My family is Republican.  For the most part.

Other parts of my family are not.  For the most part.

But we try to get along despite of our differences.

Sometimes, in spite of our differences.

I know I am the family black sheep, yet all members of my family keep trying to assure me otherwise.

They love me.

If I wasn't a member of the family, though......would they even give me a second glance?

Discuss.

Because I'm too bewildered by my family, and even myself, tonight, to discuss.  I will let you all do it for me.

Hugs and kisses,
Lis B.

Tears and Rain, by James Blunt

Nocturne, Op. 61 No.7 (from Midsummer Night's Dream), by Mendolssohn

Should I Stay or Should I Go Now, by The Clash

That's all I can think of for now, and, as it depends upon my mood which song eventually makes it into my will, when I don't even know when I'll write one, and I don't know what mood I'll be in when I do (or when I will pass, for that matter), I would like to keep it open, and have all three songs played.

Keep 'em guessing.

Not that I plan on dying any time soon, but when I read recently that The Clash's Joe Strummer had requested (and was granted his wish) that they play his Clash song "(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais" at his funeral, I decided I really should have a song that I love and have felt deep inside me was "my song" played at my funeral so that everyone who knew me and shows up anyway will walk away feeling that they still knew me and will still know me years later.

Joe Strummer felt that "(White Man) in Hammermith Palais" was his best song, ever.  He wrote it because he wanted to make a statement about the time he was invited to appear at an all-black, mostly Jamaican band collaboration concert in London. He felt honored to be invited because he felt that the bands would fire up an important political movement with the help of its audience.  He wanted the concert to make a difference.  Instead, he sat through the show and felt that it was nothing but a "Four Tops all night with encores from stage right" affair, no statement made, and therefore, no point.

In his song about this experience, he moves from his bitterness about it to an overall picture of black/white society, followed by the more general rich/poor society, as it was in the tougher parts of Great Britain at the time - aw hell, just society - and then closes with what can only be one of the most bittersweet and enigmatic of lines.  Here are the lyrics, for those of you still reading this and still interested:

Midnight to six man
For the first time from Jamaica
Dillinger and Leroy Smart
Delroy Wilson, your cool operator

Ken Boothe for UK pop reggae
With backing bands sound systems
And if they've got anything to say
There's many black ears here to listen

But it was Four Tops all night with encores from stage right
Charging from the bass knives to the treble
But onstage they ain't got no roots rock rebel
Onstage they ain't got no...roots rock rebel

Dress back jump back this is a bluebeat attack
'Cos it won't get you anywhere
Fooling with your guns
The British Army is waiting out there
An' it weighs fifteen hundred tons

White youth, black youth
Better find another solution
Why not phone up Robin Hood
And ask him for some wealth distribution

Punk rockers in the UK
They won't notice anyway
They're all too busy fighting
For a good place under the lighting

The new groups are not concerned
With what there is to be learned
They got Burton suits, ha you think it's funny
Turning rebellion into money

All over people changing their votes
Along with their overcoats
If Adolf Hitler flew in today
They'd send a limousine anyway

I'm the all night drug-prowling wolf
Who looks so sick in the sun
I'm the white man in the Palais
Just lookin' for fun

I'm only
Looking for fun

/end lyrics

Joe Strummer was the voice of The Clash.  Obviously, he was also the voice of his time and place.

But, I digress.

I was speaking of my funeral song choices.  If I think of any more songs, I'll add them to my list of, so far, three.

I can just imagine the faces of my funeral gatherers when all three songs are played in succession and at a healthy volume.

But, I digress.

So, I am into The Clash (with an emphasis on Paul Simonon, bass) after many years of not being into the Clash, and so I'm catching up and have recently discovered that a) Paul Simonon is an artist (oil paintings) and recently, this year, opened yet another show in London to great success and b) in 2005 he got back out of the artist studio and into the musical one, and collaborated with Damon Alburn (the Blur, Gorillaz, et. al.), Simon Tong (guitarist from The Verve), and Tony Allen, one of the primary co-founders of afrobeat, on an album entitled "The Good, The Bad & The Queen" (hereinafter known as "TGTBTQ").

