologies and the Hispanic voting block are a mirage.“. It wasn’t that I agreed with either sentiment regarding the Hispanic voting block. It was just that there is more than one point of view being expressed on this post-game analysis of the election.
I thought that it would be comprehensible and fairly non-controversial, especially since it was already a topic of discussion. Geesh…
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 8:05 pm
I recall not all that long ago when the right-wingers were predicting the gay rights issue would drive Hispanics and blacks into the arms of the GOP. We can see how well that worked out. The Republicans are also amazed to find that Roman Catholics aren’t especially interested in movement conservatism. The religious right doesn’t have any natural allies and the sooner the Republican Party recognizes it the better for all concerned.
Alex, then you may also recall that when Prop 8 passed in 2008, it was the African-American voting block in California that put it over. Their large turnout for Obama translated into a large turnout for traditional marriage. You disputed this at the time, but then Nancy or someone confirmed.
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Rana said on December 3, 2012 at 8:10 pm
Nancy, I would read that book, whether it was long-form, or a collection of essays and interviews.
Back in my temping days, most of the work I did took place in such settings, and you never knew quite what you’d find inside.
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MaryRC said on December 3, 2012 at 8:47 pm
I agree with David C, I’m going to be planted in the same plot as the previous 7 generations of my family. I don’t need a headstone or a marker of any kind, I just like knowing I’ll be there with the rest of them. I wish I could have known my great-grandparents and on back. They must have been tough as nails.
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basset said on December 3, 2012 at 8:55 pm
I wish I could have known my grandparents. If my blood relatives have a family plot I don’t know where it is. Play “All Things Must Pass,” “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “Beware of Darkness” and, I dunno, tip my cremated leavings down a storm drain or something, it don’t matter.
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 9:02 pm
Alex, then you may also recall that when Prop 8 passed in 2008, it was the African-American voting block in California that put it over. Their large turnout for Obama translated into a large turnout for traditional marriage. You disputed this at the time, but then Nancy or someone confirmed.
See, Danny, this is another iteration of the general sense of irritation that your first post instilled within me.
Well, the very first thing that irritated me was when you said
Maybe Borden’s poker buddies ought to read more.
Maybe YOU “ought to read more”, and think more, and think critically, and re-think.
Bottom-line: folks are folks. I don’t think politics are intrinsically determined by ethnic origin, although various discernible racial and social groups may well react in an organized way, to how they’re treated. You seemed to be saying that (for example) hispanics ain’t votin’ for no Repubs, no how, no way, even if the R’s change their national posture with regard to immigration/citizenship. Your National Review link flatly stated that all these people really care about is “safety net issues” – which is to say “Obama-phones”/foodstamps/47%/no responsibility for their lives/knows no better leaches and free loaders.
Party affiliations change over time. Go watch “Lincoln”, and then explain to me why any non-white, non-male person would ever ever EVER end up voting for a Democratic candidate for any office.
In the recent past, the GOP was doing TWICE as well with Latinos as they’re doing now…the trend lines are going the wrong way.
Maybe the 2012 Republican party should read up about what happened to the Whigs
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Deborah said on December 3, 2012 at 9:14 pm
Both of my parents are buried in a cemetery in Miami, FL. It’s one of those kind that don’t allow headstones, only those flat deals with name dates etc. Most are etched or engraved in bronze or something resembling bronze. I have no idea if they paid for me or my sister to be buried there, probably not, but in any case it is the last place I would want to be buried. I have not been back since my father died in 1991. I have been in Miami on business since then and I always think it would be good to visit their graves but it has never worked out timing wise. I sort of feel guilty about that , but then I don’t.
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Connie said on December 3, 2012 at 9:20 pm
Send me direct to cremation. That’s all. No songs, no ceremonies, no stuff. Buy a book in my memory for your local library if you must do something.
I already own the plot next to where my mother is buried in the home town cemetery where my father’s family has buried many generations. I’ve asked that the headstone there for my baby be replaced with a headstone that includes my husband, myself and our son.
On the other hand I’ll be dead and gone. You can do anything you want because I’ll never know.
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brian stouder said on December 3, 2012 at 9:23 pm
but in any case it is the last place I would want to be buried.
I confess, this turn-of-phrase made me laugh.
On the other hand, if you visit old cemeteries, it is surprisingly common to note how people would get re-arranged (buried and then dug up and re-buried), especially with regard to second and third spouses (usually women, who died in childbirth).
My dad’s remains are in a box on my mom’s dresser; mom expressed the wish, sometime ago, to be cremated and scattered with his remains, in some suitable place.
A few Memorial Days back, we went to a big old cemetery at Roanoke, where a bunch of Stouders and Powells are buried – and for a moment there I thought it might be a suitable place…or maybe not.
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Crazycatlady said on December 3, 2012 at 10:37 pm
Went to a ‘Dirty Show’ a few years ago. It was great fun chatting with the topless woman who was giving out treats from her tray. I said I wish I could do that, but my boobs were so saggy I’d trip on them.
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Danny said on December 3, 2012 at 10:58 pm
Brian, let get this straight:
1. The first thing that “irritated” you was me pointing out that Jeff B. may be correct in his estimation that his conservative poker buddies may be wrong in their views…. that there are some conservatives who do not agree with his conservative buddies on voting block demographics.
2. Then, after Alex brings up voting demographics in regard to the gay marriage issue, you are “irritated” by the reports that were written in LA Times and other papers on the facts of the post-election analysis of Prop 8 in California. Something that Nancy also reiterated as correct when the topic came up in 2008.
It sounds to me like you are easily irritated today, but probably not so much by the reasons you state.
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del said on December 3, 2012 at 11:20 pm
Yeah, Danny’s post was no big deal to me, I thought he was just agreeing with Borden’s take, that’s all.
JWfromNJ, that Springsteen song was sweet. I’m still chuckling about your post from a few weeks ago when you urged your wife to take that fast food job for the described reasons albeit your urging was described with your appropriate disclaimer — “I KNOW I AM A TERRIBLE PERSON.” 🙂
But I think I agree with Connie that I wouldn’t want songs played at my memorial — especially sad ones. Raucous songs, maybe.
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LAMary said on December 3, 2012 at 11:57 pm
While the sons are pushing me out to sea they should play Knockin on Heaven’s Door, Any Day Now and Ripple.
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