Bell Business

You're right!

Things look different around here. Major changes coming soon!

Crazy Horses

This made me (and my very small daughter) very happy.

The Osmonds - Crazy Horses

Thanks to TBogg. You are awesome.

My Prediction

We have already declared war on Iran. And we will be bombing them soon.

I hate this. But I am pretty sure I'm right.

Life Imitates British Comedy

I don't know much about Little Britain. I've seen a couple bits and I thought they were pretty funny, but I never made the effort to seek it out and watch whole episodes.

That said, given all the hoopla surrounding NOT GAY AT ALL Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID), this is a pretty timely (and funny) bit.

Sir Norman Fry - Public Toilet

Oh, I should give a hat tip here to Josh Marshall for posting it. Thanks, Josh!

Rock Critics Are Idiots

I heard this in one of my favorite Scharpling & Wurster bits, namely "Kid eBay."

(Kid eBay is a bit where Wurster plays a cocky guy who uses nefarious means to profit on eBay. The bit is great because of the bizarre twist it takes when Kid eBay falls down some stairs, and then while fatally injured and in horrible pain, he proceeds to have an incredibly nuanced discussion with Scharpling about music. I loved this the minute I heard it, but I love it even more after hearing their interview on A Special Thing and learning that everything after Kid eBay's fall was pretty much improvised. I hate improv comedy as a rule. But this was great.)

Anyway, one of the things they mention in their discussion of rockdom is a Harp article about Exile on Main Street, and how it is a "Desert Island Dud."

So I looked it up. Exile is about my favorite album of all time, so I figured if some writer has a beef with it I'd like to hear it.  I read it last night, and I have to say, it gave me pause. Apparantly, the Rolling Stones are sort of dicks! And they did a lot of DRUGS! And sometimes, Keith Richards would call the engineer guy and make him come to the studio in the middle of the night because he had an idea about something, but maybe then he would fall asleep again, probably because he was on DRUGS!

What a fucking tool this Harp guy is. His other complaint is that  NOT ALL OF THE STONES PLAYED ON EVERY SINGLE TRACK!

Well, I for one would like my money back.

I have always said that the Rolling Stones are not at their best as a live act. I don't care how much some idiots pay to see them. Jagger's vocals when he's on the road are atrocious. And their best songs all revel in the little things that are added in studio. They are a studio band, and whatever it takes to get them through each track is fine with me. How much do I care that Bill Wyman didn't play bass on that last track? Uh, not at all. If the song has Jagger and/or Richards in it, I'm OK with that.

Anyway, this guy made me a little mad. And I listened to Exile again just to make sure it was as great as I remembered it. (It was.)

EVERYTHING about this record is great. I don't care if Sweet Black Angel offends the Harp guy. He's an idiot. This is a fantastic record. It is my favorite record. The Harp guy is stupid. Whatever his desert island pick is, I can guarantee you I would rather have Exile.

The Power of the Nuge

Here is a good reason to keep checking in with Crooks and Liars. You just don't see this kind of video anywhere else. Here's a bit of text...

Nugent: I was in Chicago last week I said—Hey Obama, you might  want to suck on one of these you punk? Obama, he’s a piece of shit and I told him to suck on one of my machine guns…Let’s hear it for them. I was in NY and I said hey Hillary—you might want to ride one of these into the sunset you worthless bitch…Since I’m in California, I’m gonna find– she might wanna suck on my machine gun! Hey, Dianne Feinstein, ride one of these you worthless whore. Any questions? Freeeeedom!

Very classy, Nuge.

Dick...

UPDATE: This is obviously all over the place now. But the first posting I saw was on Crooks and Liars, so the KUDOS remains. Good job, gang.

Unfortunately, Up Is Still Down

Matthew Yglesias points this NY Post article, which offers up a Hillary Clinton quote. To wit:

Discussing the possibility of a new nightmare assault while campaigning in New Hampshire, Clinton also insisted she is the Democratic candidate best equipped to deal with it.
"It's a horrible prospect to ask yourself, 'What if? What if?' But if certain things happen between now and the election, particularly with respect to terrorism, that will automatically give the Republicans an advantage again, no matter how badly they have mishandled it, no matter how much more dangerous they have made the world," Clinton told supporters in Concord.
"So I think I'm the best of the Democrats to deal with that," she added.

Yglesias takes Hillary to task, thusly...

...I think the Democrat best positioned to deal with GOP political mobilization in a post-attack environment is going to be the one who isn't reflexively inclined to see failed Republican policies resulting in the deaths of hundreds of Americans as a political advantage for the Republicans.

