New Music 2004

Here's a personal short list of new and interesting music from 2004.

Smile - Brian Wilson
What can you say when one of pop music's boy geniuses takes the 30-year old ruins of his most daring work and, note by note, reconstructs and releases it? Perhaps simply that it was worth the wait.

Life for Rent - Dido
I take a special interest in sophomore albums. They let us see what the artist is capable of producing, under pressure, without recourse to the playlist that got them signed in the first place. In Dido's case, we get a second helping of the tuneful mellowness of her debut, with no noticeable losses in either hummability or lyrical wit.

The College Dropout - Kanye West
It's no surprise to find the most daring, satirical, funny, sincere, original music of the year coming from hip hop (see last year's Outkast double-album). What's surprising is to find it all on this single-disk debut.

Songs About Jane - Maroon 5
Maroon 5 have surely sold their souls for this back-to-back rack of hooks. The album spawned more pop singles than any other last year. Not bad for a start, and if they work a little more on their harmonies they might be worth listening to for many years to come.

How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb - U2
Just like any child of the Eighties, I find myself tickled that U2 is the hot new band for today's teens. Just check out the iTunes sales of their e-single Vertigo, off the new album; watch their iPod television ad; or ask your local high schooler their opinion about debt forgiveness for African nations (hint: Bono), and you'll see what I mean.

Encore - Eminem
Eminem is one of the singular forces of our pop culture - if you don't already both love him and hate him then you just haven't been paying attention. His new album makes this list mainly for one song, Mosh, which was recorded and rushed to market (with animated video) just before the election. Many of us have wondered where the stirring protest music of this generation would come from. Well, folks - here it is.

Los Lonely Boys
A Latino / Country Western band out of Los Angeles, they earn a spot with their local color, breadth of styles, and fearless mix of genres.

Ray - Ray Charles
The soundtrack of the year is an easy pick. Erica and I saw Ray Charles in concert at the Hollywood Bowl two summers ago, and he seemed absolutely unstoppable. He wasn't though, of course; so goodbye, Ray, and thanks for sharing.

The Elections in Iraq Went Well

From everything I have read, the elections in Iraq went well: high turnout, even respectable turnout in Sunni areas, some violence, a few dozen deaths but nothing like the violence and boycotting we had reason to fear. Peace and prosperity there and the return of our boys are certainly still a ways off but it's nice to have some good news and some hope for more for a change.

The Bush Administration Jumps the Shark (1)

I have never found much in the Bush Administration's policies to admire. And, Bush 43 Redux looks like more and even more of the same. But, in Bush's headlong victory, we can watch as those things he truly represents overcome those things he claims he stands for.

So, I'm watching for Bush's Jump the Shark moment -- the moment when it becomes obvious to everyone watching that Bush is no longer about what even he claimed he was about. ("Jump the shark" refers to the episode of the 70s TV show "Happy Days", when the Fonz -- the ultimate in cool -- took the show in its unprecedented direction by travelling to California and jumping over a great white shark cage on water skiis).

My first nomination for Bush's jump the shark moment: "The Heroes Red, White and Blue Inaugural Ball", attended by Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. (described here by Frank Rich) The evening's headliners Nile Rodgers and Chic sang the lyrics 'Clap your hands, hoo!' and 'Dance to the beat' to a group of soldiers missing hands and legs. It's a moment in which even the preternaturally naive can see that the Balls held to "honor" the wounded and dead from Iraq simply used them as ornaments and political props.

Now, sure, that's mere rank symbolism -- the ground-up meat and bones of soldiers home from war, set on display to convince a country that their sacrifices are honored by this Administration, openly if negligently made mockery of by a bread-and-circus-style circus.

In the meantime, the woman who brought us the quotable "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud" and the man who made torture, once illegal by the Geneva Conventions, the policy of the United States now turn the machinery of Bush's foreign policy and domestic legal apparatus.

It renders Orwell's "1984" to -- borrowing from one of Gonzales' legal briefs -- the status of "quaint". The woman now responsible for the nation's security through diplomacy was as responsible as anyone in the administration for bringing us to a war which removed not a single nuclear bomb from play, or even delayed a biological terror program. The man now responsible for the nation's justice system believes more strongly in the capability of power-politics, where you can torture people, because you can. Indeed, War is Peace, and Freedom is Slavery. No duh.