No Clash sound here, except perhaps in "Three Changes", and no Verve sound here, except perhaps in the title track "TGTBTQ" when Simon Tong's guitar rips new holes in rockdom's ass with a great sense of humor and relish; no Blur sound here, except when Damon opens his mouth or smashes his fingers against the willing ivorie, and all the while Tony Allen keeps a jazz/reggae/afrobeat/you name it throb and pssshhhttt going on almost in spite of it all.

This album does not rock -- yet it rocks-- except for a few exceptions.  This album is mellow, veddy British (the darker/sometimes lighter side), and makes one, for the most part, sit back and just get mellow. Think Cold Play, but better. Stronger.  Tighter.  Yet more relaxed.  And more rockin'.  Yeah, that kind of album.  Just so you know. 

There are surprises....but they're all good. 

I enjoy watching youtube footage of "TGTBTQ" live performances because I love to watch Paul Simonon move.  Back when he was in The Clash, he kept his bass slung low, below the hips, resting on his upper thighs, and in interviews admitted that a) when he joined the band he didn't know how to play a guitar or bass yet found the bass easier to learn, b) he taped the letters of each chord to his fret and looked at them in great need in the very earliest Clash days, and c) he felt the bass was so heavy at times that his shoulder strap needed cushioning with whatever he could use as a shoulder pad.

As an aside, when he and the rest of The Clash played the song he wrote, "The Guns of Brixton", on stage, Paul would switch guitars with Joe Strummer in order to play rhythm guitar instead of bass, because he felt a little nervous concentrating on both the bass and his lyrics/singing.

That was then, this is now.  In 2005-2007 youtube.com video footage of TGTBTQ live performances he holds the bass to his belly with no strap half the time.  Yet he still bounces around, shuffles around, slides around, grooves around, jerks his shoulders around, his hips around, his knees around, and his feet around, always to the beat and always looking neat, just like he did in the Clash days. 

The man has learned his craft(s).  And he still looks fookin' sexy.

Would you look at me, I'm turning Brit.  Oi.

But, I digress.

When I listen to this album by "TGTBTQ", I feel melancholy, then elated, bounced up, bounced back, mad as hell then happy as hell, and glad that Paul Simonon learned how to play the bass.

Next week, I think I might cover the work of Leonard Cohen.  Until then, yours truly,

LisB (Working towards Unity, one song at a time)

Reign o'er me!!!
Rain o'er me.

You are my family now.

Like it or not, I will now taste your sweet potatoes at Thanksgiving.  And I want marshmallows, dammit.

I want smart posts, mindful posts, political posts.

KNOW YOUR POSTS!!!!!!!!

These are your Posts!

Number One.
You'd better be smart enough to get fooked.
Cuz we will fook witcha.

But not if you are like Raider99, cuz he's smart.

Numbah 2.

You have the right....to your own personality.
Unless of course you like to have two or threeeeeeeeeeee
That's your right..

Number three!!
You have the right
to make friends here
and not be investigated....
agitated....
frustrated.....

These Are Your Rights!!!!

All 3 of Them.....

This week, more than ever, I've been wondering to myself (sometimes aloud, sometimes silently) why do I love it here at TPM so much?  Why am I a TPMAholic?  For more about TPMaholics Not-So-Anonymous, look us up at www.barackobama.com under Groups.  Or, alternatively, search posts by CaliforniaPaige and Genghis and, while you're viewing all of their posts, feel free to buy someone a beer.

God, I wish I knew how to use the buttons on the top of this freakin post page.  The comment page is so much easier.  I have gotten <i>so</i> used to those distracting little html code thingies.  But, I digress.

Why do I love it here?  Why, when sometimes I get bashed over the head or in the nose and sometimes even my kneecaps (with a bat, no less), do I choose to come back here, almost daily, for more punishment?

Because I love the fact that each of us loves politics.

We're addicted to politics.  We eat, sleep, and breathe politics.  We talk politics, we walk politics, we use the Chicago-style, elbow-jabbing, this is MY fucking court, politics. 

Our conversations range from gasoline, energy, human rights, the Constitution, institutions, absolutions, to Obama and McCain. 

