Dear Mr. President
Dear Mr. President,
Thank you for appointing completely unqualified people to run FEMA. Nothing makes me more confident to see that four years after 9/11 that we, as a nation, are totally unprepared to handle major emergencies. It also helps us see that all your rhetoric for the last four years was really just a way to get re-elected and had nothing at all to do with the safety of the average American. You're doing a heck of a job.
Ed McDonald
Charlotte, NC
From a New York Times article: "The president, long reluctant to fire subordinates, came to a belated recognition that his administration was in trouble for the way it had dealt with the disaster, many of his supporters say. One moment of realization occurred on Thursday of last week when an aide carried a news agency report from New Orleans into the Oval Office for him to see.
The report was about the evacuees at the convention center, some dying and some already dead. Mr. Bush had been briefed that morning by his homeland security secretary, Michael Chertoff, who was getting much of his information from Mr. Brown and was not aware of what was occurring there. The news account was the first that the president and his top advisers had heard not only of the conditions at the convention center but even that there were people there at all."
Completely fucking incompetent.
Rickey
"Three Decades Of Rickey Because we should always respect our elders, I feel obligated to point out that Rickey Henderson recently completed his 30th season of professional baseball. Henderson, who began his pro career in 1976 with the Boise A's, suited up for the San Diego Surf Dawgs of the independent Golden Baseball League this season. The 46-year-old hit .270, reached base at a .456 clip, stole 16 bases in 18 attempts and hit five homers for the league champs."
Saturday, September 10, 2005
New book me read, no can stop
I have to work tomorrow and I should be in bed. Insead I am taking a break from a book that I am near completing and will complete before I hit the sack. I am reading Wrecking Crew by John Albert. It's the story of a group of thirty-something citizens of the streets of LA who form an amateur baseball team/support group. The team made up of recovering junkies, strugglig actors and musicians which, in Hollywood, seems to be the same thing and other assorted freaks of that scene. Amazing to me is that one of the players was the bass player of my favorite early 90's rock band, Junkyard. They were kind of a Guns 'n' Roses/Drive by Truckers/Rolling Stones kinda band. I listened to their first album tonight while reading the book and it's a little dated but "Can't Hold Back" is still a jammin' tune. Also the author of the book was in Christian Death when they first started for a short time and I downloaded a few of their songs tonight from the short era of the first lead singer, Roz Williams. It's pretty good gothy rock. I had heard the name of the band before and had assumed they were some kind of death metal band. I was way off.
Most of the people who read this are readers and you know how it is when a book grabs. This is a brutally honest memoir full of hope, heartbreak and humor. I'm loving it and I'm going to be sad when I finish it.
By the way, the Decemberists is good reading music.
I have to work tomorrow and I should be in bed. Insead I am taking a break from a book that I am near completing and will complete before I hit the sack. I am reading Wrecking Crew by John Albert. It's the story of a group of thirty-something citizens of the streets of LA who form an amateur baseball team/support group. The team made up of recovering junkies, strugglig actors and musicians which, in Hollywood, seems to be the same thing and other assorted freaks of that scene. Amazing to me is that one of the players was the bass player of my favorite early 90's rock band, Junkyard. They were kind of a Guns 'n' Roses/Drive by Truckers/Rolling Stones kinda band. I listened to their first album tonight while reading the book and it's a little dated but "Can't Hold Back" is still a jammin' tune. Also the author of the book was in Christian Death when they first started for a short time and I downloaded a few of their songs tonight from the short era of the first lead singer, Roz Williams. It's pretty good gothy rock. I had heard the name of the band before and had assumed they were some kind of death metal band. I was way off.
Most of the people who read this are readers and you know how it is when a book grabs. This is a brutally honest memoir full of hope, heartbreak and humor. I'm loving it and I'm going to be sad when I finish it.
By the way, the Decemberists is good reading music.
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
Headline of the day
From CNN: "Bush to lead probe to find 'what went wrong.'" Look in the mirror, monkey boy, you're the problem.
He also said, "One of the things people want us to do here is play the blame game," he said. "We got to solve problems. There will be ample time to figure out what went right and what went wrong." He always says that when he screws up. No time for the blame game. First we got to concentrate on fixing what I helped screw up and then we'll shift over to stem cells or gay marriage.