But, as Bush said, the "accountability moment" has passed. In his view, he can move forward, unaccountably. I'm sure all those who voted for him find that to be something they can dance and clap about.

Who's that kid in the olive parka?

One of the attendees at yesterday's Auschwitz commemorations stuck out like a sore thumb - and Washington Post fashion writer Robin Givhan is not being kind about it (the word "snowblower" is mentioned).


You can also see the Yahoo story.

YOU'RE OLD! GET IT?!?

Here is yet another example of GW acting very unpresidential-like. Making a joke at the expense of a reporter, of senior citizens, altzheimer sufferers, etc. Basically, it reads: Bush: "You're acting old, get it? You can't remember anything like an old person, YOU'RE OLD!!, GET IT? OLD PEOPLE CAN'T remember...AHHAHAHAHAHA. Next question."

President Holds Press Conference: "Q I seem to remember a time in Texas on another problem, taxes, where you tried to get out in front and tell people it's not a crisis now, it's going to be a crisis down the line -- you went down in flames on that one. Why --

THE PRESIDENT: Actually, I -- if I might. (Laughter.) I don't think a billion-dollar tax relief that permanently reduced property taxes on senior citizens was 'flames,' but since you weren't a senior citizen, perhaps that's your definition of 'flames.'

Q I never got my billion --

THE PRESIDENT: Yes. Because you're not a senior citizen yet. Acting like one, however. Go ahead. (Laughter.)"

Microsoft: no patches for pirates

Microsoft announced that they will be starting a program that will deny security patches to all pirated copies of Windows.

While on the surface this seems like a valid business plan (why provide updates to people who STOLE your product?), this essentially blocks anyone from being able to protect their system from turning into a zombie that serves up email, DDOS attacks, etc. etc. etc. These zombie computers account for terabytes of data being sent over the internet every day, which slows down everyone elses connections, piles the spam into their email box, and if a website that they're trying to get to is experiencing a DDOS attack, they won't be able to access those services.

Microsoft is just washing their collective hands here. "Not our problem. They should have bought their copy." This may have been valid in the past, but in an era where we need this infrastructure to operate at all times, Microsoft is just handing tools over to the destroyer, by thinking about themselves first. Although I don't advocate people stealing their operating system, millions of people on this planet steal it anyway, and their unprotected systems will affect everyone else in profound ways.

Dear Terrorists:

It's the Red states you want.

Stop bombing the blue states.

William Safire's Farewell Column

He retires today from his "right-wing scandalmongering" on the NYTimes OpEd. Why? To try something new -- full-time chairmanship of the Dana Institute for Brain Reasearch ("Fewer lone-wolf assertions; more collegial dealing. I hear that's tough.")

He'll keep the language column. I'll miss him. Through his numerous political contacts -- unmatched among columnists -- he brought factual reporting into his columns, something which David Brooks, for example, never does, preferring to refer to his own books to understand what's going on in the world. I'm sure Brooks' approach can be useful, but getting Israel's policies explained by Sharon has its advantages too.

I was hoping he would announce at last that he was Woodward and Bernstein's Deep Throat. Why him? While the Nixon administration was imploding, Nixon's heavily partisan, long-time speech writer was offered a job at the Washington Post by Katherine Graham. It was after Graham died that Safire revealed in a column she also stepped forward to recommend him highly for the NY Times job, which he took. That he was a frequent guest at her well-attended parties possibly brought them close enough that she would want to scoop up the bright young commentator onto her masthead; but how that translates into getting him a job at her newspaper's major competitor is not so transparent --- unless she had some reason to respect him so greatly, that she saw his having such a position transcended the business concerns of her newspaper. And, it would make sense that, if Safire was a major source pushing Watergate forward, he'd like a little distance from the reporters who took him up on it. Finally, while Safire admires the cause of the right, he's also highly intellectually honest -- meaning, as soon as he would find out members of the administration were using illegal and anti-democratic means to hold onto power, he'd roll over on them.