But it's not just the politics we're addicted to.  It's the people.  We range from IT nerds to lawyers to housewives to social workers.  We all have voices and perspectives and we love to share our knowledge.  We also love to bat each other around like mice in a slim cat's clutches, but we always stand up, dust ourselves off, and get right back into the ring again. 

Unless we're banned.

And then we just create new user names (if we haven't already got two or three others under our hats -- and no, I don't post under any other name, just so you know) and we go right back at it again, waving our flags, shouting our points of view, shouting down each other like Chris Matthews and his merry band of loud people who don't listen to each other, until someone accidently spits or gets flustered. 

Meanwhile, all the time exposing more and more of ourselves to each other.  Our weaknesses, our soft spots, our unexpected kindnesses -- our cruel moments.  And we still come back for more.  Because it's better than General Hospital in the Luke and Laura days.  It's better than Who Shot J.R.  Okay, I'm showing my age now.  But, I digress.

What I mean is, we're all different, but we're all beautiful.  Our own little human unique snowflakes.  Who sometimes melt down softly, or stay frozen and cold and rather sharp to the vulnerable un-scarfed part of your face that's exposed to snow in harsh, bitter wind.  Depending on our mood, or the news of the day, or -- usually both.

I love all of your points of view, even though I don't always agree with them.  I love the passion that all of you have.  I love the fact that so many people are willing to share what they know to a bunch of strangers across the world.  I love this place.

Thanks.

"Financier Linked to Burkle and Clinton Is Charged".

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121431648873899937.html?mod=hpp_us_whats_news


I think I'd rather make the cover of the Rolling Stone.  Wouldn't you?

My youngest sister is a hell of a lot more religious than I am.  She's gotten into some guy named Andy Stanley.  I don't resent it when she sends me a religious email now and then, because I understand we all have our own ideological points of view, but I have to admit I don't always read them.

I think she knows this, because the religious emails have slowed way down.  Which is why, when I got this email from her today, I actually stopped and read it. 

It is a very interesting (to me, anyway) mix of politics and religion that I find fascinating.  Andy Stanley's North Point Ministries is encouraging people to write letters to the next president, and whether it be Obama or McCain doesn't matter.

This website includes links to letters already written, as well as a place where you can write your own.  Again, I find this whole idea rather fascinating.  So I thought I'd share the link with you all, and see what you think about it, if anything:

http://www.letterstothenextpresident.com/

I sit here, able to turn on my A/C and my computer, and pet my cats, and meanwhile some people in this world are displaced due to war -- Iraq, anyone? -- or due to flooding or earthquakes or unfair laws in their own countries.

People are dying, and I have an iPod.  I have PC games.  I have access to almost one hundred cable TV channels.

I have a life.  I live it.  I recycle my beer cans, my V-8 cans, my Vitamin Water bottles.  I go to work.  Don't always love it but I love the fact that I have a job and make money, and am able to contribute my money to causes I deem worthwhile.

Meantime, people are dying. 

Every. Single.  Fucking day.

Makes my life seem not so significant, don't it.

Makes my anger over whatever makes me angry today seem rather silly, don't it.

Makes my anger over whether Hillary should've won or FISA won and shouldn't have seem rather silly, don't it.

Life goes on. 

I want life to go on with a Democratic President in our White House.  Anything else, after all, could make life going on obsolete.

I mean, really.

So last week I'm watching Channel 13 late at night and I see a special about The Clash.  And I remember how sexy the bass player, Paul Simonon was, back in the day, so I watch this hour-long special. 

And I learned that not only was Paul Simonon sexy (he still is, btw), but Joe Strummer was one of the most political lead singers, lyricists, and rhythm guitar players since....well, since maybe John Lennon.  <b>And then some<b>.

One week later, two DVD orders later, dozens and dozens of youtube video viewings later, dozens and dozens of wiki hits about each song, each album, each band member, and I'm wondering why in the hell I thought Duran Duran was hot back in the day.  As I told Sean last week, I have no Duran Duran songs on my iPod.....but I now have 11 songs by The Clash and am buying up about 3 per day.

