Today's John Oliver

Keynote: Preventing Cable Company Fuckery

And it worked - kinda:

This Thursday, FCC Chair Tom Wheeler will announce that under Title II, broadband companies will be regulated as utilities. Real progress, and we should be grateful to Wheeler and President Obama for listening to the public as we made our wishes known.

It's not the same as putting rules in place that make it illegal to create tiered pricing structures, but at least it gives average jokers like me and you a way to verbally assault the Suits and the Nickle Humpers as they proceed to ease their bullshit ownership paradigm into place.

Stay after 'em.

hat tip = Crooks & Liars

The Prophet Charlie Pierce

I posted something a while back that said I wanted to hear more from Jim Webb.  I haven't completely changed my mind on that one, but I'll say straight out this ain't what nobody needs to hear nobody say no how.  

"I think they could do better with white, working people and I think this last election showed that," Webb said, referencing the 2014 midterms where Republicans took control of the Senate and added more power in the House. "The Democratic Party could do very well to return to its Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Andrew Jackson roots where the focus of the party was making sure that all people who lack a voice in the corridors of power could have one through the elected represented...You are not going to have a situation again where you have 96% of the African American vote turning out for one presidential candidate. ... We need to get back to the principles of the Democratic Party that we are going to give everyone who needs access to the corridors of power that access regardless of any of your antecedents. I think that is a fair concept." --Jim Webb

Take it, Charles:

There is no question that the Democratic party has done a god-awful job of explaining to white working people who's screwing them and why. Most of the people who have tried that have found themselves marginalized, and not always by Republicans, either. Senator Professor Warren is one of the few of them who has managed to explain these matters in such a way that they are both easily understood, and in such a way that she doesn't sound like she's talking down to anyone. And she still has a long push up a dirt road before she moves the political dialogue to the point where white working class voters actually act on what she's saying to them. Sooner or later, it's up to the voters to decide to stop being stupid about their own self-interest, and to stop falling for scams about how the Poors and Browns are the ones stealing all their money.

It's hard to say some of the things Webb is trying to say, and to make it all understandable in a way that prevents about half of the audience from immediately putting buckets on their heads and running around crashing into walls and shit.  

We gotta find candidates who don't just have the guts to say the things that are hard to say; but candidates we can count on to figure out how to say those things in ways that let us understand the core truth while not making us feel threatened or guilty or lied to; and who aren't just pandering to one group or another, trying to manipulate the crowds, etc etc etc.

One of the first things Webb's team has to figure out is that no matter what he says, he's speaking from a position deep inside the Dominant and Over-Privileged power structure.  

So say what you're saying, Mr Webb, but I gotta call that shit strike one - you're not going anywhere if you don't say it way better'n that.

Darwin Implied

I'm not the only one who was left wondering if the the Xtianist Radicals would get their dander up over the Carnival ad yesterday, but Ken Ham's the only one I've heard anybody even refer to.  So OK - maybe we just have to wait a while longer for the obligatory outrage to build(?)  

Addicting Info beat me to the blog.



The problem is that JFK got the facts wrong when he tried to make the biology connection between humans and the sea, so of course that makes the whole Darwin thing just some atheist bullshit.

Addicting Info posted this as a follow up:

Today's SNL

American "culture" is a curious thing - all 'round.

The Amazing Randi

James Randi announced his retirement:

At 86 years of age, I feel that it’s now well time to officially retire, so I’m stepping down from my position with the JREF – the James Randi Educational Foundation.

This doesn’t mean that I’m retiring from my battle against the so-­called psychics, faith healers, paranormalists, and the assorted frauds I’ve encountered in my worldwide wanderings. I’ll in no way relax the critical attention I’ve given to them over the last busy 73 years, I promise you. I’ll still lecture and write, here and abroad – but now on my own time – not on the exhausting schedule that I’ve had these past few years.

Here are some resources to help you create your very own Junior Bunkum Buster Kit:

What's The Harm?

Quack Watch

Pusware QuackCasts

The most important tool in your kit (imo) is the Randi Challenge:

The James Randi Educational Foundation will pay US$1,000,000 (One Million US Dollars) ("The Prize") to any person who demonstrates any psychic, supernatural, or paranormal ability under satisfactory observation. Such demonstration must take place under the rules and limitations described in this document. An applicant can be from or in any part of the world. Gender, race, and educational background are not factors for acceptance. Applicants must be at least 18 years of age and legally able to enter into binding agreements.

Have fun - and let's be skeptical out there.

hat tip = Wonkette

Whoa, Dude

I hope I'm not the only one who thinks it's a tiny bit over the top (or weird, or even creepy) that companies are running TV Ad Trailers - teasers for the ads they plan on running during the Super Bowl.

Youngsterism

Californina is making an effort to raise the age at which it's legal for people to buy tobacco products from 18 to 21.

I remember, way way back in the day, when we were all blabbing about "how it ain't right for  kids to get drafted at 18 and have absolutely no say in electing the slaggards who're sending them off to die in some place they can't even pronounce...".

We got Amendment #26 outa that one.

So let's consider for a minute that raising both the drinking age and the smoking age to 21 is a really good idea.  People's brains aren't terribly well developed until they hit their mid-20s, which is why we should be moving some of those BFD Life Decisions a little further towards that maturity threshold.  (If you can get your kids not to take up cigarettes (eg) before they turn 21 or 22, the chances that they'll stay non-smokers for life go up something like 300 Jillion percent.)

Now, since we're making these changes in order to protect our kids from the evils of nicotine and liquor, how about we take one more step and move the Age of Enlistment up there too.  You're not gonna convince me that joining the US military is somehow safer for the average 18-year-old than just about anything else thay might try - especially since the first 6 months in the military is the period when a ridiculous buttload of kids get introduced to, and then hooked on, all manner of unhealthy habits.  Yes, this happens in college, and yes, it happens to plenty of kids who go to work right out of high school, but the numbers are  higher for those in the military.

Which lands us smack in the middle of the intersection of Obvious and Wise-The-Fuck-Up: not many college freshman and shoe clerks are getting shipped back into Iraq, or off to Afghanistan or whatever Shit-hole-istan is next on our list, so let's acknowledge the fact that just being in uniform is inherently more dangerous than not being in uniform.  And guess what - it's not just more dangerous for the kids; it's more dangerous for everybody to have kids in uniform wandering around with automatic weapons and hand grenades (fucking duh, muthuhfuckuhs).

Or maybe we could just try to be a little more consistent with some of this shit for a change.

Sunday Tunes

Let There Be Love (cover) Laura Fygi

Night Train --Rickie Lee Jones

North Dakota --Lyle Lovett w/Rickie Lee Jones

Early Mornin' Rain (cover) --Eva Cassidy

I Gave My Love A Candle --Bonnine Raitt

Someone To Watch Over Me (cover) --Amy Winehouse

At Last (cover) --Beyonce

Precious --Annie Lenox

I Only Wanna Be With You (cover) --Shelby Lynne

My Opening Farewell (cover) --Alison Krauss

That Was Then And This Is Then Again

  

Know Your Shit

Here at the end of White History Month which (paraphrasing Tim Wise) goes by the clever name of March-thru-January, we should oughta maybe not concetrate only on the Black History part, but make sure we look at the other side and examine our own shit a bit more closely.