A War Americans Don't Have To Fight

Friedman thoughtfully suggests that the War on Terror is, actually, not an American war : "Ever since 9/11, I've argued the war on terrorism is really a war of ideas within the Muslim world - a war between those who want to wall Islam off from modernity, and defend it with a suicide cult, and those who want to bring Islam into the 21st century and preserve it as a compassionate faith. This war of ideas is not one that the West can fight, only promote. Muslims have to fight it from within. That is what is at stake in the Iraqi elections. This is the first great battle in the post-9/11 war of ideas."

In this view, Americans are the collateral damage in radical Islam's fight to control their own sphere of influence. Their tactic is to poison relations between the West and Islamic countries, so that those inclined to a modernist, western-oriented and personal religion feel forced to embracing militant fundamentalism.

Bush, too, nostalgic for Clinton Administration

Quoting directly from his second Inaugural Address, delivered January 20, 2005 (paragraph 3):

For half a century, America defended our own freedom by standing watch on distant borders. After the shipwreck of communism came years of relative quiet, years of repose, years of sabbatical. And then there came a day of fire.

Almost maudlin enough to bring a tear to one's eye. Those were the days, eh? Ahh Georgie - if only I'd known you cared!

Not so sure about that "shipwreck of communism" image, though. What kind of ship were you thinking of? I seem to be picturing a sleek three-masted clipper, myself. Grounded on a rocky shore under leaden skies, tattered sheets blowing in the gale, and no one aboard (well, no one but Fidel and a few million Cubans).

Bonus observation: Note how our President stealthily includes eight months of his own first Administration among those "years of sabbatical"! Haha! Take that, Michael Moore!

What a Freakin Rip....

When Ronald Reagan was inaugurated, the Iran Hostages were released, ending a more than 400 day national nightmare.

Today, Bush was inaugurated, and all the national nightmares just continue on, and on....

By the way: did NOT get an invitation to any Inauguration Balls. You just know it got sent back in the mail, insufficient postage. Again, dinged for living in Canada! I'll probably get it next week, too late.

Bush's Lines get Wider and Wider

Always read between Bush's lines: 'I want you to know how touched I was that the chief justice came to administer the oath,' the president said afterward at the Capitol luncheon. 'That was an incredibly moving part' of the ceremony, he said."

Translation: "Look at 'im! He's practically dead! You think he's fulfilling his duties as Chief Justice of the United States? HELLS NO. He should resign right now. I'm gonna get me a good appointment in by-crackey!"

Great CNN headlines recently

Poll: Nation split on Bush as uniter or divider

Bush: Better human intelligence needed

At this point, the jokes tell themselves

File under D for "duhhh"

He's a deep thinker.

When President Bush was asked last week by The Washington Post why Osama bin Laden had eluded capture, he replied, "Because he's hiding."

Frank Rich asks in 2009: American War Crimes, How Did They Happen?

[NYTimes OpEd]. Frank Rich reviews the fact that American TV news is iignoring the obvious stories of torture and murder committeed by American troops and agents -- even ones which are printed in papers. Part is due to TV branding: like Fox News network's rightwing slant. Part, due to the FCC's obscenity crackdown -- which makes TV squeemish to anything which might upset viewers. Part due to the US government's own lack of forthcoming.

The result is that when Specialist Charles Graner is convicted of abuses at Abu Ghraib, it barely breaks on TV, and the fact that the judge supressed discussion of knowledge of the abuses at higher levels doesn't even come up. TV News portrays the US Government of acting against torture, even though the US government's policy permits torture -- a prime example being "waterboarding", where someone held indefinitely without charge in Guantanamo, for example, is tied to a board and submerged, underwater to simulate drowning.

Rich is predicting a news show five years hence: "How Did This Happen?" The answer is, nobody cared.

There's the simple fact: George Bush tortures people. But he sees his "accountability moment" as past, and now he's going to move forward. Without accountability in his future.