I wish this were true, but I completely disagree. Even with the "departure" of Rove (he's relocating, that's it) I'm pretty sure that Laura Bush could raze an orphanage with an Abrams tank and the Republicans would be able to use it to their advantage. (I have no doubt that politicians and pundits of all types would be gravely declaring that Republicans are the only ones who know how to wage the War on Laura) And I think that the Democrat best positioned to deal with GOP political mobilization is the one that DOES recognized that.

I know, Bush's numbers are crazy low. But I'm a cynic, and sorry, but I just don't have  so much faith the general population. What I do have faith in is the amoral win-at-all-cost attitude of the Republican party.  Lying to America, cheating America means nothing to them. War means nothing to them. Power is everything. Power at all cost.

Bush and Cheney have been lying to the country for years. So have Rice, Gonzales, Rumsfeld, Fleischer, McClellan, Snow, Perino, etc, etc, etc... It doesn't matter. We're still in Iraq 4 years later. FISA was just gutted so that Bush and Co. could continue their unconstitutional spying on Americans (which they lied about BLATANTLY). And FUCKING HOW DO YOU GET PAST FUCKING NEW ORLEANS???? And how do you get past Cheney saying Iraq would be a quagmire if we tried to dispose of Saddam back when he was SecDef? And how do you get to be a major Republican presidential candidate and also get past NOT believing in EVOLUTION??   
And now we're all waiting for Gen. Petreaus' report, the one he's not going to give personally, because he didn't write it, but will justify the continuation of this War on Sanity.

Go back further. Iran-Contra. How many of those guys are still major players today? How many reasonably intelligent people do you know that still think it was a "good and brave" thing for Ford to do when he pardoned Nixon? Phew! Good thing that healed the country, right?

Mark FUCKING Foley! Yeah, they lost some seats for that, but Denny Hastert gets to RESIGN?!?!

Is anyone still talking about Mark Vitter? Didn't he admit to breaking the law?

Jack Abramoff.

(Sorry, this post is sort of all over the place. This is all just off the top of my head...)

My point is, they are GOOD at this. The Democrat best positioned to deal with GOP political mobilization in a post-attack environment will recognize that, then plan and act accordingly. Are some Americans wising up? Sure, I guess so. A lot more have turned against the president and his war than I would have thought. But the war's been going on for years. I think a lot of that is fatigue. And I think that if there is another major terrorist attack on our soil, many them are going to turn back to the so-called "Daddy party" as asinine as that is.

I wish I didn't believe this. It's GD depressing. Yglesias is a smart guy and he disagrees. Atrios is a smart guy, and he disagrees. I would love to be wrong here.

UPDATE: Add to the list of people who disagree with me Josh Marshall. For the record, I think he is much smarter than me.

I agree with Matt on this one. It is extremely important for the Democrats to nominate someone who doesn't think like a loser. And assuming that any failure of the president's anti-terrorism policies will automatically be a political boon for the Republican party means thinking like a loser.

It also signals a lack of confidence either in your own policies or the American people's reasoning powers. And quite possibly both. And whether or not your policies make sense and whether or not the American people know jack you just can't be an effective advocate of those policies unless you think average Americans can be persuaded that they make sense.

Otherwise, you are permanently off balance, ill-prepared and incoherent.

I would like to say that I do not think it is "thinking like a loser" to recognize your opponent's strengths. And as far as that goes, the Republicans are REALLY REALLY GOOD AT PORTAYING THEMSELVES AS THE STRONGER PARTY WHEN IT COMES TO BATTLING TERRORISM.

(And on a broader scale, they are REALLY REALLY GOOD at making their weaknesses look like strengths.)

When you recognize this business, you can confront it, and (hopefully) demonstrate why it is absurd to the electorate.

This has nothing to do with a lack in confidence in your policies, although it certainly does have something to do with thinking the American people don't know jack. There's pretty ample evidence of that.

I really really like Josh, but I think he's off on this one.

BREAKING NEWS!!! Warner and Levin Parrot Bush Administration!!!

Yesterday it was big news all over my TV about how how Sen. John Warner (R, VA) was breaking with the administration (after his trip to Iraq with Carl Levin) and advocating for a PARTIAL WITHDRAWL of troops so that we could get somewhere around 5000 home in time for Christmas. Wolf Blitzer was all atwitter, as were lots of other talking heads on other stations, who's names I cannot recall.

Of course, Digby says what they didn't say:

The press is portraying this as a "tectonic shift," which is what they've been saying about Warner's every utterance for the last three years. It's ridiculous. I don't know if the Great God Petraeus will say that the surge is working so well that we can redeploy 5,000 troops, but I wouldn't be surprised, would you? (Particularly since it's highly likely that 5,000 troops are scheduled to be redeployed anyway.)