The music, the lyrics, the politics, the <i>emotion</i>....how did I miss all of this until now?

Where in the hell have I been?

And ain't it a crying shame that Joe Strummer passed away in 2002? 

I grew up in a broken family, as most of you know.  My dad married three times, had seven daughters, and my mom married three times and had three, including me.

My dad had a little brother named Jack, who grew up to do many great things, such as teeach, tutor and act as guidance counselor to both young students and inmates at Riker's Island.

My Uncle Jack married young, the first time, and his marriage didn't work out, and he felt badly about that.  So when he made his second marriage to a lady named Jane (I kid you not, his own Lady Jane), he felt happy.

He tried to emotionally adopt her two kids but they were hers, with another father.  We all know how that goes.

So when he and Jane got pregnant and had their daughter Jackie, it was a big thing.  To him and his wife, and to the rest of our family, it was a big thing.  Finally, to see Jack happy.  Finally, to see Jack being a loving daddy, and to be loved by someone who called him "Daddy".

And he was a loving daddy.  And he was loved.

"Here's your cousin's picture, Littlebit.  Here's Jackie and her Betty Grable legs",  he said to me as he proudly showed off a picture of his chubby and adorable little one-year-old daughter.

I met her when she was a toddler, Jackie.  And yes, she had sexy legs, for a baby.  And yes, she was adorable.  And yes, she was the apple of her daddy's eye.

And then I moved to California and stayed out there for 11 years.  And so I missed seeing Jackie grow up.  I missed out on how smart and clever she was -- smart enough to win a scholarship to Oxford at the age of 16.  And I missed how she made an impact with her own fellow students at school, giving them a voice through being a very outspoken and smart young lady who questioned everything, and missed nothing.  I missed everything about her, while I was 3000 miles away.

Until I got a phone call, out of the blue, and it was my sister and she said, "Jackie is in a coma.  It looks really scary, but we're praying".

My dad had been living overseas at the time, but he was home during Jackie's coma, and he, unreligious as could be, even he asked me to pray for her.

I asked:  "How??"  "Why?".  All I could remember was the pretty toddler with Betty Grable legs.  It didn't make sense.

I was told:  Jackie, like a number of our family, suffers asthma.  She was using inhalers and having to go the hospital a lot when the inhalers didn't work.  So Uncle Jack and Aunt Jane found a specialist for her, so that she could live like a normal 16-year-old girl.

She would go to a doctor, once a week, and get a shot, and she would no longer get out of breath or need an inhaler.  And she could continue playing sports, and she could to to Oxford on her scholarship, and all would be well for her.

Except that, on the day she fell into her coma, which was a day just like any other once-a-week day, she went to see her doctor to get her normal shot in the arm, and afterwards she got into the car with Uncle Jack, and put on her seatbelt just like always, and they took off towards home, and then.....suddenly, so suddenly, Jackie grabbed her arm and yelled, "Daddy!  It hurts!!"

And Uncle Jack pulled the car over to the side of the road, and said, "What hurts, honey, what's wrong??" and she passed out.

She passed away about two weeks later, in a coma, with kidney failure.

My Uncle Jack and Aunt Jane donated everything to science.  That was their wish. 

They did not ask why, they did not sue the doctor who gave Jackie her shot in the arm, they did not want their daughter's sudden death to become a freak show in the media.

They held a very beautiful ceremony at her high school wherein the statue of Rodin's Thinker was added to the school grounds in her name, and they kept a small statue of Rodin's Thinker in their home.  They also kept Jackie's bedroom untouched, for years, so that by the time I got home from California for good, the room was stale but still untouched.

My uncle personally opened the bedroom door for me, without my asking him to, and proudly showed off Jackie's highschool yearbooks, her ribbons, her pictures, and her dollhouse.  It's a tour I will never forget.

My uncle has since passed away, recently, and so did Jane.  Within a few weeks of each other, in fact.

Rodin's Thinker thinks and ponders on.