John Kerry Calls for Donald Rumsfeld's Resignation

I got an email from John Kerry today, asking me -- and, I'm sure, others -- to join him in calling for Donald Rumfseld's resignation. He says:

I have just come back from Iraq. After several months consumed by the campaign trail, I wanted to make contact with our soldiers on the ground there. The first thing I want you to know is that, in very difficult circumstances, our brave soldiers are serving America with enormous skill and great courage.

In the Senate, we have a duty during times like these to hold our Defense Department accountable for the well-being of our troops. It's one of the ways that our democracy makes our military the strongest in the world. And I can't tell you how comforting it is as a soldier to know even if you don't have a say over your own situation, the folks back home do.

I knew our soldiers were still facing hold ups getting the equipment they need, but I wanted to see it for myself. American troops deserve the best gear and equipment we can provide. But adequate vehicle armor remains in short supply.

A soldier who spoke up about these problems was told by Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, "you have to go to war with the army you have, not the army you want."1 Well, it's been over two years since Rumsfeld planned this war. And whether he has the army he wants or not, he should at least have basic armor for army vehicles.

I'll say this in the Senate, but I'm asking you to add your voice to mine:

"President Bush, for the sake of our troops, replace Rumsfeld now."

Here's a petition Kerry's letter asks you to sign.

Just Following Orders

Yesterday, Specialist Charles A. Graner, Jr. was sentenced to 10 years for being the "ringleader" of the Abu Ghraib abuses as the NYTimes and presumably many other sources reported. His defense was that he was following orders. I had hoped that his trial would have been the opportunity to investigate this thing up the chain of command. After all, I think he might have expected a reduced sentence if his defense team could have produced evidence that he acted on orders or was encouraged in any way. It was reported that he said that one of his superiors gave him the "advice" that he should do what "military intelligence" told him to do. However, other than that, the coverage I've heard over the last few days (though I've paid attention only NPR, NYTimes, & LATimes) have not described even any new evidence or allegations that have come about as a result of this trial nor have any of the media sources commented on any failure of the defense to produce such evidence.

18 days

was the amount of time between the tsunami hitting and me receiving my first email from "Fred Newman, attorney at law" telling me about a client who "died in Banda Aceh in Indonesia with all members of his family in the deadly Tsunami" and asking "to assist me in ensuring that the funds lodged by my client with a Financial Institution Abroad...". In retrospect, it's surprising it took that long.

Apple Everywhere

Today, the name of the individual who runs the Think Secret website This individual is being sued by Apple for publishing trade secrets.

Of particular interest in the article: "California is one of approximately 44 or 45 states that have adopted [the] Uniform Trade Secrets Act. That statute makes it wrongful to acquire or publish without authorization information you know or have a reasonable basis to know is a trade secret of another,”

This means that Robert Novak can get away with publishing the name of a CIA agent, but if he publishes a trade secret, he'll be sued.

Oh, and by the way.....

The Washington Post reports today that we stopped looking for Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq last month.

So, the charade is over. I suppose, given the $200B price-tag for the Iraq war and recent budget reshuffling at the Pentagon, it was time for meaningless but oratorically advantageous gestures to get chopped.

The list of discovered weapons will be published between the first and second pages of the New York Times sometime this week. Wet your fingers!

We can now draw a line under the most bogus justification for war given in US History. There never were any such weapons, and the claims for them were based on "intelligence" which reasonable people could see was a crock of santorum. Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be any such people in the Bush Administration -- at least, none with courage.

Words of the Year

[Slate]. The Linguistic Sociiety of America, mostly for fun, votes on "Word of the Year" in several nebulously defined categories. It bares pointing out that "Word" doesn't describe what they vote on, but "Lexical term" of the year lacked panache. The winners of 2005:

• Most Creative: pajamahadeen , refers to bloggers in their bedclothes who criticize the mainstream media ( ahem );
  
• Most Euphemistic: badly sourced , meaning "false", used by Colin Powell and others this year.
  
• Most Outrageous: santorum , coined by sex columnist Dan Savage, after Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, as "the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex". As in, "Have you seen any santorum around the halls of Congress?".
  
• Most Likely to Succeed: red state, blue state, purple state . If you have to ask, you can't afford it.
  
• Overall: Word of the Year: red state, blue state, purple state .
  
