The phrase: “dumb as a bag of hammers”:)

Another January is bearing down on us. As we close the door to 2008 and open up 2009, I figured a selection worthy of Janus the god of gates and doors in Roman mythology. Janus from the Latin “ianua” (the Romans didn’t have a “j” in their alphabet:) meaning “gate” or “door” is where we get our word January.

Now that that horse is dead and beaten, let’s move on to The Doors. I went through a serious Doors phase back in the day and have at times been known to break into spontaneous (and mercifully brief:) renditions of their stuff. You won’t have to suffer through any of that. Though Riders on the Storm is appropriate considering the hard times that seem to be crashing down on us, I picked a somewhat happier (at least it seems cheerful and full of promise:) track to ring in the New Year, “Waiting for the Sun”:

Lagniappe tracks (it was difficult to narrow these down): Peace Frog, Strange Days, Soul Kitchen and, I’m obliged to add:), The Alabama Song, which you may be surprised to learn is originally from a 1930 German opera: Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny.

Enjoy.

Bonus (Optional:) Commentary:
At their best, The Doors were Blues-based, organ-driven rock at its finest. They sometimes verged on falling into a polka/lounge lizard (no pun intended) ravine, but somehow managed to keep it together enough to put out some really good music. I’ll even put up with Jim’s meandering, endless and some say meaningless spoken word tracks because they have a mesmerizing rhythm and are usually backed by excellent guitar/organ tracks. Even if he wasn’t quite the philosopher-poet he fancied himself, Jim Morrison and the boys put together some of the finest songs in rock n’ roll.

A roundup to facilitate your Monday web wanderings:

The Partying Priest

How Visiting Your Family Warps Your Brain (a good explanation for holiday family feuds)

Fortify Your Cocktails W/ Port (Port, Madeira and other fortified wines are underrated and delicious.)

Russian Professor claims recent events are confirming his theory that the US will cease to be one nation by 2010.

Locally: Dome Follies Continue Even as County Slouches Toward Bankruptcy (This impending bankruptcy also seems like a blow for the “regional government” folks.)

Do you like modern music? Oh, I think it’s marvelous. Some of it, really fine…

Here’s the full story.

‘Tis the season for holiday cheer! This year, I’ll be enjoying many delicious beers thanks to my sis and brother-in-law “smuggling” some Chimay, Aventinus and other tasty treats down from Ohio. Would you like to enjoy such wonderments year-round? Do you wonder why you can’t find imperial stouts or Belgian dubbels and tripels here in Bama? You’ll find the answer and ways to make sure that next year’s festivities include beverages such as these at Free the Hops!

If eggnog is your bag, i’ve made this recipe several times and it’s delicious!

Now for your holiday amusement, the nice and naughty this year:

Nice: Santas give Tempe motorists a holiday treat in the form of a great example of civil disobedience:

To keep up the fight all year long, join the NMA.

Naughty: Even Santa wants a bailout:

Via Radley.

The Unforgivable: Celebrate “Life Day” with the Star Wars Holiday Special:

Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year to everyone:)

I’m ashamed that it’s taken me so long to make my favorite Icelandic-Canadian rockstar, Lindy Vopnfjord (try saying that three times fast:), the subject of a WW. Lindy is one half of the indie rock duo that make up Major Maker. I met Lindy last summer at the Liberty Summer Seminar. Among other things, Lindy is very tall and also the author and performer of the official LSS theme song. Here’s another version.

Major Maker is blowing up in the “Great White North” aka Canadia because Lindy and his bandmate Todor compose what can only be described as pop magic. For our WW main selection, here’s “I’m in Love”:

For lagniappe, try: Window (very clever video concept) and Rollercoaster, a song you may have heard if you listen to Sirius’ Iceberg channel.

On Tuesday, Major Maker released their new Funky Lady EP, including the eponymous single: “Funky Lady.”
Pick up the EP at Apple iTunes and preview it and other great tracks here.

Thanks to my good friend Peter for gifting me w/ the Funky Lady EP! It’s starting out to to be a merry Christmas indeed!

Every time another story about police abuse or corruption breaks, we hear the same story: these were renegade cops; this was an isolated incident; this type of behavior is rare. What’s clear is that in many departments across this country, a culture of corruption and patterns of abuse are commonplace and, if anything, increasing. Many people grip about these facts, but few folks try to root out the problem or systematically expose the wrongdoing that occurs in the name of law enforcement every day.

Radley Balko was one of the first to carefully document the abuses occurring in wrong-door swat raids and trace the rise of constitutionally questionable practices to the militarization of local law enforcement, who are supposed to be civilian peace officers rather than soldiers waging war against citizens.

Now comes another innovative effort to keep tabs on those who are supposed to be protecting us. Ex-cop Barry Cooper, who has found a new career selling his Never Get Busted DVDs, is the host of a new, web-based reality series: KopBusters. The premise is to set up honeytraps mimicking situations where a local department is believed to be using unconstitutional or otherwise illegal procedures to gain evidence, get warrants and otherwise harass people. The first episode was filmed in Odessa, Texas, where Yolanda Madden is serving several years in prison for possession of marijuana methamphetamine with the intent to distribute. Yolanada and her family maintain that the drugs were planted on her during a traffic stop. KopBusters set up a “grow operation” in a honeytrap house to make it appear that the inhabitants were growing pot. In fact, the only plants found by police, who did raid the house, were a couple of Christmas trees. It’s illegal for police officers to use infrared or other scanning technology without a warrant and KopBusters believes that’s just what the local Odessa force did in this situation.