Pretty earth-shaking, huh?

And of course, his buddy, Sen. Carl Levin (D, Mich) goes even a little farther...

"Declaring the government of Iraq "non-functional," the influential chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee said yesterday that Iraq's parliament should oust Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his cabinet if they are unable to forge a political compromise with rival factions in a matter of days.
"I hope the parliament will vote the Maliki government out of office and will have the wisdom to replace it with a less sectarian and more unifying prime minister and government," Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) said after a three-day trip to Iraq and Jordan. (...)

Interesting... So Maliki is the road-block here. You know, I never liked him. Just didn't feel like he was a guy I'd want to have a beer with. That's sort of a deal-breaker with me.

Hilzoy does a pretty good job of explainning why this is crazy talk.

Anyway, my point is, these news people like Blitzer spend literally all of their time hearing about and talking about the news. Couldn't SOMEONE have smelled the bullshit here? (Someone on my TV, I mean)
And granted, it's a little more complex, but isn't it a MUCH BETTER STORY once you've parsed it, even just a little bit?

I'm not saying Warner and Levin are bad guys. Frankly, I have no way of knowing, as Bob Somerby might say. But, at best I think they got played. And nobody on my TV could connect the HUGE dots to see that.

This is pathetic.

I should say, as I write this I'm watching a C-Span3 rebroadcast of the Taguba hearings (5/11/04) featuring Levin and Warner, and they seem to be doing a pretty good job. (Rather, it seems like they did a pretty good job. Three years ago.)

Anyway, I highly recommend you read the entire Digby and Hilzoy posts. They are excellent.
You might even want to politely suggest that Wolf read them.

By The Way...

Fuck you.

Go to hell.

Go fuck yourself.

In hell.

P.S. Go fuck yourself.

P.P.S. In hell.

Honey, I'm Home...

Had a bit of a layoff there. Sorry about that.

Actually, I'm not that sorry.

So what am I listening to? What am I paying attention to? What am I concerned about?

All excellent questions. Proof that Bell Business readers are a cut above the rest.

Musically, I'm listening to Jay Reatard. Nice with the rock and the hoy de hoy. Love it.

I also just rediscovered Skylarking. It's been a dismal rainy day today, so the album seems a little extra perfect. Is this my my favorite XTC record? Another excellent question!!! Kudos!!!

(BTW, LAME website, XTC)

I've also recently discovered The Best Show on WFMU, starring Tom Scharpling (pictured) and Jon Wurster. They're both very funny. Scharpling handles the meat of the show, while Wurster calls in as a different (or recurring) character each week. They've got a few albums of bits available on their website. I bought them on iTunes a couple weeks ago to listen to on vacation. Pretty GD funny.

Anyway, that show might be going away soon. Scharpling got a dead fish delivered to his studio during the last show and it freaked him out. It wouldn't be a big shock if he called it quits. He's been threatening to for quite some time for various reasons anyway.
Also, I should say that the episode with the dead fish doesn't surprise me in the least, and I think that most of his listeners assumed it was just part of the show. Almost every character that Wurster does threatens to kill Scharpling in some horrific way. It's not surprising that some regular caller trying to develop his own character (this guy called himself Captain Jack, and he was such a regular that he was mentioned in The Best Show's theme song) would go to such lengths for what he considered a joke.
That said, obviously what the guy did is not cool, and Scharpling is certainly right to be alarmed by it. Personally, I would call the cops, but that's just me.

It would be a shame if The Best Show were to go away, but it certainly wouldn't be a surprise. At any rate, we'll find out tonight at 8pm ET. You can listen live on the web at WFMU.

Finally, what am I concerned about?  I am concerned that Rex Grossman had three fumbles, an interception, and a sack against the Colts Monday night. And that's playing like half a game. Ugh.

Go Bears.

Oh, one more thing. Major kudos to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) for calling Cheney on his bullshit yesterday. I happened to catch part of this on TV and it was great. Choice nugget:

Incidentally, in the administration’s response today, they claimed the Office of the Vice President is not part of the Executive Office of the President. So it’s some kind of fourth branch of government.

Well, that’s wrong. Both the United States Code says it is part of the president — oh, incidentally, at least this morning, as I left Vermont, I checked the White House Web site. And even their own Web site, this morning, at least, says that the Executive Office — that the vice president is part of the Executive Office of the President.

Think Progress has a good chunk of transcript as well as video here. Good stuff. Well worth the couple minutes it'll take you to read through/watch it.  I just hope he follows through on it.

Anyway, go Bears.

UPDATE: Great news. Scharpling is back on the air, with pretty much no mention that anything happened last week. It certainly doesn't sound like he has any intention of giving up the show any time soon. Nice.