  The conferences of the Linguistic Society of America sound like real cliffhangers.

The God As Assumption Meme Continues

Continuing with the God-as-assumption in media meme: an article in Slate, in light of recent events, calls for a boycott of God. Denouncing centuries of uncritical worship which have "clearly produced a monster", Heather MacDonald says the time that we sit passively while human life is wantonly mowed down is gone. "Where is God's incentive to behave?" Credit for the good, no blame for the bad.

The Value of a Dollar (in Thailand)

Lots to think and talk about after Erica's and my trip to Southeast Asia - not the tsunami, which I think inundated you wired ones more back here (and about which enough said, really - thanks Bill!), but other stuff - observations of these alien worlds and interactions with people.

One moment that sticks in my head: Erica and I were on the verge of making our largest single purchase of art and mementos, at a hole-in-the-wall store in Bangkok, and it was going to exhaust my remaining supplies of Thai Bhat. I offered to make up the difference to the store owner with dollars - fresh, crisp bills - and she declined. "My son says, today 38 Baht, tomorrow 37 Baht, next day... no thank you." So instead of completing our transaction (her largest of the night, I would guess) on the spot, cash in-hand, she had us ducking out of her store, past dozens of like establishments, in search of an ATM.

Note: This was not a clever attempt to negotiate the exchange rate (I was willing and tried) - she just didn't want the dollars.

Now granted, we had just come from Cambodia where the dollar is de facto currency, and the local Riel is used almost exclusively to make change (4000 Riel to one USD; no US coins accepted). But to someone who's watched his jokes about the doomed dollar go from mildly wonkish humor to Economist cover story in just one W term - with one full term to go - the experience was a bit of a shock.

Whack-em in the kneecaps and damn them for not being able to run

[NYTimes] This is interesting, because the case would be cut-and-dried as a discrimination case: 4 gay plantifs want to adopt children. It's against FL law to permit gays to adopt children, the only state with such a law on the books.

The appeal to US Court of Appeals (Atlanta) came back that the prime issue is not relief against discrimination, but the welfare of the child. And, to quote: "'Openly homosexual households represent a very recent phenomenon, and sufficient time has not yet passed to permit any scientific study of how children raised in those households fare as adults. Given this state of affairs, it is not irrational for the Florida Legislature to credit one side of the debate over the other. Nor is it irrational for the Legislature to proceed with deliberate caution before placing adoptive children in an alternative, but unproven, family structure that has not yet been conclusively demonstrated to be equivalent to the marital family structure that has established a proven track record spanning centuries.'"

The Supreme Court let that ruling stand, without comment. It's interesting logic, and not fundamentally flawed, however discriminatory. It says that states decide for themselves, with arbitrary considerations which need meet only a minimum standard of rationality, what requirements an adopting household must meet to provide for the best interests of the child.

So, overturning this requires a generation in which openly gay, married households raise children. If, after that generation, it can be shown that such children don't fare any worse than in straight, married households, I presume the applicants will return. Of course, gays can't marry in Florida, nor in any state except Massachusetts.

It's classic legal "whack-em in the kneecaps and damn them for not being able to run." Remember back before African Americans had legal rights to vote? Some states gave "literacy" tests designed to keep them from voting. Of course, education was so bad in part because African Americans had no political representation. And, they couldn't sway politicians to improve their education, because they didn't vote. And, they were kept from voting in large numbers, because education was so bad.

So, here is another example of a right that straight couples have, which will be denied gay couples -- at least in Florida -- until a generation after they are permitted to marry.

The Media Change: God as Fundamental Assumption

This morning, I heard a new voice in US media. Previously, the us media I read and listen to (NYTimes, NPR) has spoken a secular humanist viewpoint. God, when invoked, was described as a phenomenon, distinct from being a causal phenomenon. Why do people worship? What does it say about humanity? What does it say about us as people? That the answers to these questions were invariably that religion reflected positively on people was distinct from the consideration of its validity.

Apparently, no more. Today, within 15 minutes of each other, I came across two pieces in which God was not a phenomenon to be examined, but in which God was an assumption, and the writers sought to answer the earnest question: why would God kill innocents in this huge Tsunami?