Here’s the raw footage from the honeytrap raid:

Here’s Barry Cooper discussing the busted bust with the local media and an interview with Yolanda Madden’s father.

Here’s a longer post I did on KopBusters over at Fr33 Agents.

Update: According to this article, Yolanda Madden was convicted for methamphetamine possession. Corrected above.

To make up for the earnest uptightness of the last post:), here’s something to mellow everyone out a bit. One of the greatest guitarists of all time, I wish he had stuck around for much longer. Though, again, it’s impossible to single out one Hendrix track, I have always appreciated The Wind Cries Mary:

It’s too bad the video cut out there at the end. I’d like to hear the English and American anthems combined–that would be quite a feat.

Lagniappe: Little Wing, Purple Haze and his iconic cover of Dylan’s All Along the Watchtower.

First, the lunacy. Alabama’s Senator Richard Shelby, despite his love of pork and earmarks generally, has taken a semi-principled stand against the financial bailout and, now, the automaker bailout. I applaud him for that and wish that more of our congresscritters would oppose these needless, wasteful bailouts. However, Joe Babiasz, a GM employee, believes that Alabama as a whole should be boycotted because of Shelby’s stance against the automaker bailout. To that end, Joe has created Boycott Alabama Now designed to encourage people to boycott Alabama products like the Mercedes M Class and avoid spending money while in Alabama. Trying to boycott an entire state because for once the congresscritters stand against the usual horse-trading and waste in Washington? Give me a break, Joe!

It’s at times like these that I’m glad the US founders created the largest free trade zone in history, so that the absurdity of protectionism could be shown once and for all. The US has been artificially propping up the domestic auto industry for years through tariffs and subsidies, like the “loan” to Chrysler. Such protection insulated the auto execs from the changing realities of the auto market and relying on that protection, they failed to adapt. As a result, the US auto industry cannot compete on the global market. So, after years of protection, they want more in the form of subsidized “loans”? Utterly ridiculous.

It doesn’t matter whether our cars are made in Wyoming or Bangalore. Protectionists always rely on jingoist pleas (”true Americans”) to make folks believe that you have to buy American or Albanian or Australian. And people like Joe and the American consumer of domestic automobiles get screwed because their job was made to appear stable and those products were made to appear economical, when nothing could be further from the truth. Both were subsidized for decades. If you want something to boycott Joe, you should boycott the protectionist policies that got us in the mess we’re in now.

This current crisis also demonstrates the flaw in Keynesian economic policy: it depends on consumption. If your economic system is heavily dependent on consumption, the bubble will eventually break and the downturn will worsen as long as your currency is inflated. That’s what’s happening here and it’s a direct result of politicians trying to manage what no person or group of people ever can, an economy. The Soviets tried to do it in a less subtle way and failed and if we continue to believe that economies can be controlled, we will continue to face downturns, some severe, every few years or so. End of rant:)

Local coverage of Shelby’s and/or the automaker bailout: Musings from Maytown, 9 Numbers, Flashpoint and Gordon Unleashed.

And now for some wisdom:

Continue reading ‘Lunacy/Wisdom on the Big 3 Bailout’

“Thinking aloud is a habit responsible for much of mankind’s misery.”

So says Benjamin Franklin, or at least his character played by Tom Wilkinson in the so far-excellent HBO miniseries: “John Adams,” which I have only recently begun. I have no idea whether the quote is historically accurate, but I will venture thinking aloud.

Does anyone know whether US automobile accident data has ever been compared to speed trap location/police roadblock data? I’ve searched in vain for both, though there are good speed trap maps out there. I doubt that there is enough reliable data as to the locations of speed traps (such as department logs) available to the general public or even of a map of accident locations. However, it would be interesting to overlay two such maps and see if there is any significant correlation.

I only bring it up because though I usually spot troopers and other officers patrolling the highway well in advance, every so often, I’ll be surprised by a hidden speed trap and, unfortunately, my first reaction is not to continue to drive in a safe and courteous fashion, but to try to escape the notice of the officer or at least reduce my chance of getting pulled over. I still try to maintain calm and drive safely, but often I’m looking in my rearview way too often and trying to get to the right lane of traffic if I was in the passing lane (passing of course) as quickly as possible. I’ve never had an accident as a result of unexpectedly happening upon a trap, but I’ve definitely been distracted from driving in order to see whether I was driving a bit over the limit and to try to blend in with other traffic. From observation and word-of-mouth, I know this is a common reaction to hidden speed traps and I have to believe that such reactions as rapid breaking or at least taking your foot off the gas and attempting to blend causes otherwise preventable accidents to occur.

Of course, correlation does not necessarily imply causation, but I suspect we’d see a lot fewer accidents if traffic were allowed to flow at a natural rate (even if that exceeds the posted limit) rather than having abrupt and random slow-downs every 30 miles or so, depending on where you are. Again, just thinking out loud:) If anyone knows of a study or reliable raw data, please let me know: pintpundit-at-gmail-dot-com. Thanks!

Btw, the miniseries is available here and the book by David McCullough on which it is based is available here.