From CNN: "Bush to lead probe to find 'what went wrong.'" Look in the mirror, monkey boy, you're the problem.
He also said, "One of the things people want us to do here is play the blame game," he said. "We got to solve problems. There will be ample time to figure out what went right and what went wrong." He always says that when he screws up. No time for the blame game. First we got to concentrate on fixing what I helped screw up and then we'll shift over to stem cells or gay marriage.
Sunday, September 04, 2005
What the?
It looks like the main requirement to head up homeland security is to have the ability to lie your ass off with a straight face. Perfect storm, my ass. New Orleans got hit with the western side of the hurricane. Think of how bad it would be there if they got the same surge Mississippi got. Hell, even I knew this was going to be a nightmare and I'm nobody.
It looks like the main requirement to head up homeland security is to have the ability to lie your ass off with a straight face. Perfect storm, my ass. New Orleans got hit with the western side of the hurricane. Think of how bad it would be there if they got the same surge Mississippi got. Hell, even I knew this was going to be a nightmare and I'm nobody.
Saturday, September 03, 2005
This hurricane thing
Like everyone I've been watching, reading and thinking about this mess on the gulf coast. I was watching the Jim Lehrer New Hour tonight and he had his usual cast of thoughtful commentators on near the end of the broadcast. I thought Tom Oliphant summed up the situation perfectly when he said this: "I would say the fault lines are much deeper than that. I mean, on the one hand there is no question that we can see now with our own eyes the two Americas of which John Edwards began speaking a year and a half ago.
But deeper than that, I think, is the anger that is going to come from the realization that virtually all public policy -- state, local, federal, where this area is concerned, has been against the public interests for decades. And the realization that government is one of the reasons we have government has been violated by virtually everything government has done for decades."
You can bring that home to you. You can look around Charlotte and watch this nice southern town being destroyed by development. You can look at your Timewarner cable bill and wonder why you can't purchase two or three networks instead of a bundle. You can drive through a shitty part of town and wonder why the richest country in the world has violent slums while the president and his recent opponent are millionaires. You can drive down to Lancaster, SC and see how their beautiful downtown is half deserted while the Wal-Mart down the street is packed. And you can turn on the tube or pull up a news site on the internet and see how the poorest people of New Orleans were left to suffer and die. It's not about George Bush (although he does blow), it's about a system that allowed someone like him to rise to power. Now we are all going to have to pay because of the shortsightedness of the mindset that doing the right thing would be bad for business.
This is my blog and that is my opinion.
Like everyone I've been watching, reading and thinking about this mess on the gulf coast. I was watching the Jim Lehrer New Hour tonight and he had his usual cast of thoughtful commentators on near the end of the broadcast. I thought Tom Oliphant summed up the situation perfectly when he said this: "I would say the fault lines are much deeper than that. I mean, on the one hand there is no question that we can see now with our own eyes the two Americas of which John Edwards began speaking a year and a half ago.
But deeper than that, I think, is the anger that is going to come from the realization that virtually all public policy -- state, local, federal, where this area is concerned, has been against the public interests for decades. And the realization that government is one of the reasons we have government has been violated by virtually everything government has done for decades."
You can bring that home to you. You can look around Charlotte and watch this nice southern town being destroyed by development. You can look at your Timewarner cable bill and wonder why you can't purchase two or three networks instead of a bundle. You can drive through a shitty part of town and wonder why the richest country in the world has violent slums while the president and his recent opponent are millionaires. You can drive down to Lancaster, SC and see how their beautiful downtown is half deserted while the Wal-Mart down the street is packed. And you can turn on the tube or pull up a news site on the internet and see how the poorest people of New Orleans were left to suffer and die. It's not about George Bush (although he does blow), it's about a system that allowed someone like him to rise to power. Now we are all going to have to pay because of the shortsightedness of the mindset that doing the right thing would be bad for business.
This is my blog and that is my opinion.