I wonder to myself, sometimes, should they have questioned further the reasons for their daughter's sudden reaction to her normal, weekly, asthma shot?  Should they have tried to find out further what happened?  They were not the sort of folks who jump at a lawsuit.  They only mourned the loss of their daughter.  And they were told it was a freakish reaction, so the drug their daughter was given was usually not so much a killer, if at all.

No one in my family blamed them or tried to talk them into finding out more.  Why, or how, could we?  They lived in depression from the day she died, until the days that they died. 

And Rodin's Thinker thinks on.

This was for Clear Thinker, and for me.  I did not write this to help my cousin, nor her parents, who are all passed.  I write it for me and for Clear Thinker (because I owed him the story), and I write it for anyone who has to deal with death, drugs, and love.

My cousin, my aunt, and my Uncle Jack are missed.  None of it makes sense, but there it is.

Your thoughts are welcome.  Clear Thinker has his answer, and I have said my piece.

I was named after my grandmother’s best friend, Aunt Bess.  Well, my sisters and I called her Aunt Bess, but her true name was Elisabeth, and she preferred Bess for short.  Unlike me, she didn’t have a surname that starts with B, so her name didn’t sound silly.  If I, on the other hand, was to call myself  Bess, it would sound silly.  BessB.  Sounds too much like “Best Bee”.  (And that might almost sound as if I was in competition with my friend workerbee, but, I digress.)

Aunt Bess used to have an old Scots saying, “Waste not, want not.”

My mother adopted this phrase whenever I left food on my plate, bought another LP or Atari game, or found myself needing a personal loan from her.  I’m thankful for my mother, and my Aunt Bess.

Waste not, want not.  To some it’s a fun phrase because it’s easy to remember, to others because it rolls off the tongue so easily, and to yet others because when you say it three times, real fast, it sounds like Charlie Brown’s schoolteacher’s voice:  “Wa waw, worh wongghh…wa wahw, wohng waangh, …wae wung waaa wonnh.”  So fun and easy is it to say out loud, that one sometimes forgets the true meaning of the phrase.

Don’t waste, and you won’t need. 

That’s the true meaning of the phrase.

And the phrase belongs to frugal people everywhere.  The old saying belongs to people who have grown up not only hearing it, but heeding it.   I won’t go all Charles Dickens on you, but you all know of people who really do scrimp and save every single penny because they have to.   These people have heeded the lesson of this phrase because every last scrap of anything is, to them, a necessity, and not a rat packer’s indulgence.

I haven’t always heeded it, and I have not worked for a company yet who understands the meaning of the phrase.  The places I have worked at, (except for a certain bakery that was family-owned for roughly 100 years until it was bought up, chewed up, and regurgitated as the same old, same old, but on a higher budget and therefore with not-as-well-baked goods that are now sold at  a higher price by a national firm that had “acquired” it), do not understand the phrase “waste not, want not” when it comes to spending money on “Image”.  Oh, sorry….now they call it “Brand”.   Thanks to “Branding”, no frivolous expenditure is frivolous if it’s under the guise of  “Networking”. 

“What?  We weren‘t out partying that night, we were ‘Displaying the Brand‘”.

“The Brand”.  As if the market were nothing but cattle, waiting with baited breath for the hot branding iron to fly down and hit its vulnerable ass.

Funny, though, that it’s all the big wigs at the company who are marketing “The Brand:, while all the worker bees (no offense, workerbee) couldn’t give a rat’s ass what the brand is as long as the boss hasn’t fired them for yet another week straight.

But, what corporate America has to remember is that the low-man-down-on-the-totem-pole employee in every company sees the waste, feels the waste, and wants their company , too, to feel the waste, and doesn’t really know how to make that happen yet, other than to kvetch about it over a forbidden smoke break, or send an email or IM to the person in the cube next to them, knowing full well the company computers can monitor and report and playback and hold against them in court the full contents of whatever frustrated and acid-filled and  worthy-of-losing-one’s-job-over flame job the low-man-down-on-the-totem-pole happens to be guiltily sharing at any given point in time.

Seeing a CEO, and his or her upper cronies, jet about the country and write-off whatever he or she can get away with, with abandon that seems almost chaotic, all the while struggling to pay one’s own rent and car payment at the same time, can get to a person. 