Skipping past the point Nicholas Kristof made last week that the Tsunami is a minor disaster (200,000 deaths) compared with the 2 Million killed every year by malaria -- which is within human power to control with DDT, yet we do not):
Bill Safire asks -- why do people deserve such suffering? Safire suggests looking to the Book of Job -- God does not allow tragedy as justice, it is simply something which happens. Perhaps it is just age for Safire -- he is, after all, retiring from his OpEd column at the end of this month -- which brings him to deathbed conversion (death of his OpEd column, not him).

Perhaps more interesting was NPR's piece, which asked the same question: why would God do this to us? The story's conclusion: we cannnot know in this life what God's will is.

So, I'm marking the day: Today is the day (I noticed, at least) that God stopped being a subject of media inquiry, and started being an assumption.
This is a big deal. Religion has never been assumed in American social life -- it has been part of our commitment to diversity that religion is practiced privately, and only discussed publicly in sociological tones. When the media adopts a voice in which a particular religion (Christianity, here) is everyone's assumed background, we move away from this embrace of diversity in our public tone, and toward a shared values -- which may be entirely invalid, and is at least exclusionary of those who do not embrace this religion.

Newt Gingrich Throws his hat in the ring.

[Here]
.

Looks like Newt thinks he could do something for the country, and he's starting his run by putting George W. Bush -- the one man he definitely will not be running against -- in his political sights.

The Gonzales Doctrine in Practice

A Pentagon official says we have 325 foreign fighters capture in Iraq who are not protected
by the Geneva Conventions.

This is the policy that Alberto Gonzales, during his confirmation hearings to become the chief law enforcement officer of the United States, spent the past two days saying had been repudiated. Clearly, it is not.

And, to be sure, one does not come out to say that certain prisoners of war are not protected by the Geneva Conventions, only to treat them as if they were protected. The US is engaged in the internationally recognized forms of torture which are banned by the Geneva conventions, on these fighters.

Why have we gone so far away from respecting international law? And, more immediately, will the US Senate confirm the man responsible for the origins of this policy -- regardless of what he says in a dog-and-pony show interivew meant to give them and him cover -- as the chief law enforcement officer of the land? And what kind of a country do you think we'll have then?

Become.com: Google Launching a Shopping Search Engine?

I came across this website -- Become.com. It appears to be a Google-run shopping search engine, presently in beta test mode. The implied "becoming through shopping" motif aside, I'm interested to see what Google does for shopping online.

File Trading Networks Killing CD Sales? CD Sales are up in 2004

[Slashdot]

Wait for it -- we'll be hearing RIAA say, "Only because we've agressively prosecuted traders."

Way to go Babs!

In another minor victory for Democrats/Liberals the Ohio vote was todaychallenged by Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones and Sen. Barbara Boxer.

They emphasize that this doesn't put the election in jeopardy, but it does force a spotlight on Ohio, hopefully underscoring the hypocrisy of a nation that goes abroad to verify democratic elections in third world countries when it has serious problems of its own.

Thank You Jon Stewart! CNN dumps Tucker Carlson

[Globe and Mail] Carlson's gone at the end of his contract. In describing his view of Carlson, CNN's CEO Jonathon Klein of the US Network said: “I guess I come down more firmly in the Jon Stewart camp.” Klein also said that it's likely that Crossfire , which has been running since 1982, will also fold up.

United States Throws Out Its Constitution

The Intelligence, Defense and diplomatic (State) officials
quoted in the WaPost say that the US is preparing long range plans to permanently detain "suspected terrorists" without ever charging them, without ever offering them judicial review.

The present plans ask for $25M for a new "Camp 6" at Gitmo, where people who have no more intelligence to give up, and can't be charged with anything in Federal Court from lack of evidence, will be held forever.

These plans violate a Supreme Court ruling this year, which stated that the US must offer access to Federal Courts to military prisoners for a judicial review of their status. They also violate a fundamental right -- that the government cannot permanently detain a person without charge, and without due process review of those charges in front of a jury of peers. The result will be a Federal government empowered to imprison anyone indefinitely permanently.