Friday, September 02, 2005
R.L. Burnside
R.L. Burnside died yesterday. He was this old blues guy from Mississippi. He was the best. He was nice. He once offered me a drink of whiskey from a bottle he had in the inside pocket of his jean jacket. After a show in Asheville he told me and Wendell dirty jokes for half an hour. When he was onstage singing and he glanced at you it was like he was looking in your soul. He was the best. His shows are the closest I ever came to going to church. I took the following picture at the Double Door in 1998. I was stinking drunk and crawling on the floor in front of him. I'm amazed it's in focus.
R.L. Burnside died yesterday. He was this old blues guy from Mississippi. He was the best. He was nice. He once offered me a drink of whiskey from a bottle he had in the inside pocket of his jean jacket. After a show in Asheville he told me and Wendell dirty jokes for half an hour. When he was onstage singing and he glanced at you it was like he was looking in your soul. He was the best. His shows are the closest I ever came to going to church. I took the following picture at the Double Door in 1998. I was stinking drunk and crawling on the floor in front of him. I'm amazed it's in focus.
Nerd time
It's not a secret that I am a KISS fan. Of course I haven't paid attention to anything they've done since the awesome reunion tour. I saw recently that the former bass player from the Bangles, Kathy Valentine, is putting out a solo album on September 6th. Ace Frehley plays a solo on the last song on the record. Here's what she had to say about Ace: On Ace Frehley: "Ace is very reclusive. That was really one of the first tracks that I did for the album. I met Ace because a friend of mine brought him to my birthday party. We hit it off. We were just hanging out and he was really such a sweetheart. He actually offered to do it. I told him that I was going into the studio in a couple of days and he offered to play on it. How often do you get a rock icon to appear on your record? I really like that he is playing on a track that is not anything like a KISS song — it is more like a BLONDIE song. He really did a great solo that is in a really different context than people are used to. Gilby and I were recording him and when he did this solo he said, 'Let me do another one.' We both said, 'No, that is the one. You got it.'"
Very cool, I think. If I had a band I'd ask Ace Frehley to come into the studio now and then.
It's not a secret that I am a KISS fan. Of course I haven't paid attention to anything they've done since the awesome reunion tour. I saw recently that the former bass player from the Bangles, Kathy Valentine, is putting out a solo album on September 6th. Ace Frehley plays a solo on the last song on the record. Here's what she had to say about Ace: On Ace Frehley: "Ace is very reclusive. That was really one of the first tracks that I did for the album. I met Ace because a friend of mine brought him to my birthday party. We hit it off. We were just hanging out and he was really such a sweetheart. He actually offered to do it. I told him that I was going into the studio in a couple of days and he offered to play on it. How often do you get a rock icon to appear on your record? I really like that he is playing on a track that is not anything like a KISS song — it is more like a BLONDIE song. He really did a great solo that is in a really different context than people are used to. Gilby and I were recording him and when he did this solo he said, 'Let me do another one.' We both said, 'No, that is the one. You got it.'"
Very cool, I think. If I had a band I'd ask Ace Frehley to come into the studio now and then.
Amazing interview with the mayor of New Orleans.
If you are interested Josh Marshall has a lot of good posts about leadership.
Thursday, September 01, 2005
Idiots
Accidents, arrests reported by CMPD
STAFF REPORTS
The Charlotte Observer
Charlotte Mecklenburg police Thursday morning released an updated list of incidents tied to motorists rushing to gas pumps to buy gas in the face of potential shortages.
Police said that through 4 a.m. Thursday there had been:
# 67 traffic incidents, such as fender benders, due to the lines
# 23 reported disturbances, generally arguments and fights over gas
# 9 arrests, including one for disorderly conduct and the others for fighting.
Officials urged residents to not create traffic hazards and be courteous when buying gas.
Accidents, arrests reported by CMPD
STAFF REPORTS
The Charlotte Observer
Charlotte Mecklenburg police Thursday morning released an updated list of incidents tied to motorists rushing to gas pumps to buy gas in the face of potential shortages.
Police said that through 4 a.m. Thursday there had been:
# 67 traffic incidents, such as fender benders, due to the lines
# 23 reported disturbances, generally arguments and fights over gas
# 9 arrests, including one for disorderly conduct and the others for fighting.
Officials urged residents to not create traffic hazards and be courteous when buying gas.
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