So seeing our own government do it to us in the same manner should get to a country.

Therefore, the way I see it, we can start big, and vote for change this year.  Or we can start small, and start asking for more equality and less wastefulness in the workplace, this year. 

Starting small sometimes works.  But starting big makes starting small one hell of a lot easier.

Why waste a change election year by starting small when what we really want is to change big?

Waste not, want not.  Vote big, get big.

I’m just sayin’.

Half of what I say is meaningless
But I say it just to reach you Julian

Julian, Julian, freedom of speech, calls me
So I sing a song of loons, Julian

Julian, open eyes, snarky smile, calls me
So I sing a song of love, Julian

His posts of angry freedom are shimmering, glimmering
In the sun

Julian, Julian, TPM watch-guard, teach me
So I sing a song of recipes, Julian

When I cannot stop the spam
I can only speak my mind Julian

Julian, waking cut, silent paste, teach me
So I sing a song of truth, Julian

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/profile/Julian%20Smith

(Forgive me, John Lennon, forgive me, please)

I don't know why, but I have my television set on and it's set on MSNBC, and every time I glance over at it, I see flashes of Tim Russert followed by a very emotional Keith Olbermann....and now, Oh God, Chris Matthews has finally hung up his cell phone and is making a televised appearance from outside the studio and I just want to beg the two of them to please go home and cry their hearts out because I can see how they feel and the rawness of it breaks my heart.

At the same time, I love the fact that MSNBC is doing this tonight.  The only cable news channel holding a memorial for one of their own with the same honor and dignity that their own Tim Russert lived his all-too-short life.

But, every now and then, I hit the "channel" button and move up to CNN for a quick look-see.  And just two hours ago, I saw something that made me glad for the look-see:

A CNN poll shows that, in a comparison of registered Democrat and Republican voters, a whopping 63% of Democrats are VERY/EXTREMELY EXCITED about voting this year, compared to a a very dismal 37% of Republicans.

Mildly Excited earned almost 45-45, and "Not All That Excited At All" earned a low 20's to 30's for the Dems, and a huge and whopping 45% for Republicans.

Good news, on a very sad day.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080612/ap_on_go_ot/tomatoes_salmonella

The forbidden fruit is now verboten.  A/K/A:  Hold the tomatoes, please.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/13/washington/12cnd-gitmo.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Headbands??  The ad next to an important news article about Gitmo and its detainees is a New York Times mag ad that displays Lindsay Lohan's little sister Ali wearing a striped hairband, and compariing her to some chick named Blair Waldorf, whom I can only figure must be a rich hotel heiress, who is wearing a striped hairband, and I refuse to click on the link so I guess I'll never be enlightened about the battle of the headbands, but if this continues to be the kind of "news" that people choose to read, when there's an important story about Habeus Corpus being discussed, well....America really needs to wake up.

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/06/12/habeas_corpus_returns/

Hello?  Anybody home???

HELL-O-OH!  ANYBODY CELEBRATING WITH ME AND E.J.?!!!

I took off my stockings and my slip and my bra is next!  I'm dancing around my living room with my dress on and nothing underneath!!!

And y'all still want to talk about Michelle Obama and Whitey?!  Y'all still want to talk about how Hillary lost?!

HELL-O-OHHH!

Move on out of the readers' posts and go to the Cafe and give E.J. her props, dammit.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20080611/sc_space/plutonowcalledaplutoid

Scorpios everywhere are in revolt and a state of confusion as they watch their ruling planet become nothing more than a dwarf this year. Astrologers from countries no one even knew existed before are reporting that all of their clients with a Pluto influence in their birth charts have lost one to five inches in height since the downsizing of the once-planet first became news. Other planets throughout the universe visibly appeared to shun the former ruling planet as they watched it shrink in stature, all the while sharing no comment.

Disney is, of course, in a turmoil tonight as they frantically burn and shred celluloid images of the beloved dog Pluto, and meetings are being held at this very moment to determine whether “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” should now be renamed -- and reintroduced -- as “Snow White and the Six Very Nice But Vertically-Challenged Guys With The Exception of Grumpy, Who Just Isn‘t Nice”.